Democratic World Parliament through a global referendum
Student Referendum Program
| Do you support the creation of a directly-elected, representative and democratic world parliament that is authorized to legislate on global issues? |
http://voteworldparliament.org/pdf/studentreferendumprogramhowto.pdf
The organization:
Vote World Parliament (VWP) is a non-profit organization registered in Québec, Canada. Its role is to launch a global referendum on the creation of a democratic world parliament by whatever legal means are possible and, assuming the referendum passes strongly, to convert the resulting “global mandate” into the reality of a democratic world parliament. VWP is not affiliated with any political party, religion or ideology.
The overall objective:
The objective of our program is to collect a mandate from the entire human race, or from most of us, for the establishment of a “democratic world parliament”. If 50% of all adults (16 or older) in the world cast votes, and 67% or more vote “yes,” such a mandate would be accepted by many as legally binding under international law (see Chapter 10 of Rescue Plan for Planet Earth, where the numbers are explained in detail). Those percentages translate into 2 billion “yes” votes, and such a gargantuan “mandate” would be politically compelling no matter what its legal status. The purpose of this document is to encourage students at your high school, college or university to organize a school-based referendum, open to all students and to their friends and families as well.
The first school mini-referendum:
The first experimental school-based referendum took place at City Montessori School in Lucknow, India in November, 2007. Slightly more than 7,000 ballots were collected from students and their families and friends. These votes were 90% in favour! The proposition on the ballot (as now presented) reads as follows:
Do you support the creation of a directly-elected, representative and democratic world parliament that is authorized to legislate on global issues?
Why we should start with students:
For a list of the ways that previous generations have essentially wrecked and endangered the world, read the first chapter of Rescue Plan for Planet Earth (posted online free at www.rescueplanforplanetearth.com/3freechapters.html). As a result of gross negligence, the older generations alive today have left the younger generations with such a disastrous mess that perhaps no amount of work will repair what is wrong with the world (especially global warming, or climate change). It is today’s youth who will suffer most. If students can’t see that and do all that it takes to change our human course trajectory, tomorrow’s youth may face literally hopeless odds. Here is a passage from page 25 of Rescue Plan:
On March 21, 2007, former American vice-president Al Gore [now also a Nobel Laureate for his work on climate change and his role in the film, An Inconvenient Truth] testified to committees of the U.S. House of Representatives and Senate. “Nature is on the run,” he said. “Future generations will suffer … and they will ask, ‘What in God’s name were they doing? Didn’t they see the evidence? Didn’t they hear the warnings?’”
Today’s youth are the people that Al Gore was talking about, and if your generation is to take on the job of repairing the damage caused by previous generations, it is through your schools that you can best get yourselves organized.
The immediate objective:
We ask that students (and teachers and others, if possible) complete a referendum at your school, college or university as a way of kick-starting the global referendum, and also as a way of raising consciousness about the danger we face and the political solution that is possible. Ideally, this should involve some pre-vote activities—debates, articles or letters in the school paper, a formal “yes” campaign, and perhaps a formal “no” campaign too—whatever it takes to encourage informed voting.
The long-term objective:
We know what the numbers are; they are presented in detail in Rescue Plan for Planet Earth. We need 2 billion “yes” votes to prevail, to claim that we have a global mandate to found a world parliament. That is not a hard job; it is merely a very big job. “Big” is not a reason to shrink from this task. Others are already busily collecting ballots, so the request to you is to take a deep breath and get started.
Three ways of proceeding:
This is not hard to do. Try method #1, and if you fail, try method #2, and if that doesn’t work, use method #3, below. You will succeed one way or another. Your referendum alone may not trigger a global referendum, but it will be a part of the overall actions that have that effect, so you will remember this achievement for the rest of your life, and you should always be proud of it.
The appendices at the end of this document can be printed and used for a presentation to the principal (or administration or faculty) or to the student council or student union. The logistics of how to conduct the referendum within your educational institution are for you to decide. You may want to do the student referendum all on one day, and set up voting stations in high-traffic areas, and ink-stamp the hands of voters so that no one can vote twice (that might take a lot of volunteers—perhaps two per station). Or you may want to print the ballot in the student paper, and set up drop-off boxes for completed ballots. Or you may have to go with Method #3, below, and do it off the school property.
Method #1—Get the principal/president and the teaching staff to support the effort and help get this referendum done:
Some principals, teachers, administrators and school board representatives are terrified of getting involved with anything “political.” However, neither the organization Vote World Parliament nor the global referendum itself is affiliated with any political party, religion or ideology. Our aim is to establish a new order of law, world law, just as our ancestors had to struggle to establish municipal law, provincial law and national law, and that is not the kind of activity that can be called “political” in the partisan sense. World law is what it will take for humanity to survive, so partisan politics, religion, etc. must be kept out of the picture. Make the attempt to get the support and approval from the administration and the staff of your institution, but be prepared to be rejected. If you are successful, that’s terrific. But if not, make it clear that you intend to proceed with or without their support, and then change your plan to one of the next two strategies.
Method #2—Get the student council or student union to sanction and/or to organize the referendum:
The student councils of high schools have limited freedom to make decisions concerning programs in the school, and the idea of running a referendum on the possible creation of a democratic world parliament is not only a non-partisan activity, it is one of the only promising steps that young people can take to try to reverse the deadly directions that the world is now moving in. The support of the student council and student newspaper (if one exists) is a good basis for a referendum, and that can bring this debate to the forefront. In a college or a university, student unions have much greater freedom to act, and should be asked to support and/or sponsor a school-wide referendum. It should be brought to their attention that the referendum can be done without their support, and members of a student union (or student council in a high school) must consider the optics of a situation (how it will look to others) if they decline to help out and the referendum turns out to be a great success. Student councils or student unions would feel foolish if they turned this proposal down and then tens of thousands of high schools, colleges and universities all around the world did referendums on democratic world parliament and got very positive results.
[NOTE: Eventually, once the groundswell of popular support is very clear, we plan to ask that a formal resolution be presented to the United Nations General Assembly calling on all nations to hold formal national referendums as part of a global referendum. Appendix #5 is the UN resolution that we want proposed. Whether or not your student council or student union supports the school-based referendum, they should be asked to support the global referendum as outlined in the UN resolution, and they should be asked to send a letter to the head of your national government and to the local/national media informing them of that support. The student body can even ask your national government to sponsor the resolution in the UN General Assembly, or to co-sponsor it if another nation agrees to be the primary or lead sponsor, or to at least agree in advance to vote for the resolution if it is introduced into the UN General Assembly by other nations.]
Method #3—Start to collect votes on your own, and recruit other vote-collectors:
It is suggested that those who want this to happen should not waste a lot of time trying to convince an administration, faculty or student council or union that doesn’t understand or is inclined to play it safe or even vote against the referendum. The tools needed to do the job are available, and there is no law in any democratic country that says you can’t stand on public property in front of a high school or university and encourage people to vote on a sane and sensible global political option. As people vote, many will ask questions and some will volunteer to become a vote collector. If the first two strategies aren’t working, one person with the courage to get things started can trigger a referendum at his or her high school or college or university. You don’t have to be an expert. You only need to be able to recognize common sense, and if you stand on a sidewalk and ask people to vote, you will quickly learn that the creation of a world parliament will make common sense to almost everyone.
In an approach like this, it is imperative to transmit the essential message in as few words as possible, and to do it in a way that is loud enough to hear, a little more assertive than a normal conversation, but not so emphatic as to sound shrill or bossy. In my opinion (and I had about ten attempts at this), the best words to declare the initiative to students as they walk by on their way to or from school are these:
“Please vote in the global referendum on a democratic world parliament. This is not some radical or naïve idea. It is sensible, it is democratic, it is urgently required for human survival and it is up to us to get it done.”
It is likely a good idea to have a clipboard with a blank ballot fastened there, and to have a lot of cutout cards so that people can take them and vote on their computers when they get home, if they prefer (or in an Internet café, if they do not own a computer. Cards can be photocopied from Appendix #2 below (10 cards per 8.5″ x 11″ page). To print out ballots, see Appendix #1 below, or the Vote Collector link inside the Volunteer link at www.voteworldparliament.org (http://voteworldparliament.org/pdf/collector.pdf).
Who gets to vote:
All adults (16 years old or older) are eligible to vote (although there is no reason why a 14-year old can’t collect votes). This referendum can be based in a school, but it does not have to confine itself to the student body. We invite every caring student to download the Vote Collector Form (http://voteworldparliament.org/pdf/collector.pdf) and canvas his or her friends and family outside the school. There is no reason why a school with 500 students can’t deliver 1,000 votes, or 2,000, or even more.
Being prepared as a vote collector:
For social reasons and security reasons, it is a good idea to collect votes in pairs, two vote collectors working together (even three). If a question comes up, one person can refer to a document (such as the pamphlet or article below, Appendices #3 and #4), while the other one continues to collect votes. If a person expresses an interest in collecting votes, ballots are set up 4 per page in Appendix #1. You can give the new volunteer materials you may have with you, or give him or her a card (see Appendix #2 below) and write on that card where the filled-in ballots are to be dropped off, and by what date. People who show interest but do not want to be pressed into voting immediately can be given a card and asked to vote online on a computer later, when they’ve made a decision. It is a good idea to have copies of the pamphlet and article with you to show to people who ask a question about the initiative. These can be photocopied from Appendices #3 and #4. It is also a good idea to have a copy of the UN resolution with you in case people ask where all this effort is leading. Student referendums are useful, but to do the global referendum, the ideal way is to have the UN pass a resolution and have the vote happen nation-by nation, and that is our plan … except it is not going to happen at all unless there is action on the ground, especially by young people. It is a good idea to keep several copies of the UN resolution with you in case a student or other person wants to study it. It is Appendix #5 below. If you do not have a spare copy, you can always give the inquirer a small card (see Appendix #2) and tell him or her to get a copy from the Student Referendum Program document that is downloadable as item 5 from the Volunteer link of the VWP site (click on http://voteworldparliament.org/pdf/studentreferendumprogramhowto.pdf).
Recruiting further vote collectors:
If you have a voter who expresses some enthusiasm for the idea of a global referendum or for the idea of a democratic world parliament, you should ask if he or she is interested in taking a sheet of 4 ballots and getting them filled in by friends or family and returning the filled-in votes to wherever filled-in ballots are being received up to the date when the inputting is scheduled to begin. If they are interested, make sure they understand that they should get them filled in as soon as possible, and returned as soon as possible.
Voting procedure:
The Vote Collector Form (Appendix #1, below) has 4 ballots on an 8.5″ by 11″ piece of paper. They are to be cut apart with scissors or a paper cutter. These are abbreviated, and have only the required fields (“yes” or “no” to the question, first name, family name, age or birth date, and country). The online ballot asks for email, street address, state, ZIP or postal code, and has a “captcha” code aspect to prevent repeated nuisance voting. (These additional fields are not required fields except for the “captcha.”) What follows pertains to the short-form paper ballots that would normally be used in a school referendum.
There are only two things that need to be established prior to accepting a vote from any person. The person cannot have voted before. The person must be 16 years old or older. It is that simple, and having gotten past those hurdles, the voter should be assured that only his/her first name and country of residence will appear on the VWP website (click on the “Public Record” link, http://voteworldparliament.org/vote-now/public-record/, to see all votes). Voters should also be told that they do not have to say what their email address is, and even if they do say, no one will ever see our database or have access to it except for our purposes of conducting the online referendum. One way or another, each voter should be encouraged to help us, and one way of doing that is to download the file called “fast track” (http://voteworldparliament.org/you-can-help/fast-track/) on their home computer, to see if they can single-handedly start a new sting of votes (more on this later).
Pamphlet and article (Appendices #3 and #4):
Whatever approach is used (through the principal or administration, the student council or union, or on the street), it is a good idea to hand out copies of the pamphlet or article—but these cost money to produce. Collecting money from voters is not permitted. If you assemble a committee of ten people to sponsor the referendum, you can each put in a few dollars. If you contribute $2 each, that’s $20, and photocopies can usually be had for 5 cents each or less, or laser-printed for less than that. You can hand out cards (Appendix #2), which cost less than a penny each. Once your group has grown, you can put together a bit more money and decide if you want to hand out pamphlets or articles.
Dealing with filled-in votes:
All filled-in paper ballots collected at a school, including those from family members or friends of students—must find their way to a central depot by a certain date (be sure to set a realistic deadline—give the referendum one month to get as far as it’s going to get). At that stage, any ballots still un-separated should be cut apart, because the first job is to collate alphabetically by last name. Then you can take all the ballots that start with “A” and do another sort by the 2nd letter of the last name (Ableman comes before Anderson, for instance). By inputting votes after such a collation, it is easier to spot duplicate votes. Duplicate votes should be stapled together and dealt with later (once all legitimate ones have been input). If one person has voted twice that can be an honest mistake, so you can input the data once onto the VWP site. If one person has voted 3 or more times, that’s not an accident, and those votes should be stapled together, crossed out and not input, since it is best to disqualify deliberate troublemakers, no matter which side of the issue they are on.
Inputting votes onto the Vote World Parliament website:
Everyone is free, of course, to input their own vote onto the website (assuming they have a computer with Internet access, or can use someone else’s). If you are collecting votes, however, there are several things to remember.
1) The information from a paper ballot must be input at www.voteworldparliament.org, the VWP website, as soon as possible. Votes will be authorized by VWP within one day, and every voter will be assigned a “voter ID” (voter identity) number in case any voter is inclined to check his or her vote at any time in the future. (Only the first name of a voter and his or her country is visible to the public on our “Pubic Record” link.)
2) Make sure that you input information accurately. Even if you’re getting mostly “yes” votes, do not assume you got only “yes” votes. Check carefully each time. People are free to vote “yes” or “no,” and we all need to be totally honest in this process. If you click on “submit vote” and then realize you have accidentally given incorrect information, send us an email (see the “Contact us” link is http://voteworldparliament.org/about/contact-us/) to tell us about the error so we can fix the situation at our end. Then re-input that ballot with the correct data.
3) The easiest way to input votes is as a team, with one person reading out a first name, and spelling it, and the other person typing it in. Then the reader would read and spell the family name of the voter, and so on through the data. When words are spoken aloud, it is a lot easier to catch mistakes and duplicates. It is also a good idea to take a break every now and then, as this work can be tiring. Generally, we find it is possible to input one or even two ballots per minute, but it is best not to sacrifice accuracy for speed. Each time a ballot is input, you must enter the “captcha” code under the ballot on our site. If you have hundreds or thousands of ballots to input, let us know in advance, and we will send you a code that will allow you to not have to complete the “captcha” field for each ballot.
Media involvement:
Don’t be too shy to inform the local TV stations, radio stations and newspapers that they should do a story about your efforts to establish a democratic world parliament. It is also a good idea to make sure that you are ready for questions, and it is a good procedure to practice on each other, even thinking up “loaded” and unfair questions. It is also a good idea to never ever lose your cool. If an interviewer is too hostile, you can always end the interview and tell him or her that you would be happy to speak to them later once they have understood that this is a serious initiative. If you have a really sarcastic or unfair interviewer, a good quote to use is the one I used as the very first words in the very first chapter of the book: “All truth passes through three states: First, it is ridiculed. Second, it is violently opposed. And third, it is accepted as self-evident.” Andrew Schopenhauer, German philosopher (1788 – 1860)
However, most interviewers are fair and polite, and while you can’t be expected to know everything there is to know about international relations, the best advice is to stick to the message. If you are asked what a world parliament would do about the Israeli-Palestinian problem, for instance, you say that that never-ending feud is an example of what happens when sovereign states are left to work things out all on their own. If war is criminalized under world law, the democratic world parliament would have to order a cessation of all hostilities, convene a negotiating forum and spend whatever amount of money it will take to negotiate a settlement, and once the world parliament has spoken on the terms of the settlement, national leaders (political and military) will be held responsible for offences against the settlement. It isn’t your job to predict what that settlement would look like, or how it would be enforced. If you had two cities in your country that are going to war with one another because there was no national parliament to prevent that from happening, it is certain that you would be working to establish a national parliament to legislate some kind of peaceful solution, not trying to predict how such an institution would do its job. Remember—stay on message. Humans will always have disputes. We are going to fight them out or talk them out. Individuals, provinces and municipalities don’t do battle over disagreements because there is national, provincial and municipal law that can be used to talk things out. There is no world law for nations to use as an alternative to violence, and that is what we are trying to do; establish a new order of law. Truman said it best:
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[If] Kansas and Colorado have a quarrel over the water in the Arkansas River, they don’t call out the National Guard in each state and go to war over it. They bring suit in the Supreme Court of the United States and abide by the decision. There isn’t a reason in the world why we can’t do that internationally. Harry S. Truman, June 28, 1945, on receiving an honorary degree from the University of Kansas City |
[There are dozens of other quotes in Appendix #6 (below), and hundreds more in Rescue Plan for Planet Earth.]
Caution:
Do not get bullied or tricked into a discussion of a “one-world” government, by which is generally meant a tyrannical global government that erases all national borders, enslaves the human race and implants microchips in our heads on behalf of some “evil elite.” Such silly conspiracy theories abound on the Internet, and we refer to their proponents as “the tinfoil hat gang.” Be clear in explaining that the role of the democratic world parliament is to make law for the world on global (or “supranational”) issues, while respecting all the legitimate rights and powers of national (and provincial and local) governments, and for negotiating solutions in instances of shared or overlapping jurisdictions. The principle of “subsidiarity” is an important basis for a DWP, and that principle means that all political issues should be resolved by the lowest or the smallest appropriate level of government, meaning that when national governments are handling a particular problem well enough, there is no need for the DWP to intervene. However, if one or more national governments can’t or won’t cope with a serious supranational problem, the DWP must assume at least partial jurisdiction, and legislate a solution—ideally in concert with the nation-states (and non-state parties) involved.
Additional activities:
Get organized at your school so that there is a DWP club or association. There are many more interesting things to discuss than how to get votes, but getting votes is the thing that can get us the democratic world parliament that we so desperately need. So talk about anything that seems relevant, but never forget, getting votes is what will make this dream come true.
Get your school library to buy a copy of Rescue Plan for Planet Earth by VWP president Jim Stark. You might also buy one yourself and write a review for the student newspaper. Reviews and 3 free chapters are posted at http://rescueplanforplanetearth.com/index.html
1. Chain reactions:
Your group should set as one objective the bringing of two other schools (or colleges or universities) into the referendum process. In other words, if you know someone sensible at another school, get this document into their hands, then help them to get a referendum going there, at the other school. Members of your group might have parents or relatives that belong to organizations, and it may be possible to persuade them to take up the cause and do a referendum within a service organization or a church, a synagogue, a mosque or a temple. You can try to get employees of a company to vote in their own referendum. The possibilities are endless.
There is also the “chain vote” (or “fast track”) idea in Rescue Plan, that is downloadable from our site at http://voteworldparliament.org/you-can-help/fast-track/. This is a credible technique whereby a single person could, at least theoretically, cause the entire global referendum on DWP to be completed in one year! You are encouraged to take a look at this “fast track” plan and give it a try. It won’t work perfectly, but it will certainly work to an extent, and if enough people try it, it could be a major player in our overall quest for the global mandate for a democratic world parliament.
2. Seek endorsements:
Send a delegation to visit your mayor and/or city councilor, and ask them to endorse the concept of a democratic world parliament and the idea of a global referendum as the democratic way to establish and authorize this new level of law. You can also ask your city or town council to consider a municipal referendum on DWP, using the same ballot, conducted in tandem with the next municipal election. The cost will be perhaps two cents per voter. (This was done in a campaign organized by VWP president Jim Stark back in the 1980s, where more than 200 Canadian cities and towns utilized a common ballot on nuclear disarmament, and ran referendums at their own expense, so this estimate of two cents per voter has some history behind it.) See who knows a famous sports star, singer, or movie actor, and get them to personally endorse the global referendum on DWP. We keep a list (http://voteworldparliament.org/allies-initiatives/allies-listing/) of these people on the VWP site, but you must inform us when you get such an endorsement. You may know an author who may be willing to endorse the global referendum initiative. Click on http://voteworldparliament.org/allies-initiatives/authors-campaign, and you’ll see that we already have 100+ cosmopolitan authors supporting us. If you find an outgoing character in entertainment or sports, ask him or her to create a YouTube video announcing that they have voted “yes” for the democratic world parliament, saying why they voted “yes,” and encouraging others (their fans) to follow their example.
Another idea is to ask your city or town council to endorse the UN resolution (Appendix #5). Endorsing that idea may get them off the hook for running a local referendum, and if that’s how it looks to you, that’s okay, but make sure they include a commitment to write your national prime minister or president and the foreign affairs minister in an effort to get that government to make the proposal in the UN General Assembly, or to co-sponsor the UN resolution if another nation takes the lead position as the sponsor, or minimally to agree to vote for it if it is raised in the General Assembly.
Allies and friends of Vote World Parliament:
A small non-profit organization can’t likely take this plan from conception to completion, so eventually there will have to be a coalition of organizations, working together. The ideal way of doing it would be for the UN General Assembly to adopt a resolution calling on every nation to hold a national segment of a global referendum on the creation of a DWP in tandem with its next national election, and we have written to the ambassador of every member state of the United Nations about our draft resolution (there are no takers yet, but in time, with traction on the ground, especially among youth, we do expect to get this ideal strategy going). In the meantime, endorsements by organizations or coalitions are helpful. We encourage all organizations (religions, companies, trade unions, service organizations, political parties, etc.) to support the referendum effort and take some kind of action.
Note: In December, 2009, the World Alliance to Transform the UN (WATUN), which is a coalition of 27 NGOs (so far—it is growing), passed a resolution as follows:
WATUN agrees to:
1. endorse the global referendum, for which the ballot question reads: “Do you support the creation of a directly-elected, representative and democratic world parliament that is authorized to legislate on global issues?”
2. encourage each member organization, and all other civil society organizations, to collect ballots however possible and as fast as possible, to be tabulated (at www.voteworldparliament.org) by Vote World Parliament, the NGO that developed this initiative;
3. support the idea of moving the global referendum from an online vote to a formal procedure by means of a resolution in the UN General Assembly (a draft UN resolution for this has been prepared, and is posted at www.voteworldparliament.org/draftUNresolution.pdf).
We now ask other NGOs (non-governmental organizations) and other networks of NGOs to consider identical or similar resolutions. And we remind everyone that a resolution like this one required the organization to follow up on their commitments.
Fundraising:
Vote World Parliament (VWP) went deeply in debt before support started to build, and we may need many millions of dollars to complete a global referendum. Bottom line? Donations are urgently needed from those who are fortunate enough to be able to donate to the cause (http://voteworldparliament.org/you-can-help/donate/). And since it is mostly in aid of future generations that this effort is being made, I suggest that involved students do something to raise some money not only to pay for pamphlets and ballots used by their fellow students, but also to support VWP.
Courage:
There is no time for worrying about how many people will get annoyed at you or at us for doing what we’re doing. There are many scientists warning us that there isn’t much time left during which human intervention may do any good, and there are some governments and companies that still deny even the science of climate change. Try to defend this new global referendum initiative politely when challenged, but don’t waste a lot of time trying to change anyone’s mind. State your case, and get on with the work of collecting ballots. An 18-nation GlobeScan opinion poll done in 2004 suggests that a world referendum should pass with 75% or so in favour. Our actual results are in the 90% range so far, but the final result will likely be in between somewhere. Our job is to collect however many “yes” votes it will take for everyone, including national governments, to concede that the human race has spoken as one, for the first time ever, and to honour that proclamation.
Good luck, and please remember the old saying: “The harder I work, the luckier I get.”
* * *
Excerpt from the first formal review [Feb. 13, 2008] of Rescue Plan for Planet Earth:
This is a brave and visionary book … [It] is full of hope and inspiration and will leave the reader with a clear objective and direction. Rescue Plan for Planet Earth should be required reading in every school and by every politician. Jerry Tetalman, California president of Citizens for Global Solutions and co-author of One World Democracy
Appendix #1 — 4 ballots [You must set your computer to “View/Print Layout” to see the contents of this page on your monitor]
Separate 4 ballots using scissors, collect votes (minimum age is 16), go to www.voteworldparliament.org and input all votes or mail them to Vote World Parliament, Box 1102, Shawville, QC Canada J0X 2Y0
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Appendix #2 — cards
[PHOTOCOPY PAGE, CUT OUT WITH SCISSORS, CARRY SOME IN YOUR WALLET & HAND OUT]
| Democratic World Parliament
through a global referendum Is it time to create a directly-elected, democratic parliament for the world? Many people think it is. Visit www.voteworldparliament.org to learn more … and to cast your own vote. |
Democratic World Parliament
through a global referendum Is it time to create a directly-elected, democratic parliament for the world? Many people think it is. Visit www.voteworldparliament.org to learn more … and to cast your own vote. |
| Democratic World Parliament
through a global referendum Is it time to create a directly-elected, democratic parliament for the world? Many people think it is. Visit www.voteworldparliament.org to learn more … and to cast your own vote. |
Democratic World Parliament
through a global referendum Is it time to create a directly-elected, democratic parliament for the world? Many people think it is. Visit www.voteworldparliament.org to learn more … and to cast your own vote. |
| Democratic World Parliament
through a global referendum Is it time to create a directly-elected, democratic parliament for the world? Many people think it is. Visit www.voteworldparliament.org to learn more … and to cast your own vote. |
Democratic World Parliament
through a global referendum Is it time to create a directly-elected, democratic parliament for the world? Many people think it is. Visit www.voteworldparliament.org to learn more … and to cast your own vote. |
| Democratic World Parliament
through a global referendum Is it time to create a directly-elected, democratic parliament for the world? Many people think it is. Visit www.voteworldparliament.org to learn more … and to cast your own vote. |
Democratic World Parliament
through a global referendum Is it time to create a directly-elected, democratic parliament for the world? Many people think it is. Visit www.voteworldparliament.org to learn more … and to cast your own vote. |
| Democratic World Parliament
through a global referendum Is it time to create a directly-elected, democratic parliament for the world? Many people think it is. Visit www.voteworldparliament.org to learn more … and to cast your own vote. |
Democratic World Parliament
through a global referendum Is it time to create a directly-elected, democratic parliament for the world? Many people think it is. Visit www.voteworldparliament.org to learn more … and to cast your own vote. |
Appendix #3 — pamphlet
Vote World Parliament
— democratic world parliament through a global referendum —
Rescue Plan for Planet Earth
Attention high school, college and university students:
The several generations of people before your generation have substantially wrecked the planet, partly out of ignorance and partly out of negligence. My name is Jim Stark and I am 66, so I was part of the problem. Apologizing to your generation isn’t nearly enough, so I have written a book about this dilemma called Rescue Plan for Planet Earth. This plan has been called practical and promising, and I hope that it works (for all our sakes). Here is the situation in brief, as I see it, as well as the required “fix.”
If garbage was collecting on the streets where you live and there was no running water or electricity because the municipal government had somehow been dissolved or disbanded, you would have to reinvent the city or town council to get these problems taken care of.
If all schools and hospitals open in your province were now closed because the provincial government had been scrapped, you would have to re-establish a provincial government to get those intolerable situations repaired and under control.
If foreigners were streaming across your country’s borders, taking whatever they wanted of your country’s resources and just shooting anyone who objected or resisted, and this was happening because somehow there had been a collapse of your national government, you would have to re-establish that government to regain control of your country.
It is ridiculous to seriously suggest that we would be better off without those three levels of government, and yet we have global problems that are literally threatening the survival of humanity (climate change and enough nuclear weapons to wipe out civilization at least ten times over), and there is no serious campaign to establish a government at the global level, or even a world parliament. Well, now there is a campaign that has a good chance at succeeding, and it is up to you and your friends and families to make it a reality before we pass the tipping point on global warming or fall into a suicidal World War III.
We know how to set up a democratic and completely corruption-free world parliament (it isn’t even difficult), and we think this can be done in a decade. Democracy is governance with the consent of the governed, so if we want a democratic world parliament (or DWP), we have to conduct a global referendum to see if the human race is ready to finally grow up and act like a united species, for the first time ever. Scientists have told us that there is little time left (a few decades) to prevent the most catastrophic aspects of climate change, so we have only one chance to get this right. Where do we start?
1. Hold a referendum based in your school, where you and others can vote (if you are 16 or older), and get your family members, neighbours and friends to vote too. You can vote online, or download ballots at http://voteworldparliament.org/pdf/printable-ballot.pdf, or at less cost you can print some vote collector forms (they have 4 “short” ballots per page) at http://voteworldparliament.org/pdf/collector.pdf. Keep them with you, thus to canvass your family, neighborhood or any group that you can contact. Then submit the completed votes through the online referendum on our site (www.voteworldparliament.org).
2. Insist that your library buy at least one copy of the book, Rescue Plan for Planet Earth, so that you and other students (and your teachers) can read it without spending money.
3. Go to www.voteworldparliament.org, and under the “You Can Help” link you will see how to start a “chain vote” (http://voteworldparliament.org/you-can-help/fast-track/) that could theoretically see one person’s act collect the global mandate in less than one year!
4. Get your teachers to address the idea of a democratic world parliament (for or against).
5. Start a Vote World Parliament club at your school and get at least two other schools to follow your example on all the points mentioned above (and this point too).
And one final piece of advice. The last thing we need at the global level is a parliament that is vulnerable to corruption, and that is why we want (and why we must insist on) a full-spectrum regime of transparency. In other words, our democratic world parliament will not be like any national or other parliament in that every word spoken by an elected DWP member or by a senior DWP bureaucrat must be recorded, transcribed and posted on the Internet for anyone to see. This DWP has to work perfectly honestly all the time, and it has to last forever, so these unprecedented safeguards are absolutely necessary. We have the required technology, so if we also have the willpower, that is how things will be done.
I will give the last word to my old friend, Ross Smyth (recently deceased at 86). “I am dying. My dying wish is that you get off your butt and give this global referendum plan a chance to work.”
Below is the global referendum ballot “question” or “proposition”
| Do you support the creation of a directly-elected, representative and democratic world parliament that is authorized to legislate on global issues? |
Vote World Parliament, Box 1102, Shawville, QC Canada J0X 2Y0
www.voteworldparliament.org — voteworldparliament@webruler.com — 1-819-647-6113
Appendix #4 — article
Vote World Parliament, Box 1102, Shawville, QC Canada J0X 2Y0
www.voteworldparliament.org — voteworldparliament@webruler.com — 1-819-647-6113
We need a democratic world parliament
A short article by Jim Stark
President, Vote World Parliament
Humanity needs a democratic world parliament because we are smart enough to resolve our disputes through law rather than through the use of force, and because we are quite civilized enough to not even want to beat up a person or a country that we may disagree with. And by “we,” I mean the overwhelming majority of ordinary people everywhere.
There is no good reason why we can’t live as comfortably under world law as we do now under national, provincial (or “state,” in the USA) and municipal law, and just as the formation of the nation ended wars among provinces and cities, a democratic world parliament should end war between or among our nations. Even “terrorist” groups should be less inclined to even want to use force if there is a new (and totally transparent) global legal order where they can get a fair hearing for their alleged grievances.
While money isn’t everything, it is important, and it will cost much less to institute a global regime of “collective security” than to maintain an armed force for each of the 194 “sovereign” nations, just as it costs far less to have a local police force protecting all of us against all local threats than it would be for each family to arm itself to the teeth in case a neighbor from across the street might attack. The tax burden for security for your lifetime may well be cut in half by a democratic world parliament, and the actual security that can be delivered will be far greater through a democratic world parliament than it is in the current world of 194 national armies and 194 spy agencies.
As far back as the 1960s, it was realized that an all-out nuclear war could kill every person on the planet … and perhaps all life on Earth. We need to permanently remove the threat of nuclear war or any war using weapons of mass destruction (WMD) from the list of possible futures, and that will require that we ban war altogether, criminalize it. Only a democratic world parliament has any realistic chance of doing all that.
There are other supranational issues besides war, the most dangerous of which is climate change (or global warming). It is now quite clear that climate change is a serious threat to our very existence. Al Gore has called this a “true planetary emergency.” If we expect a patchwork of national initiatives to solve this problem, we are simply dreaming.
We know how to use off-the-shelf technology to “corruption-proof” a parliament and make it completely transparent, so we won’t need to worry about the possibility of a “Hitler” gaining control of the democratic world parliament. If we are going to construct a democratic world parliament, common sense dictates that it must have full and verified integrity, using whatever technology it takes to accomplish this extremely high standard. It must be made impossible for military force to be used inappropriately or prematurely at the global level.
There are enormous injustices in the world, and history surely teaches us that there is no peace without justice, no justice without law, and no law without government—in this case, world law and a democratic world parliament.
More perhaps than anything else, business needs stability to operate, and of course war is the exact opposite of stability, even if a few industries profit temporarily from war. Any future where a company can operate smoothly and profitably for thousands of years is possible only if we construct a fair and democratic world order.
According to former American senator George Mitchell (the architect of the Mitchell Plan for peace in the Middle East): “We benefit enormously from technology … but we also suffer from [its] consequences … it is now easier, takes fewer people, less skill [and] fewer resources to kill large numbers of people than at any time in … history.” (This was on Newsnight, CNN, May 9, 2002.) In the future, perhaps a twelve-year-old will be able to make purchases on the Internet and poison an entire city. To survive as a species, we must accept law as one of the necessities of life, and that must include world law (this is not the same as international law; international law applies mostly to governments, and world law would also apply to individuals, like the other three levels of law do).
No one today is so foolish as to suggest that we tear down all of our democratic municipal, provincial or national governments, even though they aren’t perfect. In twenty or thirty years, if a democratic world parliament is in place and doing its work routinely, nobody will suggest that we might be better off without it, either.
We have in front of us the opportunity to become the “founders” of the world of law and justice that must exist if humanity is to survive and thrive in the years 2500 or 25,000 or 250,000 … not to mention the year 2,500,000. This might be the greatest opportunity you will ever have, the chance to carve a path across this last major political frontier. The task of building a new and democratic world parliament is not that difficult, but it is huge—which means we should start immediately and work very hard.
If, say, 95% of all human adults voted in favor of the creation of a democratic world parliament, no one would dare to try to stop us from building what we had voted for. No political issue ever gets such high support, but there is a poll, done within 18 nations, that shows that a global referendum on constructing a democratic world parliament would pass strongly. The numbers were 63% “yes,” 20% “no,” and 17% said they weren’t sure or gave no answer. So, let’s collect the two billion or more “yes” votes that it will take to comprise a “compelling” mandate. Our legal research indicates that if for instance 50% of all human adults cast votes and 67.% of all votes are entered into the “YES” column, such a mandate would be “legally binding” under international law (this in addition to being politically compelling).
If you are a democrat, then you know that democracy means governance with the consent of the governed. In other words, to get a democratic world parliament, we must first have a democratic world referendum. The ideal way would be for the UN to pass a resolution calling for such a global referendum, but since that will likely prove difficult to accomplish, we can start by using the Internet, and a ballot now awaits your participation at www.voteworldparliament.org. (A draft UN resolution is also ready for the moment when a few national governments decide that we really do need something a great deal better than the UN to resolve supranational conflicts and defend human rights.)
In addition to the global referendum, we need to come to grips with the obvious need for a constitution for the world. We would like Canada to host a “framing convention” of NGOs (“non-governmental organizations,” for the uninitiated), scholars, religions and governments to prepare a draft. We anticipate the need for an electoral commission to prepare for a first global general election, and to prepare for the presentation of a draft world constitution to the human race (likely through a second global referendum).
For the full picture, go to the Internet address above, and consider buying a copy of Rescue Plan for Planet Earth. (Go to www.rescueplanforplanetearth.com/3freechapters.html to read three chapters free.) One way or another, please come to grips with this new and potentially world-altering initiative. It truly deserves your support, and as David E. Christensen (the author of Healing the World) recently wrote to me, “This could work!” Yes indeed—it could work. And if we all do our parts, it will work.
Appendix #5 — UN resolution – available online at http://voteworldparliament.org/draftUNresolution.pdf
Draft United Nations Resolution
for a
Global Referendum
on a
Democratic World Parliament
THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY,
EXPRESSING deep concern over the danger of nuclear war and the danger that WMD (weapons of mass destruction) may be used by non-national groups, either of which could imperil the existence of life on Earth,
MINDFUL of the profound problems (climate change, HIV/AIDS, etc.) that persist and worsen for lack of resources while more than one trillion (1,000 billion) dollars are spent on armaments every year,
BEARING IN MIND that all nations and all people need genuine security in the age of “overkill” weapons, and that real security is now possible only through the establishment of an effective and widely supported world authority,
AFFIRMING the interest of all individuals in expressing their preferences on a matter as fundamental as the survival of humankind, and indeed asserting a human right on the part of all adults to participate meaningfully in such a basic choice,
RESPECTING the principle of subsidiarity, whereby issues are handled by the lowest appropriate level of government, thus leaving national politics to national governments, local politics to municipal governments, and so on,
REALIZING that people of every background would be inclined to support the creation of a directly-elected world parliament that is authorized by the human race to adopt and enforce legislation on such supranational issues as security, justice, peace, and protection of the shared natural environment,
RECALLING that Article 21 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights provides that “The will of the people shall be the basis of the authority of government [and that] this will shall be expressed in periodic and genuine elections which … shall be held by secret vote or by equivalent free voting procedures,”
KNOWING that because the will of the people is the basis of all political power and authority, a clear expression of that will in a mandate emerging from a successful global referendum must be given effect to by all national governments,
ACCEPTING that the principle above finds strong support in the Declaration on the Inadmissibility of Intervention in the Domestic Affairs of States and the Protection of their Independence and Sovereignty, whose Preamble states that: “… all peoples have an inalienable right to … the exercise of their sovereignty … and that, by virtue of that right, they freely determine their political status,” which status may include “citizen of Earth” in addition to one’s nationality, province or city,
REALIZING that a substantial mandate from the people of all nations would provide an irresistible legal and political base of support for the eventual achievement of a world of cooperation, co-existence and civil governance,
DETERMINED to provide to all adult human beings the opportunity to formally express their views on this hopeful concept,
1. RESOLVES to seek the unanimous agreement of all Member States to a brief and simple expression of the goal of a Democratic World Parliament;
2. DECIDES to use this brief expression as the wording on the ballot in a Global Referendum on establishing a Democratic World Parliament;
3. CALLS UPON each Member Nation to voluntarily collect its “national component” of the Global Referendum before January 1, 2017;
4. ENCOURAGES each Member Nation to seek full and open debate of all sides of the issue prior to holding the vote among its national population;
5. DETERMINES that no one may cast a ballot before having attained the age of sixteen;
6. RESOLVES that the collection of each national component of the Global Referendum must be accompanied by United Nations supervision to ensure the fairness of the voting procedures; and
7. DECIDES to form a committee to study the proposal for a Global Referendum on a Democratic World Parliament, and report back to the next Session of the General Assembly.
* * * * *
Suggested ballot wording:
Do you support the creation of a directly-elected, representative and democratic world parliament that is authorized to legislate on global issues?
Appendix #6
Quotes
These quotes are from our monthly newsletter, The WorldVoter, which is available free at www.voteworldparliament.org, or from reviews of Jim Stark’s new book, Rescue Plan for Planet Earth (www.rescueplanforplanetearth.com). We have hundreds more quotes.
* * *
I loved your book…. I think you have a brilliant idea that bypasses governments and puts the power in the hands of ordinary people. I was particularly impressed with the way you addressed the questions that arise in the mind of the reader. Mary-Wynne Ashford, MD, PhD, co-author (with Guy Dauncey) of Enough Blood Shed: 101 Solutions to Violence, Terror and War
There is no salvation for civilization, or even the human race, other than the creation of a world government. Albert Einstein
The idea of a global vote is a powerful one and Jim Stark needs to be commended for putting all the arguments together and presenting them with clarity, logic and passion…. I think the steady development of such a worldwide appeal has the potential to be one of the great forces leading the world in the direction of DWG [democratic world government]. From a review of Rescue Plan by Lyndon Storey, author of Humanity or Sovereignty: A Political Roadmap for the 21st Century
We need to promote the democratization of globalization before globalization destroys the foundations of national and international democracy. Boutros Boutros-Ghali, former Secretary-General of the United Nations.
I have high hopes that the Vote World Parliament project [the global referendum] will harness the awesome power of the Internet to initiate a serious dialogue on the possibility of establishing an effective federal world government. James A. Yunker, Political Globalization: A New Vision of Federal World Government
The common good of all nations involves problems which affect people all the world over: problems which can only be solved by a public authority … whose writ covers the entire globe. We cannot therefore escape the conclusion that the moral order itself demands the establishment of some sort of world government. Pope John XXIII in Pacem in Terris
As scientists, we understand the dangers of nuclear weapons and their devastating effects, and we are learning how human activities and technologies are affecting climate systems in ways that may forever change life on Earth. As citizens of the world, we have a duty to alert the public to the unnecessary risks that we live with every day, and to the perils we foresee if governments and societies do not take action now to render nuclear weapons obsolete and to prevent further climate change. Stephen Hawking, author and cosmologist, in a news conference January 17, 2007, organized by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
The global referendum on democratic world government is a compelling mobilizing strategy to jumpstart a grassroots movement to usher in a just world order for the human polity and gaia. Saul Mendlovitz (editor), On the Creation of a Just World Order: Preferred Worlds for the 1990s
The international community should support a system of laws to regularize international relations and maintain the peace in the same manner that law governs national order. Pope John Paul II said essentially the same thing, as follows:
Mark my words … the only problem which deserves the devotion of contemporary man, the problem to which I myself am determined to devote the rest of my life, up to my very last day … is, very simply, the survival of the species. It is a question of knowing whether mankind … will disappear by its own hand, or whether it will continue to exist. Albert Einstein (circa 1947)
It is absolutely undeniable that … some of [the UN’s] most influential and powerful members do not buy, as applicable to them, the principles therein contained. In fact, they defend and apply the law of the jungle—might makes right.… The United Nations has not achieved the fundamental goals for which it was created.… If the United Nations is evaluated having those [goals] in mind, then … it has failed.… I have come to the conclusion that the time has already passed for reforming or mending our organization [the UN]. What we need to do is reinvent it. Father Miguel d’Escoto Brockmann, the former president (2008-2009) of the General Assembly of the United Nations
I have worked all my life to get a democratic world government, but obviously we don’t have one yet. Too many of us did too little to save the world. Now I am dying. My dying wish is that you get off your butt and give this global referendum plan a chance to work.” The late Ross Smyth, a former national president, World Federalist Movement—Canada; Board Member of VWP; author, One World or None
The hope that a radical transformation will occur in world politics lies in the entry onstage … of a new political subject, the only political subject that possesses democratic legitimacy: the citizen…. Empowering the citizen of the world means to build up at the global level those checks and balances that have nurtured the evolution of democracy. Daniele Archibugi, The Global Commonwealth of Citizens
Leaders are indispensable, but to produce major social change many ordinary people must also be involved. Anne Firor Scott (From the November 2009 newsletter of Citizens for Global Solutions, Minnesota)
This [global referendum] initiative is vital to the very future of humanity. People everywhere must understand the necessity of democratic world government for the survival and flourishing of life on the Earth. Vote World Government brings our one real option for a decent world order to the attention of humanity. God bless this movement. Glen T. Martin, author of Ascent to Freedom: Practical and Philosophical Foundations of Democratic World Law
The mandate from a successful global referendum on establishing a world parliament would be the first legitimate expression of the people’s world sovereignty to make world law. World law will be at a higher level than what we know as international law, and what we are really doing with the global referendum is embryonic world law. Francisco Plancarte, President of the Mexican NGO Planetafilia and a member of the Inter-American Bar Association. (Washington D.C.)
Referendums are a substantial part of the transformation of a delegative democracy into a participative one. Using them at the global scale in order to democratize the international political order constitutes an extraordinary way of appealing for a world democracy through worldwide democratic tools. Fernando Iglesias, author of Globalizar la Democracia: Por un Parlamento Mundial (Globalizing Democracy: Appeal for a World Parliament)
The future depends on what we do in the present. Mohandas Gandhi (From the November 2009 newsletter of Citizens for Global Solutions, Minnesota)
I would be proud and honoured to be a part of the group advocating a global referendum on democratic world government. Your proposal sounds practical, and I hope with all my will that it becomes a reality. Kai Nielsen, author of Globalization and Justice
Problems such as global warming and nuclear weapons make it clear that the global community needs a functioning democratic government. We need a global constitution, an elected global parliament that can make global laws, a global judicial system that can determine which individuals are guilty of breaking those laws and a global police force and prison system that can apprehend and punish those individual criminals rather than trying to punish whole nation-states. The global referendum gives individuals the opportunity to register their views on this important but generally-neglected issue. Ronald J. Glossop, author of Confronting War: An Examination of Humanity’s Most Pressing Problem
Rescue Plan for Planet Earth is a triumph. It belongs in a class with Thomas Paine’s “Common Sense.” John Kintree, St. Louis Public Library
Our greatest responsibility is to be good ancestors. Jonas Salk
If given a choice between what we have now—a hodgepodge of uncoordinated, contested, non-representative, under-resourced international organizations and institutions of “global governance”—and what we could have—a democratic world “government”—I am convinced that the vast majority of humanity would choose the latter. The problem has been that this choice has not been available … until now. The global referendum on democratic world government offers a means for humanity to make such a choice. James P. Muldoon Jr., The Architecture of Global Governance: An Introduction to the Study of International Organizations
If we cast our minds ahead into the future, and ponder our past history, it becomes totally obvious that a civilized planet like ours must have a democratic world government. Future generations will be surprised that it took us so long. Guy Dauncey, Stormy Weather: 101 Solutions to Global Climate Change
We will, I believe, come together in a global community. The members of that enlightened community will recognize that we are made in the image of our environment; i.e., that we are divine and that we have to operate, not in a survival of the fittest manner, but in a way that supports everyone and everything on this planet. Bruce Lipton, The Biology of Belief
The continued reliance on purely national forms of democracy has become radically insufficient in a global age. It is no longer a question of whether democracy should define the contemporary world, but of which type of democracy we should wish and indeed hope to have. Patrick Hayden, Cosmopolitan Global Politics
The most important decisions have migrated away from institutions under citizens’ control and towards international power centres free from any form of democratic supervision. Globalisation thus brings about the crisis of democracy. How long can democracy last in a world where citizens are excluded from participating in decisions which determine their destiny? Globalisation must be democratised before it destroys democracy. Lucio Levi, Crisi dello Stato e governo del mondo (Crisis of the state and world government)
History has given our generation an enormous responsibility and two daunting tasks: If civilization is to survive, we must not only stabilize global population, but also, even more importantly, we must eliminate the institution of war. John Avery, “Against the Institution of War” (article)
You are leading the way, brother. Somehow, some way, this species needs to embrace your leadership or, eventually, cockroaches will be running the whole gig. Bless you for your vision. Jim Kanady, author of Capital Offenses and A Different Winter
I am really impressed by the faith and courage of the VWG team. Most people are not very interested in problems of global governance, unfortunately … [so] I’m not terribly optimistic … but you never know, perhaps [the global referendum] might suddenly take off! Christopher Hamer, author of A Global Parliament: Principles of World Federation
Jim Stark’s suggestion for a global referendum is a great idea to kick start a real democratic global government movement. I hope millions of people around the world join in! David E. Christensen, author of Healing the World: A Primer About the World and How We Must Fix it for Our Children
The global referendum on democratic world government is an excellent initiative. World government is urgently needed to help solve the global problems we can foresee, such as global warming and the proliferation of nuclear weapons. Frank Barnaby, editor, The Gaia Peace Atlas
Global problems—from climate change to nuclear proliferation—need global solutions. Existing structures of international governance are failing to deliver in these and other key areas, such as the Millennium Development Goals. This suggests that a step change is needed to create effective, legitimate and democratic global governance. Such a development would need to be backed by decisive support in a worldwide referendum open to all global citizens. Oliver Tickell, author of Kyoto2: How to Manage the Global Greenhouse
All acts of creation begin with a single step. The creation of a global referendum is a necessary first step in creating the political will necessary to create a viable global government. Jerry Tetalman, author (with Byron Belitsos) of One World Democracy: A Progressive Vision for Enforceable Global Law
I hope my presidency will address what has become a universal clamor all over the world for the democratization of the United Nations. I promise to give full support to the working group on the revitalization of the General Assembly. H.E. Miguel D’Escoto, President of the General Assembly of the UN, June 2008
Public sentiment is everything. With public sentiment nothing can fail; without public sentiment nothing can succeed. Consequently, he who molds public sentiment goes deeper than he who enacts statutes or pronounces decisions. He makes statutes or decisions possible or impossible to be executed. Abe Lincoln, 1858
The question is not one of “surrendering” national sovereignty. The problem is not negative and does not involve giving something up we already have. The problem is positive—creating something we lack … but … imperatively need—the extension of law and order into another field of human association which heretofore has remained unregulated and in anarchy. Emery Reves, The Anatomy of Peace
Law is merely what enables us to live together in peace without having to love one another. Mark Van Doren, American Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and critic
Your people will judge you on what you can build, not on what you can destroy. U.S. President Barack Obama, Inaugural Speech, 2009
The nations of the world have a stake in one another. Barack Obama, “A time for global action,” an Op-Ed piece, March 23, 2009
Law is merely what enables us to live together in peace without having to love one another. Mark Van Doren, American Pulitzer Prize-winning poet and critic
The essential notion is the replacement of anarchy with the rule of law reaching to individuals. Joseph Preston Baratta, Ph.D., from an article entitled “The World Citizens Party: Ideas for the Future”
There are no passengers on spaceship earth. We are all crew. Marshall McLuhan
It is no longer sacrilegious to consider that democracy can be applied even outside the state. Daniele Archibugi, in his new book, The Global Commonwealth of Citizens: Toward Cosmopolitan Democracy
The United Nations is not living up to its expectations in curbing conflicts among nations and we need a new charter…. No country should possess veto power. H.E. Dr. APJ Abdul Kalam, former president of India
… the present world situation … makes it necessary to have a world constitution, a world parliament, and a world government…. Throughout her long history, India has always believed in the idea of humanity as a single family. Bairam Jakhar, then-Speaker of the Lok Sabha (the People’s House of India) in 1985
For the first time in human history, world government of some sort is now possible. Geoffrey Blainey, Australian historian
We face problems we hadn’t even imagined, and they’re cropping up all over. I think the ability of the nation-state to deal with them individually, the way we used to, is disappearing, because national borders are eroding…. This financial crisis … has shown us that we have a global economic system, [but] we don’t have a global political system…. Almost all our institutions were built or refined during, or for, the Cold War. General Brent Scowcroft, co-author (with Zbigniew Brzezinski), America and the World with a.
Global governance is just a euphemism for global government…. [the] core of the international financial crisis is that we have global financial markets and no global rule of law. Jacques Attali, adviser to President Nicolas Sarkozy of France
[E]ven as we celebrate tonight, we know the challenges that tomorrow will bring are the greatest of our lifetime – two wars, a planet in peril, the worst financial crisis in a century. U.S. President-elect Barack Obama in his victory speech, November 4, 2008.
I’d put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don’t have to wait until oil and coal run out before we tackle that. Thomas Edison, almost 100 years ago!
We’re borrowing money from China to buy oil from the Persian Gulf to burn it in ways that destroy the future of human civilization. Every bit of that has to change. Former U.S. vice-president Al Gore to the Democratic National Convention where Barak Obama accepted the presidential nomination in Denver, Colorado (August 28, 2008)
Evidence of the new Congress and administration’s national priorities was confirmed in President-elect Barack Obama’s victory speech, who called on America to defend a “planet in peril” as one of the three great challenges of our time. Sue Brown, Executive Director, National Wildlife Federation Action Fund
In just 100 months’ time, if we are lucky, and based on a quite conservative estimate, we could reach a tipping point for the beginnings of runaway climate change. Andrew Simms, policy director, New Economics Foundation
A candle has to burn itself in order to give light to others. You are that candle…. Jim, fire symbolizes also Holy Spirit. According to Greek mythology, fire was in possession of gods only. Prometheus stole it from god Zeus to give to humans when they lived in dark caves. This gift brought productivity also in the field of art and literature. You are bringing productivity in the field of peace with your new thoughts and fresh energy. Congratulations. Dr. Stephen Gill, Poet Laureate of Ansted University and the author of more than 20 books
Sadly, our political evolution is lagging far behind our ability to effectively address our most pressing problems. One of my favorite quotes comes from the genius of Buckminster Fuller: “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.” Vote World Parliament is building that new model. Ted Stalets, futurist, VP of VWP and literary agent for Jim Stark’s book, Rescue Plan for Planet Earth
At best, the UN is part of the bureaucratic system that has brought us the IMF and the World Trade Organization but has failed to do much about preventing mass murder or the violation of human rights even in Rwanda or Somalia, let alone in more organized and powerful states. I think we are as likely to grow a lily from an acorn as [we are] to grow a democratic world parliament from the UN. Caspar Davis, World Federalist Movement—Canada, Victoria Branch (In an article called “Two Views of a Democratic Global Parliament,” he compares our global referendum initiative with the idea of a UN Parliamentary Assembly, and concludes that: “Stark’s idea sounds more radical and perhaps quixotic, but I think it may actually be more practical.”)
I’m reading your fabulous book [Rescue Plan for Planet Earth]. Best compendium of … quotes I’ve ever read. You’ve put a great deal of thought into these issues and I salute you for the important groundbreaking work you are doing. You can quote me on that. Thank you so much for sending it to me. Arthur Kanegas, American filmmaker
Democracy is the best revenge. Bilawal Bhutto Zardidi, 19-year-old son of Benazir Bhutto, three days after his mother’s assassination (it was one of her favourite sayings)
