Fairness in aFragile World

Professor Wayne HayesV. 0.6, Build #7 | 11/14/2012

Our goal is to decode and supplementthe memorandum.

“Fairness in a Fragile World:A Memo on Sustainable Development”

ByWolfgang Sachs

Aka, the Johannesburg MemorandumRecommended is the full version.

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Introducing our author

Wolfgang Sachs is the Director of the

Wuppertal Institute for Climate and

Energy. See his biography.

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The Earth Summit was held in Rio in 1992.

• The official name of the 1992 Earth Summit was the U.N. Conference on Environment and Development.

• The Earth Summit was held in Rio and was a response to the Brundtland Commission Report in 1987.

• The 2002 summit, held in Johannesburg, was titled The World Summit of Sustainable Development (WSSD).

• Rio+20 was held in Rio in June, 2012.

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Sachs connects us to the UN process.

This classic provides a preamble to Rio+20, held in June, 2012. The dilemma has deepened, the formal UN process has again stalled, but civil society organizations and a global citizens movement has been mobilized.

In this context, we should remember Sachs, as he intended. Note the continuity with the Peoples’ Sustainability Treaties.

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So what? Crack the code.

• Sachs claims that the subtle linguistic shift translates into a concern for the (export-led) economic growth of the global South.

• What is presumed is that economic growth reduces poverty. Perhaps it creates poverty?

• What was forgotten was the environment. Sachs wrote a memorandum so that we do not forget.

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Sachs sees a hidden agenda.• Sachs claims that there was no clearly stated

agenda for WSSD. This vagueness provided the pretext for a hidden agenda.

• Sachs saw a disguised corporate intrusion into the sustainable development process and a corruption of the authenticity of both Brundtland and the 1992 Earth Summit.

• Sachs reflects an outcry from civil society organizations that carried through the Rio+20 summit in 2012. He gives this concern a resonant voice.

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Sachs turned to civil society.

In the preparation for WSSDcivil society organizations,

a player at Rio,had begun to rebel and to push back.

Sachs is speaking to, not for,civil society.

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Sachs offers an agenda and a program.

His memorandum has two parts:1.A statement of the problem (pages 31-37)2.A program for authentic development that alleviated poverty and restored nature (pages 37-58).A continuation of this thinking is reflected in an essential product of Rio+20, The Peoples’ sustainability Treaties.

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Sach’s agenda: resolve the ecology of rich and poor

1. Nature is under assault. The problem of the environment was raised by the North. This was reflected in the Brundtland Report and in the 1992 Earth Summit.

2. Fairness and social justice means that poverty must be alleviated, the legitimate claim of the South. Economic growth is not the solution.

Sachs attempts to forge a social contract that addresses both concerns and reconciles the North/South divide.

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A new path must be forged.

Consider his words:“. . . the development model

of the Northis historically obsolete” (p. 33).

Sachs recognizes theLimits to Growth.

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Sachs cites overshoot.

Since the mid-1970s, “. . . ecological overshoot

has become thedistinguishing mark of human history” (p. 34).

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Sachs defines another path.

“Some claim that humanity faces a choice between human misery and natural catastrophe. That choice is false.”

His alternative is toreconcile environment

and (economic) development. 04/19/23 13

The South must go its own way.

Avoid copycat development,a path that is not feasible anyway

and that collides with nature.There is a better way toalleviate poverty and to

achieve equity.

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Livelihood rights vs.export-led growth

• Sachs redefines the economy around livelihood, making a living.

• Livelihood grounds development in ecology.• Exploiting resources and labor is inadequate,

leaving “holes in the ground and holes in the belly.”

• Over 2 billion humans live through subsistence, many others on the margins.

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Sachs urges de-coupling.

• De-link economic growth from resource use.• Don’t confuse social progress with economic

growth.• Break the “master-student relationship,”

which is self-defeating. • Leapfrog into the solar age! (page 35)

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Sachs connects ecology with equity.

Without ecology there is no equity:•The rich 20% of the world’s population consumes nearly 80% of its resources.•Eat about half the meat and fish.•Consume two-thirds of the electricity.•Consume 84% of the paper.•Own nearly 90% of the automobiles.“The wealthy 25% of humanity occupy a footprint as large as the entire biologically productive surface of the Earth” (pp. 35-36).

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Sachs identifies zombie concepts.

We are misled by confusing language void of concrete meaning:1.North/South2.G7 (or G8) versus G77 (plus China)3.Even developed versus undeveloped carries cultural arrogance.How does Sachs re-frame the discourse?

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Sachs reframes the divide.

“The major rift appears to be between the globalized rich and the localized poor” (p. 36).•The rich are about 20% of human population, about the same number as have access to automobiles.•80% of the rich live in North America, Western and Eastern Europe, and Japan.•20% are dispersed in the South.

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Globalization works for the rich.

• Globalization integrates the rich within worldwide circuits of commodity production and consumption.

• “Transnational corporations cater to this class” (p. 36).

• Resources and energy are pulled toward “high consumption zones” (p. 37).

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Reduce the footprint of the rich.

• “Reduction of the ecological footprint of the consumer classes is not just a matter of ecology but also a matter of equity” (p. 37).

• “As the consumer class corners resources through the global reach of corporations, they contribute to the marginalization of that third of the world population which derives their livelihood directly from free access to land, water, and forests” (p. 37).

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Sachs defines an alternative plan.

Sachs outlines a green planfor the South

from pages 37 to 58.We will examine his greenprint.

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Eradicate poverty!

• Eradication of poverty is job #1. Still is.• Conflict exists between the marginalized

majority and the global middle class.• Poverty reduction is not achieved through

conventional capital formation and globalization.

• Sachs directly challenges the development paradigm, even sustainable development.

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Choose livelihood over economic growth (39).

“Boosting economic growth is less important than securing livelihoods for the impoverished. Since economic growth often fails to trickle down, there is no point in sacrificing people’s lives in the present for speculative gains in the future. Instead, it is crucial to empower them for a dignified life here and now” (39).

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Environmental and economicrefugees increase.

Source: Lester Brown in The Permaculture Research Institute of Australia

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Export-led growth is not the answer.

• Such growth displaces millions from the land. Livelihood is lost.

• Labor is now redundant and families drift to the slums of burgeoning cities.

• Promote, don’t destroy, sustainable livelihoods.

• “Ecology is thus essential for ensuring decent livelihoods in society” (40).

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Export-led growth favors theglobal rich.

Sachs plants an important notion here (40): The global rich must “transition towards resource-light patterns of production and consumption.”

Sachs thus links poverty eradication to the consumption patterns and lifestyles of the rich.

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Ensure Livelihood Rights (37).

• Mobilize the excluded as agents of renewal, especially women.

• Work within nature as an active element in renewal.

• Throughout this article, people and nature are portrayed as active agents of poverty alleviation, not passive recipients of aid and sustainable development.

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Leapfrog Into the Solar Age (40)

Source: E+CO: Energy Through Enterprise

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Embrace a post-industrial regenerative economy.

Sachs defines the 21st century challenge:“how best to extend hospitality to twice the number of people on the globe in light of a rapidly deteriorating biosphere” (40).Don’t lay off people, lay off waste and destruction.

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Link livelihood to ecology (42).

Economic growth often destroys ecosystems and displaces and impoverishes people. So structure economies •to preserve and revitalize ecosystems •to restore the cohesion and capacities of communities.

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Enrich diversity and protect commons (43).

Link the Convention on Biological Diversity with the productive lives

of culture and nature. This rural development is

real development that protects forests and fisheries.

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This opens a path for the inclusion of women.

“Indeed, women play a pivotal role in both maintaining strategically using biodiversity. Besides being managers and providers of food in the families, they are also carriers of local knowledge, skills for survival and cultural memory” (43).

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Women guard biodiversity (45)

Ensuring the livelihood rights of women, seeds are protected. Nature and nurture

can be significantly improved. Displacement is reduced

and people can return to the land.

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Land, water, and soil (45-47)

These are local and regional commons that must be preserved and cultivated.

The stakes are high:About one billion are affected by

soil erosion, deforestation, over-grazing, and industrial agriculture (46).

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Industrial agriculture and the Green Revolution (47)

• The Green Revolution uses petroleum as fertilizer and fuel for mechanization.

• Consumes more water and erodes soils

• Privatizes knowledge and seeds.

• Reduces biodiversity.Source: Peak Oil Technology

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Energy, renewable, and jobs (48-51)

• Sustainable enterprises localize the economy. Livelihood is built by decentralized, local, living economies. See BALLE.

• Livelihood is small in scale and capital requirements, serving local markets.

• Such small businesses can incorporate information and knowledge within their business models.

• They easily adopt renewable energy.• They can serve the two billion or so outside the

commercial sector.

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Cities grow, create hazards.

Source: chinaSmack 04/19/23 38

Burgeoning Cities (51)

Some important points:•Over half of humanity lives in cities.•The wealth gap is greatest in cities.•Environmental risks for the poor are great. Public health is threatened.•Rural development and agrarian reform can mitigate and even reverse urbanization.

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Justice and wealth (53-56)

• Sachs speaks of environmental space, inequitably distributed. The expands beyond most definitions of environmental justice.

• Sachs depicts the “natural heritage of the earth” as a commons, belonging to all (54).

• Fairness in a finite world requires mindful and restrained consumption by the rich.

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Four steps to environmental equity:

1. Greatly increased resource productivity while creating meaningful work.

2. Redesign production along biological lines.3. Restore living systems.4. Produce end-user services and not

consumable goods.5. Stress culture and nature over consumption

(55-56).

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Democratizing globalization (56)

• Cosmopolitan localism must balance economic globalization.

• Stress small business over big business.• Celebrate and enhance cultural pluralism.

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Forge a global deal.

“The North is most unsustainable in resource consumption, and the South is most unsustainable in regard to poverty and misery. The former must reduce its ecological footprint, while the latter must ensure livelihood rights for the marginalized majority” (57-58).

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The three R’s:

1. The rich must practice restraint in consumption and production and the exercise of power.

2. The North must assist in the restoration of damage in the South.

3. Livelihood rights must be assured for all, especially in the South (57-58).

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Conclusion

We can remember Sachs’s admonitions and his analysis, which never came to be.

As the Rio+20 process unfolds, remembering his agenda and his proposals for the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburg might provide a good place to start. His memo is available in sixteen languages.

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