Yunus' wish list

Towards the end of his book Creating a World without Poverty, Yunus shares his 2050 wish list. Amongst the items, there are a few which called my attention:

- There will be no poor, no beggars and no homeless

- There will be no passports or visas – everybody will be a world citizen

- There will be no war, no war simulation, no military institutions and no mass destruction weapons

- The economic system will encourage people, enterprises and institutions to share their prosperity

- There will be no discrimination of any kind

- Basic connectivity will be wireless and practically free

- People will enjoy an atmosphere of continuous innovation

- Everybody will be committed to maintaining a sustainable lifestyle

- All peoples will live in peace, harmony and friendship, searching for expansion of humankind’s potential


And he finishes: “If we consider human history, it’s clear that we always accomplish what we want – or what we refuse to accept.”

Free market & global issues

My experience has shown that the free market - powerful and useful as it is - could treat problems such as global poverty and environmental degradation if only it weren't too concerned in accomplishing the financial goals of its richest shareholders.

Extracted from the book Creating a world without poverty, by Mohammad Yunus

Interviewing Jacqueline Novogratz

Jacqueline Novogratz began her career as an international banker but soon, aspiring to change the world, joined a nonprofit women’s microfinance group that dispatched her to Africa.

Currently, she is the CEO of Acumen Fund, a nonprofit venture capital firm she founded in 2001 to invest in sustainable businesses that bring health care, safe water, alternative energy, and housing to the developing world’s low-income people.

She is at the moment launching the book The Blue Sweater: Bridging the Gap between Rich and Poor in an Interconnected World.

On an interview for the McKinsey Quarterly, she said:

"The next ten years are about developing talent, developing the stories that inspire and influence a generation, that we could do things differently in the world and that we don't need just to be sitting within the market place or just within traditional philanthropy or charity, but that there's real room for reinventing an economy that is global but is also more imaginative, creative and most importantly inclusive."

Earth Hour

Your action can trigger many others

On March 28th, swich off the lights at 8:30 p.m. for 1 hour

Maybe host your neighbours and friends for a conversation about global warming.

More: http://www.earthhour.org

US$ 500,000 pay limit for top executives

The Obama administration is expected to impose a cap of $500,000 for top executives at companies that receive large amounts of money from the Treasury Department.

"That is pretty draconian — $500,000 is not a lot of money, particularly if there is no bonus," said James F. Reda, founder and managing director of James F. Reda & Associates, a compensation consulting firm. He said such limits will make it hard for the companies to recruit and keep executives, most of whom could earn more money at other firms.

Mr. Obama said Tuesday "if the taxpayers are helping you, then you have certain responsibilities to not be living high on the hog."

In 2007, Vikram Pandit of Citigroup made $3.1 million; Kenneth D. Lewis of Bank of America received over $20 million; and Rick Wagoner of General Motors made $14.4 million.

Hopefully, we may start discussing some ethical aspects around abusive salaries:
- short term shareholder pressure
- concept of success
- motivation for working
- social (in)equality
- gap between rich and poor
- environmental impacts of unnecessary buying
- etc

What do you think?

Maybe wanna sponsor an executive?

New Your Times' article here.

Systemic reform is the only course for ‘decimated’ investors

Great article! It appropriately questions what we currently understand as sustainable investment.


Author: Sarah Stranahan
Published on January 25th, 2009
http://www.responsible-investor.com/home/article/if_not_now/P0/

"At a recent conference in New York, I was asked to speak about the Needmor Fund’s 20 years of experience as a mission investor. I wrote a paper comparing Needmor’s returns to the returns of a traditional foundation, which was founded by the same family, uses the same investment consultant and has a very similar investment strategy. In the end, I decided not to read my prepared paper. The reason had nothing to do with my conclusions: Needmor in fact outperformed the traditional fund by 4.5% last year, but by only 0.4% over the last five years. My careful analysis revealed the majority of this short-term outperformance was caused by the quality bent of Needmor’s screened equity managers, which basically supports the conclusion that ESG screens are a proxy for good management. This quality bent functions like a hedge, so that one consistent result of Needmor’s mission investing has been to reduce portfolio volatility. No, the reason I decided not to read my paper was that I was embarrassed by its irrelevance. At the conference, I listened to my peers make the case that social (or sustainable or ESG) investing is competitive with the dominant markets and it made me wonder.

Why are we trying to prove that we are as good as the dominant markets? The dominant markets have failed dismally. Needmor did 4.5% better. So what? We still lost 25% of our endowment. We failed in our fiduciary duty and disappointed our grantees and our staff because we had faith in the dominant markets. A generation lost their retirement security, millions lost their jobs and their homes, and the next generation is foregoing or deferring higher education. And we did 4.5% better. Yippee. The word decimated is a Latin military term used to describe an army that has lost 10% of its soldiers. We were all decimated. Why are we talking about a fraction of a point of performance difference within a failed paradigm? That’s rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic. We need to be talking about systemic reform. Let’s look at the paradigm that failed. It can be summarized as: “Unregulated markets are the most efficient allocators of capital and pricers of risk and they will result in the greatest and most sustainable global economic growth.” This was not just a financial paradigm. It underpinned the dominant theories of global development and political progress.

Unregulated markets were supposed to lift the world’s population out of poverty, and this, in turn, was supposed to lead to education, empowerment, and engagement in the political process, which would lead to, “ta da!”, democracy. This entire set of paradigms has failed. Unregulated markets have not only destroyed $12 trillion worth of savings, but they have destabilized emerging economies, erased 10 years of development and created uncertainty, chaos and corruption. They failed utterly, and in the nick of time. The only thing worse than the collapse of the markets would have been their continued success. We all know that maximizing global economic growth is disastrously unsustainable. We were on the brink of resource scarcity in oil, water, rice, wheat, corn and copper when the wheels fell off the car. If they had not fallen off, we would have driven over the cliff. Now at least we are crawling, not speeding, toward environmental disaster. And the dominant paradigm has been discredited. We should celebrate. Pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and get to work. The problem is, we don’t have a nice, shiny, broadly accepted, politically feasible, researched and tested, safe new paradigm to pop in like a fluorescent light bulb. I wonder where we will find one? Who will stay up all night for six weeks straight to save us? If we leave the re-regulation of the financial and economic systems to the same people who became tremendously wealthy and powerful by dismantling the old regulations, they will design a system that preserves their tremendous wealth and power. They will spend trillions of dollars of our money putting the wheels back on the car and then they will drive it over the cliff. We can’t allow this to happen. We have to develop a financial system that is safe, secure and rewards equitable and sustainable economic behavior. We can draw on the ideas of the New Deal and Keynes, but there are new wrinkles of difficulty and complexity that have to be addressed: globalisation, extreme inequality, resource scarcity and global warming. I cannot tell you what the solutions are; but I do know that if we succeed we will build a financial system that rewards long-term thinking, internalizes externalities, reduces speculation, rewards sustainability and increases social equity. In other words, we will build a financial system that rewards investors like us.

We need new analysis and new ideas. And we also need to subject these ideas to rigorous critical review. We already know that the unintended consequences of well meaning reform can be disastrous. It was, after all, activist institutional investors who advocated for stock options tied to quarterly returns in order to align management interests with shareholder interests. The lesson is to be careful what you ask for: you just might get it. But ideas alone are not enough. To succeed we will need to build the political power to move a reform agenda that supports equitable and sustainable markets. We will need to hash out our differences, prioritise our agenda, and organise and educate an informed engaged constituency.

We will need to amass more power than the Wall Street lobby. To succeed we’ll need good ideas and good organising. We are all worried about our clients’ portfolios. No one is paying us to research financial market regulation, engage in public advocacy, or organise a coalition. But no one is going to do this for us. There are many ways to contribute to this collective effort. One is the Network for Sustainable Financial Markets at www.sustainablefinancialmarkets.net. Another, that I am involved in, is a coalition of organisations including The Social Investment Forum and the Community Development Finance Institution Coalition called The New Economy Roundtable.

Our purpose is: “To shift the dynamics of public discourse and public policy in the wake of the global economic crisis to highlight structures and solutions that support equitable and sustainable economies.” I hope you will join one of these efforts. Our experience at Needmor is that ordinary people become transformative leaders when they assume personal responsibility for the systemic problems that affect their communities."


Sarah Stranahan is chair of the Needmor Fund, a Toledo, Ohio-based fund that supports community investing.

Civil Disobedience

Civil disobedience is the active refusal to obey certain laws, demands and commands of an occupying power without resorting to physical violence.


Yesterday, I joined Bicicletada, a group of people passionate about cycling, who ride in São Paulo and in other cities for pleasure and as a means of transportation, with no one leader. As they ride, they question why bikers don’t have the same rights as drivers to come and go, once taking certain streets and roads can be dangerous or even prohibited, even though everybody knows cyclers use a lot less space and don’t emit greenhouse gases.

In this context, the idea was to go from São Paulo to Santos by bike, so we could swim in the ocean after the effort of accomplishing the 80km journey. The plan attracted about 200 cyclers and started early in the morning.

Unfortunately, the police didn’t allow us to pass the 41st km, claiming they were concerned about the group’s safety and that the tunnels are not prepared to receive walkers and bikers.

As negotiation continued, my frustration gave way to the satisfaction of being part of a civil disobedience movement. Everybody from the group kept talking, bringing up the arguments, always with respect and determined not to cause any violence. The police was as peaceful and patient.

We ended up needing to come back to São Paulo without swimming in Santos’ sea. But the media, the company that takes care of the road and even the police seemed to have understood and even agreed with the importance of the discussion.

r
Leaving from São Paulo


My friends and I


Stopped by the police for the first time

Living / Dying Planet

In the last week of October, WWF, the Zoological Society of London and the Global Footprint Network released the 2008 Living Planet Report.

Amongst other warning data, the report reveals that we are currently using 130% of the planet's renovation capacity and that, by the early 2030s, we will need two planets to keep up with humanity’s demand for goods and services.

Check the whole report here. And spread the word.

Linking global problems with individual habits

Recently, as part of an assignment for the BTH Introduction to Sustainable Development course I'm taking, I came across an interesting piece of data: 60% of deforestation in the Amazon forest in 200-2005 was due to cattle ranches.

It can be even more alarming if we cross that with other facts:
- we need 20 kilograms of feed to make a kilogram of beef
- China's per capita intake of poultry, pork, fish and beef has more than tripled since 1970 and keeps on rising (remember that China has 1.6 billion inhabitants)
- 15 of the 24 ecosystems vital for life on Earth have been seriously degraded or used unsustainably

It seems to me it would be smart to reduce or even stop eating meat. Therefore we could keep eating our veggies, eat a portion of the food that is currently directed to cattle raising to compensate the lack of meat, fight poverty and still transform all the cattle raising areas into environmental recovering reserves, at the same time we prevent further degradation of the soil and more deforestation.

Facing such scenario, I've started doing my part by reducing significantly my meat consumption and therefore my individual contribution to the problem.

Data sources: http://www.mongabay.com, http://www.seedmagazine.com/news/2008/05/carnivores_like_us.php, http://www.millenniumassessment.org/en/index.aspx

Peace Day

Amazing what one strong idea and committed people can achieve. Do you want to join the World Peace Day movement?

A teenager's journey to end child slavery

My action plan to end child slavery was both rewarding and challenging. There were many pros and cons and many forks in the road and dead ends.

Photographer : henri ismail at flickr


My vision: To end child slavery so every child has access to education. Child slavery and poverty form a classic ‘egg chicken’ relationship; what came first the poverty or the slavery? Ending child slavery will help eradicate poverty; closing the gap between rich and poor nations.

The plan: Through a social awareness campaign and government lobbying I planned to get people excited about ending child slavery and creating change. I wrote letters to MPs and local councils and to the Victorian Governor Mr David de Kretser.

What I realised: Governments will not change their policies unless the public demands it. The government is the economic guarantor of a nation and will not implement policies that will be against the national interest of economic growth. A policy to end trade with a nation who uses child slavery would weaken Australia’s economy. The strongest action a nation’s government would be willing to take is to apply diplomatic pressure to a country that uses slavery.

My solution: In the globalised world that we live in, nations don’t have absolute power. The key to ending child slavery is through consumer awareness and action. Companies will produce what people want. If people don’t want goods made by a child’s hand they won’t buy it. The obvious answer is to name and shame the companies who use child slavery (there are clear examples on the net; search for child labour under images).

The problem: defamation and corporate confidentiality. Corporations can sue you for defamation. This is happening in Tasmania at the moment with the Gunns logging company suing 20 environmentalists for defamation. The act for Breach of Confidence protects commercial and private communication above freedom of expression.

The solution: promote products and services who don’t use child slavery. Although this is not as effective and emotionally appealing; by supporting services and products who don’t use child slavery you can start a trend which, other consumers may follow forcing companies to change their ways. However this also brings problems of innuendos; if a company releases a line of clothing that is ‘child free’ does that imply all other clothes are made by child slaves?

The pros of my action plan: developing a deep understanding of the complexities of child slavery and the mechanics behind it was rewarding and forced me to think outside the square. I became very passionate about the issue and determined that I could contribute to the movement to help end child slavery.

The cons of the action plan: the complexities involved in child slavery and the greed attached to the continuation of slavery was at times daunting and unnerving. Sometimes I felt that it was too much of a challenge and I wouldn’t make a difference. The project was time consuming but at the same time I was being rewarded for my hard work.

My advice: Take on the big challenges in life; someone has to do it why can’t it be you!
This work is licenced under a Attribution licence.

© Jenelle 2006. First published on actnow.com.au. See original post here.

In Brazil, the richest tenth owns 23,5 times more than the poorest tenth

... and that is good news! Social inequality diminished for the first time in recent history, thanks to social programs like Bolsa Família and the rise of the minimum wage.

In 2004, the richest tenth owned 27,4 times more than the poorest tenth. In the last 5 years, the revenues of the former has risen 4,9%, while the revenues of the latter increased in a much faster pace: by 22%.

The interesting thing, though, comes when we relate this piece of news with other figures:

- the average monthly wage of the poorest tenth of the population is R$ 207 (US$ 128), while the richest tenth earns R$ 4,853 a month (US$ 3,014 - not a fortune, right?)

- when we consider the number of billionaires, Sao Paulo is the 11th city in the world, with 14 uber rich residents - first is Moscow (with 74), followed by New York (71), London (36), Istanbul (34), Hong Kong (30), Los Angeles (24), Mumbai (20), San Francisco (19), Dallas and Tokyo (15 each)

- talking about millionaires, Brazil was granted with 60.000 new ones in 2007 - in 2006, there were 130.000, a colossal 46% growth

- Sao Paulo has the second largest helicopter fleet in the world - it has passed Tokyo and is just behind New York

I guess we have a lot of serious work to do when it comes to offering a quality life to all the Brazilian citizens. And if we take sustainability into account, we should probably not count on economical growth for closing the wealth distribution gap. But that discussion is worth a new post for itself. Stay tuned!

Sources: Portal Exame, Folha Online, BCG Global Wealth Report 2007

Violence

Today it's been 7 years a cousin of mine was killed after a robbery attempt. Also today I got to know that, in a different part of the country but under the same circumstances, the ex boyfriend of another cousin was assassinated.

As Brazilians, we're exposed to violence all the time: drug dealers porting heavy guns; policemen invading slums and handing people to rival gangs to be executed; huge gap in wealth distribution, stopping a big part of the youth from dreaming about a good future; kids pickpocketing in the city centre; people afraid of being kidnapped while driving their cars at night alone; friends and family members being robbed, abused and assassinated.

This can't be normal! We shouldn't need to learn how to live with such an absurd!

I can't understand the dynamics and the level of influence of each of the founding factors of violence: poverty, guns, bad wealth distribution, destroyed communities, psycological temperament, history, drugs, others. We must have created an environment where the combination generated an explosive result, as many countries have more serious individual problems, which don't seem to lead to this war we live in.

What I can say, though, is that is getting harder and harder to stay loyal to the phylosphy of being free, not thinking too much about what could happen and just enjoying life.

Human Scale Development, by Max-Neef

Manfred Max-Neef is a Chilean economist who has worked for many years with the problem of development in the Third World, articulating the inappropriateness of conventional models of development, that have lead to increasing poverty, massive debt and ecological disaster for many Third World communities.

Max-Neef and his colleagues have developed a taxonomy of human needs and a process by which communities can identify their "wealths" and "poverties" according to how these needs are satisfied.

Human Scale Development is defined as "focused and based on the satisfaction of fundamental human needs, on the generation of growing levels of self-reliance, and on the construction of organic articulations of people with nature and technology, of global processes with local activity, of the personal with the social, of planning with autonomy, and of civil society with the state." (Max-Neef et al, 1987:12)

The main contribution that Max-Neef makes to the understanding of needs is the distinction made between needs and satisfiers. Human needs are seen as few, finite and classifiable (as distinct from the conventional notion that "wants" are infinite and insatiable). Not only this, they are constant through all human cultures and across historical time periods. What changes over time and between cultures is the way these needs are satisfied. It is important that human needs are understood as a system - i.e. they are interrelated and interactive. There is no hierarchy of needs (apart from the basic need for subsistence or survival) as postulated by Western psychologists such as Maslow, rather, simultaneity, complementarity and trade-offs are features of the process of needs satisfaction.

Max-Neef classifies the fundamental human needs as below.

Fundamental Human Needs	Being (qualities)	Having (things)	Doing (actions)	Interacting (settings)
subsistence	physical and mental health	food, shelter work	feed, clothe, rest, work	living environment, social setting
protection	care, adaptability autonomy	social security, health systems, work	co-operate, plan, take care of, help	social environment, dwelling
affection	respect, sense of humour, generosity, sensuality	friendships, family, relationships with nature	share, take care of, make love, express emotions	privacy, intimate spaces of togetherness
understanding	critical capacity, curiosity, intuition	literature, teachers, policies educational	analyse, study, meditate investigate,	schools, families universities, communities,
participation	receptiveness, dedication, sense of humour	responsibilities, duties, work, rights	cooperate, dissent, express opinions	associations, parties, churches, neighbour- hoods
leisure	imagination, tranquillity spontaneity	games, parties, peace of mind	day-dream, remember, relax, have fun	landscapes, intimate spaces, places to be alone
creation	imagination, boldness, inventiveness, curiosity	abilities, skills, work, techniques	invent, build, design, work, compose, interpret	spaces for expression, workshops, audiences
identity	sense of belonging, self-esteem, consistency	language, religions, work, customs, values, norms	get to know oneself, grow, commit oneself	places one belongs to, everyday settings
freedom	autonomy, passion, self-esteem, open- mindedness	equal rights	dissent, choose, run risks, develop awareness	anywhere

Max-Neef shows that certain satisfiers, promoted as satisfying a particular need, in fact inhibit or destroy the possibility of satisfying other needs: eg, the arms race, while ostensibly satisfying the need for protection, in fact then destroys subsistence, participation, affection and freedom.

Synergic satisfiers, on the other hand, not only satisfy one particular need, but also lead to satisfaction in other areas: some examples are breast-feeding; self-managed production; popular education; democratic community organisations; preventative medicine; meditation; educational games.

This model forms the basis of an explanation of many of the problems arising from a dependence on mechanistic economics, and contributes to understandings that are necessary for a paradigm shift that incorporates systemic principles.

Source: Rainforest

Usage of water

Did you know 70% of the global usage of water goes to agriculture?

And did you know how much water is wasted to produce...

- 1 sheet of paper - 1 litre of water
- 1 litre of petrol - 10 l
- 1 kg of sugar - 100 l
- 1 cup of coffee - 140 l
- 1 egg - 200 l
- 1 kg of rice - 2400 l
- 1 kg of chicken - 6000 l
- 1 kg of meat - 15000 l
- 1 car - 1,2 million litres of water

Doesn't it sound wrong?

Source: Veja Magazine, 30/01/2008

First global warming refugees in Tuvalu

The sea level rising is already threatening the existence of a country in the world - obviously with its population, culture and biodiversity. This alarming piece of news testifies the effects of global warming and should be treated with responsability by the international community. But perhaps because Tuvalu is not a big player in the international arena, we don't even get to know the tragedy is happening. Check the details below.

The 11,000 Tuvaluans live on nine coral atolls totaling 10 square miles scattered over 500,000 square miles of ocean south of the equator and west of the International Dateline. Tuvalu is the smallest of all nations, except for the Vatican. Tuvalu has no industry, burns little petroleum, and creates less carbon pollution than a small town in America. This tiny place nevertheless is on the front line of climate change. The increasing intensity of tropical weather, the increase in ocean temperatures, and rising sea level -- all documented results of a warming atmosphere -- are making trouble for Tuvalu.

Tuvaluans face the possibility of being among the first climate refugees. Sea level rise is the greatest problem. Tuvalu's highest elevation is 4.6 meters .
[…]
The islands are not going to go under immediately. Yet the effects accumulate, year by year. "Even if we are not completely flooded, " said Laupepa, "in 50 to 70 years we face increasingly strong storms and cyclones, changing weather patterns, damage to our coral reefs from higher ocean temperatures, and flooding of all our gardens." Not growing enough food and decreasing fish catch if reefs are damaged would mean "importing more food, more foreign exchange, and more health and diet problems, " he said.

Source: http://www.worldviewofglobalwarming.org/pages/rising-seas.html

Visiting the Khmer Rouge killing fields

From 1975 to 1979 (yes, this recently!), the Khmer Rouge regime exterminated over 3 million people in Cambodia, notably ex government officials and "intellectuals" (teachers, educated people, people wearing glasses, etc). The method was ruthless: after some time in gruesome jails, weak prisoners would be transported in trucks to killing fields. Blindfolded, they would stand on the edge of a massive hole, would be strongly hit on the back of the neck and fall into their death graves (in case they weren't yet dead, some poisonous chemicals - also used to avoid the decomposing smell - and the burial would finish the job).

Digging to understand the context behind such cruelty, one might find a determined leader with a strong vision for his country. What Pol Pot wanted, seemingly, was a place based on agriculture, simple, where everybody would be the same and have enough - not a bad idea in itself.

Obviously, there was a lot wrong with the execution. The new regime didn't allow "dissidents", and we all know it's impossible to have everybody thinking the same. Even worse was the fact that, as most dictatorships, the system assumed all governmental decisions would be good; therefore all the force and power was concentrated and all civil mechanisms to guarantee basic values or legal actions to remove the leaders was nonexistent.

I guess we value democracy more and more when we are faced with these horrendous historical moments. Although it might be slower and more controversial in decision making - and in economic development, one may say - it theoretically never trespasses some essential values, such as (depending on the country) life, freedom, equality or family.

For the leaders-to-be, I guess there is a lesson to be learnt: the end does NEVER justify cruel means. We can never build an equal society with unequal respect to people's ideas and lives. In the end of the day, how can we foster happiness if not with love and consistent good actions?

Does tourism save or destroy culture?

Since I started this trip, one question has always been on my mind: does tourism save or destroy culture?

We all know that tourism interferes in the local culture: brings points of view from all over the world; injects money into the economy; stimulate constructions; demands the presence of ATMs; stretches business hours; puts a price in handicrafts and traditional arts expressions; etc.

Therefore, a tourist destination is more likely to have the presence of global brands, but also more money to support local cuisine and arts (there wouldn't be tons of Thai food courses in Chiang Mai or daily Vietnamese traditional dance performances in Hue without travellers). In the same way, it's very probable that the life of a touristic town be less simple and less community based; however, its residents will possibly have more access to goods and comforts than before.

In the book "Once while travelling", Lonely Planet founder Tony Wheeler - a travel enthusiast himself - brings up some interesting points:

The First World may have exported McDonald's, KFC and Pizza Hit, but we've brought back Thai, Mexican and Japanese food to balance those exports.

and

...it's very patronising for those of us in the developed world to think people should maintain a simples life to please us: 'It was so nice when you didn't have electricity and cars and motorcycles and life was simple.' I've yet to see a Third World village that didn't rejoice when electricity arrived or cheer when they could enjoy motorcycles traffic jams instead of walking to work.

I don't have an answer to the original question above. Probably tourism both saved and destroys culture. What I'm sure of is we shouldn't measure its impact just through the material gains of the visited societies, as often cars, electronics and money don't represent a better life. Perhaps a better indicator would be the tolerance and cultural understanding raised through individuals' direct contact, especially in times of fear and unjustifiable wars.


Kao San, the crowded backpackers' street in Bangkok, Thailand

Magnificent forest on the way to an Akha village in northern Laos

Exploring amazing museums in Hanoi

Women's Museum

This morning I went to the Women's Museum in Hanoi, an experience that touched me quite a lot.

I knew women participated in the Vietnam war, but I didn't have any idea about how crucial their role was. Besides being soldiers on the battlefields, women led associations; planted and transported almost all the food; sewed the clothes; built 10.000 km of tunnels for protection, transport and education; took care of the wounded; and delivered messages to soldiers pretty much everywhere.

The most amazing thing, though, is not what they did, but how they did it: with love, without losing the tenderness, in spite of the terrible circumstances (as we can perceive from the pictures, objects and diaries in the exhibition). They sewed while in prison, wrote letters to elders and loved ones, served food with a smile and, with all that, kept everybody connected, hopeful and enjoying brief moments of joy.


Museum of Ethnology

In the afternoon it was time for the Ethnology Museum, with information, pictures, objects and constructions - both in and outdoors - from the various ethnic groups that formed the Vietnamese nation.

The part that I liked the most was the open-air exhibitions, particularly one building: the Central Highlanders' communal centre.

For those tribes, the highest, biggest, most beautiful and most important construction was the space that hosted spiritual ceremonies, parties and community gatherings, which also represented the male power.

Although the villages remain nowadays, these sort of spaces are rapidly disappearing, whereas other symbols of status (e.g. the individuals' house windows) are more evident than before, probably showing us that we've not always been taking the wisest path.

The stories we tell

In this trip I realised I'm a constant observer and enthusiastic student of the stories, tales and legends we pass forward, much more than clothing, ceramics or even architecture. Perhaps that interest is always present because it strongly determine our perception of reality (maybe even more than unquestionable facts), as 2 situations happened today illustrate.

First, in the morning, I went to the National Museum (ex Revolutionary Museum), which tells Laos' history since pre-history until the present days. Unsurprisingly, it elevates figures like Marx, Engels, Mao, Ho Chi Minh and other chiefs of state of socialist countries.

On the other hand, one can easily perceive some resentment against the French and - what called my attention the most - a super friendly approach towards the Dutch of the East Indias Company, but an extremely hard naming of the US forces (puppet soldiers of the imperialism), even if their interests in Laos weren't too far apart.

In the afternoon, I joined a meditation session in the Wat Sok Pa Luang. Concentration demanded extra effort, as the monks were building a foot path 10 meters away, therefore doing a lot of noise. That moment represented daily life for me: heaps of things urging our attention (including advertisements with its intangible and unreal promises associated with products, which use persuasive stories and visual effects that make them sound essential), while the real and important things are slipping between our fingers, lacking our accurate perception, integrity and discipline.

A taste of Lebanon in Sydney

Last Sunday I was invited by Manny to visit Punchbowl, the suburb where she lives. I knew it was a mainly Lebanese region, but it's more: it really feel like a little Lebanon in Sydney. People speak Arabic, the markets have a different display, the posters on the walls are from Lebanese singers, Arabic styled clothes are sold and people eat the most yummy Lebanese food and sweets.

In order to live a little bit of all that, Manny showed me around, we bought some really good sweets and went to have lunch with her brother and father. I'm very glad we did, as I learnt a lot of things.

As you might know, Lebanon was created to be the Christian state in the Middle East. So around xxx% of the population is Christian, but another xxx% is Muslim.

Therefore, there's an ongoing tension. Formally, it is one country, but the education people receive at home segregate them into Christian Lebanese and Muslim Lebanese.

Discontent with this situation, Manny's father (who is Christian married to a Muslim wife) joined a political party which advocates the creation of one secular state comprised not only by all of Lebanon, but also Syria and Jordan. The idea is to acknowledge the difference but unite people around a bigger dream and, in his words, "let God decide whose religion was wrong when we die".

West Wing - commerce vs. ethics

I’ve been watching quite a lot of the West Wing recently, an American series that shows the routine of a fictitious President of the United States and its close staff.

It’s impressive how arts can subtly introduce messages in our minds. I found myself thinking about commerce solving some important democracy problems, when I would normally defend a less financial and more conscientious approach to the problem.

Anyway, as even the West Wing has its critique moments, look at a dialogue happened in the Chapter 11 of Season 7, discussing exactly this commerce vs. ethics issue.

Context: The White House is negotiating an oil commercial sanction against Sudan in order to avoid genocide. The agreement goes against China’s economic interests.

Chinese Ambassador: You know what I think about a lot? Capitalism vanquished Communism. Obliterated it. And here we are having a discussion where you are trying to restrict our markets.

White House Chief of Staff: We are trying to address a humanitarian situation in the Sudan.

Chinese Ambassador: Exactly. But you have always taught us that liberty is the same thing as Capitalism. As if life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness cannot be crushed by greed. Your American dream is financial, not ethical.

White House Chief of Staff: This is a good deal for the Chinese. I hope you’ll consider it carefully.

Chinese Ambassador: Of course.

White House Chief of Staff: Thank you.

Chinese Ambassador: No, thank you. You have taught us well.

Lovely weekend in Brisbane

I’ve been to Brisbane this last weekend. The weather didn’t make justice to the capital of the sunshine state, but it was certainly lovely anyway.

Quality time with Brett for riding bikes, seeing the contemporary art centre, watching movies and enjoying each others’ company and catch up with wonderful Anh, after 9 months in Cambodia, a broken fist and a Portuguese love story.

Talking to Anh, the development work issue surely arose. We discussed how it seems to be the right thing to dedicate one’s career to, as it directly addresses fundamental issues. On the other hand, it so many times doesn’t work, neither for the professionals, nor for the communities!

Facing that, Daniel Quinn would probably say that "kids don't follow the circus to give up about things”. So I guess we need to listen to our intuition more often and consciously follow our circus.

Youth in Australia

I’ve been thinking about posting about Australian Youth for a long time, but I didn’t want to jump into conclusions too fast, in order to be able to understand a bit more of the hidden part of the cultural iceberg. After chairing 2 youth conferences and facilitating 2 others (including a recent high school girls’ leadership event – thanks Flor and Lucy for the invite!), I think I’m ready to share some perceptions.


Young people in Australia are incredibly capable. They are smart, skilled, express themselves very well and have a fairly good understanding of the world’s situation. They are interested in internationalism, are free from pressures if they want to pursue an Arts degree and broadly wish to live in a better world. They value their leisure and life style a lot and have tons of opportunities available, such as education, government welfare programs, individual sponsorships and corporate jobs.


However, with all these things easily available, they tend to hop around different things and don’t generally commit a long / a lot of time for a project in which they believe. Therefore, big initiatives don’t tend to be carried on and beliefs such as “it’s too difficult” and “there’s not enough money” are reinforced.


Talking about Australian society, this behaviour probably works. People are exposed to different jobs throughout their lives, have a great quality of life and are happy, whereas the economy runs smoothly and prices rise proportionally to the incomes. On the other hand, it’s a pity to have these many capable people doing so little to transform a very uneven and unfair world out there.

Another way of looking at the world

Through a reference in Brett's blog, I found World Mapper, an amazing website that visually disturbs us about the world's current state.

Wealth Distribution

Living over US$ 200 per day

Living up to US$ 10 per day

War Deaths

Mortality 1-4 Years Old

Environment

Biocapacity

Forest Loss

Species Extinct

Gender issues

Female Managers

Girls not at primary school

Celebrating Women's Work for Peace and Justice

Last night, I went to a fantastic panel called "Peace Messengers - A celebration of women's work for Peace Justice", part of a Nobel Prize Exhibition called Beautiful Minds, in UTS.

A little bit about the Nobel Prize:
Established by the inventor of the dynamite Albert Nobel (Sweden 1833-1896), it uses the interests of his fortune to award the year's most outstanding contributors in the world in the fields of Physics, Chemistry, Medicine, Literature, Economics and Peace. What a vision!

Reflections from the women's dialogue:
One of the women participating on the panel was a Masters Law student from Afghanistan, who said a couple of things that stayed in my mind.

First, when she talked to her family about studying abroad (after having her studies interrupted many times), her mother said she'll find her wherever she was and cut her head off. Coming from another woman, that's harsh.

Secondly, talking about the future, she said she wanted to come back to be a teacher, judge or politician. But that would totally depend on the current government, whether they will allow women to study, work and even leave their houses or not. I can understand that people who never had something (freedom, for instance) find it difficult to fight for it. But in the Afghan case, women pass from times when they have rights to times when they don't, depending on the government rules. I sincerely cannot understand how power orientation can vary dramatically and still be unquestionably obeyed. I've been thinking about this social dynamic since then, as it's the very opposite of how I believe(d) social forces worked.

Amazing Burmese Democracy Female Activist

Recently I’ve been finding myself more interested than generally in people who are outstanding for some reason, especially women. And the interesting thing about them is that all of them seem to search for honesty, not fearing too much change, exposure or other people’s judgment.

As I’m going to Asia in September, I’ve started to look for such examples there. And just found the most amazing one: a pro-democracy activist Aung San Suu Kyi from Burma (now officially called Myanmar), one of the closest military dictatorships in the whole world.

“Aung San Suu Kyi is the Nobel Prize-winning peace activist who is being detained by the military dictatorship of Myanmar. She is the daughter of Burmese General Aung San, a popular hero for helping to establish national independence (1948). Aung San was assassinated in July of 1947, and two year-old Suu Kyi left Burma and lived and studied in India and the United Kingdom. In 1988 she returned to Burma at a time of political upheaval and ended up leading the National League for Democracy (NLD) in opposition to the ruling military regime. Inspired by the non-violent practices of Mohandas Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr., she became a national hero and an international celebrity. She was placed under house arrest in 1989, but the NLD still convincingly won popular elections in 1990. The military junta refused to give up power and held Aung San under house arrest until 1995 (she won the Nobel Prize for peace in 1991). She was detained again from September 2000 until May 2002, during which time the NLD was having secret negotiations with the junta in an effort to break the political deadlock. In May 2003 she was again detained, taken into "protective custody" as confrontations between the NLD and government supporters increased. Despite diplomatic pressure and international pleas for her release, she continues to be held in Myanmar; in May of 2006 the ruling military junta announced an extension of her house arrest for an indefinite period.”

In such cases we perceive:
- How important it seems to be for leaders to leave their countries for a little while, in order to enlarge their perspective and consolidate their strength to fight against injustice at home;
- How little international recognitions and treaties can value at some situations, in the sense that a Nobel Prize Peace activist can be kept detained from spreading the word about peace in her own country.

End of the Australian CSIRO Sustainability Network

Since I arrived in Australia, I’ve been part of a Sustainability virtual network, fed by Elisabeth Heiji from CSIRO, an intelligent, sensitive and very coherent woman. Today the 14.000 people participating in the network received the newsletter with a note saying that was the last one, as CSIRO considered the program a proved success and would move resources to new initiatives.

I’d like to share with you some parts of Elisabeth’s last words to the network:

“Looking around, I see many of us thinking about sustainability – we may even be involved with it in our professional lives – but, whether as a result of inertia, complacency, the entrenched social systems around us, or a mixture of all of these, we are collectively doing very little personally in our homes and lifestyles. Actions such as replacing incandescent light bulbs with compact fluorescents and installing low-flow shower heads barely scratch the surface and, furthermore, are consumerist solutions based on trading new goods for old. They fail to tackle the very basic issue of our reverence for the natural world and behaviour towards it. When change occurs at this more intrinsic level, it can radically transform for the better both our own wellbeing and our environmental footprint.”

She also quoted Manfred Lenzen saying that “troubling is the fact that research has indicated that there is little correlation between knowledge and concern and action: emissions attributable to households are strongly linked to consumer spending, which doesn’t seem to be affected by environmental issues, even when these issues and problems are well known by those households”

If welfare doesn’t improve our harmony with the planet, why a bigger government?

If wealth doesn’t really bring comfort for societies, why focus on economic development?

And the biggest of all:

If education doesn’t drive action, what does? Should we use the consumerism and create trends and fashions? Should we restrict our freedom and impose certain behaviours through law? Or should we finally accept that we only radically change in extreme situations?

What do you think?

World Press Photo

Last weekend I went to the State Library to watch the World Press Photo prize winners.

World Press Photo is a non profit that organises the world's largest and most prestigious annual press photography contest. Prizewinning photographs are assembled into a traveling exhibition that is visited by over two million people in some 45 countries worldwide. The idea is to develop photojournalism and consequently enlarge people's conscience.

As you can imagine, the exhibition is impacting. Amongst all the very interesting facts and stories featuring news, contemporary dramas, sports, nature and people, one picture called a lot my attention. It was taken by Espen Rasmussen, from Norway, and shows over 3,000 people gather for Friday prayers facing icy winter conditions to pray at the ruins of the main mosque in Balakot, Pakistan, one of the towns worst hit by the Kashmir earthquake.

That picture transmitted a sense of wrong and injust; but also a strength coming from an incredible faith, that makes people pass through one more disaster, overcome another unfairness and pray for a better future. Better than what? Was this dream possible at any point of our history? How do out minds work so unreasonably?

See the picture here (can't publish it here because of the copyright).

More about aboriginal culture

The aboriginal culture is fascinating and, although it’s 40.000 years old, it many times represents some of the most progressive thoughts we hear nowadays.

To start with, before the European colonisation started, the population was fairly distributed across the whole the territory, and not 95% concentrated in the cost as it is now.

All their social and legal rules were based on an extensive number of stories from the Dreamtime, which essentially transmitted that nature is sacred and all beings are equally important, as well as the idea that the Dreamtime / Creation / Paradise is now (differently from us, they were more attached to places than to time).

Reflecting those stories in their social organisation, some of the beliefs and expressions were:
- Kids are independent, choose their mothers and are raised by the community
- Complex kinship system, guaranteeing stability, independence and constant interaction with other tribes
- No commerce, no exchange of goods, but presents in various situations and responsibility towards the well being of some of the community members
- Arranged marriage + sweethearts (extra marital relations), which would bring social stability without losing the individual pleasure
- Clear gender roles to be played: women's role is conserve, love, look for harmony; men's role is to destroy and create, understand nature's cycles and avoid super population, aggressiveness

I know the readers of Thoureau, Huxley and Quinn are exhilarated now ;o)

However, the very sad side of it from what I read, heard and noticed is that currently most aboriginals don't live essential aspects of their culture anymore (sharing, dependence on nature and self independence), neither benefit from modernity comforts. They often receive government support, are not nomads anymore, maintain very few ceremonies and are quite marginalized, without having a unique space in their own land.

Poems and quotes #4 - Kindness, Peace and Politics

"If governments were kind, they'd realize that conficts are resolved and wars prevented not by armies but by ordinary people.

[...]

If governments were kind, they would provide at least as much funding for people doing this work as they do for the military."

Scilla Elworthy

Amazing Ads

As a Marketer, I can't help noticing intelligent ads. And there are two which particularly called my attention recently (sorry forthe quality of the images, but one is scanned from a book and the other is a mobile phone picture).

The first, by Body Shop, is a celebration of women and help braking some paradigms stuck in our minds.

The second is part of an Oxfam campaign for people to behave responsibly in everything that they do: their resources usage, relationships, consumption and donations.
Enjoy!

It says: "Alex Elliot

Future prime minister, inventor, entrepreneur, philanthropist

(shown here with her brother Chris)"

It says:

"Florence Nightingale

For as little as $20 a month, I'm helping the 25 million of people in southern Africa living with HIV and AIDS.

What are you doing for others?"

Tension in Thailand

The only tense moment of my New Year’s was to receive a text message from my close friend Lucy, currently in Thailand, saying: “Hey hey, before you hear the news, I am safe and well. There have been bombs attacks in Bangkok, but we are at home. Happy new year!”

Once more, we care so much more about what happens everywhere when we have loved people spread around the world.

Apparently the feeling in Thailand is of security again.

Reflection: Interconnections

Recently, I had a conversation with a friend about what we can really and effectively do in order to improve our world a little bit. His point was that everything was extremely intricate that all changes didn’t seem to impact the system substantially.

Last night I went to the movies to watch Babel. In the same line as Traffic and Crash, the film shows different apparently independent situations, which are amazingly interconnected and influencing each other importantly.

All the three movies talk about the schizophrenia and inequality of our society. The interesting fact is that all the situations can be understood if analysed in isolation, but can never be genuinely comprehended or accepted in the broader context.

Adding to all this the facts that many people behave properly (in terms of fairness of their relations with other people and the world around them) and that some other feel the need to do something truly meaningful and transformative, my answer to my friend was: you gotta start!

Never before were as many critical movies produced and watched, was there a big range of visionary networks and organisations in action, and especially was there an extremely democratic and disseminated platform for communication and engagement: the internet and self governed web portals.

Therefore, even not visualising the whole impact of what we’re doing, we gotta start! Start not contributing to what we think is wrong (after all, we cannot do peace through war); doing what we makes sense to us; and engaging with people who share our beliefs.

We never know what we’ll end up achieving. All we know is when we’re passionate about what we’re doing, other ideas, opportunities and allies show up. And in a very interconnected world, the movement can achieve never imagines proportions!

To finalise, here comes a quote from a fantastic book I read recently:

"I am a crowd, obeying as many laws
As it has members. Chemically impure
Are all 'my' beings. There is no single cure
For what can never have a single cause."

Aldous Huxley, in The Island

Sustainability Learning Circle #2

This week, the theme of our sustainability learning circle was: “Do companies lead the global agenda?” The discussion was quite interesting! Some highlights:

- Companies definitely influence a lot the global decisions, for good (e.g. engaging SMEs and individual entrepreneurs in their distribution chain) and for bad (e.g. fighting for less health regulations or even stimulating war);

- In general, multinationals and governments are not extremely pro-active in driving change, but have a much more responsive attitude in face of public demands. In this sense, size is quite a limiting thing;

- In this sense, it’s more probable that the main paradigm changes will come from individuals, who are visionary, try beyond the others have tried and establish horizontal networks, both to design and spread the new inventions.

Coming back from such interesting conversation (around midnight), Lucy, Jem, Jhow and I played a little bit of soccer in the Centennial Park. Random, we???

Koori Kitchen

Yesterday, I took part in an AIESEC in Sydney project called Koori Kitchen. It was created by a quite visionary and hard working member, Tina, with the objectives of:
- Preserving aboriginal culture and proud amongst aboriginal teenagers from Redfern, a quite marginalised suburb in Sydney nowadays;
- Improve their knowledge about nutrition and pleasure for cooking, so that they can have a healthier diet and a better life.

In the process I learnt:
- Aboriginal communities still have a strong sense of group; so we should never highlight too much individual accomplishments;
- They are generally very quiet, and just let you interact with them once they trust you;
- They face very important social problems: poverty, drugs addiction, bad nutrition, discrimination, among others. As a result, their life expectation is significantly lower than other Australians;
- In my perception, Australians don' recognise them as legitimate Australians, seeing aboriginal communities as another minority group present in the country.

This Saturday, as part of my role, I was around while the kids were cooking, giving some instructions but mainly taking pictures. It was quite a nice experience to interact with them and realise that people are at the same time very equal and very unique. Very equal in a sense that they just need a inspiration, trust and a little bit of skills to do extraordinary things; and unique in the sense that their actions, dreams and contribution will always be different, once genetics, temperament and previous experiences shape each one of us differently.

Comparing to Brazil, the Australian aboriginal communities can be translated into:
- Our indigenous communities, also extensively disrespected by the colonisers, with less legal rights until recently and facing important social problems nowadays;
- Our poor communities, quite marginalised, with fewer opportunities and not as many role-models. The difference, in this case, is that in Brazil we cannot use an ethnicity as synonymous of poverty, even if black people are statistically poorer and face heaps more discrimination.

Thanks for the opportunity, guys! See you in another Koori Kitchen Saturday!

Internationalism

Something that really calls my attention is how Australia is international. Let me explain.

Although Australia is a quite isolated island, it’s very very connected to what happens in the world, especially in US and UK. Some facts to support this idea:

- People study lots of foreign models and the situation of other countries in university;
- One of the biggest selling point in my work is that we have access to “global best practices”;
- English people are extremely respected in the country;
- AIESEC members are always participating of other national committees, international conferences, AIESEC International and other international bodies;
- Australians travel overseas a lot!

As paradoxes are always present, though, when it comes to the official external policy, Australia is a very conservative country and is not taking part of some extremely relevant global efforts. They didn’t sign the Kyoto Protocol, to reduce greenhouse emissions; don’t support UN the corporate responsibility working group; and didn’t sign the Treaty against women discrimination.

Australian Personality #2 – Mr. Smith

While in the beach, I had the opportunity to meet Mr. Smith (picture below). Mr. Smith was in the beach in the end of the afternoon, walking around with his metal detector!?! My first (dumb) thought was that he was looking for land mines. As I was too curious not to talk to him, I approached him and we had a very pleasant conversation. He told me he was looking for coins, which people accidentally drop. He explained me everything about this market: all you need to do if by a metal detector, commonly sold in tools stores; in winter, you don't find as many coins; on the other hand, there is a lot of competition in summer; etc.



Besides making a living, Ms Smith is a very popular character in the beach, as everybody knows him and many people look for him when they lose their mobiles, watches, cameras and so on.

A true personality!

Homosexuality

I’m very impressed on how Australians lead with homosexuality. Three examples will illustrate what I want to express:

- In my first week of work, I saw the cutest guy in my office (in the office, a quite formal environment) with a t-shirt saying “sorry girls, I’m gay”;

- About 2 weeks ago, I was in a pub with some friends of a guy that I met and we starting commenting about the hot people present in the place. Without ceremony, he revealed he was bisexual and felt attracted by a specific guy;

- Today, the most curious of all. One of my female colleagues saw some papers in my desk and asked: are we working with this company? How cool! My girlfriend works there.

I used to consider myself very open-minded and without prejudices. But I need to admit that this kind of situation is not normal for me, as I followed how hard it was for all my Brazilian gay friends stand up and assume their sexuality.

In Sydney, differently, it doesn’t seem to be a big deal. Some facts:

- The city is the second biggest gay city in the world (the first is San Francisco, in US);

- It hosts maybe the most famous gay parade in the world;

- There’s a big area close to the city centre (and relatively close to where I live) where many gays live and have fun, in many pubs, cafes, gyms and clubs;

- I’m not sure about legal rights – I’d better research about that!

- It’s quite common to see gay couples walking hand-by-hand in the streets.

Seems like Sydney citizens really live diversity and worry more about enjoying life than following rules. And it seems they live much lighter, as a result. I have the impression this doesn’t happen out of the big cities, though, at least when the topic is homosexuality.

Not that foreigner

Australia hosts a good amount of foreigners in the country.

Some data:

- One third (!!!) of the population of Sydney is comprised by foreigners;

- The biggest number of foreigners is from UK;

- Besides English, the most spoken languages are Chinese, Arabic and Spanish.

Some facts:

- According to Australian students, about 10% of the university students are foreigners, generally Asian, and generally in some sort of exchange program;

- In AIESEC, there are several members with foreign parents or born in other countries, such as China, Japan, UK and Lebanon;

- In my team at work (6 people), we come from 5 different countries: UK, Australia, New Zealand, Philippines and Brazil ;o)

- Coming back home today (20 minutes walk), I heard at least 4 other languages being spoken in the streets: Chinese, Spanish, Polish and some other eastern European that I didn’t identify.

Well, all this reflection started because yesterday was cold and rainy, and I entered a Chinese restaurant in order to have a soup. The place was completely Chinese: the food, the attendant, the decoration, all the other people in the place and even the bill!

In such a place, I don't feel that foreigner...

Middle East talks

On my 3rd day of work, I took a lift back home with John, one of the company directors. John is English, around 35 years old, very friendly and worked for Cola-Cola in various countries, including Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Yemen.

Talking about tolerance and gender issues, John said that the countries are quite different. In Yemen, they are quite tolerant with western women; in Egypt, they would see them as sluts; and in Saudi Arabia as blasphemous. The whole problem is all this “structure” is supported by local governors, who posses 90% of the wealth and do not really live the things they preach.

Continuing our Middle East talk and moving to the conflicts subject, I said that many times I didn’t really see a solution for the area (or to Brazilian drug dealing in slums), as the complexity is huge and there are no compromised efforts towards solving the problem.

John, on the other hand, said everything people need is hope and the possibility to have security, a house and a family. Supporting that affirmation, he brought the IRA episodes in UK, which happened in the last decades of the 20th century. Who wouldn’t prefer peace and opportunities to insecurity and war?

Very deep and political, I know…