Sep 9, 2006 10:20:00 AM cite

Tania Bruguera: This is a very complicated question because precisely the economy is a more fundamental way of talking of exchange. Not always of the exchange of money, it can often be the exchange of money with objects, the exchange of ideas, it can be the exchange of actions. The economy is not only guided by money and I think that one of the things which have happened is that you always see the economic system related with money. Therefore it is logical that when a system is guided by money all of the decisions will define based on an efficiency of money [inaudible]. But if you refer to the economy as a system of exchange, which part play ethics, which part plays a whole conglomerate of ideas, of concepts concerning humanity, concerning the own process of exchange and change. Maybe one could take decisions which could not have exactly a tendency or a prosperity which is countable in money but in another element. I don´t know, maybe it could be a system guided by a kind of ethics instead of only money. I think that there was a reduction of terms, there has been a reduction and I think it is concerned with a capitalist system, which has dealed with regarding the economy every time more just like a system of profit and loss at the monetary level. But if one could integrate others, this means ethics and even an autoevaluation of the process of change and exchange which you autoanalize, and rather question and why this is done, how and for what it is done instead of how much profit you will make with it. Maybe this would be a possible solution.

by Tania Bruguera

Sep 9, 2006 10:20:00 AM cite

Tavis Smiley: I am not an expert in this area, but I’m not certain that an economic system can be devised that is not in conflict on some level with human, animal, or planet rights. Conflict is a part of life and public policy. There is no perfect public policy. That said, we can in fact develop an economic system that is not tilted against human, animal, or planet rights, and that means we have to take these things into consideration. And quite frankly most of those persons who drive our economic system care only about money. They care only about profit. So I’m not certain that we can create a system that doesn’t conflict at all with human, animal, or planet rights, but we certainly can have people who run the system who care more about these other areas of concern and fight harder and are more aggressive about trying to find a balance amongst our economic systems and our ecological systems. But again it begins; it has to begin with people who care about human, animal, or planet rights. Quite frankly, and not to cast aspersions on everyone in the economic system, there are too many people who don’t care, don’t value those concerns in the way that they should. We need to change that.

by Tavis Smiley

Sep 9, 2006 10:20:00 AM cite

Tegla Loroupe: Answertext will be available soon.

by Tegla Loroupe

Sep 9, 2006 10:20:00 AM cite

Thenmozhi Soundararajan: I think one of the things that’s very interesting about the time that we live in is that I think we are moving past having leaders who actually define the economic agenda for mass parts of the world. I don’t think we need to be caught between a Western dichotomy or a Communist dichotomy by leaders that are from mostly the North. I think the question around just economic systems whether it’s just relationships of labor, just relationships with the environment and just relationships with each other in general, is really something that’s going to be decided at a local level. I think the more that we can really look at distributive models of leadership, distributive models of power where people are actually able to create what that means for themselves on the ground in their local community, I think we’ll see the local become global as opposed to what we have seen in the past where what’s happened globally has to be forced locally. I think there is a dissonance with people’s local traditions, with their local values, and the way that they can truly internalize what that means. I feel like what I’ve seen around the way people have incorporated human rights and maybe what we need to look at is connecting human rights with a body of work that looks at the rights as a planet and the rights of animals; is that when we look at what we care about in terms of [sentiency], I think that if we can hold those things to be true in whatever systems we create in our society, I think that’s one way to look at creating that system. But my number one thing that I would actually say to begin with is that I don’t think we actually want to start with saying this is meta solution for all peoples in all times in all spaces, but really allow people to decide that locally, regionally and based on their own cultural traditions and values.

by Thenmozhi Soundararajan

Sep 9, 2006 10:20:00 AM cite

Tu Weiming: The whole question about the so-called humanization of economics is very complex, and this new understanding that economy ought to be a form of human flourishing, for example, the father of economics, Adam Smith, in fact consider himself very much a moral philosopher thinking about human relationships in terms of mutual human flourishing. In the Chinese case, economics sometimes is considered as managing the world. If you try to manage the world, you have to understand the human species is an integral part of a larger nature, and bio-diversity is an important part of human existence. Economics is not simply a mechanism of handling the economic situation, it has broad political implications, it has extremely important feature not only in economy but in society and culture in this particular sense that the new kind of humanized economy is something that may have far reaching implications for all people in the world. And it is in this sense that economics should be liberated from simply the mechanism of the distribution of power and wealth. It should be understood as a mechanism of human flourishing in the broadest and comprehensive manner. It is in this particular sense that economics ought to be developed not simply for the sake of the human species but for the idea of rights that would enhance the importance of the biodiversity for the eventual development of the human species as a whole. Economics, in this particular sense, is not simply a science of the distribution of wealth but as Adam Smith pointed out earlier, that economics has moral sciences ought to take into consideration all aspects of the human experience as a way of dealing with the whole situation.

by Tu Weiming

Sep 9, 2006 10:20:00 AM cite

Udi Aloni: I really believe that if we concentrate on the true rights and needs of humans the rest will follow. If we really understand the true needs of humankind we also understand that animal and planets are part of it. So I don't have to divide it to three different issues. I would say let’s concentrate on what’s good to human but what's really good to human, not in the short term, in the long term. And the rest will just fall into this concept. Because they are not in contradict to each other. They are complementary to each other.

by Udi Aloni

Sep 9, 2006 10:20:00 AM cite

Valentina Melnikova: First of all it is possible to reduce war expenditures. The mankind spends enormous human and economical resources, spends its intellect to develop weapons of destruction and to prepare people for war. Is it possible to deflect these resources for for paeceful purposes? Yes, it is possible if every community would say “We want to live on the clean planet. We want to save the world of animals and plants. We don’t want to have wars.”

by Valentina Melnikova

Sep 9, 2006 10:20:00 AM cite

Vesna Pesic: Answertext will be available soon.

by Vesna Pesic

Sep 9, 2006 10:20:00 AM cite

Viviana Figueroa: An economic system that would not harm the rights of human beings, animals or those of the planet, actually is an economic system, I think here the word not to harm does not exist, instead it must be an economic system which develops in a way, so to speak in an accurate balance, inclosing nature and each living creature. From the point of our global vision, it is not that we may not make use of the natural resources, as if we were animals, or not respect all that which constitutes mother nature, the Pacha Mama our earth, but rather be respectful by maintaining a balance. If we take something away from nature, for example by hunting a guanaco or a [chahama], we have to take only the most necessary and sufficient of it for our consumption, without having a sense of destruction towards nature or taking advantage of an overexploitation of nature. By keeping up a respectful relationship with mother nature we are allowed to have places on earth with a huge biodiversity, many different animals and plants,. An economic system should be based on respect, on an accurate balance between all the living creatures and nature. It is not a matter of harming or not, because actually you could be referring to as harmful to eat an animal, and that is not possible in my opinion. Instead, what should be taken is the necessary and sufficient. For that reason, one of the indigenous people of Argentina for example, the wichí, only take as food what is needed for one day, and so does not take everything and accumulate it in an immoderate way, disadvantaging others. For example in my home town, water is used moderately by each one of the community members, so that nobody produces more and others therefore less. Therewith, in my opinion an economic system must consider all these situations, and by doing that we can really obtain a just and balanced development between all the living creatures, and so be able to preserve nature.

by Viviana Figueroa

Sep 9, 2006 10:20:00 AM cite

Wim Wenders: It’s hard to conceive of an economic system that would neither exploit human rights nor the Earth’s with its plant life and animal life. Given that there are 6.5 billion people on this planet, I think we could be entirely happy already and it would be already utopian enough if man was not man’s worst enemy, if equality and liberty and fraternity could be established at the basis of worldwide economics. The rest the respect for the animals and the planet, I feel, would come out automatically. Such a humanity where man is no longer man’s enemy would respect the Earth’s very naturally all by themselves. Right now with the balance of rich and poor, of privileged and underprivileged, being completely out of control, it is no wonder that we mistreat the land and that our economics are out of whack. The present – hey, the present economic system largely controls us instead of mankind governing it. -- They're trying to put an umbrella here. I wish we can pan over and see this effort. And they’ve given us all sun lotion. -- Smoke is rising; we’re going to the next question. What is it?

by Wim Wenders

Sep 9, 2006 10:20:00 AM cite

Yungchen Lhamo: I think human -- we human think we are on this planet and if we think all the species and then the nature, we are connected and then we won’t have like so many tortures to the species. I think -- and we need to connect the -- we need to connect land and we need to connect to the species and we are connected and I believe.

by Yungchen Lhamo