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118 responses | 2 votes

Aug 30, 2006 3:14:44 PM cite

Will it now take a global government to solve what were once considered national or regional issues yet now affect us all?

by Michelle Twohig

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Jan 24, 2008 6:40:10 PM cite

Which headline do you choose for the Future? Developed countries to dial down their tech. so other countries can "catch up" as equals. or Developed countries to invest time and money to help build advanced infrastructure in developing nations.

by HRamko

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Nov 15, 2007 4:09:21 AM cite

Will it now take a global government to solve what were once considered national or regional issues yet now affect us all? There are inherent problems with forming any government. When a government is formed no matter how altruistic it may be at first, soon it becomes corrupt and then eventually it degrades to a high degree of corruption, see the USA as the prime example. The reason this happens is the negative side of what we refer to as human nature but as you can imagine is neither humane nor just. One can hope mans nature is good but the problem is the bad side of human nature has been throughout history aligned with power and greed. We have not yet come close to the place where a world government based on human ethics, peace and compassion can be implemented. There are those who would say I am wrong, these are the people who are as I write forming the NOW (new world order). They are greedy capitalist elitists; if they have they way we are doomed.

by Thai sean

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Sep 15, 2006 3:52:28 AM cite

There needs to be a clear understanding that every person on this planet has the right to self-determination, even if that determination is one you/we/they disagree with. This said however, if your/our/theirs determination infringes or invades anyone else?s determination, regardless over whether you/we/they think you/we/they are more right, then you/we/they must withdraw. For that fact is, there is no such thing as right or wrong determination, just determination.

by RedSevenOne

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Sep 9, 2006 4:29:59 PM cite

It will take more then a global government, without a strong global community their will be no accountability and benefit sharing for all. All people need to be involved to make the value change happen, which is needed to solve global problems.

by hendrik@druknet.bt

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Antoschka - Ekaterina Moshaeva: Of course, because the time is coming, because now we have this opposition between America, European countries, Russia, China, and India. We broke new cracks like in the book of Antoine de Saint-Exupéry. He writes about baobabs: when they are grown up, they break the planet. We are with our [groups] like these baobabs. We must have our own government. Of course we can live in our houses, countries our social structures and have people who rule or organise this. But we must have a global government which would look from the top, like astronauts look from the space on our Earth and see how small and precious it is. And when they come back their minds are changed. People, who have had a clinical death and has almost been gone out of their bodies, may be having seen the Earth, how precious and fragile is our life, our security. To understand this we must build this government, where people would give their voices and their advices how to save our civilisation, not only our village, town, community or country, but the whole Earth. We must think about this. The time is [reigning], and we have such a situation, that it might be too late. And we live on it. And after this if we don’t do this, we wouldn’t have questions to answer, because there would be no civilisation at all.

by Antoschka - Ekaterina Moshaeva

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Abbas Beydoun: Yes, when this government represents all people like poor and rich or weak and strong, why not? When this government treats all people equally without discrimination, why not? United Nations was a dream in the past, but it is difficult to talk about equality or justice as long as there are differences between rich and pool people for example.

by Abbas Beydoun

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Alvaro Restrepo: I think that an organization like the United Nations should be much more effective. It should really be a collective will that rules the world. But we perceive that the United Nations are not very effective concerning recent problems like the war in Iraq or other problems when they were completeley incapable against the objectives of the most powerful country of the planet. In my opinion this country which declared itself to be the head and the government of the planet is making some mistakes that will be regretted and that humanity will not be able to change. All empires have a moment of decadence, but the decadence of the North American empire is different to the decadence of other countries. The decadence of the North American empire will lead to the fall of all of us because we depend on their qualities and their strategies that they made themselves. And this is a tragedy. The fall of the global government may be the fall of the whole world.

by Alvaro Restrepo

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Ana Lucy Bengochea:

by Ana Lucy Bengochea

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Andries Botha: Good afternoon Michelle. You know, there used to be a time when people were able to govern themselves.Where, you know, the regionalism, or the locality, or the local, was able to take care of itself. The world has become a global environment because it has been engineered economically to do so. It’s because it’s an economic system requires a global marketplace in order for capital, and for a particular mode of government to come into being. So you know, it kind of manifests itself, it kind of becomes what certain people have made it to be. I think the delicacy of a local form of government, the delicacy, something which is nuanced at a local level, has been able to govern itself. It’s just suddenly become non-functional, inappropriate, and unable to cope in a global environment. So I think the purpose of globality is to create global forms of government. We’re finding the European common market. And it’s all got to do with zones of economic activity. You know it doesn’t necessarily have to be that way. Global government has now become an inevitability certainly because a world of leadership is – leadership, global leadership has forced it in that way. I don’t believe it will take global government to solve regional issues. It’s not interested in national or regional issues. It’s only interested in global issues. And you know it has no interest in the small or the delicately nuanced issues of difference. It’s all about homogeneity and conformity. I really think that we need to be particularly vigilant about this, and alert, you know. I don’t know what we can do about this. But I think large is – small is large. Large is cumbersome, and in the end I don’t believe sustainable, you know. It’s sustainable on a crude, macro level, but it’ll never answer. The human nuancing necessary to take care of the subtle differences that exist and need to be respected across the national and geo[inaudible]

by Andries Botha

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Angaangaq Lyberth: Michelle, when I look at your question I realize how we have been robbed of the events of the world. It is like they have hijacked us all and we are allowing it to happen. Yes, it’s going to have to take a world government to solve the simplest issues on the world in which we live. But this time it’s going to be done globally rather than locally. Because locally we have not been able to do that. Did you know that? Within the municipality we have not been govern ourself to the best of the advancement of the society in which we live. So if we don’t have that, what have we got? What have you and I got when we cannot even in our municipal boundaries live a life to the fullest both materially and spiritually? Ponder upon it. Yes, it’s going to have to take much bigger governments to resolve the simplest issues. I wish it didn’t have to be. But then again mankind has yet to grow up to his own potential. It takes a long time doesn’t it? And look at the price we have to pay. We have to pay with lives upon lives upon lives, resources upon resources upon resources, to be what we are now. And it did not work. The way we know the calendar is coming to an end. When it comes to an end what will we do? Yes, I wish I had the answer. I wish I had the answer. I wish I had the answer for your question. Help me find the answer. Help me find the answer. Thank you.

by Angaangaq Lyberth

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Anthony Arnove: I think the question gets at a crucial point, which is the problems we confront in the world today are global problems. They are not problems that have national boundaries. There is not a problem that exists only among state or local boundaries. The problems we confront today are global problems. But, the question raised is the question of a global government, and I think that the real solution is not global government, but global movements. The idea usually, as I say with a global government, is of institutions like the United Nations, which could somehow become an instrument for global decision-making and rule. The problem is the United Nations is an undemocratic institution. The representatives of states at the UN are not elected. They represent very narrow interests within their own states. And the UN itself is dominated by the United States, and a handful of other powers who have effective control. And the reality is we need global movements from below, popular movements, social movement that can confront the power of states and that can begin to create international institutions, democratic participatory decision-making institutions from the ground up, from the grass roots. The World Social Forum is just the beginning of an expression of that aspiration. But, the forum right now is a meeting space. It is a forum for dialog, but not for decision-making and not for taking action. We need to transform that and develop new institutions that reach across national boundaries, but become action bodies, become decision and action taking bodies, because the problems we are confronting are urgent and will only be changed not through dialog but through protests, through struggle.

by Anthony Arnove

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Anuradha Koirala: I don’t think -- we can dream of global government, but I don’t simply think is [inaudible] regional competition of our development and [inaudible]. And then to solve the regional problems of our governments, [inaudible] and ... First the national government first try to solve the problem and then it should go to regional and solve the problem but if we cannot solve the problem, so if do not issues which are not solved by a national or regional government can we take it to the global government? But we cannot think of a local government as yet. We can think of having a networking of national, regional, or global government are not however global.

by Anuradha Koirala

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Anuradha Mittal: I think it’s not about needing a global government, but what we are going to need is global governance. Now that’s in real deficit today. It is true when we look at some of the most important issues of the time, hunger. It is not just something happening in Asia, Africa, or Latin America; it is to be found in rich Western nations as well. In the United States, almost 36 million Americans are considered food insecure. So, when we look at some of those issues, the absence of healthcare, I mean, over 45 million Americans have no health insurance. If we look at increasing poverty figures, again poverty is endemic to all parts of the world and that is because of the absence of global governance and that’s what we do need. It is not about one global government because it cannot be the model of the UN Security Council where basically the empires, the superpowers, the ex-colonial powers are still in power. But we will need global governance where basically countries, regions can actually determine what is best for them, where the people of those countries of the region can determine what kind of policies they want. So, it is not about one government for all because those attempts have been made through the World Trade Organization, one government for all to regulate all. We are looking for a different kind of governance; and it is really about global governance which really is about everyone in this world having a right to participate in the governments, to have a government which respects their wishes, their desires, which fulfills the obligations in terms of respecting the human rights.

by Anuradha Mittal

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Ashok Gangadean: I like this question because it really opens up the fact that we are in a global age. Which means that we are in a new space in which the old borders of national boundaries and so forth don’t carry the same weight as it did in earlier times. We have to reconsider all of those borders. Because the problems we face on the planet today are global problems stemming across all borders. Global warming. Issues of poverty. Issues of degradation of the climate. Pollution knows no borders. Issues of AIDS, whether it's in Africa or any part of the world. Any endemic, any pandemic, all of these issues spread across. They are common human problems. And we have to think in a global way, as global citizens, which is a more higher integral space. And I’m not sure of the global government; I don’t like that word. A lot of people are scared of the idea of one world government. And I think we should be very cautious about that. Because I think the new model of a high culture based on global consciousness and global spirituality is one that really has local autonomy and local governance and local wisdom, dealing with the local issues in a global way and global issues in a local way. I think there is a higher form of integral, holistic consciousness of self-organization and self governance, in which people trusting people to regulate themselves. Not to have a strong monolithic government imposing its will and intervention. Perhaps some kind of force like that is required in transition. Maybe a strong UN to intervene against national borders and the so-called sanctity and sovereignty of national borders. That may take a transition. But the ideal would be not to have imposed external government. But local ecologies and communities and self-regulation, but governed by their own global awareness and global consciousness and global values of the dignity of all life and humanity moving together in a dialogic, mutual way of mutual co-creation, cooperation, consultation to solve our collective problems. That’s the model, I think, that we need to see on the planet. And I think that hope will come with a new awakened culture.

by Ashok Gangadean

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Audrey Kitagawa: Well, I think that we'll always have to have local governments who are closer to the people be able to create laws to legislate the problems that local governments and peoples face together. There are global challenges that we have faced that caused the creation of the League of Nations and now the United Nations. The question becomes has a governmental, a worldwide governmental organization been effective in being able to address these global challenges and issues. We've had 60 years of the United Nations to be able to work through these global issues and the question becomes has it been effective? It's very difficult to have an international organization alone that is not fully supported, that is not properly funded be effective. So we need to look at that as well. We also have the creation of regional organizations like the African Union, and we also have the European Union, so these are regional organizations that seek to address issues within their regions but also have a view towards their role on the international stage. So I think there is a concurrence of action as well as views, the local, the regional, as well as the international, that all act together. But I think there is an understanding that no one international organization can handle all of the global issues and that regional as well as local governments are also important to all work together to be able to address these issues that are local, national, and international.

by Audrey Kitagawa

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Avi Primor: At one point in the future we will probably have a global government, and I believe that a global government will be necessary and efficient. But we are far from ready for this. Mainly, because we are all very much different from each other. We are not compareable. If we consider ourselves to be thinking in a european way, or in an american way, then we believe that we all share the same values and criteria and thus might possibly have a common or global government in the future. But this is not possible yet, we are not ready for this as well. We have to consider how long it takes to build the European Union. And the EU consists of states sharing a common history, a common culture, common experiences and a common knowledge from the Second World War, just having a lot in common. And even so the EU does not have a uniform government yet. The tradition is still stronger, the cultures, the languages. And if you now try to compare Europe and the Middle East, or Southamerica, or Southeast Asia, or Africa, there are huge differences. Sometimes those differences are as deep as an abyss. Well, a global government, very far from it indeed. But even if it will be possible to build a global government some time in the future, there will be huge differences within this government. Because in the EU there is a principle that can be made even more efficient on the highest level, which needs to be built on a federal system. And what will be more effective on a national level should stay on a national level or even on a regional level. It is important that every region should be capable to look after its own problems. So, even if there will be a global government, there will be increasingly autonomous power as well. But should we try to force a global government into existence now against nature or prematurely, we will not succeed. Because there still is the phenomenon of civil war, and even in a common national setting there is still the possibility of war breaking out. Thus, if there was a global government, there might be so-called civil wars between ... ?

by Avi Primor

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Sep 9, 2006 1:40:00 PM cite

Benjamin Fahrer: So what are the national and regional issues that now affect us all? And if we take in context of climate and take climate change, to come up with a global government to solve this problem or to come up with a global government to solve our health care, or solve our lack of food? It’s too general; a global government to come up with a solution that would fix everything is too general. Our world is still diverse and so organic that these regional -- what would be better is if we have regional local governments that were working with a global government. And these are already in place, and really, there's just not to communication, there's not the information, the cooperation. There’s a competition not a cooperation between these entities. But we need to have more of cooperation between the local and the regional, the national, and the global governments of the world. We can’t have the national government trump the global government. We can’t have national government trump the local. We have, everything needs to be in balance, and more balance. And that, these issues are so big, but yet they start locally, as there common term use a lot in our country which is, “Think globally, act locally,” and you can act locally and yet today, our global environment, because of technology and different ways of communication and transportation, we live more in the global stage. But still, is our local environment is the people we sit next to, but then we have affects upon. So, we need to act in that localized way, but then can ripple out into an affect globally. Small solutions to big problems, lots of them, lots and lots. We need a bio-diversity of small solutions to address these diverse problems at a global scale.

by Benjamin Fahrer

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