Governance and Conflict

Global Challenges Excerpt from the 2010 State of the Future reports

This section includes the actions that have been suggested to address the following challenges:

Democratization

How can genuine democracy emerge from authoritarian regimes? [Challenge 4]

SUGGESTED ACTIONS TO ADDRESS THIS CHALLENGE WITH A RANGE OF VIEWS

These actions were distilled from suggestion made by the Millennium Project experts' panel. Following each action are comments and suggestions from Millennium Project participants through interviews, web page, and other collaborations. Generally, each paragraph comes from another source/participant; hence, there might be some inconsistencies in the views expressed.

4.1 Make development assistance and loans from international organizations dependent on progress toward democracy.

This type of development assistance worked in both Malawi and Kenya. Another possible road to achieving this action would be to make a distinction between humanitarian and development assistance.

External aid to foster democracy should be provided openly wherever possible. Covert action designed to alter the affairs of a foreign society is itself anti-democratic. Democratic aid also ought to serve the purpose of empowering internal political actors. The approach followed by agencies such as the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI) and USAID in the former Yugoslavia is admirable and ought to be pursued in the future. NDI and USAID channeled funding toward encouraging local political leaders to forge alliances in favor of democracy.

Development assistance should only be given with concrete cooperation and participation of those to be helped.

Peaceful elections in Niger and Guinea-Bissau showed it was possible to have elections even in times of recent conflicts. In recent years, humanitarian aid has changed dramatically, moving beyond the mere delivery of short-term relief toward attempting to influence governance, social inclusion and social structures. Much hope then has been placed on democracy initiatives as a possible solution to protracted complex emergencies. The electoral rules, timing, structures and post-election power-sharing arrangements determine whether peace holds (Nicaragua, Mozambique, El Salvador, sometimes in Cambodia), fails (Angola, Burundi, Burma, Afghanistan, Liberia, perhaps Rwanda) or remains fragile (Haiti, Tajikistan, Indonesia).

Yet, some say multilateral sanctions can help, but not development assistance conditionality. It is not wise to provide aid on the basis of the political systems, but on the basis of particular projects.

Development of democratic institutions has to grow from the inside of a nation, not imposed from outside.

All assistance should not be dependent on this, since it is difficult to define the phases of democratic development. In such situations, questions of who will be referees and what their interests are need to be addressed in a careful manner. Loans should not be extended to brutal dictatorships.

Economic stability and the development of a stable middle class, like democracies, are sighted as keys to reducing religious and ethnic violence. Recently Greek officials have asked for the admittance of the Balkan states to the EU to stabilize the region, increase prosperity, and ease tensions.

Currently, wealthy countries like America dictate international organizations like the IMF. To help the transformation to democracies, international organizations should seek consensus from national and regional organizations like the European Union and SAARC.

4.2 Increase support and visibility of UN Electoral Units, which aid governments in election design, management, and monitoring.

A monograph of the National Research Council compares 4 major types of election systems and finds that election prospects are heavily dependent on demographic & social structure; for example, the ideal number of major social groups is 3 or 4, beyond which "the respective needs of transitional vs. consolidated democracies are quite different. The most important factor for democratic transition in electoral terms is a system that maximizes inclusiveness, is clearly fair to all parties, & presents minimal areas for potential pre-election conflicts, such as drawing of electoral boundaries. Goals that are maximized by some form of regional or national list can lead to election of a grand or oversized coalition govt. By contrast, the priorities of a consolidated democracy may be more concerned with crafting a system, which gives rise to a minimal winning coalition or single party government, is accountable in geographic and policy terms, and allows voters to throw out a government. The authors find that systems that promote minority group representation do not at the same time ensure minority influence. Proportionality in representation and incentives for interethnic accommodation are not the same thing.

Over 80 elections have been monitored and more are scheduled. The system is working satisfactorily today. For the most part, this is acceptable, but political parties should take the lead and show keen interest.

Many resources have gone to the agenda of peace at the expense of development assistance.

The key word is visibility.

Are societies that have lived under dictatorships for a long time ready for democratic elections and traditions?

Is it enough to develop a necessary legislative base and to provide a democratic election? Can such a population understand its own interests and responsible roles in elections?

The process of democratization is not simply copying a model; it is a painful process of transformation. International institutions can help by giving information about world experiences and different policies, but they should not force the process.

4.3 Support short wave, AM, and FM radio transmissions to areas with less access to alternative sources of news.

CNN and BBC are making it difficult for people to remain ignorant.

People in dictatorships are hungry for information, communications, and personal contact with other countries.

Increasing all kinds of linkages is necessary because isolation is a primary cause of poverty and support for dictatorships.

I’m 100% in favor of this, initiated by bilateral and multilateral assistance, but not those alternative radio stations that incite conflict like the one that incited the Hutu to kill the Tutsi. There should be some council to prevent such extremist content.

With oversight by NGOs or international organizations to promote democracy, respect, and balanced news reporting, these linkages could be successful. For example, closing the radio stations in Bosnia that spread messages of hate was an appropriate action.

The UN Department of Public Information should provide information to radio stations, but it should not lead in creating alternative stations, except where UN Peacekeeping forces are stationed.

Internet is another way to organize relationships. On the other hand, few have access and there is no cultural understanding of Internet culture; hence, radio makes sense. This is not an attractive proposition as visual media is so cheap and is spreading rapidly worldwide. Privatization and free media are the solutions. We are moving towards them.

4.4 Conduct (via UNDP, UNU, IMF, International Court, universities, NGOs like Transparency International, OAU, and related organizations) advanced training programs and seminars for senior political officials to discuss with their international peers successful transition strategies in the areas of the rule of law, respect for human rights, free media, tolerance of political opposition, free elections, and an independent civil society.

Leaders with strong moral foundations should be utilized in the conducting of these programs. It also needs to be agreed that UN agencies and NGOs should be the leaders in these types of programs. A charter on democracy should be evolved, something like the human rights declaration that can be signed by all countries. Retired judges are the best persons to take the lead.

Perhaps, we could pass a resolution at the speaker’s conference. The discussions should analyze the problems of transitional society and develop recommendations based on the trends of evolution, rather than to try to impose stereotypical ways of thinking and acting.

Yes, but there is the danger of the export of certain development models; we should be aware of cultural identity.

Yes, but guarantee that the approach is not partial to some private interests.

Seminars have little effectiveness.

4.5 Create and implement a “global partnership for development” as a partnership between high-income countries and those with less industrial and entrepreneurial cultures.

This has become the UN Millennium Development Goal Number 8, though it seems to be a general catch all for miscellaneous goals. See the attached CD-ROM chapter on Global Partnership for Development for greater detail on how to create it by a study lead by the Central European Node of the Millennium Project.

Partnership is preferable, although skepticism surrounds the role of aid from abroad. A moral compact is needed for a long-term collaboration and mutual relations, not a quick and massive infusion of assistance in one direction.

UN member nations feel that they are either part of those that assist or those that are assisted, but do feel unity as all are citizens of the world. Awareness of instability is emerging.

The UNDP is a crucial organization that places emphasis on the important connection between economic growth and democracy. In many ways, progress is tightly bound to economics, business, and profit. One reason for Africa's troubles is its lack of adequate institutions. When information and capital circulate freely in a country, central authority diminishes and democracy will spread. Open markets in poorer countries with authoritarian regimes will enhance their development.

A global Marshall Plan would not be needed if the world economy included fair prices for agricultural products from developing countries, including the cost of tropical rainforest as absorbers of CO2, and other items not currently included in the price of items, but are a true cost of production. Some argue there are not enough resources to conduct a Marshall Plan for the whole world. This is where questions of global ethics come into play a vital role. Corporations' actions as citizens need to be assessed, and the overall negative impacts of their actions on the global community need to be weighed against the overall benefits the corporation provides. The UN Global Compact is one strategy to address this.

Make it more focused on nations that have some background for modernization (educational, financial, and intellectual), such as European countries in transition. Perhaps yes, but this could be abused, especially by elites.

Criteria should be made by independent international organizations (probably the UN). No single country should have control over these organizations, and over time, a set of international guidelines would evolve. The quantum of aid given to a country should depend on the output.

Good, but I am a little bit skeptical how to realize it. As for China, let them get rich. Do not worry about how their development will affect the world’s environment. There is much data that shows that the environment degrades at first during the development process, but as the country gets richer, the environment improves.

4.6 Give more force to human rights; define when human rights are abused to the point that national sovereignty is less important than them (international rights to regulate the global environment via increased UN enforcement powers).

Genocide is a clear reason for intervention. Of course, human rights are more important than national sovereignty. Codes could be evolved as have been before for war crimes. Yet, this could be very problematic. Who will define the degree to which human rights have to be abused in order for us to “break” national sovereignty?

Better to ask how to enforce human rights than to ask when protection of human rights is more important than sovereignty. Dealing with this question is central to international affairs today....

International organizations and NGOs should collaborate to define the gradations....

The evolving concept, definitions, and measurements of state killing (democide) could become an important indictor to measure progress on this action.

The UN Security Council and the General Assembly should use sanctions for those who abuse human rights.... Get national governments to make it national policy, in addition to a UN statement. The US Department of State issues an annual human rights report, which has become the annual state of human rights around the world.

The concept of human rights is complex. Social rights under socialist dictatorship regimes were supported better, but private rights were not defended. Today, in some countries in transition, social rights are not honored. Totalitarianism is increasing, increasing poverty. In addition, all positive achievements from socialist regimes have been lost. Global attention is very important, but these issues tend to be solved regionally. UN budgets/organizational capacity is too small to solve these problems. World society is not ready to do it yet. In addition, we face different organizational and political problems.

War does not end with diplomatic treaties, such as Bosnia, but we need a new way of thinking and operating. The limited peace-keeping authority of the UN hinders its ability to transmit a global image as a security agency and agent of human rights. The UN needs to make its structures more democratic to increase its credibility.

4.7 Actively promote democracy by having existing democracies work with indigenous NGO’s.

Yes, but some “indigenous” NGOs are externally funded agents of foreign powers. Too often the most visible official urban NGOs are chosen rather than informal rural grass-roots organizations. Work with NGO’s coordinating committees and Africa 2000 Network that coordinate among such committees. Real NGOs are autonomous from any state power.

NGOs, yes, but responsibility should not be on the NGOs, but on the democratic government institutions. Excessive dependency on NGOs can reduce personal responsibility and create confusion between state and community responsibilities.

The relationships between the world community, international institutions, national NGOs, and democratic oriented publics should take place not only in the political and economical fields, but also in the professional, human, cultural, ethical, and institutional development fields. This would help to open the view on professional, human and political problems.

International organizations should work with national experts. It should be an open dialogue. Collaboration between dictatorships and democratic-oriented structures is essential.

International organizations have to focus on the political intellectual elite of society and the new generation to improve relationships with governments. Very often international missions fail because of misunderstood cultural, religious, and national specifics of the country.

Freedom of the press will lead to this, but strict watch on investigative journalism is necessary. Responsive governments will help evolve a public consensus over time. NGOs like World Watch Institute should provide leadership.

4.8 Provide the kind of assistance that aids the transition from centrally planned economies to market economies that have proven effective in previously successful transitions.

Each society has its own traditions, religion, social psychology, culture, and history. The mechanisms of regulating norms of life and a model of economy may function successfully in one country, but might not be appropriate in another one. Transformation and copying may cause varying results in different countries. Generally, these models have been created bilaterally with World Bank capital. Not all transitions have proven successful and often there are too many conditions. If they could have satisfied all the conditions, they would have not needed the assistance in the first place.... In addition, local-specific policy should evolve from think tanks evaluating by trial and error. The greatest effect of transitions was that two separate worlds came into normal contact, but theory and models of transition in most cases did not work.

4.9 Identify and make the public aware of the value and necessity of its own human and technical resources in the transition to a more democratic system.

Publicity should be implemented that reinforces transparent systems, but also recognizes the significance and contributions of a society’s human capital. For instance, traditional wisdom was needed, such as the advent of the temple in architecture and Siddha’s advancements in medicine. These insights should be recognized by research and by universities. The danger of indoctrination is the ambiguity; what does a “more democratic system” mean? Does it necessarily mean “better system?” It is very important to identify people, creativity, health, and education from inner sources, not just those from the World Bank.

4.10 Study and implement means for minimizing or eliminating corruption in government and business.

[See strategy to counter organized crime in Challenge 12 that focuses on money laundering, which is also central to Transparency International’s strategy to counter corruption.] The international community is just beginning to address this. The UNU or some international body should begin by studying the US laws on corruption and explore its applicability to other countries. The US needs to take more leadership. The WTO could be used to enforce anti-corruption measures. How do you distinguish between one man’s bribe and another man’s finder’s fee? Should UNICEF pay bribes to vaccinate villages? The definition of a bribe is again, shrouded by ambiguity.

Corruption requires both government and the private sector, hence create strategies that address both sides of the bribe. An enlightened public, educated by NGOs and a free press, help transparent governments evolve and politicians understand that they are held accountable. It is hard to believe that governments in dictatorial countries will introduce some methods to reduce corruption. Corruption is one of the methods of management in dictatorial regimes that pay inadequate salaries to officials.

An alternate illustration of corruption is the dependency of political parties on businesses for funds.

Free press and media are essential in establishing corruption-free businesses and governments. Freedom of press and media is important because, “[Media gives] the person or group with access to that technology the power to reach the rest of society” say Fareed Zakaria in his book The Future of Freedom. Given the freedom to express ideas and opinions freely is a strong indicator of the level to which the government is allowing itself to be accountable to the people.

4.11 Find ways to smooth the transition to democracy and minimize the risks of instability, while understanding that democratization can be a complex, long-term process.

Maintain "safety nets" during the transition. Sustainable development is the key to democracy in the developing world. Basic human needs must be met before a population can concern itself with instituting democracy. For instance, in a current dictatorship where the population is fed, the population will not be easily persuaded to overturn the dictator if it will result in their going hungry. So considering this, there is a lot of truth in the old saying, "Do not bite the hand that feeds you." Although democratization is a very long and complicated process, its realization cannot be put off to the distant future. If it were to be put off like that, current decision-makers might give up and new talent might not come forward to help.

Globalization has provided common standards, but the current strategy in Russia might destabilize the economic world. Education should be provided to help the people understand citizens' rule, roles of political parties, and that the military is accountable to the civilians. Action 4.4 can help in this regard. Policies should be viewed as approximate solutions. Transition in Sierra Leone, West Africa may have been too fast, and the pace of their transition may be a way to explain the problems that the country is experiencing in a peaceful democratic transition. A positive vision is important, and the concept of freedom should go together with the concept of responsibility.

4.12 Expand NGO initiatives that focus on corruption.

Why not have them institute conferences on corruption? Good, not enough NGOs are working on this now. It is imperative for governments to understand the total impact of corruption. Frank Vogal, Transparency International, and the International Chambers of Commerce are currently providing some leadership in this area. There is no NGO for anti-corruption for many countries. Public opinion should be created. “Lok Adalat” is a new experiment in India (People’s Court in each place). People of integrity and value-laden education are needed for this action. NGOs alone may not be that effective. NGOs should coordinate with opinion-makers, such as investigative journalists and religious leaders. Declare some strategic issue like environment for instance as “corruption-free” where any attempt, threat/damage should be considered a global issue to be dealt with through a global authority with real but limited powers.

In Africa, maybe we should force political leaders to retire to private business on their 25th birthday so that they are only in politics when they have new ideas, are enthusiastic, and have less time to become corrupt. On the other hand, consistency can pay off, which can be lost in elections every four years.

ADDITIONAL ACTIONS

Millennium Project participants suggested these actions later on through interviews, Internet correspondence, and/or continuous updating of the Global Challenges.

Established democracies can also encourage the spread of democracy throughout the world simply by existing, and providing examples of successful systems. The power of example was particularly strong in ending the Cold War in European countries that were close to Western democracies whether geographically or culturally.

Superpowers should not be dictators and should not promote their own economy. I believe more in the positive role of media (TV, radio, newspaper) than in the ability of NGOs to help genuine democracies develop. The key that unlocks the door of democracy is participation rather than waiting for others to solve problems. The addition of female participation in decision-making is crucial.

Brief overview
Indicators
Regional views
Detailed discussion on this challenge is in the CD-ROM accompanying the State of the Future reports

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Global Long-Term Perspectives

How can policy making be made more sensitive to global long-term perspectives? [Challenge 5]

SUGGESTED ACTIONS TO ADDRESS THIS CHALLENGE WITH A RANGE OF VIEWS

5.1 Create participatory processes informed by futures research to develop national and corporate visions of the future.

This is increasing – nearly all major corporations have long-range vision statements and vice presidents for strategic planning that tracks global, long-term trends.

The UN Millennium Development goals have also furthered global, long-term thinking – granted, maybe just in talk, but before action there must first be talk. The UN 2005 General Assembly review of the goals has stimulated some public debate in some quarters.

Every level of government and education, as well as organizations should have visions of the future, especially those organizations that are entrusted with the preservation of natural and cultural heritage, or the institutional control of long-lived hazards, such as nuclear wastes.

These goals/visions should have all sectors involved and be accumulative and developed at local, national, regional, and global levels.

Visions can be often wrong. Some create narrow focus on the “problem of the moment,” at the exclusion of others. I’d be wary of visions, for they are never comprehensive enough….Policies must be flexible, adaptable, and able to respond to new information.

5.1a. Create a flexible State of the Future Index (SOFI) Software

It seems appropriate to develop decision-making tools that allow inclusion of long-term perspectives. One such tool is the State of the Future Index (see Chapter 2), which, despite its complexity, is still primitive in concept and implementation. A more flexible version could store arrays of data and judgments used in computing a SOFI, and make these data available to others. With inputs from people conducting or contracting SOFIs for their own purposes, non-proprietary data could be shared and thus improved over time. An intial voluntary attempt by the Silicon Valley Node of the Millennium Project is available in the CD Futures Research Methodology version 2.0

5.2 Initiate training for future leaders that includes an emphasis on long-term and global perspectives in policymaking.

Experience shows that future-oriented studies and policymaking cannot be separate from one another: they should be linked.

Include current policy advisors and implementers as well as future leaders. Include sensitivity to relevant regional issues and how to deal with uncertainty, and decision-making. We also need public education or social marketing for public awareness of the need for futures thinking.

People are poor because they do not have the long-term future consciousness; tomorrow is discounted. Even the Bible says the future will take care of itself.

It is difficult to set up future studies in the universities because we do not have professional training programs. Finland has created the Finland Futures Academy and plans to create the World Futures Academy to address this need to improve futures instruction in universities around the world. See related action that follows.

5.3 Create National Futures Academies as networks of universities that teach futures studies, including a World Futures Academy as an advisory group for each national academy to improve the quality of instruction (as initiated by Finland Futures Research Center in 2000).

Inventories of university instruction in futures research should be conducted and maintained on a web site by the World Future Society, the World Futures Studies Federation, or the proposed World Futures Academy. A collaboratory could be established on this web site for instructors to share insights and mutually improve instruction. This could also lead to the creation of local, national, and regional academies. See http://www.tukkk.fi/tutu/tva/english/default.htm for current status.

5.4 Expand research into nonlinear modeling of social, political and economic systems to improve forecasting.

Improve future-oriented methods in general. Today, we only have two approaches: exploratory (trends and models) and normative (goal-oriented). All theoretical approaches should be reconsidered. Include dynamic biological and ecological models.

We simply do not know enough about the basic systems that are involved. Thus, we do not have the faith to believe in complex models. But this assumes that the purpose is to know the future – which is impossible in total. One can know very small parts of the future. But the purpose of futures research is to explore alternatives futures and seek strategies to improve the human condition.

5.5 Create future studies summer camps with access to all modern telecommunications technology.

Explore a range of communication techniques. More than 200 students from Tanzania and Norway spent a day together enacting the role of parliamentarians in an online cyberspace game called Global Island, exposing them to the MDG and the realities of democratic governance and policymaking (http://www.globalisland.nu/signup/index.html).

Space Camps already exists, maybe add additional futures themes could be created by futurists. Local issues should be included as well. What outcomes are expected?

5.6 Integrate an emphasis on futures, creative, and non-linear thinking process in education, including effective decision-making, the moral basis for decisions, the nature of risk, and dealing with uncertainty.

Such thinking should be added to all systems (legal, business, agricultural, etc.), not just in the schoolroom…. This is important and should be done as soon as possible.

5.7 Promote the use of global scenarios in UN and other international organizations.

UNEP has added scenarios to their Global Environmental Outlook reports. The World Water Vision Project created global and regional water scenarios for the World Water conference in The Hague. This is desirable for global decisions, but local realities and local variations should be included so that views are not unilateral and to prevent local conflicts…. Add regional organizations…. Unless this is done right, it would promote the worst kind of decision-making.

UN General Assembly is a political organization that produces the lowest common denominator. The UNU could play a more active role as a think tank and produce these scenarios.

5.8 Incorporate futures research methods into all levels of policymaking.

See the attached CD-ROM Chapter 10 for Factors Required for Successful Implementation of Futures Studies in Decision-making.

The Foresight and Governance Project at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars was created to address this challenge. See wwics.si.edu/foresight.

Previous efforts were initiated by a single individual, who then gets a national planning commission to lead the project.

Multi-disciplinary scientific teams that study the nature of the human condition and environment should inform long-term perspectives. These experts and politicians should communicate with one another, and then inform the public.

The past thirty years witnessed an explosive growth in the development and use of tools for quantitative policy analysis aimed at studying policy and decision-making processes and to provide information to assist decision-makers. Since 1970ties, when the policy analysis was acknowledged as an identifiable and respectable professional activity, the policy analysts became part of the decision-making process in a wide variety of programs and areas.

With the end of Cold War and with the emergence of an international system of global scope in the late 1990ties policy analysts increasingly turned to the consideration of international long-term problems of global scope. Thereby they have found it natural to employ standard common tools. However, these tools were developed to address problems that lie near the origin in the space, address only short term with some immediate policy in mind and consequently focus on details of particular cases and on practical solution to the problem they present. In consequence, the application of such tools often fails and produces silly and misleading findings, as most of problems of global scope lie far from origin (are highly interdependent) and have long-term implications.

In order to make policymaking sensitive to long-term global perspective one thus needs to diminish the inadequateness of conventional tools for policy analyis for analysing problems of global change. One way to diminish the analytic deficiencies of policy analysis could be by integrative and complementary use of policy analysis tools and futures research methods in policy studies. Such revival of futures orientation of policy analysis could enable generation of policy relevant knowledge that is highly responsive to global and long-term perspectives. It would also mean a continuation of the idea of the grounder of policy analysis, Harold D Laswell, who was the first sholar that saw that decision-making and policymaking necessarily rely on future anticipations.

Sustainability Governance Foresight (SGF), for example, represents an innovative policy analytical approach that aims at bridging the gap between the policy analysis and governance for sustainable development by promoting the capacity of policy analysts to account for long-term and global perspectives. Several innovative methodological strategies and methodological questions that represent departing points of methodological reflection of the choice and use of futures research methods for exercising SGF with the aim to inform creating and managing governance for sustainable development. These strategies and questions severely challenge the research logic and the traditional professional profile of policy analysts exercising Foresight. The mainstream policy analysts exercising SGF need to become (a) critical explorers, (b) translators across discourses, (c) facilitators of citizen deliberation, (d) honest brokers who direct the emerging global information order in the context of global governance, (e) transdisciplinary knowledge agents, and (f) seismographs of deep societal change.

5.9 Develop socio-cultural indicators (and data collection) that promote analysis. Perform research on the interaction of these indicators with other global scientific, economic, political and environmental factors.

See action 5.1a and Chapter 2 for a discussion of the State of the Future Index (SOFI).

It is important to develop alternative indicators as to what gets measured, gets attention.

5.10 Use the Internet to: a) distribute information about potential consequences of actions of the UN and other inter-governmental organizations; b) disseminate policy analysis and forecasting tools on the Internet; and c) create a global repository for socio-cultural data so that all agencies can conduct foresight policy analysis.

Direct satellite access and rechargeable batteries for computers will broaden Internet access to those without electricity and telephone lines.

It is important to do so, but the action needs a strategic overlay; what is the strategic intent here? Maybe the UN Millennium Goals could serve this purpose?

Self-imposed ethical codes/guidelines should be evolved; otherwise, it will destroy the social order.

5.11 Convert futures research methods into teaching methods for a broad range of courses.

This is very important, especially the awareness of the importance of qualitative input to decision-making.

5.12 Include futures research methods and perspectives in MBA courses on strategic management.

Futures research methods and perspectives should be integrated into all areas, not just MBA courses. See action on the creation of a World Futures Academy to improve university futures instruction.

5.13 Governments should periodically communicate long-term future implications of decisions to the public.

The right to information is a fundamental right. This should be required.

This should be done all the time via the media, including the Internet.

5.14 Formally integrate analysis and forecasting of global long-range implications into intergovernmental meetings.

Best are intergovernmental meetings of ministers of such as ECOWAS, EC, G-8, etc. Even integration into national meetings: what are the implications of future studies in the country and the region? We have to avoid getting attached to specific forecasts and include a range of possible outcomes and uncertainty in decision-making.

This is far too general. It would be nice, but difficult to implement. Politics of inter-government meetings makes this very difficult. Nevertheless, G-8 meetings are including such long-range forecasts such as the G-8 meeting in Canada that focused on the future of Africa.

ADDITIONAL ACTIONS

Millennium Project participants suggested these actions later on through interviews, Internet correspondence, and/or continuous updating of the Global Challenges.

Develop a collection of high impact cases wherein foresight led to demonstrable benefits, and where lack of futures thinking proved costly.

U.N. University should create a UN faculty for policy analysis for main world regions (e.g. in Bratislava for Europe) oriented on education of political leaders. It is good to create system of wide education of political leaders and future political leaders in basic and also new areas of economy, society and civilization including future studies and forecasting. It is also good to organize the seminars and conferences based on this education system especially for realization of realistic-optimistic visions with accent on global aspect of all political decisions in individual countries.

Document how long-term perspectives have improved decision-making, such as the Apollo program that focused on physics and biology in the attempt to send a man to the Moon.

The President should make a commitment to educate the staff in long-range thinking. It is necessary to have incentives for policymakers to think ahead. The Millennium Project is a start because it gets the future-oriented issues in the view of policymakers. Futures Research has to be fine-tuned to create a recognized niche. Successful pilot studies should be shared.

Develop methods for efficiently communicating, networking, and interactively revising future visions of interdependent entities. Effective exchange of future studies, views, and assessments among national, state, and local governments, private sector establishments, and various interest groups can stimulate the development of more comprehensive scenarios and visions. This will serve to correct unrealistic expectations of the stakeholders.

Indicators should be developed to assess long-term performance of companies. Theoretical understanding is that companies that survive long periods are far more attentive to their stakeholders rather than their shareholders. People need to be aware that stakeholder companies provide more benefit to the community. Long-term perspectives should have cooperation rather than competition as a focus. Professional groups and banks should get local government to change town planning laws to require 20-30 years considerations and re-educate engineers and town planners to embrace longer-term perspectives.

All of this leads to the question about the right way to spend money. For some class of problems, the right thing to do is act and act now. For other problems, the right thing to do is spend money for research. Still other problems should result in decisions to spend money for information, which may be important to reduce uncertainty. As yet, there is no formula for picking the right course.

Brief overview
Indicators
Regional views
Detailed discussion on this challenge is in the CD-ROM accompanying the State of the Future reports

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Capacity to Decide

How can the capacity to decide be improved as the nature of work and institutions changes?[Challenge 9]

SUGGESTED ACTIONS TO ADDRESS THIS CHALLENGE WITH A RANGE OF VIEWS

9.1. Provide training and education in decision-making, advanced management, and technology, such as Intranets, executive information systems, total quality management, and knowledge visualization.

Include “how to learn to learn” as the introduction to education and training on anything technically or socially complex.

NGOs and universities could conduct training through Internet, other forms of distance education, and eventually through low-cost, hand-held computer communications.

Design learning environments based on implications from cognitive science.... Use knowledge-acquiring strategies that begin with designating what capabilities are necessary, how to acquire the skills, and how to manage the knowledge so that the needed information gets to the right persons, at the right time, and in the correct form.

Only by competition can learning consciousness be promoted, and then, social development and progress will follow.

Have people identify what they do best, and focus on that, because competition is far more difficult in the global environment.

Teach team building and reinforce behaviors that model these new approaches. Teams with interdependent skills create internal loyalty. Gaining a second opinion outside of one’s own department would work best to expand experience and to learn what needs changing.

It is important to (a) include logic and the issues of sovereignty, (b) combine local and global decision-making, (c) introduce new forms of notation to represent evolving complex concepts, including uncertainty and risk that can be used by both advanced thinkers and the public, and (d) include families and corporations in the educational environment. NGOs could create curriculum units that simulate complex situations to teach decision-making skills and to learn from consequences. There is a mismatch between what is being taught to people and what they need to know. We should have 20-year forecasts and tailor curricula to those needs.... Celebrate cultural stories and myths that make basic discovery exciting and promote experimentation.

If decision-makers don't learn to understand the complexity of the problems they face, their incompetence can lead to corruption.

It is virtually impossible to implement it in a developing country. Time, money and infrastructure are all lacking. Besides, corruption in these countries is a widespread phenomenon.

9.2 Institutions should increase accountability, transparency, and participation in management.

Display how visions, missions, goals, strategies, and objectives are linked and how each in turn, is linked to every employee. The awareness of this personal linkage and rewards leads to accountability. Making this clear to all personnel increases transparency.

This is increasingly being accepted around the world.

Accountability and transparency are the central focus of UN reform. Too many in international organizations focus too much on process and not enough on results.... Others argue the reverse, due to the uncertain future goals are going to change continuously, so one should focus more on HOW to make change rather than achieving specific goals.

Institutions have to be transparent to outsiders as well as insiders, because much of the pressure for change comes from outside an institution. Making information on strategic challenges available to employees makes their participation in policy-making meaningful. Bring in people who have succeeded in making institutions more accountable, transparent, and participatory.... Transparency International is working on this.

9.3. NGOs, individuals, and groups, with some support from government, should expand research into nonlinear modeling of social, political, and economic systems.

It is important to learn early that nonlinear systems are unstable at some points and stable at others. Yet, people need not be afraid to learn this way of thinking.... Include different theories of why systems change.

This action seems to be to be too academic and the eventual benefits of it are uncertain.

9.4 Institutions should evolve from hierarchical or top-down management to network approaches.

Instead of only using the network approach, we need multi-organizational structures: distinct structures formed for distinct purposes. Management types should fit the situations. Top-down management works best in the military in industrial warfare, but not necessarily for information warfare. A key benefit of the network organization is democratic access to information.

9.5 Promote creation and harmonization of international standards and protocols.

The International Organization for Standards has over 16,000 ISO standards. Globalization of standards increases competitive pressure. Suppliers find it harder to defend their position. This is good for consumers, but can be bad for employees. How can we overcome the conflict between certain interests and harmonization, and how can diversity be accommodated?

It will take time for people to accept and understand the term “governance” rather than government, but it is part of the information evolution and transfer of new management tools.

Governance is unusually determined by economics. In the US, Jack Walshman noted that the 1970s focused on quality with TQM and benchmarking to recapture the electronics and auto industries, and the 1980s and 90s focused on the cost to compete in the evolving global market, forcing companies to downsize and concentrate on process. Growth is the current model that focuses on core competencies, knowledge management, and high revenues. Next may be a global model that has the private sector taking on many of the functions of government.

9.6 Use information technologies to ease global restructuring of work and leisure.

NGOs, corporations, and international organizations should apply information/communication technologies in developing countries in ways that improves productivity in low-income communities.... It is important to pair developed with developing regions, as much as possible.

Governments, NGOs, and the private sector should collaborate in research and development of distance learning technologies more effectively…. Distance learning has been on the top of the agendas of the European Ministries for Education since 1997.... Regional authorities are an impediment to rapid implementation of this action, and it is difficult to forecast what skills will be necessary as we make this economic transition.

It is essential to educate the public about the rate of change they will face.... Consider implications of cognitive science for designing learning environments and achieving educational and training goals.

Government and corporations should fund and market low-cost computer communications in schools, libraries, businesses, hospitals, etc.

UN organizations, with some leadership by government, should establish international programs for retraining to help avoid technological obsolescence.... UN organizations should initiate some major projects in the social sciences to understand the meaning and purpose of work as a desire and source of meaning in various parts of the world.

9.7 Create more equitable and less corrupting systems for political campaign financing.

The UN Electoral Units could help in some cases like Cambodia, but it will take a great large-scale public response from the media and NGOs to make a difference.

Can the conflict between candidates concentrating on getting elected as opposed to governing be resolved?.... The only solution is to change the nature of politicians. The present system cannot achieve that.... Peoples’ movements should lead.

Corporations should support an international feasibility study for the reduction of bribery. We should work with Antonio Maria Costa, Executive Director of the UN Drug Control Programme in Vienna, Austria, as well, Yet, such a study may not be able to get the most important information.

9.8 Encourage NGOs to contribute to confidence building, conflict resolution, and preventive diplomacy; and include NGO’s in international decision-making.

The most important problems are transnational in nature and inter-institutional in solution. They cannot be addressed by any government acting alone; they require collaborative action among governments, international organizations, corporations, universities, and non-governmental organizations.

Yes, but the seriousness and quality of NGO work has to be good. Amnesty International’s work is good and as a result, it has a direct relationship with the Secretary-General of the UN.

NGOs are not all the same, but in general, they have an important role in policy-making because they have no baggage and are strictly concerned with the essence of the policy.

Outsiders can play an important role in conflict resolution (Norway in Israel, US in Bosnia), but these are not usually NGOs…. Some NGOs do not have the confidence in governments. In many cases, NGOs consist of opponents of the government. Furthermore, many NGOs do not have constituents that are able to seize opportunities.

There is a tension between global organizations such as the World Bank, who want NGO involvement, and government, who see NGOs as the breeding ground for opposition.

9.9 Incorporate a child-care systems into the workplace.

This has been proven to be cost-effective and to be helpful in improving morale; hence, it improves decision making.... Corporations are increasingly doing this today.... Work rules should be revised and businesses should be encouraged to make further voluntary changes that give higher priority not only to childcare in general, but to greater parental involvement in providing that care. Make arrangements and provisions to facilitate and encourage the extension of the breast-feeding period of working mothers. These are additional responsibilities of institutions… This action is really a “women in the workplace” issue. The whole of society is a child-care system where extended families accomplish childcare.

9.10 Governments should support NGOs, individuals, and groups in applying the knowledge from the human genome project and related brain research projects to improving the understanding of brain reasoning and decision processes; and ultimately, enhance the brain’s ability to perform complex reasoning.

Some people lack confidence in this idea, and they would prefer research on external problems rather than the internal workings of the brain. They say that progress on computers is more likely than progress on the brain.

In addition to supporting the genome project, it is important to include the psychological differentiation of individuals in an attempt to understand the diversity of the world.

9.11 The private sector, governments, and NGOs should create toll-free telephone numbers and computer networks to match demand and supply of labor among the developing, newly developed, and more developed nations.

This recognizes that a key to improved decision-making is getting the right person in the right job.

This would have to be done very carefully to avoid forming a clearinghouse to help companies move jobs offshore to places where they can exploit cheaper labor. If the coordination was limited to “information-based” jobs, it could assist the receiving nation in the accumulation of intellectual and financial capital, but it could also increase unemployment (or underemployment) in the more developed nations.... Manufacturing jobs might just result in more offshore sweatshops if not carefully controlled.

It is also helpful for collecting and coordinating information among the federal, regional, and local authorities about unemployment, job listings, and training centers’ activities.

Businesses should also participate in funding.... NGOs could use this system to initiate programs everywhere that implement constructive uses for leisure, such as Habitat for Humanity and the Peace Corps.

9.12 Continue the modernization of UN systems and promote US payment of past dues on time and without conditions.

Since international problems need healthy international systems to address them, a financially sound UN is key to improving global decision-making.

Since the world does need an international police, and the US is not willing to perform that role very often, it should pay past dues, which will go to repay other nations' UN Peacekeeping expenses.... By not paying its past dues without conditions, the US encourages other nations to cut their payments and make up their own rules and conditions. Other nations pay their dues without conditions on the UN, because they know that if they and others put conditions, it would hamper UN efforts.

Ted Turner's $1 billion contribution to the UN should be used as a worldwide campaign to raise money from other wealthy people for UN reform. Bill Gates is the only one to pick up the challenge by his contributions to WHO.

UN reform now has a life of its own and is beginning to succeed. Total reform is not necessary, but efficiency could certainly be improved. The UN does many things right and corruption is rare, not withstanding the current review of the UN Food for Peace program in Iraq. Outside of the US, most people trust the UN. It can be seen as needing some improvement, but it can never be seen as corrupt. The UN should be given teeth to be more effective.

ADDITIONAL ACTIONS

Millennium Project participants suggested these actions later on through interviews, Internet correspondence, and/or continuous updating of the Global Challenges.

As institutions change, and work becomes more flexible, people will increasingly need their own personal decision support software. Distinctions of work, play, and leisure are blurring for the more affluent, but will also for the less affluent in the foreseeable future. Hence, the factors in decision-making will increasingly take into account the whole person’s life.

Institutional innovations focus too often on the urban situations, neglecting rural institutions…. Traditional and cultural wealth should be promoted. An international “think tank” consisting of apolitical academic bodies that address the issues of institutional change should be created. It is good that the Millennium Project has taken this up. The Millennium Project can form the initial nucleus for this, but later has to broaden its scope.

Study alternatives to current definitions of national sovereignty. None of these actions attack the issue of sovereignty head-on, such as creating a new definition of sovereignty and national security. Is there a third alternative to a system of national sovereignty and global government? To what extent does the supranational nature of the EU affect the sovereignty of its member-states? Can sovereignty be shared? Would changing sovereignty undermine the legal basis for the international system?.... Global authority, not world government, is part of the solution. For example, without the authority to set English as the language for all international airport control towers or the establishment of postal and telecommunications agreements, we would have chaos.

Create a new theory of life based on evolutionary theory, complexity, and chaos. This theory should be clear for everybody. Contemporary research concludes that a new system of values is a spontaneous adaptation of a society to the complexity of the consequences of its actions. This new theory is important because the mentality of decision-makers depends on the mentality of society. The inclusion of this new thought in the media is as important as putting it into the curricula. Media should be responsible for their actions and should value life as well as broadcast the complexity of the problems we face.... We should also look at the decrease in both genetic and cultural diversity as a result of domination of mass culture. We need to create more open international decision-making.... 99 percent of the world thinks only of their own country, but we need to think globally to solve the problems that are global.

Consider the complications of cooperation among terrorist groups and organized crime in countries like Colombia and Peru.... The UN University (UNU) should provide some leadership in increasing global thinking and the improvement of global decision-making through its new Center on Leadership in Jordan.... Add transparency of information in all considerations of this issue.... Study the UNESCO report, Learning: The Treasure Within, a report from the International Commission on Education for the Twenty-First Century.... Create a commonality of interests so that all participants benefit from sharing....

Do not stress the complexity of problems.... Reform democracies to curb influence of money and special interest and widen citizen participation.... Improve the tools of democracy.... Shift payroll and income taxes to ecological taxes.

Achieving optimum human care in terms of physical, psychological and attitudinal awareness of children and the aged is developing, but the youth are being neglected. Terrorism and AIDS are early warning signals. Policies that specifically address the attitudinal changes in youth should be created.

Brief overview
Indicators
Regional views
Detailed discussion on this challenge is in the CD-ROM accompanying the State of the Future reports

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Peace and Conflict

How can shared values and new security strategies reduce ethnic conflicts, terrorism and the use of weapons of mass destruction? [Challenge 10]

10.1 Strengthen UN Secretariat early warning and monitoring systems with indicators of peace and security that are transparent for cross-referencing by media, governments, NGOs, and the public, to increase the likelihood of connecting early warning with appropriate and timely action.

It should identify cultural, ethnic, and religious issues and trends that might lead to conflict and working with other systems, facilitate mediation between the groups involved..... Very good idea to make the system transparent for media cross-referencing. Since early warning does not always get timely decisions and governments can manipulate information, the media (BBC, CNN, etc.) are required to put the pressure of world opinion on political leaders to act…. Imagine Cable News Network (CNN) or a UN media team with fast-moving cars and television cameras for a live satellite link, as an Information Age rapid deployment force to focus global conscience more quickly.

The U.S. created the Genocide Early Warning Center in 1998 as a joint program of the CIA and Department of State to alert authorities to imminent mass killings. A search has failed to turn up any news of it after its founding.

There is a consensus that the international community has the right to intervene when conditions warrant because the consequences of not intervening can have effects beyond national borders. Early intervention, by threatening or even bombing, would have deterred most of the violence in the former Yugoslavia.

Early interventions should follow this sequence: first, international media attention with the assistance of NGOs; if there is no response, then economic pressure from governments; and if there is still no response, then military action through regional or UN or groups of nations.... Focus on this action as the key to addressing this challenge.... The UN is working on this now, but it is difficult to connect early warning to appropriate action. Although there is a better sharing of intelligence now, governments will not let their intelligence systems be used by the UN in the same way that the UN Security Council can use governments’ military force.... U-2 flights over Iraq were the first use of national intelligence assets by the United Nations Security Council.

The new system should have the ability to send in human rights observers in greater numbers to prevent massacres; this might have prevented the carnage in Rwanda that was initiated by a small number of people.... The Security Council knew all the early warning indicators in Rwanda, but there was still no action.... Instead, UN human rights observers were pulled out. Liberia could have been much worse, if the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and observers had not come in.

Previous attempts for early intervention have appealed to moral values; instead, there should be a focus on political and economic cost/benefit analyses (millions of dollars to cure the problem versus funds for early intervention to prevent the problem). The consensus is growing that we need to establish criteria on when to intervene against a sovereign nation-state.... This could help prevent super power hegemony, which otherwise will stimulate the emergence of a counter balancing alliance further fragmenting the UN.... Despite declarations of globalization and growing roles of the UN and NGOs, US dominance is increasing.

The early warning systems already exist - they are NGOs and the media. The issue is how to get the political will to act on the early warnings. Automatically putting items on the Security Council agenda from an early warning system won’t work if the political will is not there to make a decision. There were 3,500 UN troops in Rwanda prior to the slaughter, but their mission was not changed by the Security Council to act. If Belgrade had been bombed three years before the Dayton Accords, it would have stopped the war, but there was no political will to act. Over the long-term, better education of leaders is the answer.

10.2 Governments, with some leadership by the UN Security Council, should expand coordination and cooperation among nations regarding information, early warning, apprehension, and punishment of terrorists (especially among those that might not normally cooperate).

This has become expected after Sept 11th. …“Rogue leaders” who harbor terrorists should be tried in an international criminal court on live television.... How should we react to countries that give asylum to terrorists, under the argument of respect for human rights? Asylum supports terrorist activities. The countries that tend to protect terrorists are not able to control terrorists’ activities against other countries.... This policy implies that all terrorism is wrong. Was terrorism against apartheid in South Africa wrong?

Centralize police work (e. g. Europe) and the development of new police techniques.... Civil libertarian flags go up against idea of further international centralization of police.... In the military there are many spare troops, but there are no spare police.

However, in addition, much more effort should be devoted to understanding the root causes of terrorism, and how they can be reduced or eliminated. Appropriate amounts of money should be spent on solving these underlying problems, not just on security technologies.

10.3 Instead of a UN standing military, governments should identify troops to provide a rapid response capability for UN peacekeeping and building who have been trained together, with compatible equipment and communications.

This could reduce response time from two to four months to one week.... This is desperately needed. Without peacekeeping forces, UNHCR cannot do its job. A 48-hours deployment is necessary as the training requirement.... Improve the UN’s military communications equipment.... There are 48 countries that have agreed to designate troops under article 43 of the UN Charter, but the Security Council has not acted on it.... If this could be a quick reaction force under the UN flag, then there would be less chance of genocide. It would be used also to restore civil order.

Rapid military force should only be used for preventing war or its escalation, not for human rights abuses. These should be addressed by softer means, such as denial of privileges, rejection of loans, and other developmental pressures of one kind of another.... Use of NATO in Bosnia by the Security Council is an effective model.... and seems to answer the question of how the UN mobilizes troops, improves communications, and creates successful coalition forces.

This should foster interdependence and trust among nations by providing standards of interoperability, doctrines, and interfaces. There may be a (commercial supplier?) role for pooling of specialized resources (such as heavy airlift capacity).... If NGOs are unable to get the UN and other providers of peacekeeping and/or peacemaking troops to punish their troops for abuses, then an international system will have to be identified to be responsible.

Alternatively (or in addition), encourage NATO-style pooling of military forces to cut down on defense expenditures and foster greater security interdependence among nations.

10.4 Give the International Criminal Court powers to punish those convicted of atrocious collective and communal violence.

The ICC went into existence July 1, 2002. See Chapter 9.4 “Environmental Crimes in Military Actions and the International Criminal Court” in this CD-ROM.

Connect this court with the UN’s early warning systems (as in Action 10.1 regarding potential communal violence) and we will have an international system of analyzing and regulating violence.... Only an international Criminal Court can develop an independent international criminal code. The financial costs of making sure all rights are taken into account makes the process more expensive than people think.

It is important to get control of money so that political crime does not pay. Prevent the ability of political leaders to store their money in Swiss bank accounts and villas on the Riviera.... Carry the court’s proceedings on live television.... Design more precise sanctions that target elite criminals, not innocent populations and whole countries.

In many countries, if you kill one person, you go to jail and die, but you can instigate the killing of 10,000 with impunity. There have to be both national and international efforts to end impunity for such violence.

10.5 Governments, with advice from international organizations, should tighten the laws, regulations, and inspections associated with security of nuclear, biological, and chemical stocks, while increasing the funding devoted to detection, capture, and punishment of terrorists; perhaps the additional funding could come from conventional military budgets.

This action should be based on an international strategy including: 1) databases of people connected with these materials; 2) standards for management of these materials and common international training of personnel so that each knows what his/her counterparts will be doing in a critical situation; 3) rules of storage, control, and displacement of nuclear, chemical, and biological stocks; and 4) ratification of these three elements by member countries of the UN.... We have to put teeth behind the UN. It is the only worldwide organization that can act here. The nations that owe money to the UN should pay their debts.

When nuclear weapons were being developed, we did not know the consequences of radiation; today we do not know the consequences of biological stocks. Many products today are based on biological processes. The mass of biological stocks is increasing, which could provoke mutations. These problems will get worse.

We need a very tight regime for transferring, utilization, storing, and supervision of all these stocks. Since it is expensive, many countries will not do this properly, leading to unexpected and irremediable consequences.... A legislative base and an international convention with a minimum code of international standards should be developed and adopted..... I disagree, the laws and regulations are already tight..... The Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty and the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) are the principal vehicles upon which to build.

Why would terrorists want to use weapons of mass destruction? If terrorists want to gain support or sympathy for their agenda, they shouldn’t take a path that would result in killing millions of people. Imagine world reaction if terrorists had managed to kill 5000 people in the poison-gas attack in Japan? In such a case, the law enforcement apparatus in Japan would have been joined by law enforcement everywhere. Therefore, rational terrorists would not be likely candidates to use weapons of mass destruction. But we have irrational terrorists. It has been possible for many years for small groups to build chemical and biological weapons. Fortunately, terrorist attacks using such weapons have not happened. However, the past is not necessarily a predictor of the future.

Despite the Non-Proliferation Treaty’s (NPT’s) call for disarmament, many policy-makers within the nuclear powers consider these weapons as a guarantee for peace and stability.... Enforcement will require sanctions against countries and groups that do not cooperate and special networks of cooperation among those countries that are targets of terrorism. Different ideological and political interests would have to be overcome for cooperation among national intelligence agencies.... The ultimate sanction, if a nation were to develop nuclear weapons illegally, would be to bomb their facilities.... Address fundamental causes of terrorism, not just consequences.

10.6 Governments, in cooperation with international organizations, should destroy existing stockpiles of biological weapons.

Gorbachev agreed to this, but it was not done. The development of biological weapons was stopped, but this could start at any moment again.... Religious fanatics believing it is morally correct to eradicate ‘evil’ from the face of the planet may resort to the use of low-cost and high-impact biological weapons, although the use of these weapons was banned. More than 130 countries have ratified the 1972 Biological and Toxins Weapons Convention (BTWC), which prohibits development and production. But the convention has no built-in checks…. The BTWC went into force in 1975 and called for a review every 5 years. During this review process in 1993, an ad hoc preparatory committee to the treaty was established to write a protocol to the treaty for verification. Unfortunately, verification is not technically possible; hence, it is misleading to call it a verification protocol. Instead, the protocol can include “confidence building” measures. Since consensus does not exist on many matters of international concern, the US still has to provide leadership, as it is too powerful to be excluded from international policy making.

Create common international rules of storage and control of biological weapons and have them ratified by UN members. All countries should inform a special organization of the UN about any operations with these weapons. The UN should create mechanisms to influence countries that do not follow the rules. Biological weapons are more frightening than nuclear or chemical weapons: they are exceedingly easy to manufacture, there is no reliable way to detect their production, their effect can spread in unpredictable ways, while both nuclear and chemical impacts have limited geographical footprints.... Destroying stockpiles of biological weapons sounds good, but no proposals for detecting the stockpiles are satisfactory. Verification is a good idea. Inspectors can validate plants that have been discovered and closed, but good faith is not enough. Chemical plants are more obvious than biological plants. Monitoring raw material inputs won’t work. There is no reliable way to contain this issue.

10.7 Governments should at least double the amount of funding devoted to protection against terrorist acts, such as airport security.

This is clearly increasing for protecting all kinds of public utilities from water systems to nuclear power plants and seaports.

More effective would be old-fashioned spying - infiltrate organizations at the highest level, and get the information to prevent this threat.

If we are concerned about big issues, smuggling of nuclear material or biological materials raises concern about destroying many more people than just a plane-load. The choice for delivery of a terrorist nuclear weapon would be a truck, van, or a cargo container. Biological weapons, on the other hand, would be essentially undetectable.

10.8 Establish an NGO network to monitor indicators of conflict and discuss and link strategies for rapid deployment of non-military resources.

NGO’s representatives are perceived as more peaceful than government’s officials and as having more freedom to make judgments, but they should be in close communications with government institutions.... NGO’s representatives should have special training and special tools for forecasting the conflict evolution.... The NGO’s networks should be organized by regions for exploration and conflict scanning.... I prefer this to 10.1.... Also have early warning alerts from such networks automatically added to the Security Council’s agenda.... Consult NGOs like the International Crisis Group of London that has 20 monitors of the Dayton Accord in Bosnia.

Government’s interference in conflict resolution, especially at the first stage, could have a negative impact and make the problem more complicated. NGOs’ interference does not result in the same negative reactions.... Link local NGOs, international NGOs, and international organizations.... The role of the NGO is suspicious to some.

10.9 NGOs, with increased funding from governments and international organizations, should create social marketing or public education programs that promote respect for diversity and equal rights.

Too many of these programs aim at people who are 17 or 18 years old. That is too late. These courses should be aimed at people in elementary and middle school.... Effort should be worldwide, not just current areas of conflict.... The UNU should become more active with a real Cyberspace University.... How to educate governing elites who may be part of the problem?

Funding is not the issue; discipline and the ability to teach in the classroom are the issues.... Be alert; under the appearance of tolerance, pornography, drug consumption, and other social illnesses, are indirectly promoted. Freedom, yes - but not licentiousness.

10.10 Governments should plan to build resilience and redundancies into sociotechnical systems to avoid possible catastrophic disruptions (including electronic infrastructures from info-terrorism).

This should be a top priority and such resilience and redundancies should be done anyway.

10.11 NGOs and UN organizations should establish global dialogues that continue over several decades via television, Internet, short-wave radio, and interactive games to identify and acknowledge human values, ethics, morals, and issues that inflame terrorists.

The State of the World Forum is one such system: www.worldforum.org. Conduct them with well-known and respected personalities.... Add local and regional organizations.... This is the most important action and needs to be developed further. Historic injustices of the parties should be fully shared in public and discussed to reach acknowledgment and public apologies. Without this, the hate continues from one generation to the next.... The UN Security Council in April 1996 debated a proposal presented by more than 30 international NGOs for an on-line network of such conflict-resolution groups worldwide: Anticipatory Risk-Mitigation Peace-Building Contingents (ARM-PC).

10.12 Governments should readjust school curricula to emphasize compassionate behavior, tolerance for diversity, peaceful resolution of conflicts, compromise and consensus.

Without the readjustment of school curricula, there will be no long-term progress.... This can lay the foundation for a more peaceful world, but how to get governments and their teachers to change curricula when they might be a source of intolerance?.... Amnesty International has been involved in such education through a network of human rights educators that adapt curriculum to local systems where the governments allow it. Venezuela has committed 2000 teachers from kindergarten to twelfth grade to teach a curriculum of tolerance and human rights.

Focus on the common ethical values and oneness that underlies the human diversity.... Common values spread risks. Racism is not seeing the human oneness....the value of each human being If children are taught that Arabs invented algebra, then non-Arabic children will be more interested in Arabic culture; if they are taught that Kodiak islanders make good fishing hooks, then there would be more interest in learning about Kodiak culture, etc. All cultures and religions have value and have contributed to civilization.... UNU and UNESCO can provide generalized knowledge for ministries of education to use, but it would be best if domestic NGOs gave the more specific content to the curriculum.

Yes, but keep a sense of perspective, competition is good to teach, but not conflict.... The President of the World Bank has pledged $2.5 billion to insure that every child completes six years of education by the year 2010…. Democratic processes are requiring indigenous leadership such as Walesa and Mandela. They interpret the needs of the society better than those from the outside do. Communications in this process is important but are means of communication only in the hands of one part of the world?

Include a course on reconciliation. There is little agreement on what it means, but the term has moved into the main stream.... Corporations also want to be involved with community values to help make safer neighborhoods, which in turn reduces costs to business.... Yes, but at the same time the “political correctness” is getting in the way of discipline in the classroom. You can’t teach compassion in an unruly school.... This view is related to the traditional view of ethics. We should improve the awareness and the capacity of extension, initiative and competition rather than patience.

10.13 Study and implement means for minimizing or eliminating corruption in government and business.

See Challenge 12 on transnational organized crime for strategy to address money laundering. Countering money laundering is the common strategy to get both government corruption and organized crime.

This is being initiated by Transparency International, which has more than 85 cells around the world – groups that are truly independent and cannot be corrupted. This also requires juries of professional peers, not peer simply by citizenship and selected because they are the most ignorant..... A good case study would be the role of corruption in the Asian financial crisis. Some argue that corruption is not possible to eliminate.

10.14 Individuals, groups, governments, and UN organizations should conduct more research projects designed to uncover the causes of collective violence, and best practices in conflict resolution and consensus building.

The World Bank has a new unit in preventive diplomacy and post-conflict reconstruction.... NGOs like the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace are making progress in this, but universities are not contributing compared to their resources and potential.... The US has one Ph.D. and seven MA programs in conflict resolution, as distinct from peace studies. The Canadians, Dutch, and Norwegians are also leading in this...Why don’t the leaders of this research create an Internet Web site that compares all the research?

More organized, international, and unbiased research should be conducted to create a better and more suitable environment for reentering values and ethics in human life.... The evolution of nationalism is not receiving proper attention and study.

Increasing national identity helps development, but it can evolve into a nationalism that becomes fascism. We need some independent system of scanning nationalistic movements.

10.15 Governments, in cooperation with UN organizations, should establish political priority for ensuring human rights and dignity.

Media attention can help put the spotlight on infractions early.... Complete treaties with standards and reporting, including those that protect the rights of women and children.... The UN and others can give constitutional and legal reform advice to comply with new standards of human rights.

In some cases, upholding human rights in general can abolish them for specific individuals. Child labor is an example. Instead of banning goods produced by child labor, impose 50% of child labor time for education. The root of the problem has to be understood.

Countries may have their own definitions of human rights that were used to control other countries.... If some intervention had occurred when the Serb-controlled government began abusing human rights, first of the Albanians and then of the Croats and Moslems, events might have evolved differently in the former Yugoslavia.

In order to respect human rights, one must first respect the right of survival…. This may require new laws, leadership from a UN agency, and NGOs working with countries... Mauritius has established an inter-religious committee that addresses this action.

10.16 Governments, with coaching from UN organizations, should seek means for including the views of dissident groups into the legitimate political processes of their countries.

Media like CNN and al-Jazeera can help get views heard by leaders and can help enforce a boycott. Alternative radio stations, the Internet, and faxes have proved very useful to help information flow.... All our recent conflicts have been the result of dissident groups not having their views heard. The UN human rights process needs shaping up. The international community is not ready to punish violators of human rights.

10.17 Governments should increase economic development (especially microenterprise credit and training).

Although the poorest of the poor do not create the conflicts, they are used as pawns. However, if they are beginning to make economic progress, then they are less likely to be used for conflict.... Just when the design and monitoring of development assistance are improving, there is little money available. Nevertheless, money should be increased to fund both multilateral and bilateral programs.

10.18 Governments, NGOs, and international organizations should increase funding for training and technical assistance in governance and mediation, especially in trouble spots.

Yes, this is something that NGOs like Amnesty International can and should implement. It is important to help search for common ground.... If governments are too poor, then they can certainly use the help, but most know what to do; they just do not want to do it.

10.19 Promote the use of development indicators that reflect social values and encourage social reform.

The more you can quantify, the more effective you will be…. Yes, but so many items are indexed to current indicators like the CPI (Consumer Price Index) that it will take a Presidential Commission chaired by a leading private sector executive to change.... Due to the importance of culture in the process of economic development and scientific advance, a related evaluation system for the index should be designed.

10.20 Promote training courses in ethical behavior for managers and executives.

Have a person on the inside of an organization working with an NGO outside the organization to cooperate to change the organization through training in diversity and ethical values... Combine best of Western management and Eastern spiritual values and have this training conducted by NGOs.... Many corporations are increasingly holding one- or two-day training retreats for both middle and senior management. Personnel usually resist at first, but appreciate it afterwards.... People like Ted Turner (CNN) and Jack Welsh (GE) should organize the Manufacturers Associations, Chambers of Commerce, and Bankers Associations to lead this action.

Teach practical aspects in the relationship of human ecology to decision making in an increasingly global society, including the moral basis for decisions, the nature of risk, and dealing with uncertainty.... People do not understand the nature of risk. Human ecology as “valuable” to decision making, is a separate concept from risk.

10.21 Pursue the acceptance of “intergenerational equity” as a major global value and legal principle.

Some expressions of this, like social security and housing, are increasingly being accepted around the world.... Develop some case law and moot court examples for law courses.

10.22 Foster collaboration among the various inter-religious dialogues to increase the contributions of religion, such as getting religious leaders to intervene when people are going to war in the name of religion, and say this is NOT what religion teaches, and/or conduct inter-religious studies to find the common moral values and attitudes acceptable to all cultures.

This would require the Vatican or El Azhar to convene representatives from all the major religions to a globally televised religious summit.... Put pressure behind Islamic and Christian leaders who might be more effective than the World Council of Churches.... NGO’s, and the UN’s ECOSOC, UNESCO, or UNU should provide the leadership for this action.

More have fought in the name of religion, than have stopped wars in the name of religion.... Religion is a very confused issue that should be respected rather than compressed.... Some religions believe war is justifiable.... Some religions wage war against evil.... Religious leaders are also political because of insecurity. They cannot be neutral.... How can you make sure they don’t take sides?.... Give more media attention to leaders in peace making. Individuals in their company and religion have to persuade their leaders to act, then publicize their successes worldwide.

10.23 Develop better techniques for non-violent conflict resolution, through, for example, studying successful interventions and reaching a better understanding of the dynamics of communications across cultural and language barriers.

Billions are spent on troops and next to nothing on the emotional healing that is necessary to pull out the troops…. The political department of the UN Secretariat should do much more about this problem. The problem is there are few similar situations. You should have a plan before going in, but be ready to throw it out once engaged in the situation…. If the UN and other international arrangements are not changed to address the current realities, then NGOs will begin to fill the void.... NGOs have to convince governments that they are not a threat and have governments invite them in for the social elements of peace building. Political elements can be led by organizations like OSCE for Bosnia, and economic rebuilding by the World Bank, IMF, and bilateral donors, but social building addresses the heart and need for healing. This is better left to the NGOs to train the trainers who are the lights at the end of the tunnel.

Consider an interdependent two-team approach: Team l composed of people who aspire towards Gandhi-like consciousness and skilled in negotiations and non-violent conflict approaches, and Team 2 composed of military or police enforcement personnel. Team 1 should also be related to action item 10.8.... World Bank’s Peace and Development work needs to be linked more closely to the bank’s policy process.... How do you pay for the interventions? See Carnegie study on “Preventing Deadly Conflict”. Learn from the rapid and successful health intervention examples by CDC and WHO.... Conflict resolution approaches consider micro-level, cultural, religions and ethical roots.... Conflicts may differ, but it is possible to develop some common principles to find solutions.... Every nation should have a legislative base and mechanisms to solve this kind of conflict.... Experts on human rights tend to see conflict resolution as short-term thinking, arguing that until human rights are addressed, conflict will continue.... The US is wrong with its Revolution in Military Affairs (RMA).

High-technology dominance is not viable. The non-violent processes are still maturing; the UK is ahead in developing them. These processes bring together many approaches including public awareness as an overall package of diplomacy.

10.24 Increase support of software development for a compact multi-language translator; increasing mutual understanding among citizens around the world.

UNU is working on this now.... An exciting technical development.... The US National Security Agency has software that can do this now. Could they make this available to the public?.... This could be dangerous, because mistranslated subtleties can make the situation worse.... English is becoming a world language. The assumption that a lack of common language is the route of conflicts may be false. Although English countries may decline, English will not…. English will spread as a second language due to international commerce and computers.

10.25 Enlarge NATO in parallel with enlargement of EU.

Both NATO and EU have expanded nearly in parallel since this suggestion was made. It is only the problem how to coordinate the interests of NATO with the interest of the others until we will enter into another phase of the world power game sometimes after 2010 when other ambitious powers will emerge - China, India, Europe after the success/failure of unification and expansion.

10.26 Improve public visibility of issues through establishment of global public access TV networks.

WETV provides television programming on the environment, ethical business practices and human development and is now in 50 countries, funded by seven aid agencies and private investors. <www.wetv.com> WETV successfully launched the world's first all-environment television channel, directed to Canadian audiences on the digital services of major Canadian cable providers. "The green channel" offers viewers authoritative information on the environment in an entertaining format that focuses on how individuals and their communities can influence shared future .How to pay for it? Maybe a new NGO?.... Add attention to the issue of the information gap by making a new UN agency to address this gap and have Bill Gates fund it.... Couldn’t hurt, but would be difficult. Public access TV’s programming is relatively stupid. There has to be a good mechanism to promote healthy funding and guidelines. It is the nature of broadcasting to compete with 200+ channels - too many channels - lots of feasibility problems.

If the UN got savvy about the media and communications (which it hasn’t yet), a UN Channel on global issues, what the UN is doing, what the UN is accomplishing, etc., would be very effective.... The way to structure a good public access TV network would be to structure it like PBS in the US or have a UN Channel.... Very important to get those who are usually closed off from conventional television.

10.27 Introduction into military, police and terrorist arsenals of non-lethal weapons including aerosols that induce sleep and sticky foam.

With the right guidelines to prevent abuse, this is a very interesting possibility because non-lethal weapons offer the opportunity to stop a conflict without causing damage to the participants. Many different non-lethal weapons have been developed and produced, but inertia prevents the implementation of these weapons. They are not included in the training programs of military and police forces.... Distribute non-lethal weapons to the military arsenals, because the military’s function is also to influence and prevent the mass disarrays and natural disasters. These weapons are very effective in the actions against terrorists when it is necessary to isolate terrorists as soon as possible. They provide the opportunity to localize a conflict in a timely manner. If these weapons would be used against terrorists, then terrorists would know that they would not have time for negotiations. It could influence a decrease in terrorism.... Yes, but one still has to be careful with them; rubber bullets have had their problems.

10.28 Accelerate reduction in arms R&D, production, stockpiling, trade, and military personnel.

Agree, except those nations providing peace keeping forces may need to increase some resources and the role of these needs to be broadened to include disaster relief.... “Generals always prepare for the last war.” Increase conversion of military weapons to peaceful uses and make new weapons conform to current and potential situations…. This is a top priority; there is still much to be done.... Imbalance should be considered; the developing countries should learn how to protect themselves first.... 60% of arms trade is from four members of the UN Security Council. … Countries should pay a fee proportional to their weapons industry to the UN peacekeeping fund (penalty tax for encouraging conflict) …Greater publicity around the world for the enormous amount of money being spent on armaments, and the benefits that would accrue from diversion of some of it to productive ends, might bring about strong public pressure for arms reduction.

10.29 Increase the size of the UN Security Council.

There is no way to work out the political problems…. Yes, but we have to change the UN rules so that regional organizations like the EU and Mercosur can be on the Security Council to reflect the current realities.... Although adding regional organizations will resolve some political issues (such as Mercosur working to resolve the problem of the Argentina vs. Brazil seat), it would require changing the UN charter - that is based on nation-state members, add regional organizations.... Adding more will not help.... Needs much caution and much discussion.

10.30 Accelerate efforts to convert military technology to civilian uses.

Developed countries should undertake more obligations including the reduction of military and nuclear weapons and environmental protection and more conservation of resources.

10.31 Development of a United Nations Task Force on Weak and Failing States

The task force will consist of a rotating coalition of member nations in the global coalition on combating international terrorism. These member nations will include representatives from both the concert of great powers and key regions and nations who have renounced state sponsorship of terrorism, but where terrorist activity and presence is known and problematic (i.e., representatives from Arab states.) The inclusiveness and representative nature of this task force seeks to add legitimacy to the effort by providing key leadership buy-in from those nations where terrorist activity is the most problematic and is of greatest concern to international peace and security.

The mission of this task force is to identify weak and/or failing states in regions of instability and volatility with a particular eye on terrorist activity and/or presence. Of course, identification of weak and failing states is the easy part, deriving a plan of action and way forward is the most complex and subsequently, the primary mission of this group.

After identification of weak and/or failing states, the task force will seek to engage the nation(s) and work alongside it to strengthen key domestic institutions with a particular emphasis of those institutions that will most effectively contribute to the global war on terror in the near and mid term (i.e., law enforcement, intelligence, social welfare, military capabilities, etc.)

This task force has certain risks and downsides, of course. Some of the most significant being the decision of which member nations will be on the task force, the potential for UN paralysis (as is known to happen with the UN), and most importantly the politicization of its mission. As with any new task force, initially these issues will be problematic and will take a bit of time to routinize, but in the long run will have positive impacts on addressing the very real security concerns that weak and failing states pose to the international community. Also, I strongly believe, it is only through an institution like the United Nations that the recommendations of such a task force will have any legitimacy in the nations in which we seek to reform and will measurably improve any chances of these reforms being successfully implemented in a manner that will strengthen key domestic institutions and combat terror in the long term. The United States alone cannot impose its version of international counterterrorism policy upon the international community with any real legitimacy without some measure of international engagement and consensus. Acting in a unilateral fashion will only alienate certain nations and will ultimately be detrimental in the international fight to counter terrorism in the long term.

10.32. Reconcile Gaps in Counterterrorism Capabilities

Unfortunately, today most nations are ill-equipped to deploy well trained forces quickly and effectively to regions of conflict and it is precisely for this reason that the United Nations does not deploy as often as it should to quell both internal and external conflicts and to maintain international peace and security. Dr. Michael O’Hanlon testified on national counterterrorism strategies before the National Security, Emerging Threats and International Relations, House Committee on Government Reform in March 2003. During his testimony, Dr. O’Hanlon provided some recommendations that address the failed states problem in countering the terrorist threat. Dr O’Hanlon states in his testimony the following:

“Surveying the world’s conflicts, both those now underway and those of the recent past, it would be desirable that the international community have roughly double its current capacity to deploy and sustain forces abroad. It has been averaging about 100,000 forces in various peace and stabilization missions in recent years, but a survey of the world’s hotspots suggest that it would often be useful to be able to deploy and sustain 200,000 troops for such missions. As noted, these missions are important not only for humanitarian reasons, but for national security ones as well—to deprive terrorists of sanctuaries and sources of income (from diamonds, drug trading, and the like) that they can often obtain in failed or failing states.”

Dr. O’Hanlon suggests that a total pool of some 600,000 personnel would be desirable at a three-to-one ratio of available forces to deployed forces. He also mentions that the international community already has about that number of military personnel who can be rapidly deployed and then sustained in overseas theaters, but that two-thirds of the total number comes from the U.S. It is Dr. O’Hanlon’s recommendation that of the 600,000 deployable military personnel required in responding to international crises involving weak and failed states, 500,000 troops would be provided by non-U.S. countries and that these countries should double their aggregate power projection capabilities.

The international community should seek to provide such a force through the United Nations in order to credibly respond to such crises when they erupt and to diffuse regional tensions in a timely and efficient manner. While the number of troops required on first glance may incite sticker shock, over time this is an attainable goal for the international community to reach and is in the interests of all nations in the international community as its purposes are to maintain international peace and security, alleviate internal and external conflicts often associated with weak and/or failing states and ultimately combat terror and terrorist safe havens/breeding grounds.

Some of the most significant problems associated with this recommendation are that some nations may not see this force as in their national interest and therefore will not seek to contribute to the force, great powers like the United States may not want to see an international humanitarian military force that would challenge its power and authority in the international systems, issues of national sovereignty in undertaking international interventions, and lastly, the inability of developing countries that face economic challenges to successfully expand their military capabilities to meet this initiative. In spite of these many challenges, the international community should not be deterred in addressing this very important issue. The existence of this very large gap in military capabilities between the US and the rest of the West and between the developing world and the developed world is substantial, so substantial that it hinders the ability of the international community to effectively respond to crises and disasters that often occur in developing, weak, and failed states. In the long term, the international community must address this very real problem in responding to weak and failed states and its close relationship with international terrorism.

10.33 Development of A UN Strategy to Combat International Terrorism

The development of a United Nations Strategy to Combat International Terrorism seeks to generate international consensus on specific counterterrorism methods and tactics to eliminate the use of terrorism as a viable method to effect change in the international system. The strategy will act as a UN Resolution and will be enforces as such. The UN Strategy to Combat International Terrorism will have two primary objectives:

Establishment of international norms on terrorism. The establishment of international norms on terrorism within the United Nations seeks to strengthen legitimacy and urgency for international counterterrorism efforts by coming to a common global understanding of the international terrorist threat facing all nations. The success of any international efforts to counterterrorism can only be accomplished through international consensus on the global terrorist threat; it is through consensus that credibility will be achieved.
Establishment of specific counterterrorism tactics and methods that seek to enforce the aforementioned international norms on terrorism in concert and with full cooperation with member nations of the UN. This seeks to enhance the effectiveness and efficiency of current counterterrorist efforts while also lending legitimacy and urgency to new methods and tactics. These tactics and methods should be inclusive of both aggressive and diplomatic strategies to combat terrorism. For example(s): Diplomatic engagement and/or coercive diplomacy; Strong and clear declaratory policies against international terrorism; International interdiction of terrorists through bilateral and multilateral agreement on law enforcement (i.e., extradition policies, intelligence sharing and liaison activities, etc.).
Improve the ability of weak states to engage in counterterrorism through an international effort that seeks to strengthen domestic institutions.

ADDITIONAL ACTIONS

Millennium Project participants suggested these actions later on through interviews, Internet correspondence, and/or continuous updating of the Global Challenges.

The following three suggestions to decrease conflict are drawn from, The New Territories of Culture: Globalization, Cultural Uncertainty and Violence by Arjun Appadurai:

There should be a concerted effort to delink ethnicity from citizenship: state politics should be developed to move away from mono-ethnic and majoritarian forms of citizenship to forms of citizenship that are dual, serial and multiple, so as to accommodate a world of growing hybridity and diversity in cultural identities.
Nationalism should be consciously allied to multicultural projects (stressing the future-orientation, openness and non-exclusively of social identities) rather than mono-cultural histories that tend to breed ideologies of purity and cleansing.
States as well as non-governmental organizations of every type should encourage the use of mass media (both popular and official) to create a public sphere that stimulates, legitimizes and circulates images and narratives of hybridity and mixed identity. In this way, public spheres, both national and transnational, will grow habituated to indeterminacies and new mixtures in social life, and uncertainly about the 'other' will be less likely to produce terror and ethnocide.

Increase stake holders in conflict resolution.

For example, in the case of the India-Pakistan dispute, which does not seem to achieve peace in the short-run, the more powerful government, e.g. the U.S. and international communities should promote the bilateral trade. For example, the United States should work with regional organizations such as the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC), to promote a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) which is based on experience with the NAFTA. Stimulating trade and business in communities in conflicting countries may pave the way for conflict amelioration. Increasing the number of people in conflicting regions who have a stake in normal relations and in a process that moves the region toward a settlement is one measure of confidence building. These people will function as “bridge-builders” who influence the international debate and make it possible for governments to make sustainable progress.

In order to increase the effectiveness of such valuable stakeholders, it is important to facilitate the free flow if information. The countries with power and international community can assist the development of free information flows through educational and media exchanges.

Both arms reduction and non-proliferation treaties should be pursued. Ultimately, addressing the underlying causes of conflict can only stop arms proliferation. Israel will not give up nuclear weapons until the countries of the Middle East become peace-loving democracies.

The best preventive strategy in this context is transparency: “naming and shaming”. Civil society actors have an enormous role to play in this regard, but governments and the Security Council must exercise their responsibility. Greater social responsibility on the part of global companies, including banks, is also essential.

The Foundation for Conscious Evolution (www.evolve.org) at the Millennium Forum of June 2000 called on the United Nations to create the first global Peace Room (www.peaceroom.org) within the first decade of the 21st Century. In the context of Conscious Evolution, the Peace Room serves to bring into coherence and coordinated application the already present and newly arising vital capacities of social, scientific, technological, and spiritual know-how from a whole-system, evolutionary perspective.

A global strategy is needed rather than ad-hoc measures.... Implement a rapid deployment humanitarian peacekeeping capability funded by “insurance premiums” paid to UN for peacekeeping forces by countries wishing to redeploy military budgets to civilian sector.... Eliminate all nuclear weapons. Increasing numbers of leaders think it is desirable and possible to accomplish the complete elimination of nuclear weapons (as recommended by the Canberra Commission) in the long run, if the will is there. If the US, United Kingdom, France, and Russia would agree, then China would agree. Sufficient conventional force would remain to address rogue states.... How to get the rightness of an oppressed people’s position through to the dominant power? How to categorize acts of terrorism? If the international community will not boycott or intervene in situations of clear injustice, then violence seems to be the only remaining strategy.

The international community must come to an agreement about how to address “state terrorism”.... UN organizations should become increasingly involved in this issue by setting international standards of behavior, and establishing the legislative base to manage terrorism.... It would be helpful if the Millennium Project initiated a conference for the discussion of this problem to bring together the strategies and then submit them to all countries and the UN to start a dialogue.

Make genocide an exception to sovereignty by the Security Council. Current genocide treaties don’t have anything to do with the Security Council.... Relief agencies were created for short-term humanitarian aid. Today they continue their presence in countries like Somalia, forced to decide who gets the food. They don’t have the field training in conflict resolution.... “Conflict resolution statements” should be required like environmental impact statements by the World Bank prior to initiating projects.... The US should clean its own house before preaching to others and end forced bussing that is tearing the US apart.... Eastern sense of values should not be eroded by Western systems.... Go beyond coexistence to understanding others' values.

How do we reconcile cultural diversity and globalization of values? By restraint - not allowing any particular set of values to have sole dominance and by restraint in the use of political, military and economic power. A role for the Millennium Project and the UN is to promote dialogue around cultural values which will enable all of us to live together peacefully in a globalized world. That is, to address the issue of global governance. The Bruntland report is a very good policy model. The Millennium Project and the UN can also play an important role in conveying information to show that things can be changed.

The Sri Aurobindo World Center for Human Unity at Auroville in India is based on the principle that it belongs to humanity as-a-whole and that it will be a place of unending education and a youth that never ages. In 1952, the Mother of Sri Aurobindo Ashram wrote: “The unity of the human race can be achieved neither through uniformity nor through domination and subjugation. A synthetic organization of all nations, each once occupying its own place in accordance with its own genius can only offer enduring unification.” For encouraging diversity and shared ethical values, we need to establish centers like Auroville all over the world.

Encourage philosophical pursuits that create terminology that communicates the strength of diversity in its underlying unity and ethical responsibilities to future generations.

Attempt to eliminate, or at least, to limit, taboos and biased views in the world media. Due to monopolization of news, frequently, views presented in the leading world media are later repeated in the mainstream media all over the world.

Both arms reduction and non-proliferation treaties should be pursued. Ultimately, arms proliferation can only be stopped by addressing the underlying causes of conflict. Israel will not give up nuclear weapons until the countries of Middle-East become peace loving democracies. Although the US might agree to give up “first use” of nuclear weapons, it is not likely to agree to give up all its nuclear weapons.

NATO should not be enlarged unless it also includes Russia and the Ukraine to handle internal conflicts as well. Transfer NATO functions to police as national guards to protect human security with standby capacity for policing.

The knowledge of mass destruction from genetic engineering, nanotechnology, and artificial intelligence will become increasingly available in the future and will have more potential to destroy civilization than nuclear, biological, and chemical weapons.

Create networks within and outside a country to attract sufficient resources to counter those who would create the ethnic conflicts.

Brief overview
Indicators
Regional views
Detailed discussion on this challenge is in the CD-ROM accompanying the State of the Future reports

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Transnational Organized Crime

How can transnational organized crime networks be stopped from becoming more powerful and sophisticated global enterprises? [Challenge 12]

SUGGESTED ACTIONS TO ADDRESS THIS CHALLENGE WITH A RANGE OF VIEWS

Over the years there has been a constant stream of international conferences, conventions, and agreements which addressed the problem of transnational organized crime. The United Nations Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime was held in Palermo, Italy in December 2000. The convention (sometimes referred to as the Palermo Treaty) detailed actions that countries can take with each other in the areas of mutual legal assistance, corruption, money laundering, confiscation and judicial measures, informal cooperation, joint investigations, and special investigative techniques. The purpose of the treaty was to make it easier to establish whether a crime in one country is also a crime in another by standardizing laws. It also serves as the basis or platform for building a global strategy to address transnational organized crime as outlined in action 12.1.

One hundred and twenty four states signed the Palermo Treaty at the initial ceremony – the largest number that ever signed a treaty at one time. Currently 147 have signed, 100 have ratified it, and the treaty has come into force. However, the fact that it was the greatest number of signatories in the shortest time of any UN Convention shows that states are taking the threat of organized crime seriously. Additionally there are three protocols: 1) Protocol against the Smuggling of Migrants by Land Air and Sea; 2) Protocol to Prevent, Suppress and Punish Trafficking in Persons, Especially Women and Children; and 3) Protocol against the Illicit Manufacture of and Trafficking in Firearms, Their Parts and Components and Ammunition. These were added to the Treaty as protocols since they could not be agreed upon by all the members.

"Ratification of the convention means that organized crime becomes a universal crime," said Pino Arlacchi, the executive director of the UN Office for Drug Control and Crime Prevention (Sydney Morning Herald, 13 December, 2000).

The latest event specifically connected with this agreement was the First Session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime and its Protocols, 28 June-9 July 2004, in Vienna. Also of great importance to it was the Eleventh United Nations Congress on Crime Prevention and Criminal Justice, held in Bangkok in April, 2005. A valuable resource is the set of its working papers, to be found at http://www.unodc.org/unodc/crime_congress_11/documents.html. The description of the opening session at http://www.unis.unvienna.org/unis/pressrels/2005/bkkcp20.html is also useful. At the Congress, the UNODC's approach was summarized: UNODC is following a three-pronged approach in its response to transnational organized crime: (a) promoting ratification of the Palermo Convention and its Protocols as well as providing technical assistance to States seeking to implement them. The aim is universal ratification and full compliance; (b) improving judicial cooperation and mutual legal assistance. Owing to the increasingly globalized nature of organized crime, the investigation, prosecution and adjudication of transnational crime cannot be limited to only one State. Consequently, the Convention contains extensive provisions on international cooperation in criminal matters; and (c) specific technical cooperation on countering organized crime, in particular by building the capacity of institutions to collect and analyze relevant data, as well as by training criminal justice officials to investigate and prosecute cases within the framework of the rule of law.

A number of other agreements, most described earlier in this challenge, have also been set up. For example, the UN Convention against Corruption entered into force 14 December 2005. Somehow, though, the results of these efforts seem not to have stemmed the growth of the targeted criminal enterprises. The two overall courses of action which appear to offer the best chance of reversing this are:

Development and application of new TOC-fighting techniques which are better suited to the current globalized and tightly intercommunicating world, and which address all aspects of the problem – including root social and economic causes, not just ongoing operations

Establishment of a single strong and capable international instrumentality devoted to the detection and prosecution of TOC, supported by all nations, and with the technical and legal tools to carry out the assignment

Would equal numbers of women in senior management positions reduce TOC?

The suggested actions that follow give details on how these goals can be reached. They have been suggested through Millennium Project questionnaires, interviews, and updated via environmental scanning.

12.1 Governments, in cooperation with international organizations, should complete the international set of agreements for tracking and arresting international criminals, and establish a strong and effective instrumentality to implement those agreements.

This international organ should build on the existing base of such agencies as Interpol, Europol, and the OECD Financial Action Task Force (FATF), and should use the latest communications and computer techniques (work groups, data bases, knowledge bases, crime network analysis tools) to centralize and then disseminate, worldwide, information on transnational organized crime.

Since money laundering is the single most prominent characteristic of transnational crime, information technology to target the money laundering locations should be used and an international agreement to re-create the registration system of financial transactions should be negotiated. In addition, information on financial transactions should be shared and prosecution strategies through an intergovernmental body should be coordinated. The activities of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC)'s Global Programme against Money Laundering (GPML), aided by the IMF and other organizations, could serve as the nucleus for this effort.

To make this work, all banks would have to cooperate or be frozen out of the international system. Instant access would have to be given to every financial transaction requested by the international body. Countries would have to give up some sovereignty, as the international body would set the location for prosecution. The international body would authorize the freezing of criminal assets prior to conviction and transfer of assets after conviction. Attacking the money laundering system should be a new responsibility of the IMF. The G-8 should prevent the establishment of safe havens. These measures should all take into account the evolution of illicit financial operations, in which valuable goods such as diamonds have become a new medium of exchange, and in which the anonymity-rich postal system is an important channel.

The intergovernmental body - one rep per country - with a situation room would:

Identify money laundering locations and set up information traps
Identify a top criminal and prepare the legal case against him
Identify the criminal’s assets, accesses that can be frozen, and readiness of banks, etc. to freeze them
Identify where the criminal is now and secure the readiness of local authorities to make the arrest
Identify best location to prosecute and secure the readiness of local courts to move immediately

When everything is ready, the IO would execute all the orders at the same time to: apprehend the criminal, freeze the assets and access, and open the court case.

The U.N. Convention Against Transnational Crime might one day have a protocol that establishes the intergovernmental body with an operations center that is capable of managing the above strategy. Nevertheless, the International Criminal Court would get too overloaded too quickly to be the prosecuting agency. It would become a bottleneck and should only be considered for pre-authorization of freezing assets and possibly deputizing other courts, as the UN Security Council deputizes armies as peacekeepers.

Nations would have to give up some sovereignty so that their citizens could be tried in another country.

Informal briefings of this strategy to senior personnel in Colombia, Argentina, Mexico, Slovakia, the Czech Republic, Finland, Romania, and the United States have met with a favorable response. A feasibility study should be the next step.

12.2. NGOs, with some leadership by UN organizations and governments, should establish global dialogues on human values and morals to continue over several decades via television, the Internet, short-wave radio, interactive games, etc., to identify, acknowledge, and advocate global ethics, encompassing responsible behavior and caring for others.

One of the most effective measures that can be taken against TOC is to deprive national OC groups of their recruits at the local level, and this action, if vigorously pursued, would make definite progress toward that goal. It needs to be accompanied by social and economic measures, in particular, education, so that young people will have avenues other than crime for achieving their personal goals.

12.3 UN organizations and governments should establish international early-warning systems focusing on potential and emerging crime threats, and set up means for dealing with such threats when they are detected.

The next step would be to decide who should act on the information.... It is an easier problem than that of early warning about conflicts as a whole.... The UN might administer weak nations in Africa and elsewhere through a revived Trusteeship Council. That mechanism could be used to salvage failing countries, which offer an open invitation for the entry of organized crime operations.

Most conflicts today are within nations. The UN could also address this with international criminal courts. What are the rights of all nations? What about the global commons? Do we just let people kill Rwandans, and the US pollute the earth, and Brazil cut down its rainforest? To answer these questions, the role of the international organizations should be intensified.

This has begun to some degree already, but the governments do not use these forecasts to make decisions. If these early-warning systems were implemented as a global or international system, then governments would be more likely to act on the information. In addition, international data standards should be established, so that forecasting could be done. A UN organization should be responsible for the collection, organization, and management of the information. If this is not possible initially, then regional centers should be established for Europe, Africa, Latin America, North America, Asia, and the Middle East, with regional centers that the countries agree with. These regional centers should be connected to a global early warning surveillance satellite system, which will be able to catalog illegal crop growth and drug movements. This information can then be cross-referenced with international communications data to pinpoint organized crime sources.

12.4 Governments should plan to build resilience and redundancies into sociotechnical systems to avoid possible catastrophic disruptions.

This is a wise policy, considering the increasing power of both terrorism and organized crime, and should be done anyway. There is much discussion about this, but governments are moving too slowly.

12.5 Software companies, in cooperation with and deriving support from governments, should accelerate efforts to develop software to detect international computer-based fraud and train in the use of such software.

Governments should assess their electoral software to ensure that programmers cannot modify programs to change elections.

Private sector associations are more likely to make a difference, such as the new anti money laundering certification program offered by the Association of Certified Anti-Money Laundering Specialists.

12.6 The UN organizations, with the help of governments and legal organizations, should continue to develop international criminal law and enhance the position of the International Criminal Court and its enforcement powers. (For a discussion of this action in greater detail see Action 10.4)

Local courts should judge local criminals; international criminals must be judged by international courts. All could be on television before the “court” of world opinion.

The scale of an individual crime may not be sufficient to be considered against humanity before the new International Criminal Court.

The use of sanctions and boycotts against parties and states violating TOC agreements should be vigorously pursued.

12.7 The G8 countries should establish budget and training programs for foreign counterparts, with special attention to newly emerging democracies and Eastern European and Central Asian countries, and increase the number of case-specific international training seminars to provide more practical training for officers.

These training programs should contain efficient and practical applications, having in mind the sophistication of criminal organized groups acting globally. The creation of more international bureaucracy should be avoided.

12.8 Governments, with some leadership by UN organizations, should address new crime areas such as illegal waste disposal, theft of nuclear materials, human organ and weapons traffic, and sabotage of information networks.

Enough evidence exists that sanctions should be used now. The Internet and media should be used to create a systematic alert system that lets individuals call in early warnings. Governments should establish their legislative base in concert with other countries and evolve international agreements. The Palermo treaty will be the basis to make such legal harmonization.

12.9 The UN and other international organizations should exert every effort to improve the ethical level in governance around the world, taking advantage of assistance from such private groups as Transparency International. The UN and the proposed central anti-TOC agency should closely monitor that level, and should take strong measures in any state where corruption is widespread enough or of a type that would aid TOC, or possibly give it a political foothold.

ADDITIONAL ACTIONS

Millennium Project participants suggested these actions later on through interviews, Internet correspondence, and/or continuous updating of the Global Challenges.

Information traps at money laundering locations should be created and coordinated with courts for fast and honest trials.

Many believe that governments should legalize “victimless crime” such as drugs and gambling to reduce the cash flow of organized crime.

Drugs should be decriminalized and put under state control. Has the US learned nothing from its prohibition on alcohol, which only strengthened organized crime in America? Today the US spends billions to prevent drug use, jail offenders, fight urban drug-related crime, and has a court system clogged with drug cases. All policies have trade-offs. The damage caused by keeping drugs illegal is more than the damage caused by making them legal. The Netherlands model of liberalizing the sale of drugs through state control is widely seen as a possible example for use worldwide. For the liberalization of drug sales to work properly, its adaptation on a global scale is necessary. If this does not happen, then it could become counter-productive because it might turn the legalized areas into major distribution centers for the drug cartel, as it has in the Netherlands.... Legalization of marijuana for medical purposes has been voted in twelve states in the US and overruled by the Supreme Court in 2001.

Brief overview
Indicators
Regional views
Detailed discussion on this challenge is in the CD-ROM accompanying the State of the Future reports

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Democratization

Global Long-Term Perspectives

Capacity to Decide

Peace and Conflict

Transnational Organized Crime