Human Settlements Review - Parliamentary Monitoring Group

Human Settlements Review, Volume 1, Number 1, 2010
phenomena does not mean that it is universal,
it does not mean that all phenomena should be
regarded in the same way (Kaplan, 2002:xiii).
Vaclav Havel noted, in an address to the
World Economic Forum many years ago, that
“What is needed is something larger (than the
scientific method). Human’s attitude in the
world must be radically changed. We have to
abandon the arrogant belief that the world is
merely a puzzle to be solved, a machine with
instructions for use waiting to be discovered…”
(Havel as quoted in Kaplan 2002: xv)
Abandoning the need to control and
shape the world – acknowledging
that we need new institutions
There exist tremendous contradictions
and incompatibilities. While global climate
stability and ecological resilience are global
public goods that require cooperative global
solutions, fossil fuels are market goods that
promote competition and resource struggles.
The transition to sustainability requires new
energy sources that are “non-rival”. Yet we
have systems that give priority to private
market goods and services at the expense
of public goods. If societal goals shift from
maximizing growth of the market economy
to maximising sustainable human wellbeing
we need new or different institutions to better
serve these goals to broaden acceptance and
credibility.
In recent months there has been much talk of
“redesigning capitalism” and a “new financial
architecture” as evident in the title of the 2010
State of the World report by the Worldwatch
Institute for example “Tranfroming Cultures –
From Consumerism to Sustainability.
Certainly organizations and institutions that
shape our world are increasingly revealing
their inability to address the challenges of our
time. These organization are experienced,
both by those outside of them and those
inside them, as driven by the need to control
and shape the world rather than respond
creatively to new impulses and needs. There
is great need for creativity and innovation in
the way we organize the world. An economic
renewal tailored to the 21st century would
establish institutions committed to fitting the
human economy to Earth’s limited life-support
capacity.
According to the capitalist perspective the
Earth is not seen as “capable of experience”
because it is reduced to a service provider,
not a living system. A “right” human-Earth
relationship would recognize humans as part of
an interdependent web of life on a finite planet.
The economy must recognize the rights of the
human poor and of millions of other species
to their place in the sun. In a world awash in
money, addressing poverty only with growth
reflects a tragic lack of moral imagination.
Indeed , in pushing for more “free” trade as it
is currently understood, we would entrench an
ongoing addiction to consumption, pursued in a
manner that often ravages the bio-productivity
of developing countries (Mofid, 2010).
Logjam in legal Systems and
governance regimes
As the grip of climate change tightens, and
other problems… we are discovering that
present law is inadequate to protect present or
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