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FOREWORD17A movement to save the worldTo address the challenges we face and realise our vision of sustainabledevelopment, we need to build one of the largest, most comprehensiveand sustained political campaigns we have ever seenBy Ricken Patel, Founder andExecutive Director of AvaazSome 70 per cent of people believe the greatestchallenges that humanity has ever faced areconverging right now. Many experts agree,with thinkers like Jeremy Rifkin giving humanity a50/50 chance of survival over the next century. Withglobal warming alone, we are rushing headlong intocatastrophic feedback loops and tipping points in ourclimate system that could threaten human life on earth.At some deep level, I think we all know howenormously fragile, delicately interdependent, anddangerously unsustainable the civilisation we’vebuilt is. And that saving it is going to need all ofus to do better than we have. Choosing love overfear more often in our individual lives, collectivelyembracing a politics of community and cooperationover demonisation and division, and raising ourconsciousness to higher levels to understand all thevastly complex ways in which our fates our intertwined,not just with each other, but with the natural world.Tremendous progress has been achieved over thepast few decades. Democracy, poverty, literacy, thestatus of women, incidence of war and deaths inwar, even crime rates are improving at breakneck,historic pace. Our levels of education and emotionalintelligence are rising fast. There is every reasonto hope.But we are at a tipping point. The world isthreatened by multiple crises that require collectiveaction. They could split us apart or bring us togetherlike never before. Unless we offer a viable vision ofcommunity and cooperation that delivers the visionand results that people need, there is another kind ofpolitics waiting. The old politics of demonisation anddivision that blames the ‘other’ for the insecurity wefeel. That way, lies disaster.It’s the challenge of our time to meet this momentwith the best within us, and we can. The vision putforward by the UN High-Level Panel on the Post-2015 Development Agenda is a beautiful one, and oneI believe the vast majority of people share. But nowcomes the hard part: getting our governments to getbehind this plan, first rhetorically, and then with actualbudgets and political will. And to stay behind it untilthe job is done.To make that happen, we need one of the largest,most comprehensive and sustained political campaignsthe world has ever seen. One that captures publicimagination like never before.It won’t be a single campaign or coalition that doesthis, but a vibrant network of governments, NGOs,businesses and individuals that come together aroundNow comes the hard part:getting our governments toget behind this plan… withactual budgets and political willthis shared vision and coalesce into fit-for-purposegroups as needed, to seize opportunities and meetthreats. These groups will need to use every tactic inthe book, because that’s what entrenched interests whooppose progress will be doing. The threads that tie allthis together likely won’t be a single brand, but memesand narratives that define and embody the zeitgeist.One popular meme, often offered tongue-in-check,is the idea of saving the world. It’s a narrative deep inour psyche, the theme of many of our most popularepics. But if ever there were a time to use this memeand its power in all seriousness, it’s now. It’s time for amovement to save the world.Refugees displacedby recent fighting queueto collect food rations inthe town of Mingkaman,South Sudan, a countrywhere some 4.9 millionpeople are in needof humanitarianassistance due toviolence and unrestGLOBAL DEVELOPMENT GOALS 2014