(1980s)
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"Bait-and-switch” is a time-tested technique used by unscrupulous merchants to offer one thing and then provide another. The environmental movement of the 1970s was the unwitting victim of its leadership which offered a cleaner environment but, in the 1980s, delivered instead a massive program to achieve global governance. The United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) had already launched a Regional Seas Program (1973); conducted a UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD 1974); developed a Global Frame-work for Environmental Education (1975); established the International Environmental Education Program (IEEP); set up a Global Environmental Monitoring System (GEMS); set up a World Conservation Monitoring Center at Cambridge, England (1975 as a joint project with the IUCN and the WWF); implemented the Human Exposure Assessment Location Program (HEAL - 1976); conducted a UN Conference on Desertification (1977); organized the Designated Officials for Environmental Matters (DOEM); and in 1980, published World Conservation Strategy jointly with the IUCN and the WWF. The DOEM is an organizational structure that requires every UN agency and organization to designate an official to UNEP in order to coordinate all UN activity with the UNEP agenda. UNEP was well positioned to interject the environment into the argument for global governance.50 Recognizing that communications was the key to global education, UNESCO adopted in 1978 a "Declaration on Fundamental Principles Concerning the Contribution of the Mass Media to Strengthen Peace and International Understanding, to the Promotion of Human Rights and to Countering Racialism, Apartheid and Incitement of War.” To figure out what the declaration meant, UNESCO Director General, Dr. A. M. McBow, appointed Sean MacBride to chair the International Commission for the Study of Communication Problems. Their report was released in 1980 entitled Many Voices, One World: Towards a new more just and more efficient world information and communication order. The head of TASS, the official news agency of the Soviet Union, was one of fifteen chosen to serve on the Commission. Not surprisingly, the report said that the "media should contribute to promoting the just cause of peoples struggling for freedom and independence and their right to live in peace and equality without foreign interference.” It expressed concern about independent news monopolies, such as the Associated Press and Reuters, but was not at all concerned about state controlled news monopolies such as TASS. It recommended a transnational political communication superstructure "within the framework of UNESCO,” an International Centre for the Study and Planning of Information and Communication.51 The Commission believed that a "new World Information Order” was prerequisite to a new world economic order. The report reflected the same "sovereign government” philosophy demonstrated in Article 14 of the Covenant on Human Rights: ...government, UNESCO in particular, should have the authority to regulate the flow of information to "promote” its agenda, and minimize public awareness of conflicting ideas. A proposal to require international journalists to be licensed brought swift and dramatic negative re-action which pushed this proposal to the back burner. The idea of controlling the media continues to simmer, even though an alternative plan was developed through NGOs. The United Nations Development Program (UNDP) allocated funding to establish computer network services for NGOs and academics in Latin America. The Association for Progressive Communications (APC) linked together networks in Brazil, Russia, Canada, Australia, Sweden, England, Nicaragua, Ecuador, South Africa, Ukraine, Mexico, Siovenj, and then entered into a partnership with the Institute for Global Communications (IGC). Known simply as igc.apc.org, this gigantic computer network now boasts 17,000 users in 94 countries. It has exclusive contracts with several UN agencies to coordinate, facilitate, and disseminate information about and from UN conferences. This NGO has arrangements with at least the following UN agencies: UN Association International Service (UNAIS); UN Centre for Human Rights; UNICEF; UNDP; UN Division for the Advancement of Women (DAW); UNESCO; UNEP; UN Information Centre (UNIC); UN International Conference on Population and Development (ICPD); UN International Emergency Network (UNIENET); UN Non-Government Liaison Service (NGLS); UN Population Fund (UNFPA); UN Secretariat for the Fourth World Conference on Women (UNWCW); UN University (UNU); and UN Volunteers (UNV).52 West German Chancellor, Willy Brandt, was tapped to chair another International Commission in 1980: the Independent Commission on International Development. The Commission report, entitled North-South: A Program for Survival, stated: "World development is not merely an economic process, [it] involves a profound transformation of the entire economic and social structure... not only the idea of economic betterment, but also of greater human dignity, security, justice and equity.... The Commission realizes that mankind has to develop a concept of a 'single community' to develop a global order." The report says that the choice is either development or destruction; either "a just and humane society” or a move towards [the world's] own destruction.”53 For 50 years, Sweden was a socialist country. In 1976, the socialists were dumped and conservatives took over - until 1982. Olof Palme restored socialism to Sweden and was promptly rewarded with the chairmanship of the Independent Commission on Disarmament and Security (ICDST). In their report, entitled A Common Security: Blueprint For Survival, the Commission built on Kennedy's 1962 Blueprint for the Peace Race, and on the 1974 Charter for a New International Economic Order, which linked disarmament with development. The Charter's Article 13 says: "All States have the duty to promote the achievement of general and complete disarmament under effective international control and to utilize the resources released by effective disarmament measures for the economic and social development of countries, allocating a substantial portion of such resources as additional means for the development needs of developing countries.” (Emphasis added). The Brandt Commission report had concluded that security meant not only the military defense of a nation, but also required solving the non-military problems - such as poverty - to improve the basic conditions necessary for peaceful relations among nations. Their conclusion was bolstered by the report of a UN advisor, Inga Thorsson, a Swedish Under-Secretary of State, who wrote: "It is important that we do not content ourselves only with the actual disarmament efforts. World disarmament is needed for world development - but equally, world development is a prerequisite for world disarmament. Not until we have arrived at a situation of reasonable equity and economic balance inthe world, will it be possible to develop conditions for a lasting disarmament.”54 The United States and the Soviet Union had hammered out a policy generally known as "peaceful coexistence,” to avoid MAD - Mutually Assured Destruction. The Palme Commission proposed a strategic shift from collective security, insured by the superpowers for the constellation of affiliated nations, to the concept of common security through the United Nations. The concept also linked the transfer of money saved by the disarming superpowers to the development of underdeveloped nations, transferred through and redistributed by the United Nations.55 A work that began in 1973 was completed in 1981 - the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea. The U.S. and the USSR wanted the Convention limited to navigational questions. But a group of 77 developing nations, known as G-77, hijacked the conference and the subsequent negotiations and wrote into the treaty the principles of the New International Economic Order (NIEO) - a UN taxing authority. The treaty created the International Seabed Authority (ISA) which would have jurisdiction over all non-territorial waters and the seabed. No seabed activity, mining, salvaging, and so forth, can occur without a permit from the ISA. Application fees begin at $250,000 and a schedule of royalties is set forth in the Convention. The Convention is the first to give direct taxing authority to the UN. It is a legal mechanism for the redistribution of wealth from developed nations to developing nations. The U.S. had avoided the Convention until 1994 when President Clinton signed the Treaty. Secretary of State, Warren Christopher, has announced that ratification of the treaty will be a priority for the Clinton Administration in 1997.56 The World Wildlife Fund (WWF) had grown dramatically by 1982, with organizations in several countries, including the United States. Russell Train, the President of WWF-USA, secured more than $25 million in grants from MacArthur Foundation, Andrew K. Mellon Foundation, and from“ US and Foreign governments, international agencies, and individual gifts,” to launch a new NGO - the World Resources Institute (WRI) headquartered in Washington, D.C. James Gustave Speth was chosen as President. Speth, a Rhodes Scholar, turned to the environment after the Viet Nam war and co-founded the Natural Resources Defense Council. He became a Rockefeller protégé and is described as “one of the most effective environmentalists alive today.” He served as President of WRI for 11 years, then as a member of President Clinton’s transition team, then moved to the UNDP as its head.57 The WRI joined the WWF and the IUCN to become the three-cornered NGO foundation for the global environmental agenda. A World Charter for Nature was the chief product of a 1982 World Conference on Environment and Development, at which Maurice Strong said: “I believe we are seeing the convergence of the physical and social worlds with the moral and spiritual. The concepts of loving, caring and sharing... for a saner, more cooperative world... are the indispensable foundations on which the future security system for a small planet must now be based.”58 In 1984, there was a World Conference on environmental management. But a Conference in Vienna, Austria, in 1985 established UNEP as a major player in world affairs when it produced the Vienna Convention on Ozone Depleting Substances. The ascendancy of Mikhail Gorbachev to the Soviet throne received far more media attention than did the Ozone Treaty. Most Americans did not hear about the Treaty until the Montreal Protocol in 1987 which banned certain refrigerants and fire-fighting materials. Another World Conference on Environment and Development was held in 1987. Gro Harlem Brundtland, Vice President of the World Socialist Party, was named as Chair. The Brundtland Commission Report, entitled Our Common Future, embraced most of the ideas contained in the UNEP/IUCN/WWF publication World Conservation Strategy, including the concept of “sustainable development.” It is the Brundtland Commission that links the environment to development and development to poverty. The Report says: “Poverty is a major cause and effect of global environmental problems. It is therefore futile to attempt to deal with environmental problems without a broader perspective that encompasses the factors underlying world poverty and international inequality.”59 Brundtland was a member of the Brandt Commission. Maurice Strong (who chaired the first world Conference on Environment and Development in 1972) was a member of the Brundtland Commission. Shirdath Ramphal was a member of the Brandt, Palme, and Brundtland Commissions, and later co-chaired the UN-funded Commission of Global Governance. Ramphal is a past President of the IUCN. The Brundtland Commission succeeded in two break-through accomplishments:
The environment was firmly established as the battle-cry to mobilize the world to create the New Economic World Order. While UNEP was convening the first Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 1988, the UNDP was funding a Global Forum of Spiritual and Parliamentary Leaders for Human Survival, sponsored jointly by the UNDP's Global Committee of Parliamentarians on Population and Development (created in 1982) and the Temple of Understanding. The Temple of Understanding is an NGO accredited to the UN, and one of several projects of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in New York City. The featured speaker at the Forum was James Lovelock, author of The Ages of Gaia. Lovelock said: On Earth, she [gaia] is the source of life, everlasting and is alive now, she gave birth to humankind and we are a part of her.”60 The Gaia Institute is also housed at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, as is the Lindisfarne Association which published G-A-I-A, A Way of Knowing: Political Implications of the New Biology. Maurice Strong is a member of Lindisfarne and often speaks at the Cathedral, as do Robert Muller and Vice President Al Gore.61 The Forum produced what was called the "Joint Appeal” which grew into the National Religious Partnership for the Environment (NRPE). The project is endorsed by eleven major environmental organizations, has received grants of more than $5 million, and is currently engaged in mailing "education and action kits” to 53,000 congregations. Amy Fox, Associate Director of the NRPE, says: "We are required by our religious principles to look for the links between equity and ecology. The fundamental emphasis is on issues of environmental justice, including air pollution and global warming; water, food and agriculture; population and consumption; hunger, trade and industrial policy; community economic development; toxic pollution and hazardous waste; and corporate responsibility.”62 The decade had begun with an eruption of Mt. St. Helens, and perhaps a more spectacular political eruption: arch-conservative Ronald Reagan captured the White House from arch-liberal, Jimmy Carter. Reagan's Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), more popularly known as "star wars,” is cited as a major factor in the eventual collapse of the Soviet Union. The USSR, which Reagan dubbed "the evil empire,” did assume a new attitude about arms reduction and disarmament. Gorbachev announced "glasnost,” a new policy of openness, and "perestroika” a restructuring program which featured measured "free market” opportunities. Gorbachev, who was infinitely closer to the socialist dominated inner-circle of the UN-global-governance cabal than was the Reagan Administration, may well have been preparing to shift the seat of socialist leadership from the Soviet Union to the United Nations. The newly formulated strategy of common security, rather than collective security could not accommodate the notion of a single state, even the Soviet Union, as the seat of global authority. And it is now clear that, even though it appeared to the west that Gorbachev was moving his country toward capitalism, he never had any such intention. Gorbachev told his Politburo in November, 1987: "Gentlemen, comrades, do not be concerned about all you hear about Glasnost and Perestroika and democracy in the coming years. They are primarily for outward consumption. There will be no significant internal changes in the Soviet Union, other than for cosmetic purposes. Our purpose is to disarm the Americans and let them fall asleep." He later wrote: "Those who hope that we shall move away from the socialist path will be greatly disappointed. Every part of our program of perestroika - and the program as a whole, for that matter - is fully based on the principle of more socialism and more democracy.... We will proceed toward better socialism rather than away from it. We are saying this honestly, without trying to fool our own people or the world. Any hopes that we will begin to build a different, non-socialist society and go over to the other camp are unrealistic and futile. We, the Soviet people, are for socialism. We want more socialism and therefore more democracy.”63 By November 9, 1989, when the Berlin Wall collapsed, it became clear to the world that events had out-run Gorbachev's intentions. The Soviet Union, along with 70 years of utopian-communist dreams, collapsed as thoroughly as did the wall. The vacuum thus created in the global political balance was seen as an invitation to usher in a new, permanent balancing force - global governance. The role and capacity of NGOs was greatly enhanced in the mid 1980s when Donald Ross of the Rockefeller Family Fund - the same Rockefeller money pot that launched the Council on Foreign Relations - invited the leaders of five other Foundations to meet informally in Washington. From that meeting grew the Environmental Grantmakers Association, a nearly invisible group of more than 100 major Foundations and corporations. They meet annually to discuss projects and grant proposals and decide which NGOs will be funded.64 Having gained a measure of national prominence in his failed bid for the White House in 1988, then Senator Al Gore, as chair of the Senate Science and Technology Committee, assumed the responsibility of advancing the global environmental agenda in America. It was Gore, and then-Senator Timothy Wirth, who arranged special "prayer breakfasts” with selected congressmen for James Parks Morton, Dean of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, to promote the National Religious Partnership for the Environment.65 It was Gore who led the Senate to approve the Montreal Protocol which banned refrigerants. It was Gore who brought James E. Hansen, head of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, to the Senate chambers to testify that he was "99% certain that greenhouse warming had begun.”66 The decade of the 1980s was a pivotal period for the advocates of global governance. The MacBride Commission had established the principle of information management as a legitimate responsibility of the United Nations, though only partially implemented through participating NGOs: IGC/APC. The Brandt Commission had linked development with peace, and the Palme Commission had linked development with peace and disarmament as a way to shift military power to the UN and money to the third world. The Brundtland Commission linked development to the environment and introduced the concept of "sustainability.” The NGOs, coordinated by the IUCN/WWF/WRI triumvirate, and funded by the Rockefeller-coordinated Environmental Grantmakers Association, launched a world-wide campaign to convince the world that the planet stood at the brink of environmental disaster. It could be averted only by a massive transformation of human societies which would require all people to accept their spiritual and moral responsibility to embrace their common global heritage and conform to a system of international law that integrates environmental, economic, and equity issues under the watchful, regulatory authority of a new system of global governance. |