(1992)
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A heat wave and an extended period of drought the last few years of the decade gave credence to a coordinated media campaign of global environmental disaster. The Union of Concerned Scientists published a Warning to Humanity which said: "A great change in our stewardship of the earth and the life on it is required if vast human misery is to be avoided and our global home on this planet is not to be irretrievably mutilated."68 The annual State of the Planet report, issued by the WorldWatch Institute, predicted progressively worsening environmental disasters. And the mainstream media joined the campaign to convince the world that the planet was on the brink of collapse:
To this mix of extravagant propaganda, then-Senator Al Gore added his best-selling book, Earth in the Balance: Ecology and the Human Spirit. Like Rachel Carson's Silent Spring thirty years earlier, what Gore's book lacked in scientific accuracy was more than compensated for by an abundance of emotion. He called for a tax on fossil fuels. He called for a "global program to accomplish the strategic goal of completely eliminating the internal combustion engine over say, a twenty-five year period.”70 And he called for the reorganization of society: "I have come to believe that we must take bold and unequivocal action: we must make the rescue of the environment the central organizing principle for civilization.... Adopting a central organizing principle - one agreed to voluntarily - means embarking on an all out effort to use every policy and program, every law and institution, every treaty and alliance, every tactic and strategy, every plan and course of action - to use. In short every means to halt the destruction of the environment and to preserve and nurture our ecological system.”71 Despite significant, legitimate objections from the scientific community, which were ignored by the media and ridiculed by environmental organizations, the public perception of impending environmental disaster was successfully blamed on exploding human population; human-caused global warming; and human-caused loss of biological diversity. The stage was set for the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) scheduled to be held in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. No previous UN conference had ever received such planning and promotion. Maurice Strong was named to head the conference, which was dubbed "Earth Summit II.” He had chaired the first "Earth Summit” in 1972 and had participated in every environmental commission and conference since. (Strong became Chairman of the Board of WRI in 1994). To guide the agenda for the conference, UNEP and its NGO partners published two major documents: Caring for the Earth, (1991 via UNEP/IUCN/WWF), and Global Biodiversity Strategy, (1992 via UNEP/IUCN/WWF/WRI). These documents contained the material from which the revolutionary UNCED documents would be produced. The NGO community, coordinated through the IUCN and the WRI publication Networking, used the igc.apc.org computer networks extensively to funnel information to and from the UNCED agenda planners, and to plan the NGO Forum. UNCED provided an opportunity for the NGOs to perfect the lobbying process. With the blessings of and assistance from the UNEP, the NGOs scheduled a "Forum” the week immediately preceding the official conference. Nearly 8,000 NGOs were officially certified to participate in the UNCED Forum, and another 4,000 NGOs were observers, swelling the total attendance at UNCED to more than 40,000 people - the largest environmental gathering the world has ever known. UNCED may be recorded in history as the most significant event the world has ever known; it was the watershed event that began the final march to global governance. Agenda 21, the underlying conference document, was a distillation of the UNEP/IUCN/WWF/WRI documents. It consisted of 294 pages and 115 specific program recommendations. Agenda 21 was further distilled into another document called The Rio Declaration which was a succinct statement of 27 principles on which the recommendations were based, and which would guide the global environmental agenda. Two major international treaties had also been prepared for presentation at UNCED: the Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Convention on Biological Diversity. In the summer of 1992, President George Bush faced a difficult reelection campaign. He expressed little interest in the Rio conference and was savagely ridiculed by then-Senator Al Gore and his own EPA Administrator, William Reilly, who publicly urged Bush to attend. Bush relented and was one of more than 100 heads of state that adopted the UNCED documents. Bush, however, did not sign the Convention on Biological Diversity due to ambiguities relating to the transfer of technology. He told the conference audience: "Our efforts to protect biodiversity itself will exceed the requirements of the treaty. But that proposed agreement threatens to retard biotechnology and undermine the protection of ideas,... It is never easy to stand alone on principle, but sometimes leadership requires that you do. And now is such a time.”72 Agenda 21 and the Rio Declaration are not binding documents. They are "soft law” documents which are the foundation for future binding documents such as the Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Convention on Biological Diversity. These two treaties contained important new features that are not present in the hundreds of other international treaties that the U.S. has ratified. These treaties do not allow any reservations or exceptions. Other treaties provide for parties to specify particular reservations or exceptions to which they are not bound. The UNCED treaties require all-or-nothing participation. The UNCED treaties created a "Conference of the Parties” (COP) which is a permanent body of delegates which has the authority to adopt "protocols,” or regulations, through which to implement and administer the treaty. The UNCED treaties were non-specific. The treaties were actually a list of goals and objectives; the COP was created to develop the protocols necessary to achieve the objectives - after the treaties had been ratified. The Framework Convention on Climate Change, for example, binds participating nations to the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions to 1990 levels by the year 2000; the COP develops the protocols necessary to achieve that goal, and the member nations are legally obligated to comply. The Convention on Biological Diversity requires the creation of "a system of protected areas.” The COP will adopt protocols to define what is an acceptable system of protected areas long after the treaty has been ratified. The binding treaties are written in language that appears to pursue environmental objectives: however, the principles upon which the treaties are based (The Rio Declaration) are in fact a refined re-statement of the principles for social change developed by the various socialist-dominated commission of the 1980s. For example,
Social change is clearly the first objective of the Declaration.73 Dr. Dixy Lee Ray, who attended the conference, reported: "The objective, clearly enunciated by the leaders of UNCED, is to bring about a change in the present system of independent nations. The future is to be World Government with central planning by the United Nations. Fear of environmental crises - whether real or not - is expected to lead to - compliance.”74 To assure that the COPs of the respective treaties were properly guided in their discussions of the protocols necessary for implementation, the UNEP/IUCN/WWF/WRI partnership launched a Global Biodiversity Assessment (GBA). Robert T. Watson, NASA chemist and co-chair of UNEP's Ozone Panel, was chosen to chair the project. IUCN's Jeffrey McNeely was selected to produce the important section on "Human Influences on Biodiversity,” and WRI's Kenton Miller coordinated the critical section on "Measures for the Conservation of Biodiversity and Sustainable use of Its Components.” The work was begun before the treaty had been ratified by a single nation, and involved more than 2000 scientists and activists from around the world.75 UNCED adjourned and the thousands of NGO representatives went home to begin the campaign to ratify the treaties and implement Agenda 21 and the principles of the Rio Declaration. A Chicago Tribune article by Jon Margolis, September 30, 1994, said that the Global Biodiversity Assessment was a process that had just begun, that no document existed. A participant in the GBA process had secretly photocopied several hundred pages of the peer-review draft of the document. Summaries of the draft documents were prepared and provided to every member of the U.S. Senate. The shocking details of the bizarre plan to transform societies was sufficient to block a ratification vote in the closing days of the 103rd Congress, despite the fact that the treaty had been approved by the Foreign Relations Committee by a vote of 16 to 3. Agenda 21 called for each nation to create a plan for sustainable development consistent with the principles of the Rio Declaration. The UN created a new Commission on Sustainable Development, and Maurice Strong created a new NGO called Earth Council, based in Costa Rica, to coordinate NGO activity to implement the Rio Declaration principles through national Sustainable Development Programs. Earth Council has produced a directory listing more than 100 nations that have formal sustainable development plans under development. The UN created another program to "empower children” to help implement the sustainable development program: "Rescue Mission: Planet Earth.” In a Rescue Mission newsletter Action Update, their work is described as getting governments together "who try to make the others feel guilty for not having done what they promised on Agenda 21.”76 To implement Agenda 21 and the principles of the Rio Declaration in America, President Bill Clinton issued Executive Order No. 12852, June 29, 1993, which created the Presidents Council on Sustainable Development (PCSD). Jonathan Lash, President of the World Resources Institute (WRI) was named as co-chair. Jay D. Hair, President of the IUCN, and former President of the National Wildlife Federation was one of eight NGO leaders appointed to the Council. Eleven government officials, along with the eight NGO leaders, easily dominated the discussions and produced a predictable report from the 28-member Council. Not surprisingly, the final report, Sustainable America: A New Consensus, presents 154 action items to achieve 38 specific recommendations that are precisely the recommendations called for in Agenda 21. The most casual reading of the PCSD's 16 "We Believe” statements, compared with the 27 principles of the Rio Declaration, reveals that the PCSD has simply Americanized the Rio language to form the foundation for implementing the UN agenda in America. PCSD Belief No. 10, for example: “Economic growth, environmental protection, and social equity are linked. We need to develop integrated policies to achieve these national goals” sounds very much like Rio Principle No. 3 “The right to development must be fulfilled so as to equitably meet developmental and environmental needs of present and future generations."77 The PCSD is Agenda 21 at work in America. The PCSD also provides a glimpse of the global governance process to come. Public policy is initiated by non-elected officials, massaged into specific proposals by an NGO-dominated "stake-holders council,” written into regulations administratively by willing bureaucrats (who themselves, are frequently former NGO officials), or presented to Congress for approval - along with the threat of retaliation at the ballot box from the millions of NGO members represented by the stakeholders council. The UNCED and Agenda 21 covered an extremely wide range of issues that affect virtually every person on the planet. The purpose for the array of policy recommendations put forth for public consumption is, ostensibly, to protect the planet from inevitable destruction at the hands of greedy, uncaring, or unaware humans. At the core, however, the policies recommended are socialist policies, built on the assumption that government is sovereign and must manage the affairs of its citizens. Nothing in Agenda 21, the Rio Declaration, or the PCSD recommendations even acknowledges the idea that humans are born free, and are sovereign over the governments they create. Nothing acknowledges the idea that government's first responsibility is to protect the inherent freedom of its citizens, particularly, the freedom to own and use property. To the contrary, everything about the UNCED documents aims to limit human freedom and to restrict the use of private property until it can be placed in the public domain. As sweeping as the UNCED documents are, they are but the first step in the final march to global governance. The IUCN held its triennial session in Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 1993. Dr. Jay D. Hair assumed Presidency of the organization, as Shirdath Ramphal stepped down to devote more time to his position as co-chair of the UN-funded Commission on Global Governance. His parting message is illuminating: "Rio, for all its disappointments, set the seal on a new agenda for the world: the agenda of sustainable development. It was not, of course, new for IUCN, which had blazed a trail for sustainable development since 1980 with the World Conservation Strategy. In the final analysis, it is a matter of equity. There are also other aspects to the claims of equity. If there are limits to the use of some resources, they must be fairly shared. Early users, who have prospered, must not pre-empt them, but must begin to use less so that others may also progress. The rich must moderate their demands on resources so that the poor may raise theirs to levels that allow them a decent standard of living. Equity calls for no less. We need... to persuade others that, for the Earth's sake consumption, must be better balanced between rich and poor."78 Equity, or wealth redistribution, is clearly the underlying purpose for “sustainable development,” in the IUCN agenda. Its influence over UNEP activities and upon the global agenda cannot be overstated. Its membership includes 68 sovereign nations, 103 government agencies, and more than 640 NGOs. Among the government agencies listed as contributors in the 1993 Annual report are: the U.S. Department of State; U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID); and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The U.S. State Department contributes more than $1 million per year to the IUCN.79 The IUCN evaluates every proposed World Heritage site and recommends to UNESCO whether or not it should be listed, or listed "in danger.”80 George Frampton, Assistant Secretary for Fish and Wildlife and Parks, asked UNESCO specifically to send a representative from IUCN to evaluate Yellowstone Park as a site "in danger” in 1995.81 On January 18, 1996, President Clinton issued Executive Order 12986, which says: "I hereby extend to the International Union for the Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources the privileges and immunities that provide or pertain to immunity from suit.”82 The IUCN is the driving force behind UNEP and the global environmental agenda. The Convention on Biological Diversity was developed and proposed by the IUCN in 1981 to the World Commission on Environment and Development.83 The IUCN is the architect and engineer designing the road to global governance. |