Financing Sustainable Global Futures
Written June
1998. Updated April 2014.
This paper discusses a
crucial gap to be filled in the financing of the development of sustainable
global futures. A case is made that people who are at the very fringe of the
global people system, those among the most poor, the most marginalized and the
most oppressed, are the carriers of wisdom and ways of living that enable
sustainable nurturing of planet earth. These are the indigenous people and the
oppressed small minority people living tribal ways close to nature and
profoundly respecting nature.
These Grassroots Folk hold
the answers to many of the world’s most pressing issues.
Examples:
o
Peacehealing,
o
Intercultural
mediating and interfacing
o
Evolving
profound spiritual respect for all life on earth
o
How
to live sustainable life ways
o
Increase
awareness of natural living systems
o
Using
bio-mimicry
o
Natural
Nurturer Networks
o
Social
Cohesion Processes
o
Ways
of Knowing different to those typically used in the West
A practical example is that
during 2003-2005 Psychnet was formed through the East Asia Oceania Region with
non-compromising support out of the UK. This is a Grassroots Folk based
psychosocial emergency response network that was able to provide crucial
interfacing support following the tsunami that hit the region.
Given the enormity of the
problematics facing humanity, with environmental degradation and societal
conflict and collapse, Grassroots Folk need strategic non-compromising support.
Currently,
funding arrangements exclude or compromise their wisdom.
Refer Interfacing Alternative and
Complementary Wellbeing Ways For Local Wellness
Many unilateral and
multilateral financial processes exist to finance the global economic
juggernaut. Unilateral and multilateral
financial processes also exist to finance global governance bodies like the
UNDP, World Bank, and regional arrangements such as Asian Development Bank and
European Investment Bank. National Aid bodies around the world like USA’s US
Aid and Australia’s AusAid also fund development. As well, private sector
with-profit and non-profit funding of private sector profit and non-profit
action is available. NGO’s cooperate with the above funding sources.
Typically, all of
the above entities operate within a system based upon the following premises:
o Experts from outside the focal context are relied upon on at every step – for conducting needs assessment, feasibility and impact studies, program design, program implementation, outcomes assessment and control. Experts diagnose problems and prescribe their own solutions.
o Typically, experienced people and companies from outside the recipient
country (and typically from the donor country) carry out the work, with figures
quoted of between 40% to 90% of the funding
returning to the donor country as
wages and profits.
o Similar points were made at the’ Aid Business is Good Business’ conference in Melbourne Australia in the Nineties put on by AusAid and AusTrade where it was acknowledged that around 75% of aid projects fail because the Aid Program fails to involve local people. This failure was seen as acceptable because of an anticipated 7-fold value in follow-on business activity in the recipient country. Refer:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/03/25/2199059.htm
http://www.aidwatch.org.au/stories/aidwatch-in-the-news-australias-boomerang-aid-slammed/
http://www.aidwatch.org.au/index.php?current=24&display=aw00728&display_item=1
Refer PDF file on the above link titled ‘REPORT:
Boomerang Aid – not good enough Minister!’
The Issues of Boomerang Aid page 66. https://eview.anu.edu.au/cross-sections/vol5/pdf/06.pdf
o
Action
is typically divided into departments, categories and sectors (refer Government and Facilitating Grassroots
Action )
o
Top
Down organization structures are used
o
Projects
entail detailed pre-planning
o
Project
funding selection/approval criteria and Project evaluation criteria are based
upon compliance with the above assumptions
o
Global
Governance and National Foreign Aid typically operate through the national
governments of the recipient counties
These
assumptions are pervasively used in and by the dominant world. They are the
taken-for-granted ‘how things are done’.
These
ways are pervasively not used by the grassroots folk
mentioned above.
Examples:
o
Rather than experts from outside the
focal context being relied upon, the grassroots folk way is to tap
into the local community wisdom and knowings about the local contexts.
o
If outside experts are used they have
cultural interfacing support and have the experts ways complement and support
local way
o
Local people use local ways to
take local action. They know what’s missing in their wellbeing.
o
Action is typically holistic with
everything inter-connected, inter-dependent and inter-related
o
Rather than top down organization
with the decision-making prerogatives at the top, grassroots folk way is local
and lateral using mutual help processes in local networks.
o
Rather than nature being
something that is imposed upon, grassroots folk way is to respect nature ‘as
mother’ and work with and copy nature (bio-mimicry) and enhance nature at every
step guided by a profound intimate knowledge of local natural phenomena.
o
Rather than detailed preplanning,
the current context guides the unfolding action. Rather than a fixed agenda
there are open themes-based agendas that are guided by the people’s energy in
context.
o
Rather than policy being
determined at a distance, that which works locally is repeated or adapted – and
becomes policy, hence grassroots folk policy is ‘that which works’.
o
While Global governance bodies
and other entities go through a country’s national government, for may
indigenous and other oppressed people the government under which they live may
be a primary source of their alienation and oppression.
The
dominant world way with the best will in the world can by-pass local resources
and capacities, and in the by-passing undermine, weaken and eliminate local
wisdoms.
A Model Program drawing upon
over 50 years of doctoral-level action research among Grassroots Folk has been
developed to tap into this wisdom. The Program envisages starting five
substantial business enterprises owned by a humanitarian foundation whereby
enterprise dividends provide a sustained non-compromising fund source for the
foundation’s humanitarian action where the Rollout uses Grassroots Folk Wisdom
and Way (refer Government and
Facilitating Grassroots Action ).
The Program adheres to a
framework ensuring every aspect of the Program rollout respects local way and
is carried out by local people supported by outside experienced people who
respect the framework (refer Interfacing
Alternative and Complementary Wellbeing Ways For Local Wellness).
Evolving
Funding for Grassroots Folk Action
Perhaps
there are people of discernment from deep within in the dominant world’s private
sector financial world who want to contribute to global futures.
This
paper has raised the possibility of vital action for global wellbeing emerging
from grassroots folk. Well-placed financial people are encouraged to contact
the author towards Financing Global Futures. Non-compromising funding platforms
are urgently needed. The Model Program is a crucial demonstration model Program
enacting the wisdom discussed in this paper.
Other Links:
Interfacing Alternative and
Complementary Wellbeing Ways For Local Wellness
Government and Facilitating Grassroots
Action