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The US Central Intelligence Agency is seeking to expand its authority to carry out remote-control assassinations in Yemen, according to a report Thursday in the Washington Post. CIA Director David Petraeus has made the request to the White House and the National Security Council is now discussing it, the newspaper said.

Petraeus is seeking permission to engage in “signature strikes,” using drone-fired missiles to attack targets identified “solely on intelligence indicating patterns of suspicious behavior,” the Post reported, without knowing exactly who was being targeted for extermination.

For all practical purposes, this means turning large parts of Yemen, a sovereign country whose government has a military alliance with the United States, into a free-fire zone, in which US missiles could be fired at virtually any gathering of men thought to be armed. The country is awash in weapons, particularly in the rural areas where tribal sheiks, rather than the central government, hold sway.

The request marks a significant escalation of the US operations in Yemen, which are conducted both by the CIA and the Pentagon’s Joint Special Operations Command. Both agencies use remote-controlled missiles as their primary weapons, selecting targets based on satellite intelligence and reports from on-the-ground spotters. According to published estimates, US agencies have conducted at least 27 strikes against Yemeni targets in the last three years, killing some 250 people.

Petraeus greatly increased the role of special forces in Afghanistan during his year as the commander of US military forces there, and he has continued this focus on covert paramilitary operations since becoming CIA director in 2011. “Signature strikes” have been a staple of CIA operations in the tribal regions of Pakistan, and now Petraeus wants to extend these methods into Yemen.

The Post report quoted an unidentified “senior administration official” to the effect that up to now the White House had opposed extensive strikes against targets in Yemen, limiting drone attacks to “only those who have a direct interest in attacking the United States.” The CIA was required to select “personality” targets from a hit list approved by Obama, and fire missiles only when those individuals were being targeted.

This was the official story of the drone attack last September that killed Anwar al-Awlaki, a US citizen born of Yemeni parents who had moved back to Yemen and become a propagandist for Islamic fundamentalism, posting English-language sermons online.

The Obama administration claimed that al-Awlaki was a leader of Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), linked to several attacks inside the US, including both the November 2009 shootings at Fort Hood in Texas and the attempt to bomb a Detroit-bound jetliner a month later. Al-Awlaki and another US citizen were killed in a drone missile strike last September 30. Two weeks afterwards, al-Awlaki’s teenage son, also a US citizen, was killed in another strike, allegedly aimed at a different AQAP figure.

The murder of al-Awlaki became the occasion for the assertion of an extraordinary expansion of presidential power. Obama claimed the “right” to assassinate any American citizen based on his own determination that the citizen was an enemy combatant, without any legal proceeding or judicial review of his actions.

Another “senior US official” quoted anonymously by the Post expressed concern that the expanded military intervention could have wider political repercussions, given the political turmoil in Yemen, whose longtime president Ali Abdullah Saleh stepped down in February after a year of anti-government demonstrations and bloody repression. “I think there is the potential that we would be perceived as taking sides in a civil war,” the official said.

According to a report last month in the Los Angeles Times, which gave details of a missile strike in Yemen conducted by the Joint Special Operations Command, “As the pace quickens and the targets expand, however, the distinction may be blurring between operations targeting militants who want to attack Americans and those aimed at fighters seeking to overthrow the Yemeni government. US officials insist that they will not be drawn into a civil war and that they do not intend to put ground troops in Yemen other than trainers and small special operations units” (emphasis added).

This article both confirmed the growing US intervention in the civil war, and revealed that the Obama administration has begun, without any public announcement, the same type of operation that was conducted last year in Libya: US troops are already on the ground in Yemen and playing a key role in directing and facilitating air strikes.

By this account, the main targets of the US attacks are three southern Yemeni provinces, Abyan, Shabwa, and Bayda, which have been largely outside central government control for several years. Even the US government admits that most of the armed men in these provinces are local Yemeni tribesmen who oppose the government in Sana, and resent the longstanding US military aid and support for that dictatorial regime.

US operations in southern Yemen are closely coordinated with the government in Sana, now headed by Abed Rabbo Mansour Hadi, Saleh’s vice president. Last month Yemen’s army chief of staff, Maj. Gen. Ahmed Ali Ashwal, went to Washington for talks with Pentagon officials. He was urged to reorganize the military for an offensive into the southern provinces, which will require use of tanks and artillery to dislodge tribal fighters.

More than 2,000 people were killed in the civil strife of the past year in Yemen, according to the country’s Ministry of Human Rights, the vast majority of them slaughtered by military forces or paramilitary gunmen loyal to Saleh. Yemen is the poorest of the Arab countries and one of the poorest in the world, with the second highest rate of chronic malnutrition; only US-occupied Afghanistan is worse.

Whether or not the White House approves the current CIA request, the United States is moving inexorably towards greater military involvement in Yemen and its surrounding region, including the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden, key waterways for international trade, and particularly for the supply of oil from the Persian Gulf to Europe, with tankers traveling for hundreds of miles along the Yemeni coast on their way to the Suez Canal.

The region includes a number of geopolitical flashpoints, including Somalia, where the US military has conducted a series of drone strikes and commando raids targeting Islamic groups battling the US-backed regime in Mogadishu, and the Sudan, which this week declared war on South Sudan, the country formed through the secession of its southern half. Sudan and South Sudan have been in conflict for months over disputed territory along their border, the location of oil fields that are a major source of supply to China.

By Patrick Martin

21 April 2012

@ WSWS.org

China has shut down the country’s leading leftist websites as the ruling Communist party tries to calm a fight over power and ideology ahead of its once-in-a-decade leadership transition.

The move came as the party also stepped up its campaign for ideological control of the military, seen as a potential key player in the power struggle.

Utopia, a website which regularly carries articles criticising pro-market reforms, demonises the US and glorifies Mao Zedong, said on Friday the government had closed it down for a month. Mao Zedong Flag Web, another Maoist page, and the online chatroom of The fourth Media, the nationalist website formerly called Anti CNN, were closed down as well.

Supporters of Bo Xilai, the former Communist party secretary of Chongqing who was purged from his position in March, had used the sites to defend him and his Maoist revival policies even after his downfall, highlighting the broader split in the party.

Wen Jiabao, premier, has stepped up his push for more reforms since Mr Bo’s removal from his Chongqing post on March 15. Mr Wen indicated larger financial reforms this week, saying the government wanted to “smash” the monopoly of the big state banks. In addition, some liberal Communist party officials say Mr Wen is pushing for a re-examination of the Tiananmen massacre in 1989.

Utopia said internet regulators from the Beijing Municipal government and from the State Council Information Office had conducted talks with those in charge of the website and accused them of publishing “articles that violated the constitution, viciously attacked national leaders and fantasised about the 18th Party Congress”.

Meanwhile the Liberation Army Daily, the main military newspaper, warned the armed forces on Friday to ignore rumours and obey the party’s political line.

“Resist with determination the invasion of all kinds of erroneous thought, do not let noises disturb you, do not let rumours confuse you, do not let undercurrents move you, and ensure that the troops absolutely obey the directions of party, the Central Military Commission and chairman Hu [Jintao],” it said in a front-page editorial.

The article follows a series of similar exhortations stressing the party’s leadership over the armed forces published since February, as is common in a period seen as politically sensitive. It also echoes a broader propaganda campaign conducted through other state media to resurrect a façade of unity and stability.

Following Mr Bo’s purge, wild rumours have been circulating, including a rumour two weeks ago that Zhou Yongkang, the top Communist party official in charge of security, had staged a military coup to rescue Mr Bo.

Mr Bo has close personal ties to some senior military leaders, partly through his background as son of one of the People’s Liberation Army’s revolutionary veterans, and has repeatedly courted the military.

By Kathrin Hille in Beijing

6 April 2012

@ The Financial Times

Additional reporting by Zhao Tianqi, Beijing

The predicament of humanity today has been called “a race between education and catastrophe”. Modern science has, for the first time in history, offered humankind the possibility of a life of comfort, free from hunger and cold, and free from the constant threat of death through infectious disease. At the same time, science has given humans the power to obliterate their civilization with nuclear weapons, or to make the earth uninhabitable through overpopulation and pollution. The question of which of these paths we choose is literally a matter of life or death for ourselves and our children. It would be enormously important to have some public discussion in the mass media of the serious challenges that face the world today.

How do the media fulfill this life-or-death responsibility? Do they give us insight? No, they give us pop music. Do they give us an understanding of the sweep of evolution and history? No, they give us sport. Do they give us an understanding of need for strengthening the United Nations, and the ways that it could be strengthened? No, they give us sit-coms and soap operas. Do they give us unbiased news? No, they give us news that has been edited to conform with the interests of the military-industrial complex and other powerful lobbys. Do they present us with the need for a just system of international law that acts on individuals? On the whole, the subject is neglected. Do they tell of of the essentially genocidal nature of nuclear weapons, and the need for their complete abolition? No, they give us programs about gardening and making food.

A consumer who subscribes to the “package” of broadcasts sold by a cable company can often search through all 35 or 45 channels without finding a single program that offers insight into the various problems that are facing the world today. What the viewer finds instead is a mixture of pro-establishment propaganda and entertainment. Meanwhile the neglected global problems are becoming progressively more severe.

In general, the mass media behave as though their role is to prevent the peoples of the world from joining hands and working to change the world and to save it from thermonuclear and environmental catastrophes. The television viewer sits slumped in a chair, passive, isolated, disempowered and stupefied. The future of the world hangs in the balance, the fate of children and grandchildren hang in the balance, but the television viewer feels no impulse to work actively to change the world or to save it. The Roman emperors gave their people bread and circuses to numb them into political inactivity. The modern mass media seem to be playing a similar role.

One is faced with a dilemma, because on the one hand artistic freedom is desirable and censorship undesirable, but on the other hand some degree of responsibility ought to be exercised by the mass media because of their enormous influence in creating norms and values.

To do justice to the mass media, one also has to say that in recent years they have made efforts to educate the public about global warming and other environmental problems. Furthermore, today’s heros and heroines are not shown with cigarettes hanging from their lips. In fact we are a little shocked to see old Humphrey Bogart films where scenes of smoking are constantly on the screen. If the mass media can accept the degree of responsibility needed to delegitimize racism, to delegitimize unnecessary CO2 emissions, and to delegitimize smoking, can they not also delegitimize nuclear weapons? One can hope for future restraint in the depiction of violence and war, and in the depiction of international conflicts. One can hope for future support for cross-cultural understanding.

It would be enormously helpful if every film or broadcast or computer game could be evaluated not only for its popularity and artistic merit, but also in terms of the good or harm that it does in the task of building a stable and peaceful future world. Of course, there must be entertainment and escapism – but there should also be insight. This must be made available for people who care about the fate of the world. At present it is not available.

Why doesn’t the United Nations have its own global television network?

Such a network could produce an unbiased version of the news. It could broadcast documentary programs on global problems. It could produce programs showing viewers the music, art and literature of other cultures than their own. It could broadcast programs on the history of ideas, in which the contributions of many societies were adequately recognized. At New Year, when people are in the mood to think of the past and the future, the Secretary General of the United Nations could broadcast a “State of the World” message, summarizing the events of the past year and looking forward to the new year, with its problems, and with his recommendations for their solution. A United Nationstelevision network would at least give viewers a choice between programs supporting militarism and consumerism, and programs supporting a global culture of peace and sustainability. At present they have little choice.

Whose responsibility is it to save the world by changing it? Whose responsibility is it to replace our anachronistic social, political and economic institutions by new institutions that will harmonize with the realities of the new world that modern science has created? If you ask politicians they say it is not their responsibility. They cannot act without popular support if they want to be re-elected. If you ask ordinary people they say it is not their responsibility. What can one person do? If you ask journalists, they say that if they ever reported the news in a way that did not please their employers, they would immediately lose their jobs. But in reality, perhaps all three actors – politicians, ordinary people, and journalists – have a responsibility to be more courageous and far-sighted, and to act together. No one acting alone can achieve the changes that we so desperately need; but all of us together, joining hands, can do it.

By John Scales Avery

14 April 2012

@ Countercurrents.org

Suggestions for further reading

1. O.N. Larsen, ed., “Violence and the Mass Media”, Harper and Row, (1968).

2. R.M.. Liebert et al., “The Early Window: The Effects of Television on Children and Youth”, Pergamon, Elmsford, NY, (1982).

3. G. Noble, “Children in Front of the Small Screen”, Constable, London, (1975).

4. J.L. Singer and D.G. Singer, “Television, Imagination and Aggression: A Study of Preschoolers”, Erlbaum, Hillsdale, NY, (1981).

5. H.J. Skornia, “Television and Society”, McGraw-Hill, New York, (1965).

is a theoretical chemist noted for his research publications in quantum chemistry, thermodynamics, evolution, and history of science. Since the early 1990s, Avery has been an active World peace activist. During these years, he was part of a group associated with the Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs. In 1995, this group received the Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts. Presently, he is an Associate Professor in quantum chemistry at the University of Copenhagen. This article is an extract from Avery’s book “Crisis 21; Civilization’s Crisis in the 21st Century”, which can be freely downloaded from several places on the Internet, for example from http://www.vrijemeje.com/en/node/129

The trial of Norwegian mass-murderer Anders Behring Breivik has today entered its second week, with many interesting but chilling details having been revealed about the bombing in Oslo and subsequent shootings on the island of Utøya.

Perhaps most interesting of all, Breivik has provided a clear explanation of exactly what he hoped to achieve through his acts of terrorism. Immediately after the attack, some commentators speculated that the tragedy would be exploited by the political elite, to demonise moderate nationalists – “patriots” who reject mass immigration and the erosion of national culture – and to stifle debates on such issues.

This, it seems, is exactly what Breivik hoped for.

During the third day of his trial, The Guardian reported how Breivik

insisted that his goal (in the short to medium term) was to make pariahs of Europe’s nationalists – the very people with whom you might expect him to feel kinship. ‘I thought I had to provoke a witchhunt of modern moderately conservative nationalists,’ he said. Then he claimed that this curious strategy had already borne fruit, citing the example of Norway’s prime minister, Jens Stoltenberg, who he said had given a speech since the attacks saying that critics of immigration were wrong. The effect of this ‘witchhunt’, said Breivik, would be to increase ‘censorship’ of moderately nationalist views, which would ‘increase polarisation’. The effect of this, he said, would eventually lead to ‘more radicalisation as more will lose hope and lose faith in democracy’. Ultimately, he said, these new radicals would join the war he has started to protect the ‘indigenous people’ of Norway and western Europe.

Whilst Jens Stoltenberg’s speech may give the impression that Breivik’s strategy is indeed going to plan, other evidence suggests that nationalist parties and policies have not suffered at all in the wake of the Norwegian terror attacks. Last week Geert Wilder’s fervently anti-Islam Freedom Party, the third largest party in the Netherlands, brought down the Dutch coalition government after withdrawing its support for EU-imposed budget cuts. In France, Marine Le Pen’s equally strongly anti-Islam National Front won a record 18 percent of the vote in the first round of presidential elections. Le Pen claims to be fighting the “Islamisation” of France, a position for which there is evidently considerable support, particularly in the aftermath of Mohamed Merah’s “Al Qaeda” shootings in Toulouse last month (the fact that Merah was likely an asset being handled by the French authorities of course being rarely mentioned).

Indeed, the far-right appears to be in the ascendancy, and even courted by the mainstream. French President Nicolas Sarkozy, knowing that he will have to attract National Front votes if he stands any chance of re-election, said after the first round that NF voters “must be respected”, as their votes were “a vote of suffering, a crisis vote”. Comments bluntly critical of Islam, previously the preserve of the far-right, have also been made by leading mainstream politicians in other European countries. Last week the leader of Angela Merkel’s Christian Democrats in parliament, Volker Kauder, described Islam as “not part of our tradition and identity in Germany and so does not belong in Germany”, though he was careful to add “But Muslims do belong in Germany. As state citizens, of course, they enjoy their full rights.”

Whilst Breivik’s purported plan to spark a demonisation of nationalists does not appear to be working, or even necessary, his attacks are certainly feeding into the general tension currently building between those of different political parties and faiths; society is indeed becoming polarised.

This may be the natural result of a failed experiment in multiculturalism, the effects of deliberate conspiracies echoing those such as Operation Gladio, or the “strategy of tension”, or a combination of the two.

No matter who or what is behind the current ratcheting up of tension, a political, religious and racial tension inextricably linked to the collapsing economies and deteriorating living standards of Europe, the ultimate beneficiaries are clear – the shadowy criminal elite who profit from such “systemic destabilisation” and who Peter Dale Scott characterises as the “overworld”.

It must be pointed out that Zionist supporters of Israel are one of the beneficiaries of the tensions currently being played out in Europe. Indeed, the new-found alliance between staunchly pro-Israeli Zionists and ultranational anti-Islamists, is one of the most intriguing aspects of today’s political scene.

The extreme right has traditionally been seen, often with good cause, as anti-Semitic – and yet now we see many examples of the anti-Islamic far-right openly embracing Zionism and Zionists. Anders Breivik was himself an avowed Zionist, his 1515-page manifesto containing multiple references to his firm belief that Israel is an ally which must be strongly defended by nationalists at all costs. Breivik was also of course an avid follower of such anti-Islamic, pro-Zionist writers as the American blogger Pamela Geller.

The Dutch politician Geert Wilders, mentioned earlier, is also a staunch supporter of Israel, having reportedly lived in the country for two years during his youth, and visited 40 times in the last 25 years. His Freedom Party allegedly receives financing from supporters of Israel in the US. The English Defence League, to whom some have linked Breivik, openly state their support of Israel, sometimes appearing at demonstrations waving the Star of David flag. The EDL has a Jewish Division, run by the Zionist Roberta Moore, who recently expressed her support for Breivik’s murders and claimed that his teenage victims were “not innocent”. In France, Le Pen’s National Front has also reportedly won support recently, from a previously hostile Jewish community.

We are obviously living in dangerous times and, with the economy collapsing, widespread social tension increasing, peculiar alliances forming, and Muslims seemingly being scapegoated in a role previously allocated to Jews, drawing parallels between today’s political climate and that of the 1930s, is unfortunately unavoidable.

This article first appeared at Resistance Radio.

By Brit Dee

25 April 2012

@ Activist Post

Brit Dee runs an independent online radio station called Resistance Radio, which broadcasts daily news, views and analysis challenging the lies of our corrupt political and financial leaders, and the controlled corporate media, at http://www.resistradio.com.

In recent months Kabul, Washington and the Taliban have made overtures to work out a negotiated settlement for Afghanistan and plan the impending exist of foreign troops from the country. Yet those gestures have not been followed through and the prospects are not getting any better – as the spate of recent violent episodes, and perverse behaviour of some US soldiers over the war dead have shown. Time is running out and any further episodes will exacerbate the tension flared up by the Qur’an burning, the   March massacre of 17 civilians, and the most daring 15th April Taliban attack of five locations in as many provinces. Washington wants to plan an orderly exit from Afghanistan, secure agreements to curb terrorism further escalating, and plan an orderly election. All the three parties seem to   share these objectives. The Taliban have been emaciated and have also changed, it seems, their initial position to negotiate only after the exit of the foreign forces from Afghanistan. They seem to have realised that negotiating with Kabul is not fruitful and that talking to the Americans, especially in the wake of their exit plan, is the course they now want  to take – hence the Taliban  request to open a political office in Qatar. This is in the interest also of Kabul and Washington as only then would they all know with whom to talk.  For the Taliban are not a monolithic voice, and new commanders   have emerged on both sides of the border with Pakistan, not all of whom are speaking the same language.

Kabul has conceded, after some hesitation, to the Taliban demand to have a representative office in Qatar – in preference apparently to Turkey, which is a NATO member, and even Saudi Arabia that was mentioned but not agreed to.  Washington has also conceded to release some of the Taliban leaders from Guantanamo – far fewer, it seems than what the Taliban are asking for, with the proviso also for a US veto power over the choice of names. The Taliban have also requested that the Black List, which has made travel difficult for them, be rescinded. What has transpired so far is thus indicative of a willingness to negotiate.

The recent US-Kabul deal that the nefarious night raids should henceforth be governed by the Afghan law is also indicative of a concessionary stance. Much would still depend on Washington’s willingness to give this due credibility and let the rule of law control these particularly objectionable raids.

The Taliban have, furthermore adjusted, their earlier views concerning, for instance, female education.  In a recent  talk at IAIS in Kuala Lumpur, Mulla Zaeef, a former Taliban leader,   asserted that the Taliban were not against female education but wanted to regulate it in accordance with  Islam and Afghan traditions . That they were open to power sharing, and that they are not against democracy. The fact that the Taliban, when in power, were besieged and boycotted by the world community invoked certain exaggerated responses from them. A consensus seems to be emerging, it was added, over failure of the military approach, and there was, therefore, no other alternative to peace talks. The general concern now is over the prospects of how and under what conditions the American military are likely to leave Afghanistan.

Failing a negotiated settlement for military disengagement,   violence is not only likely to continue but to escalate further. The so-called Spring Offensive, as recently announced by the US military HQ in Kabul, is particularly inopportune, and should be withdrawn, if the proposed talks were to have a chance.  It is far better, even for the Americans, to bind the Taliban to a plan for a ceasefire now, secure overall commitments to reduce violence – and pave the way for a more comprehensive political settlement later.

The issue of US military bases and last November’s ‘Traditional Loya Jirgah’ (TLJ) decision on a long-term strategic plan concerning it remains problematic.  The manner of convening the TLJ and its endorsement of such a momentous decision, without the involvement even of the sitting Parliament, have remained controversial. There was no public debate on this and no clear information of its details.  Following the March massacre, Karzai announced that a careful scrutiny of the military bases issue would be undertaken.  It seems that the US-Karzai agreement over the bases has involved, not just one, but five bases in as many provinces of Afghanistan.

Confidence building measures are needed now to put fresh impetus in   the stalling peace talks.   This may involve a clear indication of interest, especially by the Americans, in peace negotiations. Further clarification over the military bases issue is also needed as the assumption would hold otherwise that the US is planning a long-term stay in Afghanistan, which is seen as a recipe for continuation of conflict. If indeed there is an agreement over this, it should be subjected to the normal legal process for ratification of international treatises, preferably after the exit of occupation forces. If the US withdrawal means that it still maintains forces in the order of the rumoured 20,000 soldiers, this is likely to be contentious, unless a further phasing out is also made a part of the plan.

Lastly, the present Afghan army is ethnically-based and marginalises the Pashtun majority. This is still a US-backed policy, which is, however, deeply problematic and should be changed, if one were to entertain the prospects of handing over the country’s security and defence to the Afghan army. No stable political future for Afghanistan can work, without the Pashtun participation, and must in any case, be  based on fair participation of all ethnic, religious and  political segments of the Afghan populace. A clear change of policy on this will be seen as a confidence-building measure and help toward planning a sustainable political future for Afghanistan.

By Mohammad Hashim Kamali

24 April 2012

Mohammad Hashim Kamali is founding chairman of the International Institute of Advanced Islamic Studies (IAIS) Malaysia

Indigenous wisdom reveals a path to the future that does not include a buy-out of the earth’s natural systems.

“Time is life.”

With these three words, Karma Tshiteem, Secretary of the Bhutan Gross National Happiness Commission, ended his brief description of Bhutan’s distinctive approach to economic development. It caught my attention because of the striking contrast to our common Western phrase, “Time is money.”

The event I was attending was a small international gathering primarily of indigenous environmental leaders. I was privileged to be among the few nonindigenous writer-activists invited to join them.

Tshiteem was seated to my left. Winona LaDuke, program director of Honor the Earth and a celebrated Native American environmental author and activist, was on my right. Tom Goldtooth, global environmental leader and executive director of the Indigenous Environmental Network, sat directly across from me. Next to him was Pablo Solón, former Bolivian Ambassador to the United Nations. Pablo was a principal driver behind the 2010 World People’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth in Cochabamba, Bolivia.

We were there to share perspectives on the work of building green economies based on the principles of indigenous wisdom. Several of the participants are involved in bringing an indigenous voice to the Rio+20 Conference on Sustainable Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil in June—the 20-year follow-up to the 1992 UN Earth Summit.

Our venue was Pocantico, the former New York estate of John D Rockefeller, the legendary icon of ruthless capitalist expansion and extraction. We enjoyed the irony of meeting in the setting of this grand estate in our search for a different path.

A Prophetic Choice

On the plane I had read LaDuke’s report Launching a Green Economy for Brown People. Its opening paragraph set the frame for our discussions:

“Ojibwe prophecies speak of a time during the seventh fire when our people will have a choice between two paths. The first path is well-worn and scorched. The second path is new and green. It is our choice as communities and as individuals how we will proceed.”

Recognizing the need for a new path, indigenous peoples around the world are revisiting the wisdom teachings of their respective traditions as a guide to their survival in a world dominated by institutional forces that have long sought to wipe those teachings from our collective memory.

We, the peoples of modern Western societies, face the same choice referred to in the prophecy. Some among us are realizing that we, too, have much to learn from the traditional indigenous understanding of what Goldtooth referred to as “The Original Instructions.”

Our deliberations at Pocantico brought into sharp relief the contrast between money-centered Western and life-centered indigenous views of the proper purpose and structure of a high-performing economy.

The Original Instructions call us to recognize Earth as our living mother and to honor and care for her as she cares for us. In the West we have forsaken the Original Instructions in favor of an economic theory that calls us to treat Earth’s resources as saleable commodities.

Rio +20

A number of the Pocantico participants were involved in negotiations leading up to Rio+20, a UN global environmental conference commemorating the 20th anniversary of 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. They informed us that the document being prepared for approval by the world’s governments in Rio will fall far short of identifying and addressing the source of global environmental failure. Rather it will recommend that to save our Earth mother, we must put an estimated price on her waters, soils, air, forests, fisheries, and gene pool and offer them all for sale on the thoroughly disproven theory that whomever is able to pay the highest price for her will have a natural incentive to care for her.

In the 1990s I was deeply involved in the global resistance against multilateral trade agreements through which global corporations sought free reign to colonize the world’s natural resources, markets, and technology. The 1999 Seattle World Trade Organization protest focused global attention on this assault against the human future. The massive demonstrations that followed all around the world largely stymied the use of multilateral agreements to circumvent democracy and popular sovereignty in a global drive to divide up control of the world’s markets and resources among the ruling corporate oligopolies.

During our Pocantico conference it became evident that corporate interests have concluded that the best current hope for advancing their agenda is to play on the world’s concern for the environment, using multilateral environmental agreements as their new vehicle to get local communities and national governments to relinquish control of the natural wealth within their borders.

As alert citizen groups are pointing out, the proposals being advanced would result in the ultimate commodification and financialization of nature for the short-term benefit of the same global profiteers who created the mortgage bubble that brought down much of the global economy in 2008.

Herman Daly, the father of ecological economics, has aptly observed, “There is something fundamentally wrong in treating the Earth as if it were a business in liquidation.” If Rio+20 goes according to the apparent Wall Street plan, it will lay the groundwork for Earth’s ultimate going out of business sale.

At the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, the leadership for a new green path came not from global corporations and the official delegates who aligned with corporate interests, but rather from the representatives of global civil society who drafted alternative NGO treaties presenting a people’s vision of a just, sustainable, and democratic human future. Rio+20 appears destined to repeat that pattern, with citizen groups already working on People’s Sustainability Treaties that align with the Original Instructions and give voice to the vision and values of the rest of us. Hopefully, the resulting contrast between the corporate and people’s visions of the human future—one grounded in the contemporary Western worldview and the other in the traditional indigenous worldview—may help us all see more clearly the choice between the two paths of the Ojibwe prophecy.

Competing Worldviews

Those indigenous people who maintain their cultural identity view the world through a very different lens than do those of us who view the world through a Western cultural lens. The implications of the difference are profound.

The summaries below represent my understanding of the contrasting Western and indigenous worldviews regarding our perception of time, relationships, and place. The Western lens leads further down the scorched Earth path we are currently on. The indigenous lens leads to the path to a viable and prosperous human future. For clarity, I’ve intentionally emphasized the differences.

Contemporary Western Worldview

Time: Time is money and plays out in an exponential unidirectional growth in financial assets, consumption, and the market value of economic activity. Decision-making properly gives priority to maximizing financial gain to grow the economic pie and thereby improve the lives of all. Indices like Gross Domestic Product that assess economic performance based on the rate of flow of money through the economy and stock price indices like the Dow Jones average that track the value of financial assets are natural and logical metrics for assessing economic performance.

Relationships: Individual liberty and economic efficiency are paramount and are maximized by basing human relationships on financial exchanges in which each individual seeks to maximize his or her individual financial gain. This in turn maximizes the general well-being and improves the lives of all. Nature exists for the benefit of humans, who rightfully control and dominate it.

Place: Earth is a resource to be owned, valued by the price it will fetch in the marketplace, and exploited for maximum financial return. Our individual identity is defined by the brands we consume. Our individual worth is determined by the price we command in the marketplace and our accumulated financial assets. We maximize our personal economic efficiency by minimizing our individual connection and commitment to any place, person, or community and maximizing our readiness to move on when presented with greater financial opportunity elsewhere. Property rights are properly treated as individual, total, and freely tradeable if the price is right.

The affirmation and celebration of extreme individualism, instant self-gratification, and alienation from one another and nature characteristic of the contemporary Western worldview resonates with the primitive core of the human brain, commonly known as the reptilian brain. This is the site of our most basic, individualistic, and predatory hide, fight, or flight survival instincts unmediated by the more highly evolved mammalian brain that is the source of our human capacity for compassion and bonding and the neocortical brain where our distinctive human capacity for self-awareness and reason resides.

Suppressing our capacity for reason, we raise the pursuit of money to the status of a sacred mission, failing to notice that money is nothing but a number of no intrinsic value and that we are destroying the real wealth of people, community, and nature to grow the numbers on financial asset statements.

The traditional indigenous worldview presents a very different, what we might call a whole brain, perspective on ourselves and our relationship to nature.

Traditional Indigenous Worldview

Time: Time is life and is experienced through the rhythms of life’s daily, seasonal, and generational circular flow. As humans we must be ever mindful of our responsibility to meet our own needs in ways that assure life’s continued healthful flow and balance now and for generations to come. The Gross National Happiness Index developed by the nation of Bhutan appropriately assesses economic performance based on indicators of the health and well-being of people living in harmonious balance with one another and nature.

Relationships: All beings are related and interconnected. It is our individual human duty to recognize and honor the rights of all beings, including the river, the rock, and the glacier. Mother Earth provides our means of living. Her bounty is a gift that we received in common and must share, respect and care for in common. None among us created that bounty and no one has a right to claim it for their exclusive personal benefit. We are entitled only to take what we need and bear a sacred responsibility to give back or share the rest—all the while respecting the natural balance of creation and the Original Instructions that constitute a higher law to which all human laws are inherently subordinate.

Place: Earth is our sacred mother. Each being has intrinsic value and its rightful place within an interconnected whole. Our personal and collective connection to our place on Earth is sacred and inalienable. Individual human identity is linked to and defined by a deep and enduring relationship to our place and to the vocation through which we sustain ourselves and fulfill our responsibility to and for the community that in turn sustains us.

There is good reason why the wisdom at the heart of the traditional indigenous worldview strikes a deep and appealing chord in the human psyche. Modern science is now telling us what indigenous wisdom keepers have known and taught across countless generations. We humans evolved over millions of years to live and prosper in community with one another and nature. Our happiness and sense of well-being depend in substantial measure on our connection to nature and a caring community. Science now acknowledges that the Original Instructions are, in effect, genetically encoded into the more highly evolved mammalian and human centers of our brain.

What we of the Western worldview embrace as progress is best understood from an evolutionary perspective as a regression to a more primitive state of awareness. Our Western separation from nature—from life—has allowed us to greatly deepen human understanding of the inner mechanics of life. It has, however, alienated us from our understanding of life’s purpose; life’s capacity for non-mechanical self-direction, adaptation, and resilience; and what is truly sacred. We are just beginning to wake up to the self-deflating truth that to find our way to the path of the new green future, we must turn for guidance to the indigenous keepers of the original instructions who have survived the brutally invasive cultural and institutional forces of Westernization.

The New Green Path

Consistent with the Ojibwe prophecy, a reawakening to our true human nature is sweeping through both indigenous and nonindigenous societies. For millennia, the wisdom keepers of indigenous societies kept alive the deep wisdom of their traditional indigenous worldview and passed down their understanding of the Original Instructions from generation to generation to be available to us all at this time of prophetic choice.

We must reject any proposal that supports the further commodification and financialization of nature.

This does not suggest a return to the traditional predominantly hunter-gatherer indigenous ways of living and organizing. That is not an option. Quite apart from personal life-style preferences, traditional indigenous institutions and technologies that served well in simpler times, will not meet the needs of a globally interconnected population of 7 billion people in a resource constrained world.

To find our way on the new green path of the Ojibwe prophecy, we need a worldview that builds on a foundation of indigenous wisdom, while selectively updating and adapting it to the realities of a densely populated world and the need for selective and responsible application of appropriately-adapted modern technologies and institutional forms. The result might be something like this:

Time: We will recognize that time is life and is experienced both through the spiral of life’s circular flow and the trajectory of its evolutionary unfolding across generations toward ever greater capacity and possibility. We will honor life, not money, as the proper standard of value, understand that individual worth is inherent in the gift of life, and accept as a sacred duty our responsibility to assure life’s continued healthful flow and balance now and for generations to come. We will evaluate the performance of our economies by indicators of life’s health and vitality.

Relationships: We will recognize that individual rights and responsibilities are inseparably linked and will rediscover and renew our deep sense of connection to one another and Earth based on mutual caring and sharing.

Place: We will recognize that the biosphere is our natural mutual heritage, the foundation of life, and beyond price. We will discover that identity based on place and community has greater meaning and is more satisfying than identity based on personal financial assets and the brands we consume. We will acknowledge that we receive the gifts of nature in common and that nature’s bounty is best managed by the peoples of place-based communities who have a natural interest in assuring the continuous flow of this bounty from generation to generation with no loss in the vitality, productivity, and resilience of Earth’s natural systems.

Our deliberations at Pocantico focused on the efforts of indigenous peoples to forge new economies within their territories based on the wisdom of the Original Instructions. Their efforts can be an essential source of inspiration and instruction for those of us long separated from our indigenous roots and the wisdom of the indigenous worldview. For indigenous people to serve this role to the greater benefit of us all, it is essential that we of the world’s nonindigenous societies honor their right to hold and manage their lands and resources consistent with their traditional teachings and practices. Therefore, we must stand beside our indigenous brothers and sisters in their struggle to prevent outside interests from gaining control of what remains of their lands and resources.

More broadly, we must reject any proposal that supports the further commodification and financialization of nature and call on the United Nations to initiate the drafting of a new framework that begins with a recognition that life is the foundation and proper measure of value, nature is sacred and not for sale, and stable place-based communities are the natural and proper stewards of Earth’s natural bounty.

Together we can choose the prophesied new green path to a secure and prosperous living future for ourselves and for all the world’s children for all the many generations to come.

By David Korten

25 April 2012

@ YES! Magazine

David Korten (livingeconomiesforum.org) is the author of Agenda for a New Economy, TheGreat Turning: From Empire to Earth Community, and the international best seller When Corporations Rule the World. He is board chair of YES! Magazine and a founding board member of the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies.