[sustran] Mumbai --> World Sustainable Cities Consortium:

[Eric Britton]

Dear Sustran Friends and Colleagues,

 

More than once in this terrific and collegial list we have heard from
people and projects that need some form of support or counsel in order
to do battle with interests that seem to be going against the principles
of sustainability and social justice to which I believe every one of us
on this list are deeply attached.  The tough messages that we have just
received from Mumbai are but the latest case in point.

 

Now, while I am trying to figure out how my colleagues and I might be
able to be of some help in this case, I would like to draw your
attention to an effort which is currently getting under way which is
aiming to develop a flexible structure of long term peer support for
sustainability initiatives in and around cities.  We are calling the
program The World Sustainable Cities Consortium: 2002-2022, and you will
find full details on it at  <http://ngroups.com/stockholm>
http://ngroups.com/stockholm.  And if you go there you will also see how
both to access and use the considerable content that is already in hand,
and, if you chose to, how to add your name to the lists of
Sustainability Advocates and Sustainable City Projects.

 

You will also note that there is a slot there for 'Issue Papers' for
consideration and discussion, and it is there where I think we might
want to consider posting some sort of composite piece on The "Enron" Of
Road Development for information and comment.  If you click to 

 
<http://www.ngroups.com/stockholm/index.php?body=display&showid=10247767
99-839168088>
http://www.ngroups.com/stockholm/index.php?body=display&showid=102477679
9-839168088

and then page down to the section entitled "Message to the Johannesburg
World Summit", you will see the first in this series, which, since I had
it in hand, is a piece that I have prepared to get the ball rolling.  It
consists of a certain number of observations and recommendations, and
opens with a short section on "
<http://www.ngroups.com/stockholm/index.php?body=display&showid=10247767
99-839168088#brief#brief> The 2002-2022 Sustainability Landscape in
Brief " which I have sliced out and attached to this note.

 

I would normally hesitate to bring all this to your attention, but I
think it is germane both to the immediate issues at hand in Mumbai and
to our work and cooperation more generally.  So thanks for being patient
with me on this, and I do hope that you will not only turn to the site
at http://ngroups.com/stockholm when you have the chance, but that you
will also decide to sign in and join us in this long term push toward
sustainable cites and sustainable lives.  Bear in mind though, that we
are talking about the period out to 2022 for now.  And when we get there
we can then all take stock of the situation and decide what needs to be
done next.

 

And in the meantime and as always, 

 

With all good wishes,

 

Eric Britton

 

The Commons __ technology, economy, society__

Le Frene, 8/10 rue Joseph Bara, 75006 Paris, France

Day phone: +331 4326 1323 Mobile: +336 80 96 78 79

24 hour Fax/Voicemail hotline: +1 888 677-4866

http://ecoplan.org/   IP Videoconference: 81.65.50.63  

Email: ecoplan.adsl at wanadoo.fr    <http://www.ecoplan.org/>  URL
www.ecoplan.org

 

 

 

= = = = = = 

 "Message to the Johannesburg World Summit", 

 

Here are my personal draft recommendations for consideration in the
context of the Message to Johannesburg. They are by no means original, I
should point out. They are rather the result of my work with the city of
Stockholm and all I have seen and learned on this challenging topic over
all these months. They are, above all, the message which I have been
able to discern from the 228 project teams and others involved in this
great group learning experience. 

 

The 2002-2022 Sustainability Landscape in Brief 

 

We have some tough years ahead, there can be no doubt about that. And
our sustainable cities strategy, whether at the level of a single place
or project, or from a global world perspective, needs to be framed with
these tough realities starkly on the screen before us as we try to
figure out what and how to manage change. Here is a simple listing for
now of what I regard as some of the main features of the future cities
landscape - a future that is already well on us but which has as yet to
be taken seriously by leaders and policy makers, if results are to be
our guide: 

 

*	Global Warming gets worse (a lot) 
*	Massive overcapacity of world industry 
*	Corruption continues to be endemic, working systematically in
favor of larger projects and transactions, whether they are what is most
needed or not. 
*	Massive population migrations and pressures internationally and
locally become a major menace to peace, well-being and society 
*	International community continues lukewarm approach to world
development, sustainability and social justice 
*	Organizational and decision structures continue to be so tightly
defined as to constrain best outcomes (leading instead to systematic and
deleterious sub-optimization). 
*	Unaccountable bureaucracies continue to dominate decision
making, with all the downsides that this evidently entails. 
*	'In the box' thinking continues to dominate public sector
decision making, rendering sustainable outcomes somewhere between
unlikely and impossible 
*	Technology offers enormous potentials which continue to be
massively underexploited 
*	The downside of technology continues to be systemically
unaddressed 
*	The rhetoric of development increasingly favors women, children,
and the disadvantaged - but the actual decisions and acts by and large
continue in the old mold. 
*	 

This for better or worse is the base-line reality of the situation that
our cities and towns across the planet are going to face in the years
ahead. Our decision and action environment. There will thank god be
exceptions to this, and these are going to need to be recognized,
applauded and integrated into the new patterns which are so badly
needed. Which in the meantime puts the emphasis on local initiatives of
just the sort that the teams, groups and people assembling here can do
something about. But to succeed, we must not only be smart, hard working
and capable on our individual projects and efforts, but also ready to
work together both to learn and to provide strategic support for each
other at critical times. Which is precisely what this WSCC is all about.

 

---- piece continues from there with short sections on Observations and
Recommendations to Johannesburg. ---

-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: http://list.jca.apc.org/manage/private/sustran-discuss/attachments/20020707/7d230292/attachment.htm
-------------- next part --------------
A non-text attachment was scrubbed...
Name: not available
Type: image/gif
Size: 94 bytes
Desc: not available
Url : http://list.jca.apc.org/manage/private/sustran-discuss/attachments/20020707/7d230292/attachment.gif