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| A Larger View |
| Another Approach to Current Events |
| Volume XII Edition 6 |
November/December |
2007 |
In this issue:
This being the last issue of the year, we follow our tradition of focusing on "good" stories, that is stories that contribute to somehow making the world a better place. What a reader may also want to know is that the number of stories that could have been included far exceeded the space we have to list them.
Muslim Leaders Seek Cooperation
Last October at the end of Ramadan 138 Moslem theologians from around the world sent an open letter to their Christian counterparts stating that the two religions which share the worshipping of one god and the principle of loving thy neighbor, need to cooperate more closely. The letter notes that 55% of the world population is either Christian or Muslim, "making the relationship between these two religious communities the most important factor in contributing to meaningful peace around the world." The effort is an important step in drawing moderates together. "Terrorists don’t have the right to speak for Islam, that is the point that is urgent for the Muslim World to get across," said Timothy Winter, a convert and lecturer in Islam at Cambridge University, who is one of the letter’s signatories. It is doubtful the effort will attract radicals, in fact while several Muslim sects signed it, none, for example, was from the Wahhabi, a strict sect known to have influenced the ideas of Osama Bin laden. The 29-page document called "A Common Word Between Us and You" freely quotes from both the Bible and the Koran and was mostly put together by the Royal Aal al-Bayt Institute for Islamic Thought in Jordan.
Such efforts may not get much press but the fact they exist speaks volume for the struggling voice of reason.
Nets Distribution Helps Fight Malaria
While many argue how long it will take to eradicate malaria altogether and others argue about how to fight it, Dr. Arata Kochi, the director of the World Health Organization, already knows. For him the answer lies in the free distribution of nets to millions of poor people. And there is evidence his way is working. In the small Kenyan village of Malendeleo, part of a five-year study of 40 health districts, the death of children dropped 44 percent. The traditional way of distributing nets is through a kind of marketing campaign involving consultants and distributors costing about $10 a net on top of the $5 to $7 the net itself costs. The cost of the free distribution so favored by Dr. Kochi is $1.25 a net including some payment to volunteers. But the advantages seem to go beyond costs. When the nets are sold at subsidized prices, only the richest of the poor can afford them—at best. This way the poorest of the poor can have access. This means that often a whole area can be mosquito free. When only some have nets, the mosquitoes can easily go to the next house. Another sign of success could very well be that the village of Malendeleo noticed that the sale of malaria pills was way down.
Nets have proven to be effective, and now a way to distribute them more efficiently is also proven, it gives no excuse for the suffering caused by malaria to continue.
A Brighter Future
We’re accustomed to thinking of the world as mired in problems, some with solutions some maybe not. Yet the State of the Future Report released last September says that the world actually faces a brighter future, one with fewer wars, higher life expectancy and improved literacy rates. The report is issued by the World Federation of UN Associations, a global network of associations in more than 100 member states. It’s not that the report denies the problems, nor omits them. It is that the researchers have access to a pool of data enabling them to have an objectivity most of us are not able to achieve without access to the necessary information. They, for example, point to the fact that the number of African conflicts fell from a peak of 16 in 2002 to five in 2005, that the number of refugees in the world is actually falling or that the average world per capita income has increased by 4.3 percent. The study also notes that over a billion people are now connected to the Internet.
Our gauge of human progress tends to be set against daily news headlines, perhaps we need to widen our lens.
Secret Iraqi Peace Talks
We’ve come to think of Sunni and Shiite Muslims as opponents, and in Iraq that seems to be true, and yet representatives of both sides attended secret peace talks in Finland several weeks ago. While secret meetings often hide what the public ought to know, sometimes they permit work that a public airing would no doubt mar. The talks were facilitated by former Finnish President Martti Ahtisaari, a long time conflict resolution activist and head of The Crisis Management Initiative, a conflict resolution group. John W. McCormack of the graduate School of Policy Studies at the University of Massachussetts in Boston also participated in organizing the meeting. With such backing and such guidance, the two sides were able to agree on certain political objectives, and also agreed to set up an independent commission to supervise the disarmament of non-governmental armed groups—insurgents to us! More importantly the group agreed "to consult further".
Sunni and Shiite cooperation is one of the world’s greatest needs, Mr. Ahtisaari is one of the few individuals qualified to bring it about. Let’s hope for more secret meetings!
Global Remittances—Larger Than Most Corporations
Global remittances are the money immigrants send back to their home countries. A World Bank study reports the total as $276 billion in 2006, almost double what it was in 2000 and larger than the receipts of most corporations. Only Wal-Mart and Exxon Mobil would be larger. World Bank economist Dilip Ratha explains the magnitude of these contributions by saying they "are larger than direct foreign investments in Mexico, tea exports in Sri Lanka, tourism revenue in Morocco, and revenues from the Suez Canal in Egypt." India leads the world in taking in $23.7 billion in 2005 and $26.9 billion in 2006. Most of these transactions are made through Western Union which says that $167 billion went to developing countries, a sum that is larger than that of official development assistance. In fact as a result of all the business Western Union does with immigrants, its foundation has begun a five-year $50 million assistance program giving help through such things as scholarships, help setting up businesses or mentoring would-be entrepreneurs.
At a time when the sentiments in many countries run against immigrants, the mounting remittances are impressive. When we take politics out of the equation and look at the facts from a human—not to speak spiritual perspective, the facts speak for what immigrants continually overcome: hardships, prejudices, privations, sacrifices. As a group they demand at the very least our respect.
Technology Comes To Light Africa
If one flies over Africa at night the absence of light is unmistakable. It is a dark continent. On a daily level the effect is far more than an observation, it means people use candles and kerosene, which often take up part of a budget they could use or need for things like school fees or food. A fisherman in Lake Victoria who usually works at night, for example, currently may spend $4000 a year on the kerosene needed to attract shoals of fish to the surface before trapping them in nets. According to a project sponsored by the World Bank, the future for lighting Africa lies in LED, light emitting diodes. While LED may not be a long-term solution, it is enough of an interim one that it will ease financing for long-term projects, something that the World Bank has already begun. With lighting comes security and a boost in economic development—at least a 2% yearly growth according to World Bank estimates.
Simple solutions are often overlooked and sometimes—temporary or not—they are the most apt answers.
Decriminalizing Prostitution
Sex workers are victims, not offenders—that is a new way India is proposing to treat sex workers. This means that instead of going after prostitutes, it will go after traffickers, pimps, brothel owners and clients. It is more than an effort to decriminalize prostitution. In India hundreds of thousands of women and girls are kidnapped and sold or coerced into becoming sex workers in what is a well-organized illicit trade which is said to generate more than $30 billion annually.
Let’s hope India goes ahead with its proposed law and sets an example that can take the sail out of human trafficking.
U.S. Institute of Peace
Few know that it exists, but it does. The U. S. Institute of Peace is a non-partisan Washington think tank which was talked about for a long time but was finally funded in 1980 and then opened in leased offices in Washington. The Institute’s best-known project has been the facilitating of the bipartisan Iraq Study Group meant to recommend solutions to the administration. The organization, which says it is neither for "pacifists" nor for "peaceniks", provides training to nongovernmental and military groups. Plans were recently approved for a permanent building on the National Mall across from the Lincoln Memorial. When the building is finished in 2010 there will be room for exhibits and it will be easier to bring the subject of peacemaking to the forefront and link scholars with students.
Sometimes a thought does need a concrete manifestation. Maybe the Institute’s new building will embody the ideas it is meant to serve.
Child Mortality Ebbing
For the first time child mortality has fallen to below 10 million a year. In 1990,13 million children died in their first year. The progress is attributed mainly a series of successes in campaigns to immunize against measles, the use of bed nets to fight malaria, vitamin A and the promotion of early and exclusive use of breast-feeding. Ann Veneman, UNICEF Executive Director, put it succinctly, "The new figures show that progress is possible if we act with renewed urgency to scale up interventions that have proven successful."
Our Understanding of Poverty
In a recent speech Robert Zoellick, president of the World Bank, asked that globalization not leave the bottom billion of us behind. As part of his remarks he displayed an understanding of poverty which ought to be generally accepted as minimal in order to start its elimination. "Poverty breeds instability, disease and devastation of common resources and the environment," he said. "Poverty can lead to broken societies that can become breeding grounds of those bent on destruction, and to migrations that risk lives." Zoellick has not only taken steps towards that end, the measures he proposed to ensure the bank takes necessary steps to better engage its resources were approved shortly after his speech.
We can’t solve poverty unless we have a basic grasp of what we’re capable of doing and why we must do it. Perhaps Zoellick’s thoughts will provide a needed impetus.
A Larger View is published by the Inner\Outer Partnership, a tax-exempt educational organization probing how trans-religious spiritual principles can be agents of individual and societal change. We are funded through donations. Please send any - as well as any comments - to P.O.Box 1293, Pac. Pal. CA 90272-1293. Also contact us by email at alargerview@earthlink.net or call 310-836-7710 or visit our web site at www.innerouterpartnership.org
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