If you doubt the seriousness of the United Nation's quest to become a world government just read through this "Charter99." While there are feel-good phrases scattered throughout, this document should send cold shivers down the spine of anyone who loves freedom!
(Mustard Seed editorial comment: OUR FOUNDING FATHERS KNEW THAT A DEMOCRACY CANNOT WORK FOR ANY LENGTH OF TIME BUT ALWAYS DEGENERATES INTO TYRANNY:
"Democracies have ever been spectacles of turbulance and contention; have ever been found incompatible with personal security, or the rights of property....politicians, who have patronized this species of Government, have erroneously supposed, that by reducing mankind to a perfect equality in their political rights, they would, at the same time, be perfectly equalized and assimilated in their possessions, their opinions, and their passions." [James Madison in The Federalist No. 10]
"The reign of an intolerant spirit of party amongst a free people seldom fails to result in a dangerous accession to the Executive power introduced and established amidst unusual professions of devotion to democracy....This is the old trick of those who would usurp the government of their country. In the name of democracy they speak, warning the people against the influence of wealth and the danger of aristocracy." [William Henry Harrison])
Dear Representatives to the Millennium Assembly,
This Charter is addressed to you and all the governments and peoples of the world you represent. It is a demand for global democracy.
Throughout the century now coming to an end there have been well meaning and sometimes eloquent calls for world government; calls which pointed to the unfairness, inequality and injustice of the present distributions of wealth, power and policy making - which mean that today one in five of us lives in absolute poverty; calls which emphasised the dangers to peace and even to human survival. If only we could work as one world, then we could solve the world's problems together.
If only! Sometimes with a sigh, sometimes with contempt, these calls have been dismissed as impractical.
But during the 1990s, demands for international government have taken on a new energy and precision:
In addition, a growing scholarly literature on all aspects of globalisation has begun to explore how governments can regulate and democratise international affairs.
There are now detailed, practical measures which set out an ambitious agenda for democracy in international decision-making, now increasingly known as 'global governance'.
We believe that there is a profound and important reason for this historic shift.
It is that in many ways we now have world government.
It is not to be found at the United Nations. Rather, the UN has been sidelined, while the real business of world government is done elsewhere. Global policies are discussed and decided behind closed doors by exclusive groups, such as the G8, OECD, the Bank of International Settlements, the World Bank, the International Monetary Fund, the World Trade Organisation and others. These agencies are reinforced by informal networks of high officials and powerful alliances such as NATO and the European Union. Together they have created what can be seen as dominant and exclusive institutions of world government. All too often they are influenced by transnational corporations which pursue their own world strategies.
These agencies of actual world government must be made accountable. If there are to be global policies, let them be answerable to the peoples of the world.
We call on you, therefore, to start the new century by initiating the process of democratic global governance following three fundamental principles:
The first aim is to make the already existing processes of world administration and governance accountable. We want to know what decisions are being taken and why. We want the decision takers to know they are answerable to the public in every country which feels the breath of international bodies.
Then we want all decisions to be compatible with public criteria of environmental sustainability.
Finally, if most ambitiously, we want them to be compatible with the principles of human rights and justice, including social and economic justice.
What we want from the Millennium Assembly and Member States is decisive action to put these principles into practice. We do not think they will be easy to achieve. But we believe the difficulties can and must be overcome. We want you to negotiate new global structures which give the world's people an effective role in solving this planet's problems. In our era everyone is linked through our shared environment, trade and communications. We live together as neighbours, and as neighbours we must respect the rights of all persons to address common problems. A joint effort of learning and negotiation, of trial and error, will be needed.
Many vital issues can best be tackled effectively at a global level, such as the environment, biodiversity and climate change; international security and disarmament; international trade, finance and labour rights; epidemics; communications; and international crime.
The first question is where should we start? We believe that the answer has to be at the United Nations. The inadequacy of the UN is well known. All around we see the principles of the UN subverted, sidelined and suppressed. Since the UN Charter was signed, more than 30 million people have been killed in war, most of them unarmed civilians; millions more people have been slaughtered in genocide and ethnic conflict; over 100 million people have fled their homes due to conflict or persecution, with over 20 million remaining as refugees today; permanent members of the Security Council have armed belligerents and engaged in war; governments have invested more in preparing for war than in strengthening peace; human rights have been violated with little redress.
Nevertheless the United Nations as an institution can hardly be blamed for the appalling behaviour of its member states. Without the UN, wars would have been even more frequent; they would have gone on longer; there would have been a greater number of victims, and many more refugees living without hope. The UN is the only arena in which all countries sit side by side. For all its weakness, it retains an unmatched legitimacy in world affairs.
The UN's founding Charter mandates you to achieve international co-operation in solving international problems of an economic, social, cultural or humanitarian character and to be a centre for harmonising the actions of nations (Article 1).
We therefore call on you to create effective mechanisms to hold every agency of actual world government to account. These include international economic alliances, military alliances, and agencies for environmental, financial, social, sporting, or other activity: All should have to answer regularly for what they have done and intend to do, for their impact on the world community and for their adherence to the UN Charter and international law. We want action to start the process now.
The creation of democratic global governance may be complicated. But [it will be achieved, because] the need for it is simple and urgent. Global problems will only get worse if international decision-making is left in the hands of the present undemocratic, exclusive institutions. Therefore we will press for action and to call on public support around the world.
World-wide campaigns have led to the end of apartheid in South Africa, to the Statute for an International Criminal Court, to the ban on landmines and some debt-reduction for the world's poorest countries. The time has come to make democratic reform of international affairs our priority, both as an end in itself and as a means of solving many serious social and economic problems.
Many reforms are needed. The following 12 points are a summary of the many demands and proposals being made across the world for better international governance.
As an urgent first step we call on you to set in motion a rigorous process to hold all agencies
of global governance to account and democratise international decision-making according
to the principles set out in this letter.
Signed
NAME:______________________________________ .TITLE_______________
ORGANISATION (if any): ____________________________________________
ADDRESS:_________________________________________________________
STATE: _______________________ COUNTRY: _________________________
PHONE: __________________________________________________________
DONATION/SUPPORT OFFERED: ___________________________________
Please make cheques payable to the One World Trust,
12 areas for urgent action
Strengthen democratic accountability and participation in international decision-making:
1. Give the UN General Assembly powers to scrutinise the work of UN agencies and other
agencies of global governance; create an annual Forum of Civil Society; open international
institutions to increased participation by civil society and elected representatives from member
countries; bring the WTO into the UN system and strengthen co-operation between all
international groupings under the UN system.
2. Create within the UN system an accountable, equitable and effective mechanism to monitor,
supervise and regulate transnational corporations and financial institutions; and require
transnational companies to adhere to an international code of conduct covering agreed principles
concerning human rights, the environment and core labour standards.
3. Give UN institutions an additional and independent source of revenue such as taxation of foreign exchange transactions, aircraft and shipping fuels, arms sales and licensing use of the global commons.
Maintain international peace and security:
4. Reform the UN Security Council to open all decision-making to public scrutiny; phase out the
single country veto and permanent membership; establish equitable representation from each
region of the world; set up a high level early warning system; and provide effective authority to
mediate and intervene in disputes at an early stage, within national boundaries where necessary.
5. Establish a permanent, directly recruited UN Rapid Reaction Force to hold the peace in a crisis,
police gross violations of human rights and support multilateral defence against aggression and
genocide;
6. Make the UN register of arms mandatory; ratify and implement the Landmine Ban Treaty; outlaw all weapons of mass destruction; initiate programmes to control the arms trade, convert the arms industry to peaceful production and cut military spending world wide; strengthen accountability to the UN of all international military action; and reduce the size of national armies as part of a multilateral global security system.
Uphold fundamental human rights:
7. Strengthen world citizenship based on compliance with and respect for the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and all international instruments on Human Rights, including the six core treaties on economic, social and cultural rights; civil and political rights; racial discrimination; discrimination against women, children's rights, torture, and the conventions on genocide, refugees and labour standards.
Strengthen justice under international law:
8. Ratify the Statute of the International Criminal Court; accept compulsory jurisdiction of the International Court of Justice, the International Criminal Court and the UN Human Rights Committee; increase the Courts' powers of enforcement; open the ICJ to individual petition and protect the judicial independence of the ICC.
Promote social progress and better standards of life:
9. Establish a strong UN institution for Economic and Environmental security to promote international prosperity, protect the global commons and secure sustainable development.
10. Establish an International Environmental Court to enforce international treaties on the
environment and protect the global commons.
11. Declare climate change to be an essential global security interest and establish a high-level
international urgent action team to assist the UN Conference of the Parties on Climate Change to
set a scientifically based global ceiling on greenhouse gas emissions, to allocate national shares of
permissible emissions based on convergence to equal per capita rights, and to work with
governments, companies, international agencies and NGOs to cut emissions of greenhouse gases
to a sustainable level.
12. Make poverty reduction a global priority: secure universal access to safe drinking water, health care, housing, education, family planning, gender equality, sustainable development and economic opportunities, and strengthen the capacity of development agencies to eliminate malnutrition, preventable diseases and absolute poverty through conservation and equitable sharing of global resources. Cancel the unpayable debts of the poorest nations and institute measures to prevent severe debt burdens from ever building up again.
These are just some of the most important issues crying out for urgent action by the world
community. To make them happen, we need a determined effort to hold all agencies of
global governance to account and democratise international decision-making.
To support the Charter, please send your name, title or trade, address and a donation (cheques payable to Westminster UNA) to Westminster UNA, 32 Carisbrooke Road, London E17 7EF, tel: 0181 521 6977
or email: titus@gci.org.uk
Using the Charter
The Charter aims to build public support and political will to create a democratic and inclusive system of international decision-making by
We are inviting signatures from public figures and all countries of the world for our public launch
on UN Day, 24 October, as an insert in the British press. We can provide artwork to anyone in
other countries planning a similar launch, but we do not want press coverage before that date. We
do want help in gathering supporters. We would like every country of the world represented
when we publish the Charter.
People and organisations who have signed
UK:
Titus Alexander, author & educator
Rt Hon Lord Peter Archer of Sandwell, QC
Anthony Barnett, author and founding Director of Charter 88
Simon Burall, One World Trust
Barry Coates, Director, World Development Movement
Terry Davis, MP
Bernie Hamilton, President, Leo Kuper Foundation
Glenys Kinnock, MEP
Peter Luff, Director, Royal Commonwealth Society
Linda Malvern, author,
George Monbiot, writer and campaigner
Tony Colman MP, All Party UNA, GLOBE UK
Anthony Giddens, Director, LSE
Alexandra Jones, Westminster Foundation for Democracy
Lord Frank Judd, Commission for Global Governance,
Ken Livingstone, MP
Sir Shridrath Ramphal, Commission for Global Governance,
Anita Roddick, founder, Body Shop
Allan Rogers, MP, President, Parliamentarians for Global Action,
Alan Tuckett, Director, NIACE
Joan Walley MP
Bowen Wells, MP, Chair, International Development Select Committee
Ted Wheatley, UK-Association of World Federalists
Dan Wheatley,
USA:
Dr. Jane Bluestein, President, Instructional Support Services, Nebraska
Irv Stolberg, UNA-USA, Connecticut,
Association of World Federalists
Commission on Global Governance,
Global Commons Institute,
New Economics Foundation
Royal Commonwealth Society,
UK- All Party Group for World Government
Westminster United Nations Associations
World Development Movement
Charter for Global Democracy
Draft Action Plan
Aim: to build national and international political determination to create effective democratic accountability and reform of all institutions of international decision making,
by getting as many influential signatures to the Charter as possible,
by promoting debate, by deepening understanding and by galvanising action.
Time scales
From now - build list of founding signatories;
- compile database of people to approach for signature
- build action group to take it forward
- create 'Committee of Six Continents' of eminent supporters
- identify and approach potential funders
- discuss informally with sympathetic journalists, to build sympathetic coverage
By 23 August: get typeset and proof printed
from 23 August: write to as many prominent people as possible
set up website and links
recruit volunteers to help data-inputting and mailing
23-26 August: build support at GLOBE International Conference, Bonn
27-29 August: build support at AWF International Conference, Italy
15-17 September: build support at DPI/NGO conference, New York
10 Sept - 14 October: build support at party conferences, UK
24 Oct: launch/press publication in Independent on Sunday or Observer
12-15 November: launch at Commonwealth People's Centre, Durban, South Africa
(note that all these depend on raising funds or people at these events taking up the Charter)
Identifying and approaching people in the following areas:
Overseas
Academia
the Arts
Business/finance
Development agencies/BOND
Environmental movement
Faith communities
Local authorities
Nobel Laureates
MPs in all parties:
Media
Peace movement
Trades unions
Voluntary sector
Other organisations
Can you help?
Perhaps you noticed the call to cancel the unpaid debts of poorer nations. Perhaps you have also noted the President's call that we cancel these debts. Perhaps you noticed Alabama's sixth district Congressman Bachus echo of the President's call.We hope you also noticed that Human Duties and Responsibilities have been "codified," meaning they have been spelled out and put into a form of law so that the UN may enforce it's idea of what you must do to be a proper world citizen in this new global democracy.
We hope you also noticed the emphasis on sustainable development, on global governance, the call for new global structures and for international disarmament and registry of arms (read: gun control).
Did you spot the call for an international tax to finance the UN? Did you see the call to phase out the veto power and permanent Security Council memberships? Did you see the plan to allow UN intervention within sovereign states to insure that they comply with the UN's definition of "human rights?"
Do you think the United States would ever have signed on if such moves had been called for in the original charter? Of course not! But given today's White House climate you can bet your liberties the push will be for us to sign them away.
LET YOUR REPRESENTATIVES IN WASHINGTON AND IN STATE HOUSES KNOW THAT YOU WANT NO PART OF THIS "CHARTER99!"