The Good Council: Annika Weis und María Fernanda Espinosa
Intro: Hello, and welcome to The Good Council, the podcast of the World Future Council. In each episode, we’ll highlight current challenges and policy solutions. And we’ll also take you on a journey of inspiring stories. Listen in to another of our intergenerational dialogues from around the globe.
Annika:
My name is Annika, I’m 25 years old, and I’m a consultant at the World Future Council. In this episode, I’m speaking with Maria Fernanda Espinosa, who is one of the Councillors of the World Future Council. On 5 June 2018, she was elected as President of the United Nations 73rd General Assembly, as only the fourth woman to hold that office in UN history.
Maria Fernanda has more than 20 years of experience in international negotiations and multilateral issues, such peace, sustainable development, women’s rights, and biodiversity. She was a Permanent Representative to the UN in New York and later in Geneva. She has also served as Minister of Natural Heritage and Minister of Foreign Affairs on two occasions.
Today, I’m delighted to learn more about her as a person, as well as her work and mission in life, including her amazing engagement within the World Future Council!
Annika: Good morning, Maria, how are you?
Maria: I’m very well and very pleased to be with you, Annika!
Annika: Well, I’m very pleased that you are here and that you’re taking the time out of your very busy schedule. It’s a pleasure to have this conversation, thanks so much.
Maria: No, I have to thank you.
Annika: Thank you.
So let’s start with a brief look into your childhood. What was that like? And in what way has it shaped who you are?
Maria: Well, first of all, I grew up with three brothers and in that, I think was very important to shape my personality. It was I had a mother, she of course, was my role model, very independent, very strong, very much in charge, self-educated, because in my mom’s generation, and women didn’t go to university, they just got married and had children, but she prepared, self-educated herself. And she was an independent, a very successful businesswoman. And then very much in charge of our household, even though there was very much like a male accent—my dad, very traditional, conventional, and my three brothers. So the team was my mom and I and, she made sure that I had the strength, the independence, and the voice, with my three brothers, of course, but in the family and outside the family as well. So I would say my childhood was a happy childhood.
A little tough on the school front, because at the time, when I grew up, there was no idea about what today we call bullying. And at the time, we didn’t have that category. But, uh, now that I—you know, I think about the past, in a way, I realized that, yes, I was subject to bullying, because I was different: I had a lot of freckles, red hair and I was left-handed. And so I wasn’t—when you are a kid, the only thing you want is to be exactly the same as your peers and classmates. So I had this problem of writing with my left hand. And I was different, you know, my physically different because of freckles and I had all kinds of nicknames and all of that. But my mom was extremely supportive. At when I grew up, there was this idea that writing with your left hand was a bad habit, and that you need you needed to fix it and use your right hand, that was the right thing to do. And my mom was extremely, extremely strict at school saying, “My daughter’s left-handed, just let her do and don’t force her to use her right hand”. These are things that, you know, may appear unimportant, but they were, and I think all these elements shaped my personality as a as a very strong person. And, and I think it had a, you know, a strong impact on my future and in my career and life choices.
Annika: I can imagine. I would have never guessed but then you’d never know these things about someone else until you ask great, right! But what a story, looking at where you are now and who you are. And it’s a really powerful lesson for everyone who’s listening and maybe goes through the same struggles in their childhood.
So, if you look at your really successful career in politics and international diplomacy, is there anything you’d like to tell your younger self?
Maria: Well, I think one of the moments in my life when I was growing up, that were extremely important for my future is—very early, I don’t remember how old I was, my mom, something happened and she came and said, “listen, no one is going to knock on your door and tell you, here you have this opportunity. You have to fight for it, you have to shape your own future in a way”. And in I think that was so transforming in a way, I always knew that I had to fight for my dreams, and to follow my principles and values and to put all my passion and energy on the things that I wanted to do and change and transform. And when I was a child, my favorite, you know, game to play—very strange!—but I had my cousins and my brothers. So I would always organize school. And I was playing as if I was a teacher, teaching things, you know, and I think what this was also a landmark in my life in terms of being able to share, to learn, to interact, that I think was very important for the advocacy work I started very early in my career, supporting indigenous peoples on their rights and struggles; being an activist on the environmental front, in a very early stages of my professional career as well. And I started working and living with indigenous communities of the Ecuadorian Amazon for a long time. Then I went to work for IUCN [International Union for Conservation of Nature], I became the regional director and I started to really shape my international career.
But I really started, you know, touching the ground living in the Amazon, learning amazing things in worldviews, from indigenous people, especially Indigenous women. And then I started to go into different scales, working at the national level, then internationally, and that also shaped my diplomatic career. But I think it’s always important to go back to the roots to remind yourself over and over again, what are you, what is that you’re fighting for? For the dignity of people, for human security, for planetary security, for a different way of shaping our societies and the way we relate to nature, the way we relate to our environment as a global commons. And so I think that it’s a process, nothing happens by a miracle, especially for us, for women.
I think you have to craft your own life and your own future, and be very mindful that we still live in a world that is not gender equal, that has transexual inequalities, when you’re a woman from the global south, and a woman of color. And it’s, I would say, a tougher struggle. But it’s worthwhile. You have to pursue your dreams. I’m convinced.
Annika: Thank you. You touched on many issues there that I’d like to get back to in the course of the interview—fantastic teaser: inequalities, how it is being a woman on the international stage—but first I’d like to ask is, you joined the World Future Council in 2012. Why did you join the World Future Council and why do you care about the rights of future generations?
Maria: Well, 2012—I was then the Minister of cultural and natural heritage, a working a very, very hard to ensure that our policies and our interventions on the ground brought together culture and nature and that we basically, through the right policies, erased these artificial wall between culture and nature in a way and it’s strongly working to recover our heritage as a nation, and the inextricable connection between our cultural diversity with our biological diversity. So I was working on that as a minister, and I received the invitation from the World Future Council. And I really was fascinated by the work of the Council for two reasons.
First of all, this emphasis on assessing, looking, exploring at right policies for sustainable development and how the right policies, the right legislation, can really bring transformation and change in a country, but beyond a country. So, I really—this public policy, right policy approach, I really like that.
And the number two, of course, is this concept of transgenerational justice in a way. Transgenerational justice, when you are an environmentalist, it’s absolutely critical. Because this harmony between nature, the economy and politics can only happen if you think about the future generations and the legacy that you’re going to leave to future generations. So, I fell in love very quickly, with the mission, the vision of the World Future Council, and I accepted. And I’ve been so privileged that I have been re-elected as a Councillor a few times now. And now very soon, I’m going to have my 10th birthday, being part of the World Future Council family, and I feel very, very proud of being part of the family being part of the mission and being part of the transformative work that the World Future Council does every day.
Annika: Well, and we are very, very lucky to have you. So, thanks so much for all the wonderful support and the engagement that we enjoy having you! In a sentence though, in being a member with the World Future Council, what do you want to change in the world?
Maria: Well, I think that the World Future Council is a very powerful instrument to bring about transgenerational justice, especially transgenerational environmental justice. But at the same time, I think it is the right setting and the right means to make sure that we contribute, even if a little bit, to empower young people to have their own voices, to be the change makers that they want to be and that they deserve to be. So basically, this contribution, to both transgenerational environmental justice, but also to work on the right policies, policy decisions, and legal scaffolds, to build a true sustainable development for all, leaving no one behind, including the younger generations, I think that’s what the World Future Council brings.
Annika: Fantastic. So, I have to ask, though, because the challenges of our time are becoming increasingly evermore complex. Could please explain how all of these issues are interconnected: climate change, the rights of young people and women, and the destruction of natural habitats and peace? How are they interconnected?
Maria: I think, Annika, we live in a world of paradox. I am always amazed to see you know, the level of technological development that humanity has reached: the new technologies, the information and communication technologies, we are more interconnected. We know more, you know, the sophistication of science. The opportunity to access knowledge and technology. So, and yet, you know, we are unable to come up with a really holistic responses to these interconnected crises. You said it well, we are living a profound I would say, crisis of culture and civilization. Because as a society, we are unable to use what we have in our hands—in terms of knowledge, science, technology—to address and solve the critical issues, the critical challenge that humanity faces. And there is a strong connection basically, when you say the climate crisis, when you say the extinction crisis, when you say the inequalities crisis, that I often say is that these are symptoms of this dysfunctional system, in a way. So basically, what we need to fix, what we need to heal is the relationship between society, the economy, politics, and nature.
And one of the problems is the disconnection between the times of politics and the times of nature. Usually a politician, a head of State and government, you think about the next elections, you don’t think about the next generations, the future generations and other future elections. And usually, the time span for policy choices, for political decision making are four or five years. The cycles of nature are longer, they do require long-term planning, long term vision, responsibility with future generations.
And I also think that we are living a very particular moment in humanity’s life because of the Covid-19 pandemic, which has been just a synonym of loss, of fear, of uncertainty about the future. But at the same time, it’s providing us an opportunity to build forward better, to rethink the way we as humans relate to other species, to have, you know, a true profound reconciliation, with nature. And this, you know, goes through rethinking our economy, a just start thinking about why is that we are so driven by greed, and by overconsumption. And these are issues that might seem you know, philosophical or abstract, but they are critical to fixing the path that we are shaping as humans. And I am stubborn optimist as late Kofi Annan used to say, and we are here because we can change course.
Of course, we need leadership. But you know, I’m not a person that believes in these messianic leaders that are going to come and fix everything for us. It’s shared leadership! It is exercising our role as citizens, as committed and responsible citizens, young change makers, academic scientists, the private sector, and of course, governments, but we cannot leave governments alone to fix all the problems that we are facing. Co-responsibility and co- building, I think are perhaps the keywords.
Annika: You mentioned something really interesting there. You wrote a recent article where you say, I quote, “addressing today’s inequities demands a far more comprehensive and critical assessment of underlying systemic forces. The pandemic’s disproportionate impact on women, for example, is a direct result of deeply entrenched patriarchal rules and norms that perpetuate segmented structures in the home, in the labor market and in the workplace”, and it ties in with the answer you gave before. Because it’s how we structure societies, isn’t it, that really is one of the root causes for all the inequities that we’re facing. But how can we change these systemic forces?
Maria: Well, as I said, in writing that article that you are citing Annika, basically there is no you know, the golden bullet, the one kind of answer and response. I think that many things that you need to tackle at the same time. One is for example, the inequities in income and opportunity. And for that, the right to a quality education that is inclusive, that has a gender perspective embedded; a part of what we learn everyday is so important, the way you grow up, family and the way you set up priorities and values in life is important. And not only the issue of education, but the issue of preconception and of prejudice, and the things that you naturalize: you feel that it is natural to have women having certain roles in society and men having, you know, other different roles; that it is natural, when you have the same qualifications than a perfect male professional, it is okay that you receive a lower salary, it’s fine—it is not fine! And in basically, we part of the role we have as citizens is just to say no, is just to raise our voices. And the same goes when we are looking at you know the most vulnerable in society, they have to have a voice, they have to be empowered.
And let’s think about any dysfunction in society: look at climate change, and look at the depletion of critical ecosystems, look at pandemics such as the Covid-19 pandemic. Who suffer the most? Of course, women and girls because of the staggering domestic violence because of lockdowns, etc.
When you look at the other health workforce, 73% of the health workforce, are women, at the forefront. But when you look at these national COVID response high level committees—or however they’re called—80% are men. So, men take the decisions, but women are at the forefront giving the service the attention, taking care of patients, etc, etc. And when you look at what is happening with women with disabilities, and the pandemic: women and these abilities and the impacts of climate change. So, I think that we are not in shortage of data or information of understanding and knowing that there is a there is a systemic inequality, multiple inequalities, transactional inequalities that cannot be naturalized, that need to be at the forefront, when we take decisions at all levels, within our family at the domestic level, in public life, in legislation design, in public policy. In the work we do as advocates, as concerned citizens simply, and we have to raise our voices and just really be very serious about not letting it become part of the normal.
Annika: Right, and you mentioned the violence against women. That’s also a huge problem in many societies around the world. The World Future Council had a Future Policy Award on that, which you were a big part of, by organizing also a meeting of women in the embassy in Geneva, you also supported the World Future Council on the FPA on youth empowerment. Can I ask you; how can they actually help?
Maria: Well, I think that these Future Policy Awards are perhaps one of the shining outcomes of the footprint, I would say, of the World Future Council. I think it not only has a value because you acknowledge a country’s people, local governments that are doing the right thing in terms of sustainable development, but it also sets the example the good practice in order to be shared with others. And I would say when you look at the bank of the policies that have won the award, basically, you have a collection of good practices that I’m sure that have had an impact in other regions, in other places with other stakeholders that have learned from the good policies that the World Future Council is acknowledging. So basically, what I think it’s one of the footprints, of the one of the identity contributions of the World Future Council.
Annika: So, in your work with the World Future Council, you are also one of the Co-Chairs of the Commission on Rights of Children and Youth. And you were also on the panel at the launch event of the world future councils Youth Forum, Youth:Present—which this intergenerational dialogue between you me is also a part of—what do you think about the activities, and political and civic participation of young people today?
Maria: Well, I cannot even imagine a to have a collective responsibility for improving and reshaping our world, for building forward better, for reconciling and making peace with nature, without the agency, without the intelligence, without the creativity of younger generations. And sometimes, you know, in my long life and career, sometimes you worry because it’s, it’s nice to have, you know, to have a young person and to tick the box and to say, “Yes, they are part of this table, dialogue, conversation, etc”. And I have learned, and I am, every day, I am more convinced that they are fundamental actors in whatever we need to do.
If you look at the younger generations, young leaders, young professionals, they are essentially interconnected. And they are creative, engaged, committed. And basically that what we need, is the food, the precondition for transformation, for improving the way we relate to each other as humans, but we relate to our environment, to our Earth system in a way. And what is challenging, I would say, is to go from tokenistic engagement of young leaders and changemakers, to naturalize that whatever decision is taken in the multilateral arena, in national decision-making, at the local level, young changemakers, young actors have to be part and parcel of the decision making. And I know how much quality, how much legitimacy, decisions that are taken in this intergenerational form have, so with it’s a win-win. And it is a precondition for successful and lasting, wise decision making.
Annika: Do you have a piece of advice that you could pass on to young people today?
Maria: Well, basically, I would say that don’t be afraid. I think audacity drive, commitment, engagement is extremely important. When you look at young people in my own region in Latin America, you see that, unfortunately, younger generations, they don’t want to get involved in politics, for example, they are afraid, because sometimes, politics and political lives, especially for women, and young women, it’s like a scary, scary choice, a scary place. It’s tough. I’m not saying that it’s not difficult, but don’t shy away from politics from, you know, being engaged from raising your voices, from being active. And really, you know, convince yourself that you are capable of shaping and crafting a better, better world—in the present and in the future.
If it’s the world of politics, if it’s the world of academia, if it’s the world of advocacy, of civil society engagement of working in the private sector, wherever you are, you have to feel that you are changemakers, that you have a responsibility, and you need to be engaged. Especially, and here I’m speaking specially to young women changemakers, we need more women in power. I have met so many in my life, and they are really making the world shake, in a way—the Greta Thunbergs of the world in a way and the more you raise your voices, I think it the better the world and world leaders are going to respond wiser, in a wiser way I would say.
Annika: Recently, you also participated at the UN Generation Equality Forum in Paris. And in advance of the event, you spoke about the need to tackle issues, like gender-based violence and inequalities that women and girls are facing. Do you know of any policy solutions that you can share with us?
Maria: Absolutely. And here, again, this paradox I was mentioning, Annika, because we are not lacking knowledge, data or understanding what is happening. The whole Generation Equality Forum was about commemorating the landmark Beijing Declaration in Platform for Action—26 years ago. And when you go back and look at the commitments or the documents that came out of Beijing, it’s clearly you know, a roadmap on gender equality, and women’s rights. And you see that there’s a huge implementation gap. Lots of words, but very little actions. And when you look at the numbers, you see, we you know, something is fundamentally wrong.
Why is that we still have 75% of world parliamentarians are men and only 25% are women and female? When you look at the pay gap between men and women, same capacity, same background, same experience—different salary. Why is it still happening, there is a pay gap, a gender pay gap of 20%. Automatically, women earn 20% less, for the same job. You know, the arithmetic of gender inequality happen almost everywhere, in all areas of public life of the economy.
How many female CEOs are there, among the 500 biggest companies worldwide? So we still need to do, and to act to use the existing policy and legal scaffolds to really make changes and societal profound changes in all levels. Political violence against women—that’s why the younger generations are so afraid to get to be engaged into formal politics, because they know that the path towards having you know, positions of power in politics have high costs for us, for women. And I speak in a you know, with a lot of experience on that front.
And basically what are the things to do: is go from words to action, improve national legislation, we still have a big space for improvement in policy and legislation at the national level, but also be very serious about the multilateral decision-making regarding gender equality. The CSW, the Commission on the Status of Women, the existing human rights treaty bodies, CEDAW, the Convention on the Rights of Women, as well. So there is a lot of space for policy improvement, for legislation improvement, but more importantly for action.
And the Generation Eq
The Good Council: Hafsat Abiola und Akinyi Obama-Manners
Akinyi: Okay, let’s start I’m like really nervous. You look so amazing. Thank you. Okay, let me begin. So Hello everyone, my name is Akinyi Obama-Manners and I’m 24 years old and I am a Youth:Present representative. I am passionate about working with children and young people to positively impact their lives by using art to allow for self-expression and creative thinking. For example, I’ve been working at Sauti Kuu Foundation in Kenya since 2019, where I helped develop the arts and creativity project activities and I work with toddlers and young people in an early childhood development program in a Nice Ju children’s village in Kenya. Today, I’m delighted to be speaking with Hafsat Abiola today and to learn more about her life, her work, and her engagement with the World Future Council. By way of introduction, Hafsat Abiola-Costello sorry, excuse me, is a human and civil rights campaigner and was appointed June 5, 2018, as the Executive President of Women in Africa Initiative. This initiative is dedicated to the economic development and support of leading and high potential African women. She is also the founder of the Kudirat Initiative for Democracy, which seeks to strengthen civil society and promote democracy in Nigeria. In 2008, she founded China Africa Bridge, an organization that seeks to ensure that growing African ties benefit between the continent and China. Hafsat received the Youth Peace and Justice Award from the Cambridge Peace Commission in 1997, the State of the World’s Forum Changemaker Award in 1998, and the World Economic Forum’s Global Leader of Tomorrow Award 2000. Since 2008, she has been a Council member of World Future Council. Welcome to The Good Council Hafsat. How have you been like, it’s so great to see you again.
Hafsat: I’ve been really I think, under a lot of stress. As of Monday, I just went for my final divorce court date. So huge, huge thing. It’s kind of sad to put to bed a dream of a wonderful marriage, but I think it’s also in inspiring, at least for me to put to bed, something that did not work, you know, sometimes you just have to do that because you don’t think something’s working you think that well, let’s keep trying to make it work. But if it’s not going to work, it’s sometimes a good idea to put it to rest so that you create space for other things.
Akinyi: Yeah, and I think also especially now since Corona, it’s definitely a time of New Age kind of like rebirth for everyone.
Hafsat: Yes, yeah. So, in a way that whole process has been on one hand, empowering. And the other it’s been stressful because I’m having to move physically from where I was living with my now ex-husband, to my new home. But it’s also been it’s also been a time for reflection. I really am thinking also about I’ve been thinking a lot about Virginia Woolf. And I’ve still never gotten around to reading the book “A room of one’s one”. But I began to realize how important it is that women have spaces of their own. I think that we do so many things differently. And the world needs the balance between the male and female energies. And when I say the balance between the male and female energies, I’m not talking about an institution like marriage, where oftentimes the female energy has been subsumed into a preexisting framework. I’m talking about real partnership, where both energies coexist in equal power, because I think that that then allows for the full expression of what’s positive.I’ve been thinking a lot about that even now, as we think of them. You now, there’s so much pressure and push for women to go into leadership. And what does this mean? I can eat? When I think of my you know, and my experience of my marriage is actually genuinely very positive, because I am married to an extremely progressive person, when I think of the institution of marriage, and the institution of government and power, and corporate power, and all the various forms of power. And we’re saying that women should go away, if we’re not careful, all they’ll do is just go and be submerged. When what the world needs, is the ability to go in and transform. And I think that we need to be thinking of how women create spaces, that allows us to hold on to our power, so that we have the full capacity to transform dysfunctional spaces, instead of just going into encouraging women to go into spaces, where then they’ll just be a number a quarter, and we’ll say we have 25% or 30%. But what’s still the outcome in terms of the allocation of resources and innovation, the appropriation of benefits? Is it more egalitarian? Is it more democratic? Is it more life sustaining or not? So, I think that I want us to begin, and especially, you know, in the end, it was because of your generation, that I was bullish around this question about divorce, not because of myself, because actually, the way that we’re raised in Nigeria, and particularly my culture, the Yoruba culture, from a very young age, girls are trained that way. So it was, you have to be like cool water. So even when you are in a hot situation, if you’re very, if you cool enough, you call the situation, you know, because we really trained to stay calm, and to absorb quite a lot. And I could have continued absorbing any number of things, when I thought of two children that I have my son and my daughter, but I want them to have the example of equal coexistence between male and female energy. And I want that given to them in such a clear and compelling way. Why do I say that? My mom died when she was 44 years old. I was at the time she died, I was about 21, I was going to turn 22. So, she has been that I’m going to be 50 very soon, in three years, I’ll be 50. So, she’s been dead for more than half of my life. And yet, I can tell you that whenever I have a question about anything, I feel my mother, I feel like voice. I just feel her like sitting beside me. And then we look at the problem together. And then I just realizing it’s just going to be this way. And you know, we’re Africans and Africans, we believe very much in the ancestors in the journey that I’ve taken just even in the last few months. So, find a new place to stay, or go to a place and they’ll say, you know, maybe they’d look at me and see this black African woman and they just wouldn’t give me the apartment. Finally, finally, if you see the place I finally found, it is so perfect in every way. The gentle children love it. It’s just walking distance from their school. It’s so perfect, and I don’t think I found it. I think the ancestors looked at the problem that I had. And they said have such as continue to conduct ourselves in the way in which we put her and so they went ahead, and I took care of everything. And so that’s why I want to make the example as compelling. Because who knows when you’re going to go in this era of COVID? People, you, you, you hear that somebody isn’t feeling well and 24 hours later that the person died. If anything were to happen, I would, no matter how long ago I left, at the gentle children, whenever they faced with a question, I should have a very clear understanding about what their mother would have wanted them to do. I think it’s so important that we live, that our lives be a clear message, that there should never be any confusion as to what our priorities are. And that we’re here, not for ourselves, but to really uphold the human spirit in the very, very best possible way.
Akinyi: Now, it’s so inspiring to me, how you talk about your mother and her role and her legacy in your life. So, what did you learn from your mother? And what might she have learned from us?
Hafsat: So, when I was very young, I’m not just an introvert, which is kind of extrapolating as I said, I’m a learner. So, I am very, on this whole water thing. My Water is very cool, extremely cool. I remember one day, someone slapped me and someone younger than me. She was upset and she slapped me and my mother, so my mother came to hear about it. Now I didn’t do anything when the person did that, because I just thought clearly, she must be upset. And that’s why she’s done that. My mother blew a gasket. She could not believe that allowed someone to slap me that I allowed someone to slap me. I hadn’t even thought about retaliation in any way. In fact, I didn’t even want to do that. My by my nature is just very relaxed. In fact, I just think Oh, poor girl. She’s so upset. And I’m given a Maven to thinking how to help her not to be so upset. Yeah. Then I remember the tools actually very cool native as I work. In fact, I have low blood pressure. She used to have low blood pressure when she was alive. So, because we just we just take it just takes more energy more to happen for me to be Want to in order to get any otherwise, I’m just happy going through life. And my mother taught me something at that moment that it was important for me not to allow people to walk all over me. Because let myself I’m actually perfectly comfortable with that. I have no problem with that. Because I mean, if somebody is walking all over you, maybe the person needed something to walk on. I mean, it, that’s just kind of my mentality, I’m doing very well, because my mother taught me that. Essentially, she was teaching me to stand up for myself because she got upset. And she spoke to me and scolded me. And essentially said, you have to learn to stand up for yourself. So, I think that’s the big lesson I learned from my mother is that I have to stand up for myself. that’s my daughter, because we’re invading our bedroom actually, sorry. You know, she was, she was, she felt very much that I shouldn’t allow that to happen. And actually, that has really helped me in my life. Because I think, just because it doesn’t really matter to you, isn’t actually a good reason to allow somebody to do something that isn’t respectful of you. Just because you can take it and it doesn’t really bother you so much, doesn’t mean you should allow it because because it’s also not good for that person, for you to allow them to power in a way that is limiting for others. It’s not good for them. And maybe if they are, if you allow them and they go on to do it to someone else, the person’s reaction will be so balanced and so aggressive. Whereas you because you notice that they’ve crossed the line. And because you say you stay so even tempered, maybe you’re the best person to say to them that that you’ve crossed a line, you shouldn’t cross that kind of line, we shouldn’t do that. And so I learned that from my mom. And I’ve been learning to stand up for myself. And the other thing I learned about standing up for myself. I don’t know where I learned this at you want to say that? It wasn’t from my mom, I don’t know where it was. I don’t know. But I don’t want to say I learned that when you want to respond. Okay, two things. Number one, when you want to respond, it’s extremely important that you are not reacting, but you are responding. So when you react is like somebody still have to do to just slap the president back and you start you know, fighting, that’s a reaction. Yeah. I set the terms for your engagement, and you have gone along with the term that I’ve been sexually. Where does power lie? Sorry. So my daughter has to collect something from a room. So we’re sorry to have invaded your space? By Zoe by Bella. So um, you know, it’s something I’m not I lost my train of thought, if something happens and you, you are not, and you follow the framework that has been created. You remember this quotation? Oh, I haven’t shared the quotation with you that slavery is not African history, slavery, interrupted African history. So it’s as if you’ve allowed yourself to be interrupted. And you’re now going with the narrative from the person that has interrupted you? Well, when somebody is interrupted, you often don’t want to take you off course, maybe you are going in this particular direction, and it’s not in their best interest, that you continue in that direction. So they try to derail you push you off course. And you when you then get sidetracked, you’ve that you’ve allowed them to win, essentially. So it’s important not to do that. Yes, you don’t want to be taken advantage of by others. But in when you say that somebody is taking advantage of you, you have to be careful to give a complete response that is, but you must act in a way that advances your own cause. You’ll act in a way that furthers their cause, you know, somebody has slapped you, maybe that person is actually physically stronger. When you slap them that they’ll end up beating you up.
Akinyi: Yeah, exactly.
Hafsat: You know, what you’ve allowed them to set the terms of engagement along the terms that best events. But when you didn’t do that, when you just step back, and you look at what the person has done, when you consider what your options are, how to respond, there’s you holding on to your power, and then applying your power in the most responsible way. Because then you could come up with a solution that at least is good for you, at the minimum. And at the maximum, ideally is good for both of you. So you could have a conversation with that person. And then the person says, you know, I don’t know why I did that, I’m sorry, I’m going to check myself in the future, and you have a better understanding. So that I think is better, especially if you’re not physically as strong. Something else I wanted to say about that which is connected. It’s always better in any engagement. Wherever possible, the strongest power is in action. Not so much in words. So, if there’s something that we don’t like, like, we don’t like the way Africa is positioned in the global economy, but Africans spend so much time talking about the poverty in Africa, the challenges, I just think that that’s not what we should be doing. We should be spending as much time connecting me, Hafsat connecting to Akinyi, and seeing and doing research, how do we change that situation? That’s what our audience is not just an exhausting yourself, lamenting limitation. Now, what is it going to do for anybody? What is it ever done? But it’s the innovation, always holding on to hope, and always trusting that the God that made Caucasians and Asians is the same color that has made Africans and is not a God as much as found in us to poverty and misery. So that is a challenge that he has set before us, he has set because he knows we can meet the challenge, then we work to meet it. So, I think that, and when we move in that way, we then engage all the potential allies and say, here’s where we’re at what Africans are doing. We would love for you to partner with us. You know, when you look at the history of the world, we look at the audacity of British companies going to take over pretty much the subcontinent of India and run it as their own private system. Before it was actually a British company, not even the British state that did that the East India Company. Yeah, you know, and, and those people acted and then mobilized alliances to concrete concretize, that action? We are not doing that. And I think that’s the problem is not that they did it, is the fact that we don’t have enough belief in ourselves to also take action.
Akinyi: And I think it’s about like because I think power comes from within. So, it’s how you harness that power?
Hafsat: Completely agree.
Akinyi: I think that’s so important. And I think also with how like the pandemic has happened, and how things have slowed down, I think especially as like black women, we’re always taught, like, we’re so strong, you know, we fail through whatever adversity or whatever happens to us. And I think it’s important for us to, like, be able to, like, be soft, to be able to be sad, if we need to be sad, you know, to be able to, like, be, we don’t have to be strong all the time. And I think that’s also important in like getting into those leadership roles. Because I think, as well as like being a strong woman, you also need to like have, you need to have emotions, you need to be like emotional in the sense that you can like slow down, you can see things for what they really are not just like hard as that’s what like the word expects women to be because we’re strong, you know.
Hafsat: You know, to be honest with you, I think it even goes deeper than that, I think, you know, first we’re women, and that’s a big issue that we need to unpack. And we’re also black people, that’s also I think, and the world that we live in, in a way bigger. Consider, you know, there was one day, I went to the very first trip to another West African country, Cote d’Ivoire. And its sister of mine from my yacht. One of the French departments in that is an island of African, the African post. She convened so many of us together in this case. And there was this exhibition that she organized that a friend of hers had done, where they looked at the way in which story where they looked at the way in which they looked at the way in which black people have been presented over centuries. Actually, women followed that exhibition, it started playing. I didn’t know when they looked at was wanting to child, I think I need to go in a zoo in a pen in a zoo, and all these people around her looking at her, like the way we look at monkey, you go to the zoo and over a banana. Then there was even another woman with a child that she was carrying and another child standing beside her and we’re going looking at this family, then the woman that they took from South Africa, Lucy I think she had a very big one. And I think that took her to France. And she was on a tour, she was put on a circuit, and people would come from all over to local, especially because of our bond, because he had a very big gun. You know, when she death, she wasn’t giving any dignity because they now did this effort to find out, you know, to call her up to study our body. When President Mandela will go to South Africa to France, when he became president of South Africa, immediate requests that remains should begin Even back to the people of South Africa. So she could be probably very. I think you, you know, there was another time I read about the Second World War. And Winston Churchill in England, you know, he, you know, Africans as colonial subjects that being part of that war as soldiers, Nigeria, in many countries, Kenya. But at the end, when they were doing the march into England, the victory march into England, Winston Churchill made the decision that the Africans should come in last, so that by this time, most of the crowd would have gone and then they wouldn’t have to acknowledge that Africans had contributed to helping them win that war. We think it’s always interesting for us, when you hear about things like this, we think, well, how could that have happened? And that’s wrong? I think we should think differently, I think, you know, how are those kinds of things happening even today? In what ways are Africans being continually objectified? In what ways? Are we not getting the rewards of our labor? Because I think sometimes, those kinds of practices, we think are colonization, it went on. And in the, from 1958, when Ghana secured independence, the countries in Africa became started to become independent. But we don’t think of the kind of mindset that shaped those kinds of political systems, and the fact that those mindsets still exist. So I think you know, that we need to realize that colonization or frameworks are like the tip of the iceberg that we can see below the iceberg is even a larger body of values, ideas, beliefs about other people. So that even if you take care of the colonization as a framework, and say, we let’s get this country to be independent, you will continually have the children, the offspring of that kind of mindset, that would also be degrading, dehumanizing for the people affected. So, I want us to take that approach. And because if we take that approach, we become more critical, less accepting, more insistent on evidence, more insistent on data, more insistent on looking at actual results, and not to be overwhelmed and overtaken by pronouncements, you know. I’m here in Belgium, which is just a wonderful country. But you know, one of their stories was when they came at the colony, in very hot continents. And he wanted to meet a certain quota for rubber. So to make sure that the Africans could deliver this quarter, their hands were cut their feet, my car, if they fail to deliver even that of their children. Now, when you think about that, and then you think about how the country gained its independence, and what happened right after that to the first democratically elected president, and the fact that till today, Congo is the poorest black, poorest country in Africa. Even though they have coltan, which is an essential and strategic resource used for every mobile phone, then you can see the long history and how we continue the has an impact. So what I don’t want is for us to feel like oh, we’re all looking at us were victims. Woe is us, everybody is against us. Because that’s not true. From the experience of slavery, through the experience of colonization, through the experience of neoliberal economics on our different countries and economies. We’ve had allies in the rest of the world will stood with us. But I think also that my challenge actually is that within the continent, so few realize that we need allies. So few realize that we’re still in a battle. They still Besant to say, Oh, it’s all about our governments now and the governments to do what they need to do, but it’s more than our governments. It’s always been more than the continent, because the continent and the people of the continent are considered to be special reserves of others. And I think this is where we need to begin to address a lack of true sovereignty, then I think that we need to recognize that as Africans, There was this beautiful quote from Toni Morrison, where she said, the big, the big, the big motive of racism is distraction. So they tell you, you don’t have a history and you start doing research to prove you have a history, when they tell you don’t have a language show to prove that you were done there, you exist in all this. And I think we need to remember that our goal as Africans is not to prove our humanity to anyone. Our goal, as Africans is to be present in the world, on equal terms with others. And so we should keep our eye on that prize. That what does the world need to have expressed today that we as Africans can also support the expression of and not get distracted by all these efforts, many centuries in the making to dehumanize and degrade us.
Akinyi: That was really, like, incredible to listen to. Like I’ve just like lost for words. Like I can listen to you all day. So now I want to know more about you. And so, my first question is, what did you want to be when you were a child?
Hafsat: When I was young, I wanted to be a diplomat. And I told my dad, that I want to be a diplomat, because I had gotten into Georgetown School of Foreign Service. I applied early from high school. And I said to my dad, but I want to go there because I want to be a diplomat. And my father paused. And he said, what kind of husband will you marry gallivanting around the world? The funny thing is that, if not for COVID, I would still be gallivanting around the world, because when he won the political presidential election in Nigeria, and this was decades ago, in 1993, and then the military put him in jail. And my mother had to begin to lead the pro-democracy efforts. At that moment, I became an activist, I started traveling, to speak for a cause for democracy, I was traveling all over the United States, through Canada, through the United Kingdom, everywhere we went to Germany, to price our case. And then afterwards, I became involved, I created an organization in Nigeria to empower women and young people to participate in that democracy, and kept traveling because of that., because I’ll be invited to Sweden, I’ve been invited. I was working on a youth employment campaign to help generate millions of jobs for young people around the world. So, we would be holding a summit in Egypt would all the summit in India, you know, so I was always traveling. And I always remember that my father said, you know, what kind of husband because I did find your husband over now. My ex husband, but also, because I think that’s ultimately the worst. I mean, I don’t represent any government. But oh, it’s saying that my internet is unstable, I hope returned to conversation. But it doesn’t, you know, I don’t represent any government. But as president of women in Africa, I represent African women. And I’m having to travel, engage with partners, engage with sponsors, and advocate for women’s economic empowerment. So, I think I ended up doing actually exactly what I wanted to do.
Akinyi: Yeah, for sure. And I think also, because through your work, you’re promoting the development of women, as initiators of change through leadership and awareness programs, for examples through founding the Kudirat initiative for democracy, which is named after your mother. Why did you name after your mother?
Hafsat: I liked that woman so much. Yeah, in my brain, great human being. And when the military gunned her, down on the streets of Lagos, because she was organizing the democratic effort, I wanted to let the military know that they had not silenced that voice. So created, because she’s a very kind lady. I just needed the acronym kind of starts with a case of I made it easier, and that I could write initiative for Nigerian democracy. And then I th
The Good Council: Annika Weis und Prof Herbert Girardet
Intro: Hello, and welcome to The Good Council, the podcast of the World Future Council. In each episode, we’ll highlight current challenges and policy solutions. And we’ll also take you on a journey of inspiring stories. Listen in to another of our intergenerational dialogues from around the globe.
Annika: My name is Annika, I’m a consultant at the World Future Council. And in this episode, I’m speaking with Herbert Girardet, who’s one of the co-founders and former director of programs of the World Future Council. Herbert is a cultural ecologist, author and former filmmaker. He’s worked as a consultant to UN Habitat and UNEP and is a recipient of a UN Global 500 Award for outstanding environmental achievements. He’s also an executive committee member of The Club of Rome, an Honorary Fellow of the Royal Institute of British Architects, a member of the World Academy of Art and Science, a patron of the Soil Association in UK, and a visiting professor at the University of the West of England. In 2003, Herbert was the inaugural Adelaide Thinker in Residence, advising South Australian Premier, Mike Rann, on his government’s sustainability policies, and how to reduce Adelaide’s carbon footprint. Indeed, his advice was fully implemented.
Hello, Herbie, thank you very much for being here today. It’s a real pleasure for me to be able to have this conversation with you. And to be able to learn a little bit more about you and your work, but also the World Future Council. So, you’ll be taking us on a rollercoaster tour of your very interesting life, which you describe as a journey towards concern about future generations. So, let’s start in the beginning, you were born in 1943. That means the Second World War was still raging, and you were brought up in its aftermath. How was your childhood, and how did that shape the person that I’m speaking with today?
Herbert: Now, of course, I was too young to really fully understand what was going on in the world. You know, I was two years old when the war finished. But I mean, the effects of the end of that war were sort of almost instant. Certainly, there was a lot of people arriving from the east. I grew up in on the outskirts of a town called Essen in the Ruhr, which was the main industrial centre, and the main centre for weapons production as well actually, for the Second World War, particularly companies like companies like Krupp, and Thyssen [which] produced the guns and the tanks and so many other weapons that were used in the war. So we were sort of in a little house on the edge of town, and we had constant arrivals, from people would come from the east to escape the Russian invasion of Mecklenburg and other parts of East Germany. And so it was, our house is always full of people, all of them kind of in worries and concerns about what they’d lost and how, what the future might hold and that kind of stuff. But when I became sort of conscious, if you like, when I was three or four years old, I very quickly became aware where we were because from my house we could see the chimneys, spewing out smoke, on the edge of Essen of the factories that were producing steel and coal and so on, coal mines, and coal power stations. And so, I could every night, we could see the glaring sort of smoke of these chimneys, and the flames coming out of the steelworks—it was an extraordinary sight. And I was, I can remember even then asking, when I was maybe four or five, asking my father, where does all that smoke end up? You know, in the air? What, is it going to do to the air that we breathe? And there was no answer to that question.
And then a little while later, when my father got his first car after the war, and he switched on the engine and the smoke came out of the exhaust pipe and I asked him, where does all that smoke go again? From small rather than a large chimney like that. And, again, you had the answer to that question.
So, I was beginning to kind of think about these kinds of things, even as quite a young kid. And a little few years later, when we went down to the river Ruhr, and there was foam, white foam on the river, and dead fish in the river. And I was asking, why are these fish dying? And again, there was no answer to those questions.
So, there was kind of a bit of a concern about these issues fairly early on in my life and so in some ways, I could say that it’s continued throughout the rest of my life and has shaped my consciousness if you like, to this very day.
Annika: That’s very powerful. What was that like as a as a child to see all of these things that no one can explain to you? That must have been very unsettling.
Herbert: Well, it was a bit unsettling, of course, it was. I mean, of course, it wasn’t all, what life was all about. And we also had wonderful things going on. I mean, we were living on the edge of a forest. And I was always climbing trees, and I was always out in the garden, helping to grow vegetables and stuff like that. So, it was not all doom and gloom by any means. But I mean, that certainly, that was part of the story of my childhood experiences.
Annika: So, then you set out to study, right? And how was that like, being a student during the, I suppose, Cold War?
Herbert: I went to study in Berlin, and I was studying something I didn’t really want to study which my father imposed that on me, if you like, to study art history, I really wanted to study politics and sociology. But anyway, so it was, quite extraordinary to live in this walled city of Berlin at that time, as you know, has just been closed off from the rest of the world, by the Soviets and by the Eastern German government. So yeah, it was quite an experience living in Berlin. And at that time, certainly the kind of anger about the history of Germany was bubbling up in the minds of many of us. I mean, we were sort of the generation who were just been shaped by the post war experience, and asking questions about what, what has happened to this country? The Nazi history was just horrible, the more you were exposed to it, the city was still full of destroyed or damaged buildings that were gradually being reconstructed. So certainly the aftermath of the Nazi era was very much a deep concern for all of us in that generation. So we were the sort of, if you like, the rebellious generation thar was trying to make sense of the world, from this horrible history that just had just swept across Germany, throughout the Second World War and before that.
Annika: And what was that like coming to terms with what has happened?
Herbert: Well, we kind of started to say can we build a new world? Can we create the new world? Can we simply kind of throw away all this horrible history and find a way of creating a sort of almost like a utopian future. And that certainly became very much part of the thinking of people, like I said. There was the new left movement, there was the beginnings of the Green Movement popping up, there was people like Rudi Dutschke, and my great friend, the German Jewish poet, Erich Fried, who was very close to me, and we were all constantly thinking about how can we make a different kind of world from the ruins of the disasters that happened to Germany in Europe just a few years before?
I moved from Berlin to London as a student. And I very quickly realized that what I had been asked to study—art history—was not for me. So, I basically I got out of university and became involved in living in Notting Hill Gate, which at that time was an extraordinary place. This really was the coming together, people from all over the world. I mean, lots of West Indians, a lot of people from Asia, from Eastern Europe and we were basically at that time really trying very hard to kind of come up with ideas for the future if you like. I mean, we did a lot of community action, we occupied buildings that were empty to turn into community centres. We were kind of holding film shows for, for trade unionists about how it could be like to have new people power establishing itself. And all sorts of amazing sort of activities. I was one of the people involved in organizing the Notting Hill Carnival, actually, in the late 60s so we had this wonderful experience of people from all these different backgrounds coming together with musical instruments and dressed up in extraordinary costumes parading through the streets of Notting Hill Gate, and basically telling the right wing sort of fascist who were trying to stop the immigration of people from all over the world to come into place like Notting Hill Gate: bugger off, we are going to determine what the future is going to hold rather than you writing bastards! It was very political time. And certainly, very creative. And there was, of course, all the coming together, often rock music and the Beatles were around and the Rolling Stones and all the other rock bands. So, on the one hand, there was a kind of cultural revolution was taking place, on the other hand, there was also a political process that was going on at the same time, all concerned with, what could the future be like if we only had a sense, if we only had the influence to shape it in the way that we were hoping we could do? Yeah, it was a very interesting, worthwhile time that’s still with me deeply today.
Annika: And what did you learn from all that time for yourself? And also, why did you even take that step to go to Notting Hill, to move to England in the first place?
Herbert: Well, Berlin was a very depressing place, because it was the walled city and I had been involved actually, in helping to build a tunnel under the Berlin Wall, with some students from the Freie University, in Berlin. And so my parents are getting very anxious about what was happening with my life and my rather rebellious ways of doing things. So they kind of encouraged me to actually move to London. But it was kind of in some ways, from their point of view, it was even worse than when I got involved. And all these rebelliousness in London, as well as. So my father, actually, basically, at that stage effectively disowned me and said, you get on with what you want to do. And, and so we were not in close contact for quite a number of years.
But then I actually got a job at the BBC as a newscaster at the BBC German service, broadcasting the news from London to the rest of the world, particularly to Germany, and so on and so forth. And also at that stage I had a young family. And so life then was partly rebellious, and partly very domestic at the same time. But always the question, what does the future hold? How can we create a world at this stage with young kids—can we create a world that these kids can actually thrive in rather than forever be burdened by history and by—pollution was becoming an issue at that time. The green movement was really beginning to spring up, particularly in the late 60s, suddenly the whole idea of creating a more egalitarian world and a more joyful world, but also a world that needed to really take care of the environment that we needed to have, to be healthy, to have a future. So all of that was coming together in the minds of young people like us. And it became a very creative, very productive time. I went back to the LSE then, to studied social anthropology, having met all these extraordinary people from all over the world who were living together and Notting Hill Gate.
For me, that became a stimulus to try and understand where we actually came from where we come from, in terms of human history. And so it was interesting to find out about African history, about ancient history, and through the eyes through the experience of leading reading about anthropology, anthropology, and all the various many tribal societies, who’ve been documented by anthropologists from this country, in Britain, but also from Germany and elsewhere. So that’s fascinating to learn about human evolution, if you like, the cultural evolution of tribes, like hunter gatherer tribes in Africa and the Amazonian tribes and the rainforests of South America and all of that became part of like the sort of instrumentation of my mind over the few years that I was at the LSE.
Annika: That’s super interesting. I’ve got many questions about your time in Notting Hill and the BBC, that must have been incredibly stimulating and an exciting time to be in.
Herbert: It was.
Annika: And I figure that when you then became a father and you had a young family, that must have been a bit of a turning point, wasn’t it?
Herbert: But it was, I mean, I didn’t stop being involved in all these kinds of activities. And my wife was sometimes a bit worried about what was going to happen next. But yes, I mean, basically the idea of the experience of having a young family, two kids growing up in Notting Hill Gate, and a house full of interesting, eccentric people in artists and musicians and, and politically minded people. Yeah. So, I mean, it was kind of a mixture of on the one hand, really making sure of young family and the well-being of our kids. On the other hand, if you like the well-being of the world all around us and so, that kind of, these two strands are always woven together and in various different ways.
Annika: And did you hang out often?
Herbert: Hang out, what do you mean ‘hang out’?
Annika: Like, did you did you spend a lot of time with them? Did you have any communal activities?
Herbert: Well, not so much in the house. But I mean, I was at that time involved at something called the People’s Association, where basically, we’ve taken over four buildings in Powis Square in Notting Hill gate, for the purpose of creating a community centre.
Annika: Really fascinating. That must have been—and you say that time still lives with you, and you probably think of it quite fondly, don’t you?
Herbert: I do, I go and visit people there still even though I don’t live there any longer.
Annika: Among all the other things that you’re doing, you’re also a poet. Right? You recently wrote a poem called “Sacrificing Tomorrow Today”.
Herbert: Yeah.
Annika: And I think it’d be really lovely if you would do us the honour and read that out loud.
Herbert:
Okay, I’ll try and do that. Sacrificing Tomorrow Today:
1 Hey folks, aren’t we having fun
roasting the Future alive,
in a furnace of ancient oil:
To burn ever more means to thrive.
2 Let us sacrifice Tomorrow
on the altar of Now and Today.
Tomorrow is there for disposal,
so why not just throw it away?
3 Steal our grandchildren’s future:
As long as we can do our living.
Taking, and taking some more,
and let’s not bother ‘bout giving.
4 Why not just get rid of Tomorrow,
we are good at playing this game.
Why care for some unborn child,
with no face yet, and no name?
5 We’re roaring into the unknown
in a souped-up luxury car,
and when we have arrived there
we’ll soon find out where we are:
6 Let us lie on a palm-fringed beach,
sipping cocktails and champagne,
with not a care in the world.
It’s so cool: we will do it again.
7 Let’s smudge our little planet
with plastics, poisons and oil,
let’s light some more forest fires
and then flush away the soil.
8 So now, what else can we do
to make our Future die
a fiery, premature death?
Are there other ways we can try?
9 Let us sacrifice Tomorrow
on the altar of Now and Today.
Tomorrow is there for disposal,
so why not just throw it away?
Annika: Thank you very much. There’s nothing like hearing it straight from the author, from the poet. Incredibly powerful—I’ve got goosebumps. What was your inspiration for it? It’s very topical, of course. And what would you say is the message?
Herbert: Well, when you look around the world today, I mean, wherever we are, we are really basically stealing our children’s future; doing that through all the activities that I’ve just listed throughout the poem, whether it’s rain forest destruction, whether it’s climate change, whether it is biodiversity loss, whether it’s what we’re doing to the oceans, in terms of plastics, whether it’s all the other ways in which we are consuming the planet. And basically robbing the future. And this is really obviously, one of the key themes that we also then focus on when we started founding the World Future Council in 2007. Basically the concern about what are we going to do, if you’re going to carry on like we are today, in terms of the lives of future generations? So these are issues that I’ve been very deeply concerned with for a long time.
Annika: Exactly. And that brings us, as you mentioned, directly to the World Future Council, which again, as you said, you founded in 2007, together with Jakob von Uexküll. What’s the story there? Obviously, you’ve spent your entire life wondering about pollution and where the fumes come from. And that then culminated in this organisation that you found them together. How did that come about?
Herbert: Well, I’ve been involved in a predecessor to the World Future Council. In London in the 80s, I got together with various people who are working in the sort of environmental field and in the sustainability field. And we called it the Council for Posterity. And that was basically just to get together people saying, well, we cannot carry on like this stealing the future in the way we are clearly doing. So that was just if you’d like to get together people but without any funding, or any major sort of support of any kind, or any publicity for it, really. But anyway, that certainly, if you like, was kind of the predecessor to the World Future Council, which came about much later.
So that, Jakob and I at that time, met around this particular theme of “Earth Emergency: Call to Action”. And then he said, well, he had the idea of trying to create a council of future generations—the World future Council, which was an interesting and exciting title. So, we basically tried to see, okay, how can we work together on this? And so, we did, we basically said, okay, let’s try and conceptualize an organization that really stands for something that is different from what has already been done by other environmental organizations, specifically focusing on the need to understand what the impacts on future generations are and how we can address them. And that’s what we set out to do.
It became very quickly apparent that we have to kind of find some innovative ways of doing that. So one idea was to say, okay, I’ve been working with the UN Habitat, that’s the United Nations Human Settlements Programme, on what we call best practice initiatives; how cities that are suffering pollution effects or that are suffering from loss of industries or whatever, and find practical ways in which to turn them around. And so, we’ve compiled this for UN Habitat, compiled together a list of initiatives in cities around the world, under the label of best practices. And it became very clear to me that just best practices per se, is not a sufficient concept if you really want to stimulate change in a deeper sort of way. So I suggested let’s focus not just on best practices, but on best policies that bring best practices about.
So when we first started the World Future Council, I managed to find a researcher with very, very bright young guy called Miguel Mendonça. And we asked him to put together a first brochure called Policies to Change the World. And he did a brilliant job. And he compiled a whole load of different initiatives on various aspects of the policies that really make a difference or could make a difference. So including wind turbine cooperatives in Denmark, the German renewable energy law, congestion charging in London urban transport solutions, on particular public transport initiatives in Bogota, and elsewhere in South America, urban agriculture initiatives, participatory budgeting in Porto Alegre in Brazil, eco-labeling of products, circular economy initiatives, plastic bag levies, mine ban treaties and various policies that have been introduced in one part of the world that we thought we could highlight and publicize. And in that way, by drawing attention to them get other cities and other countries to adopt them. And so that’s where we first got this idea to really focus on policies to change the world rather than just best practices. And that’s obviously being the kind of special quality, special aspect of the work of the World Future Council ever since.
Annika: That’s a Yeah, I mean, as you say, that’s a very innovative idea—hasn’t been done before, the focus on policies specifically. But a very innovative aspect, a unique aspect about the council, is the council itself, right? The composition of about 50 members from all over the world, your life has already been marked by getting to know very interesting people from all walks of life. And how did you then bring together all of these 50 members, obviously, slightly different maybe back then than it is today. But still…
Herbert: Well, I mean, you did it partly because Jakob had already been running other initiatives such as Right Livelihood Awards, and so they had been giving prizes, and special recognition to people from many different countries who’ve been doing excellent, extraordinary outstanding work, as well and with my network of people involved in the work that I’ve been doing, for the United Nations, about other organizations. So, we basically put together a provisional list of people who we thought we could invite, and we were very successful in really getting amazing people on board to became the core of this council that eventually ended up as you know, with 50 members, and that’s obviously, some some people have died in the meantime, others have decided not to stay involved. But we have a wonderful global line-up of people who are really outstanding in their own particular areas of work.
Annika: And what was that like just feeling this incredible momentum of brilliant people around the world trying to work for one cause?
Herbert: What I mean, Now, of course, not just working for one, cause they all have their own particular initiatives in their own localities on their own countries. But certainly, the idea of bringing together people around this theme of what can we do to ensure a future for this planet, that was obviously something that galvanized all of them in their own particular ways. And that’s obviously still the kind of main focus or the main concern of everybody involved in the in the Council. But I mean, it’s also a very difficult initiative to try and issue because future generations can’t speak for themselves. They’re not born yet by definition, so to be advocates of future generations, it’s not an easy task, particularly because when you try to speak to try governments and persuade them to really take these issues much more seriously, they say, well, there’s no votes in future generations. Why should we concern ourselves with people, not just be to be born in 50 years, or 30 years from now, but maybe a few 100 years from now? And that’s certainly become a very difficult thing to persuade politicians to take seriously, because their concern is to be re-elected, and often re-elected just for three or four or five years. So long term thinking is not very easily embedded in the existing political system of our countries or around the world. So that’s certainly been very difficult thing to persuade people to do. So certainly, when it comes to advocates for future generations, there’s only a very few countries that have embedded a future generation spokesperson in their own parliament. We’ve tried very hard at the World Future Council to do this. But the only place that has actually still has a future generations advocate, it’s actually Wales, were I happen to live for the last 20 or 30 years.
The Good Council: Annika Weis und Pauline Tangiora
Intro: Hello, and welcome to The Good Council, the podcast of the World Future Council. In each episode, we’ll highlight current challenges and policy solutions. And we’ll also take you on a journey of inspiring stories. Listen in to another of our intergenerational dialogues from around the globe.
Annika: This is a slightly different episode of our podcast series. For starters, it begins with a traditional Maori greeting…
Kosha: Greeting
Annika: One of the most cherished Councillors of the World Future Council is Pauline Tangiora. A Maori elder and leading figure for indigenous communities, she is described as a repository for knowledge and wisdom. She is a daughter, a mother and grandmother, and not just to her family, but to many people around the world. She is also a tireless fighter and campaigner for the rights of nature, for peace and disarmament, and for intergenerational conversations—just like the one she had with me. Pauline has been a member of the World Future Council since its foundation in 2007. But I wanted to get to know her as a person, what she did before she joined, and why she does what she does. I hoped to learn about her views on life, on her work and on her community, and about her message to present and future generations.
For example, I read that Pauline’s community is much more collective than we are used to in Europe, and often lives together across generations where generations can benefit from one another. So, I asked her how exactly she practices inter-generational living.
Pauline: Well, it’s a difficult question to answer. By bringing on board—over few years that I’ve travelled overseas, taking a younger person with me, and then dropping them into the situation that they have to speak because we, we as Maori, usually do things together. Not on our own. And that’s the way that we have been doing it for several years. My travels overseas haven’t been for me, they’ve been for the younger people to learn so that they can carry on to the future or to each other. That’s the way our people live, by sharing what knowledge we have. So, everybody is on board, because of different generations have different values. And if we can’t dialogue with the generation what is happening is a generation gap if we are not understanding or not sharing that knowledge.
Annika: I was also really interested in her indigenous community. I wondered, is there prhaps a particular message that the Maori have for the WFC?
Pauline: Well, I can’t talk for everybody. I can only talk from my perspective and my community… to achieve the dreams of this modern age we have to get everybody on board and that is like in any other community, trying to get everybody on board is very difficult.
You’ve had an extra little experience of how Maori start their day, when Kosha-Joy opened with our language and introduced me. Those things are important to retain. It’s very important that every indigenous community in the world retains those introductions in a world which is so European.
But we have some young people like Kosha-Joy and that, who are working very hard to bring the “new world” to the “old world”. Cause some of us are not prepared yet for that new world. As for indigenous people internationally, in my work with the indigenous peoples around the world, many of them have looked to Maori to help them to succeed.
But at the Rio Conference, of Kari-Oca, one thing we were all united in—the over [ninety] nationalities—was that, we mustn’t lose that, which we’ve had.
Annika: In June 1992, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development—also known as the ‘Earth Summit’—was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It was a major UN conference that sought to rethink economic development and to find ways to stop polluting the planet and depleting its natural resources. But while heads of governments met in Rio, indigenous peoples had their own summit at Kari-Oca, a village outside Rio: the World Conference of Indigenous Peoples on Territory, Environment and Development. And following their Kari-Oca Conference, the indigenous leaders shared their perspectives with the State representatives.
Pauline: One of the things that we have noticed in the international world: international companies look at some of our young indigenous peoples, they grab them and put them into places where they lose their contact with their indigenous world. And that’s a danger that all indigenous communities around the world have. And I think the WFC have given a little bit of a leeway for the indigenous peoples to come forward from their perspective, especially some of the women of Africa who have come forward planting millions of trees, the waterways; the women in India, trying to save Gujarat; the women in the Amazon, trying to stop the forest being cut down. Because indigenous peoples can only work with the environment that they’re around, those environments vary from country to country. And it doesn’t matter how big a community you have, it’s all the same, it’s retaining the knowledge of how Mother Earth works with humanity. If we don’t work this together, we are not above Mother Earth, we are within Mother Earth, and humanity must be tamed.
Pause
Annika: One thing that I learned in advance of my call with Pauline was that Maori people believe in Kaitiakitanga, which can be translated into trusteeship (of the Earth). What does this fascinating concept mean, and what does it entail?
Pauline: That number one, you have a responsibility for yourself. To make sure that you are honest, your morals are above reproach. Because unless you yourself can look within yourself, you cannot work within the environment or with the new community. Because to look after anything, you must be there for the purpose of, number one, your people, humanity, and the world as such. So, sometimes it’s a hard-y road to walk. But other times people can come to understand if indigenous peoples go to the government and say “this is not right”.
Unfortunately, the government has different values. But in my experience in approaching other governments around the world, saying “this is the way these people that I am with today, see it”—but people seem to think that you ask one or two people, how to do things, and that is why the Rio Conference in ‘92 for environment, it was set up by [Maurice] Strong [former Under-Secretary of the UN], the Kari-Oca Conference—free conference where all these 90 year old national, independent indigenous peoples of the world came together—and they decided with the Kari-Oca document “this is the way we do it”. And when Marcos Terena presented to the Rio Conference, which is only visited by heads of state, he walked in there with bare feet. And I heard somebody say “the poor man hasn’t got any shoes!”. Now, to Marcos, having his feet touch Mother Earth gave him the strength to present that document. So, if you’re a Kaitiaki, you must be able to stand for what you believe is right, but you can’t always get everybody to agree with you.
Indigenous peoples know the difference in Europeans. But if you can sit and come together, to listen to what Mother Earth is your guiding light. For instance, if I can’t hear the frogs, I know something’s wrong with the environment. Climate, and the environment is not two separate things, they work together. That’s how indigenous people see the circle is all complete. But once you start taking one thing out of the circle, and talking about just the climate, or the environment, or health, then you’ve lost the whole concept of being Kaitiaki. Because everything in that circle makes up the life force of a person, and you’re wider or your whole person is within that circle. That’s about how I can explain it to you Annemike.
Annika: Before my call with Pauline, I had the chance to speak to one of the Councillors of the WFC, Neshan Gunasekera from Sri Lanka…
Pauline: Oh, Neshan is a great man! He worked for Judge Weeramantry…
Annika: Judge Weeramantry was a Sri Lankan judge at the International Court of Justice, in the Hague. After his tenure at the ICJ ended, he took up the position of President of the International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms and became an influential figure in the area of international environmental law.
Pauline: When Neshan came onto the World Future Council, it was great to see a young person who’s come who has worked alongside Judge Weeramantry who could bring the dreams of the youth of Sri Lankra with the old values that Judge Weeramantry had. And one of the things I really admired about Neshan was that he is carried on these workshops for the young people, in Sri Lanka, for people from all around the world together, and I think the WFC is very lucky–or very blessed more than luck—to have him on board with that sort of thing.
Annika: Neshan shared with me an amazing story about a time he met Pauline in Hamburg, during one of the early annual general meetings of the Council. He told me that on a dark snowy evening, Pauline was barefoot in the snow. She encouraged others to also take their shoes off; Neshan, who is used to the warmth and sun, actually took off his shoes, and tried not to show how freezing it was. And yet, it was a lesson of bearing the elements, and I ask Pauline to remember…
Pauline: Ah yes… Well, everything is a living live force, doesn’t matter whether it’s snow, or whether it’s the rain, or whether it’s the sun. Everything is a living life force, and without that none of us would survive for future generations. So when I sit here with the birds, and look at the sunrise here just a little while ago, they are all living life forces which starts our life when we open our eyes in the morning. We must remember to pay respect to those that living life force, it may not be the same to everybody. But if we can train or teach our young people what a living life force is, then I think we’ve done the greatest part of our lives, what the Creator created us for.
I don’t think there are any boundaries of life forces, we are all the same, we need to breathe the air, and have the sun. And without those two things, we are nothing. Because the spirituality of our life comes from those areas of the light of the days. And what we do through the day will be how we can teach our younger people, my grandchildren, and some of them say they want to go into space, and live in space. And I say, how are you going to survive in space? So, we have to bring that to our young people how the space is there as a creation of the Creator, and not to take control of the space. Because nothing of our lives can be controlled, it’s controlled by the Creator. That’s the living life force that the Creator has given to each and every one of us to use, for the betterment of humanity.
Annika: Listen to this story about one of Pauline’s grandchildren… a story that reminds us also to look at our own relations with others, and between children and grandchildren…
Pauline: I remember one of my grandchildren when he was three years old. He decided he was going to climb a tree out at the back of my place. He got up to two or three branches and then he looked up sky and he said “Nanny, one day I’m going to climb up this tree and climb and have a look at the sky”. That’s some proof of how young people learn things. And when he comes back now and again, he has a look at that tree and says “see, that tree has grown taller”. And I said “Well, when are you going to climb up?” And he said, “well, it’s not yet up to the sky”, so he’s got the idea that the tree will keep growing—simple things like that. I think it’s very important to encourage in our young people. Too often they’re sitting watching the films on space and they’ve forgotten just to run around.
And look at dandelions, for instance. One day, I picked some dandelions, and he said “what are you gonna do with that nanny?” And I said, “I’m gonna make salad of them”. And he said “you can’t make salad out of the weed!”. And I said “well, you go watch because that’s what we’re gonna have for dinner”. Simple things like that. Us as elders and young people must continually come together and talk. I don’t know why is when my discussions with my grandchildren, or with my own children where I think it’s good to help have a healthy discussion. Not with the kid, the children watching television and all these programs and learn all those things—they need to talk face to face. And the elders don’t lose anything by missing out and young people show you that you might have to have another look at your world view. One of the basic things about the world view of the indigenous thinking is: never forget that you are the creation of the Creator. Unless you continually remember that, you are not here to serve yourself, you’re here to look after and be with your people.
Pause
Annika: We then moved on to talking about Pauline’s rich experience on the international stage. As a leading figure for indigenous communities, she travelled to Mexico to face militaries with Indigenous community members, comforted child victims of chemical weapons attacks in Iraq, and drove to Big Mountain in Arizona in a peace caravan. So, I asked her: What did you learn from representing indigenous communities on the world stage? But first, rightly so, Pauline corrected me…
Pauline: I can never represent indigenous peoples, but I can be the voice to carry to the UN. For instance, the people in Africa, South Africa, wanted their land back, the bush people, but they could not get into the UN. And through Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, we could get into the UN, and have a voice because you must be accredited as you will know. And with Kim Langbecker, we managed to get into the UN and put their case so that at the World Environmental Conference at the beginning of 2000, I was very humbly honoured by the government taking me up to see that the bush people will be given the land back because the pressure of the UN on the South African government pushed it that those bush people will now have their land back. So that’s the sort of thing I think that we must be available for other indigenous peoples—or any person—to voice their concern. The honour is not ours, the honour is of those people who we are the voices of. If we don’t pick up those concerns, you don’t win any friends on the international scene, I’ll tell you that!
Annika: In the Western hemisphere, there are currently large campaigns taking place that advocate for the rights of nature to be codified in law. This would allow for the possibility that violations of nature can be enforced in a court of law. But this consideration isn’t new. The American law professor Christopher D Stone first argued that environmental interests should be recognised apart from human ones in his book “Should Trees Have Standing?”, in 1972. Similarly, there are advocacy campaigns under way to lobby the UN Human Rights Council to consider a historic resolution on the right to a healthy environment. Again, the difference to indigenous communities is striking, for in 2017, New Zealand granted legal rights to the Whanganui River. The Maori had been fighting for more than 160 years to get legal protection for the river, relying on it for food, travel, and their livelihood.
Pauline: We haven’t put it into law. It’s a natural right and responsibility of the government to accept. You’re talking about the river, aren’t you? The Whanganui River. The government had to accept that that was the right of those indigenous tribes of the Whanganui River. That was there was a lifeforce. To me, they didn’t need a law. But for Europeans, you have to have laws. So there’s two conflicts here: one is the ‘lore’, L-O-R-E, the lore of the people. And L-A-W, the European way of living.
Annika: And here’s Kosha-Joy, joining the conversation.
Kosha-Joy: I have a question, though. What about the Takutai Moana stuff. Does that relate to this question?
Pauline: Well, we have te takutai moana on the coast. We live on a peninsula, which is three quarters surrounded by the ocean. And we made an application because the government declared in 2004 that we had no rights to the oceans, the foreshore and seabed. But they belong to everybody. What became confusing for me, was how can you make a law to say that we who were here for hundreds of years have taken your food basket from your back door is not ours to look after. And that was why our people would have applied to the court in 2004 to have it put back into the hands of the people to look after, not after the law, L-A-W of the country and we’re still fighting that at the moment. So, there is a confusion of the L-A-W with the L-O-R-E. And Europeans have come from an ownership, nuclear ownership background of the Westminster parliamentary system, which makes it very difficult for many Europeans. And it becomes then a racial thing or discrimination: Why is one people getting more than the other? But unfortunately for the world, people forget to look back at who has looked after it for the millions of years before somebody else has moved into a country and decided that they want to do it this way.
And that’s why we’ve got within the Amazon forests all those farmers that have come in after the Second World War and taken over the forestry of the indigenous peoples of the Amazon. Now that’s why we’ve got forest fires going on all the time in the Amazon which is affecting the climate.
Annika: Pauline’s concerns hit close to home. Her community is protesting against letting a US-owned rocket company launch US military technology from the Mahia Peninsula, which has an impact on the local flora and fauna.
Pauline: Those people know that if you start doing that sort of thing, you’re going to affect the climate. And so it is with our foreshore and our seabed. The government saying, the government argue on behalf of the people. That’s why I was our foreshore and our seabed are becoming contaminated. Nobody was looking after it because if you want to try and do something, oh, then you’ve got a local council who says, “Oh, no, you can’t go fishing this time because this area of the foreshores and seabed must be locked down, because there’s a rocket going up, on our peninsula”.
So we’ve got this now that the local council gave permission for rocket land company to set themselves up on my peninsula where I live. And now, when that rocket goes off, that company is allowed by law, L-A-W, to close down that collection area of picking up seafoods. Now, that is wrong, you can’t do that sort of thing because our people rely on them for their sustenance, for their livelihood. When people pass away, that is the most important place that they go, to get the seafood to feed all the hundreds of people who come to pay their respects, but when this rocket is going up, that coastline has closed down. So there already is a very non-compliance of recognition, or acceptance rather, that our people, indigenous peoples of the Mahia peninsula, have that responsibility, it’s not a right, it’s a responsibility to look after that foreshore. And that’s a takutai moana [the marine and coastal area] which we have taken to the court in 2004. We’re still wanting that to be accepted. But then saying that, we have to get all our people to understand, it’s not a law L-A-W we’re going for, it’s a L-O-R-E, and that nobody will be missing out if we come together as one group because within Maoridom you have fano, which is a group of families, you have hapū [“subtribe”, or “clan”], which is when those families will come together. And you have a iwi [“people” or “nation”] group which has a responsibility to carry out those things which the people, the fano and the hapū, the families and the group of families, have come together and agreed to carry out so that the iwi group’s responsibility is to go forward and carry the request with all our people on board.
Pause
Annika: After this lesson in Maoridom and the concerns that they have about the use of the Mahia peninsula, I moved our conversation to other issues that Pauline dedicates her life to, which are also core areas of work of the World Future Council: Peace and disarmament, ocean diversity, rights of women and young people, and climate and energy issues.
Pauline is particularly concerned about nuclear issues. In a previous interview with the World Future Council, Pauline clarified that the issue is four-fold: first, the mining of uranium destroys indigenous lands. The second issue is the so‐called civil use for nuclear power plants. Thirdly, nuclear energy is used as an instrument of war, and fourthly, there are concerns about the handling of nuclear waste. Aotearoa / New Zealand became nuclear free in all four aspects in 1984, but Pauline still had to witness the nuclear destruction in the South Pacific while raising her children in the 50s and 60s.
Pauline: Well, that is a very dangerous area, the Pacific at the moment, and also north of Russia, Belarus. Because people have dumped their natural nuclear waste in the Pacific, and they say they’ve got it encased in a stone vault. Now anybody with any two-piece brain in their head will know that where it’s situated that it drives on an earthquake fault. And when we’ve seen so many earthquakes going up at the moment, spitting the land around the world, that that could damage the concrete vault, and then waste will go into the ocean. And there’s nothing you can do about it. Japan has their waste sunk which is on the edge of the ocean because it’s in big bags apparently, from the blowout of some years back. And that was opened through the climate destruction which is happening with earthquakes now as well, in Japan.
What’s going to happen? Who’s gonna feed the world because 75% of the world’s surface is oceans? How do all these millions and billions of people who live around the coastlines going to feed themselves? It’s a living disaster. And before we talk about climate change, we have to look at how are we going to deal with the disaster which is sitting under our noses but we don’t want to address it. The scientists need to first come up with something, you’re getting all these warm oceans, and the warm oceans will destroy the streams. So, the basic is the nuclear waste is really hot. So that’s where you really have to start looking at Belarus, Russia, and the Pacific Ocean. Because nobody has thought about why is the Pacific Ocean warming up? Recently, people of the Pacific have said to me, “Well, naturally, if you’re warming up those concrete slabs which the nuclear waste is in, naturally that’s going to warm the ocean”. Because the nuclear reactors, when they’ve dumped all that nuclear waste, it will naturally heat up the concrete vaults which they’re contained in. You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to know that.
Annika: To Pauline, this constitutes the greatest threat to the environment.
Well, there won’t be any humanity left. That how simple it is. The damage will kill us. The environment will die down, humanity will die down. I’m not a scientist and I’m not a bearer of bad news or good news. It’s only common sense that with the Ocean, even though we’re near the Pacific, where’s the food going to come from? Already, the fish is contaminated with mercury poisoning. And that’s not very well known. Many people buy fish overseas, that’s already contaminated with mercury poison, unless we as humanity are going to go otherwise, it won’t be even humanity if you’re going to damage the oceans like that.
Annika: So, what are her hopes for how we can improve this?
Pauline: Number one: war—sou stop the wars; you help to stop the destruction. But we don’t need nuclear bombs. You don’t need nuclear fallout. That’s how simple it is… War does not bring peace to anyone. If you look around the world today, the wars are a destruction, killing humanity on every continent, that’s very simple. Stop the wars and start living peacefully together.
Pause
Annika: Pauline has already done so
Shownotes
& weitere Informationen
Intro: Hello, and welcome to The Good Council, the podcast of the World Future Council. In each episode, we’ll highlight current challenges and policy solutions. And we’ll also take you on a journey of inspiring stories. Listen in to another of our intergenerational dialogues from around the globe.
Annika: This is a slightly different episode of our podcast series. For starters, it begins with a traditional Maori greeting…
Kosha: Greeting
Annika: One of the most cherished Councillors of the World Future Council is Pauline Tangiora. A Maori elder and leading figure for indigenous communities, she is described as a repository for knowledge and wisdom. She is a daughter, a mother and grandmother, and not just to her family, but to many people around the world. She is also a tireless fighter and campaigner for the rights of nature, for peace and disarmament, and for intergenerational conversations—just like the one she had with me. Pauline has been a member of the World Future Council since its foundation in 2007. But I wanted to get to know her as a person, what she did before she joined, and why she does what she does. I hoped to learn about her views on life, on her work and on her community, and about her message to present and future generations.
For example, I read that Pauline’s community is much more collective than we are used to in Europe, and often lives together across generations where generations can benefit from one another. So, I asked her how exactly she practices inter-generational living.
Pauline: Well, it’s a difficult question to answer. By bringing on board—over few years that I’ve travelled overseas, taking a younger person with me, and then dropping them into the situation that they have to speak because we, we as Maori, usually do things together. Not on our own. And that’s the way that we have been doing it for several years. My travels overseas haven’t been for me, they’ve been for the younger people to learn so that they can carry on to the future or to each other. That’s the way our people live, by sharing what knowledge we have. So, everybody is on board, because of different generations have different values. And if we can’t dialogue with the generation what is happening is a generation gap if we are not understanding or not sharing that knowledge.
Annika: I was also really interested in her indigenous community. I wondered, is there prhaps a particular message that the Maori have for the WFC?
Pauline: Well, I can’t talk for everybody. I can only talk from my perspective and my community… to achieve the dreams of this modern age we have to get everybody on board and that is like in any other community, trying to get everybody on board is very difficult.
You’ve had an extra little experience of how Maori start their day, when Kosha-Joy opened with our language and introduced me. Those things are important to retain. It’s very important that every indigenous community in the world retains those introductions in a world which is so European.
But we have some young people like Kosha-Joy and that, who are working very hard to bring the “new world” to the “old world”. Cause some of us are not prepared yet for that new world. As for indigenous people internationally, in my work with the indigenous peoples around the world, many of them have looked to Maori to help them to succeed.
But at the Rio Conference, of Kari-Oca, one thing we were all united in—the over [ninety] nationalities—was that, we mustn’t lose that, which we’ve had.
Annika: In June 1992, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development—also known as the ‘Earth Summit’—was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It was a major UN conference that sought to rethink economic development and to find ways to stop polluting the planet and depleting its natural resources. But while heads of governments met in Rio, indigenous peoples had their own summit at Kari-Oca, a village outside Rio: the World Conference of Indigenous Peoples on Territory, Environment and Development. And following their Kari-Oca Conference, the indigenous leaders shared their perspectives with the State representatives.
Pauline: One of the things that we have noticed in the international world: international companies look at some of our young indigenous peoples, they grab them and put them into places where they lose their contact with their indigenous world. And that’s a danger that all indigenous communities around the world have. And I think the WFC have given a little bit of a leeway for the indigenous peoples to come forward from their perspective, especially some of the women of Africa who have come forward planting millions of trees, the waterways; the women in India, trying to save Gujarat; the women in the Amazon, trying to stop the forest being cut down. Because indigenous peoples can only work with the environment that they’re around, those environments vary from country to country. And it doesn’t matter how big a community you have, it’s all the same, it’s retaining the knowledge of how Mother Earth works with humanity. If we don’t work this together, we are not above Mother Earth, we are within Mother Earth, and humanity must be tamed.
Pause
Annika: One thing that I learned in advance of my call with Pauline was that Maori people believe in Kaitiakitanga, which can be translated into trusteeship (of the Earth). What does this fascinating concept mean, and what does it entail?
Pauline: That number one, you have a responsibility for yourself. To make sure that you are honest, your morals are above reproach. Because unless you yourself can look within yourself, you cannot work within the environment or with the new community. Because to look after anything, you must be there for the purpose of, number one, your people, humanity, and the world as such. So, sometimes it’s a hard-y road to walk. But other times people can come to understand if indigenous peoples go to the government and say “this is not right”.
Unfortunately, the government has different values. But in my experience in approaching other governments around the world, saying “this is the way these people that I am with today, see it”—but people seem to think that you ask one or two people, how to do things, and that is why the Rio Conference in ‘92 for environment, it was set up by [Maurice] Strong [former Under-Secretary of the UN], the Kari-Oca Conference—free conference where all these 90 year old national, independent indigenous peoples of the world came together—and they decided with the Kari-Oca document “this is the way we do it”. And when Marcos Terena presented to the Rio Conference, which is only visited by heads of state, he walked in there with bare feet. And I heard somebody say “the poor man hasn’t got any shoes!”. Now, to Marcos, having his feet touch Mother Earth gave him the strength to present that document. So, if you’re a Kaitiaki, you must be able to stand for what you believe is right, but you can’t always get everybody to agree with you.
Indigenous peoples know the difference in Europeans. But if you can sit and come together, to listen to what Mother Earth is your guiding light. For instance, if I can’t hear the frogs, I know something’s wrong with the environment. Climate, and the environment is not two separate things, they work together. That’s how indigenous people see the circle is all complete. But once you start taking one thing out of the circle, and talking about just the climate, or the environment, or health, then you’ve lost the whole concept of being Kaitiaki. Because everything in that circle makes up the life force of a person, and you’re wider or your whole person is within that circle. That’s about how I can explain it to you Annemike.
Annika: Before my call with Pauline, I had the chance to speak to one of the Councillors of the WFC, Neshan Gunasekera from Sri Lanka…
Pauline: Oh, Neshan is a great man! He worked for Judge Weeramantry…
Annika: Judge Weeramantry was a Sri Lankan judge at the International Court of Justice, in the Hague. After his tenure at the ICJ ended, he took up the position of President of the International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms and became an influential figure in the area of international environmental law.
Pauline: When Neshan came onto the World Future Council, it was great to see a young person who’s come who has worked alongside Judge Weeramantry who could bring the dreams of the youth of Sri Lankra with the old values that Judge Weeramantry had. And one of the things I really admired about Neshan was that he is carried on these workshops for the young people, in Sri Lanka, for people from all around the world together, and I think the WFC is very lucky–or very blessed more than luck—to have him on board with that sort of thing.
Annika: Neshan shared with me an amazing story about a time he met Pauline in Hamburg, during one of the early annual general meetings of the Council. He told me that on a dark snowy evening, Pauline was barefoot in the snow. She encouraged others to also take their shoes off; Neshan, who is used to the warmth and sun, actually took off his shoes, and tried not to show how freezing it was. And yet, it was a lesson of bearing the elements, and I ask Pauline to remember…
Pauline: Ah yes… Well, everything is a living live force, doesn’t matter whether it’s snow, or whether it’s the rain, or whether it’s the sun. Everything is a living life force, and without that none of us would survive for future generations. So when I sit here with the birds, and look at the sunrise here just a little while ago, they are all living life forces which starts our life when we open our eyes in the morning. We must remember to pay respect to those that living life force, it may not be the same to everybody. But if we can train or teach our young people what a living life force is, then I think we’ve done the greatest part of our lives, what the Creator created us for.
I don’t think there are any boundaries of life forces, we are all the same, we need to breathe the air, and have the sun. And without those two things, we are nothing. Because the spirituality of our life comes from those areas of the light of the days. And what we do through the day will be how we can teach our younger people, my grandchildren, and some of them say they want to go into space, and live in space. And I say, how are you going to survive in space? So, we have to bring that to our young people how the space is there as a creation of the Creator, and not to take control of the space. Because nothing of our lives can be controlled, it’s controlled by the Creator. That’s the living life force that the Creator has given to each and every one of us to use, for the betterment of humanity.
Annika: Listen to this story about one of Pauline’s grandchildren… a story that reminds us also to look at our own relations with others, and between children and grandchildren…
Pauline: I remember one of my grandchildren when he was three years old. He decided he was going to climb a tree out at the back of my place. He got up to two or three branches and then he looked up sky and he said “Nanny, one day I’m going to climb up this tree and climb and have a look at the sky”. That’s some proof of how young people learn things. And when he comes back now and again, he has a look at that tree and says “see, that tree has grown taller”. And I said “Well, when are you going to climb up?” And he said, “well, it’s not yet up to the sky”, so he’s got the idea that the tree will keep growing—simple things like that. I think it’s very important to encourage in our young people. Too often they’re sitting watching the films on space and they’ve forgotten just to run around.
And look at dandelions, for instance. One day, I picked some dandelions, and he said “what are you gonna do with that nanny?” And I said, “I’m gonna make salad of them”. And he said “you can’t make salad out of the weed!”. And I said “well, you go watch because that’s what we’re gonna have for dinner”. Simple things like that. Us as elders and young people must continually come together and talk. I don’t know why is when my discussions with my grandchildren, or with my own children where I think it’s good to help have a healthy discussion. Not with the kid, the children watching television and all these programs and learn all those things—they need to talk face to face. And the elders don’t lose anything by missing out and young people show you that you might have to have another look at your world view. One of the basic things about the world view of the indigenous thinking is: never forget that you are the creation of the Creator. Unless you continually remember that, you are not here to serve yourself, you’re here to look after and be with your people.
Pause
Annika: We then moved on to talking about Pauline’s rich experience on the international stage. As a leading figure for indigenous communities, she travelled to Mexico to face militaries with Indigenous community members, comforted child victims of chemical weapons attacks in Iraq, and drove to Big Mountain in Arizona in a peace caravan. So, I asked her: What did you learn from representing indigenous communities on the world stage? But first, rightly so, Pauline corrected me…
Pauline: I can never represent indigenous peoples, but I can be the voice to carry to the UN. For instance, the people in Africa, South Africa, wanted their land back, the bush people, but they could not get into the UN. And through Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, we could get into the UN, and have a voice because you must be accredited as you will know. And with Kim Langbecker, we managed to get into the UN and put their case so that at the World Environmental Conference at the beginning of 2000, I was very humbly honoured by the government taking me up to see that the bush people will be given the land back because the pressure of the UN on the South African government pushed it that those bush people will now have their land back. So that’s the sort of thing I think that we must be available for other indigenous peoples—or any person—to voice their concern. The honour is not ours, the honour is of those people who we are the voices of. If we don’t pick up those concerns, you don’t win any friends on the international scene, I’ll tell you that!
Annika: In the Western hemisphere, there are currently large campaigns taking place that advocate for the rights of nature to be codified in law. This would allow for the possibility that violations of nature can be enforced in a court of law. But this consideration isn’t new. The American law professor Christopher D Stone first argued that environmental interests should be recognised apart from human ones in his book “Should Trees Have Standing?”, in 1972. Similarly, there are advocacy campaigns under way to lobby the UN Human Rights Council to consider a historic resolution on the right to a healthy environment. Again, the difference to indigenous communities is striking, for in 2017, New Zealand granted legal rights to the Whanganui River. The Maori had been fighting for more than 160 years to get legal protection for the river, relying on it for food, travel, and their livelihood.
Pauline: We haven’t put it into law. It’s a natural right and responsibility of the government to accept. You’re talking about the river, aren’t you? The Whanganui River. The government had to accept that that was the right of those indigenous tribes of the Whanganui River. That was there was a lifeforce. To me, they didn’t need a law. But for Europeans, you have to have laws. So there’s two conflicts here: one is the ‘lore’, L-O-R-E, the lore of the people. And L-A-W, the European way of living.
Annika: And here’s Kosha-Joy, joining the conversation.
Kosha-Joy: I have a question, though. What about the Takutai Moana stuff. Does that relate to this question?
Pauline: Well, we have te takutai moana on the coast. We live on a peninsula, which is three quarters surrounded by the ocean. And we made an application because the government declared in 2004 that we had no rights to the oceans, the foreshore and seabed. But they belong to everybody. What became confusing for me, was how can you make a law to say that we who were here for hundreds of years have taken your food basket from your back door is not ours to look after. And that was why our people would have applied to the court in 2004 to have it put back into the hands of the people to look after, not after the law, L-A-W of the country and we’re still fighting that at the moment. So, there is a confusion of the L-A-W with the L-O-R-E. And Europeans have come from an ownership, nuclear ownership background of the Westminster parliamentary system, which makes it very difficult for many Europeans. And it becomes then a racial thing or discrimination: Why is one people getting more than the other? But unfortunately for the world, people forget to look back at who has looked after it for the millions of years before somebody else has moved into a country and decided that they want to do it this way.
And that’s why we’ve got within the Amazon forests all those farmers that have come in after the Second World War and taken over the forestry of the indigenous peoples of the Amazon. Now that’s why we’ve got forest fires going on all the time in the Amazon which is affecting the climate.
Annika: Pauline’s concerns hit close to home. Her community is protesting against letting a US-owned rocket company launch US military technology from the Mahia Peninsula, which has an impact on the local flora and fauna.
Pauline: Those people know that if you start doing that sort of thing, you’re going to affect the climate. And so it is with our foreshore and our seabed. The government saying, the government argue on behalf of the people. That’s why I was our foreshore and our seabed are becoming contaminated. Nobody was looking after it because if you want to try and do something, oh, then you’ve got a local council who says, “Oh, no, you can’t go fishing this time because this area of the foreshores and seabed must be locked down, because there’s a rocket going up, on our peninsula”.
So we’ve got this now that the local council gave permission for rocket land company to set themselves up on my peninsula where I live. And now, when that rocket goes off, that company is allowed by law, L-A-W, to close down that collection area of picking up seafoods. Now, that is wrong, you can’t do that sort of thing because our people rely on them for their sustenance, for their livelihood. When people pass away, that is the most important place that they go, to get the seafood to feed all the hundreds of people who come to pay their respects, but when this rocket is going up, that coastline has closed down. So there already is a very non-compliance of recognition, or acceptance rather, that our people, indigenous peoples of the Mahia peninsula, have that responsibility, it’s not a right, it’s a responsibility to look after that foreshore. And that’s a takutai moana [the marine and coastal area] which we have taken to the court in 2004. We’re still wanting that to be accepted. But then saying that, we have to get all our people to understand, it’s not a law L-A-W we’re going for, it’s a L-O-R-E, and that nobody will be missing out if we come together as one group because within Maoridom you have fano, which is a group of families, you have hapū [“subtribe”, or “clan”], which is when those families will come together. And you have a iwi [“people” or “nation”] group which has a responsibility to carry out those things which the people, the fano and the hapū, the families and the group of families, have come together and agreed to carry out so that the iwi group’s responsibility is to go forward and carry the request with all our people on board.
Pause
Annika: After this lesson in Maoridom and the concerns that they have about the use of the Mahia peninsula, I moved our conversation to other issues that Pauline dedicates her life to, which are also core areas of work of the World Future Council: Peace and disarmament, ocean diversity, rights of women and young people, and climate and energy issues.
Pauline is particularly concerned about nuclear issues. In a previous interview with the World Future Council, Pauline clarified that the issue is four-fold: first, the mining of uranium destroys indigenous lands. The second issue is the so‐called civil use for nuclear power plants. Thirdly, nuclear energy is used as an instrument of war, and fourthly, there are concerns about the handling of nuclear waste. Aotearoa / New Zealand became nuclear free in all four aspects in 1984, but Pauline still had to witness the nuclear destruction in the South Pacific while raising her children in the 50s and 60s.
Pauline: Well, that is a very dangerous area, the Pacific at the moment, and also north of Russia, Belarus. Because people have dumped their natural nuclear waste in the Pacific, and they say they’ve got it encased in a stone vault. Now anybody with any two-piece brain in their head will know that where it’s situated that it drives on an earthquake fault. And when we’ve seen so many earthquakes going up at the moment, spitting the land around the world, that that could damage the concrete vault, and then waste will go into the ocean. And there’s nothing you can do about it. Japan has their waste sunk which is on the edge of the ocean because it’s in big bags apparently, from the blowout of some years back. And that was opened through the climate destruction which is happening with earthquakes now as well, in Japan.
What’s going to happen? Who’s gonna feed the world because 75% of the world’s surface is oceans? How do all these millions and billions of people who live around the coastlines going to feed themselves? It’s a living disaster. And before we talk about climate change, we have to look at how are we going to deal with the disaster which is sitting under our noses but we don’t want to address it. The scientists need to first come up with something, you’re getting all these warm oceans, and the warm oceans will destroy the streams. So, the basic is the nuclear waste is really hot. So that’s where you really have to start looking at Belarus, Russia, and the Pacific Ocean. Because nobody has thought about why is the Pacific Ocean warming up? Recently, people of the Pacific have said to me, “Well, naturally, if you’re warming up those concrete slabs which the nuclear waste is in, naturally that’s going to warm the ocean”. Because the nuclear reactors, when they’ve dumped all that nuclear waste, it will naturally heat up the concrete vaults which they’re contained in. You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to know that.
Annika: To Pauline, this constitutes the greatest threat to the environment.
Well, there won’t be any humanity left. That how simple it is. The damage will kill us. The environment will die down, humanity will die down. I’m not a scientist and I’m not a bearer of bad news or good news. It’s only common sense that with the Ocean, even though we’re near the Pacific, where’s the food going to come from? Already, the fish is contaminated with mercury poisoning. And that’s not very well known. Many people buy fish overseas, that’s already contaminated with mercury poison, unless we as humanity are going to go otherwise, it won’t be even humanity if you’re going to damage the oceans like that.
Annika: So, what are her hopes for how we can improve this?
Pauline: Number one: war—sou stop the wars; you help to stop the destruction. But we don’t need nuclear bombs. You don’t need nuclear fallout. That’s how simple it is… War does not bring peace to anyone. If you look around the world today, the wars are a destruction, killing humanity on every continent, that’s very simple. Stop the wars and start living peacefully together.
Pause
Annika: Pauline has already done so
Shownotes
& weitere Informationen
Intro: Hello, and welcome to The Good Council, the podcast of the World Future Council. In each episode, we’ll highlight current challenges and policy solutions. And we’ll also take you on a journey of inspiring stories. Listen in to another of our intergenerational dialogues from around the globe.
Annika: This is a slightly different episode of our podcast series. For starters, it begins with a traditional Maori greeting…
Kosha: Greeting
Annika: One of the most cherished Councillors of the World Future Council is Pauline Tangiora. A Maori elder and leading figure for indigenous communities, she is described as a repository for knowledge and wisdom. She is a daughter, a mother and grandmother, and not just to her family, but to many people around the world. She is also a tireless fighter and campaigner for the rights of nature, for peace and disarmament, and for intergenerational conversations—just like the one she had with me. Pauline has been a member of the World Future Council since its foundation in 2007. But I wanted to get to know her as a person, what she did before she joined, and why she does what she does. I hoped to learn about her views on life, on her work and on her community, and about her message to present and future generations.
For example, I read that Pauline’s community is much more collective than we are used to in Europe, and often lives together across generations where generations can benefit from one another. So, I asked her how exactly she practices inter-generational living.
Pauline: Well, it’s a difficult question to answer. By bringing on board—over few years that I’ve travelled overseas, taking a younger person with me, and then dropping them into the situation that they have to speak because we, we as Maori, usually do things together. Not on our own. And that’s the way that we have been doing it for several years. My travels overseas haven’t been for me, they’ve been for the younger people to learn so that they can carry on to the future or to each other. That’s the way our people live, by sharing what knowledge we have. So, everybody is on board, because of different generations have different values. And if we can’t dialogue with the generation what is happening is a generation gap if we are not understanding or not sharing that knowledge.
Annika: I was also really interested in her indigenous community. I wondered, is there prhaps a particular message that the Maori have for the WFC?
Pauline: Well, I can’t talk for everybody. I can only talk from my perspective and my community… to achieve the dreams of this modern age we have to get everybody on board and that is like in any other community, trying to get everybody on board is very difficult.
You’ve had an extra little experience of how Maori start their day, when Kosha-Joy opened with our language and introduced me. Those things are important to retain. It’s very important that every indigenous community in the world retains those introductions in a world which is so European.
But we have some young people like Kosha-Joy and that, who are working very hard to bring the “new world” to the “old world”. Cause some of us are not prepared yet for that new world. As for indigenous people internationally, in my work with the indigenous peoples around the world, many of them have looked to Maori to help them to succeed.
But at the Rio Conference, of Kari-Oca, one thing we were all united in—the over [ninety] nationalities—was that, we mustn’t lose that, which we’ve had.
Annika: In June 1992, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development—also known as the ‘Earth Summit’—was held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It was a major UN conference that sought to rethink economic development and to find ways to stop polluting the planet and depleting its natural resources. But while heads of governments met in Rio, indigenous peoples had their own summit at Kari-Oca, a village outside Rio: the World Conference of Indigenous Peoples on Territory, Environment and Development. And following their Kari-Oca Conference, the indigenous leaders shared their perspectives with the State representatives.
Pauline: One of the things that we have noticed in the international world: international companies look at some of our young indigenous peoples, they grab them and put them into places where they lose their contact with their indigenous world. And that’s a danger that all indigenous communities around the world have. And I think the WFC have given a little bit of a leeway for the indigenous peoples to come forward from their perspective, especially some of the women of Africa who have come forward planting millions of trees, the waterways; the women in India, trying to save Gujarat; the women in the Amazon, trying to stop the forest being cut down. Because indigenous peoples can only work with the environment that they’re around, those environments vary from country to country. And it doesn’t matter how big a community you have, it’s all the same, it’s retaining the knowledge of how Mother Earth works with humanity. If we don’t work this together, we are not above Mother Earth, we are within Mother Earth, and humanity must be tamed.
Pause
Annika: One thing that I learned in advance of my call with Pauline was that Maori people believe in Kaitiakitanga, which can be translated into trusteeship (of the Earth). What does this fascinating concept mean, and what does it entail?
Pauline: That number one, you have a responsibility for yourself. To make sure that you are honest, your morals are above reproach. Because unless you yourself can look within yourself, you cannot work within the environment or with the new community. Because to look after anything, you must be there for the purpose of, number one, your people, humanity, and the world as such. So, sometimes it’s a hard-y road to walk. But other times people can come to understand if indigenous peoples go to the government and say “this is not right”.
Unfortunately, the government has different values. But in my experience in approaching other governments around the world, saying “this is the way these people that I am with today, see it”—but people seem to think that you ask one or two people, how to do things, and that is why the Rio Conference in ‘92 for environment, it was set up by [Maurice] Strong [former Under-Secretary of the UN], the Kari-Oca Conference—free conference where all these 90 year old national, independent indigenous peoples of the world came together—and they decided with the Kari-Oca document “this is the way we do it”. And when Marcos Terena presented to the Rio Conference, which is only visited by heads of state, he walked in there with bare feet. And I heard somebody say “the poor man hasn’t got any shoes!”. Now, to Marcos, having his feet touch Mother Earth gave him the strength to present that document. So, if you’re a Kaitiaki, you must be able to stand for what you believe is right, but you can’t always get everybody to agree with you.
Indigenous peoples know the difference in Europeans. But if you can sit and come together, to listen to what Mother Earth is your guiding light. For instance, if I can’t hear the frogs, I know something’s wrong with the environment. Climate, and the environment is not two separate things, they work together. That’s how indigenous people see the circle is all complete. But once you start taking one thing out of the circle, and talking about just the climate, or the environment, or health, then you’ve lost the whole concept of being Kaitiaki. Because everything in that circle makes up the life force of a person, and you’re wider or your whole person is within that circle. That’s about how I can explain it to you Annemike.
Annika: Before my call with Pauline, I had the chance to speak to one of the Councillors of the WFC, Neshan Gunasekera from Sri Lanka…
Pauline: Oh, Neshan is a great man! He worked for Judge Weeramantry…
Annika: Judge Weeramantry was a Sri Lankan judge at the International Court of Justice, in the Hague. After his tenure at the ICJ ended, he took up the position of President of the International Association of Lawyers Against Nuclear Arms and became an influential figure in the area of international environmental law.
Pauline: When Neshan came onto the World Future Council, it was great to see a young person who’s come who has worked alongside Judge Weeramantry who could bring the dreams of the youth of Sri Lankra with the old values that Judge Weeramantry had. And one of the things I really admired about Neshan was that he is carried on these workshops for the young people, in Sri Lanka, for people from all around the world together, and I think the WFC is very lucky–or very blessed more than luck—to have him on board with that sort of thing.
Annika: Neshan shared with me an amazing story about a time he met Pauline in Hamburg, during one of the early annual general meetings of the Council. He told me that on a dark snowy evening, Pauline was barefoot in the snow. She encouraged others to also take their shoes off; Neshan, who is used to the warmth and sun, actually took off his shoes, and tried not to show how freezing it was. And yet, it was a lesson of bearing the elements, and I ask Pauline to remember…
Pauline: Ah yes… Well, everything is a living live force, doesn’t matter whether it’s snow, or whether it’s the rain, or whether it’s the sun. Everything is a living life force, and without that none of us would survive for future generations. So when I sit here with the birds, and look at the sunrise here just a little while ago, they are all living life forces which starts our life when we open our eyes in the morning. We must remember to pay respect to those that living life force, it may not be the same to everybody. But if we can train or teach our young people what a living life force is, then I think we’ve done the greatest part of our lives, what the Creator created us for.
I don’t think there are any boundaries of life forces, we are all the same, we need to breathe the air, and have the sun. And without those two things, we are nothing. Because the spirituality of our life comes from those areas of the light of the days. And what we do through the day will be how we can teach our younger people, my grandchildren, and some of them say they want to go into space, and live in space. And I say, how are you going to survive in space? So, we have to bring that to our young people how the space is there as a creation of the Creator, and not to take control of the space. Because nothing of our lives can be controlled, it’s controlled by the Creator. That’s the living life force that the Creator has given to each and every one of us to use, for the betterment of humanity.
Annika: Listen to this story about one of Pauline’s grandchildren… a story that reminds us also to look at our own relations with others, and between children and grandchildren…
Pauline: I remember one of my grandchildren when he was three years old. He decided he was going to climb a tree out at the back of my place. He got up to two or three branches and then he looked up sky and he said “Nanny, one day I’m going to climb up this tree and climb and have a look at the sky”. That’s some proof of how young people learn things. And when he comes back now and again, he has a look at that tree and says “see, that tree has grown taller”. And I said “Well, when are you going to climb up?” And he said, “well, it’s not yet up to the sky”, so he’s got the idea that the tree will keep growing—simple things like that. I think it’s very important to encourage in our young people. Too often they’re sitting watching the films on space and they’ve forgotten just to run around.
And look at dandelions, for instance. One day, I picked some dandelions, and he said “what are you gonna do with that nanny?” And I said, “I’m gonna make salad of them”. And he said “you can’t make salad out of the weed!”. And I said “well, you go watch because that’s what we’re gonna have for dinner”. Simple things like that. Us as elders and young people must continually come together and talk. I don’t know why is when my discussions with my grandchildren, or with my own children where I think it’s good to help have a healthy discussion. Not with the kid, the children watching television and all these programs and learn all those things—they need to talk face to face. And the elders don’t lose anything by missing out and young people show you that you might have to have another look at your world view. One of the basic things about the world view of the indigenous thinking is: never forget that you are the creation of the Creator. Unless you continually remember that, you are not here to serve yourself, you’re here to look after and be with your people.
Pause
Annika: We then moved on to talking about Pauline’s rich experience on the international stage. As a leading figure for indigenous communities, she travelled to Mexico to face militaries with Indigenous community members, comforted child victims of chemical weapons attacks in Iraq, and drove to Big Mountain in Arizona in a peace caravan. So, I asked her: What did you learn from representing indigenous communities on the world stage? But first, rightly so, Pauline corrected me…
Pauline: I can never represent indigenous peoples, but I can be the voice to carry to the UN. For instance, the people in Africa, South Africa, wanted their land back, the bush people, but they could not get into the UN. And through Women’s International League for Peace and Freedom, we could get into the UN, and have a voice because you must be accredited as you will know. And with Kim Langbecker, we managed to get into the UN and put their case so that at the World Environmental Conference at the beginning of 2000, I was very humbly honoured by the government taking me up to see that the bush people will be given the land back because the pressure of the UN on the South African government pushed it that those bush people will now have their land back. So that’s the sort of thing I think that we must be available for other indigenous peoples—or any person—to voice their concern. The honour is not ours, the honour is of those people who we are the voices of. If we don’t pick up those concerns, you don’t win any friends on the international scene, I’ll tell you that!
Annika: In the Western hemisphere, there are currently large campaigns taking place that advocate for the rights of nature to be codified in law. This would allow for the possibility that violations of nature can be enforced in a court of law. But this consideration isn’t new. The American law professor Christopher D Stone first argued that environmental interests should be recognised apart from human ones in his book “Should Trees Have Standing?”, in 1972. Similarly, there are advocacy campaigns under way to lobby the UN Human Rights Council to consider a historic resolution on the right to a healthy environment. Again, the difference to indigenous communities is striking, for in 2017, New Zealand granted legal rights to the Whanganui River. The Maori had been fighting for more than 160 years to get legal protection for the river, relying on it for food, travel, and their livelihood.
Pauline: We haven’t put it into law. It’s a natural right and responsibility of the government to accept. You’re talking about the river, aren’t you? The Whanganui River. The government had to accept that that was the right of those indigenous tribes of the Whanganui River. That was there was a lifeforce. To me, they didn’t need a law. But for Europeans, you have to have laws. So there’s two conflicts here: one is the ‘lore’, L-O-R-E, the lore of the people. And L-A-W, the European way of living.
Annika: And here’s Kosha-Joy, joining the conversation.
Kosha-Joy: I have a question, though. What about the Takutai Moana stuff. Does that relate to this question?
Pauline: Well, we have te takutai moana on the coast. We live on a peninsula, which is three quarters surrounded by the ocean. And we made an application because the government declared in 2004 that we had no rights to the oceans, the foreshore and seabed. But they belong to everybody. What became confusing for me, was how can you make a law to say that we who were here for hundreds of years have taken your food basket from your back door is not ours to look after. And that was why our people would have applied to the court in 2004 to have it put back into the hands of the people to look after, not after the law, L-A-W of the country and we’re still fighting that at the moment. So, there is a confusion of the L-A-W with the L-O-R-E. And Europeans have come from an ownership, nuclear ownership background of the Westminster parliamentary system, which makes it very difficult for many Europeans. And it becomes then a racial thing or discrimination: Why is one people getting more than the other? But unfortunately for the world, people forget to look back at who has looked after it for the millions of years before somebody else has moved into a country and decided that they want to do it this way.
And that’s why we’ve got within the Amazon forests all those farmers that have come in after the Second World War and taken over the forestry of the indigenous peoples of the Amazon. Now that’s why we’ve got forest fires going on all the time in the Amazon which is affecting the climate.
Annika: Pauline’s concerns hit close to home. Her community is protesting against letting a US-owned rocket company launch US military technology from the Mahia Peninsula, which has an impact on the local flora and fauna.
Pauline: Those people know that if you start doing that sort of thing, you’re going to affect the climate. And so it is with our foreshore and our seabed. The government saying, the government argue on behalf of the people. That’s why I was our foreshore and our seabed are becoming contaminated. Nobody was looking after it because if you want to try and do something, oh, then you’ve got a local council who says, “Oh, no, you can’t go fishing this time because this area of the foreshores and seabed must be locked down, because there’s a rocket going up, on our peninsula”.
So we’ve got this now that the local council gave permission for rocket land company to set themselves up on my peninsula where I live. And now, when that rocket goes off, that company is allowed by law, L-A-W, to close down that collection area of picking up seafoods. Now, that is wrong, you can’t do that sort of thing because our people rely on them for their sustenance, for their livelihood. When people pass away, that is the most important place that they go, to get the seafood to feed all the hundreds of people who come to pay their respects, but when this rocket is going up, that coastline has closed down. So there already is a very non-compliance of recognition, or acceptance rather, that our people, indigenous peoples of the Mahia peninsula, have that responsibility, it’s not a right, it’s a responsibility to look after that foreshore. And that’s a takutai moana [the marine and coastal area] which we have taken to the court in 2004. We’re still wanting that to be accepted. But then saying that, we have to get all our people to understand, it’s not a law L-A-W we’re going for, it’s a L-O-R-E, and that nobody will be missing out if we come together as one group because within Maoridom you have fano, which is a group of families, you have hapū [“subtribe”, or “clan”], which is when those families will come together. And you have a iwi [“people” or “nation”] group which has a responsibility to carry out those things which the people, the fano and the hapū, the families and the group of families, have come together and agreed to carry out so that the iwi group’s responsibility is to go forward and carry the request with all our people on board.
Pause
Annika: After this lesson in Maoridom and the concerns that they have about the use of the Mahia peninsula, I moved our conversation to other issues that Pauline dedicates her life to, which are also core areas of work of the World Future Council: Peace and disarmament, ocean diversity, rights of women and young people, and climate and energy issues.
Pauline is particularly concerned about nuclear issues. In a previous interview with the World Future Council, Pauline clarified that the issue is four-fold: first, the mining of uranium destroys indigenous lands. The second issue is the so‐called civil use for nuclear power plants. Thirdly, nuclear energy is used as an instrument of war, and fourthly, there are concerns about the handling of nuclear waste. Aotearoa / New Zealand became nuclear free in all four aspects in 1984, but Pauline still had to witness the nuclear destruction in the South Pacific while raising her children in the 50s and 60s.
Pauline: Well, that is a very dangerous area, the Pacific at the moment, and also north of Russia, Belarus. Because people have dumped their natural nuclear waste in the Pacific, and they say they’ve got it encased in a stone vault. Now anybody with any two-piece brain in their head will know that where it’s situated that it drives on an earthquake fault. And when we’ve seen so many earthquakes going up at the moment, spitting the land around the world, that that could damage the concrete vault, and then waste will go into the ocean. And there’s nothing you can do about it. Japan has their waste sunk which is on the edge of the ocean because it’s in big bags apparently, from the blowout of some years back. And that was opened through the climate destruction which is happening with earthquakes now as well, in Japan.
What’s going to happen? Who’s gonna feed the world because 75% of the world’s surface is oceans? How do all these millions and billions of people who live around the coastlines going to feed themselves? It’s a living disaster. And before we talk about climate change, we have to look at how are we going to deal with the disaster which is sitting under our noses but we don’t want to address it. The scientists need to first come up with something, you’re getting all these warm oceans, and the warm oceans will destroy the streams. So, the basic is the nuclear waste is really hot. So that’s where you really have to start looking at Belarus, Russia, and the Pacific Ocean. Because nobody has thought about why is the Pacific Ocean warming up? Recently, people of the Pacific have said to me, “Well, naturally, if you’re warming up those concrete slabs which the nuclear waste is in, naturally that’s going to warm the ocean”. Because the nuclear reactors, when they’ve dumped all that nuclear waste, it will naturally heat up the concrete vaults which they’re contained in. You don’t need to be a rocket scientist to know that.
Annika: To Pauline, this constitutes the greatest threat to the environment.
Well, there won’t be any humanity left. That how simple it is. The damage will kill us. The environment will die down, humanity will die down. I’m not a scientist and I’m not a bearer of bad news or good news. It’s only common sense that with the Ocean, even though we’re near the Pacific, where’s the food going to come from? Already, the fish is contaminated with mercury poisoning. And that’s not very well known. Many people buy fish overseas, that’s already contaminated with mercury poison, unless we as humanity are going to go otherwise, it won’t be even humanity if you’re going to damage the oceans like that.
Annika: So, what are her hopes for how we can improve this?
Pauline: Number one: war—sou stop the wars; you help to stop the destruction. But we don’t need nuclear bombs. You don’t need nuclear fallout. That’s how simple it is… War does not bring peace to anyone. If you look around the world today, the wars are a destruction, killing humanity on every continent, that’s very simple. Stop the wars and start living peacefully together.
Pause
Annika: Pauline has already done so
The Good Council: Prof. Dr. Michael Otto und Anna Stehn
Intro: Hallo und herzlich Willkommen bei „The Good Council”, dem Podcast des World Future Councils. In jeder Folge beleuchten wir aktuelle Herausforderungen und politische Lösungen und nehmen Sie mit auf eine Reise voller inspirierender Geschichten. Hören sie rein und folgen sie einem weiteren internationalen und generationenübergreifenden Dialog! Viel Spaß.
Anna: Guten Tag, ich bin Anna, ich bin 25 Jahre alt und ich bin Medien- und Kommunikationsmanagerin beim World Future Council. Ich freue mich sehr in dieser Folge des Generationen Dialoges „The Good Council“ mit Prof Dr. Michael Otto zu sprechen. Er ist Mitgründer und Ehrenratsmitglied des World Future Councils. Er ist außerdem einer der erfolgreichsten deutschen Unternehmenspersönlichkeiten der Gegenwart, hat zahlreiche visionäre Stiftungen und Initiativen gegründet. Er ist Träger des großen Bundesverdienstkreuzes mit Stern. Er ist Gründer der „UMWELTSTIFTUNG Michael Otto“ und der „Aid by Trade Foundation“. Außerdem unterstützt er zahlreiche Umwelt- und gesellschaftspolitische Projekte, beispielsweise das Flüchtlingsprojekt „Ipso“ oder im Bildungsbereich, wie „The Young ClassX“. Er engagiert sich ebenfalls im Bereich der Kunst und Musik und hält zahlreiche Ehrenämter inne. Guten Tag Prof. Dr. Otto!
Dr. Otto: Schönen Guten Tag!
Anna: Es ist für mich eine sehr große Ehre und Freude heute mehr über Ihre Arbeit ihr Leben und ihr Engagement beim World Future Council zu erfahren. Im Rahmen unserer Jugendforums „Youth:Present“ möchte ich heute mehr über sie erfahren und ich würde sagen, wir starten mit einer kleinen Zeitreise durch ihr Leben und Sie erzählen mir dabei vieles über Ihre Ansichten und ihr gesellschaftliches Engagement. Ich freue mich sehr auf diesen intergenerationellen Dialog! Aber lassen Sie uns von vorne anfangen: Sie sind bereits mit 28 Jahren in das Familienunternehmen ihres Vaters eingestiegen. Davor absolvierten Sie ihre Ausbildung. In welchem Bereich war das?
Dr. Otto: Es war so, dass ich nach meinem Abitur mich entschieden habe, in die Unternehmerlaufbahn zu gehen. Denn es war zwar auf der einen Seite für mich schon immer klar, dass ich so als Jugendlicher im Unternehmen meines Vaters immer mal gejobbt habe in den Schulferien und mein Vater sagte auch immer: „Du wirst mal das Unternehmen übernehmen.“ Aber nach dem Abitur war dann doch die Entscheidung, soll ich das denn wirklich mein Leben lang machen? Für mich wäre alternativ auch noch das Medizinstudium und der Arztberuf in Frage gekommen. Aber das Unternehmertum muss ich sagen, habe ich bis heute nicht bereut, weil im Grunde dort beide Gehirnhälften gefordert sind. Nämlich einmal das analytische und das rechenhafte und auf der anderen Seite das Kreative. Wenn man ein Unternehmen aufbaut oder neu gründet, dann ist das auch ein kreativer Prozess. Und das fand ich wie gesagt bis heute spannend, dass man eben beide Gehirnhälften hier einsetzen muss.
Und nachdem ich mich dann entschieden habe, dass ich den Weg zum Unternehmertum gehen will, war für mich eigentlich die Frage, wie beginne ich damit? Mein Vater hätte eigentlich gerne gesehen, dass ich sofort ins Unternehmen einsteige. Und da habe ich gesagt, nein ich möchte unabhängig sein. Und habe gesagt, als erstes wäre am besten mal eine Banklehre. Das heißt eine Ausbildung zu machen im Finanzbereich, das kann nie was schaden. Und das habe ich dann in München gemacht, habe dann Volkswirtschaftsstudium angehängt, promoviert. Ich habe mich aber während des Studiums dann schon selbstständig gemacht, sodass ich auch unabhängig war. Das war mir immer ganz wichtig. Und das war eigentlich so mein erster Einstieg, bis ich dann nach Hamburg zurückgegangen bin und da auch gleich in den Vorstand des Otto-Versands, wie er damals hieß, gekommen bin.
Anna: Ich finde das total spannend, dass sie seit ihrer Jugend ja eigentlich schon diese Unternehmerdenkweise in sich tragen und trotzdem sagen sie in ihrer Biografie einen Satz, nämlich: „Die Wirtschaft muss für den Menschen da sein und nicht umgekehrt. Wie denken sie denn wird das derzeit in der Realität umgesetzt, gerade auch in Zeiten der Pandemie?“
Dr. Otto: Ja ich finde das eigentlich wichtig und das ging mir auch bereits während meiner Jugend und meines Studiums so, dass ich manchmal den Eindruck hatte, dass die Wirtschaft nur an Wachstum denkt, nur daran denkt, dass sie das wichtigste Element ist und dass letztlich alle Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter dazu dienen, die Wirtschaft voranzubringen. Und dabei habe ich immer gesagt: Die Wirtschaft ist ja nur Mittel zum Zweck. Sie soll letztendlich ermöglichen, dass die Menschen ein gesichertes Einkommen haben, dass sie einen gewissen Wohlstand haben. Das ist die Aufgabe der Wirtschaft, das heißt die Wirtschaft muss dem Menschen dienen und nicht umgekehrt! Und das war mir eigentlich immer ganz wichtig.
Ich habe den Eindruck, dass gerade jetzt in Zeiten von Corona durchaus ein Rückbesinnungsprozess da ist. Und, dass man in den letzten Jahren in der Wirtschaft zunehmen man erkannt hat, man muss nachhaltig wirtschaften und man muss letztlich auch der Gesellschaft dienen. Das war wie gesagt nicht immer so, das hat in den letzten Jahren zugenommen. Aber natürlich gibt es immer noch Unternehmen, die nur sich sehen und nur ihr Wachstum sehen.
Anna: Ja, das ist auch das, was ich von der Otto Group und von Ihnen immer mitbekommen habe. Ich bin ja selbst Hamburg geboren und aufgewachsen und für mich stand die Otto Group und Sie immer auch für nachhaltige Produktion und ich glaube auch für viele andere Hamburger ist das so das Bild, dass man von der Otto Group hat. Denn Sie haben Nachhaltigkeit, bevor es, wie sie auch eben sagten, größer wurde, zum Trend wurde, Nachhaltigkeit zum Unternehmensziel der Otto Group erklärt. Und das war schon 1986. Und fünf Jahre später wurden Sie dann noch zum Ökomanager des Jahres ernannt. Sie sprechen häufig über den Bericht des Club of Romes. Gab es daneben noch andere Gründe Umweltschutz in die Unternehmensstrategie mit aufzunehmen?
Dr. Otto: Ja der erste Bericht an den Club of Rome muss ich wirklich sagen, hat mich sehr beeinflusst. Das war ein Wach- und Weckruf. Und ich habe damals mit meinem Freund Eduard Pestel, der Mitbegründer des Club of Romes war, sehr viel über den Bericht diskutiert und ich habe immer gesagt, für das Bewusstsein war der Bericht ganz wichtig, um letzten Endes auch öffentlich Aufmerksamkeit zu schaffen. Aber noch wichtiger ist es zu handeln. Und das war für eigentlich der Grund. Man kann nicht sagen die Politik muss handeln, die Industrie muss handeln. Nein, jeder muss bei sich selbst anfangen. Jeder Bürger muss bei sich selbst anfangen aber auch jeder Unternehmer. Und das war für mich eigentlich der Ansatz zu sagen, ja dann muss ich auch beginnen. Und das fängt natürlich an erstmal an den Standorten, dass man da einzelne Projekte umsetzt bis sich das dann weiterentwickelt, aber das war eigentlich der wichtige Antrieb dazu.
Anna: Ich kann mir aber auch vorstellen, dass gerade, weil sie so früh mit dem Thema begonnen haben, wo andere Unternehmen vielleicht noch nicht so weit waren, dass Sie auch auf gewissen Problemen und Widerstände gestoßen sind. Gab es in der Zeit mal einen Zeitpunkt, wo Sie wirklich an ihre Grenzen gekommen sind?
Dr. Otto: Als ich dann 1986 praktisch nachhaltiges Wirtschaften und Umweltschutz zum weiteren Unternehmensziel erklärt habe, da gab es bei Unternehmer Kollegen natürlich schon einige, die ein wenig gelächelt haben darüber oder mich als Exoten, um es mal freundlich zu sagen, bezeichnet haben. Aber ich glaube, wenn man von einer Sache überzeugt ist, und auch wirklich sich selbst sagt, das ist der richtige Weg, und es ist notwendig ihn zu gehen, dann geht man auch nicht mehr ab von seinem Ziel. Und das gibt einem dann auch die Kraft durchzuhalten, selbst wenn man mal angezweifelt oder kritisiert wird.
Anna: Ja, ich glaube wir haben im Laufe des Gesprächs schon mitbekommen, dass unternehmerisches Handeln und Nachhaltigkeit für Sie immer Hand in Hand gehen. Das klingt immer so einfach, aber das ist natürlich superschwer umzusetzen. Wie vereinbaren Sie denn unternehmerisches Handeln und Nachhaltigkeit und warum ist es so schwierig nachhaltig zu wirtschaften?
Dr. Otto: Gut, erst einmal ist es natürlich notwendig die Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter zu überzeugen und mitzunehmen. Dass eben alle bereit sind. Denn es gibt einige, die begeistert sind, aber es gibt natürlich auch einige, die eher abwarten oder auch etwas kritisch sehen, weil sie sagen: Gut, jetzt müssen wir schon Umsatz und Ergebnis im Unternehmen bringen und uns dafür einsetzen und jetzt noch das Thema Umwelt oder Sozialstandards, was sollen wir denn noch alles machen? Also, man muss erstmal die Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter begeistern. Das zweite ist, es gibt hier natürlich durchaus und das ist natürlich immer das schönste, Win-win Situationen. Also wenn ich z.B. sage, unsere ganzen Importe, die transportieren wir nicht über Luftfracht, sondern wesentlich über Seefracht. Das spart Co2 ein und das spart Kosten ein. Also das sind natürlich die schönsten Situationen. Aber es gibt natürlich auch viele Maßnahmen, da muss man erstmal investieren. Da muss man erstmal die Produktion ändern. Denn ich erinnere, dass wir Anfang der 70er Jahre, nein ich entschuldige, das war Anfang der 90er Jahre, so früh waren wir noch nicht dabei. Anfang der 90er Jahre haben wir unsere Textilproduktion angefangen zu analysieren und zu gucken, was passiert denn eigentlich in jeder Produktionsstufe. Wie sind da die Auswirkungen? Und ich war erstaunt, dass es da noch überhaupt gar keine Analyse gab. Wir haben das mal mit 2 Universitäten analysieren lassen und festgestellt: In jeder Produktionsstufe gibt es außerordentlich negative Auswirkungen auf die Umwelt. Aber das Erfreuliche war, man konnte auch jede Maßnahme ersetzten durch eine umweltfreundliche Maßnahme. Und da haben wir dann z.B begonnen, in der Türkei beim Baumwoll-Anbau, wo hohe Pestizid Einsätze und Bewässerung benötigt wird, in biologischen Baumwall Anbau umzustellen. Wir haben dann begonnen, die Stoffe, die gebleicht wurden von Chlorbleiche auf ozonbleiche umzustellen. Dann erfolgte die Ausrüstung der Stoffe, dass die nicht einlaufen über Formaldehyd. Wir haben das umgestellt mit Maschinen, die natürlich die Einlaufwerte reduzieren, oder metallhaltige Farben im Färbe Prozess, durch biologisch abbaubare Farben ersetzt. Das alles war natürlich ein mühseliger Prozess. Das alles hat auch erstmal Geld gekostet. D.h. wir haben auch hier erstmal investiert, denn wir konnten die höheren Preise nicht an die Kunden weitergeben. Dann wären wir nicht mehr im Geschäft gewesen. Aber wir haben festgestellt, dass mittel- und langfristig, wenn die Produktion dann in einer gewissen Größenordnung ist, dann kommen wir auf die alten Preise zurück. D.h. es ist manchmal auch ein Investment für einige Jahre notwendig und da scheuen natürlich einige Unternehmen, sodass manche Prozesse eben nicht umgesetzt werden.
Anna: Ja, das klingt auch so, als ob die Hürden und Hindernisse, die auftauchen sehr vielseitig sind. Aber, wie man auch an ihrem Beispiel sieht, es gibt auch Lösungen. Und ich denke ein Teil dieser Lösung ist es auch, wenn Unternehmen mit Stiftungen kooperieren und, wenn Unternehmen auch von Stiftungen und deren Arbeit lernen können. Und eine Stiftung, die mir besonders am Herzen liegt und Ihnen ja auch ist der World Future Council. Und meine Chefin Alexandra Wandel hat mir erzählt, dass Sie im Jahr 2006 den Bürgermeister der Stadt Hamburg anriefen und ihn überzeugten, dass der World Future Council sein weltweites Hauptquartier hier in der Stadt Hamburg aufstellen sollte. Und so konnte mit Ihrer Unterstützung und der Unterstützung der Stadt Hamburg im Mai 2007 der Gründungsprozess des World Future Council im Rathaus der Stadt Hamburg stattfinden und dann auch in den Jahren zwischen 2007 und 2011 der Rat mit seinen 50 Mitgliedern in Hamburg tagen. Und sie sind heute nicht nur ein geschätztes Ehrenratsmitglied von uns, sondern auch ein Unterstützer unserer Arbeit. Wir setzen uns ja sehr stark für die rechte zukünftiger Generationen ein. Woher kommt denn ihre Leidenschaft für das Recht künftiger Generationen oder anders gefragt. Was war ihre Motivation den World Future Council damals mit ins Leben zu rufen?
Dr. Otto: Also, das waren eigentlich zwei Themen, die Jakob von Uexküll mir damals mitgeteilt hat, als er das Konzept erarbeitet hatte. Und zwar einmal das Thema, dass man einen Future Policy Award für jedes Jahr zu besten Gesetzgebung zu einem wichtigen Thema geben will. Und das war wirklich vollkommen innovativ. Da gab es weltweit wirklich nichts Vergleichbares. Und das fand ich insofern auch ganz wichtig, denn letztendendes kann die Wirtschaft, kann die Gesellschaft, können Ngos viele Maßnahmen durchaus anstoßen, aber der große Durchbruch kommt nur, wenn die Regierungen die richtigen Rahmenbedingungen geben. Das heißt auch die richtigen Gesetze erlassen. Und deswegen ist es eigentlich so wichtig zu sagen: Wo gibt es denn weltweit schon gute Gesetze zu einem bestimmten Thema? Und wenn man dann die besten Gesetze gefunden hat und ausgezeichnet hat, dass dann, und das macht ja der World Future Council, dass dann über Seminare und über bestimmte Kongresse Regierungen einlädt, diese Gesetze eben auch mitzuteilen, um andere eben auch zu informieren. Und darüber hinaus bekommen alle freiheitlich gewählten Parlamentsabgeordneten weltweit bekommen auch die Informationen über diese Gesetze. Also wenn ein Staat dann zu einem Thema ein Gesetz erlassen will, muss er nicht alles neu erfinden, sondern er kann schauen, was gibt es für Gesetze? Und gerade auch durch solche Seminare und Veranstaltungen haben dann auch immer wieder Staaten diese besten Gesetze übernommen. Das fand ich also schonmal eine super Sache.
Und das zweite eben die Rechte zukünftiger Generationen. Denn das ist ja ganz wichtig, dass wir sehen müssen, dass wir unsere Welt nicht schlechter hinterlassen, sondern mindestens gleichwertig, wenn nicht besser hinterlassen für zukünftige Generationen. Zukünftige Generationen haben ja nun keine stimme, also müssen wir zukünftigen Generationen eine Stimme verleihen und uns dafür einsetzen. Das war das zweite wichtige Thema und das hat mich einfach so begeistert, dass ich von Anfang an gesagt habe, also da mach ich mit, da bin ich dabei!
Anna: Ja sehr schön, sie haben es ja auch eben schon angesprochen: Unsere Arbeit ist sehr komplex, wir arbeiten zu vier großen Themenbereichen. Und ich musste ein bisschen schmunzeln, denn auf Ihrer Website habe ich den Satz gefunden: „Neugier, Bescheidenheit und ein untrüglicher Blick für das Wesentliche – Dafür steht der Mensch Michael Otto“. Sie schaffen es eben in diesem Berg von Herausforderungen in dem wir arbeiten immer das Wesentliche im Blick zu behalten. Was ist denn für Sie das Wesentliche und welchen wesentlichen Herausforderungen müssen wir uns jetzt stellen?
Dr. Otto: Also einmal ist das ja freundlich formuliert worden von jemanden. Ja, also das Wesentliche ist im Moment also denke ich am besten zum Ausdruck gekommen, wenn wir die Agenda 2030 nehmen, nämlich die 17 Nachhaltigkeitsziele der UN. Da drückt sich eigentlich alles aus, was wir im Augenblick als Herausforderungen haben und, wo wir handeln müssen. Erfreulicherweise gibt es schon einige Themen, wo wir vorangekommen sind. Ich denke z.B. an das Thema Bekämpfung der Armut. Wir haben in den letzten 10 Jahren die Anzahl der Menschen, die in Armut leben halbieren können von 2 Milliarden auf 1 Milliarde. Leider ist jetzt mit der Pandemie die Zahl der Menschen, die in Armut leben wieder gestiegen, trotzdem war das schonmal ein Schritt in die richtige Richtung. Also, es gibt verschiedene Themen, wo wir vorangekommen sind. Nur häufig nicht schnell genug, nicht stark genug. Und für mich ist ein überragendes Thema das Thema Klimawandel – also Klimaschutz. Denn dieses Thema berührt eigentlich alle übrigen Bereiche. Weil damit letzendes eine Überlebensfrage wirklich gestellt wird. Hier geht es um Biodiversität, hier geht es wirklich um Armut, um Flucht Ursachen. Also Klimawandel ist für mich derzeit das zentrale Thema, für das wir uns sehr viel stärker einsetzten, müssen.
Anna: Ja, wenn man vom Klimawandel spricht, das ist ein Thema, wie sie schon gesagt haben, das mit allen anderen Bereichen sehr stark zusammenhängt unter anderem natürlich auch sehr stark mit dem Thema Kinder und Jugendrechte für das sie sich ja auch bei uns sehr stark einsetzen. Warum sollten wir uns aber nicht nur dafür stark machen, dass die Rechte von Kindern und Jugendlichen geschützt werden, sondern warum sollten wir auch junge Menschen dazu ermächtigen für ihre Rechte selbst einzustehen?
Dr. Otto: Also ich glaube es ist ganz wichtig, dass die jungen Menschen letztendlich auch wissen, welche Probleme auf sie zukommen und wie ggf. auch Lösungen aussehnen können. Und dafür brauchen wir Bildung. Das heißt es beginnt in den Schulen, dass die jungen Menschen einmal kennenlernen: Was bedeutet eigentlich eine freiheitliche Demokratie? Wie viele Länder haben wir überhaupt auf der Welt, wo eine freiheitliche Demokratie herrscht? Was bedeutet es eigentlich nachhaltig zu leben? Was bedeutet Umweltschutz? Sozialstandards? Wie muss man damit umgehen oder was bedeutet auch eine soziale Marktwirtschaft? Denn letzten Endes ist es wichtig, dass sie diese Informationen haben, um dann auch gefeit zu sein, wenn irgendwelche radikalen Parteien irgendwelche Behauptungen in den Raum stellen. Um dann auch zu unterscheiden, ist das Etwas, was wirklich stimmt oder sind das Fakes, sind das Unwahrheiten, die in den Raum gestellt werden, nur um uns zu locken mit falschen Aussagen. Also ich glaube das ist ganz wichtig. Und natürlich: Keiner kann sich besser für seine Rechte einsetzen als die Betroffenen und das finde ich eben auch ganz wichtig.
Anna: Ja, absolut. Also ich stimme ihnen auch total zu. Ich finde auch Aufklärung ist alles. Also Aufklärung ist ein ganz wichtiger Punkt, für den wir uns auch stärker einsetzen sollten. Sie unterstützen uns ja seit 2014 gemeinsam mit ihrer Tochter Janina Özen Otto im Kinder- und Jugendrechte Team. Und sie haben eben schon eine Reihe von Faktoren angesprochen, die stark mit dem Thema Kinder und Jugendrechte zusammenhängen. Ein Thema, das derzeit ja stark in den Medien diskutiert wird und das auch wir auf unserer Agenda haben ist das Recht auf eine gesunde Umwelt. Wie hängt das für sie mit dem Thema kinderrechte zusammen?
Dr. Otto: ja ich denke eine gesunde Umwelt ist letzten Endes die Voraussetzung, um gesund leben zu können und letzendes sein Leben auch gesund gestalten zu können so wie man es gerne möchte, denn Gesundheit ist die Voraussetzung für alles. Und von der Seite ist es eben ganz wichtig zu sehen. Was passiert in der Umwelt? Wo müssen wir ansetzen? Was müssen wir ändern? Und wir sehen es auch gerade in dem diesjährigen Future Policy Award gegen gefährliche Chemikalien, dass das ein Thema ist, das natürlich auch hochgradig gefährlich ist für die Gesundheit der Menschen aber auch für die Tiere für die Umwelt. Und deswegen ist das ein Thema, das so wichtig ist, wir werden später ja auch sicherlich noch darauf zu sprechen kommen, dass dieses Thema in diesem Jahr eben auch als Haupt Thema angesehen wird.
Anna: ja genau auf jeden Fall. Wir kommen gleich noch auf den Future Policy Award zu sprechen. Ich würde vorher gerne nochmal darauf eingehen, weil wir ja jetzt hier zusammen sitzen in diesem intergenerationellen Dialog, wo ich mich auch sehr freue mit ihnen sprechen zu dürfen. Und ich merke ja auch als junger Mensch, dass es eine Änderung in der Denkweise meiner Generation gibt. Wir zunehmend unsere Rechte selbst in die Hand nehmen, dafür einstehen, dafür auf die Straße gehen. Und ich glaube auch, dass viele Politiker, viele Unternehmer einiges von uns jungen Menschen lernen können. Was glauben sie denn ganz persönlich, was sie von der jüngeren Generation lernen können?
Dr. Otto: Also ich glaube, dass die junge Generation begeistert für ein Thema ist. Das finde ich eben ganz wichtig. Und ich würde mir wünschen, dass viele Menschen auch in der älteren Generation sich so begeistern und sich so einsetzen für ein Thema und sich auch informieren. Also ich stelle auch da fest, dass die jungen Menschen immer besser informiert sind, wenn Diskussionen sind. Gerade, also ich habe ja auch häufiger Gespräche mit Vertretern der Friday fort Future Generation und die wirklich gut informiert sind. Wo man sehr zielorientiert diskutieren kann über Maßnahmen und das finde ich eben ganz wichtig. Also deswegen sich für ein Thema einsetzen, sich aber auch zu informieren, dass man wirklich in die Tiefe gehen kann, und das konstruktiv auch mitwirken kann. Das finde ich toll und das würde ich mir auch wünschen bei den älteren Generationen, dass die verstärkt sich auch einsetzen.
Anna: Ja ich hoffe auch, dass dieser Wandel noch mehr kommt, dass man auch in diesen Dialog tritt und sich austauscht, denn es ist ja nicht nur so, dass Sie viel von uns jungen Menschen lernen können, sondern wir können natürlich auch viel von ihnen und ihrer Erfahrung lernen. Deswegen stelle ich die Frage jetzt auch nochmal andersherum: Was ist denn ein Ratschlag, den sie der jüngeren Generation mit auf den weggeben würden?
Dr. Otto: Also im Grunde kann ich nur sagen, macht weiter so! bleibt weiter engagiert, lasst euch nicht beirren durch irgendwelche kritischen Stimmen, denn wenn man von einer Sache überzeugt ist, dann muss man auch den Weg gehen und das ist ganz wichtig, ansonsten wird man nichts ändern.
Anna: ja genau, also weiter für die Sache einstehen, weiter Druck ausüben vielleicht nicht nur auf die Politik, sondern auch auf Unternehmen. Die Otto Group ist ja schon dabei Herausforderungen unserer Zeit anzugehen. Nachhaltige Produktion ist wie wir erfahren haben, für sie schon lange prägend. Beispielsweise habe ich gefunden, dass 100% der Textileigenmarken ihres Unternehmens das Siegel „hautfreundlich, weil schadstoffgeprüft“ tragen. Und da kommen wir jetzt auch auf den diesjährigen Future Policy Award zu sprechen. Welche Rolle spielt denn Chemikalienmanagement in ihrem Unternehmen und wieso ist es wichtig, dass wir Chemikalien gut managen und regulieren?
Dr. Otto: Ja bei uns im Unternehmen, ich hatte es ja schon geschildert, dass wir Anfang der 90er Jahre angefangen haben in der Produktion auf umweltfreundlichere Ausrüstung umzustellen. Natürlich hat das auch viele Jahre gedauert, bis wir unser gesamtes Sortiment umgestellt haben. Also das hat bestimmt bis Ende der 90er Jahre gebraucht. Dann haben wir sozial Standards eingeführt. Auch das war ein wichtiges Thema, was dann auch wieder einige Jahre gebraucht hat, bis wir dann bei unseren ganzen Produktionsstätten entsprechende Voraussetzungen hatten. Also notwendig ist es ja, d
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Intro: Hallo und herzlich Willkommen bei „The Good Council”, dem Podcast des World Future Councils. In jeder Folge beleuchten wir aktuelle Herausforderungen und politische Lösungen und nehmen Sie mit auf eine Reise voller inspirierender Geschichten. Hören sie rein und folgen sie einem weiteren internationalen und generationenübergreifenden Dialog! Viel Spaß.
Anna: Guten Tag, ich bin Anna, ich bin 25 Jahre alt und ich bin Medien- und Kommunikationsmanagerin beim World Future Council. Ich freue mich sehr in dieser Folge des Generationen Dialoges „The Good Council“ mit Prof Dr. Michael Otto zu sprechen. Er ist Mitgründer und Ehrenratsmitglied des World Future Councils. Er ist außerdem einer der erfolgreichsten deutschen Unternehmenspersönlichkeiten der Gegenwart, hat zahlreiche visionäre Stiftungen und Initiativen gegründet. Er ist Träger des großen Bundesverdienstkreuzes mit Stern. Er ist Gründer der „UMWELTSTIFTUNG Michael Otto“ und der „Aid by Trade Foundation“. Außerdem unterstützt er zahlreiche Umwelt- und gesellschaftspolitische Projekte, beispielsweise das Flüchtlingsprojekt „Ipso“ oder im Bildungsbereich, wie „The Young ClassX“. Er engagiert sich ebenfalls im Bereich der Kunst und Musik und hält zahlreiche Ehrenämter inne. Guten Tag Prof. Dr. Otto!
Dr. Otto: Schönen Guten Tag!
Anna: Es ist für mich eine sehr große Ehre und Freude heute mehr über Ihre Arbeit ihr Leben und ihr Engagement beim World Future Council zu erfahren. Im Rahmen unserer Jugendforums „Youth:Present“ möchte ich heute mehr über sie erfahren und ich würde sagen, wir starten mit einer kleinen Zeitreise durch ihr Leben und Sie erzählen mir dabei vieles über Ihre Ansichten und ihr gesellschaftliches Engagement. Ich freue mich sehr auf diesen intergenerationellen Dialog! Aber lassen Sie uns von vorne anfangen: Sie sind bereits mit 28 Jahren in das Familienunternehmen ihres Vaters eingestiegen. Davor absolvierten Sie ihre Ausbildung. In welchem Bereich war das?
Dr. Otto: Es war so, dass ich nach meinem Abitur mich entschieden habe, in die Unternehmerlaufbahn zu gehen. Denn es war zwar auf der einen Seite für mich schon immer klar, dass ich so als Jugendlicher im Unternehmen meines Vaters immer mal gejobbt habe in den Schulferien und mein Vater sagte auch immer: „Du wirst mal das Unternehmen übernehmen.“ Aber nach dem Abitur war dann doch die Entscheidung, soll ich das denn wirklich mein Leben lang machen? Für mich wäre alternativ auch noch das Medizinstudium und der Arztberuf in Frage gekommen. Aber das Unternehmertum muss ich sagen, habe ich bis heute nicht bereut, weil im Grunde dort beide Gehirnhälften gefordert sind. Nämlich einmal das analytische und das rechenhafte und auf der anderen Seite das Kreative. Wenn man ein Unternehmen aufbaut oder neu gründet, dann ist das auch ein kreativer Prozess. Und das fand ich wie gesagt bis heute spannend, dass man eben beide Gehirnhälften hier einsetzen muss.
Und nachdem ich mich dann entschieden habe, dass ich den Weg zum Unternehmertum gehen will, war für mich eigentlich die Frage, wie beginne ich damit? Mein Vater hätte eigentlich gerne gesehen, dass ich sofort ins Unternehmen einsteige. Und da habe ich gesagt, nein ich möchte unabhängig sein. Und habe gesagt, als erstes wäre am besten mal eine Banklehre. Das heißt eine Ausbildung zu machen im Finanzbereich, das kann nie was schaden. Und das habe ich dann in München gemacht, habe dann Volkswirtschaftsstudium angehängt, promoviert. Ich habe mich aber während des Studiums dann schon selbstständig gemacht, sodass ich auch unabhängig war. Das war mir immer ganz wichtig. Und das war eigentlich so mein erster Einstieg, bis ich dann nach Hamburg zurückgegangen bin und da auch gleich in den Vorstand des Otto-Versands, wie er damals hieß, gekommen bin.
Anna: Ich finde das total spannend, dass sie seit ihrer Jugend ja eigentlich schon diese Unternehmerdenkweise in sich tragen und trotzdem sagen sie in ihrer Biografie einen Satz, nämlich: „Die Wirtschaft muss für den Menschen da sein und nicht umgekehrt. Wie denken sie denn wird das derzeit in der Realität umgesetzt, gerade auch in Zeiten der Pandemie?“
Dr. Otto: Ja ich finde das eigentlich wichtig und das ging mir auch bereits während meiner Jugend und meines Studiums so, dass ich manchmal den Eindruck hatte, dass die Wirtschaft nur an Wachstum denkt, nur daran denkt, dass sie das wichtigste Element ist und dass letztlich alle Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter dazu dienen, die Wirtschaft voranzubringen. Und dabei habe ich immer gesagt: Die Wirtschaft ist ja nur Mittel zum Zweck. Sie soll letztendlich ermöglichen, dass die Menschen ein gesichertes Einkommen haben, dass sie einen gewissen Wohlstand haben. Das ist die Aufgabe der Wirtschaft, das heißt die Wirtschaft muss dem Menschen dienen und nicht umgekehrt! Und das war mir eigentlich immer ganz wichtig.
Ich habe den Eindruck, dass gerade jetzt in Zeiten von Corona durchaus ein Rückbesinnungsprozess da ist. Und, dass man in den letzten Jahren in der Wirtschaft zunehmen man erkannt hat, man muss nachhaltig wirtschaften und man muss letztlich auch der Gesellschaft dienen. Das war wie gesagt nicht immer so, das hat in den letzten Jahren zugenommen. Aber natürlich gibt es immer noch Unternehmen, die nur sich sehen und nur ihr Wachstum sehen.
Anna: Ja, das ist auch das, was ich von der Otto Group und von Ihnen immer mitbekommen habe. Ich bin ja selbst Hamburg geboren und aufgewachsen und für mich stand die Otto Group und Sie immer auch für nachhaltige Produktion und ich glaube auch für viele andere Hamburger ist das so das Bild, dass man von der Otto Group hat. Denn Sie haben Nachhaltigkeit, bevor es, wie sie auch eben sagten, größer wurde, zum Trend wurde, Nachhaltigkeit zum Unternehmensziel der Otto Group erklärt. Und das war schon 1986. Und fünf Jahre später wurden Sie dann noch zum Ökomanager des Jahres ernannt. Sie sprechen häufig über den Bericht des Club of Romes. Gab es daneben noch andere Gründe Umweltschutz in die Unternehmensstrategie mit aufzunehmen?
Dr. Otto: Ja der erste Bericht an den Club of Rome muss ich wirklich sagen, hat mich sehr beeinflusst. Das war ein Wach- und Weckruf. Und ich habe damals mit meinem Freund Eduard Pestel, der Mitbegründer des Club of Romes war, sehr viel über den Bericht diskutiert und ich habe immer gesagt, für das Bewusstsein war der Bericht ganz wichtig, um letzten Endes auch öffentlich Aufmerksamkeit zu schaffen. Aber noch wichtiger ist es zu handeln. Und das war für eigentlich der Grund. Man kann nicht sagen die Politik muss handeln, die Industrie muss handeln. Nein, jeder muss bei sich selbst anfangen. Jeder Bürger muss bei sich selbst anfangen aber auch jeder Unternehmer. Und das war für mich eigentlich der Ansatz zu sagen, ja dann muss ich auch beginnen. Und das fängt natürlich an erstmal an den Standorten, dass man da einzelne Projekte umsetzt bis sich das dann weiterentwickelt, aber das war eigentlich der wichtige Antrieb dazu.
Anna: Ich kann mir aber auch vorstellen, dass gerade, weil sie so früh mit dem Thema begonnen haben, wo andere Unternehmen vielleicht noch nicht so weit waren, dass Sie auch auf gewissen Problemen und Widerstände gestoßen sind. Gab es in der Zeit mal einen Zeitpunkt, wo Sie wirklich an ihre Grenzen gekommen sind?
Dr. Otto: Als ich dann 1986 praktisch nachhaltiges Wirtschaften und Umweltschutz zum weiteren Unternehmensziel erklärt habe, da gab es bei Unternehmer Kollegen natürlich schon einige, die ein wenig gelächelt haben darüber oder mich als Exoten, um es mal freundlich zu sagen, bezeichnet haben. Aber ich glaube, wenn man von einer Sache überzeugt ist, und auch wirklich sich selbst sagt, das ist der richtige Weg, und es ist notwendig ihn zu gehen, dann geht man auch nicht mehr ab von seinem Ziel. Und das gibt einem dann auch die Kraft durchzuhalten, selbst wenn man mal angezweifelt oder kritisiert wird.
Anna: Ja, ich glaube wir haben im Laufe des Gesprächs schon mitbekommen, dass unternehmerisches Handeln und Nachhaltigkeit für Sie immer Hand in Hand gehen. Das klingt immer so einfach, aber das ist natürlich superschwer umzusetzen. Wie vereinbaren Sie denn unternehmerisches Handeln und Nachhaltigkeit und warum ist es so schwierig nachhaltig zu wirtschaften?
Dr. Otto: Gut, erst einmal ist es natürlich notwendig die Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter zu überzeugen und mitzunehmen. Dass eben alle bereit sind. Denn es gibt einige, die begeistert sind, aber es gibt natürlich auch einige, die eher abwarten oder auch etwas kritisch sehen, weil sie sagen: Gut, jetzt müssen wir schon Umsatz und Ergebnis im Unternehmen bringen und uns dafür einsetzen und jetzt noch das Thema Umwelt oder Sozialstandards, was sollen wir denn noch alles machen? Also, man muss erstmal die Mitarbeiterinnen und Mitarbeiter begeistern. Das zweite ist, es gibt hier natürlich durchaus und das ist natürlich immer das schönste, Win-win Situationen. Also wenn ich z.B. sage, unsere ganzen Importe, die transportieren wir nicht über Luftfracht, sondern wesentlich über Seefracht. Das spart Co2 ein und das spart Kosten ein. Also das sind natürlich die schönsten Situationen. Aber es gibt natürlich auch viele Maßnahmen, da muss man erstmal investieren. Da muss man erstmal die Produktion ändern. Denn ich erinnere, dass wir Anfang der 70er Jahre, nein ich entschuldige, das war Anfang der 90er Jahre, so früh waren wir noch nicht dabei. Anfang der 90er Jahre haben wir unsere Textilproduktion angefangen zu analysieren und zu gucken, was passiert denn eigentlich in jeder Produktionsstufe. Wie sind da die Auswirkungen? Und ich war erstaunt, dass es da noch überhaupt gar keine Analyse gab. Wir haben das mal mit 2 Universitäten analysieren lassen und festgestellt: In jeder Produktionsstufe gibt es außerordentlich negative Auswirkungen auf die Umwelt. Aber das Erfreuliche war, man konnte auch jede Maßnahme ersetzten durch eine umweltfreundliche Maßnahme. Und da haben wir dann z.B begonnen, in der Türkei beim Baumwoll-Anbau, wo hohe Pestizid Einsätze und Bewässerung benötigt wird, in biologischen Baumwall Anbau umzustellen. Wir haben dann begonnen, die Stoffe, die gebleicht wurden von Chlorbleiche auf ozonbleiche umzustellen. Dann erfolgte die Ausrüstung der Stoffe, dass die nicht einlaufen über Formaldehyd. Wir haben das umgestellt mit Maschinen, die natürlich die Einlaufwerte reduzieren, oder metallhaltige Farben im Färbe Prozess, durch biologisch abbaubare Farben ersetzt. Das alles war natürlich ein mühseliger Prozess. Das alles hat auch erstmal Geld gekostet. D.h. wir haben auch hier erstmal investiert, denn wir konnten die höheren Preise nicht an die Kunden weitergeben. Dann wären wir nicht mehr im Geschäft gewesen. Aber wir haben festgestellt, dass mittel- und langfristig, wenn die Produktion dann in einer gewissen Größenordnung ist, dann kommen wir auf die alten Preise zurück. D.h. es ist manchmal auch ein Investment für einige Jahre notwendig und da scheuen natürlich einige Unternehmen, sodass manche Prozesse eben nicht umgesetzt werden.
Anna: Ja, das klingt auch so, als ob die Hürden und Hindernisse, die auftauchen sehr vielseitig sind. Aber, wie man auch an ihrem Beispiel sieht, es gibt auch Lösungen. Und ich denke ein Teil dieser Lösung ist es auch, wenn Unternehmen mit Stiftungen kooperieren und, wenn Unternehmen auch von Stiftungen und deren Arbeit lernen können. Und eine Stiftung, die mir besonders am Herzen liegt und Ihnen ja auch ist der World Future Council. Und meine Chefin Alexandra Wandel hat mir erzählt, dass Sie im Jahr 2006 den Bürgermeister der Stadt Hamburg anriefen und ihn überzeugten, dass der World Future Council sein weltweites Hauptquartier hier in der Stadt Hamburg aufstellen sollte. Und so konnte mit Ihrer Unterstützung und der Unterstützung der Stadt Hamburg im Mai 2007 der Gründungsprozess des World Future Council im Rathaus der Stadt Hamburg stattfinden und dann auch in den Jahren zwischen 2007 und 2011 der Rat mit seinen 50 Mitgliedern in Hamburg tagen. Und sie sind heute nicht nur ein geschätztes Ehrenratsmitglied von uns, sondern auch ein Unterstützer unserer Arbeit. Wir setzen uns ja sehr stark für die rechte zukünftiger Generationen ein. Woher kommt denn ihre Leidenschaft für das Recht künftiger Generationen oder anders gefragt. Was war ihre Motivation den World Future Council damals mit ins Leben zu rufen?
Dr. Otto: Also, das waren eigentlich zwei Themen, die Jakob von Uexküll mir damals mitgeteilt hat, als er das Konzept erarbeitet hatte. Und zwar einmal das Thema, dass man einen Future Policy Award für jedes Jahr zu besten Gesetzgebung zu einem wichtigen Thema geben will. Und das war wirklich vollkommen innovativ. Da gab es weltweit wirklich nichts Vergleichbares. Und das fand ich insofern auch ganz wichtig, denn letztendendes kann die Wirtschaft, kann die Gesellschaft, können Ngos viele Maßnahmen durchaus anstoßen, aber der große Durchbruch kommt nur, wenn die Regierungen die richtigen Rahmenbedingungen geben. Das heißt auch die richtigen Gesetze erlassen. Und deswegen ist es eigentlich so wichtig zu sagen: Wo gibt es denn weltweit schon gute Gesetze zu einem bestimmten Thema? Und wenn man dann die besten Gesetze gefunden hat und ausgezeichnet hat, dass dann, und das macht ja der World Future Council, dass dann über Seminare und über bestimmte Kongresse Regierungen einlädt, diese Gesetze eben auch mitzuteilen, um andere eben auch zu informieren. Und darüber hinaus bekommen alle freiheitlich gewählten Parlamentsabgeordneten weltweit bekommen auch die Informationen über diese Gesetze. Also wenn ein Staat dann zu einem Thema ein Gesetz erlassen will, muss er nicht alles neu erfinden, sondern er kann schauen, was gibt es für Gesetze? Und gerade auch durch solche Seminare und Veranstaltungen haben dann auch immer wieder Staaten diese besten Gesetze übernommen. Das fand ich also schonmal eine super Sache.
Und das zweite eben die Rechte zukünftiger Generationen. Denn das ist ja ganz wichtig, dass wir sehen müssen, dass wir unsere Welt nicht schlechter hinterlassen, sondern mindestens gleichwertig, wenn nicht besser hinterlassen für zukünftige Generationen. Zukünftige Generationen haben ja nun keine stimme, also müssen wir zukünftigen Generationen eine Stimme verleihen und uns dafür einsetzen. Das war das zweite wichtige Thema und das hat mich einfach so begeistert, dass ich von Anfang an gesagt habe, also da mach ich mit, da bin ich dabei!
Anna: Ja sehr schön, sie haben es ja auch eben schon angesprochen: Unsere Arbeit ist sehr komplex, wir arbeiten zu vier großen Themenbereichen. Und ich musste ein bisschen schmunzeln, denn auf Ihrer Website habe ich den Satz gefunden: „Neugier, Bescheidenheit und ein untrüglicher Blick für das Wesentliche – Dafür steht der Mensch Michael Otto“. Sie schaffen es eben in diesem Berg von Herausforderungen in dem wir arbeiten immer das Wesentliche im Blick zu behalten. Was ist denn für Sie das Wesentliche und welchen wesentlichen Herausforderungen müssen wir uns jetzt stellen?
Dr. Otto: Also einmal ist das ja freundlich formuliert worden von jemanden. Ja, also das Wesentliche ist im Moment also denke ich am besten zum Ausdruck gekommen, wenn wir die Agenda 2030 nehmen, nämlich die 17 Nachhaltigkeitsziele der UN. Da drückt sich eigentlich alles aus, was wir im Augenblick als Herausforderungen haben und, wo wir handeln müssen. Erfreulicherweise gibt es schon einige Themen, wo wir vorangekommen sind. Ich denke z.B. an das Thema Bekämpfung der Armut. Wir haben in den letzten 10 Jahren die Anzahl der Menschen, die in Armut leben halbieren können von 2 Milliarden auf 1 Milliarde. Leider ist jetzt mit der Pandemie die Zahl der Menschen, die in Armut leben wieder gestiegen, trotzdem war das schonmal ein Schritt in die richtige Richtung. Also, es gibt verschiedene Themen, wo wir vorangekommen sind. Nur häufig nicht schnell genug, nicht stark genug. Und für mich ist ein überragendes Thema das Thema Klimawandel – also Klimaschutz. Denn dieses Thema berührt eigentlich alle übrigen Bereiche. Weil damit letzendes eine Überlebensfrage wirklich gestellt wird. Hier geht es um Biodiversität, hier geht es wirklich um Armut, um Flucht Ursachen. Also Klimawandel ist für mich derzeit das zentrale Thema, für das wir uns sehr viel stärker einsetzten, müssen.
Anna: Ja, wenn man vom Klimawandel spricht, das ist ein Thema, wie sie schon gesagt haben, das mit allen anderen Bereichen sehr stark zusammenhängt unter anderem natürlich auch sehr stark mit dem Thema Kinder und Jugendrechte für das sie sich ja auch bei uns sehr stark einsetzen. Warum sollten wir uns aber nicht nur dafür stark machen, dass die Rechte von Kindern und Jugendlichen geschützt werden, sondern warum sollten wir auch junge Menschen dazu ermächtigen für ihre Rechte selbst einzustehen?
Dr. Otto: Also ich glaube es ist ganz wichtig, dass die jungen Menschen letztendlich auch wissen, welche Probleme auf sie zukommen und wie ggf. auch Lösungen aussehnen können. Und dafür brauchen wir Bildung. Das heißt es beginnt in den Schulen, dass die jungen Menschen einmal kennenlernen: Was bedeutet eigentlich eine freiheitliche Demokratie? Wie viele Länder haben wir überhaupt auf der Welt, wo eine freiheitliche Demokratie herrscht? Was bedeutet es eigentlich nachhaltig zu leben? Was bedeutet Umweltschutz? Sozialstandards? Wie muss man damit umgehen oder was bedeutet auch eine soziale Marktwirtschaft? Denn letzten Endes ist es wichtig, dass sie diese Informationen haben, um dann auch gefeit zu sein, wenn irgendwelche radikalen Parteien irgendwelche Behauptungen in den Raum stellen. Um dann auch zu unterscheiden, ist das Etwas, was wirklich stimmt oder sind das Fakes, sind das Unwahrheiten, die in den Raum gestellt werden, nur um uns zu locken mit falschen Aussagen. Also ich glaube das ist ganz wichtig. Und natürlich: Keiner kann sich besser für seine Rechte einsetzen als die Betroffenen und das finde ich eben auch ganz wichtig.
Anna: Ja, absolut. Also ich stimme ihnen auch total zu. Ich finde auch Aufklärung ist alles. Also Aufklärung ist ein ganz wichtiger Punkt, für den wir uns auch stärker einsetzen sollten. Sie unterstützen uns ja seit 2014 gemeinsam mit ihrer Tochter Janina Özen Otto im Kinder- und Jugendrechte Team. Und sie haben eben schon eine Reihe von Faktoren angesprochen, die stark mit dem Thema Kinder und Jugendrechte zusammenhängen. Ein Thema, das derzeit ja stark in den Medien diskutiert wird und das auch wir auf unserer Agenda haben ist das Recht auf eine gesunde Umwelt. Wie hängt das für sie mit dem Thema kinderrechte zusammen?
Dr. Otto: ja ich denke eine gesunde Umwelt ist letzten Endes die Voraussetzung, um gesund leben zu können und letzendes sein Leben auch gesund gestalten zu können so wie man es gerne möchte, denn Gesundheit ist die Voraussetzung für alles. Und von der Seite ist es eben ganz wichtig zu sehen. Was passiert in der Umwelt? Wo müssen wir ansetzen? Was müssen wir ändern? Und wir sehen es auch gerade in dem diesjährigen Future Policy Award gegen gefährliche Chemikalien, dass das ein Thema ist, das natürlich auch hochgradig gefährlich ist für die Gesundheit der Menschen aber auch für die Tiere für die Umwelt. Und deswegen ist das ein Thema, das so wichtig ist, wir werden später ja auch sicherlich noch darauf zu sprechen kommen, dass dieses Thema in diesem Jahr eben auch als Haupt Thema angesehen wird.
Anna: ja genau auf jeden Fall. Wir kommen gleich noch auf den Future Policy Award zu sprechen. Ich würde vorher gerne nochmal darauf eingehen, weil wir ja jetzt hier zusammen sitzen in diesem intergenerationellen Dialog, wo ich mich auch sehr freue mit ihnen sprechen zu dürfen. Und ich merke ja auch als junger Mensch, dass es eine Änderung in der Denkweise meiner Generation gibt. Wir zunehmend unsere Rechte selbst in die Hand nehmen, dafür einstehen, dafür auf die Straße gehen. Und ich glaube auch, dass viele Politiker, viele Unternehmer einiges von uns jungen Menschen lernen können. Was glauben sie denn ganz persönlich, was sie von der jüngeren Generation lernen können?
Dr. Otto: Also ich glaube, dass die junge Generation begeistert für ein Thema ist. Das finde ich eben ganz wichtig. Und ich würde mir wünschen, dass viele Menschen auch in der älteren Generation sich so begeistern und sich so einsetzen für ein Thema und sich auch informieren. Also ich stelle auch da fest, dass die jungen Menschen immer besser informiert sind, wenn Diskussionen sind. Gerade, also ich habe ja auch häufiger Gespräche mit Vertretern der Friday fort Future Generation und die wirklich gut informiert sind. Wo man sehr zielorientiert diskutieren kann über Maßnahmen und das finde ich eben ganz wichtig. Also deswegen sich für ein Thema einsetzen, sich aber auch zu informieren, dass man wirklich in die Tiefe gehen kann, und das konstruktiv auch mitwirken kann. Das finde ich toll und das würde ich mir auch wünschen bei den älteren Generationen, dass die verstärkt sich auch einsetzen.
Anna: Ja ich hoffe auch, dass dieser Wandel noch mehr kommt, dass man auch in diesen Dialog tritt und sich austauscht, denn es ist ja nicht nur so, dass Sie viel von uns jungen Menschen lernen können, sondern wir können natürlich auch viel von ihnen und ihrer Erfahrung lernen. Deswegen stelle ich die Frage jetzt auch nochmal andersherum: Was ist denn ein Ratschlag, den sie der jüngeren Generation mit auf den weggeben würden?
Dr. Otto: Also im Grunde kann ich nur sagen, macht weiter so! bleibt weiter engagiert, lasst euch nicht beirren durch irgendwelche kritischen Stimmen, denn wenn man von einer Sache überzeugt ist, dann muss man auch den Weg gehen und das ist ganz wichtig, ansonsten wird man nichts ändern.
Anna: ja genau, also weiter für die Sache einstehen, weiter Druck ausüben vielleicht nicht nur auf die Politik, sondern auch auf Unternehmen. Die Otto Group ist ja schon dabei Herausforderungen unserer Zeit anzugehen. Nachhaltige Produktion ist wie wir erfahren haben, für sie schon lange prägend. Beispielsweise habe ich gefunden, dass 100% der Textileigenmarken ihres Unternehmens das Siegel „hautfreundlich, weil schadstoffgeprüft“ tragen. Und da kommen wir jetzt auch auf den diesjährigen Future Policy Award zu sprechen. Welche Rolle spielt denn Chemikalienmanagement in ihrem Unternehmen und wieso ist es wichtig, dass wir Chemikalien gut managen und regulieren?
Dr. Otto: Ja bei uns im Unternehmen, ich hatte es ja schon geschildert, dass wir Anfang der 90er Jahre angefangen haben in der Produktion auf umweltfreundlichere Ausrüstung umzustellen. Natürlich hat das auch viele Jahre gedauert, bis wir unser gesamtes Sortiment umgestellt haben. Also das hat bestimmt bis Ende der 90er Jahre gebraucht. Dann haben wir sozial Standards eingeführt. Auch das war ein wichtiges Thema, was dann auch wieder einige Jahre gebraucht hat, bis wir dann bei unseren ganzen Produktionsstätten entsprechende Voraussetzungen hatten. Also notwendig ist es ja, d
The Good Council: Dr Auma Obama and Raina Ivanova
Raina Ivanova
Hello, my name is Raina. I’m a 17-year-old Climate and Child Rights activist from Germany and today I’m speaking to Dr. Obama. Thank you for being here first of all.
Dr Auma Obama
Thank you for having me.
Raina Ivanova
Dr. Auma Obama is a Kenyan sociologist, journalist, author and speaker and she’s a very powerful activist who supports many projects in the east of Africa and who has successfully created her own foundation called Sauti Kuu. She’s also a Councillor at the World Future Council. Thank you for being here.
Dr Auma Obama
Yes. Thank you for having me.
Raina Ivanova
We are speaking together in in Hamburg today. How do you like the city and how do you feel?
Dr Auma Obama
I actually like Hamburg a lot, especially when the sun shines as it’s doing now. It can be a bit dreary when it’s raining. But usually, when I’ve been here, luckily the sun has been shining. And it’s a beautiful city, beautiful buildings, the lovely waters of the Alster. So, yes, I do love Hamburg.
Raina Ivanova
I think then you are a very lucky person because it rains quite often here.
Dr Auma Obama
Yes, I actually am lucky.
Raina Ivanova
The sunshine comes with you.
Dr. Auma Obama
Sunshine. Indeed. That’s true.
Raina Ivanova
,So, let’s not waste any of our precious time and get started right away. You grew up in Nairobi, in Kenya as one of five siblings and you started your education at a boarding school. How was it growing up in Nairobi and in the Luo community?
Dr Auma Obama
Well, I think you said I grew up in Nairobi, which is quite diverse. And the Luo community was my family, because otherwise, Kenya has over 40 different ethnic groups. So, we grew up with very many different people from different ethnic backgrounds. And in the family: Yes, it was a little family. Although, saying that, my stepmother was American, so we’re already multicultural within the family. And the interesting thing about my growing up was that I was the only girl. So, among boys, which made my upbringing quite interesting, because I often heard “you can’t do this”, “you can’t do that because you’re a girl.” Or “you must do this”, “you must do that because you’re a girl.” And that was, at first, quite confusing. And then I was a little bit rebellious. So, I would say: “Why? Why do I have to do this because I’m a girl?” “Why can’t I do this because I’m a girl?” So, my family had a little bit of trouble with me on that front because I would always resist being put into a box.
Raina Ivanova
What was your favorite thing about growing up in Kenya?
Dr Auma Obama
My favorite thing about growing up in Kenya was the fact that I grew up with a lot of space and a lot of time and a lot of friends to play with. So, there was really a balance between growing up and going to school and also playing. We really were able to go out. From the Swiss Alps where I will be out in the morning and come back in the evening, just before it got dark, and only because I get in trouble for being out. Because we really played, I really loved my childhood, we had a lot of time to play. We played traditional games with five stones, we played skipping, we played football, we went exploring in the caves near where we lived. So, it was really full of adventure and discovery and really just exploring the world as a child. And I really love that. And I think I was privileged to have that because many children don’t have that anymore because of the urbanization and also, especially in Europe, because many children grew up in apartments, so I know that I was blessed to have that in my childhood.
Raina Ivanova
Yeah, that sounds lovely. You mentioned your education and also Europe. So, after you finished your school in Kenya, you moved to Germany, with a scholarship to study in Saarbrucken, Heidelberg and in Berlin. So why did you choose Germany for your studies? And is there something you find particularly interesting about the German culture?
Dr Auma Obama
Germany was sort of a coincidence initially because when I was in high school, they offered German as a course. And I had missed a chance at French because I didn’t pay enough attention. I don’t know how it works here, but the system in Kenya was such that you had to get very good grades in two languages. And I think I wasn’t paying attention too much when it came to French. And I got the opportunity just before I finished high school, to jump in from the side and do a language and this was German. And we had a really great German teacher. So, we explored the German language we had exhibition visits to go to and I learned German with Asterix and Obelix. And that’s how I say I learned my German. So, we had so much fun learning the language. And it was really, really a great time for me. And I discovered German literature. So, I started reading a lot of German literature, because that would also help with learning the German language. And then I thought: Well, now that I finished high school, I did want to go abroad, because I wanted to have more space to spread my wings to find myself and my own identity. And I felt restricted because as a girl at home, I was constantly being told what to do and what not to do. And I wanted my own space, so I said, I want to study abroad, I don’t want to stay at home. And I started looking for scholarships. And obviously, because I had German as a background, it made sense to try and get a scholarship in a German-speaking country. At the same time, I was interested in German literature, and studying German culture, and I was lucky enough to get a scholarship. So, I ended up in Germany, like you said, in Saarbrucken, to learn the language properly to sharpen up, because it wasn’t as good as I thought it was when I got here. And then I did my master’s in Heidelberg, and my doctorate in Bayreuth, before I then went to Berlin to study at the film school. So, I did a lot of learning, I was really what they’re calling “Ein ewiger Student” in German, which is a lifelong student, and I still am.
Raina Ivanova
So, you mentioned that you studied in film school in Berlin. What else was your study focus?
Dr Auma Obama
I think, through all of what I did by studying in Heidelberg, or learning the language in Saarbrucken, or even in Bayreuth, and then find and then finding the film school, what really drives me is communication and telling stories. And I was always looking for a way to be able to tell my story, and tell the story of the African continent, and then tell General people’s story, to make people connect, to interact with each other, understand each other. For me, it was really important I did a lot with the idea of being different. Being different is nothing to be afraid of, being different is actually enriching your life. Diversity is something that we need to strive for. And it’s an opportunity to learn, it’s an opportunity to grow. It’s an opportunity to enrich yourself and your surroundings. So, I think that’s what always drove me. Whether I was trying to do it through public speaking, whether I was trying to do it through teaching, whether I was trying to do it through making films and telling stories or writing books, it was always the motivation behind what I did: communication and exchange and integration. And at the same time, celebrating our differences, too.
Raina Ivanova
I can imagine that that might have been difficult for you moving to Germany as a young woman, do you want to share something about that?
Dr Auma Obama
When I was just a little bit older than you, I was 19 when I decided to leave. And it was interesting, because when I was trying to get my scholarship, because I was the only girl, and I was very close to my father, I thought that my father wouldn’t let me leave. I had this impression: oh, he won’t, he’ll decide in my life what I’m going to do with it. And he’s going to stop me from doing because that was my own decision. I looked for my scholarship by myself. So, I actually left without letting him know so I snuck out of the country. I ran away. My mom knew but she didn’t tell him, she was sworn to secrecy. So, for me, it was an adventure from beginning to the end, in that I left without everybody knowing I was going, it was quite unconventional. And so, I started off my life in Germany fighting the fight for my rights. And I think I kept that fight up till today.
Raina Ivanova
So, you lived in Germany, and also in the UK for a few years, right. And now you have returned to Kenya, where you also helped to set up the Sports for Social Change Network, which helps to introduce girls in particular to sports as a means of improving their social situation. Why is it especially girls’ rights that you are passionate about?
Dr Auma Obama
I think I’m passionate about the rights of all young people. That is definitely. I tend not to discriminate, but the focus on the girls is really because we don’t want them to be left behind, yes. The tendency for girls is that if you have a situation where an initiative has been created, or activities are happening that involve boys and girls, the girls will always take one step back and let the boys go ahead, and the boys will take the position. We know it in life, you are a young woman, you’ll experience it much more, I’ve experienced it quite a bit. Because men are not shy, whether they are competent or not. They’re not shy about taking the lead. And what we’re trying to do is make the girls also not shy about taking the lead, be brave, just try their luck be out there, be upfront. And that’s what we try to do. And that’s why in the Sports with Social Change Network that we created at the time, it is about promoting this, to make girls also start using sport just like boys, just like men do, to improve their confidence to make them have more self-esteem and to realize that being a girl is not a limitation. Being a woman is not a limitation. It’s just a fact of life. Before you’re a woman before you’re a girl, you’re a human being and as human beings we’re equal. So that’s what I was trying to promote. And that’s what the whole program was about.
Raina Ivanova
That sounds very impressive. And a few years after that, in 2010, you started your own foundation: Sauti Kuu. What does Sauti Kuu mean, and why did you start the foundation?
Dr Auma Obama
Sauti Kuu means powerful voices. And I started the foundation because, actually, I worked for a while with international organizations, e.g., Sports for Social Change. And one of the problems I always had was that many organizations, not just this one, are donor-driven in the sense that they are funds-driven. So, an activity can be done, a program, a project, and it will be lasting, maybe three years, five years. But this is because of the funding that is available. And very many times the funding is available for that period. And you work with young people, you work with a local team. And as soon as the funds are finished, the whole project just stops, it’s like – to me – falling off the edge of a cliff. And this really disturbed me because we were working with children, and when you’re working with a 10-year-old, if the project is only a three-year-long project, then the child is 13. When the project then stops, then what happens to this child, if the child is from the slums, you have not actually even scratched the surface of their life, you may have made a small dent, but you haven’t actually made that much of an impression. And they go back into the slums. And they fall into a bigger slum, because now they’ve tasted the possibilities of being appreciated, of moving forward or being active, all these things, and suddenly, there’s nothing there. So, they actually go backward and fall into a situation that is even more helpless and hopeless. And this disturbed me a lot, because even with a five-year program that 10-year-old is only a 15-year-old, not even old enough to even go into an apprenticeship somewhere, or even learn a trade somewhere because they should still be in school. And this disturbed me a lot, but it’s very hard to change big organizations and the way they work. It’s, for me, less personal. And even the fundraising is less personal. It’s very distant. It’s project-based, project-based, as I said, project funds-based and not individual-based and not beneficiary-based, in my opinion. So, parallel to working within this international organization, I would pick up these young people and start collecting them and working with them around own things that I was doing. And actually, in the end, I said “Well, if I’m already doing so much on the side on my own to keep these young people still active, to keep an eye on them, and try and keep the project alive like a skeleton type of support for them, why don’t I just do my own thing?” And also, another motivation was the fact that I wanted to work in the rural area, which at that time, few organizations worked in, because the rural, young person, the rural child with regards to being supported in a project-based situation whereby you assist them to improve their lives. There are very few organizations, and they’re disadvantaged. Especially in my own community where there’s a lot of poverty, and a lot of a false sense of not being able to look after your own life, not being able to cope financially by the provision based on ignorance and not knowing how to work with locally available resources. So, I saw a gap that I felt needed to be filled. Also, because with this, I wanted to show that programs have to be run in such a way that at the forefront are the beneficiaries, they must never notice as there’s no money, there must always be continuity. If you struggle in the back struggle in the back looking for funds, whatever. That is the problem of the operation, the problem of the organization, but the beneficiary must, especially with children, it must be continuous. And they must always be able to access the services that you’re giving. So, the fundraising has to be done differently. And it has to be rigorous, and it has to be sustainable and long-term. And we actually managed to make this happen at Sauti Kuu. So, the foundation works in such a way that the beneficiaries stay with us over the years. They grew up with us. But in the background, we have a system whereby we’re constantly fundraising, and we have a system whereby we tried to fundraise for unrestricted funds. So, the program always continues. It is not project-based we call it ongoing program activities. It is program based and not just project-based, we do have restricted funding projects. But our core work is with the ongoing programs that go on all the time. And the young people have sports, young people have drama, they have art activities, they have tuition, they are working in the gardens, because we agriculture, they have many different activities that they do ongoing, that are not just based on one project, and it doesn’t end after three years, and then they, we have to send them home, we never send our children home.
Raina Ivanova
That sounds amazing. How many children are in the program currently?
Dr Auma Obama
In our books, we have about 500, because we’ve been around for ten years. And what happens is that because they grew up, they go to Nairobi, or they go to university, and they’re not always there. So active participants, we have about 250. But we will say once a Sauti Kuu young person, always a Sauti Kuu young person. So, in the holidays, they come back, and they take part in activities when they’re older, they become interns with us, some of them have been employed by us. So, there’s a lot of continuity. So, you see the same faces again and again and again. I forgot to mention that the parents are very strongly involved. So, we have the children involved. And then we have the parents because you can’t go into somebody’s home, work with their children, and do not involve the parents, because then you’re actually violating their space. So, what we do is, we get the parents involved, but you have to be a parent, you have to have a child with us. So, we have programs for the parents, and the children participate in those programs, whether it’s creating a kitchen garden, or at present, what we’re doing is building energy, save a hut that involves a stove attach, so they start not cutting down the trees and use less wood. So, we do all these things with a kid, children are always involved, so that they learn from what we do and participate in creating those spaces and those initiatives that we do, but the parents are there so that the parents open doors and make it possible. So, we create, together with the parents, a platform for the children to improve their lives by doing different activities be it in economic empowerment, be it in personality development, be it in education and training, or, you know, just motivational activities that have to do with skills, life skills. So, with the parents we call them households because with a parent comes a household, we work with about 200 households.
Raina Ivanova
I love that! It seems like a very sustainable model.
Dr Auma Obama
It’s a family. Yeah.
Raina Ivanova
So, talking a bit more about the World Future Council. The WFC tries to identify and disseminate good policies in order to pass on a healthy and sustainable planet to current and future generations. And you are one of the Councillors. What does it mean to you to be a Councillor?
Dr Auma Obama
It means a lot to me. I was very honored when I was asked. I’ve been around a while. So, I have been a Councillor for a bit, so maybe I am doing something right. And I think the most important thing is what you said about policies, trying to influence and celebrate first. Celebrate good policy, influence policy that is not so good to align with what it needs to happen to ensure that future generations have a future. And for me, that’s very important. I work with children; my foundation is a Children’s Foundation basically. So, all of what happens at the World Future Council is helping my work, supporting my work, promoting my work. So, to be part of it is the most natural thing for me and I think we might achieve quite a bit. We’ve managed to celebrate and highlight many good policies that not only work well for children and young people but work well in general for communities, for countries and for our world at large. So, I think we need a lot more publicity, a lot more people involved, a lot more visibility and I hope that I’m able to give us that in order to let people know the great work that we’re doing in the World Future Council.
Raina Ivanova
Within the WFC, you have been the Co-Chair of the Rights of Children and Youth commission. Are there any synergies between the work at the World Future Council in this area and your work at the Sauti Kuu Foundation?
Dr Auma Obama
I think one of my biggest takeaways from being part of the World Future Council is the focus on children’s rights. And it’s actually quite a challenge to teach children about their rights in a way that it really is clear to them that they have a right to have rights, especially in our part of the world, especially in the rural community. And that’s one of the things that I’m constantly reminded that I have to do more because I’m in the World Future Council and because I co-chair the Children’s Rights Commission. And this is something that is a work in progress, very exciting. But just getting children to go back to one of the things that we want to try and do is get back to civic education, because it was taken out of the schools. And this is very unfortunate because I think it was done almo
Shownotes
& weitere Informationen
Raina Ivanova
Hello, my name is Raina. I’m a 17-year-old Climate and Child Rights activist from Germany and today I’m speaking to Dr. Obama. Thank you for being here first of all.
Dr Auma Obama
Thank you for having me.
Raina Ivanova
Dr. Auma Obama is a Kenyan sociologist, journalist, author and speaker and she’s a very powerful activist who supports many projects in the east of Africa and who has successfully created her own foundation called Sauti Kuu. She’s also a Councillor at the World Future Council. Thank you for being here.
Dr Auma Obama
Yes. Thank you for having me.
Raina Ivanova
We are speaking together in in Hamburg today. How do you like the city and how do you feel?
Dr Auma Obama
I actually like Hamburg a lot, especially when the sun shines as it’s doing now. It can be a bit dreary when it’s raining. But usually, when I’ve been here, luckily the sun has been shining. And it’s a beautiful city, beautiful buildings, the lovely waters of the Alster. So, yes, I do love Hamburg.
Raina Ivanova
I think then you are a very lucky person because it rains quite often here.
Dr Auma Obama
Yes, I actually am lucky.
Raina Ivanova
The sunshine comes with you.
Dr. Auma Obama
Sunshine. Indeed. That’s true.
Raina Ivanova
,So, let’s not waste any of our precious time and get started right away. You grew up in Nairobi, in Kenya as one of five siblings and you started your education at a boarding school. How was it growing up in Nairobi and in the Luo community?
Dr Auma Obama
Well, I think you said I grew up in Nairobi, which is quite diverse. And the Luo community was my family, because otherwise, Kenya has over 40 different ethnic groups. So, we grew up with very many different people from different ethnic backgrounds. And in the family: Yes, it was a little family. Although, saying that, my stepmother was American, so we’re already multicultural within the family. And the interesting thing about my growing up was that I was the only girl. So, among boys, which made my upbringing quite interesting, because I often heard “you can’t do this”, “you can’t do that because you’re a girl.” Or “you must do this”, “you must do that because you’re a girl.” And that was, at first, quite confusing. And then I was a little bit rebellious. So, I would say: “Why? Why do I have to do this because I’m a girl?” “Why can’t I do this because I’m a girl?” So, my family had a little bit of trouble with me on that front because I would always resist being put into a box.
Raina Ivanova
What was your favorite thing about growing up in Kenya?
Dr Auma Obama
My favorite thing about growing up in Kenya was the fact that I grew up with a lot of space and a lot of time and a lot of friends to play with. So, there was really a balance between growing up and going to school and also playing. We really were able to go out. From the Swiss Alps where I will be out in the morning and come back in the evening, just before it got dark, and only because I get in trouble for being out. Because we really played, I really loved my childhood, we had a lot of time to play. We played traditional games with five stones, we played skipping, we played football, we went exploring in the caves near where we lived. So, it was really full of adventure and discovery and really just exploring the world as a child. And I really love that. And I think I was privileged to have that because many children don’t have that anymore because of the urbanization and also, especially in Europe, because many children grew up in apartments, so I know that I was blessed to have that in my childhood.
Raina Ivanova
Yeah, that sounds lovely. You mentioned your education and also Europe. So, after you finished your school in Kenya, you moved to Germany, with a scholarship to study in Saarbrucken, Heidelberg and in Berlin. So why did you choose Germany for your studies? And is there something you find particularly interesting about the German culture?
Dr Auma Obama
Germany was sort of a coincidence initially because when I was in high school, they offered German as a course. And I had missed a chance at French because I didn’t pay enough attention. I don’t know how it works here, but the system in Kenya was such that you had to get very good grades in two languages. And I think I wasn’t paying attention too much when it came to French. And I got the opportunity just before I finished high school, to jump in from the side and do a language and this was German. And we had a really great German teacher. So, we explored the German language we had exhibition visits to go to and I learned German with Asterix and Obelix. And that’s how I say I learned my German. So, we had so much fun learning the language. And it was really, really a great time for me. And I discovered German literature. So, I started reading a lot of German literature, because that would also help with learning the German language. And then I thought: Well, now that I finished high school, I did want to go abroad, because I wanted to have more space to spread my wings to find myself and my own identity. And I felt restricted because as a girl at home, I was constantly being told what to do and what not to do. And I wanted my own space, so I said, I want to study abroad, I don’t want to stay at home. And I started looking for scholarships. And obviously, because I had German as a background, it made sense to try and get a scholarship in a German-speaking country. At the same time, I was interested in German literature, and studying German culture, and I was lucky enough to get a scholarship. So, I ended up in Germany, like you said, in Saarbrucken, to learn the language properly to sharpen up, because it wasn’t as good as I thought it was when I got here. And then I did my master’s in Heidelberg, and my doctorate in Bayreuth, before I then went to Berlin to study at the film school. So, I did a lot of learning, I was really what they’re calling “Ein ewiger Student” in German, which is a lifelong student, and I still am.
Raina Ivanova
So, you mentioned that you studied in film school in Berlin. What else was your study focus?
Dr Auma Obama
I think, through all of what I did by studying in Heidelberg, or learning the language in Saarbrucken, or even in Bayreuth, and then find and then finding the film school, what really drives me is communication and telling stories. And I was always looking for a way to be able to tell my story, and tell the story of the African continent, and then tell General people’s story, to make people connect, to interact with each other, understand each other. For me, it was really important I did a lot with the idea of being different. Being different is nothing to be afraid of, being different is actually enriching your life. Diversity is something that we need to strive for. And it’s an opportunity to learn, it’s an opportunity to grow. It’s an opportunity to enrich yourself and your surroundings. So, I think that’s what always drove me. Whether I was trying to do it through public speaking, whether I was trying to do it through teaching, whether I was trying to do it through making films and telling stories or writing books, it was always the motivation behind what I did: communication and exchange and integration. And at the same time, celebrating our differences, too.
Raina Ivanova
I can imagine that that might have been difficult for you moving to Germany as a young woman, do you want to share something about that?
Dr Auma Obama
When I was just a little bit older than you, I was 19 when I decided to leave. And it was interesting, because when I was trying to get my scholarship, because I was the only girl, and I was very close to my father, I thought that my father wouldn’t let me leave. I had this impression: oh, he won’t, he’ll decide in my life what I’m going to do with it. And he’s going to stop me from doing because that was my own decision. I looked for my scholarship by myself. So, I actually left without letting him know so I snuck out of the country. I ran away. My mom knew but she didn’t tell him, she was sworn to secrecy. So, for me, it was an adventure from beginning to the end, in that I left without everybody knowing I was going, it was quite unconventional. And so, I started off my life in Germany fighting the fight for my rights. And I think I kept that fight up till today.
Raina Ivanova
So, you lived in Germany, and also in the UK for a few years, right. And now you have returned to Kenya, where you also helped to set up the Sports for Social Change Network, which helps to introduce girls in particular to sports as a means of improving their social situation. Why is it especially girls’ rights that you are passionate about?
Dr Auma Obama
I think I’m passionate about the rights of all young people. That is definitely. I tend not to discriminate, but the focus on the girls is really because we don’t want them to be left behind, yes. The tendency for girls is that if you have a situation where an initiative has been created, or activities are happening that involve boys and girls, the girls will always take one step back and let the boys go ahead, and the boys will take the position. We know it in life, you are a young woman, you’ll experience it much more, I’ve experienced it quite a bit. Because men are not shy, whether they are competent or not. They’re not shy about taking the lead. And what we’re trying to do is make the girls also not shy about taking the lead, be brave, just try their luck be out there, be upfront. And that’s what we try to do. And that’s why in the Sports with Social Change Network that we created at the time, it is about promoting this, to make girls also start using sport just like boys, just like men do, to improve their confidence to make them have more self-esteem and to realize that being a girl is not a limitation. Being a woman is not a limitation. It’s just a fact of life. Before you’re a woman before you’re a girl, you’re a human being and as human beings we’re equal. So that’s what I was trying to promote. And that’s what the whole program was about.
Raina Ivanova
That sounds very impressive. And a few years after that, in 2010, you started your own foundation: Sauti Kuu. What does Sauti Kuu mean, and why did you start the foundation?
Dr Auma Obama
Sauti Kuu means powerful voices. And I started the foundation because, actually, I worked for a while with international organizations, e.g., Sports for Social Change. And one of the problems I always had was that many organizations, not just this one, are donor-driven in the sense that they are funds-driven. So, an activity can be done, a program, a project, and it will be lasting, maybe three years, five years. But this is because of the funding that is available. And very many times the funding is available for that period. And you work with young people, you work with a local team. And as soon as the funds are finished, the whole project just stops, it’s like – to me – falling off the edge of a cliff. And this really disturbed me because we were working with children, and when you’re working with a 10-year-old, if the project is only a three-year-long project, then the child is 13. When the project then stops, then what happens to this child, if the child is from the slums, you have not actually even scratched the surface of their life, you may have made a small dent, but you haven’t actually made that much of an impression. And they go back into the slums. And they fall into a bigger slum, because now they’ve tasted the possibilities of being appreciated, of moving forward or being active, all these things, and suddenly, there’s nothing there. So, they actually go backward and fall into a situation that is even more helpless and hopeless. And this disturbed me a lot, because even with a five-year program that 10-year-old is only a 15-year-old, not even old enough to even go into an apprenticeship somewhere, or even learn a trade somewhere because they should still be in school. And this disturbed me a lot, but it’s very hard to change big organizations and the way they work. It’s, for me, less personal. And even the fundraising is less personal. It’s very distant. It’s project-based, project-based, as I said, project funds-based and not individual-based and not beneficiary-based, in my opinion. So, parallel to working within this international organization, I would pick up these young people and start collecting them and working with them around own things that I was doing. And actually, in the end, I said “Well, if I’m already doing so much on the side on my own to keep these young people still active, to keep an eye on them, and try and keep the project alive like a skeleton type of support for them, why don’t I just do my own thing?” And also, another motivation was the fact that I wanted to work in the rural area, which at that time, few organizations worked in, because the rural, young person, the rural child with regards to being supported in a project-based situation whereby you assist them to improve their lives. There are very few organizations, and they’re disadvantaged. Especially in my own community where there’s a lot of poverty, and a lot of a false sense of not being able to look after your own life, not being able to cope financially by the provision based on ignorance and not knowing how to work with locally available resources. So, I saw a gap that I felt needed to be filled. Also, because with this, I wanted to show that programs have to be run in such a way that at the forefront are the beneficiaries, they must never notice as there’s no money, there must always be continuity. If you struggle in the back struggle in the back looking for funds, whatever. That is the problem of the operation, the problem of the organization, but the beneficiary must, especially with children, it must be continuous. And they must always be able to access the services that you’re giving. So, the fundraising has to be done differently. And it has to be rigorous, and it has to be sustainable and long-term. And we actually managed to make this happen at Sauti Kuu. So, the foundation works in such a way that the beneficiaries stay with us over the years. They grew up with us. But in the background, we have a system whereby we’re constantly fundraising, and we have a system whereby we tried to fundraise for unrestricted funds. So, the program always continues. It is not project-based we call it ongoing program activities. It is program based and not just project-based, we do have restricted funding projects. But our core work is with the ongoing programs that go on all the time. And the young people have sports, young people have drama, they have art activities, they have tuition, they are working in the gardens, because we agriculture, they have many different activities that they do ongoing, that are not just based on one project, and it doesn’t end after three years, and then they, we have to send them home, we never send our children home.
Raina Ivanova
That sounds amazing. How many children are in the program currently?
Dr Auma Obama
In our books, we have about 500, because we’ve been around for ten years. And what happens is that because they grew up, they go to Nairobi, or they go to university, and they’re not always there. So active participants, we have about 250. But we will say once a Sauti Kuu young person, always a Sauti Kuu young person. So, in the holidays, they come back, and they take part in activities when they’re older, they become interns with us, some of them have been employed by us. So, there’s a lot of continuity. So, you see the same faces again and again and again. I forgot to mention that the parents are very strongly involved. So, we have the children involved. And then we have the parents because you can’t go into somebody’s home, work with their children, and do not involve the parents, because then you’re actually violating their space. So, what we do is, we get the parents involved, but you have to be a parent, you have to have a child with us. So, we have programs for the parents, and the children participate in those programs, whether it’s creating a kitchen garden, or at present, what we’re doing is building energy, save a hut that involves a stove attach, so they start not cutting down the trees and use less wood. So, we do all these things with a kid, children are always involved, so that they learn from what we do and participate in creating those spaces and those initiatives that we do, but the parents are there so that the parents open doors and make it possible. So, we create, together with the parents, a platform for the children to improve their lives by doing different activities be it in economic empowerment, be it in personality development, be it in education and training, or, you know, just motivational activities that have to do with skills, life skills. So, with the parents we call them households because with a parent comes a household, we work with about 200 households.
Raina Ivanova
I love that! It seems like a very sustainable model.
Dr Auma Obama
It’s a family. Yeah.
Raina Ivanova
So, talking a bit more about the World Future Council. The WFC tries to identify and disseminate good policies in order to pass on a healthy and sustainable planet to current and future generations. And you are one of the Councillors. What does it mean to you to be a Councillor?
Dr Auma Obama
It means a lot to me. I was very honored when I was asked. I’ve been around a while. So, I have been a Councillor for a bit, so maybe I am doing something right. And I think the most important thing is what you said about policies, trying to influence and celebrate first. Celebrate good policy, influence policy that is not so good to align with what it needs to happen to ensure that future generations have a future. And for me, that’s very important. I work with children; my foundation is a Children’s Foundation basically. So, all of what happens at the World Future Council is helping my work, supporting my work, promoting my work. So, to be part of it is the most natural thing for me and I think we might achieve quite a bit. We’ve managed to celebrate and highlight many good policies that not only work well for children and young people but work well in general for communities, for countries and for our world at large. So, I think we need a lot more publicity, a lot more people involved, a lot more visibility and I hope that I’m able to give us that in order to let people know the great work that we’re doing in the World Future Council.
Raina Ivanova
Within the WFC, you have been the Co-Chair of the Rights of Children and Youth commission. Are there any synergies between the work at the World Future Council in this area and your work at the Sauti Kuu Foundation?
Dr Auma Obama
I think one of my biggest takeaways from being part of the World Future Council is the focus on children’s rights. And it’s actually quite a challenge to teach children about their rights in a way that it really is clear to them that they have a right to have rights, especially in our part of the world, especially in the rural community. And that’s one of the things that I’m constantly reminded that I have to do more because I’m in the World Future Council and because I co-chair the Children’s Rights Commission. And this is something that is a work in progress, very exciting. But just getting children to go back to one of the things that we want to try and do is get back to civic education, because it was taken out of the schools. And this is very unfortunate because I think it was done almo
Shownotes
& weitere Informationen
Raina Ivanova
Hello, my name is Raina. I’m a 17-year-old Climate and Child Rights activist from Germany and today I’m speaking to Dr. Obama. Thank you for being here first of all.
Dr Auma Obama
Thank you for having me.
Raina Ivanova
Dr. Auma Obama is a Kenyan sociologist, journalist, author and speaker and she’s a very powerful activist who supports many projects in the east of Africa and who has successfully created her own foundation called Sauti Kuu. She’s also a Councillor at the World Future Council. Thank you for being here.
Dr Auma Obama
Yes. Thank you for having me.
Raina Ivanova
We are speaking together in in Hamburg today. How do you like the city and how do you feel?
Dr Auma Obama
I actually like Hamburg a lot, especially when the sun shines as it’s doing now. It can be a bit dreary when it’s raining. But usually, when I’ve been here, luckily the sun has been shining. And it’s a beautiful city, beautiful buildings, the lovely waters of the Alster. So, yes, I do love Hamburg.
Raina Ivanova
I think then you are a very lucky person because it rains quite often here.
Dr Auma Obama
Yes, I actually am lucky.
Raina Ivanova
The sunshine comes with you.
Dr. Auma Obama
Sunshine. Indeed. That’s true.
Raina Ivanova
,So, let’s not waste any of our precious time and get started right away. You grew up in Nairobi, in Kenya as one of five siblings and you started your education at a boarding school. How was it growing up in Nairobi and in the Luo community?
Dr Auma Obama
Well, I think you said I grew up in Nairobi, which is quite diverse. And the Luo community was my family, because otherwise, Kenya has over 40 different ethnic groups. So, we grew up with very many different people from different ethnic backgrounds. And in the family: Yes, it was a little family. Although, saying that, my stepmother was American, so we’re already multicultural within the family. And the interesting thing about my growing up was that I was the only girl. So, among boys, which made my upbringing quite interesting, because I often heard “you can’t do this”, “you can’t do that because you’re a girl.” Or “you must do this”, “you must do that because you’re a girl.” And that was, at first, quite confusing. And then I was a little bit rebellious. So, I would say: “Why? Why do I have to do this because I’m a girl?” “Why can’t I do this because I’m a girl?” So, my family had a little bit of trouble with me on that front because I would always resist being put into a box.
Raina Ivanova
What was your favorite thing about growing up in Kenya?
Dr Auma Obama
My favorite thing about growing up in Kenya was the fact that I grew up with a lot of space and a lot of time and a lot of friends to play with. So, there was really a balance between growing up and going to school and also playing. We really were able to go out. From the Swiss Alps where I will be out in the morning and come back in the evening, just before it got dark, and only because I get in trouble for being out. Because we really played, I really loved my childhood, we had a lot of time to play. We played traditional games with five stones, we played skipping, we played football, we went exploring in the caves near where we lived. So, it was really full of adventure and discovery and really just exploring the world as a child. And I really love that. And I think I was privileged to have that because many children don’t have that anymore because of the urbanization and also, especially in Europe, because many children grew up in apartments, so I know that I was blessed to have that in my childhood.
Raina Ivanova
Yeah, that sounds lovely. You mentioned your education and also Europe. So, after you finished your school in Kenya, you moved to Germany, with a scholarship to study in Saarbrucken, Heidelberg and in Berlin. So why did you choose Germany for your studies? And is there something you find particularly interesting about the German culture?
Dr Auma Obama
Germany was sort of a coincidence initially because when I was in high school, they offered German as a course. And I had missed a chance at French because I didn’t pay enough attention. I don’t know how it works here, but the system in Kenya was such that you had to get very good grades in two languages. And I think I wasn’t paying attention too much when it came to French. And I got the opportunity just before I finished high school, to jump in from the side and do a language and this was German. And we had a really great German teacher. So, we explored the German language we had exhibition visits to go to and I learned German with Asterix and Obelix. And that’s how I say I learned my German. So, we had so much fun learning the language. And it was really, really a great time for me. And I discovered German literature. So, I started reading a lot of German literature, because that would also help with learning the German language. And then I thought: Well, now that I finished high school, I did want to go abroad, because I wanted to have more space to spread my wings to find myself and my own identity. And I felt restricted because as a girl at home, I was constantly being told what to do and what not to do. And I wanted my own space, so I said, I want to study abroad, I don’t want to stay at home. And I started looking for scholarships. And obviously, because I had German as a background, it made sense to try and get a scholarship in a German-speaking country. At the same time, I was interested in German literature, and studying German culture, and I was lucky enough to get a scholarship. So, I ended up in Germany, like you said, in Saarbrucken, to learn the language properly to sharpen up, because it wasn’t as good as I thought it was when I got here. And then I did my master’s in Heidelberg, and my doctorate in Bayreuth, before I then went to Berlin to study at the film school. So, I did a lot of learning, I was really what they’re calling “Ein ewiger Student” in German, which is a lifelong student, and I still am.
Raina Ivanova
So, you mentioned that you studied in film school in Berlin. What else was your study focus?
Dr Auma Obama
I think, through all of what I did by studying in Heidelberg, or learning the language in Saarbrucken, or even in Bayreuth, and then find and then finding the film school, what really drives me is communication and telling stories. And I was always looking for a way to be able to tell my story, and tell the story of the African continent, and then tell General people’s story, to make people connect, to interact with each other, understand each other. For me, it was really important I did a lot with the idea of being different. Being different is nothing to be afraid of, being different is actually enriching your life. Diversity is something that we need to strive for. And it’s an opportunity to learn, it’s an opportunity to grow. It’s an opportunity to enrich yourself and your surroundings. So, I think that’s what always drove me. Whether I was trying to do it through public speaking, whether I was trying to do it through teaching, whether I was trying to do it through making films and telling stories or writing books, it was always the motivation behind what I did: communication and exchange and integration. And at the same time, celebrating our differences, too.
Raina Ivanova
I can imagine that that might have been difficult for you moving to Germany as a young woman, do you want to share something about that?
Dr Auma Obama
When I was just a little bit older than you, I was 19 when I decided to leave. And it was interesting, because when I was trying to get my scholarship, because I was the only girl, and I was very close to my father, I thought that my father wouldn’t let me leave. I had this impression: oh, he won’t, he’ll decide in my life what I’m going to do with it. And he’s going to stop me from doing because that was my own decision. I looked for my scholarship by myself. So, I actually left without letting him know so I snuck out of the country. I ran away. My mom knew but she didn’t tell him, she was sworn to secrecy. So, for me, it was an adventure from beginning to the end, in that I left without everybody knowing I was going, it was quite unconventional. And so, I started off my life in Germany fighting the fight for my rights. And I think I kept that fight up till today.
Raina Ivanova
So, you lived in Germany, and also in the UK for a few years, right. And now you have returned to Kenya, where you also helped to set up the Sports for Social Change Network, which helps to introduce girls in particular to sports as a means of improving their social situation. Why is it especially girls’ rights that you are passionate about?
Dr Auma Obama
I think I’m passionate about the rights of all young people. That is definitely. I tend not to discriminate, but the focus on the girls is really because we don’t want them to be left behind, yes. The tendency for girls is that if you have a situation where an initiative has been created, or activities are happening that involve boys and girls, the girls will always take one step back and let the boys go ahead, and the boys will take the position. We know it in life, you are a young woman, you’ll experience it much more, I’ve experienced it quite a bit. Because men are not shy, whether they are competent or not. They’re not shy about taking the lead. And what we’re trying to do is make the girls also not shy about taking the lead, be brave, just try their luck be out there, be upfront. And that’s what we try to do. And that’s why in the Sports with Social Change Network that we created at the time, it is about promoting this, to make girls also start using sport just like boys, just like men do, to improve their confidence to make them have more self-esteem and to realize that being a girl is not a limitation. Being a woman is not a limitation. It’s just a fact of life. Before you’re a woman before you’re a girl, you’re a human being and as human beings we’re equal. So that’s what I was trying to promote. And that’s what the whole program was about.
Raina Ivanova
That sounds very impressive. And a few years after that, in 2010, you started your own foundation: Sauti Kuu. What does Sauti Kuu mean, and why did you start the foundation?
Dr Auma Obama
Sauti Kuu means powerful voices. And I started the foundation because, actually, I worked for a while with international organizations, e.g., Sports for Social Change. And one of the problems I always had was that many organizations, not just this one, are donor-driven in the sense that they are funds-driven. So, an activity can be done, a program, a project, and it will be lasting, maybe three years, five years. But this is because of the funding that is available. And very many times the funding is available for that period. And you work with young people, you work with a local team. And as soon as the funds are finished, the whole project just stops, it’s like – to me – falling off the edge of a cliff. And this really disturbed me because we were working with children, and when you’re working with a 10-year-old, if the project is only a three-year-long project, then the child is 13. When the project then stops, then what happens to this child, if the child is from the slums, you have not actually even scratched the surface of their life, you may have made a small dent, but you haven’t actually made that much of an impression. And they go back into the slums. And they fall into a bigger slum, because now they’ve tasted the possibilities of being appreciated, of moving forward or being active, all these things, and suddenly, there’s nothing there. So, they actually go backward and fall into a situation that is even more helpless and hopeless. And this disturbed me a lot, because even with a five-year program that 10-year-old is only a 15-year-old, not even old enough to even go into an apprenticeship somewhere, or even learn a trade somewhere because they should still be in school. And this disturbed me a lot, but it’s very hard to change big organizations and the way they work. It’s, for me, less personal. And even the fundraising is less personal. It’s very distant. It’s project-based, project-based, as I said, project funds-based and not individual-based and not beneficiary-based, in my opinion. So, parallel to working within this international organization, I would pick up these young people and start collecting them and working with them around own things that I was doing. And actually, in the end, I said “Well, if I’m already doing so much on the side on my own to keep these young people still active, to keep an eye on them, and try and keep the project alive like a skeleton type of support for them, why don’t I just do my own thing?” And also, another motivation was the fact that I wanted to work in the rural area, which at that time, few organizations worked in, because the rural, young person, the rural child with regards to being supported in a project-based situation whereby you assist them to improve their lives. There are very few organizations, and they’re disadvantaged. Especially in my own community where there’s a lot of poverty, and a lot of a false sense of not being able to look after your own life, not being able to cope financially by the provision based on ignorance and not knowing how to work with locally available resources. So, I saw a gap that I felt needed to be filled. Also, because with this, I wanted to show that programs have to be run in such a way that at the forefront are the beneficiaries, they must never notice as there’s no money, there must always be continuity. If you struggle in the back struggle in the back looking for funds, whatever. That is the problem of the operation, the problem of the organization, but the beneficiary must, especially with children, it must be continuous. And they must always be able to access the services that you’re giving. So, the fundraising has to be done differently. And it has to be rigorous, and it has to be sustainable and long-term. And we actually managed to make this happen at Sauti Kuu. So, the foundation works in such a way that the beneficiaries stay with us over the years. They grew up with us. But in the background, we have a system whereby we’re constantly fundraising, and we have a system whereby we tried to fundraise for unrestricted funds. So, the program always continues. It is not project-based we call it ongoing program activities. It is program based and not just project-based, we do have restricted funding projects. But our core work is with the ongoing programs that go on all the time. And the young people have sports, young people have drama, they have art activities, they have tuition, they are working in the gardens, because we agriculture, they have many different activities that they do ongoing, that are not just based on one project, and it doesn’t end after three years, and then they, we have to send them home, we never send our children home.
Raina Ivanova
That sounds amazing. How many children are in the program currently?
Dr Auma Obama
In our books, we have about 500, because we’ve been around for ten years. And what happens is that because they grew up, they go to Nairobi, or they go to university, and they’re not always there. So active participants, we have about 250. But we will say once a Sauti Kuu young person, always a Sauti Kuu young person. So, in the holidays, they come back, and they take part in activities when they’re older, they become interns with us, some of them have been employed by us. So, there’s a lot of continuity. So, you see the same faces again and again and again. I forgot to mention that the parents are very strongly involved. So, we have the children involved. And then we have the parents because you can’t go into somebody’s home, work with their children, and do not involve the parents, because then you’re actually violating their space. So, what we do is, we get the parents involved, but you have to be a parent, you have to have a child with us. So, we have programs for the parents, and the children participate in those programs, whether it’s creating a kitchen garden, or at present, what we’re doing is building energy, save a hut that involves a stove attach, so they start not cutting down the trees and use less wood. So, we do all these things with a kid, children are always involved, so that they learn from what we do and participate in creating those spaces and those initiatives that we do, but the parents are there so that the parents open doors and make it possible. So, we create, together with the parents, a platform for the children to improve their lives by doing different activities be it in economic empowerment, be it in personality development, be it in education and training, or, you know, just motivational activities that have to do with skills, life skills. So, with the parents we call them households because with a parent comes a household, we work with about 200 households.
Raina Ivanova
I love that! It seems like a very sustainable model.
Dr Auma Obama
It’s a family. Yeah.
Raina Ivanova
So, talking a bit more about the World Future Council. The WFC tries to identify and disseminate good policies in order to pass on a healthy and sustainable planet to current and future generations. And you are one of the Councillors. What does it mean to you to be a Councillor?
Dr Auma Obama
It means a lot to me. I was very honored when I was asked. I’ve been around a while. So, I have been a Councillor for a bit, so maybe I am doing something right. And I think the most important thing is what you said about policies, trying to influence and celebrate first. Celebrate good policy, influence policy that is not so good to align with what it needs to happen to ensure that future generations have a future. And for me, that’s very important. I work with children; my foundation is a Children’s Foundation basically. So, all of what happens at the World Future Council is helping my work, supporting my work, promoting my work. So, to be part of it is the most natural thing for me and I think we might achieve quite a bit. We’ve managed to celebrate and highlight many good policies that not only work well for children and young people but work well in general for communities, for countries and for our world at large. So, I think we need a lot more publicity, a lot more people involved, a lot more visibility and I hope that I’m able to give us that in order to let people know the great work that we’re doing in the World Future Council.
Raina Ivanova
Within the WFC, you have been the Co-Chair of the Rights of Children and Youth commission. Are there any synergies between the work at the World Future Council in this area and your work at the Sauti Kuu Foundation?
Dr Auma Obama
I think one of my biggest takeaways from being part of the World Future Council is the focus on children’s rights. And it’s actually quite a challenge to teach children about their rights in a way that it really is clear to them that they have a right to have rights, especially in our part of the world, especially in the rural community. And that’s one of the things that I’m constantly reminded that I have to do more because I’m in the World Future Council and because I co-chair the Children’s Rights Commission. And this is something that is a work in progress, very exciting. But just getting children to go back to one of the things that we want to try and do is get back to civic education, because it was taken out of the schools. And this is very unfortunate because I think it was done almo
The Good Council: Annika Weis and Jakob von Uexkull
Intro: Hello, and welcome to The Good Council, the podcast of the World Future Council. In each episode, we’ll highlight current challenges and policy solutions. And we’ll also take you on a journey of inspiring stories. Listen in to another of our intergenerational dialogues from around the globe.
Annika: Good morning, my name is Annika, I’m 25 years old and I’m a consultant at the World Future Council. In this episode, I have the pleasure of speaking with Jakub von Uexküll, who is the founder of the World Future Council. Born in Sweden in 1944, he grew up in Hamburg and went on to study Philosophy, Politics and Economics at the University of Oxford. As a member of the European Parliament, he served on the Political Affairs Committee from 1987 to 1989, and later, on the UNESCO Commission on Human Duties and Responsibilities. He also served on the board of Greenpeace, Germany, as well as on the Council of Governance of Transparency International. He’s a patron of the Friends of the Earth International, and lectures widely on environmental justice and peace issues. As Jakob was becoming increasingly desperate at the development of the health of the planet, and the finite resources that are continuously being exploited, he set out to cause change: first, by creating and establishing the Right Livelihood Award, which is also known as the alternative Nobel Prize, and later, the World Future Council. And today, we listen to him tell the story in his own words.
Hello, Jakob.
Jakob: Thank you.
Annika: Thank you for being here today.
Jakob: Thank you. Pleasure.
Annika: So, it’s a real pleasure, actually, for me to have this conversation with you. And I think there’s a lot to learn for me from you. And I’m looking forward to learning from you about yourself, and also about the World Future Council. So, to start with, what’s your life’s mission in one word?
Jakob: In one word? Well, the future.
Annika: And that’s also I suppose, the World Future Council. That’s, that’s the name. And I’m curious also, why did you call it the “World Future Council”?
Jakob: Because I saw that we were, we are living in a very short, sort of short-tempered way where we are not really looking at—we’re looking at a future, which is really very threatening. And we could change it in time. But it demands a lot of very deep and profound change. And there wasn’t really an organization which was focused on that. And so, I thought we need such an organization.
Annika: Right, and we’ll come back to that in a moment. But you say, you know, your life’s mission is the future. And obviously, the World Future Council is about the concern about future generations. So where does your concern about future generations come from?
Jakob: Growing up in a very sort of remote part of Sweden, for my first 11 years, and being and loving nature. And so, the more I started readine and realizing what the threats are to nature, it seemed to me that there was a need for such an organization, but of course, you know, this came after the Right Livelihood Award. First of all, I believe that Right Livelihood was the way to live our lives. And so, I had this idea for this organization, but it was very much a challenge to the Nobel prizes, you know, so I called it, from the beginning, “the alternative Nobel Prize”. And to my surprise, instead of being sort of, rejected or ignored, a member of the Swedish Parliament arranged for us to present these awards in the Swedish parliament from the beginning. Well, we had a sort of one- or two-years period when we presented them privately, but then she brought us into the Swedish parliament. So, I realized then that there was really an interest in solutions, there was a deep discomfort with the way things are at the moment, because if you look at the world today, the Nobel prizes are really the most prestigious awards on the planet. And so, to say that they need an alternative, and to say that in Sweden—the country of the Nobel prizes—was really quite a challenge, and to my pleasant surprise, there was a response. And so, doing this for quite a few years, I always felt, you know—and then going into going into politics because I realized if you want to change things, you have to change the law, you know, “laws don’t move heart but they restrain the Heartless”, as Martin Luther King said. So that was the reason why I had the idea of the World Future Council, I wrote a book about that. And, again, pleasantly surprised that there was the response, including from the city of Hamburg where I had grown up as a teenager.
Annika: So, the Right Livelihood Award awards… the award to individuals who cause great positive change in terms of livelihood, justice, human rights issues, social issues, that are not covered by the by the Nobel Prize, right? And why did you think we need a prize for that, so why specifically, the Right Livelihood Award?
Jakob: Again, because of the existence of prizes and honours, which are very much focused on the present. And so, I realized that we needed an award, which was focused on solutions, which didn’t, didn’t fit in, you know—as I said, the novel prizes are the most prestigious prizes within the current world order. And the Right Livelihood Award is a prize going beyond the current world order. Because the current world order, which is very much the modernity is a life, a modernity which is not possible for the whole world population. And at the same time, there’s no reason why some people should have it, and some people shouldn’t have the advantages. So you basically have to have to find solutions which cover a larger range, some of these, these, the right livelihood award, some of these prizes are just take things further. But others come from a completely different world worldview, where we look at what the world needs and not what we need.
Annika: So then you founded the World Future Council. What a story! So what’s the vision for the world future council? What was it in the beginning? And is that still the same?
Jakob: I think very much so. Again, what kind of future can we have, which the whole population of the world can benefit from? And currently, we have a modernity, which is not transferable to the whole world. At the same time, there’s no reason why some people should benefit from it and other shouldn’t. So how can we spread these benefits, but at the same time, making sure that they are benefits which also benefit the planet and benefit nature?
Annika: So maybe just as a sort of basic—as a foundation for our conversation—maybe you can just give an overview of what the World Future Council is and what it does?
Jakob: Well, the World Future Council was very much set up to ensure that the future is sustainable and global. Because at the moment, as I said, you know, we have a future which is very focused on a small minority, and pretends to care about the rest of the world. But basically, it’s a lifestyle, which is not globally replicable. And so the World Future Council looks at that challenge and picked it up and, you know, wondered what kind of solutions do we need to change that? So it was it was very much filling a gap in current institutions, because there are so many who basically are built on the current present, but don’t look at it from the perspective of the future. And this is what the World Future Council does.
Annika: And its day-to-day activities and actual work, what’s the core work of the World Future Council?
Jakob: It’s very difficult to sort of say that it’s just one core activity because of course, the future is as diverse as the planet is diverse, the World Future Council membership is very diverse, and so they have different, different priorities, all within creating a sustainable future. But still, we focused on areas where there was the support, also the financial support to do the work, but also very much the interests of the most active councillors took priority.
Annika: And that’s all through policy work, right?
Jakob: All through policy work. Yes, exactly.
Annika: So it’s about finding the right policies and seeing what works, right? It’s along your maxim of “Why live with problems that we can solve”—
Jakob: Exactly.
Annika: It’s your life motto.
Jakob: Yeah, exactly.
Annika: Okay. So, when you founded the Council, that was in 2007? Well, the work before was a bit earlier…
Jakob: Before that was, we had a sort of tried to have a debate which was as global as possible, we looked at the membership, you know, how that could be as diverse as possible. At the same time, we needed people who are already in actively involved in trying to create a better future. And when we had a, by about 500-600 sort of candidates, we then started a dialogue with people in organizations who are working in the similar areas, finding out who they recommended should be actually a member because we couldn’t have more than about 50 members. And as a result of that, we got the Council, and we got these priorities. And those priorities, of course, also responded on the needs, the current needs of the planet, you know, why the future policy award, which we set up, was very much an annual prize for the area which was regarded by—including international organizations—but which was regarded by our supporters as the most urgent area to work on at that time.
Annika: Where there any sort of particular challenges that are maybe that you, well, still remember, from the very beginning of founding the council? One, of course, there’s so many interested people that would like to be part of it, so you have to narrow it down to about 50. But anything else? I mean, you’re setting up a network across the globe, of people who are working in their own field, but they also have a common interest, which is preserving our planet for future generations. Were there any challenges?
Jakob: Well, making sure that there’s common interest, which you mentioned, actually, was, was prioritized, because clearly everybody works in a certain in a different area, or many people work in different areas and see these areas as the most important one. So we had a lot of diplomatic—diplomacy was needed to make sure that we chose priorities, and also the membership of the Council of course had to reflect those priorities.
Annika: Who was responsible for that diplomacy?
Jakob: Well, the founding members, you know, I had sort of to do a lot about it. I had found that there were cases—there were some people who left you know, who couldn’t, didn’t fit into this very challenging agenda.
Annika: And, conversely, what are some of the successes from the very beginning? Because there was something that hasn’t been done before. And obviously, there’s, you know, there’s always the infancy of a project, and then suddenly, you can see it pays off. So what’s the, like a memorable success that you have?
Jakob: Well, I think the idea to have parliamentary representation of future generations, how could that be? That has been, that was a dialogue, which didn’t really exist before, and which we brought into reality. And I think in some areas, which have been—in other areas, which have been very challenging, including those for which we awarded the future policy award and where we joined in with existing campaigns that help to make them more future focused.
Annika: It’s really, it’s really fascinating. And you mentioned just a while ago that there was a good public response. Has that always been the case? So it was that straight from the get-go, that people recognized this as a good project, that merits support? Or was there a little bit of a tough work that you had to do before you got there?
Jakob: Well, no, it’s more or less, it’s more that it ran in parallel. Of course, there were journalists who thought that this is a very arrogant name. But it was interesting that this very visionary Hamburg entrepreneur, Dr. Michael Otto, he liked the idea, he came up to me when the book was published, and had and had a couple of questions about it, and then he supported it and his support, of course, was instrumental in bringing the Hamburg mayor and Hamburg parliament on board. So, without that, beginning that financial support, we wouldn’t have been able to launch it.
Annika: Yeah. And that’s super important. If you want to set up something like that, right now, what is it that you need to get together?
Jakob: Basically, I think you need to have charismatic leadership, it’s very good sort of, to say that it has to be very democratic, and everybody has to be involved, but somebody has to take the initiative.
Annika: So that’s you?
Jakob: Well, I took the initiative, but very, very quickly, I brought together, you know, a core membership. And I had co-founders, you know, Dr. Otto was one of them, obviously, who brought the whole thing into reality, because it’s very easy to talk about what needs to be done. And I’ve seen so many initiatives, which haven’t succeeded, because, you know, there have been too many internal disputes. Unfortunately, while we had some disputes, we were able to get off the ground before they before they hit. And so, we have been able to, to survive some conflicts. And some people, as I said, you know, left and others joined. But it’s very much also of trying to hit the interest of the day; what is actually most inspiring? And the fact that we had such a good—still have such a good media presence, I think has been because even, especially also media representatives have realized, that this is really an idea whose time has come.
Annika: And that probably also helped, the charismatic leadership, to get people together in the first place. And keep them engaged.
Jakob: Well, yes, I mean, I’ve never regarded myself a very, you know, inspiring, charismatic, I just tried to sort of do my job. But I realized, from the response I’ve had in the media that, you know, people have really liked, realize that this was an idea whose time had come.
Annika: Moving on to younger generations, I’d like to pick your brain on what you think about the current youth and young people nowadays, and about their activities and political participation. What do you think about that?
Jakob: Well, in general, it’s very—it is very difficult to generalize, because, of course, you know, growing up and in the world of today must be extremely challenging, and very hard, because until, until recently, you know, we had this idea that we’re going to get this global future, which meant everybody was going to live and have a good comfortable life. And now we are seeing threats. The climate threat, of course, is the worst, overreaching threat possible to imagine—I mean, it is, it’s within a comparatively short time period, where we were facing a threat to our very survival. And so of course, it’s easy to flee from that, it is easier just to sort of live in the present. But fortunately, there is an increasing number, I noticed that, you know, more and more increasing numbers, especially of young people who are prepared to take, you know, take the necessary changes to prepare to work for solutions, even if that’s not something which one would like to, you know, which one is sort of comfortable with, which one would like to sort of see, you know, as one’s life, it’s very, very challenging.
Annika: Thank you for recognizing that.
(laugh)
Annika: Yeah. It’s, it’s a bit of an obvious question, but why are young people so important for our future?
Jakob: Well, it says, our future more than anybody else’s future. And of course, you know, if struggle, and it wouldn’t really lead anywhere.
Annika: Yeah. And if that’s not an argument enough, then what would you advise young people today to do? What should they do? Why should they become active?
Jakob: Well, again, you know, what is the alternative? There is no alternative anymore, to really become part of the solution, because if you’re not part of the solution, you’re part of the problem. There’s no neutrality possible. And it’s such a challenging environment.
Annika: Do you have any other piece of advice, irrespective of maybe what they’re choosing to do with their life that you can pass on to young people today, based on what you’ve learned in your life, and looking back, etc.
Jakob: Well, not to take anything for anything for granted and take any information you’re giving any—the current leadership; don’t believe that, you know, they have the solutions, because unfortunately, they don’t. And so, you have to be prepared to challenge almost well, challenge everything, but at the same time, not just challenge it as like, like a cynic, but actually do something. eEen small solutions, you know, can grow and if you multiply small solutions, and they become big solutions.
Annika: So be constructive, be critical, and, yeah.
Jakob: Very much.
Annika: Okay.
Jakob: But at the same time, you know, be practical, realize that even one step ahead is a step ahead, you know.
Annika: Okay, oh, I’ll try and remember that. Sometimes it’s easy to think I need to make big change to be effective. And, well,…
Jakob: Yeah, but lots of small changes also become big changes. So you know, it’s, it’s very important not to be; otherwise, it’s very easy to become totally disillusioned, because, you know, nobody can save the world on their own.
Annika: As a as a role model very much for future generations, you have done a lot to try and pass on a healthy planet, to current and future generations. What’s your hope for future generations?
Jakob: Well, my hope is, is very much that I have inspired more, you know, people, and especially, you know, of course, the young people are inspired. Being seen as an example of what one person can do, and—nobody needs to replicate that—but it just shows if you can come in there and—where I had grown up in Sweden, but I hadn’t lived there for many years—and challenge, the biggest sort of famous Swedish invention internationally, the Nobel Prize, and get the response, a positive response, including from the Swedish parliament and from the Swedish media, that just shows you know, what is what is possible. So just look at, you know, don’t be too disillusioned, don’t what’s possible, you know, believe in what is what you can do.
Annika: And an anecdote comes to mind, well, it’s an anecdote of your life, because you sold your entire stamp collection to create the Alternative Nobel Prize….
Jakob: It wasn’t that, it was my job, you know. I collected but I’ve also dealt with buying and selling stamps.
Annika: So you gave up everything, basically.
Jakob: Well, I still had to make a living. So, I still continued dealing and stamps. But what I had accumulated at the time, most of that I have sold to the finance the Right Livelihood Award. But fortunately, you know, after not a long time, other donors came in. There was a Swede who won a top prize in the lottery. And he donated it, he said I don’t need this money, he donated to the Right Livelihood Awards. And then, our biggest donations have come from Germany, especially for one German lady, and it’s interesting that although it’s very much, you know, a Swedish award, most of the financial support has actually come from Germany and from the German speaking world, Switzerland…
Annika: There’s a huge lesson to be learned from that as well to be completely selfless. And I mean, completely goes against the capitalist urge and kind of pressures of the market today, isn’t it, to completely sacrifice one thing, sacrifice your assets for something that you really believe in? I think maybe is that also something that is good to know, for young people today?
Jakob: Yeah, it’s very much good to know, I think and, you know, the market is always such a, it means so many things to people you know. and we used to be critical of market of itself, its focus. We used to calculate laws, environmental laws in communist countries in the Soviet Union, for example, and saying, you know, they’re better and they were better on paper, but then we found in practice, they weren’t at all better. Now, you know, the, in fact, they just weren’t followed. They were just propaganda in the Cold War. The so called better environmental laws in the Soviet Empire, and so the market isn’t, isn’t the problem: people live in markets. But to prioritize the market is, of course, very, very, very, very dangerous. You always have to have—your goal cannot be to maximize your own monetary wealth, your goal needs to be to maximize yourself as a person. And to maximize the well-being of the planet where you live.
Annika: Which is just very much not the focus of what the markets are oriented towards today.
Jakob: Oh, yes. Oh, yes. And but it’s, it’s interesting even now, people who used to believe in markets even a few years ago, that the market would probably provide a solution, and now they’re coming and saying, we need to intervene, we need to change the framework, you know, within that framework markets can be effective, inventors can be effective. But above all, we need to set the right framework. And what does that mean? It means the right laws, and that’s again why the World Future Council was created, because I saw solutions were key and solutions were what the Right Livelihood Award is promoting, and solutions are still key. But without legal solutions ultimately, we’re not going to get there because again, you know, as Martin Luther King said, it’s not just not just enough to inspire people, you need actually to restrict those who want to don’t want to be inspired.
Annika: But I mentioned in the introduction that you were a member of the European Parliament. But then you founded the World Future Council a couple of years later, or actually few decades later, according to the timeline—why didn’t you remain a part of political life, you say that it’s actually the laws that cause change?
Jakob: It was a difficult, difficult choice, but I found that career in the European Parliament would not get me where I wanted to be, I wanted to be like a catalyst. And I found maybe I could have continued to do that also as a parliamentarian, but you know that the day has 24 hours, I just had to prioritize. And I found that I wasn’t the person who would, for a political career, it didn’t really sort of seem to fit my priorities. But I kept on—the Green Party puts me up on that list, and I was very grateful for that. But then they became a more conventional party. And hopefully now they will, you know, benefit from that—
Annika: Go back to the roots.
Jakob: —Go back to the roots, yes, especially when they get into power. But so, yeah, so I had different priorities. I couldn’t see myself putting in the energy I would have needed, I was living in England, living in London, because I found it very, it’s a very global city. And for the work I was doing, it had certain benefits. But clearly, you know, if I wanted to be a German politician, and I have a German nationality and Swedish nationality, I would have had to go back to one of those two countries, and it didn’t really sort of fit in with my life.
Annika: Okay, that makes sense.
Annika: You spoke with many people in your life politicians, entrepreneurs, advisors, business people, investors, policymakers, all of them. What would you say is the one biggest obstacle to actually implementing the changes that we know will work?
Jakob: Very much to believe in the current global system, which, of course, is the capitalist system, there is no doubt that there is too much trust in that and not enough trust and in what we can do to rectify what’s going on in the world. It’s very difficult to have a vision, which is global, because I remember the prominent German politician saying to me that, you know, look at the television is now everywhere, you know, look at the lives people need in Africa. Everybody wants a German lifestyle or an American lifestyle. And that is just not physically possible. And so, I think, you know, to make the alternatives sound attractive, which obviously means sharing to a certain extent. You know, everybody has to have the basics. But moving beyond that, and having different priorities is going is extremely hard because most people find themselves part of the system.
Annika: So is it either those with a high standard of living going back to a simpler lifestyle? Or is there a possibility and opportunity for those who have not yet attained that lifestyle to sustainably and justly reach that lifestyle that everyone else seems to already be living? Is it one or the other? And which one is it? Is there a third option?
Jakob: Well, I mean, you have to find an in-between solution, because the consumption of, of Germany or the USA, is never going to be globally possible. But at the same time making sure that people have enough, you know, to protect themselves against dire poverty, straits, against starvation, etc, there is enough. So there is enough for, for a simple lifestyle, the world has enough for everybody’s need, but not to ever this greed, as Gandhi said, you know, that is the truth, more than ever.
And that is now, the climate threat shows that the politicians who understood the climate threat, are still not daring to sort of say what it actually will actually mean. The rich are going to have to find other ways to support themselves and to build a sustainable lifestyle, rather than having more and more, accumulate more possessions, and that’s very difficult to choose
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