Thinking Green 2
Conclusion
“The time for biosphere politics and life-affirming politics is now. If we learn to change ourselves, we can begin the difficult work of sharing our insights and way of doing things with others so that together we can do the work that is needed to stop destroying ourselves and to heal our Mother Earth.” (p. 132)
The New World Order
What went wrong?
- “The parting of the Iron Curtain in autumn 1989 revealed a land laid waste by industrial pollution. The environmental outrage of the people was so high that it helped topple governments in several countries. Now the task of ecological restoration is huge. Under the assault of air pollution and acid rain, many of Eastern Europe’s medieval cities are blackened and crumbling, and entire hillsides are deforested. Crop yields are failing. Thousands of Bohemian schoolchildren wear breathing masks to walk to school. Rivers serve as open sewers, and clean drinking water is not easily accessible. One chemical plant in the former East Germany discharges as much mercury into nearby rivers in a single day as comparable plants in the West discharge in a year. To restore Eastern Europe’s environment will be a massive undertaking. Estimates for cleaning up eastern Germany alone run as high as $300 billion.” (p. 111)
- “Our goal must be European unity in diversity through policies of nonalignment, active neutrality, and solidarity with the Third World. We must build a civil society, a fully demilitarized and socially just community, whose economic development will not be at the expense of the environment and the Third World.” (p. 114)
- “When President George Bush took up the theme and proclaimed a New World Order, I found myself distressed-it was not that many years ago that Hitler also classed for a “New Order”.” (p. 116)
“We have taken on all the bad features parties usually display-including financial scandals, a credibility crisis, and an inability to resolve problems in a constructive way.” (p. 127)
If there is to be a future, it will be green
- “To me the term denotes a party capable of choosing between morality and power, that uses creative civil disobedience to combat every form of repression, that combines audacious imagination with efficient working methods, and that recognizes the link between world peace and peace within every individual.” (p. 126/127)
The Green Party
- Kelly persuaded friends to join her in creating a new political party modeled on ecological, antimilitary, and feminist principles.
- In 1979 the West German Green Party came into being
- In 1982 Kelly was elected one of the Green’s three parliamentary speakers. During her eight years in Parliament, Kelly used her office to advance ecological, human rights, and feminist causes, to eliminate arms exports, and to lead protests against nuclear weapons.
Petra Kelly:
Ecofeminism & the Green Party
Thinking Green 1
Chapter 1: Women & Power
Violence
3rd World
Environment and Women
- Third world women have it the worst but still fight for environmental change; its unfair that its legitimized by ancient tradition
- Women do most of the work but are landless; industrialism makes it worse because it wipes out domestic handicraft businesses and they are beat out for factory jobs because they will probably have kids at some point
- Women are overlooked and overworked; although women in the 1st world shouldn’t tell people how to live, it should be left up to the societies to make their own courses but they should have everyone included, both men and women.
Summary
Picking one evil is bad, this fragmentary approach is part of the problem, reflecting the linear and not complexity, it fails to understand living systems and just tries to establish a hierarchy solution is to approach them holistically
- Strong relationship between sexism and environmental degradation, patriarchal power has given us climate change, we bear the scares of male dominance on the world
- “There is a clear and profound relationship between militarism, environmental degradation, and sexism. Any commitment to social justice and nonviolence that does not address the structures of male domination of women is incomplete.” (p.12)
The oppression of women
is so deeply embedded
in our societies and our
psyches, it continues to be
invisible, even to those
who are working to
overcome other forms
of injustice.
- Petra Kelly
Oppression of Women
- It should not be part of feminist logic to go after all industries just to prove a point, we need to make our own values and influence them on society; “rather than training women to kill, let men learn to nurture for life”
- Military policies are among the most destructive, wasteful contributors to environmental degradation; it requires a large amount resources to protect us against the environmental threats that are responsible for our security
- In violence we dehumanize people and devalue nature, calling them the enemy which will lead to inevitable destruction; these people are interconnected with our planet
I still believe that people are good at heart
- Anne Frank
- Feminism: Women gain power through nurturing others, not gaining power over others but sharing power with others; although women nurture they aren’t weak
- Degradation of women’s rights appears natural because of laws and institutions that were developed by men
- Daily war against women; why do we have no voice if we constitute half of the population and 1/3 of the labour force; we outlive men and therefore are the elderly of the world
- Double day
- Media gives into this, although there should be freedom of the of the press but we still must be protected from sexism
To rid the world of nuclear weapons and poverty, we must end racism and sexism. As long as white males hold all of the social and economic power, women and people of color will continue to be discriminated against, and poverty and the military mentality will continue unabated.
- Petra Kelly
Chapter 3: Thinking Green
- Spiritual perspective must be the foundation of green politics; at the root of it is nonviolence; holistic attitude doesn’t mean organized religion
- Bottoms up approach to change will open up a civil space
- Oppression of women, exploitation of 3rd world nations, nonviolence, social
- Justice and feminism need to be addressed before moving forward with the environmental movement
- No matter the type of economies between East and West Germany, we are reduced to economic entities
- Today assertion is valued more than integration and competition is valued over cooperation
Important Dates In Petra Kelly's Life:
Chapter 2: Creating an Ecological Economy
Factors that demand an ecological economy
- November 27, 1947: Petra Karin Lehmann was born in Günzburg, Bavaria, West Germany
- December 1959: Kelly family moves to Columbus, Georgia USA
- May 1970: Kelly graduates from the School of International Service at American University in Washington, DC with a BA degree (focus on International Relations: East/West European studies)
- Autumn 1977: Elected to the board of Bundesverband Bürgerinitiativen Umweltschutz (BBU) umbrella organization for citizens environmental action groups in Germany
- March 1979: Die Grünen (The Greens) formed in Frankfurt - Kelly elected head of list for forth-coming elections to the European Parliament
- March 1980: Kelly elected one of three speakers of Die Grünen
- March 1983: Bundestag Election - Die Grünen polls 5.4%, 27 seats. Kelly heads Bavarian list, is elected.
- October 1983: Peace Woman of the Year Award, Philadelphia
- October 1st, 1992: Petra Kelly died at a young age of 44, with her life partner Gert Bastain, 69, in a believed murder-suicide.
- “We have to understand that we are part of nature, not outside of it. What we do to the Earth, we do to ourselves.”
- Aggressive approach to the natural world is based on short term material gain and capitalist greed
- “A life simple in means but rich in ends”, the ecological crisis is a crisis of consumption not scarcity of resources
- The 3rd world bears our ecological debt
- Mass extinction in the rainforest as well as our oceans
How does an ecological economy function?
- Measure prosperity not in terms of goods produced but in terms of production methods that conserve the environment, human health while resulting in durable goods; value measured in air and water instead of capital
- Massive industry replaced by small production units that produce minimal waste and sparingly use natural resources, production occurring closer to consumers
- Importance of traditional and aboriginal knowledge
Discussion Q's
Emily Caddell, Molly Rafelson, Meagan Ellacott
- On page 113, Kelly says “I still hope that an ecological model of economic development-an alternative to repressive state socialism and to aggregate capitalism-can emerge somewhere in Eastern Europe, perhaps in Poland, Hungary, or Czechoslovakia.”
- Do you think that this model became a reality in the time since? Why or why not? If you believe that it hasn’t, discuss why you believe this model failed to occur.