Women's Views on News |
| Posted: 03 Jul 2015 07:19 AM PDT
Socially-responsible advertising? Online games shaping real life – think SimCity influencing town planning? Big Ideas Change the World is a Friends of the Earth project. Big Ideas Change the World will identify what needs to change to focus some of humanity’s amazing abilities on solving the challenges we face and building a brighter future for everyone. This is a three-year research project. It will inspire a new campaigning journey for Friends of the Earth. Change won’t be easy: there’s a gap between scientific understanding of the challenges and public and political responses. But there’s also an explosion of interest – especially among businesses, politicians and academia – in finding a new path. The right kind of change won’t happen without a shared vision – one backed with a compelling route map, and pressure from civil society, businesses and thinkers. History tells us change is possible. Without change women wouldn’t have the vote, slavery would still be commonplace, and Britain’s National Health Service wouldn’t exist. There would have been no industrial, no green and no digital revolutions. The coming decades will throw up huge challenges and uncertainty. We’ll cross thresholds in environmental, social and economic systems. Unforeseen events, so-called black swans, will happen. But we also know the world population will grow, and food and resources will come under pressure. But opportunities are bound to emerge. If we seize them we could produce a much more stable, equal and healthy society by 2050. We could provide well-being for everyone and for our planet. So through a series of linked research pieces this project will bring new thinking to the challenges ahead. We’ll learn from the past with a view to the future. Take for example the fact that discrimination against women is widespread. This is morally unacceptable and makes it impossible to achieve well-being for all. It hinders efforts to slow population growth and, by shutting out women’s views, dramatically reduces the perspectives, knowledge, value sets and experiences available for solving pressing environmental, social, economic and political problems. Women’s empowerment alone might not guarantee a society which lives within environmental limits. But could it significantly increase our chances of achieving this? Women’s empowerment is often considered in environmental circles only as a driver in reducing global population growth. This is necessary for living within environmental limits. But it positions it as an issue only for developing countries. It also neglects continued male dominance in policy-making in developed countries and businesses. Our three research questions are: Could women’s empowerment transform the chances of societies living within environmental limits? What interventions are most needed? Could these help achieve equality for other disadvantaged communities of people? This research will influence future campaigns by Friends of the Earth’s Just Transition Programme. It will also help broaden the debate around women’s empowerment. Humans have done some amazing things: space travel, global communications, advances in medicine. New challenges like the growing demands on the Earth’s resources and the threats of climate change require big ideas. Carrying on as we are will cause profound damage to human welfare, economies and ecosystems. Big Ideas Change the World seizes on the biggest ideas out there for enhancing our lives, preventing the mass-extinction of species and looking after the planet. Friends of the Earth think you’ll be surprised by some of the ideas. Share and debate the topics below. The list will grow as more and more of you add your voice. Where do you stand on these ideas? How do we transform our cities into healthy, sustainable and happy places to live? How can we improve natural resource management? We’re defined by the products we buy. Consumers. But we’re more than that, aren’t we? What political change do we need to address global issues like climate change? What can we learn when we look back to the past? How can we focus economies and mainstream business on long-term sustainability? How can we provide resilient, affordable and low carbon sources of energy for all? How can we foster innovation for well-being? How can we get banks – and other streams of finance – investing in activities that are good for society? Read more in the Big Ideas prospectus: ‘Mapping a Route from a Planet in Peril to a World of Well-being’.  |
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