The run-up to Copenhagen

Contrary to the usual topic of the blog this article will be the starting point of a small cycle of posts dealing with the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen from the 7th to the 18th of December 2009 which I will attend as part of the delegation of the Foundation for the Rights of Future Generations. I hope to share some first-hand impressions here that are both fun and informative. The first short posting will deal with the climate change agenda of the Foundation for the Rights of Future Generations.

There are only seven days left until the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen starts. The conference itself was prepared for months and months through preliminary meetings within and without the UN framework. All this preparation will culminate in a 12-day conference of tremendous symbolical importance in mid-December, but that's also about it. Barely anyone is still counting on an ambitious post-Kyoto agreement in Copenhagen. US-President Barack Obama will be at the conference in it's early days, stopping by on his way to pick up the Nobel Peace Price in Norway. No other head of state will be there during the same period, and some newspapers already joke that President Obama is combining the Copenhagen and Norway trips in order to save kerosene, as Americas contribution to cutting CO2 emissions.

I will attend the COP15 talks as observer in the delegation of the Foundation for the Rights of Future Generations on the 14th and 15th of December. A high workload in December and a very limited travel budget unfortunately make a longer stay impossible. Nevertheless we are determined to make the best out of the stay, meeting with other NGO delegations and getting a first hand impression of the process. Chances to really influence the talks are close to zero anyway. 

The Foundation for the Rights of Future Generations is advocating a more concerted and ambitious approach to climate change mitigation. The principle of Intergenerational Justice is only observed when future generations have at least the same chances to satisfy their needs as previous generations. In terms of climate change this would mean that we have to pass our climate system and the environment down to our ancestors in a shape that allows them to sustain an equal level of wellbeing that we are enjoying in our lifetime. In practice this is of course nearly impossible. After all we have already brought the absorption capacities of earth's atmosphere close to collapse which makes the maintenance of today's lifestyle impossible - at least on a fossil energy basis - if we do not want to destroy our planet. But, since future generations will bear the brunt of negative climate change consequences it is at least our duty, as the generations living today, to minimize the damages for future generations. The growing tendency of some scientists to enforce adaptation over mitigation as the "cheaper" alternative is directly violating these duties.

In a nutshell, adaptation says that we should adapt to the consequences of climate change by building higher and better dams against rising sea-levels and ultimately leave areas that become uninhabitable due to climate change. There are two catches though: first, only rich countries have the resources at hand to adapt to climate change and secondly, we will eventually reach a threshold of climate change, at which adaptation becomes impossible. At this point, future generations will pay the bill for our negligence. This means that environments that have been home to humans for centuries will become uninhabitable and people living there for generations will be turned to homeless refugees. We argue that the loss of the place one calls home cannot be calculated economically like any other commodity. This is why the advocates of an adaptation approach are wrong when they want to make us believe that it is the cheaper alternative. We see adaptation as a short sighted strategy, disadvantageous both for the poorest people living today as well as for future generations. Therefore the FRFG is advocating a strategy to combat consequences of climate change that focuses on mitigation over adaptation.

Why intercultural exchange needs to go beyond culture

Currently there is something like a 'hype' about Latin American and Spanish culture in Europe. This process has been accelerating for months and years and has only gained further momentum in recent times. Examples to support this claim are manifold.

In Germany the number of pupils choosing Spanish as a third language is growing faster than the schools can manage. In every German region there is a lack of qualified Spanish teachers for schools. Three German regions, Bavaria, Baden-Württemberg and North Rhine-Westphalia are offering an exchange programme for teachers from Spain and Latin America who want to teach Spanish in Germany in order to be able to meet the demand. Some schools are even starting to offer Spanish as a first or second language.

Additionally Latin America is becoming more and more popular as a tourism destination. According to the most recent tourism report of the European Commission, Latin America still plays a marginal role in the overall statistics for the tourist destinations of Europeans, but the growth rates for tourism in Latin America show the increasing appeal of the destination. Naturally tourism figures have dropped in the wake of the global financial and economic crisis, but tourism in Latin America is still doing significantly better than in any other region.The same goes for exchange programmes of all different types. More and more university students are heading to Latin America for exhanges or internships of one year and many young people leaving school after A-levels spend a year backpacking through Latin America.

Last but not least Spanish and Latin American popular culture is reaching more and more people in Europe. Apart from Flamenco, Salsa, Tango and other dances that were always hugely popular and well known, Spanish music is also becoming popular in Europe beyond the peninsula. Almost everybody nowadays knows Spanish singing artists like Shakira, Juanez and Alejandro Sanz. Furthermore Latin American literature has inspired an entire generation of European authors. Daniel Kehlmann, the young German author of the bestseller 'Measuring the World', told the audience at a literature event in Frankfurt´s Instituto Cervantes that reading the books of authors like Gabriel García Marquez, Mario Vargas Llosa and Juan Carlos Onnetti completely changed his approach to literature.

Even though this rising interest in Latin American (popular) culture can be a good starting ground for deeper intercultural exchange, it is necessarily only a first step. Dancing Salsa to Shakira songs and learning Spanish does not already create a deeper understanding for Latin American cultures. Quite the contrary, there is even the danger of seeing Latin America as a continent of dancing, celebrating people that are fun but not to be taken too seriously. A cliché sadly prevalent in parts of Europe from my experience.

This is why an interest for the culture of a country/region can only be a first step. Civil society initiatives and cultural institutions like Instituto Cervantes need to take it over from here and facilitate a broader and more general understanding of Latin America, it´s different countries, cultures and social and political problems. Culture can be a powerful door-opener for intercultural exchange, but the experience the ´Latin America meets Europe´group had at an exhibiton organized by the Peruvian embassy at the Instituto Cervantes in Berlin shows what happens, if exchange is limited to culture.

The Peruvian embassy had organized a small, multilingual exhibition on Inca Garcilaso de la Vega. With a conquistador father and an Inca princess as his mother he was supposedly one of the first mestizos (person of Spanish/Indigenous origin) and the first Peruvian author of 'mixed' descent. The exhibition focused on the life and the works of de la Vega and pictured him as one of the origins of modern Peru. Thus the mixed heritage of Latin America and Peru with all it´s history and conflicts was implicitly mentioned. Nevertheless the exhibition did not elaborate on this in any way. Some critical remarks by forum participants from Latin America soon led to a discussion of these issues that was rather embarassing for the Cultural Attache of the Peruvian Embassy. An average visitor to the exhibition perhaps would not even have realized that one of the core questions of Latin American identitity was broached in this exhibition without being discussed.

The lesson for people trying to further real intercultural exchange between Europe and Latin America is clear: If exchange is reduced to general cultural topics beyond dispute, everybody is feeling good. But a real in depth look and a real exchange can only be reached if the deep-rooted social, historical and political context of culture is also discussed.

Europe and Latin America - Shoulder to shoulder for a post-Kyoto Agreement

Progressive climate change is one of the great dangers to a secure and peaceful future of mankind. Even though most world leaders today understand that in theory, it still seems very difficult to draw the right conclusions and act in practice. For centuries mankind has been altering the face of mother earth in order to make use of its riches. But never before did we have the technological capabilities to alter or destroy the earth forever and pre-determine the environmental circumstances under which our offspring will have to live. The risk potential of nuclear technology and genetic engineering are two examples, but the consequences of climate change are already beyond abstract risk calculations. Since climate change is a lagged phenomenon the scientific consensus expects an unavoidable rise of the global mean temperature that will inevitably change our environment and endanger ecosystems in which people have been living for centuries. Again, these consequences will mainly strike the poor and disadvantaged as droughts, desertification and floods mainly affect the poor South of the globe. But the industrialized North will also suffer. Security specialists are preparing the European public for waves of migrants on the run from the devastating effects of climate change. Additionally rising sea levels are democratic: The Netherlands are threatened by it at as much as Bangladesh, even though the Netherlands have more means and resources at hand to adapt. The question is no longer IF climate change will affect us, but HOW MUCH. Can we stay below the threshold of a two degree Celsius warming seen as critical by the IPCC and most other scientists?  

Everything depends on mankind's ability to find a consensus on how to solve the questions of distributive justice when determining each nation's burden share in climate change mitigation. Since the Rio Convention in 1992 the history of climate change mitigation has been one of failures. Kyoto was a failure because the USA, as one of the main polluters, decided to free-ride instead of participating. And the run-up to the Copenhagen Talks in December 2009 has only proved that a post-Kyoto agreement is more than unlikely. US President Barack Obama will not be able to pass legislation on climate change mitigation before the COP 15 talks, the EU has refused, partly thanks to German pressure, to offer tangible figures for the sum they are ready to provide to developing countries in order to lower emission levels and China and India are refusing to make deep cuts in their emission budgets, pointing towards the high historical emissions of the industrialized world and the danger to their economies. UN-Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon recently said that he does not believe that there will be a post-Kyoto Agreement in Copenhagen.

Nevertheless there is hope. The Copenhagen talks have to become a first step towards a tangible and determined post-Kyoto Agreement. Since the US are blocked due to a legislative impasse, hope lies on Europe. And Latin America again would be a perfect ally for pushing the cause of climate change mitigation forward together with "the old continent". Environmental degradation and the consequences of climate change are issues for which awareness is raising rapidly in Latin America. And some Latin American projects and developments indeed are on the fore of the effort of climate change mitigation. For example Ecuador, a country which rich oil resources were tapped by US oil companies in the past, with little consideration for the environment or the natural living space of indigenous people, has suggested to not develop the Ishpingo Tambococha Tiputini oil reservoirs that were found in the Yasuní-National Park. The plan is to sell certificates to protect the national park to donors from developed countries or to take the saving of emissions into consideration when emission caps are set for individual countries in the scope of a global agreement. In Brazil, farmers are beginning to invest into rain forest areas instead of illegally burning them down to win fertile ground for agriculture. They are beginning to grasp the future economic potential of intact rain forest areas as CO2 reservoirs. 

At the same time large Brazilian companies, among them Klabin, Moinho Brasil and Brasilinvest, are promoting sustainable economic activities and environmental protection. Additionally a lot of their CEOs and leading managers recently joined the Brazilian green party. These companies have understood that they need to get involved in environmental and climate politics at home in order to preserve their international credibility. Corporate Social Responsibility is becoming a big deal on the global market and multinational companies of Latin American origin are starting to help to spread the concept to their home region.

This impetus for climate change mitigation in Latin America should not phase-out unused. Europe and Latin America need to push for clear steps towards a post-Kyoto Agreement at the COP 15 talks. Of course Europe and Latin America have different interests when negotiating burden sharing agreements, but the ultimate goal is the same: to ensure that global climate change is reduced to non-catastrophic levels. As long as the US drops out as a global leader and China and India are focusing their energies on minimizing their own commitment, Europe and Latin America are two of the few actors that can still push for decisive measures.

I will attend the COP 15 talks in Copenhagen as an observer for the foundation I am working at. I'm really looking forward to get some insights into the way the talks work and will be sure to post some first hand impressions here.

P.S. (17.11.2009): Things are not always as bright and easy as they seem at first glance. In the scope of the APEC Summit in Shanghai Chile and Peru, together with the other participants including the US, China and Russia,  have declared that they will not try to seal a post-Kyoto Agreement in Copenhagen.
Brazil recently declared that it will only cut it's emissions by 15 percent on a voluntary basis and has thus joined the position of China and India, blocking a real effort of the emerging nations.
The chances for an ambitious agreement on climate change mitigation in the next months have become a good deal slimmer...

When blogs shake worlds

When this network of blogs was first created, with the idea in mind to foster intercultural exchange between Europe and Latin America on a grass roots basis, it was born as a plan B. We where thinking about cultural diplomacy initiatives to enhance the exchange between our two continents. Ideas ranged from organizing academic exchanges to 'real' bilateral exchanges and volunteer programs that were not exclusively tailored to European university students. Finally we decided to start out with a network of blogs first, since everyone would have enough time besides university studies and work to contribute something and we would ensure that the group stays in touch. But a recent example from Cuba shows that something that looks simple at first glance, like  a network of blogs, can stimulate a lot of movement and change.

In Cuba, about 200.000 people have access to the world wide web and until recently private persons were not even allowed to own a computer. Among the select few with Internet access an even smaller group of people has launched blogs on the everyday life in Cuba. One of them is Yoani Sanchez, a philologist and web designer from Cuba. She started to blog back in April 2007 (http://www.desdecuba.com/generaciony/) and updates her page from hotels, pretending to be a Spanish tourist since she is not allowed to have Internet access privately and the Internet cafés in Cuba are too expensive for natives to pay. 

Her blog is not political, on the contrary, she is focusing on the small things of everyday life. But in unfree countries even writing on everyday life becomes political. Since Fidel Castro was forced to pass on power to his brother Raúl due to health reasons, there is change in Cuba. Things change very slowly, admittedly, but it is a start. As Yoani Sanchez puts it: there has been no change in the circumstances, but in the minds of people. They are not as afraid to speak out as they were before. Yoanis blog is part of this slow and gradual change that starts in the heads of people and slowly, yet irresistibly leads to change of political regimes. The 20 years anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall two days ago, on Monday 9th of November 2009, reminds us how a change in mentality spreads among the population and finally tears down walls and shakes the world. Blogs, twitter and modern communications technologies nowadays enhance these processes, as the incidents in Iran after the rigged presidential elections showed.

Taking these developments into consideration it is not surprising that a blog in a country like Cuba can become very influential. Yoani Sanchez was listed as one of the 100 most influential persons in the world by the "Time" magazine in 2008. Additionally she was awarded Spains most important media prize Ortega y Gasset in the same year. Naturally this influence comes at a price in political systems like Cuba. Yoanis site has been blocked in Cuba since March 2008. Naturally she was also not allowed to leave the country in order to receive the Ortega y Gasset award in Madrid. The immigration authority in Cuba simply kept her passport when she requested the traveling permit. This weekend the regime apparently went even a step farther. Yoani Sanchez was abducted and beaten when she was on her way to a demonstration against violence in Havanna. According to Yoani the offenders where civilian agents of the Cuban secret service. One can only imagine how afraid the regime has to be of one simple blogger when they go to such lengths to try to shut her up.

Yoanis example clearly shows that blogs can stir things up in the modern world. Let's hope that we will be able to spread our network and do our part in creating understanding and cultural exchange between our continents. Clichés and ignorance remain strong in the Euro-Latin American relations, there is a lot to be done.

Simple idea - big impact

When talking about civil society or cultural diplomacy initiatives all beginnings are difficult. The people who participated on the Europe meets Latin America Forum know from personal experience that, even when you have a good team of motivated and qualified people, it is not that easy to come up with viable ideas to start a small civil society or cultural diplomacy initiative. Making the idea work afterwards is another story and even more difficult. But sometimes the simplest ideas can generate the best results.

The Brazilian architect Ruy Ohtake, an immigrant with Japanese origins, had never put one foot into a favela, until he was misquoted by a Brazilian newspaper as calling Heliópolis "the ugliest neighborhood of Sao Paolo". The inhabitants of the slum in the south of Sao Paolo immediately asked him to change something about the looks of the neighborhood if he disliked it so much. Ohtake, until then chiefly known for designing high-class hotels and the Brazilian embassy in Tokio, didn't need to be told twice.

He started a project in order to embellish Heliópolis, painting 278 houses in an initiative involving locals. The simple idea to paint a couple of houses soon generated an unexpectedly big impact: when firt results showed, Ohtake was able to collect funding for further projects. Meanwhile he has designed various housing units, a school center and three daycare facilities for the neighborhood. Additionally he was able to collect 1.000 new books for the local library donated by publishers.

As secondary effects the self-confidence of the inhabitants has grown and they finally have real perspectives to find a job and lead legal lives after the anathema of living in an 'irregular' slum has been lifted from them. The initiative is the perfect example of how to break a vicious circle of poverty, social exclusion and the emergence of slums. 

Additionally Ohtake's initiative shows that the best projects often start as very simple ideas. A reassuring thought for those of us who would like to engage in cultural diplomacy initiatives but don't know where to start. Small, apparently symbolical, gestures can change the (self-)perception of people and thus generate further change, it's just a question of getting things rolling.