Aim of an open and international platform
Berlin – The Global Marshall Plan Initiative will adopt a clear structure and a strong and representative Board of Benefactors (Trägerkreis) to replace the current Steering Committee. After intensive and expansive discussion of a submitted structure and governance proposal, a working group was commissioned on the 3rd of September 2008 at the Ludwig-Erhard-Haus in Berlin to work over the document.
This resulting Berlin consensus on the structure of the Initiative was made possible thanks to the organization of the meerting by the BWA, the moderation by Josef Riegler and the determination of the participants to reach a consensus.
The governance draft submitted by the Steering Committee will now be edited with the help of individual organizations and be eligible as a clear decision-making proposal for potential benefactors. The working group consists of Franz Fischler (Coordinator), Chistoph Bail, Dieter Härthe, Miriam Lakemann, Björn Ludwig, Heribert Schmitz, Dirk Solte. To ensure continuity of the work, representatives of the previous Steering Committee members (Bail, Fischler, Solte) will work in cooperation with the working group, as well as local and student groups (Lakemann).
Josef Riegler stated that the idealism of the people who bear the responsibility is the Initiative's most important asset. Frithjof Finkbeiner thanked both his colleagues Josef Riegler and Franz Josef Radermacher for their five-year long intensive and trustworthy collaboration within the Steering Committee. The working group's goal is to bring together the loose network which pioneered the Initiative into a structured body, emphasizing the shared values and analysing the clear and effective factors of the past.
This consensus, aimed at creating an open structure, is an important and fundamental step.
The office team is growing
Projects and responsibility increase in the secretariat. With the planting of a symbolic first tree, Plant for the Planet kicked off its initiative on March 27, 2007. It has already developed into an large and impressive movement for climate protection within just these first six months. The task of coordinating this project has been taken on by the secretariat.
The secretariat team is integrated into the Global Marshall Plan Foundation. In order to accomplish the goals of this ambitious project, we have brought on Timothy Klofski to strengthen the team and who will work out of the Hamburg office. Timothy is responsible for the compilation of the newsletter “Climate Justice” and is the primary contact for all queries.
With Oliver Strasser we will open our Salzburg office on September 1, 2008. Oliver Strasser worked previously as a representative in the sporting goods industry in Austria. After taking a trip around the world, he decided to devote his full energies and talents in the service of climate justice.
Also on September 1st Miriam Lakemann picked up her work with the Global Marshall Plan once more. The student of Pedagogics and Economics has been actively volunteering for the Global Marshall Plan Initiative since 2006 and will be primarily assisting in the development and implementation of the Global Marshall Plan and Plant for the Planet Academy.
Maiken Winter, doctor of Biology and collaborator on Al Gore’s Climate Project, will be joining the team in Pähl starting September 15th. As a scientist with 10 years research experience in the USA, Maiken Winter will be occupied with the content of work. She will hold several lectures and oversee the training of teachers and children.
Matthias Wobben joined the team in August. He manages the IT infrastructure and web-based platforms used for networking the initiative. During his studies in Philosophy and Economics. Afterwards, he founded a regional group with Elias Brumm.
Welcome to the new team members!
The presentation of the team online.
Confered at the UN Youth Assembly
On August 14, 2008, James B. Quilligan was honored with the Martin Luther King,
Jr., Hall of Fame Award at the United Nations for his service towards the
creation of a Global Marshall Plan.
Others receiving this first annual award,
presented during the UN Youth Assembly, included Arun Gandhi and Jesse Jackson.
CEO of IBM opines his perspective of the global commons (Op-ed)
In a mild reprise of Thomas Friedman’s The World is Flat, Sam Palmisano (CEO of IBM) uses the global commons as a metaphor for a globalized world where business opportunity has become an even playing field. He goes on to map out a four point strategy for businesses and states to capitalize on this contemporary circumstance.
For the most part they are strategies and revelations not new for private or state enterprises when considering globalization. However, what is most striking is Palmisano’s fourth point, which he acknowledges as the toughest: "winning hearts and minds." It is the hearts and minds of those who have not traditionally prospered from globalization that he is specifically targeting, citing their perception of global integration as being less than favourable. This fourth point feels more concessionary to business as usual. An acknowledgement to the strains a globalized economy can warrant, but without really acknowledgement of the types of change that heads of companies and states must accept to remedy them.
Communities, individuals and populations would perhaps not be a "problem" were the priorities not placing them and the ills of global integration as fourth on their list of to-dos. The rise of global commons is more than an economic challenge and it is time to win hearts and minds to that fact.
The Coalition for the Global Commons, an initiative supported by the Global Marshall Plan Foundation offers a platform for discourse on and promotion for the global commons. You can find more information at www.coalition-global-commons.org.
Global Marshall Plan Initiative member Zeki Ergas contemplates the potential of new governance in the United States
In two articles recently published by Media for Freedom, writer, scholar and social activist Dr. Zeki Ergas dissects the promises and potentials of the upcoming elections in the United States.
Mainly he lays the challenge to Barack Obama to maintain campaign promises in the face of decades of conservative neo-liberal influence on American policy that has created a self-perpetuating system of corrupted interests and weakened democracy, and then also to the American people to recognize the urgency for change and the willingness to support Obama in restructuring business as usual.
You can read both articles at the following links:
Can Barack Obama Make the Withering American Democracy Bloom Again?
Barack Obama And The Fourth American Revolution 1
10/23/2008 - 10/25/2008
Bregenz
Political and Societal Action in the Interest of Children
Klemens Riegler introduces the Global Marshall Plan in a workshop.
For further information on the event, please visit the organizer's website: Welt der Kinder.
11/03/2008 10:00 am (local time) - 11/04/2008 4:00 pm (local time)
Amsterdam
Project Kick off
Start of the ThinkCamp-Year. Participants will come together for a first meet and greet.
For more information and details, please visit http://www.thinkcamp.eu/.
