The Center for Ecozoic Studies has endorsed the Earth Charter and has made the teaching the Earth Charter a part of the mission of CES.
What is the Earth Charter?
The Earth Charter is a declaration of fundamental principles for building a just, sustainable, and peaceful global society in the 21st Century. These are its basic principles:
- Respect Earth and life in all its diversity;
- Care for the community of life with understanding compassion, and love;
- Build democratic societies that are just, participatory, sustainable, and peaceful; and
- Secure Earth’s bounty and beauty for present and future generations.
The entire Earth Charter may be viewed on the Internet at www.earthcharter.org.
History of the Earth Charter
In 1987 the United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development called for creation of a charter for sustainable development. Such a charter was begun but not completed in the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. In 1994 Maurice Strong, the Secretary General of the Earth Summit and Chairman of the Earth Council, and Mikhail Gorbachev, President of Green Cross International, launched a new Earth Charter initiative. In the summer of 2000, after a decade-long series of conversations, meetings and workshops that were cross-cultural, cross-sectoral and global in scope, agreement was reached on a set of common goals and values that became the Earth Charter. Thousands of people from over a hundred nations participated in creating the Earth Charter. Steven C. Rockefeller played an especially important role as Secretary of the Earth Charter process. The final text has rightly been called the “people’s treaty” for the Earth.
Human Justice and the Ecological Crisis
CES recognizes that in addition to the ecological crisis, other problems such as militarism and terrorism, cultural and religious conflicts, and social and economic inequity are also of critical importance. CES believes human and ecological problems must be approached comprehensively. As emphasized in its Expanded Mission Statement: “[The Ecozoic Era] involves transformed relationships of humans with the larger community of life and with other humans.” Yet CES also believes there can be no resolution of other human problems without addressing human-Earth relations. Moreover, given the short period of time humans have in which to act to avoid the destruction of Earth’s life systems, addressing the ecological situation must have moral and political primacy.
CES accepts the Earth Charter as the best available blueprint for the Ecozoic Era. As stated in its preamble, it provides an “ethical foundation for an emerging world community” by setting forth “interdependent principles for a sustainable way of life as a common standard by which the conduct of all individuals, organizations, businesses, governments, and transnational institutions is to be guided and assessed.”
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