Surviving Capitalism (Not) : Because the Land Is Ours – The Rights of Mother Earth v. Carbon Trading

We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Thursday, October 3, 2013

Because the Land Is Ours – The Rights of Mother Earth v. Carbon Trading

Click here to access article from sustainablog.

The anonymous author explains the flaws behind REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation), a program promoted by international capitalists to continue their exploitation of resources anywhere in the world under the guise of protecting the environment. The writer introduces his essay with the recent experience of an indigenous group in Panama.

In October 2011, the US-based Wildlife Works Carbon presented a REDD proposal to the Kuna Yala. The fifty-one communities spent a year and a half in consultation. In June 2013, the Kuna Yala general congress voted to reject the corporate proposal. They declared, further, their complete withdrawal “from all discussions at the national and international level on the REDD issue” and a prohibition on “organizing events, conferences, workshops and other activities on the issue.”