Dr. Sara Clarke-Habibi, UN Consultant for peacebuilding, education and youth
Honourable Chairs, Delegates and Distinguished Guests,
I wish to thank you for this invitation to share a few reflections on the theme of the plurality and diversity in governmental regimes, as a contribution to your deliberations.
From my perspective as a researcher and consultant with the United Nations on education, conflict and peacebuilding, there can be no doubt that we stand at an important crossroads in human history. It is a moment of great risk and potential – the decisions made by our nations will have important impacts on the peace and security of future generations.
As we survey the current state of global affairs, we see humanity struggling with two counteracting forces:
On the one hand, there is evidence of a global process of integration and cooperation. Innovation and exchange are bringing the nations and peoples of the world closer together, enabled by advances in science, technology, communication and travel, and economic and political cooperation.
These stunning advancements have changed the way we think about our world, and opened pathways to the emancipation, education, improved health, prosperity and civic participation of women and men, boys and girls of all social strata, across the globe. Through migration and cooperation, many societies are becoming increasingly diverse and interconnected. What has made this possible is the cultivation of open societies founded in principles of democracy and human rights, which protect individual liberties while ensuring the rule of law, framed within a vision of society in which the wellbeing of each and all are interdependent.
But these advances have not benefited all equally. They remain out of reach for millions of women, men and children who suffer under outworn ideologies that seek to monopolise the political, economic and social benefits of society in favour of a privileged few, to the exclusion of other groups and minorities within and beyond their borders. Both our interdependence and the inequalities that divide us have become even clearer in this period of the global pandemic.
And so our world is full of both hope and frustration:
- On the one hand, inter-state wars have declined dramatically since 1945, while other forms of intrastate conflict and new forms of war have increased steadily since the 1960s. Consequently, almost 80 million people remain forcibly displaced from their homes as reported by the UNHCR.
- While extreme poverty is at the lowest level in recorded history, 736 million people still live on less than $1 a day.
- While the world is now more educated than ever before, still 258 million children remain out of school, (especially across sub-Saharan Africa and south Asia) and some 750 million adults – mostly women – remain illiterate today.
- While tyranny has in many places been replaced by democracy, corruption, conflict and state suppression undermine trust in government and the implementation of just policies. Observers speak of the “global erosion of democratic norms”.
What is more, recent years have seen a resurgence of trade wars, nationalist rhetoric, xenophobia and radicalisation that analysts compare to the dangerous conditions in Europe that preceded the two World Wars.
We should be wary. Political and ideological conflicts are enormously wasteful of human and material resources. Vast social and economic inequalities lead to hardship, frustration and ultimately violence, giving rise to a host of human and environmental crises that spill over borders and render fragile the peace and prosperity of our world.
Former President Barak Obama summarized it well when he said:
“This is the paradox that defines our world today. A quarter century after the end of the Cold War, the world is by many measures less violent and more prosperous than ever before, and yet our societies are filled with uncertainty, unease, and strife. Despite enormous progress, as people lose trust in institutions, governing becomes more difficult and tensions between nations come more quickly to surface. And so at this moment we all face a choice. We can choose to press forward with a better model of cooperation and integration. Or we can retreat into a world sharply divided, and ultimately in conflict, along age-old lines of nation and tribe and race and religion.”[i]
Rather than being frightened by our diversity, I believe we must find ways to live together. Without a vision of shared identity and common purpose, however, we cannot escape power struggles and division. And without unity, we cannot achieve justice or wellbeing.
As Bahá’u’lláh stated a century ago: “The well-being of mankind, its peace and security, are unattainable unless and until its unity is firmly established.”[ii]
I propose to you, Honourable Chairs, that humanity finds itself at a critical stage in its collective development and self-awareness. Our needs moving into the future can no longer be satisfied by limited ways of thinking and relating, based on short-sighted and narrow aspirations that belong to bygone eras of nationalism, religious fanaticism, materialism, racism, and other ideologies that set the human family against itself and that undermine the realisation of human potential and the sustainability of our planet. We are being invited to make a massive shift in our sense of collective purpose and action.
Writing from a Birmingham jail in 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. wrote:
“Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere. We are caught in an inescapable network of mutuality, tied in a single garment of destiny. Whatever affects one directly, affects all indirectly… [We must not prefer] a negative peace which is the absence of tension [but rather] a positive peace which is the presence of justice… Oppressed people cannot remain oppressed forever. The yearning for freedom eventually manifests itself.”[iii]
To build a peaceful and prosperous global society, we must therefore question and let go of old ideas and ways of doing things that no longer serve our most pressing and consequential challenge: that of safeguarding the survival and well-being of the whole world.
This means devising new modes of governance that enable the views, needs and interests of diverse groups, sectors and civil society actors to be heard and jointly considered. It means widening the sphere of participation in processes of consultation, truth-seeking, priority-setting, decision-making and action. Exclusion is itself a form of violence that is deeply embedded in our societies and it has a corrosive effect on peace.
Advances in technology have succeeded in providing wider forums of participation, but they also bring to our attention on a daily basis the inequalities that exist between nations and social classes. This awareness escalates frustrations that people are no longer willing to tolerate.
The leaders of the world are being called upon to lead us towards “justice”, towards models of society that honour the diversity of their members and that enable the full development and expression of their capacities, regardless of gender, race, religion, nationality or class.
If we are to meet the challenges of this century, we must discard isolationist policies that fail to address the present challenges that traverse borders and require international cooperation.
- Outworn modes of governance based on the idea of “might is right”, which use force to oppress opposition and monopolise power are a seedbed of grievances.
- Excessive cultures of competition that lead to massive gaps between political and economic ‘winners’ and ‘losers’ are likewise unable to succeed in transforming the global challenges we face today which require cooperation and compromise.
Whether we seek to overcome extreme poverty, contain the spread of disease, reverse the climate crisis, or prevent violent conflicts and extremism – our success relies on recognizing and valuing our shared humanity and common destiny.
Our understanding of power needs to change from ‘how much we can take from others’ to ‘how much we can enable others’ to contribute their talents to the best interests of the world community as a whole.
In order to do this, we need to look searchingly and creatively at how to close the gap between rich and poor nations and between rich and poor classes within our societies, how to close the gap between men’s and women’s educational and economic outcomes, and how to ensure the sustainability of our planet. The Sustainable Development Goals are an important start, but there’s more to be done.
We need to offer young people a global education and an active role in decision-making. Cross-border exchange, dialogue, collaboration and inclusive participation, ensuring that opportunities and benefits of society are extended to all groups, and soliciting the views and ideas of diverse communities--especially the most vulnerable, alienated and marginalised--is needed if we are going to identify solutions that will promote confidence, trust and social cohesion.
And the appetite for change and collaboration is now huge – young people the world over are mobilising for change. An impetus which the United Nations has encouraged in Security Council Resolution 2250. But governments need to do more to enable youth participation in decision-making.
Governing a plural society requires knowledge, skills and maturity. In this respect, education must do more than simply teach young people to “get along”. Rather, it must engage them from a young age to exercise critical, creative and collaborative problem-solving skills, to exercise deep personal reflection, ethical reasoning and moral courage.
Education must help us to reflect on our social identities, to become conscious of our biases and prejudices and to learn to value the diversity of the human family. Education must also help young people to engage with the complexity of social issues in our globalized world, raising awareness of the historical roots of inequalities and social privilege, and strengthening young people’s ability to stand up to and transform injustices. Such an education will strengthen young people’s intercultural capacities and courage to collaborate with others across traditional social divides, and to design and promote their own innovative solutions to local and global challenges.
In essence, a plural and united world depends upon both individual and societal transformation.
Honourable Chairs, I wish to conclude my reflections with a final quotation from the Baha’i writings:
“Be anxiously concerned with the needs of the age ye live in, and center your deliberations on its exigencies and requirements…[iv] Bend your minds and wills to the education of the peoples and kindreds of the earth, that haply the dissensions that divide it may be blotted out from its face, and all mankind become the… inhabitants of one City.”[v] “The earth is but one country and mankind its citizens.”[vi] – Bahá’u’lláh
Thank you.
[i] Address by President Obama to the 71st Session of the United Nations General Assembly, 20 September 2016. https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/the-press-office/2016/09/20/address-president-obama-71st-session-united-nations-general-assembly
[ii] (Bahá’u’lláh, Gleanings, CXXXI)
[iii] Martin Luther King, “Letter from a Birmingham Jail”, https://www.africa.upenn.edu/Articles_Gen/Letter_Birmingham.html
[iv] (Bahá’u’lláh, Gleanings, CVI)
[v] (Bahá’u’lláh, Gleanings, CLVI)
[vi] (Bahá’u’lláh, Gleanings, CXVII)