Every person ought to spend an afternoon writing an essay with this title. It is stimulating to dream about how we could change our world.
Putting daydreams aside, a re-engineering of global governance is long overdue. Communicable diseases spread as rapidly as viral videos, multinational corporations are more powerful than many governments, and climate change does not respect borders. Arms sales, agricultural subsidies and energy strategies are agreed with little thought of the repercussions, which can include refugee migrations, famine, pandemics, environmental degradation and civil wars.
If I could, I would overhaul the United Nations system. In six-and-a-half decades, the UN has worked hard to bring about greater international co-operation in managing and overcoming common challenges. Its organisations have often been successful in redressing societal ills. But the system is in dire need of a serious rethink.
My highest priority would be to transform the UN security council: to revamp the council’s modus operandi for responding to longstanding tensions, armed conflicts, and other threats; to ensure representative membership; and to re-examine selective veto power. A humanitarian force, chartered with the “responsibility to protect” against war crimes, crimes against humanity, and other conflicts in which innocent civilians are the primary victims, would stand ready to intervene, to prevent the kind of slaughter taking place in Libya and elsewhere. The International Court of Justice would be granted compulsory global jurisdiction. A global energy agency would be launched to help nations achieve energy security and develop environmentally responsible strategies.
Many other mechanisms for global governance, including regional organisations, political alliances and economic forums, are dysfunctional, hamstrung by failures to adapt to our changing world. Stalemates on critical issues—climate change, arms control and trade—have become the norm. Our politics does not sufficiently take into account the increasingly globalised nature of society, and continues to treat many of these issues as a zero-sum game.
Consider our spending habits: how nations invest in the engines of war versus the arts of peace. Worldwide military expenditures last year cashed in at $1.6 trillion—an increase of 56 per cent since 2001, despite the ongoing global economic crisis. By contrast, official development assistance stood at $129bn.
There is no common sense in this strategy. If the past has taught us nothing else, it should have exposed the folly of believing that international security—or for that matter, the security of any nation—would be enhanced by investing in weapons, at a 12-to-1 ratio, rather than in development.
If I were handed the reins of global sovereignty, I would reprioritise the budgets of the world’s wealthiest nations. No government would be permitted to spend more on armaments and military force than on development assistance and humanitarian aid. The dividends—in prosperity, social cohesion, national and global peace, and security—would be immediate and dramatic.
A durable peace can be built only on a foundation of human security: that is, security based on the dignity and worth of every individual. If it were up to me, society would meet the basic needs of every human being—food, water, healthcare, and shelter—and every young person would receive a well-rounded education. Curriculums and learning methods would consciously de-emphasise differences of nationality, ethnicity, and stereotypes, replaced by an emphasis on tolerance and respect for our diversity, and appreciation of our collective cultural heritage.
In that context, no spending priority should be ranked higher than a global investment in the world’s children: inculcating in the next generation the ideals we would like to see embodied in their future.
This idyllic planet at peace with itself, this world I imagine for my infant granddaughters and their generation, is a world I will not live to see. But it is a vision I will pass on to my grandchildren; and one day, inshallah, they will live my dream.
Harry Sivertsen
There is nothing here with which any well balanced person would disagree but it remains a dream. It will unfortunately stay as a vision of utopia for the simple reason that all too many of the influential people of the world do not belong to that category termed ‘well balanced’. The list of current faults merely serves to underlines this.
Jo Huddleston
A nice future. Spoiled only by the narrow selfishness of many toads who turn up to the Assembly carrying the misnomer “government representative”.
Phil Vickery
This is represents a case for global governance to a degree that I don’t think any right minded, freedom-loving person is willing to accept. It’s so utopian o the face of it but think about how easy and destructive abuses within such a system would be. I do not believe my fellow man is that trust worthy and capable of taking care of ALL the worlds ills with integrity and honesty. The evidence of that is replete throughout man’s history and is clearly evident in our time. Small government is the goal and lots of them. Nothing requires a world-wide power to determine our fates. That is the path to dictatorships and absolute power – not fun for us little (less powerful) folks. Harry and Jo – you guys are nuts!
John R. Thomas
A lovely thought but I have to agree with Phil. The world is just not ready for it sad as that is.
Fred A. Werkmeister
Mohamed’s statements reflect a well balanced human that acknowledges the equality of all human beings and the right to live in peace.
He recognizes it from the start as a dream, because he will not live long enough to see it.
The fact remains that the spending on arms, warfare, revolution and other forms of aggression has failed to bring peace, prosperity and improve the welfare of the world’s population. Aggression breeds revenge with ever increasing destruction and mortality. Everyone is aware of this, but the allure of owning more than others is too great to be overcome with reason.
As long as more than seventy-five percent of the world’s population is relegated to stretch their limited income to meet the basic daily needs of food and shelter, while less than one percent lavish in more wealth than they can spend, there will be a large number of “right minded, aggression-loving” persons willing to demand more property and better arms to profit from and subjugate their less fortunate peace seeking brothers.
Until the minority of right minded persons is willing to distribute the high cost of aggression there can be no world peace.
John Wojewidka
More than a little late to this party, I’ve had thoughts about this article for some time and, I suppose, just need to get them out! I hope, too, Mr. ElBaradei sees at least one more person put the time into a response. Five comments for this effort is pretty sad. That said…
Certainly, Mr. ElBaradei is not a blind optimist and understands basic human motivations better than most. The majority of people today are not literally fighting for survival every day; fighting against the elements, wild hungry animals, what we today would consider simple viruses that once killed their hosts with regularity, ice ages, mega-volcanoes and more than we contemporaries could possibly imagine. We have been “civilized” for a very short period of time relative to our existence, and those fears and the resultant tendencies are still very much with us.
Instead, we have diverted that natural instinct to survive: we shop competitively, politic with abandon and generally leave a wake of destruction behind us in most everything we do. It’s part of our internal code. It matters not about today’s casualties as long as *we* remain alive. That is every species’ number-one imperative: stay alive to pass along another set of genes so we might continue our very existence.
But, just as we pursue seemingly unconnected, at-odds endeavors such as the arts, one of our wired-in imperatives (a constant march toward improvement – adaptation as we call it – drives us to understand more and become more “perfect”), we realize it is apparent we inherently have competing agendas: for the present and for the future. But they are both necessary and provides that balance for all species that allows moving forward.
So with Mr. ElBaradei’s unattainable perfect future world, *somebody*, dammit, has to think about reaching goals of that magnitude in order to make our daily, excruciatingly incremental progress. It is so very wrong to for any of us to denigrate others for their lofty visions. Without them we would not be even as far as we are (though it surely doesn’t seem like we’ve made any substantive progress, overall; and that might be our final undoing this time around).
Mr. ElBaradei, your vision is worth every ounce of effort to work toward, however difficult, however many other ambitious people you piss off, and however many enemies you make because of the potential to take away some of what they believe they could possess.
Everyone’s measure of success is different, but in the end we all die with nothing of material value. Zip. The Great Ancient Egyptians got it wrong, thinking the stuff they buried away was going anywhere – at all. Nobody could possibly know what lies on the other side – if there is an other side – but if we all aimed high and did the best we could for ourselves and the rest of the species, maybe the energy we leave behind (remember, in this incomprehensible, massive ecosystem *nothing* is lost, only recycled) will help to keep our progeny in better shape than when we left. And that is simply all that ultimately counts.