A consumers' vision on the news to come, based on statements of parliaments and presidents, finance and trade, producers interviewed in the media, newspapers, consumer organizations and special research institutes. Plus some thoughts about the year(s) to come. Consumers and consumer organizations in action in all area's and all issues!
"From globalize to cosmosize" / understanding needs helicopter views / From clash of civilizations to meet & greet / individuality and spirituality
Especially religion is an area where we ourselves as consumers have to be active in finding the roots of all spirituality! Find our own "lifelines" instead of listening alone (to our producers/moderators - priests, rabbi's, imams, guru's, sjamaan, Darwin, or even our best friend). Also Pope Benedictus in Colonia Germany already told the youth of the 21st century: "....it's not any more about religion and faith in the old fashioned way, but from now on it's all about ..... how credible are YOU?" From the old religions - through materialism of the past four, five centuries and secularization nowadays - the human being is on its way to find his/her own free destiny! As individual, as citizen, as consumer. "Connecting the dots" with spirituality (again).
In the next years only looking from a cosmic point of view will be the way to understand each others contribution to the history of mankind to become "co-creators" in the 21st century. All esoteric knowledge in the world has now become exoteric and available for everybody in all levels of society, so that religion art and science can become transparent in all their relations.
Art from outside watching to inside activity / art as a tool in daily life / social relations / building organizations
Arts become more and more part of daily life itself. Jeder Mensch ein Kunstler - Every human being a (co-) creator (professor in modern art and especially social art Joseph Beuys always repeated). Worldwide all schools also recognized the arts as a training instrument for creativity more than making fine things alone! Even big organizations discovered that one day of painting, dancing or sculpting in clay can be a very profitable learning process for building better relations and better organizations. Transforming ideals into realities is an ever ongoing creative process of trial and error, thinking - arguing - willing, not only when working on new products but also working on new relations, work processes, new laws, and all other issues concerning another world "in the making".
The years to come we are still in the metamorphosis of the 20th into the 21st century to create together a new social contract in all its organizational aspects. As basis for the century to come with ever new challenges to tackle ...
Making the invisible visible / from microscope and dna to visualizing through projective geometry, flowforms or crystallization / and further
The science must go on! For science in general we need new ways of research! The natural sciences have led us into the physical world. But for a real understanding of plants, animals and human beings we need the scientific phenomenological methods that Goethe developed (Urpflanze or living principle for the world of all plants, Typus or character for the animals/groups, Biography for the individual human being). These research methods also form the bridge to the higher forms of science, looking into the spiritual worlds, by strengthening our thinking, feeling and willing (head/hart/hands) in imagination, inspiration and intuition. This was our comment on the website of the World Science Forum in Budapest 2005.
In all the discussions about food and medicare the step towards a more deepening of insights is necessary. Although in education and social sciences there are made already big steps even into business spirituality to research the inner motives of managers and their organizations!
Every child worldwide / from individual development to a better society / consumer education and lifelong learning
All kids to school according to the Millennium Development Goals of the United Nations is in progress but will take longer than expected (81% - 87% from 1990 - 2004)
Since the turning point of the centuries also quality is more and more recognized in developing individual possibilities instead of training the old knowledge alone. See Rudolf Steiner, Montessori, Dalton and others. And last but not least life itself (the consumer as autodidact) is a playing field for all kinds of learning and discovery! Lifelong learning not only for new jobs, not only for consumer education, but also as a discovery journey through infinity and eternity!
Interesting developments nowadays are the many tourists staying some more days in developing countries to give education, or help in projects or even start new schools and other initiatives after their retirement with all the knowledge they have! But also internet is an instrument for a booming in distance learning worldwide! Together with microcredit and multinationals producing for the people at the "bottom of the piramid" the asian and african continent are coming in the picture and can make their kick start. Direct contacts via foundations, internet and interpay from our own desktop are now possible! Chatting is also education!
Less patents for more medicines worldwide / clear water first
More than one Millennium Development Goal of the United Nations is focused on health and healthcare. Developing consciousness that biological and local food-production is the first step for surviving and get on our feet here on earth, all kinds of medicare are necessary first to survive the sicknesses of the past such as hunger, war and bad water supplies. More and more organizations, governments and producers are now working on new ways of a better distribution of healthcare and medicines worldwide.
So: using the wealth of nations for the health of nations - globalization of healthcare first, pay later... The way of thinking about less copyrights and selling more medicines seems to be the right direction. Parallel to the "bottom of the pyramid" strategy where cheap products with small profit margins are produced in the millions for those people who need to upgrade their lifestyle now.
Biological food in the lift / gentech to be contained / new energy / restoring sustainability
Getting the whole world family sitting at the table and have a decent meal is the most important Millenium Development Goal of the UN. When we re-arrange incomes or only spend 3 percent of all our army budgets for this we can start eating and even not need to go to war anymore at all! The other 97 % we can use then for all kinds of other activities! The old economic principle of choosing between producing butter or bullets! And of course gentech is interesting for scientists and some medicare but not for food! Biological food is now in the lift, the EU has even started a promotion campaign! Now we can go "culinary" following the Eurotocques top-cooks!
Other issues underway are the discussions about gentech, about nanotechnology, about the honeybees, about the biofuel, climate and clear water. Agriculture, environment, energy and commodities are parts of nature as a whole. Solar energy and hydrogen are on the move, so we can hope to restore sustainability and climate in time. The new wave is Cradle2Cradle! New commodities as carbon can follow-up iron and aluminum. Nature itself in all aspects is in the centre of all discussions today!
Experiments experiments / organic architecture in the making / tangent lines and projective geometry as a tool
After so many styles of architecture through the ages we ended in the most materialistic form ... the cube. The most non-spiritual mathematical structure of the salt crystal. represented in the Dead Sea! But it gave us the utmost freedom to think about sculpture, architecture, furniture and gardening. And today we're really in the middle of experimenting and discovering how lines, structures, surfaces, colors and materials give us the finest views, feelings and inner forces to work and live! The turning point towards living (organic) architecture was made by Frank Loyd Wright and Herzberger. In the magnificent House on the Waterfalls the connection between living inside and nature outside is made visible and became a real experience! In the multi-cubic office building of Centraal Beheer Assurance Company in Apeldoorn Netherlands the architect Herzberger opened up all cubes to make relations possible between all people in the building.
From container building to social networks! The beginning of using mathematical tangents not yet visible as in organic architecture, but already full-scale experience! The organic style today became worldwide fame with the ING Bank headquarters in Amsterdam (Bijlmer), built in a network of ten tower-structures which was also the most energy-efficient building in the world. This year it was chosen by the public as one of the most beautiful buildings.
Sustainable investing / worldwide bookkeeping / one stocks-exchange and perhaps world money in due time / wto and fair trade
Money is a mirror of all activities in society based on division of labour. To achieve more benefits for all we divide our labour in specializations and exchange the products and services again. The administration system is called money. When products or services are not available or not in time the value (price) changes to make exchange possible in the end. All other issues as international relations between countries, ethical labour, fair trade etc are manipulations or corrections on this process. The worldwide standard for financial reporting IFRS, a world currency in the making, the globalization of trade in the WTO discussions now, IMF and Central Banks together in Basel, and of course the Global Reporting Initiative GRI for good corporate governance will have the result that the world economy will become highly transparent and show us the real prices.
New York and Amsterdam Stock Exchanges also merged last year int NYSE-Euronext, Asia will follow in some years to make one world market for stocks. About fair trade and the whole discussion about dividing the wealth between two dollar a day and ten million a year can then become fully transparent how to look at the colors of the spectrum in between and how to talk about the right for a REASONable income for everybody. Then only then the world economy can grow fast forward, in quality and in quantity, in trade and in money, including sustainability. Because the need for survival and/or the greed to get more don't work anymore as brakes on development and innovation. We think!
World is getting smaller every day / from tourism to ecotourism to private projects / Meet & Greet
When oil will be replaced by solar energy in H2O tanks (prognosed within ten years by Dutch students of the University of Delft this summer who designed a hydrogen racing car) or by plug-in electricity the travelling possibilities will be almost unlimited for everybody. Combined with the possibilities of internet people will be able to communicate and meet&greet by wire&tyre! And the oil can be used for other products, tires, asphalt and plastics, anti-noise walls can disappear in the landscape to give a clear view on the horizons again, and with carbon cars the world can use steel for railways only. But who wants to go by train then?
Internet and mobile / citizen journalists / alternative news media / multi media
Although talking one-to-one is the basis of communication and telepathy the long distance variant of it, internet is the main route for all our communication today. And beyond that it is a medium also for all written information and can be used as archive as well, plus all kinds of applications in technique, design and our daily work in all different aspects. But even further it became a "tool" for everybody to become a citizen journalist, private researcher, a lifelong learning student, and a worldwide activist if necessary. Research, surgery, space shuttles, warfare and the rise of democracy worldwide, fair trade, world currency and financial reporting worldwide in the end. Communication has everything to do with exchange of information (systems) parallel to trade and travel and between people.
But direct communication as writing and reading, travelling and talking will always be there as the basic communication route for ALL twelve sense-organs!
International diplomacy and crises mediation / participative democracy / Europe as a test / proposals of citizens
Politics and diplomacy at work in the 21st century! No longer citizens are waiting for actions of action groups but rather start an action themselves via internet. Since 9/11 and the first three years after that where a kind of black&white thinking came up, people began to cooperate in all organizations more and more. The World Watch Institute spent the whole issue of their State of the World 2004 to the consumer/citizen! In 2005 the UN started with the Decade for Education in Sustainable Development DESD 2005-2014. The World Social Forum in Porto Alegre Brazil and the Economic World Forum in Davos Switzerland started up talking. And the systems of money, stocks, trade and financial reporting went globalizing too. Parallel to the cultural and economic globalization also political democratization went global. The EU referendum as an example, but also initiatives as PressNow to help papers, radio- and tv stations emerge in all countries, and last but not least the International Crisis Group that went into action to solve problems, moderate and start projects to prevent war. The same procedure in official governmental strategies is even called 3D - defense- diplomacy - development!
The whole world of parliaments will more and more grow forward into different kinds of direct democracies, where all parties have a say. The last missing link - civil society - is now integrating in United Nations, EU commissions and in more countries and local governments than ever.
Especially the Declaration of the Human Rights in 1948 was the first time in the history of mankind to write down ourselves the basic rules for living together, for a "social contract" Rules which the philosopher Rousseau, kings, priests and god himself did before us! Rules that now are also the basis for all kinds of discussions in parliaments, corporate governance and ...consumer laws.
After the consumer advocate Ralph Nader declared US cars "Unsafe at any Speed" consumer laws came into a current worldwide. Although the US and especially the state of California have a comprehensive system of consumer laws, the European commission for Consumer Affairs has developed a structure connecting laws of 27 countries. Plus an online educational program called Dolceta and a Europe Diary for all schoolchildren. So there's only one more step to go for a worldwide handbook and education ...
Read more www.ec.europa.eu/consumers
All kinds of human relations / consumer-trade-producer relations / consumer organizations
Multimedia, forums, and finally choosing our own networking are the three steps in modern time to create all kinds of associations to reach our cultural, social or economical goals. In cultural and social life we know it since centuries that people come together. But consumer-trade-producer relations including the finance of projects is very new! The rise of all kinds of consumer associations is also the proof that mankind has entered maturity in the 21st century!
Since more and more consumers in the US and the EU are now active to create new organizations in food and agriculture, with shopping cards, financing parts of the stocks, direct finance of farms (Pergola Associations), finally the civil society is participant in all twelve areas of the world economy!