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The concept of 'sustainable development' emerged with the Brundtland Report and in 1992, during the Rio Summit it was set forth as an overall shared goal for global development. It was introduced and defined as a broad concept and was soon to be adopted as a plus keyword. No country and no organisation have failed to include 'sustainability' in their vocabulary. However, sad as it may seem, this proved to be insufficient! In 1997, at the Rio+5 meeting in New York it became clear that globally speaking, very few advances towards the targets of the Rio Summit had materialised. By 1997 the environment was actually in a worse condition than in 1992. A development to confirm our hopes - that it is indeed possible to provide better living conditions for people, without endangering the global environment and fundamental conditions of life and diversity - has yet to emerge. In other words, the state of affairs means we are faced with a defined goal that (so far) we have been unable to fulfil.
One hitch is that when taken with all its implications, our goal of an ecologically sustainable development is inconsistent with our very concepts of nature and development. Therefore, given our present understanding, we are unable to translate them into new value systems and action patterns. In Denmark we may well feel that we have gone a long way; yet we need to realise that even a long-standing and devoted effort, including eco-education and public enlightenment, has done little to fundamentally change our way of life. Nor did it change the indomitable expansion of the growth and consumer society. We are still on a collision course with our own nature, and our ecological basis is at risk.
Environmental protection or love for Planet Earth
So far, most eco-education has been of a problem oriented nature, addressing the mind. We seemed to believe that adequate information and enlightenment, combined with a 'green trend in education' would invariably produce the required behavioural changes. As we have seen, this assumption only proved true to a limited extent. Moreover, we based our nature and eco-education, as well as our entire nature and environmental management on an understanding of nature as being something separate, beyond ourselves, that we need to protect.
Yet, our task is not 'to protect nature/the environment. Our task is to change our own attitude, our way of thinking. Obviously, nature doesn't need protection against snakes, owls and oaks. Protecting nature or the environment just won't do and never will, since basically the notion of 'protecting' reflects a defensive approach. 'Nature protection' will wait for things to happen, and will reduce our relationship with nature into a question of merely complying with rules and regulations. Instead, we need to make it a matter of the heart, or a matter of love. Once we put our hearts into it, the rest is bound to follow. Basically, a new and transformational eco-education needs to spring from love for nature, for Gaia or whatever we wish to name, the wholeness that we are born of and embedded in with our breath, our metabolism, and our senses. A sense of all life being one, tied to that same unity, so when harming the whole, we'll harm ourselves, and vice versa.
Dialogue across borders and mental barriers
In the long run, even the most sophisticated environmentally friendly technology won't be able to prevent the destruction of our ecological basis, unless simultaneously we change our own attitude towards nature, as mentioned above. But how can we do so? What is it that we, Homo sapiens, need to learn? Where did we go wrong?
We need an open-minded and free dialogue, free of vested interests and rigid viewpoints, one where we forget the quick answers and excuses. Instead starting to question ourselves in a more fundamental way - our own understanding of nature and development, and the resulting educational practice - in order to understand and identify the roots of the crisis facing our civilisation.
We need dialogue rather than monologue, between people, and between people and nature; a dialogue across borders and mental barriers in which we grasp and comprehend the world anew.
We know that world-wide, people are concerning themselves with similar questions and deliberations, and that much valuable experience is gained in the process. But also that much of the time individuals tackle these issues in not very sympathetic environments.
The Internet has enabled us to build links between like-minded people, regardless of distance. The Eco Net wishes to extend and promote this development by offering an international homepage. Our goal is to invite schools, universities, NGOs, projects, and also people working with the ecology aspects of projects, education and enlightenment to join this dialogue and share their experience, ideas, thoughts, wishes and dreams for a comprehensive 'earth education for life'.
However, electronic meetings are not to replace the meeting in flesh, so we also want to arrange a seminar on these issues. The seminar will address teachers and all those involved in any form of public enlightenment on every level. Also those who devote themselves to these issues and who wish to take part in this dialogue on how people can learn to live a harmless life on earth, as harmless as that of a shark or a hyena.
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