Posted By Halina Ward
on 15 September, 2009
FOUNDATION FOR DEMOCRACY AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
PRESS RELEASE
Climate Policy could threaten democratic freedoms, warns NGO
EMBARGOED TO 00:01 GMT, 15th September 2009
In an open letter to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon published on their new website today, the second International Day of Democracy, UK-based non-governmental organisation the Foundation for Democracy and Sustainable Development (FDSD) warn that unless governments step up immediate efforts to tackle climate change, the result could be significant incursions into future democratic freedoms.
As the UN and supporting organisations around the world celebrate democracy today, they know that there are some formidable environmental and natural …
Posted By John Elkington
on 11 September, 2009
The Environment Foundation – now the Foundation for Democracy and Sustainable Development – originated in the world of insurance, as perhaps the City of London’s first major environmental initiative. The core funding came from a levy on environmental impairment insurance policies, a market which proved to be highly problematic, particularly after the introduction of the ‘Superfund’ legislation in the USA. It’s an extraordinary fact that some 20% of the losses that almost brought the Lloyds insurance market to its knees related to such policies – and to the losses incurred in underwriting risks linked to such issues as asbestosis, contaminated …
Posted By Halina Ward
on 10 September, 2009
One common question in our work is ‘what sorts of changes could help to get democracy working for sustainable development? Give me some examples’.
One answer is to point to existing examples of innovations designed to help parliaments to integrate long-term thinking into their decisions.
There are three examples and one idea that I want to highlight here.
In Israel, the Knesset passed legislation to enable the creation of a Commission for Future Generations, a non-political entity which operated from 2001 until 2006.
The Commission’s functions lay in four areas: providing opinions on bills, secondary legislation and regulation of …
Posted By Halina Ward
on 5 September, 2009
We want to open our Blog to invited guest bloggers, and we’re pleased to post below a first contribution from Alejandro Litovsky, who heads the Pathways to Scale programme with our friends at Volans.
You can also find Alejandro’s post on the Volans website, here.
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‘Radical’ is not the word that is most often used to describe the European Commission’s President, Jose Manuel Barroso. Over the last two years, his efforts to align European countries behind ambitious climate targets have run into the inevitable stalemate and compromise.
But as Barroso unveils his new ‘manifesto’, intended to …
