28th Aurelio Peccei Lecture in Brussels by Agni Vlavianos-Arvanitis

December 14th, 2005: The Brussels-EU Chapter of the Club of Rome invited to a lecture by Dr. Agni Vlavianos-Arvanitis, President and Founder of the Biopolitics International Organisation, Athens, about "Biopolicy - Building New Values for the Millennium". Details are available for download.

CACOR Luncheon with Marie Elena Tracey O'Donnell

December 14th, 2004: The Canadian Association for the Club of Rome organized a Luncheon Meeting with Marie Elena Tracey O'Donnell on the topic "Aboriginal World Views and Stewardship in Canada" The central message of this presentation was that fundamental changes are required if the world is to be a better place for all. There are deep-rooted and entrenched beliefs that man dominates nature - the world around him. Political, scientific and corporate leaders, the media and the public have consistently failed to acknowledge and integrate the First Nations in their approaches to dealing with nature and the world around them. Integrating First Nation's teachings and ideologies into environmental or ecological plans and resource development plans will create more efficient, equitable and sustainable solutions to the current environmental and development issues facing the world today.

Marie Elena Tracey O'Donnell is a member of the Red Rock Indian Band located south and east of Thunder Bay, Ontario. Tracey is currently an elected Bencher of the Law Society of Upper Canada - the first aboriginal woman ever elected. As well, she volunteers on a variety of community-based committees, Boards of Directors and Boards of Governors.

More information can be found on the CACOR Website The http://www.cacor.ca .

Symposion "Zukunftsperspektiven der Gesellschaft"

December 2-3, 2005: a symposion on Future Perspectives of Society was organized in Vienna by the Austrian Chapter and the European Support Centre of the Club of Rome. The focus was on the influence of the presently dominating ways of globalisation on the individual citizen and on the social capital of society. For long, it has been overseen that the loss of natural capital is closely related to the loss of social capital and that a sustainable development is not possible in societies which have less and less "bridging and bonding" between their members.

Ewald Nowotny spoke about "Sachzwang Ökonomie?
- Was zählt der Mensch?"

Among the speakers there were: Jakob von Uexküll (Founder, World Future Council), Uwe Möller (COR Secretary Genral), Ewald Nowotny (future Generaldirektor of BAWAG-PSK Bank), Wilfried Stadler (Generaldirektor of Investkredit Bank AG), Siegfried Sellitsch (President of the Austrian Chapter of the Club of Rome), Ernst Gehmacher (BOAS and member of the Austrian Chapter), Friedrich Hinterberger (SERI and member of the Austrian Chapter), Helmut Reinalter, (University Innsbruck and member of the Austrian Chapter), Alfred Pritz (Gründungsrektor of Sigmund Freud University) and other high level experts in the field. The conference website is http://esc.clubofrome.org/perspektiven.

27th Aurelio Peccei Lecture in Brussels by Mathis Wackernagel

November 24th, 2005: The Ecological Footprint is a policy tool to drive sustainability. It is a standardized way to measure what has been immeasurable, contentious, and often misunderstood: ecological limits. Mathis Wackernagel, co-creator of this tool and executive director of Global Footprint Network, showcased applications from around the world with government agencies, NGOs, businesses, cities, highlighting how they have used the tool for advancing human well-being within the means of one planet. The invitation can be downloaded here.

26th Aurelio Peccei Lecture in Brussels by Ping Chen

November 22nd, 2005: Prof. Ping Chenhe was one of the reform scientists who systematically criticized traditional agriculture policy and strategic thinking in China. The major policy proposals for China's reform are: agricultural policy based on ecological constraint, dismantling the state monopoly system for purchase and marketing in agriculture, introducing patent system, regional integration policy based on energy co-development in East Asia, developing credit system in financial market, and breaking monopoly in state banking. More info can be downloaded here.

World Summit on the Information Society: Three Events

November 16-18, 2005: In co-operation with WorldSpace and UNESCO, there were three events at the World Summit on the Information Society in Tunis.

Raoul Weiler and Roland Burger open the workshop on capacity-building

On November 16th, the results of the Club of Rome/UNESCO World Conference were presented. These included results on low-cost technology and critical success factors. The proceedings of the conference as written publication and the conference DVD, which includes an Ubuntu Linux software, were also presented.

On November 17th, there was a workshop on "ICT for Sustainability and Environmental Issues". The workshop included presentations on the ecobalance of paper versus electronic documents, on the use of GIS for environmental monitoring, on electronic waste, on policy options and the introduction of a satellite radio which was powered by a lamp that can be fuelled by renewables.

Nicholas Negroponte presents the 100-Dollar-Laptop project

On November 18th, there was a presentation of the 100-Dollar-Laptop project by Nicholas Negroponte, MIT. The idea is to equip every child with such a device that is run with a Linux system and supplied with energy by a wind-up mechanism. The challenge will be to scale software and hardware down in order to have an efficient and easily usable device.

The programme of the events is available for download.

Aurelio Peccei Lecture in Rome by Jared Diamond

November 15, 2005: Jared Diamond, author of "The Third Chimpanzee", "Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies" and "Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed" gave the 2005 Aurelio Peccei Lecture in Rome and presented the Italian version "Collasso". There were introductions by Roberto Peccei and Carlo Alberto Bonadies and interventions by Piero Angela, Gianfranco Bologna, Alessandro Lanza, Antonio Navarra and Giulio Sapelli. The invitation can be downloaded here. For more detailed information please contact Mr. Gianfranco Bologna, Secretary General of the Aurelio Peccei Foundation.

25th Aurelio Peccei Lecture in Brussels by Vandana Shiva

November 15th, 2005: In the 25th Aurelio Peccei Lecture, Vandana Shiva spoke about Eco-feminism in historical Perspective: From the Enlightenment to the 21st Century. Diversity is fast moving into the defining metaphor in place of monocultures of the mind. Eco-feminism has emerged as a serious challenge to Cartesian reductionism and the Baconian "rape of nature" as the "masculine mode" of knowing. Globalization is however threatening to the ecological gains of the past few decades. More info can be downloaded here.

Ted Mosquin spoke at CACOR

November 8th, 2005: "A Manifesto for Earth" by Ted Mosquin and Stan Rowe was published in early 2004 in the journal 'Biodiversity.' The text of the Manifesto is available on the web at http://www.ecospherics.net/ . At a meeting of the Canadian Assciation for the Club of Rome (CACOR), Ted Mosquin discussed the rationale behind the Manifesto, reviewed its eleven Principles, and commented on the response to date. The invitation can be downloaded here.

World Ethics and Sustainability - Discussion in the Dutch Association

November 3rd, 2005: The relationship between World Ethics and Sustainability was the topic of an event in the Dutch Association of the Club of Rome. Jacqueline Cramer spoke abaout sustainable enterprises, Koo van der Wal discussed sustainability, globalisation and ethics and Toos van Noordwijk-van Veen discussed ethics after stating: "Na ons de zondvloed? Leer alle kinderen zwemmen!". Information on the event (in Dutch language) is available for download.

Meadows' 30 Years Update Available in Finnish

October 28th, 2005: The environmental classic, Limits to Growth: The 30-Year Update has been published in Finland. The book was published in october in the Finlands biggest book fair in Helsinki. One of the authors, professor Jørgen Randers form Oslo, Norway came to Finland to present the book to the finnish public. “The earths resources are limited, and we are near to reach these limits”, said professor Randers when he was presenting the book in Finland. “But there are also good news, we do have the technology to reach more sustainable development, and we still have time make a change in our policies. What we need is a political will for change” stressed professor Randers while in Helsinki.

More information (in Finnish) on the event and on the book is available from the Website of the Finnish Association in the News Section.

CoR/UNESCO World Conference Book and CD

Following an initiative by Raoul Weiler, President of the Brussels-EU Chapter of the Club of Rome, the CoR and UNESCO had co-organized in Paris a three-day World Conference on Harnessing the Potential of ICT for Capacity Building.

A DVD is now available which contains quite a variety of information and includes useful software:

   - the complete webcast archive of the conference,
   - a summary video,
   - the proceedings book,
   - additional info about the Club of Rome,
   - Wikipedia info,
   - info about the 100 Dollar laptop project,
   - and a bootable version of Ubuntu Linux

the CD is available free of charge via the European Support Centre of the Club of Rome (ESC) via office.europe@clubofrome.at. The book can be ordered for a fee of 8 Euro or is available for download on the World Conference website.

CACOR Proceedings January 2006 available

The January 2006 issue deals with the following topics:

- A Leadership Opportunity for Canada (by Andrew A.A.D. Clarke);
- A Plan for Global Powerdown (by Richard Heinberg);
- Considering a Future of Possibilities, The “Report Project” Process (by Sheila Murray and Gail Stewart);
- A Strategy for a National and International Population Policy (by J. Anthony Cassils);
- The Human Journey; Genuine Progress and Well-Being Indicators (by Fred G. Thompson);
- Significant Quotes

The publication is available for download.