The Transition Network is a growing network of over a thousand communities around the world. The network “supports community-led responses to climate change and shrinking supplies of cheap energy, building resilience and happiness.†The summer issue of the magazine Transition Free Press, which was published on 1 May 2013, contains four articles about arts projects that relate to the topics of sustainability and ecology in various ways. In summary:
Art and Science meet at new Bee Festival
The Louth Festival of the Bees, organised by Transition Louth in the United Kingdom in May 2013, combines biological sciences with an art exhibition, exploring “the relationships between the aesthetic and the rationalâ€.
“We may not, single-handed, be able to stop war, cure disease, end hunger, or save the planet, but we can, each of us, plant some flowers that give insects a better chance and make our world a little more beautiful,†writes Biff Vernon, a teacher who grows vegetables and flowers in Lincolnshire, and is, according to the magazine editor, “attempting to save the planet one Facebook post at a time.â€
“If we are to make the transition to a truly sustainable post-industrial society, protection of biodiversity must be an urgent priority. The festival aims to raise awareness of biodiversity, focussing particularly on wildflowers and all their pollinators,†Biff Vernon writes.
Louth Festival of Bees includes a Family Fun Day, Conference Day and Art Exhibition with stalls, exhibitions, children’s activities, workshops, talks about wild bees, wild flowers, beekeeping and art.
Anne-Marie Culhane, a performer, activist and catalyser of projects who lives in Cornwall in the United Kingdom, tells about the projects ‘Abundance’ and ‘The Diary Keepers’, about the festival ‘Grow Sheffield’, and about exploring the dynamic relationship between the artist and the community:
When Anne-Marie Culhane talks about Art, it is not as it is commonly understood, a commodity to be bought and owned, but a narrative co-created by people seeking to bring the earth and belonging into an urbanised culture.
“I’ve always been uncomfortable with the perception of an artist as a solitary creator who’s outside society,†she tells Transition Free Press.
To be resilient in the face of ecological and economic challenges, communities need to be adaptive and collaborative. As climate scientists admit, “we’re not managing to communicate properlyâ€. Because what inspires us to change are not dry facts, but celebration, creativity, and most of all, belonging:
“We can’t go into any meaningful thinking about the future unless we are examining how we live now, and the diversity of the way different people in the community live now: really looking, taking time, slowing down, observing our place within natural cycles, seeing what we share. So we can say: OK, this is where we’re at. From this point we can look forward.â€
Anne-Marie Culhane developed a project, ‘Diary Keepers’, to engage people into thinking about these things by keeping a diary for a month, where they would be trying to answer questions about what it is like to live now.
For Anne-Marie Culhane everything began when she came across climate change as a student of geography: “I was overawed by what it meant,†she said. Characteristically her first piece of work did not appear in a gallery, but in a city park in Leeds – twelve installations, actions and performances during one year.
“I began to ask: How can I support people to grow their own food, to be more knowledgeable about what they’re eating, to start seed-saving and seed-sharing and using organic and permaculture methods which nourish the land and communities? This where the main energy for ‘Grow Sheffield’ came from.
The idea was to hold a big season of events around harvest, giving people from different backgrounds lots of points of access – some creative, some more practical. We had guerrilla gardening in the city centre, a film screening and open space session in a local cinema, poetry walks and Allotment Soup, a celebration of allotment culture, with artists taking up mini-residencies on different allotments.â€
Her creative project ‘Abundance’ started from an idea about harvesting unwanted fruit from street trees, but it also quickly took foraging and growing stuff to another level and became about doing and being with people.
Jeppe D. Graugaard writes about ‘The Telling’ which he describes as “a new kind of grassroots, power-down, artistic event which draws on various forms of storytelling, performance, music and craft to explore what living through a time of transition means.
“Born in the imagination of Warren Draper, The Telling is inspired by The Dark Mountain Project and created on a DIY ethos as a reaction against the debilitating effect of the entertainment industry on folk culture.
The enchanting performance of Mr. Fox is just one of many that evening set in the post-apocalyptic Church View courtyard, which is adorned by a large mural by street artist Phlegm, depicting an archer sitting in a giant horn shooting down human bones tied to floating balloons. And the evening programme is just the culmination of a series of events and workshops that ran throughout the day: a pop-up cinema, the Sheffield City Giants (15 ft large puppets), bread-making, make-do-and-mend, a singing workshop, a talk on peace, and my absolute favourite: making iron in a clay foundry.
This diverse mix of activities and performances makes The Telling a place to be inspired and to learn practical skills at the same time.â€
Jeppe D. Graugaard is a writer and researcher at UEA, with an interest in grassroots movements and projects. More of his writing is available on patternwhichconnects.com
Arts book in the making: mapping arts and ecological living
Fifteen artists and writers gathered at a Writing Residency at Lumb Bank in Yorkshire to lay the first tracks down for a groundbreaking workbook – mapping ways in which the arts inspire a different way of living within the ecological limits of the planet, reported Lucy Neal.
“At Lumb Bank we glimpsed an everyday ‘art of living’ which now remains to build on and articulate over the next few months, as the book and the project come together.â€
“Stories shape the way that we act,†says Shaun Chamberlin, author of ‘The Transition Timeline’, in this interview which is an excerpt from the film ‘In Transition 1.0: From oil dependence to to local resilience’ from March 2012.
A transition art piece
About the art piece Oil Memorial
Another excerpt from the same film, ‘In Transition 1.0’.
Culture|Futures is an international collaboration of organizations and individuals who are concerned with shaping and delivering a proactive cultural agenda to support the necessary transition towards an Ecological Age by 2050.
The Cultural sector that we refer to is an interdisciplinary, inter-sectoral, inter-genre collaboration, which encompasses policy-making, intercultural dialogue/cultural relations, creative cities/cultural planning, creative industries and research and development. It is those decision-makers and practitioners who can reach people in a direct way, through diverse messages and mediums.
Affecting the thinking and behaviour of people and communities is about the dissemination of stories which will profoundly impact cultural values, beliefs and thereby actions. The stories can open people’s eyes to a way of thinking that has not been considered before, challenge a preconceived notion of the past, or a vision of the future that had not been envisioned as possible. As a sector which is viewed as imbued with creativity and cultural values, rather than purely financial motivations, the cultural sector’s stories maintain the trust of people and society. Go toThis post comes to you from Culture|Futures
Eight museums in the Tyne and Wear in the north east of the United Kingdom are taking action to address climate change. In April 2013, they launched a new initiative called ‘Make Carbon History’. The first goal is to reduce their carbon footprint by 12 percent within the next two years.
With the UK Government committing to reduce carbon emissions by 80 percent by 2050, museums across the north east of the country, in a region called Tyne and Wear, have decided they want to play their part in helping to achieve this target.
Led by Tyne and Wear Archives and Museums (TWAM) through the Museum Development Programme funded by Arts Council England, ‘Make Carbon History’ is a two-year programme of support that will enable museums to reduce their carbon footprint by 12 percent by 2015, whilst helping reduce their carbon footprint and become more sustainable. And not only that, they also want to help create a sustainable future for communities across the region.
“Art and culture has played a huge role in Tyne and Wear’s regeneration, however, the sector faces significant challenges ahead,†explains Sarah Carr, Senior Museum Development Officer at TWAM. According to her, the initiative is about creating a sustainable future for the region’s museums and in this way to ensure that they can continue to have a positive impact on the surrounding communities: “The purpose of museums is to inspire and educate, and I hope that the action we are taking to address climate change, will also influence museum audiences to look at how they can implement sustainability and reduce their own carbon footprint.â€
The not-for-profit low-carbon consultancy CO2Sense will work with the eight museums to identify and implement practical solutions to minimise their carbon emissions through reduced grid energy demand and sustainable facility management. These measures will allow the museums to reduce their energy bills, whilst also creating a more comfortable environment for visitors, staff and volunteers.
Environmental commitmentÂ
Tyne and Wear Museums is a grouping of 11 museums and galleries in the north east of England, administered by a joint board of local authorities. The group writes on its home page that its commitment is to provide “a world-class service that is sustainable and which aims to minimise the environmental impacts of our operations. We are committed to continually improving our green policies and will work to reduce our consumption of gas, electricity, water and other materials.â€
“The Director is fully committed to supporting the green campaign and champions green issues including setting a corporate objective in the organisation’s operational plan, chairing the TWAM Energy Reduction Group and ring-fencing an allocation of capital resources for sustainable ‘invest to save’ initiatives.
The Senior Management Team takes the lead on environmental performance, awareness and engagement activities for TWAM. Managers throughout the organisation are committed to improving the physical infrastructure and environmental management of their individual venues, and minimising the environmental impact of services they provide.
Staff are encouraged to participate in green polices and are kept up to date with green initiatives and activities through:
• Staff newsletter
• Quick tip emails to staff on energy saving and recycling
• Minutes of the Energy Reduction Group
TWAM has achieved the Julie’s Bicycle certification programme standard, Industry Green, which acknowledges its environmentally responsible business practices, and its commitment to ongoing improvement.
The Industry Green (IG) Standard is the environmental certification scheme managed by Julie’s Bicycle which provides an audit report of environmental performance covering energy, waste, water and travel.
The four core Industry Green criteria are:
• Commitment
• Understanding
• Improvement
• Communicationâ€
The museums across Tyne and Wear who are currently engaged in the programme are: Bebe’s World, Heugh Gun Batterty, Killhope Lead Mining Museum, Woodhorn Museum, Oriental Museum, Durham Light Infantry, Middlesborough Institute of Modern Art, and Hexham Old Gaol.
Culture|Futures is an international collaboration of organizations and individuals who are concerned with shaping and delivering a proactive cultural agenda to support the necessary transition towards an Ecological Age by 2050.
The Cultural sector that we refer to is an interdisciplinary, inter-sectoral, inter-genre collaboration, which encompasses policy-making, intercultural dialogue/cultural relations, creative cities/cultural planning, creative industries and research and development. It is those decision-makers and practitioners who can reach people in a direct way, through diverse messages and mediums.
Affecting the thinking and behaviour of people and communities is about the dissemination of stories which will profoundly impact cultural values, beliefs and thereby actions. The stories can open people’s eyes to a way of thinking that has not been considered before, challenge a preconceived notion of the past, or a vision of the future that had not been envisioned as possible. As a sector which is viewed as imbued with creativity and cultural values, rather than purely financial motivations, the cultural sector’s stories maintain the trust of people and society. Go toThis post comes to you from Culture|Futures
Apr 26, 2013 – Jun 22, 2013, at Pace Gallery, in New York (USA)
New work by Maya Lin exploring her longtime interest in environmental issues, including rising currents and climate change, and expanding her engagement with natural and geographic forms.Click here for the gallery’s website
An article on the exhibition was published in the New York Times (on April 25th):
“…in a sense, Hurricane Sandy also woke up Ms. Lin. Soon after the floodwaters receded, she decided she wanted her latest show at Pace — her first conceived specifically for a commercial gallery — to fix on Manhattan and its surrounding landscape, environmental history and waterways.“I really wanted people to understand more about literally what’s right under their feet,†she said. “I wanted to really focus on revealing aspects of New York, which we might not be thinking about from a natural, topographic, environmental point of view.â€
Her website, mentioned below, is well worth visiting:
“…the show’s most unexpected aspect is a space devoted to her Web site What Is Missing?(whatismissing.net), begun in 2011 as part of a larger memorial to vanishing species and habitats worldwide. “I see it as a guerilla artwork,†she said.â€
Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.
Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.
The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:
– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)
Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21
Legion Arts, 1103 Third Street SE Cedar Rapids, IA (USA), May 3 – June 16 2013
Legion Arts presents an exhibit in which a dozen contemporary artists from around the world explore issues related to water: droughts and floods, climate events and climate change, as well as the economics, distribution, uses and scarcity of this incomparable commodity. Trouble the Water is curated by Diane Barber, Houston, Texas.
Featured artists include Janet Biggs (New York), Erika Blumenfeld (Qatar), Maarten Demmink (Netherlands), Chris Turner with Helen Friel & Jess Deacon (UK), Sant Khalsa (California), Mark Klett (Arizona) & Byron Wolfe (California), Nathalie Miebach (Massachusetts), Carlos Montani (Argentina), Yuka Nakajima (Japan), Lori Nix (New York), Susannah Sayler & Edward Morris (New York), Dustin Yager (Minnesota).
Public reception from 5 to 7 pm on Friday May 3. Read more here
Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.
Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.
The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:
– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)
Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21
“At the forefront of today’s social issues are questions related to the human relationship to nature and the environment, the meaning of a sustainable future and the relationship of environmentalism to modernity and today’s economic structures. While the sciences have, until recently, dominated the debate, the arts are making an increasingly important contribution. Antennae is seeking submissions to an issue focused on Art, Environment, Sustainability. We are seeking contributions that go further than being a mere rehashing of the narrative of environmental activism (the human as destroyer of nature; the dangers of climate change; extinction of species; etc, etc.) to address more fundamental meanings, explore ambiguities and engage with the complex societal questions that arise from the environmental and sustainability debate – and the role of the arts in that debate. We encourage potential contributors to be bold and creative in generating and exploring perspectives that move beyond the apocalyptic and often “preachy†culture of modern environmentalism.â€
Academic essays = length 6000-10000 words
Artists’ portfolio = 5/6 images along with 500 words max statement/commentary
Interviews = maximum length 8000 words
Fiction = maximum length 8000 words
Cultura21 is a transversal, translocal network, constituted of an international level grounded in several Cultura21 organizations around the world.
Cultura21′s international network, launched in April 2007, offers the online and offline platform for exchanges and mutual learning among its members.
The activities of Cultura21 at the international level are coordinated by a team representing the different Cultura21 organizations worldwide, and currently constituted of:
– Sacha Kagan (based in Lüneburg, Germany) and Rana Öztürk (based in Berlin, Germany)
– Oleg Koefoed and Kajsa Paludan (both based in Copenhagen, Denmark)
– Hans Dieleman (based in Mexico-City, Mexico)
– Francesca Cozzolino and David Knaute (both based in Paris, France)
Cultura21 is not only an informal network. Its strength and vitality relies upon the activities of several organizations around the world which are sharing the vision and mission of Cultura21
Within the framework of the Joint Programme ‘EU-Brazil Sector Dialogues’, the Ministries of Culture and Planning, Budget and Management will hold a seminar on Culture and Sustainable Development, which will take place from 21 to 23 May 2013, in Brasilia, Brazil.
The seminar aims to strengthen the role of culture as a catalyst for global governance as well as to promote the importance of culture for sustainable development, exploring the three axes of this concept — social, economic and environmental.
The event will have three discussion tables, which will debate the contribution of culture to each of these three axes. These tables will be composed by distinguished guests from the European Union and Brazil, with recognized experience in the academic field, in public administration or in cultural production. At the closing session, there will be a moment to reflect on the relevance of culture as a fourth pillar of sustainable development, and how cultural cooperation between the EU and Brazil can strengthen the culture in global governance.
In order to enhance the quality of this dialogue, Olaf Gerlach-Hansen of Culture|Futures has been invited to take part in this seminar as a speaker who will address the theme ‘Culture and Environment’.
Programme description
The development of any culture arises from the constant interaction between the environment and human needs. As cultural identity and social stability may be strongly influenced by environmental conditions, cultural factors may influence consumption behaviors and attitudes related to environmental management. Therefore, culture and cultural diversity are key pieces for attitude changes towards environmental values.
On issues ranging from the erosion of biodiversity to climate change, cultural diversity has an important role to play in the way it addresses the current ecological challenges and ensure the future of sustainable environmental. In order to face the current ecological challenges, primarily technical and scientific responses are usually sought. However, the recognition that cultural practices are intimately linked to environmental integrity has been greater than ever.
There is an interdependence between biological diversity and cultural diversity, although is of little knowledge in what degree they relate. It goes far beyond what is commonly perceived in common sense. The reciprocity between both elements is clear: many cultural practices come, in its existence and expression, from certain specific elements of biodiversity. In a similar way, important sets of biological diversity are developed, maintained and administered by specific cultural groups, whose cultural aspects are the core of this special management practices.
The way of life of the majority of indigenous people embodies biodiversity. The cultural and religious beliefs, and spiritual values of these traditional societies, often have the effect of preventing predatory exploitation of resources and ensure the viability of the ecosystems on which they depend on.
The traditional indigenous practices of management and use of environmental resources, including construction techniques, represent a more sustainable way of land use, consumption and production, and also contribute to food security and access to water. These practices are based on a knowledge developed after centuries of adaptation. Therefore the concept of sustainable use of biological diversity — which is one of the three objectives of the Convention on Biological Diversity — is inherent in the indigenous and traditional society’s value systems.
Culture|Futures is an international collaboration of organizations and individuals who are concerned with shaping and delivering a proactive cultural agenda to support the necessary transition towards an Ecological Age by 2050.
The Cultural sector that we refer to is an interdisciplinary, inter-sectoral, inter-genre collaboration, which encompasses policy-making, intercultural dialogue/cultural relations, creative cities/cultural planning, creative industries and research and development. It is those decision-makers and practitioners who can reach people in a direct way, through diverse messages and mediums.
Affecting the thinking and behaviour of people and communities is about the dissemination of stories which will profoundly impact cultural values, beliefs and thereby actions. The stories can open people’s eyes to a way of thinking that has not been considered before, challenge a preconceived notion of the past, or a vision of the future that had not been envisioned as possible. As a sector which is viewed as imbued with creativity and cultural values, rather than purely financial motivations, the cultural sector’s stories maintain the trust of people and society. Go toThis post comes to you from Culture|Futures
Whether its climate change or the health of our oceans, air, and soil, the planet is worse off now than it was 40 years ago, and rapidly declining. Yet, corporations have more rights than our communities or ecosystems and are doing just fine.
This weekend I will be presenting a motion at the 2013 Irish National Green Party convention on ecocide; the post below explains why I’m trying to get the term ‘ecocide’ into the Irish political and public domains. If you are interested in measures against fracking and other environmental destruction, a law of ecocide and nature-based rights are developing in response. Please feel free to share this post.
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Could an ecocide law prevent environmental destruction?
One of the key concepts and terms in my PhD work ‘Seeing and Tending the Forest: beyond ecocide toward deep sustainability‘ is – ‘ecocide’.
‘Ecocide’ is a term I kept coming across in my research and reading. In fact I first used ecocide almost without thinking. To me it so well conveyed the exponential accelerating ecological suicide that is occurring globally. Particularly the horrifying rate of destruction since World War II, that some are calling ‘The Great Acceleration’, that characterises our now globalised, extract-at-all costs, industrial growth society.
However, one of the fundamental principles in undertaking doctoral level research is that you fully define all terms and concepts. I had some years ago been alerted by one of my blog followers that I should look at the work of UK legal barrister, Polly Higgins. Polly Higgins’ work in organising high profile mock legal trials against corporate ecocide, her award-winning books on ‘eradicating ecocide’, her well received ecocide talks has developed quickly in recent years to become an international campaign; to have corporate ecocide recognised in international law as the missing 5th international crime against peace.
What is ecocide?
In March 2010 Polly Higgins proposed to the United Nations that Ecocide be the 5th international Crime Against Peace. This is the definition she proposed:
Ecocide is the extensive damage to, destruction of or loss of ecosystem(s) of a given territory, whether by human agency or by other causes, to such an extent that peaceful enjoyment by the inhabitants of that territory has been or will be severely diminished.
Her website www.eradicatingecocide.com is a comprehensive resource for the history and current research into ecocide legal developments. It is also the site for the growing global campaigns to raise awareness of how we can all become involved in outlawing ecocide (taking part in the AVAAZ, Wish20 Eradicating Ecocide and if you live in Europe the endecocide.eu online petitions are a good place to start, you can also follow and share the posts from the Ecocide is a Crime Facebook Page too).
How can a law against ecocide work?
Polly Higgins and Thomas Linzey, a leading lawyer working in the US (quoted above),and growing numbers of leading international legal people and researchers, are arguing that in much the same way that slavery and disenfranchisement against women were perpetuated by seeing other races and women ‘as property’,that changing laws to overturn the erroneous idea that natural ecosystems be regarded as property, will powerfully and legally shift corporations away from committing crimes of ecocide.
This is not to underestimate that this is complex area (leading legal experts in universities, particularly some University of London legal researchers, are working hard to address all the many legal details on this issue) and I have only briefly highlighted the key point here. Yet this key point, to extend a legal, enforceable ‘duty of care’ to ecosystems would be a paradigm shift for humanity, and the corporate world in particular.
Corporations are legally mandated to produce profits; this law would fundamentally change corporations actions and enforce eco-social responsibility and accountability. This will in turn legalise long term sustainability for the earth’s life giving ecosystems.
Ecocide legal frameworks already exist and has been enforced
Ecocide has since been recognised legally from the Vietnam war onwards, and some legal redress for victims of ecocide has and is occurring.
Oddly unsettling in my reading about ecocide, is that I found the term is exactly the same age as me.
I say this as the term evolved in the late 1960s from recognising the criminality behind the long term destruction and poisoning of the forest and food ecosystems in the Vietnam war with industrial chemical herbicide agents such as Agent Orange (Monsanto/Dow Chemicals and other companies produced Agent Orange and an arsenal of other poisonous ‘rainbow agents’) used by the US military. Agent Orange in particular was noted for its disastrous long term residual poisoning of ecosystems and human populations with dioxins – lethal cancer and birth defect causing compounds, and other persistent effects of which health professionals and scientists are still realising and dealing with).
Ecocide law works: this is the card I have that gives me access to specialists doctors as my late father served and was fatally affected by the slow violence of Monsanto/Dow companies Agent Orange in the Vietnam war
Ecocide since Vietnam is legally recognised in war situations
As I’ve mentioned before in a previous post, this affected my family as my late father was a New Zealand Vietnam veteran. It was through the hard work of the NZ Vietnam Veterans associations and the then Labour Government under former Prime Minister Helen Clark, that a Memorandum of Understanding sought acknowledgement, compensation and redress to the children of NZ Vietnam veterans by the ecocide caused by these long lasting poisonous herbicides. My sisters and I are now on a official NZ Vietnam Veteran’s Children’s Register (my NZ Vietnam Veteran’s Children’s card is pictured here) that gives some support to descendants affected by cancers/diseases attributed to Agent Orange and the millions of tons of poisonous herbicides sprayed across Vietnam and other parts of Asia in the 20 000+ US military air raids (see notes at end of article for more details on this NZ landmark case).
On a personal note, my father, a very quiet man, could never speak easily of America or its culture again and the destruction he witnessed to a beautiful country and the peoples of Vietnam. I grew up knowing him interested in these things; reading the paper, vegetable growing, his love of the wild forested West Coast of the South Island of NZ, horse racing and Labour Party politics. He often bribed us as children (with chocolate) to deliver Labour Party political leaflets in our local area and he would have been so moved that it was the Labour Party that worked hard to bring some compensation to his engineer army colleagues and their surviving families (NZ sent 3,980 mainly non-combatant, engineer troops, to serve in the Vietnam war).
Nature-based rights development
Landmark nature-rights book, first published in 1972; now in 3rd edition, 2010, Oxford Uni. Press, USA
While the NZ military situation above is an example of legal retrospective redress for gross war-time ecocide, developments since the 1960s to bring the crime of ecocide into non-military situations have evolved slowly. Surprisingly there was much talk and legal efforts in bringing ecocide forward as a crime in non-war situations in the early 1970s due to the huge public awareness of the situation in Vietnam (many scientists signed an international petition to try and stop Agent Orange use during the Vietnam war) and the publication of Rachel Carson’s 1962 Silent Spring book alerted many to the long term environmental problems of pesticide/herbicide compounds. However such legal measures for non-war situations were stopped by several nations (see the eradicatingecocide.com website for more details). Even so, legal minds have for some decades further examined the idea of extending a legal duty of care to the non-human world, such as in the work and landmark book by US law lecturer and researcher, Christopher Stone, who wrote in 1972 Should Trees have Standing? – law, morality and the environment.
In recent years I have also noticed some nations in South America are leading the way for the ‘rights of nature’ to be legally recognised in their countries’ constitutional framework (for e.g Ecuador). Often such legislation is evolving with lawyers working with indigenous peoples, peoples who have not forgotten their nature-centred worldviews that respects all life, fundamentally ensuring long term sustainability for all species. Also in South America, one of the most important cases against corporate ecocide is ongoing, the multinational petrochemical Chevron is facing $18 billion in redress to thousands of indigenous peoples whose livelihoods and waters were affected by Chevron’s disregard of the gross and poisonous pollution it was creating (see Amazonwatch.org for details of this case – Chevron has engaged 64 law firms trying to overturn this decision!).
An online book of my great Grandmother’s 1890s paintings of the New Zealand Whanganui River. A river ecosystem that since 2012 is now one of the first in the world to have achieved legal agreement that ‘recognises the river and all its tributaries as a single entity, Te Awa Tupua, and makes it a legal entity with rights and interests, and the owner of its own river bed.’
And nature-based rights are developing in New Zealand. In fact, I was startled last August, while back in NZ to see that NZ’s third largest river, the Whanganui river, was granted legal standing from long years of work from Maori tribes and other river stakeholders. This river has a particular connection to my mother’s family as our Great Grandmother was an early European settler in the northern reaches of this river (I created a book on her paintings with my mother a few years ago – my great grandmother witnessed and painted both the beauty and the rampant deforestation by early European settlers way back in the 1890s near this river). Also last September I noticed online that the Green Party of England and Wales had invited Polly Higgins to their national convention and the Green Party of England and Wales unanimously adopted a motion to support a motion against ecocide. I made a promise to myself back then that I would at some stage attempt to bring it to the attention to the Irish and New Zealand Green Parties (NZer’s, please feel free to share this post) in a hope it would spread across the political and public domains.
Law against corporate ecocide and nature-based rights could prevent fracking, other ecosystem destruction
Land and water degradation – gas and coal extraction, sewage sludge, factory farms, massive water withdrawals, landfills, and more could be addressed
Over the last few months, I was busy with other aspects of my project but I was fortunate to come across a new book Earth at Risk (Dec, 2012) from leading US author/activist/deep green philosopher Derrick Jensen. In it I read a fascinating interview by Derrick with US lawyer Thomas Linzey. While Polly Higgins has been tackling ecocide law at an international/UN level, I was excited to read Thomas Linzey also describe how modern law often legally enables ecocide and how despite the best of intentions, environmentalism has largely failed. I was even more excited to read how Thomas was working from the ground up, assisting grassroot local communities across the United States, to stop fracking and other forms of pollution or degradation in their areas etc by fundamentally changing the legal framework in regards to their local environments. Thomas Linzey is founder of the Community Environment Legal Defense Fund (CELDF), an organisation which since 1995 has been assisting and educating ordinary concerned citizens in towns and municipalities to fight for new nature/community based rights. In recent months, its been great to see on the eradicatingecocide.com website, both Polly’s and Thomas’s new legal ideas and work are beginning to influence local and international law. On the CELDF website you can also see how rights based successes are spreading across the US, with some communities having success in preventing fracking in their localities.
Here is a short video trailer from an upcoming documentary film from Thomas Linzey on the work that the CELDF organisation is undertaking (note, you’ll see the NZ Whanganui River rights case briefly highlighted in this trailer too). Thomas’ groundbreaking plenary 30 min speech from a US Bioneers conference is also worth listening to, see here) .
If you are involved in local politics, concerned about fracking or other types of environmental destruction, I would also recommend you watch the more detailed video below by Thomas on how this area of legal reform is developing swiftly across many US states.
Higgins and Linzey’s work acknowledges that ecocide is a crime and a move to install nature/community based rights are important and urgent. In my own writings I point out that ecocide isn’t just happening in the Arctic or the Amazon, that the slow violence of ecocide, in our culture and local environments, threads its way through our everyday lives. To me, short rotation monoculture tree plantations are a form of ecocide, leading to eventual soil fertility collapse and limiting severely resilient ecosytems from developing; the very opposite of an ecosystem thriving sustainably in the long term. My work will continue to show alternatives to industrial forestry. Perhaps one day I might even fight for legal standing for the small forest in which I live, a living community that supports me and which I am interdependently connected to.
***
I will be proposing that the following motion will be adopted by the Irish Green Party on 13 April 2013. My thanks to Carlow Law lecturer John Tully, former Green Minster for Equality, Mary White, Cllr Malcolm Noonan, Dr. Paul O’Brien, Martin Lyttle, Dr. Rhys Jones, Alan Price, Duncan Russell, Nicola Brown, John Hogan and others for enthusiastically supporting my proposing this motion.
‘The Irish Green Party supports the proposition that a crime of ecocide be created in international law, as a crime against nature, humanity and future generations, to be defined as ‘the extensive damage to, destruction of or loss of ecosystem(s) of a given territory, whether by human agency or other causes, to such an extent that peaceful enjoyment by the inhabitants (human and non-human) of that territory has been or will be severely diminished’; and that the proposed crime of ecocide be formally recognised as a Crime against Peace subject to the jurisdiction of  the International Criminal Court.’
Do take a minute to sign and share the petitions, click on the links above or the AVAAZ and also the End Ecocide in Europe (if you live in Europe) logos at the bottom of this page. If a million Europeans sign the End Ecocide in Europe it helps enforce an EU wide directive against corporate ecocide (170 000+ have signed so far).
Please feel free to share this post and comments are always welcome. Thanks for reading. (Please add the #ecocide hastag if you are reposting this article)
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Notes on redress for Vietnam veterans and their children in NZ
In December 2006, the New Zealand Government, the Ex-Vietnam Services Association (EVSA) and the Royal New Zealand Returned and Services Association (RNZRSA) agreed to, and signed, a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) following the recommendations of the Joint Working Group, designated with advocacy for Veteran’s concerns.[7] The MoU provides formal acknowledgement of the toxic environment New Zealand Vietnam Veterans faced during their service abroad in Vietnam, and the after-effects of that toxin since the service men and women returned to New Zealand. The MoU also makes available various forms of support, to both New Zealand Vietnam Veterans and their families.[8] New Zealand writer and historian, Deborah Challinor, includes a new chapter in her second edition release of Grey Ghosts: New Zealand Vietnam Veterans Talk About Their War that discusses the handling of the New Zealand Vietnam Veterans’ claims, including the Reeves, McLeod and Health Committee reports, and the reconciliation/welcome parade on Queen’s Birthday Weekend, 2008, also known as ‘Tribute 08′.[9]
From 1962 until 1987, the 2,4,5T herbicide was manufactured at an Ivon Watkins-Dow plant in Paritutu, New Plymouth which was then shipped to U.S. military bases in South East Asia.[10][11][12] There have been continuing claims that the suburb of Paritutu has also been polluted.[13][14]
An Arts & Ecology Notebook, by Cathy Fitzgerald, whose work exists as ongoing research and is continually inspired to create short films, photographic documentation, and writings. While she interacts with foresters, scientists, and communities, she aims to create a sense of a personal possibility, responsibility and engagement in her local environment that also connects to global environmental concerns. Go to An Arts and Ecology Notebook
Slick Sunset, N 57.14.07 W 111.35.15, Shell Albian Sands, Alberta, Canada, Louis Helbig, with permission
Louis Helbig’s talk on his project Beautiful Destruction yesterday afternoon at Edinburgh College of Art brought together some interesting elements: environmental destruction in remote northern Alberta, national economic benefits, the role of the arts, the relevance of this to Scotland, Jim Hansen’s arguments about tipping points in climate change, the need for civic discourse and the uses of restorative justice techniques.
Louis presented on the Alberta Tar Sands highlighting the scale of the environmental and economic impact. The Tar Sands cover something like an area the size of England. There has been an investment over the past 10 years of something like $300 billion into this industry and investors represent every country in the world with an active oil industry. Canada has derived a massive economic benefit from the Alberta Tar Sands allowing it to ride out the global economic crisis and become an oil exporter.
Louis articulated his interest in the Alberta Tar Sands coming from the experience of flying, with his partner Kristin Reimer, over the workings and being amazed at the scale, whilst also being astounded at the lack of civic discourse in Canadian society. He described the polarisation of debate in Canada between the environmentalists and the industrialists, and he offered a critique of the environmentalists in terms of their lack of engagement with the subject over an extended period during the development of the industry. Canadian environmental NGOs have, according to Louis, largely ignored the Tar Sands until recently.
Scott Donaldson, Portfolio Manager at Creative Scotland, reminded us that Jim Hansen,  recently retired Director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies and one of the foremost scientists and more recently activists has specifically highlighted the development of Canada’s Tar Sands as a key indicator. Scientific American said this year,
His acts of civil disobedience started in 2009, and he was first arrested in 2011 for protesting the development of Canada’s tar sands and, especially, the Keystone XL pipeline proposal that would serve to open the spigot for such oil even wider. “To avoid passing tipping points, such as initiation of the collapse of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet, we need to limit the climate forcing severely. It’s still possible to do that, if we phase down carbon emissions rapidly, but that means moving expeditiously to clean energies of the future,†he explains. “Moving to tar sands, one of the dirtiest, most carbon-intensive fuels on the planet, is a step in exactly the opposite direction, indicating either that governments don’t understand the situation or that they just don’t give a damn.†23 Jan 2013
Hansen’s argument makes Canada’s tar sands everyone’s business, but the issue of energy and land is one where Canada is only an extreme example.  This point was raised by Gemma Lawrence of Creative Carbon Scotland.  Harry Giles, Environment Officer for Festivals Edinburgh noted that there are a significant number of applications for open-cast coal currently before the Scottish Government, as well as numerous applications for major renewables installations. All of these, for better or for worse, are driven by our addiction to cheap energy, and politicians commitment to “keep the lights on.â€
Louis kept emphasising the need for a civic discourse, rather than throwing stones at each other from extreme positions. There was a sense in the room that this was an unusual position for an artist to take. Are we more used to artists aligning themselves with environmental campaigners, than trying to open up a centre ground that enables all parties to engage in the discourse?
Louis kept returning to the experiences of speaking with individuals who worked in the industry, electricians or truck drivers rather than corporate executives, and how they, when faced with an artists’ representation of the beautiful destruction, articulated their own conflicted views.
Although it wasn’t raised in the formal discussion, the idea of restorative justice was also present, and perhaps needs to be explored. Kristin Reimer, Louis’ partner, is currently in Scotland to research restorative justice programmes in Scottish schools. Restorative justice is broadly speaking an approach that seeks to address the needs of both the victims and the offenders. It provides a space in which offenders, including those who have committed the most serious crimes, can be confronted by their victims. It is not a space of stone-throwing or media manipulation.
Given that we are all implicated in the self-destructive culture of cheap energy (even if energy doesn’t necessarily seem cheap in Scotland at the moment) do we not need the means by which to face each other, and talk about the problems, not as a soft option, but as a way to see that we all benefit economically from cheap energy and we all need to change our ways.
ecoartscotland is a resource focused on art and ecology for artists, curators, critics, commissioners as well as scientists and policy makers. It includes ecoartscotland papers, a mix of discussions of works by artists and critical theoretical texts, and serves as a curatorial platform.
It has been established by Chris Fremantle, producer and research associate with On The Edge Research, Gray’s School of Art, The Robert Gordon University. Fremantle is a member of a number of international networks of artists, curators and others focused on art and ecology. Go to EcoArtScotland
Creative Carbon Scotland is a partnership of arts organisations which puts culture at the heart of a sustainable Scotland.
We provide a range of services which help the cultural sector achieve this goal. These include:
Training in carbon measurement and reporting;
Initiating special projects which engage organisations, artists and audiences in the sustainability debate and inspiring behavioural change;
Lobbying government, funding bodies, organisations and artists for the role of the arts in building a more sustainable Scotland.
Our work will help Scotland’s cultural sector to be at the forefront of current debate on climate change by influencing public awareness and inspiring behavioural change as well as providing practical support in carbon management and strategic planning projects.
This is in line with likely future funding requirements from Creative Scotland which will require arts organisations to report their carbon emissions in line with Scottish Government policy and following a similar move by the Arts Council England.
ecoartscotland is a resource focused on art and ecology for artists, curators, critics, commissioners as well as scientists and policy makers. It includes ecoartscotland papers, a mix of discussions of works by artists and critical theoretical texts, and serves as a curatorial platform.
It has been established by Chris Fremantle, producer and research associate with On The Edge Research, Gray’s School of Art, The Robert Gordon University. Fremantle is a member of a number of international networks of artists, curators and others focused on art and ecology. Go to EcoArtScotland
The deadline for all strands is Thursday 22 March 2013.
There are several strands:
Open Call for Ideas – ideas for artworks that connect aspects of land, sustainability, energy, coast, rural living, Biosphere, Dark Skies, climate change, ecosystem services, transport, etc. and are relevant or connected to Dumfries and Galloway.  These could be small or large ideas.  Proposals are invited from any discipline.
Ten ideas will be selected to receive small grants towards their development. Â They will be included in the Environmental Art Festival in some form (depending on the stage of development).
Commissions – temporary installations for the duration of the festival (30 August to 2 September 2013) addressing the theme of “energy and the landâ€.  There is a budget of £5,000 for each commission.  Commissions can be across a wide range of media including visual art, sound, film, digital media, text based or combinations.  The Environmental Art Festival is looking to demonstrate cutting edge art practices engaged with ecology, nature or land art which is moving, meaningful and dynamic.  The
Venues, Places, Organisations – Wide Open is interested in hearing from Venues, Places or Organisations with existing or planned activity that fits with the themes of the Environmental Art Festival.
ecoartscotland is a resource focused on art and ecology for artists, curators, critics, commissioners as well as scientists and policy makers. It includes ecoartscotland papers, a mix of discussions of works by artists and critical theoretical texts, and serves as a curatorial platform.
It has been established by Chris Fremantle, producer and research associate with On The Edge Research, Gray’s School of Art, The Robert Gordon University. Fremantle is a member of a number of international networks of artists, curators and others focused on art and ecology. Go to EcoArtScotland
The Transition Network is a growing network of over a thousand communities around the world. The network “supports community-led responses to climate change and shrinking supplies of cheap energy, building resilience and happiness.†The summer issue of the magazine Transition Free Press, which was published on 1 May 2013, contains four articles about arts projects that relate to the topics of sustainability and ecology in various ways. In summary:
