THE AGREEMENT, page 22
Naman carried on, “In the early stages of its development, the universities and the intelligentsia were openly supportive of the knowledge economy as it was then proffered. A mechanism for wresting some wealth from the intellectual dimensions of the developing technology and services needed in the changing world. However, there were some who understood the possibilities were not just economic. Initially this underworld of intellectual possibility was almost clandestine. Eventually, the bombings and suicides, the deaths and carnage, the degradation of our planet, the helplessness, and the futility of it all merged into a perfect storm. A return from a tentative start to the recognition of the benefits of a global economy which had been cancelled by the United States of America, as it was then, with an isolationist power grab based on a fundamental Christian belief system ensconced in a written constitution from the 18th Century. Combined with the first health pandemic for almost one hundred years, these events helped us recognise the need to take this opportunity and change some fundamental mindsets in many governments. That was started in about 2060, and all humanity, we hoped, would be better for it.”
‘Mind you,” he continued, “The truth is that no matter which course we take, no matter what religion or ideology, people will and should compete. They seek to be on the top of the pile. In personal relationships we have learned not to do this so much, but many still do. Dishonest and fraudulent activities are still a menace we need to constantly identify and neutralise. Women are still treated very poorly in some communities. Gender identification remains a certain challenge for some as well. In our national communities we still fail the test of being on the same side against the unbeatable odds of nature. We still fail to recognise that the real challenge is not the point of view of non-democratic leaders or the demagoguery of a few, but most often by our own failures to grasp the reality we all face; this planet can only support us if we support it. It is no longer acceptable to consider that everyone else needs to nurture the planet systems, but we are the power, we are the mind-setting cohort that determines how we behave, and we are entitled to do as we wish. Fortunately, however, in the over two hundred countries we have brought together, we now have a stronger cohort who know, who really understand, that the enemy is ourselves, and that failure to work together will destroy us all.”
“Naman,” interjected Sha, “You forget that while we might think so, many still do not. Many still wonder if this power will eventually be re-distributed and when, if ever, will they too see the benefits. You now have an opportunity, perhaps I might even suggest a responsibility, to lead more of them into the world we dream of building for all to enjoy. You must surely carry on. You can make it happen. If not you, we must find someone who does understand that need. Interesting as it may be to revisit the separation policies of the United States, surely you must either also discuss the isolationist policies of Russia, China, Japan, Nigeria and Venezuela and many others in more recent times? Otherwise perhaps you don’t refer to that at all assuming we all know the history. Remember the United States is no longer the pinnacle of our endeavours. We must ensure the whole membership is along with us on this journey, mustn’t we?”
Her husband listened carefully whenever she interrupted him. He wanted to be clear he understood her meaning. He respected her intellect because he knew she was smart. That accounted for their successful partnership, at least in part. He also knew that none of us could judge our own external influences better than close friends and confidants. While he may feel intimidated, or dominant, in an area, he knew he had to listen most carefully to his wife, and to his other trusted friends and advisers. History has a trail of people, mostly men, who have achieved a controlling power over a lot of others, and then stopped listening or consulting. Interestingly to Naman, history records these men thought they were listening, but they didn’t have the skills or the determination to account for those critical voices and include their authors inside the completion model. It used to be understood that demagogues were the enemy of us all. Since the President of a so-called democracy, the United States of America, bullied his personal agenda onto the three hundred and fifty million citizens at that time, and a Prime Minister of the United Kingdom believed he was invincible, and a democratically elected leader of Canada considered abolishing the state parliaments, to name a few of the most unlikely of them, it was now clearly understood that anarchy could be deceptive in its implementation. It was not only the result of militarised ambition.
A moment of silence passed.
Naman continued, “We have learned a lot from these last one hundred years. Fundamentalism is extremism, and just as religious extremism has been our downfall, so has democratic extremism been an unfortunate experiment. We know that until large sectors of the population of a community are educated and receiving a comfortable living standard that allows them to enjoy hope and success, until they and their children can rely on these fundamentals, we will have anger and hatred sufficient to destroy all of humanity. Communism, socialism, democracy, and militaristic takeovers et al, every one of them at an extreme level fails to provide for the people who inhabit their communities and countries. The strongest democracies typically reverted to a two-party conference. That meant the parties controlled the governing agenda and the party who won the election spent a lot of time and energy seeking to uphold their popularity. In the other realms of governance, where there was typically only one party, their energy was frequently spent preparing to defend themselves against the more powerful states or trying to keep very large populations working towards the same objectives and national endeavours. The difference between a monopolistic party or a duopoly of parties was frequently just a lot of words. Both were, in the end, worried that their populations would revolt and refuse their right to govern and control. The drivers for change came with fear of the consequences if that continued unabated, as well as with the education of a larger share of the population.”
“No matter the popular vote might prefer my leadership, we know that if I push the boundary anywhere, if I take the old line of knowing what is best for everyone and seeking to create new paradigms before they are established as neutral to the other values we now keep in balance, then my leadership will end quickly and disastrously. But most importantly, that the forward momentum we have gathered will be cut off, and groups will again seek to dominate others within their own communities. They will realise the power is no longer spread across all communities in a complex system that generates trust but will want to ensure they are entitled to a share of what appears to be a limited resource. The pressures from competition for scarce natural resources make this inevitable. The measures we have already endorsed to encourage a very large global economy that does not stop at boundaries or borders is fragile but very powerful at the same time.”
Again, Sha interjects. “You are right, there are still many who have not enjoyed the peaceful co-existence of this balanced values system we are developing. Yet, I feel guilty if we do not seek to expand these values into more communities. I also know we must not risk the progress for the principle. We cannot compromise on the progress already secured. While negotiations are in good faith, they cannot contradict the agreed principles of The Agreement. It is a conundrum like a misty sea, that we know can work but we must surely find a way to navigate so everyone can understand the strategy as well as the process, yet be confident the risks are managed and minimised, considering the known and agreed factors that demand action.” Sha knew her husband was agreeing. She knew they would talk for another hour or two, and that he would be successful in finding a way to propose a balanced solution at the conference.
Naman continued. “Thank you my dear. I would then add something along these lines: We must understand that when fighting wars became a pointless exercise because small groups could still wreak powerful havoc, the need for dominance was taken into the economic realm. Even now the expansion of knowledge continues to be a major driver. The fear that destroyed democracies was due to the minority governing coterie of leadership believing they had the right to change the rules and principles of the democratic process to ensure they stayed in control. They didn’t trust the majority. They didn’t agree with the popularism that seemed to be determining the path forward. They were convinced their way was the clearly best way. What I believe is that we need more people with education and easy access to reliable facts, to ensure our future decisions will be understood. That way will produce support if we are on the right path. Not because we say so, but because the great majority understand, accept, and believe in it. The other key areas we have succeeded with are the free travel by all people within our cohort of member states across a very large geographic region on the planet, and the agreement that regional governments will never impose tariffs, taxes or financial penalties on essential goods and services being transferred within The Agreement member states. We must ensure that money does not distract us from this success.”
He carried on with his monologue. “That is how we have already overcome the most astonishing challenges for our survival. We must enjoy the energy and change it delivers and then seek to lead the direction and the acceptable implementation of the agreed strategies. We all must continue to work together in ways we have never done before.”
Sha understood the playing with words was a preamble to a final position. She did not fully appreciate and understand the real value of this familiar political language and suspected he did not either. Both were too pragmatic to believe that the words will be the end game. They had learned by experience that their actions, and completion of their objectives in a clear and transparent way, were both far more telling in the ongoing struggle to build and maintain trust. She had seen him do this in public when he was younger. The reactions from his speeches were sometimes a shock to him. However, he now appreciated these processes for thinking out how words will sound and capture the minds of his audience, are best kept private. He was very lucky to have a wife who participated in and tolerated this process.
“Today, almost 60% of private use vehicles on the roads of our member states are self-contained. That is, they don’t require inputs of fuel from a national grid for electricity, nor do they use petroleum products. The batteries have a minimum 30-year life span, and the cars are warranted for five yearly intervals. Accordingly, their CO2 emissions are rated at zero. Many are now powered using hydrogen that is manufactured using electricity and water. We have a severe reduction in petroleum product demand and the changes have meant significant drops in carbon emittance into our atmosphere. Trucks and buses are not using diesel anymore. Aircraft and boats have reduced their emissions by over 90%.
“The roading infrastructure can now carry autonomous driven vehicles on all major city interlinks and inside all major cities without risk of severe personal injury to our populations. Personal ownership of small vehicles for travel inside these cities is significantly reduced.
“Space travel is problematic. The use of space has been unregulated for too long. The failure of the nations involved to work collaboratively has led to significant degradation of our upper atmosphere. This is a new focus, included in the budget, for the next four years. We must realise the risks from ignoring this problem area will not reduce over time. The cost of reducing the contamination and the cost of designing the new systems that can attain our needs both economically and environmentally, are likely to grow exponentially with time. This leaves us with the need to retain our budgets for transport. We might have been able to reduce those budgets but for this identified outstanding need. It is therefore important for this conference to determine whether the needs of the Water Plan are more important at this time than those I have just alluded to.
“Nations’ competition for power, both economic and military, combined with a failure to regard the resources of this planet as finite, have led us to the realisation that we need to recalibrate our global expectations and protocols. That is perhaps easy to express, but fundamentally impossible to implement. Notwithstanding the challenges this appears to present, we have determined that at the very least, some changes are critical to all our futures. Two or three of the strongest economies have invested many trillions of dollars over many years seeking to control the resources most in demand by all countries. This power-play has been relentless but very successful. Each of those countries are now being asked to relent on their controls and to provide an even market opportunity for all economies. That is never going to be a voluntary process. We need to provide a protocol and a supporting regulatory environment so each of them accepts they are not being arbitrarily penalised. We can only expect co-operation when they know we are protecting them against unfair competition.
“The defence of communities from attacks by other communities is one very material and complex issue. Whereas history will provide many examples of nations determining they have the power to control other state’s actions, this new understanding needs to reflect a new paradigm. To reinforce this principle and to ensure an efficient and economic undertaking, The Agreement now has control over the largest cache of armaments and warfare complicit machines and programmes on the planet. We have already, through the last fifty years following World War Three, amassed the trust and the commitment of the largest economies on the planet. This globalisation of our trade and our defences has made a very significant change to the international legal rules and expectations of all nations.
“I remind all of us that we believe in defending our boundaries from physical attacks. We have reached very significant milestones in achieving this control and wrestling it away from individual countries. This has been a fundamental change but one we cannot take for granted. I am certain we will achieve even more security in this area as we continue along this path. However, I also wish to remind us of the second path that runs parallel to the armament’s pathway; that is the globalisation of trade. Over the centuries governments have protected their own economies, their own businesses, and their own workers by controlling trade across national borders. This was always a difficult area. Large economies needed to trade internationally but small economies needed to protect themselves, including from what was known as dumping and from the theft of intellectual property. Not surprisingly, these larger economies realised they could weaponize trade. Countries such as Communist China, as it was then, and the United States of America, as they were then, and the European Union countries, each of them used their economic strength to stop trade and or to place economic constraints on it to give their own producers and manufacturers advantages. These tariffs, as they were often devised, were weapons in the battle for economic supremacy and were also used to prevent countries affording warfare. Perhaps an unintended consequence, or perhaps not, this also allowed them to ensure the poorer economies stayed poor. The Agreement principles have included the need for the inhabitants of this planet to coalesce and work constructively to feed, shelter, and provide health support to all, and to work to protect communities from storms and weather events such as fire, flooding, and drought. This programme is also travelling well, but my messages today, as they have been this last eight years, is we cannot take this progress for granted. We must remain steadfast and focused on maintaining our progress and improving our implementation of these critical plans.”
“The movement of people from one nation to another has also been weaponised by some. The resources we depend on are located on the planet irrespective of the national boundaries, although often the latter were determined with those resources in mind. The people needed to efficiently manage our use of those resources are often not in the same place, and so either the resources were shipped to the people, or the people were moved to the resources. Controlling this process was a power play. The Agreement has allowed some regulation and management of this tension that was otherwise impossible to achieve. Typically, nations agree so long as all other nations are made to comply with the same rules.”
“Rather than take geo-political actions unilaterally, we have reached a point where our member states accept that the people within areas of their national boundary may choose to leave. The arrangements for these massive shifts require a lot of planning time. Time to focus on the demands of the populations in the affected regions, time to negotiate the new boundaries, time to finalise compensation and financial arrangements and then, as in the recent examples, time to implement. Overall, this seems to require between twenty and forty years. These are costly and difficult, but we must always revert to our principles. We also must remember our history and realise these costs and the inconveniences are far less devastating than the alternatives.”
“The members of the Leadership Group who are here today have supported me and have been diligent in protecting your interests within the limits of our protocols and principles. We are fortunate to have been so well corralled and lead. I extend my personal thanks to you all and leave here knowing the progress we have already made is settled and provides a sound base for our future.”
