After three days of intensive lectures and presentations about the environment, climate change, ecology, economy, development, theories, corporate progress and grass root success example; there were a lot of messages flying through the air of Canada Place ballroom. Yet, at the end of it all, I grew rather depressed reading all the data and equations of how long we as human have time on earth before we totally corrupt it.
For me, I’m a scientist with a heart, which by Hawken’s definition, makes me a pessimist-optimist. But when I thought of Hawken’s words, the scientist side of me linked Hawken’s inspiring ideas to Hernando De Soto’s theory which talks about giving the poor full rights over their illegal properties they live on as the first step toward a better future for us all.
These two ideas may sound different at the beginning but, in my humble opinion, when we link property rights and social justice with sustainability and green development; we are actually working towards greater social justice for the people who need it while simultaneously developing their neighborhoods into a safe and sustainable environment. This is the very soul of the current global movement of sustainability and what it means to be green. We must be just and fair to everything around us: air, soil, plants, animals and, above all, humans.
Think about it, when the majority of the world’s population lives in poverty that means all the development we have today is only happening for the lucky few of us who don’t live within the black market with no access to credit, proper basic services of energy or water and live in concentrated and highly polluted environments.
Do we dare imagine we are contributing to world-wide social justice and cleaner environments when only few of the world’s population reap the benefits? And of that few only roughly 3% to 5% are consciously taking measures to be environmentally friendly? How can we achieve the goals we set for our planet if we don’t include the majority of us – the poor – into our plans?
My straight answer is – we cannot. Period.
Regardless how much we recycle and build green; or how much we develop and force corporations to do their clean duty; or even how much we try to produce environmentally friendly materials and programs; it is all fruitless if the majorities of us humans don’t or can’t participate in the global movement.
Therefore, we must address the issues of poverty in order to tackle the problems with our environment.
To illustrate further I would like to give a short and quick explanation of
It explains that unregistered properties under any person’s name means there is no proper ‘value’ to that land. For instance, if a person were to take an unregistered piece of land, build on it and use it, the property will still have no value because it is not officially legal. If this person decides to sell their developed land to someone else there is no proper documentation that can connect this person to that property or transfer the property title from one name to another therefore anyone or any governments can simply take the land at any time because it is not properly registered and push those people outside without any legal protection for them and as a result, these properties are entered into the ‘shade’ or black market and are not accounted for in the official market.
In order to grasp the magnitude of this problem, we need to multiply this one property by a million to understand that entire neighbourhoods, communities and even villages that have residential, commercial, industrial and agricultural value currently exist only on the black market. And since these groups are not officially recognized on paper, they do not have any official value to support them in the real market.
So the first step we need to take to get these ‘shade’ properties into the market is to connect each property to its owner and then help them enter formal markets. There, they can retain official value of what they own and have the ability to engage in real business or apply for legitimate loans and credits without fear from any person, organization or law that may have intimidated them before.
Yet before we can implement such a theory, where it is needed, and for it to work properly, several supporting steps need to precede it. This includes remedial action such as fixing political problems and fighting corruption, as well as providing awareness and incentives for environmental improvement and sustainability
We also need to factor in the cultural, traditional and custom layers into the property right laws to discourage any corruption among the poor. We simply want to make business easier to do in these communities instead of killing it.
Educating the poor about property rights and then teaching them to be responsible land owners and how to incorporate green practices into their daily lives would be our best contribution to help slow down climate change. Meanwhile, we must also continue pushing corporations to do their share in research and find new ways to clean up the earth that includes everyone, even the poorest one of us.
Majora Carter, one of the speakers at the Smart Growth Conference, shared with us her success story of bringing justice back to her own neighborhood of South Bronx, New York. Carter worked with her community to improve their run-down neighborhood by treating polluted areas, planting parks and building community centres that introduced education programs to help improve community wellbeing.
Yes, we must educate the poor. Yes, we must improve their corrupted systems. And yes, we have to introduce a democracy to them in the way that works for the main goal and not to our western standards. I believe that we can achieve it all by connecting theories and working with organizations that have clear visions and passionate people who work hard for their community, like Majora Carter. This is the key to slowing down environmental deterioration and it is for this reason I have chose the title to my article.
I started my post with Paul Hawken and now I will close with him saying:
‘Working for the earth is not a way to get rich, it is a way to be rich’
Resilient Cities, Urban Strategies for Transition Times, Vancouver, Canada, October 20-22, 2009
http://via-architecture.blogspot.com/2009/11/salvation-of-our-environment-lies-at.html
