Cultural Pillar:

How to find harmony between tradition and modernisation in a globalizing world?

There is no doubt that globalisation is the buzzword of our time. It refers to a highly complex and multidimensional worldwide process with great impact on the economic and political, but notably also on the cultural life. Its advocators highlight the social progress, the technological innovation, the diversification of products and services, the growing cultural freedom, the higher standard of living and cornucopia of information which it brings along. Its critics rather shed light on the extinction of local traditions, the subordination of poorer regions by wealthier ones, the environmental destruction and the general homogenisation of culture and everyday life.

Globalisation is commonly regarded to form nowadays a part of the process of modernisation. This latter development commenced in Europe during the time of the bourgeois revolutions, in Asia in the second half of the 19th century with various consequences. Socially and politically, modernisation boosters the gravitation of population in large cities, the appearance of centralised governments, an increasing social mobility, the widespread participation of the population in economic and political activities and the belonging of people to larger political units, namely nation states. As far as values are concerned, modernisation entails the spread of ideas of progress confining conservatism, of a universal system based on performance rather than on decent as well as of literacy and rationalism, especially with regard to an increasingly secular and scientific thinking.

All this happens at the expanse of established traditions in religion, philosophy and all other moral standards which used to be entrenched parts of the respective societies and found expression in literature, art and other forms of cultural life. All traditions, specific to each culture, try to explain the essential problems of human existence and explore a path to their solution while equipping the people with such. At the same time, culture has been the particularising and regionalising force that distinguishes societies and people from each other. By this, it has given identity. The transmission of tradition has always taken place within the closest environment of a person, namely in his clan or his family. Nowadays, however, families do not live at one ancestral home anymore which used to be the case in past centuries but rather spread out seeking new whereabouts. This phenomenon in the framework of globalisation contests on top of everything else the transmission of traditions as it used to take place.

In view of all this, modernisation is a chance for all ASEM countries but poses a great challenge to them at the same time, not least of all to its citizens’ identity. Therefore, it is vital to find harmony between tradition and modernisation.

Political Pillar:

How to deal with possible security issues linked to natural resource distribution, disparities and shortages?

In today’s international security situation which is disturbingly uncertain resource availability is frequently linked with historic or potential conflict. Resource conflicts occur in locations where growing resource demand and declining supply are the greatest and which lack institutional capacity to deal with it. In the last quart-century, human kind has added more people to the planet than there were in 1900. By 2050, world population is most likely to have reached nine billion and economic output to have increased substantially as well. In spite of this logic, though, the historic evidence shows that the global food situation has improved rather than declined. Global food availability, both in total and per capita, has increased since 1960 while prices have fallen. This, however, does not spare certain regions of the world from facing severe shortages in food leading to malnutrition and starvation.

It is among other factors as industrialisation and urbanisation exactly this intensified agricultural activity in view of a growing world population which has increased the demand for fresh water while at the same time Climate Change and other trends put greater pressure on its supply. Up to two third of the world population will live in water-stressed countries by 2025. But also a growing demand for oil and mineral resources has to be taken into consideration in this context. Resource conflicts especially arise as a dispute between countries. This occurs either if the question of sovereignty is not clearly defined as in the instances of the disputed boarders between India and Pakistan as well as between China, Indonesia, Malaysia, the Philippines and Vietnam in the South China Sea. But interstate conflict can also have its source in the availability of commonly shared fugitive resources (e.g. fluvial water or wild life) or pool resources (e.g. oil reserves or ground water) which lie across its shared boundaries. In spite of their common accessibility, their use by one nation may impact the quantity available to the other one(s) which is likely to cause a “Use it or lose it mentality!” by all nations, an overexploitation hence and a conflict as a result of that.

But also on the domestic level, resource shortage and decrease in the land available due to Global Warming lead to conflict over the claims of shrinking reserves and space. Economic decline and migration are the consequence of this, and as groups start to wander to new places seeking new resources to replace these that have been depleted, fights between immigrants and natives are likely to happen.

Not least of all, resource conflicts erode the people’s confidence in their government, leading to civil unrest and general instability. Hence, resource scarcity is together with a global economic disparity which is strongly linked to this issue, and along with all other forms of marginalisation, a breeding ground for global insecurity and even terrorism. Hence, it is necessary to deal with all these issues in a comprehensive manner.

Economic Pillar:

How can Green Technologies contribute to economic growth and help to fulfil the global Right of Development?

Economic growth is energy intensive. Even though the energy used per unit of economic growth has declined over the past century, the total amount of energy consumed has been steadily increasing. It is an undeniable fact that the industrialisation and modernisation of the nowadays developed countries during the past 150 years is based on the heavy use of fuels like oil, coal and gas.

Due to the emissions which this process has entailed, the developed world is responsible for about 80 % of the carbon dioxide existing in our atmosphere today, and by this cardinally for the phenomenon of Global Warming at the same time. This latter trend, if no effective measures are taken against it, will pose a serious challenge to the future living conditions on our planet. There is every probability that its consequences would harm human health and environment, and furthermore cause huge migration flows as well as casualties among the human population.

In spite of this, the undeveloped and developing countries of the world are now seizing their chance to develop and seek a higher standard of living. They industrialise and motorise, and all this goes along with an environmentally highly harmful exhaust of greenhouse gases. However, the “Right of Development” which was established by the United Nations in 1986 is generally acknowledged and the past achievements of the developed world have been based on no other grounds. Hence, it is hardly possible to bereave the now economically emerging countries of their right to modernise.

Renewable energies seem to be one of the most effective and efficient solutions to solve this dilemma. At the present time, however, with an oil price which is high but seemingly still payable and with the availability of other cheaper energy options the incentive to fundamentally shift the lever towards Renewable Energies is considerably low. The recent effect of higher oil prices is instructive with regard to this indeed: Highly emission intensive alternatives, like for instance coal, are expanding their roles in the major developing countries and in many other parts of the world more rapidly than their lower-emission alternatives. To politically enforce the introduction of Renewable Energies would be an option, but then again industrialists argue that such environmental policies would hurt capital accumulation and growth by raising abatement costs. And this would hamper the opportunities of developing economies to emerge. This, hence, raises the question how one can deal with the world’s hunger for energy in view of growing economies without limiting the future living opportunities on our planet.

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As of Sept 1, 2009 :

Please send us an e-mail to inform of who (of your team of 2) will be participating in which pillar.

Cultural Pillar:

Austria, Brunei, Bulgaria, Cambodia, Cyprus, Denmark, Finland, France, Greece, Indonesia, Ireland, Italy, Japan, Laos, Lithuania, Malaysia, Mongolia, Netherlands, Pakistan, Philippines, Portugal, Romania, Singapore, Slovakia, Spain, Sweden, Thailand, United Kingdom, Vietnam


Political Pillar:

Belgium, Brunei, Bulgaria, Burma, China, Czech Republic, Estonia, Finland, France, Germany, Greece, Hungary, India, Ireland, Laos, Latvia, Luxembourg, Malaysia, Malta, Mongolia, Netherlands, Philippines, Poland, Portugal, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, South Korea, United Kingdom


Economic Pillar:

Austria, Belgium, Belgium, Burma, Cambodia, China, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Germany, Hungary, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, Pakistan, Poland, Romania, Slovenia, South Korea, Spain, Sweden, Thailand, Vietnam