A Few Historic Events Leading to SDGs and a Stark Warning for the Future

A Few Historic Events Leading to SDGs and a Stark Warning for the Future?

Professor Dr. Qais Aslam ([email protected] ) and

Javaria Qais ([email protected] )?

https://www.newslens.pk/historic-events-leading-sdgs.../ #

The world had already seen the two World Wars in the first half of the 20th Century that had killed and wounded an estimated 60 to 80 million people – more than half of which were civilians. The blatant use of ‘new’ weapons of all kind took its toll on the natural environment too, especially around the theaters of war in Europe, Asia and Africa.??

The result of these World Wars was the surge in nationalist movements leading towards independent states and dismantling of colonialism in all corners of the globe. The colossal advancement in military technology and inventions (later to be used in civilian economic advancements) and the division of the world into World Capitalism and World Communism that ushered an era of Cold War between these systems in the second half of the 20th Century (1950 – 1990) which also resulted in colossal advancement in military, nuclear, IT related and space technologies rapid productive ‘conveyer belt’ industrialization, mono-cultures in agriculture and huge urbanization and creation of Maga cities without regard for other non-human living inhabitants of our planet. There was a quest for political and economic supremacies for ‘Free Market or ‘Planned’ Economies, revolutions and counter revolutions, Coup D'états in countries of both these politico-economic system with blatant disregard towards natural and human environment.??

The Korean War, the Cuban Missile crisis and the Vietnamese war and many others minor conflicts and territorial tensions around the world were pointing towards the ‘ticking’ of the nuclear clock that brought in a horrifying reality that humans were poised towards destroying themselves and everything on this planet in a matter of minutes or days. The nuclear race had begun. Countries were developing weapons of mass destruction – nuclear, chemical, biological, conventional and landmines (that could kill and maim civilians and children much after the conflict had ended).?

During the 1960’s the financial crisis in US dollar emerged creating the first post-war economic crisis, especially in the capitalist world that had just rehabilitated itself from devastation of the World War II followed by many waves of economic and financial crisis to-date. In 1972 the Stockholm Conference on Human Environment realized that the natural resources were not unperishable and unlimited as assumed till then and that environmental issues were global in nature, rather than local to each nation state. Collective world ‘wisdom’ stated that Humans had the means and capability of destroying life on earth in multiple ways or to build a better life for all on this planet through protection of the environment, human rights and peaceful use of technologies and elimination of poverty and deprivation. The 1980’s underlined deep economic and political rifts and Strifes around the world undermining the issues of natural and human environment, but at the same time negotiations among the opposing political forces of economic systems were bearing fruit in agreements and declarations for a better world caping the spread of weapons of mass destruction and rewinding the nuclear clock. Then the accident at Chernobyl Nuclear plant in USSR happened creating a rude awakening to the leaders of the world about a stark reality that ‘accidents can also trigger global destruction.??

A new thinking about denuclearization, world peace, environmental rights and human rights was being developed both at national and global levels initiated by debated in universities and media across the globe, especially by non-governmental actors like the NGO’s and the MNCs. By 1989 the USSR had been dismantled and one ‘global’ ‘free’ market economic system was emerging with a promise of a ‘better’ world for all – humans and non-human species alike. In 1992 the Rio Conference on Human and Natural Environment had conned the term ‘sustainable economic development’ and ‘intra-generational equity’ because now thinkers and statemen around the world wanted the ever-rising population and the ever-diminishing natural environment to co-exist at a sustainable level without compromising on the technological achievements that humans had made over their known’ history, especially in the 20th century. In 1995 there was a global consensus and WTO was created for a freer’ but sustainable trade of economic, financial, natural and technological resources with a global interaction between state and non-state actors.??

The world was moving towards the 21st century with a vision of solving the issues of world hunger, poverty, child mortality, gender equality, clean water, environmental assets, disease, technology transfers and third world debt. Human rights, environmental rights, rights of biodiversity and economic rights became more prominent globally and stopped being realms of individual political issues in sovereign states.?The global financial crisis of 2008-2009 again showed the world of unsustainability of the speculative economic and financial quest of the financial institutions at the cost of more vulnerable human, environmental assets and other non-human species.??

Then the world was struck by a new enemy – the ‘hidden’ arm of ‘faceless’ global terrorism that went hand in hand with the process of peaceful interaction of globalization. This new terror was financed and covertly supported by secret agencies of many nations, religious organizations around the globe fanned by historic hatred and quest for domination as a conflict between the ‘old 'order of conservative thought and the ‘new’ order of scientific sustainable thought. The world terrorism, human trafficking, drugs and arms smuggling was facilitated by the ‘dark’ web on the internet and cyber currencies unchecked by governments around the world. This new world enemy realigned the global thinking from building of peaceful, sustainable world towards a distrusting and fearful world that again started building mental and physical barriers and walls that threatened world peace once again.???

In year 2000, at the beginning of 21st century the leaders of the world had agreed to eight MDGs for a more sustainable world with tasks for individual governments to reduce poverty, child mortality, gender disparity, decease, environment protection and water protection in each nation by year 2015 for giving the world a hope for a better future of its children. But unwillingness of both technologically and industrially advanced nations and the developing countries to seriously enforce these MDGs resulted in even more flagrant overuse of natural resources, fossil fuels, creating wastages and CO2 that engulfed the globe with non-sustainable to life gasses and energy resulting in global warming, pollution of oceans and land with plastic and other man-made waste at a colossal level and now individual states are not able to solve the problem of world pollution, environmental degradation and diminishing of biodiversity.??

Climate Change and its resulting impact on human economic activity and health has brought in a realization that if all the above-mentioned problems of modernization are not tackled individually, nationally and globally, the future of human existence on this earth is seriously threatened. Nature is fighting back with a vengeance and would kill us in the same way we are killing nature by our callous behaviors. Affluence and poverty, modern technology and conventional tools are all driving us towards the fact that we as humans have not found sustainable ways to life today and leave a better world for the children of our children whose life is under threat because of our socio-political behaviors and economic attitudes with a quest of the upper 10% to become even richer at the cost of the 90% of world poor and hungry population who are deprived of any stake in the direction of the world’s future history, opportunities, or culture.?

In 2017 the leaders of the world decide upon the 17 SDGs as a direction that people across the globe on the individual, and collective levels as well as the local and state governments to enforce in their daily life, so that the clock of manmade disaster that is ticking fast into destruction can be stopped or reverse and that carbon emissions can be capped below 1.5-degree levels. These SDGs have to be achieved by year 2025-2030, so that the world can rebuilt itself for a brighter future for its future generations and for life on earth itself. Thes 17 goals include, Goals: (1) No poverty, (2) Zero Hunger, (3) Good Health & Well Being, (4) Quality Education, (5) Gender Equality, (6) Clean Drinking Water & Sanitation, (7) Affordable & Clean Energy, (8) Decent Work and Economic Growth, (9) Industry, Innovation & Infrastructure, (10) Reduced Inequalities, (11) Sustainable Cities and Communities, (12) Responsible Consumption and Production, (13) Climate Action, (14) Life Below Water, (15) Life on Land, (16) Peace, Justice & Strong Institutions, and (17) Partnership for The Goals. All these 17 goals have many measurable sub-goals for individuals and governments to follow and adapt so that humans on this earth can survive and live a happy, peaceful life. As yet the realization that we as a specie are under threat from our own non-sustainable behaviors towards each other and towards the environment has not set in among a vast portion of people and economic and political leaders around the world.??

In 2020 the world that was struggling to end issues of debt, poverty, water distribution, climate change, global warming, pollution, population explosion and deprivation etc. were confronted with a global pandemic of COVID-19 that has killed one million people in USA alone and globally 6.3 million people died and total of 520 million were affected to-date with the disease spreading and mutating rapidly among rich and poor nations alike bring out the stark reality that humans with all their technological advancement are still exposed to fury of nature because they have not learnt to live in a sustainable manner.??

The SDGs are not just guidelines, but ways of life to be adapted so that we and other life on earth – in the water and on the land can have a better and happy future, when from 1970 to date biodiversity has diminished with 50% because of human activity of encroaching (30%) on their habitat as well as flagrant killing and eating (20%) the other inhabitants on this planet in order to increase its own population unsustainably.?Till such time the Richest 500 people own 50% of world GDP and the poorest 20% of world population is derived from clean drinking water, quality education for their children, lives in poverty and extreme hunger and are dying from curable diseases, and lack of judicious institutions and behaviors and biodiversity (non-human life on earth) as well as the natural assets are under threat it is becoming more scientifically visible that humans are not aware that they as a specie on this earth have become an endangered species. And once again in 2022 the Russian war in Ukraine has started a new ‘cold’ war between NATO and Russia that has realigned the economically declining but technologically advanced “Western’ nations against the economically and technologically rising Asian nations with USA’s traditional allies like India, Saudi Arabia, Brazil, South Africa Pakistan and many others remaining neutral or not supporting USA, NATO and G-6 on international forums against Russia (that is the aggressor in this war) for their own political and economic gains that has brought fossil fuels like oil and gas as well as grain and cooking oil on center stage of world politics and economic interests of military complexes undermining the global consensus on climate change, or on capping carbon emissions and even abiding by the vision of SDGs.?

Climate change, global warming, world terrorism, COVI-19 pandemic and now the Ukraine war should be a warning to the world that the only hope to our survival in the next two millennium is a sustainable way of economic and social life peacefully coexisting with each other and with other life forms on the planet in accordance with the guidelines of SDGs. The stark warning is written on the sky. Can we as individuals and collective as governments abide by the SDG for a long-term sustainability of the human race or are we setting a time frame of our own extermination as a specie on planet earth in near future.?