ECOCLUB Blogs™

This year there has been a steady stream of self-congratulatory announcements of successes from the bloody "war on poaching" undertaken by security services led by merciful mercenaries, drone fleets etc. But conservation should not be inhumane or trample on human rights. Nor should it be used as a geopolitical pretext to put troops on the ground where there are not enough drugs or religious fanatics. As long as there is demand for ivory and rhino horn and as long as possession of such is legal there is no chance of stopping this trade. Some therefore propose to focus on demand. Tackling demand can involve education and peer pressure but it is very likely that the affluent and powerful buyers of such "works of art" are not so sensitive. Perhaps a global campaign to pressure key and powerful governments to make holding ivory (all ivory, not just "illegal") and rhino horn pieces illegal? Even including artefacts in museums, that glorify and thus perpetuate this abominable "art"? Perhaps! Even though governments (in effect the military-industrial complexes behind them) cannot agree even on small steps to combat climate change.   We should also realise that elephants and rhinos are not the only victims. The poachers...

Today another mega-event circus is about to open in Brazil at a USD 11bn cost (mostly at the benefit of monopolies and oligarchs) but there are clear signs that the organisers have forgot about the bread bit of the old appeasement equation ("panem et circenses" in Latin): Rio airport workers are on strike, there are numerous planned marches while 200,000 troops are mobilising across Brazil to prevent(?) rioting. Preparations have also involved the displacement (forced or induced eviction) of many thousands of Brazil's homeless. A good article documenting the injustice and inequality reproduced by the preparations for this mega-event in Brazil is at http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/06/10/race-class-and-the-world-cup-in-brazil/   There are also big worries about the Qatar World Cup, and a campaign to re-run "the vote" due to serious worker rights abuses. A people's sport has been slowly hi-jacked by a powerful and allegedly corrupt international monopoly and turned into a commercial, consumerist spectacle. Some telling numbers: the cheapest world cup ticket to watch a single game costs approximately costs a week's average pay in Brazil and about half the monthly salary of the woman that hand-stitched the official ball. A peaceful reaction: we can switch off our TVs, NOT buy any official merchandise, and go out...

Zoos, that historically originate in the private entertainment of rulers and gradually moved on to the 'edutainment' of the general public are now trying to convince us that they are undertaking serious research and conservation work, perhaps as a reaction to increasing environmental and public awareness that the days of all animal abuse and incarceration facilities (including circuses, dolphinaria) are numbered. The green-(magic) imagemaking effort sometimes includes producing articles by prestigious researchers in prestigious journals, such as this onehttp://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0080311 which claims that up to a quarter of species 'kept' in zoos are officially-considered endangered. (This by itself is one more way in which a designation of a species as endangered may be counter-productive under the currently prevailing socio-economic system (capitalism) as the designation increases its monetary value.). If zoos really wanted to clean up their act, they would gradually transform themselves into research & conservation institutions, abolish public animal enclosures, return all existing non-endangered animals to wilderness areas, stop purchasing new ones (often from illegal purveyors), and turn former zoo facilities into nature and recreation / amusement parks but without animals.

Determining what an ideal situation or solution (or ultimate goal) could be in every real-world problematic situation is not a utopian exercise but, on the contrary, it is a useful rule of thumb: to evaluate how far we are from achieving the goal, how likely we are to achieve it and if we are currently moving closer or further away. For a meaningful discussion of alternatives, we have to choose a broad political and philosophical framework. On this occasion we will examine the concept of community-owned tourism (COT) and try to tackle four key questions: (a) what constitutes a "local community" (b) according to which criteria an individual can be considered a member of a local community (c) which types of organisation are compatible with 'collective or community ownership' and (d) who should decide and who decides in practice about the previous three clarifications, in each case, or in general. The Ecosocialist framework (Ecological, direct-democratic and devolved 21st century Socialism, as opposed to productivist, authoritarian and centralised 20th century Socialism) seems fully compatible with an Ecological & Socially-just Tourism (EST) as defined at https://ecoclub.com/about/philosophy . Tourism, which, after all, is locally produced and consumed, should also be locally and collectively owned...

The UNWTO this year has picked "Tourism and Water" as the theme of the World Tourism Day. Should they/we be celebrating? While access to clean water and sanitation is not a given for over a billion people in the global south, northern multinationals, use vast amounts of water (private swimming pools, golf courses) often in semi-arid and arid areas, to pamper their affluent guests in luxury resorts / enclaves for the rich that displace vulnerable communities and destroy coastal ecosystems. General annual "parental-advisory" type calls on holiday-makers to voluntarily "minimize" or, worse, "offset" their water use are hypocritical and simply do not work. Can private water offset projects, even technologically-novel ones such as those producing water from air humidity, replace a government's responsibility to provide water and sanitation to all inhabitants in a general, permanent and not sporadic manner (i.e. one village has water due to the benevolence of private benefactors, 10 villages nearby do not).  Does anyone seriously believe that meeting basic human needs can be left to "Corporate social responsibility" and voluntary corporate participation in paper schemes, most of which can certify & guarantee little more than the rate of bathroom towel change? That said an unequal, neocolonial tourism model...

AlJazeera on June 11 did a special feature on "Slum" Tourism see http://stream.aljazeera.com/story/201306102246-0022819 If such tours are organised by the community itself (or genuine members thereof), following some sort of democratic decision / consensus process, and all proceeds are used to meet the real needs of the community then such tours are acceptable, and will tend to be respectful, meaningful and life-changing for participants. It then becomes a form of solidarity tourism and depending on how it is being promoted (content & channels) it may also attract suitable, politicised tourists not just the curious. "Slum Tourism" is however not a real solution to the problem of Slums, as Slums are the direct and visible products of capitalism, inequality and racism, the causes need treatment, not the symptom. It is of course easy (and safe) for large international media to criticise those small operators who are trying to do the right thing the wrong way in difficult areas and circumstances, compared to - say - exposing powerful multinational tourism companies or the exploitation involved in luxury tourism - as they are usually their best advertisers.

On this years World Environment Day it is becoming clearer, through a wide range of developments ranging from the violently suppressed ecological protests in Istanbul, the popular anti-gold / anti-multinational mining campaign in the forest of Skouries, near Halkidiki Greece, the ongoing struggle of indigenous communities against oil giants in the Amazon and against bauxite in India, the growing anti-fracking movement in the United States, widening global awareness about Climate Change and its main causes (Capitalism in all its forms: authoritarian, statist or neoliberal) and a constant flow of tragic sweat-shop deaths that reveal the ugly backstage of consumerism that the Environmental Movement can no longer remain or pretend to be apolitical, and that it must pick sides – either the 99% and the side of progress, of the people, or the 1%, the side of the ecocidal status quo. Or, as Noam Chomsky put it in a recent editorial, “... those who are trying hard to do something about these threats [to destroy the planet], and others who are acting to escalate them.” The process of choosing sides is of course slowly undermining the credibility of large systemic green NGOs who may in turn have to chose between their corporate...

  While (and perhaps because) geopolitics are getting messier each year in the post cold war era, it is the grassroots, empowered and emancipated by information and communications improvements that may take humanity a long way forward during this century. Here are two random, seemingly unrelated, developments, we spotted today:  The reopening as worker-run of an, abandoned by its owners, metal factory, "Viomihaniki Metaleftiki" factory is taking place today 12 February, in Thessaloniki, Greece. In a country where unemployment has already climbed at 30% following the austerity, neoliberal policies imposed by IMF and the EU., such are obvious and necessary solutions.   And the discovery of a simple-to-use method for diagnosing cancer, which costs just 3 cents (and may continue to do so unless/until big pharma get their hands on it), by 15 year Jack Andraka old who following the sudden death of a close family friend decided to search for answers online. As Andraka says: "through the Internet anything is possible...but instead of posting photos you can change the world!" So true, so how about supporting the Vio.Me workers with an online donation at www.viome.org ?    Related film by Brandon Jourdan of globaluprisings.org

  At the end of the month and of the year 2012 we may not see the end of the world, to the disappointment of mayan calenderists, survivalists, and assorted ufologists, yet, the situation is rather apocalyptic. During 2012 the climate crisis brought extreme weather phenomena, while the economic crisis became a permanent fixture in parts of the global north. The global south, with a few exceptions, did not really catch up as it also suffers from the repercussions of the global economic slow-down. Inequality within most countries grew as well. So were tensions, violence, unemployment, bigotry and fascism.. The system’s holy pillars – supposedly too big to fail/fall on our heads, the banks, have been re-erected with public, tax payers money – money now missing from Health and Education – and essentially unreformed, they are back to business as usual. A few dictators were replaced by new ones, while regional wars, declared and undeclared, provided excellent export and field-testing opportunities for the military-industrial complex(es) new toys. The melting ice opened wonderful business opportunities for oil industry drilling and shipping lanes, while ungrateful mining workers asking for a meager rise were summarily shot. The world is overflowing with consumer goods covering...

Non-ostentatious, quickly-built and modest enough so as to be missed by the law in the 1840s, today fortuitously missed by many high-season tourists fixating on the Acropolis: the Anafiotika neighbourhood, right below the massive Acropolis rock, on its shady, north-eastern slopes, offers a surreal and serene aegean island experience just 1 km from the political (and occasionally literal) battlegrounds of Syntagma Square; this tiny quarter is not-to-be missed by serious travellers.   Its island architecture is an authentic product of builders from Anafi, an island east of Santorini - one so poor and barren that it was a place of exile during the turbulent 20th century. The first two houses (two rooms really) were, allegedly, built by G. Damigos, a carpenter and M. Sigalas, a stone mason, for their families over a few nights, with the fear of police arriving as this was a no-building area, protected since 1834, due to its high archaeological value. When police eventually arrived, the semi-legend continues, they did not have either the desire or the ability to arrest them, due to an old Othoman era customary law which forbid the demolition of newly-built homes. Contradicting laws exist to this day in Greece, and sometimes, as in...