Transcript: 'Revolution of values' needed to solve world problems

BUDAPEST, Hungary -- The following is an edited transcript of remarks by Alfredo Sfeir-Younis to the annual conference of the World Association of Non-Governmental Organizations in Budapest, Hungary on October 22, 2004. Sfeir-Younis is senior advisor to the World Bank's managing director and former special representative of the World Bank to the United Nations and the World Trade Organization. The session was held in the Hungarian parliament building in a conference hall that was the upper house chamber before the legislature became unicameral. (editor's note)
    
    
    Chairperson, secretary-general of WANGO, Mr. Taj Hamad, his excellency the honorable Dr. Katalin Szili, president of the parliament of Hungary, excellencies, ladies and gentlemen. You have deeply honored me to invite me to speak today. This is a conference that is to address healing the hurting world, the role of NGOs. Yes, "the hurting world." Do we know how to heal it? Do we have the capacity to heal the world? I was so glad that WANGO selected this theme of healing the hurting world.
    
    Can the NGO community heal the world? Are they part of the problem, or are they the key to the solution? I asked myself, why is the world hurting in the first place? My friends, the world is you and me, is all of us. And this is not just a semantic, or just a metaphor. Actually, we are the world. So the fundamental question of this conference is "Why are we hurting each other," when there is only one world, and there are no two worlds.
    
    Clearly, today, and to share my principal conclusion of my statement at the very beginning, I'd like to say that I am one those who firmly believe that the NGO community and organized civil society are fundamental in healing the hurting world. However, there are important conditions for this to happen, and one of them is to really understand the golden rule of this era. Every era has its challenge. In the past, one of the challenges was to reconcile science and religion. Many people actually died, because these were not reconciled, particularly those who thought that the earth was round. The basic golden rule of that era, which still permeates this era, is very simple, but very powerful: "As I know, so I act." Knowledge as the center stage of our lives, knowledge as the center stage of public policy making but also the authorizing rule, as the authorizing factor in our personal and social life.
    
    That's why many of us are not content with a higher degree diploma, a master degree or even a PH.D. And actually the market place honors this rule by giving more money to those who have a higher degree than those who have a lesser degree. However, I must say that the challenge that we face today is changing, and with this I am not saying that science and religion have been reconciled, nor am I saying that knowledge is not important, because it is very important. But the greatest challenge that we face today is the reconciliation between our material life and our non-material life. What I have said in many conferences: the reconciliation between economics and spirituality. And the golden rule today is very different. The golden of this era is: "So I self-realize, or so I experience, so I act." Therefore it is central to understanding this millennium the process of human self-realization, the process of human transformation. Just to have, just to do, or just to know is not enough for human betterment. In fact, Einstein in the later part of his life was saying that he was not concerned about the advance of science and technology, but that his great concern was the level of consciousness of those who use these advances.
    
    So we can do anything we want with nuclear physics. We can help to solve cancer or we can create a human holocaust. The choice today is ours. There is no doubt that the world is hurting, and the world is hurting because of material and spiritual reasons. The world is hurting, because there is nearly half of the world population living in poverty, being in absolute poverty with less than one dollar a day, or in relative poverty with less than two dollars a day. There are nearly one billion people who go to bed everyday hungry in a world full of richness and plenty of food. There are thousands of children who are dying today of preventable diseases. This is not only a shame, but a greatest ethical and moral dilemma. There are 600,000 women who die every year, because they don't' have access to health care services during pregnancy and delivery. The world is hurting because of the way we are treating the children and the youth. Today, the large majority of the youth face unemployment, and they see no real opportunities for betterment of their lives. There are millions of children who don't go to school, and the majority are girls. And there are millions of children who are combatants today at war. In fact, the weapons industry is building lighter and more effective weapons so they don't have a physical impairment to carry these weapons.
    
    We are teaching the children through media and toys how to kill, and it's devastating to think about how they are going to decide between war and peace when they have [to decide whether] to push the button that they are so well trained to [push]. Many youth are joining gangs in the world. This is not a phenomenon only of developing countries. This is a worldwide phenomenon, because these youngsters have lost hope and they don't believe in the existing political system or a better future.
    
    The world is hurting, because we are not respecting the elderly people. They are materially fragile, and they are disempowered. Their wisdom, their spiritual guidance, and their contribution are not allowed to be made, so the transition between our generation and future generations is being ignored.
    
    We still are violating the rights of women, as if we needed to discuss again and again whether men and women are equal. This is really a shame and a tragedy of great proportion. We are destroying indigenous cultures, as if they didn't have anything to contribute to human history. In fact, we are burning the library of humanity before we have the chance to read the books.
    
    Yes, this is not enough. What is most tragic today -- and that's why the world is hurting -- is that we believe that conflict and war is a normal state of human beings. This is not possible. We have created millions of innocent victims and we have destroyed the fiber of society and we have devastated the principal social unit of our lives which is the family. The world is hurting because of social injustices, and because we are not respecting human rights. We are hurting, because we are destroying the environment, which is so fundamental not only for our material existence but for our spiritual existence as well.
    
    The world is being crushed today by a value system that is individualistic and is bounded by economics and finance. These values dominate our lives and the present course of the so-called globalization. But people should know that economists are globalizing, but societies are not globalizing. Spiritually we are hurting, because we see so much discrimination in the world, because we are taught that there are lives of different values. That the life of the rich is worth much more than the life of the poor. Spiritually, we are not respecting the most sacred aspect of our lives and we see how one religion persecutes another religion. We are hurting spiritually, because we insist that our way of life today somehow requires that we sacrifice someone for the betterment of someone else, as if we need to leave [some] people behind to move other people forward.
    
    We are unhappy, and this is not a matter of just being developed or underdeveloped. But there will be no material wealth that will be capable to buy happiness, joy, or security. We have tried to cure the world. We have spent billions and billions of dollars on poverty elimination programs, and we have tried to help in many ways, but actually the success is not that great. And many of us feel that we are losing the battle. In fact, many people spend a lot of time today saying that the millennium development goals will never be attained. This is not just a matter of material means. It's the lack of political power and lack of human will.
    
    My friends, to heal the hurting the world will require that we go beyond matter and beyond the material expression of our human existence. No material wealth will resolves the pains of the soul. These pains are deeply rooted in us both as humans and as beings. For healing the world, humanity needs to go through a major revolution of values and we have to go through a major human transformation. To heal humanity, we must have the experience of the human self-realization of compassion. Compassion not as material generosity or a compilation of handouts. Compassion as an absolute state of our existence. Compassion as that capacity to become the other without losing our own identity.
    
    Compassion is born within us for the other. This is the true source of healing. Compassion must become a human value in public policy making. Otherwise public policy is just empty promises and shallow decision-making processes.
    
    Despite the delicate situation we are living in today, I remain very optimistic. I remain very optimistic, because the solution to this problem lies within us. The solution of the problem does not depend on something else, or someone else. The solution of the problem depends on us individually and collectively. The poor and the rich, the blacks, the whites, the yellows, the browns, the people living in the north or in the south and everyone else on this planet has the ability to self-realize compassion. You just need one breath of life to do so. And it will be through this self-realization of compassion that we will heal the hurting world.
    
    My friends, the NGO community is key to the solution to the hurting world. But it's very important: to be able to heal the world, to heal the world, NGOs must be instruments of the self-realization of compassion for those they want to serve and themselves. Otherwise, our civil society or governments, or anyone else for that matter might become a deterrent to healing the hurting world. I believe, I trust, and I am sure that the world will be healed by this coalition of civil society with the rest of society.
    
    Let me end by saying that now is the time to make major decisions. The time to make major commitments, and to bring to the fore our human will. Without this, we will never be able to heal the world. We live in a moment of human history when we know now that the solution is within us. That the solution is in the hearts and the soul of each of us, whatever may be happening in our material lives. Compassion must be spread now as a wildfire. Compassion must be spread now like a river of fire. The transformational power of compassion is the only source, and perhaps the ultimate source of healing the world.
    
    This is why, wherever I go, I am trying to advocate what I call the 200% society -- the society that is not only materially rich but is also spiritually rich. This conference must mark a step forward in terms of the creation of this 200% society. I believe the world is healing, but I also believe that the world is prepared to be healed. Let's us not spend time pointing fingers. The time has come to look inwards, rather than outwards, respecting all aspects of our lives. It is a time to embrace an honest and loving process of inner reflection. We live in an inter-dependent world. If one person is hurting, we all are affected. Here in this great parliament, I thank you very much.