By David Gallup
Two moments in recent history have helped us to realize that
there is one humanity and one earth:
The first moment was when the bombs were dropped on Hiroshima
and Nagasaki in World War II. These bombs confirmed that humans have the power to
eradicate humanity and destroy the entire world.
The second moment was when a rocket was propelled into near
earth orbit in 1946, with an attached motion picture camera. The camera captured
photographs of the earth as one unified whole.
These two moments provided competing visions, one view of the
earth as a fractured planet and another view of the earth as one world. Representing
two ends of an ethical spectrum, they forced humanity to choose between a world
of destruction and a world of inspiration. Both moments ultimately led to the
development of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and world citizenship.
Moments such as these helped to inspire Eleanor Roosevelt and
Rene Cassin (drafters of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights) to establish
universal principles to guide humanity, principles that would be applicable to
everyone, everywhere. The Declaration
was a legal response to the violence and chaos of World War II. The drafters
intended to establish a code of conduct for humanity in order to prevent a
third world war.
These moments also inspired World War
II veteran Garry Davis, as he describes in his memoir My Country is the World,
to “willfully withdraw from the co-partnership of citizen and national state
and declare himself a world citizen.” Garry was ashamed of his own direct
participation as a bomber pilot 29,000 feet above the earth dropping bombs on
his fellow humans.
1948 was the year that Garry Davis gave up his exclusive
allegiance to a country and also the year that the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights was promulgated. Specifically, this December 10th marks the 70th
anniversary of the unanimous adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human
Rights, now viewed by many legal scholars as customary international law. This year also marks the 70th
anniversary of Garry Davis’s renunciation of national citizenship in favor of
world citizenship, which has been followed by almost 2 million people
world-wide who have also claimed world citizenship status.
What can we learn from this
joint celebration of the Declaration of Human Rights and Garry’s declaration of
human unity?
At the heart of the creation of the Universal Declaration of
Human Rights and at the heart of Garry Davis’s claim of world citizenship is
the idea that humanity, human rights, and the earth itself, deserve a universal
legal status, a universal identity, and a universal governing system. The UDHR
drafters and Garry Davis responded to World War II by universalizing rights and
by universalizing citizenship.
The UDHR was revolutionary. It created a human rights dialogue, so
that people could engage in discussion of our universal freedoms and responsibilities.
Garry Davis’s renunciation of national citizenship also was a
revolutionary act. He constructed a level citizenship that did not involve
violence, war, or oppression to establish a world government.
In 1948, the framers of the Universal
Declaration of Human Rights envisioned the Declaration as a tool to teach
everyone about our rights. They wanted the global public to demand that
governments “secure universal and effective recognition and observance” of our
rights, as the Preamble of the UDHR states. They wanted to create “a social and
international order” in which everyone could share the world peacefully and in
which everyone’s rights and needs would be fully met. They envisioned every day
as a human rights day.
Both the drafters of the UDHR and
Garry Davis knew that if the rights of all human beings were to be upheld, those
rights would have to be codified – written down for all to see, all to learn,
and all to implement. As the UDHR’s Preamble states, if humans are “not to be
compelled to have recourse, as a last resort, to rebellion against tyranny and
oppression, then human rights should be protected by the rule of law.”
In the halls of the UN, however, the
squabbling of the nation-states continued throughout the autumn of 1948. The
Russian government and several Soviet Bloc countries were threatening to vote against the
Declaration.
If you saw the documentary “The World is My Country” about Garry
Davis, you learned that he was
instrumental in the unanimous signing of the Declaration. By December of 1948,
Garry was world renowned for camping out on the steps of the United Nations
when it was holding its General Assembly sessions at the Palais de Chaillot in
Paris, and for interrupting a session to demand the creation of a world parliament
and world government. (His interruption occurred on November 19, 1948.)
On December 9th, 1948, the night before the UN general assembly
vote on the Declaration, Garry Davis spoke before a crowd of 20,000 war-weary
Europeans at the Velodrome d’Hiver Stadium in Paris. Calling for world
government, Garry said, “We can no longer permit ourselves to
be led by statesmen who use us as pawns in the game of national interests. We
wish to be led by those who represent us directly: we, the individuals of the
human community.”
This rousing speech made headlines
throughout Europe and impacted the representatives of the states considering
whether to accept or reject the Declaration.
The next day, instead of voting against the UDHR, 8 countries
abstained. This meant that 48 countries
unanimously accepted the UDHR. Now every
member-state of the United Nations, when becoming members, must agree to abide
by the Declaration.
It takes moments--like Garry Davis’s bold
acts of civil resistance--to build
momentum.
What does the UDHR and world citizenship tell
us as about humanity’s roadmap to a peaceful world? Where do we go from here?
It’s time to rise up! We need a spark—like the character Katniss
Everdeen—in the novel The Hunger Games. Or like actual heroes Mahatma Gandhi, Eleanor
Roosevelt, Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King, and Garry Davis. We need to know
that we can each be the spark of world peace, and we need to teach others how
to find their spark.
Just as Garry Davis created a movement in 1948 that inspired a
global public searching for hope, unity and peace, we need to do the same.
As global warming, perpetual wars, and neo-nationalism threaten
the existence of our rights and our human identity, NOW is the time to organize
a new world citizenship movement for global change! We need a movement that engages both
incremental change through law and institutions, as well as moments of mass
resistance.
We need to stage an uprising devised of political theater and
activism. We need to interrupt the UN and nation-state system once again. Through
coordinated disruption, sacrifice and escalation, we need to show that our
world model resolves and transcends the anomalies of the nation-state paradigm.
We need to unite universal rights and world citizenship into a movement that
people will flock to.
Here are two concrete examples of how the World Service
Authority (WSA) is igniting this movement, one through incremental change and
one through immediate action:
For incremental change, the World Service Authority, along with
partner organization Citizens for Global Solutions, is establishing World Citizen
Clubs on high school and university campuses. We are using the theory of change
and building momentum simultaneously by educating the minds and inspiring the
hearts of youth around the world. World Citizen Clubs will get young adults to
start thinking and acting as world citizens, claiming this status for
themselves and providing an example for others. Engaging youth will help us to
create the moments that lead to momentum in the world citizenship movement.
For immediate action, representatives of WSA’s World Citizen
Center of Ojai have traveled to Tijuana to stand in support of people fleeing persecution in the
Americas and around the world. Along with American Friends Service Committee,
we are exposing the inhumanity of militarization and borders that separate
humans from humans, perpetuating the divisions that lead to violence and war. We
are shining a light on the injustices that refugees, stateless and undocumented
people -- millions of our fellow humans -- face on a day-to-day basis.
This 70th anniversary of the UDHR and of modern world
citizenship teaches us that we can imagine change, we can organize change, and
we can be the change. We can be successful in igniting the world citizenship
movement by coordinating our theory of change efforts with momentum from mass
non-violent action.
By coordinating the principles of the UDHR and world citizenship,
we can advance institutions and identity based on unity, rather than separation
– based on our common needs, rather than our cultural differences. Respect for
human rights and recognition of world citizenship strengthens us socially,
economically, politically, legally, psychologically, and environmentally.
The strength that we gain through world citizenship and the
universalization of human rights will not supplant the nation-state system or
threaten local identity. The way to protect the local is to acknowledge the
global. By achieving peace at the world level, we can ensure that local culture
is preserved rather than destroyed by violence.
After World War II, the drafters of the UDHR and Garry Davis
were compelled to imagine a world in which all human beings could live together
in harmony. To take that image of peace and portray it in the world writ large,
they had to make and be the change that they wanted to
see. The drafters had to affirm the universality of our rights and Garry had to
affirm the universality of our human identity.
Like the creators of the Declaration of Human Rights and Garry
Davis, we must be the drafters and actors of own destiny. We must be the change
we want to see in the world!
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