Legacy and the Good Ancestor #35 #cong24 #legacy

Reading Time in Minutes

3

1. Citizen´s assembly
2. Communal democracy
3. Reinventing politics
4. Environmental personhood

• Former archaeologist
• Political end environmental activist

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By David Iguaz

I am not lazy, I am just a slow thinker. That is my excuse to leave the writing of this piece to the last minute and it certainly has its advantages. One of them is that it gives you more time to ponder about the ins and outs of drafting a readable essay. The other one is that the probabilities of getting lucky and stumble upon an inspirational event increase as times goes by. This is exactly what happened to me recently upon reading Roman Krznaric´s book “History for Tomorrow” which incidentally has some close parallels to my inner desires to improve my legacy potential and increase the chances to influence people around me. In another inspirational piece, Krznaric talks about the idea of the “Good Ancestor” which talks about how to come to terms with the state of things and understand how they will irreparably influence future generations. And in my view that is exactly the point, that is to ask how to repair the state of the two fundamental pillars of our civilization, politics and the environment. Both are crucial to our very survival as a species.

As far as the former is concerned Ireland is in the forefront of such a repair job with the adoption of the citizen´s assemblies. As Krznaric rightly puts it “Citizen´s assemblies seem to embody the very best of the communal democratic tradition”. This tradition has been going on for centuries, ever since the Athenian democracy in the 5th century BCE and has known enlightening examples such the Althing parliament in Iceland (930-1798 CE) and the Rhaetian Free State (1524-1799) whose legacy lives on in Switzerland which conducts more referendums than any other nation in the world. On the contrary Spain and Portugal, countries where I have lived most of my life, are still at the backwaters of such a movement and the degradation of the political and environmental situation in these countries creates the urgent need for a clear break of the actual status quo and towards the adoption of a more deliberative democracy.

I think it is fair to say that we are pillaging the inheritance of our descendants and colonising their future by carelessly dumping waste and consuming resources. Our future generations are being rendered powerless. There is hope however. There are signs that tides may be turning. For example the Future Design Movement in Japan is currently aiming at eliminating the short term cycles that dominate politics by drawing on the principle of 7th nation decision making practiced by many Indigenous American communities. They gather and 50% they have to imagine they are residents on the year 2060. These future residents advocate for more changes in their cities, from improvement in the health care system to climate change action: It is like a future citizen´s assembly to extend our vision far beyond the now.

This where the good ancestor in me comes to life. Having been positively influenced by these currents of thought I am now directly involved in the creation of a citizen´s assembly in an area North of Lisbon that will debate by mid-November the way forward to decontaminate two rivers and find solutions to reconvert the area so the local inhabitans may once more enjoy the natural habitat around them. We are still a long way away from granting legal personhood to Nature but a movement has started to do just that to River Whanganui in New Zealand or the Ganges in India. The organization Our Children´s Trust has filed a landmark case against the US government on behalf of 21 youngsters campaigning for their legal right to have a safe climate and healthy atmosphere for them and future generations.

We do not realize it but most of us are already involved in politics from the moment we step out of our doorsteps. When we engage in a conversation and exchange points of views with someone we do just that: politics. Unfortunately the word has become a swearword in today´s society thanks to the subversion of our flawed democratic system. It is our duty to change it in order to to revitalize democratic decision making and to turn electoral fundamentalism a relic of the past.

Let´s all become good ancestors within our possibilities and leave a long lasting legacy, shall we?