ECI welcomes comments and suggestions on the new site, and invites you to "stay tuned" and watch as new developments come on line.

Mirian Vilela has been appointed by the ECI Council as the new executive director of ECI. Ms. Vilela has worked with the Earth Charter Initiative since 1995. Over the past two years she has served as the director of the Earth Charter Center for Education for Sustainable Development at the University for Peace in Costa Rica. Ms. Vilela will continue to direct the Earth Charter Center for Education, and the office of executive director of ECI has been moved from Stockholm to UPEACE in Costa Rica.

Mr. AtKisson developed a new strategic plan for the Earth Charter Initiative in 2005, and he worked with ECI to implement that plan in 2006 and 2007. This involved clarification of ECI’s mission, the drafting of a new vision statement, and a major reorganization of the governing and management structures for ECI. A new 23 member Earth Charter International Council was formed and charged with oversight of the Initiative, replacing the former Steering Committee of the Earth Charter Commission. The former Earth Charter Secretariat was renamed Earth Charter International. The ECI Council and executive staff worked together to create the new policies and management systems necessary for an expanded global operation. Over the past two years, ECI has developed a new website with ten times the number of visitors as two years ago and has greatly expanded programs in education, and youth and new initiatives in business and religion. A network of Earth Charter Ambassadors and Advisors has been formed. ECI has also built many new partnerships and formed many new affiliates around the world, including a partnership with UNESCO in support of the UN Decade of Education for Sustainable Development.

Mr. Rockefeller also stated: “The ECI Council is very pleased that Mirian Vilela will serve as the new executive director of ECI and greatly appreciates her willingness to take on this responsibility. As a result of all that has been accomplished over the past two years, the Earth Charter Initiative is well positioned today to continue to grow and to contribute in significant ways to the great work of building a just, sustainable and peaceful world.”

ECI Council

Mirian Vilela ha sido nombrada por el Consejo de la CTI como la nueva directora ejecutiva de la CTI. La Sra. Vilela ha trabajado con la Iniciativa de la Carta de la Tierra desde 1995. Durante los últimos dos años ha fungido como directora del Centro Carta de la Tierra de Educación para el Desarrollo Sostenible en la Universidad para la Paz en Costa Rica. La Sra. Vilela continuará dirigiendo el Centro Carta de la Tierra de Educación, y la oficina de la dirección ejecutiva ha sido trasladada de Estocolmo a la UPAZ en Costa Rica.

Consejo de la CTI

Like with the Earth Charter, principles play a large role in this study and in the WildCountry project, as it is called. WildCountry emphasizes the value of voluntary partnerships between a wide range of stakeholders, and particularly highlights the value of NGOs. Where governments are constrained by inertia, vested interests, or prior policy decisions, NGOs have flexibility. Through this multi-party approach to conservation, agricultural and pastoral systems can come closer to sustainability. But success will depend on having strong engagement with local communities and education, and especially on having strong scientific components of a strategy. (Photo1: 'Brendan Mackey and a giant termite mound on a recent field trip to Arnhem Land Northern Australia' by Charles Tambiah & the ANU WildCountry Research & Policy Hub)

Current research projects include surveying traditional owners of Aboriginal land in Northern Australia about the conservation status of native mammals, and investigating the challenges of conserving highly mobile ‘nomadic’ bird species. Another recent publication of his that focusses on the application of landscape ecology principles to conservation and development is the report entitled "The Nature of Northern Australia: its natural values, ecological processes and future prospects" (available online at
http://epress.anu.edu.au/nature_na_citation.html).

Brendan is a Professor of environment science at at The Australian National University (ANU). He is also Director of the ANU WildCountry Research and Policy Hub. He has worked as a research scientist with the CSIRO and the Canadian Forest Service. In addition to his essential role as a member of the Earth Charter International Council, Brendan co-chairs the IUCN (World Conservation Union) Ethics Specialist Group. (Photo2: 'Brendan Mackey hard at work on a recent field trip to Arnhem Land in Northern Australia' by Charles Tambiah & the ANU WildCountry Research & Policy Hub)

This volume underscores the meaningfulness of the Earth Charter principles for protecting ecological integrity and achieving sustainable development. It is both practical and uplifting—and it shows how much each of us can achieve.

Detailed topics include how to get your issue into the news, how to organize, how to lobby, how to mount a successful campaign, how to get an appointment with a cabinet minister, and how to appear on TV, among others. May says that too many people feel powerless. And as the reader progresses through this book, all such feelings disappear.

May was the Executive Director of the Sierra Club of Canada from 1989 to 2006. She has been instrumental in the creation of several national parks, including South Moresby, and was involved in negotiating the Montreal Protocol to protect the ozone layer. In 1998, the “Elizabeth May Chair in Women’s Health and Environment” was created in her honor at Dalhousie University. In May, 2001, she staged a 17-day hunger strike on Parliament Hill to force the government to promise to relocate at-risk families adjacent to the Sydney Tar Ponds.

May was elected the Green Party of Canada’s ninth leader at its national convention in August 2006 with a clear majority of the votes. She is the author of four other books, besides this one.

Guidance from May’s mother is irresistible, and these words are borrowed from May’s book as a way of directing you to it:

LESSONS LEARNED AT MY MOTHER’S KNEE
1. My grandmother always said, “Thought without constructive action
is demoralizing.”
2. You can accomplish anything you want if you don’t care who gets
the credit.
3. There is no one so famous or important that you cannot pick up
the phone and talk to them. Even famous people need baths.
4. Media coverage is fickle.
5. Sometimes governments lie.
6. No one is powerless without their own permission.
7. Be polite.
8. Thank people for helping.
9. Changing the world is only a matter of time (if you have enough
people on your side. Getting them on your side is what takes time!).
10. My mommy changed the world. So can I.

Dear Earth Charter friends,

I am writing to inform you that two vacancies have arisen on the Earth Charter International Council, which is the body responsible for guiding the international dimensions of the Earth Charter Initiative and for governing Earth Charter International, the coordinating secretariat. In accordance with the agreed process for appointing new Council members, I am inviting members of the Earth Charter community to recommend replacement candidates to the Nomination Committee.

The Nomination Committee will treat all recommendations for candidates in confidence. However, the Committee will be responsible for undertaking due diligence on recommended candidates, and may seek advice from Council members, Special Advisers and Affiliates on the suitability of the candidates. The Committee will then nominate a candidate for the Council’s approval.

Please note the following:

- Council members are appointed as individuals not as representatives of a nation or organisation;
- Council members need to have experience in and connections with international networks and processes, be able to report on perspectives from their region, and have the capacity to think strategically;
- You should obtain the person’s agreement before making a recommendation; and
- The person needs to understand that their contributions to the work of the Council will be voluntary.

Details of the nomination process and the responsibilities of Council members can be found on the “Nominations” page of the Earth Charter web site:

http://www.earthcharterinaction.org/nominations

If you wish to recommend a candidate for the Nomination Committee’s consideration, please email a letter outlining the reasons why you think this person should a member of the Earth Charter council plus their abbreviated curriculum vitae (maximum two pages).

Recommendations should be sent to: Lisa Öberg -- loberg [at] earthcharter [dot] org -- by 15 September 2007.

Yours sincerely,

Brendan Mackey
Chair, Nominating Committee
Earth Charter International Council

Dear ECI Executive Committee and Staff,

It seems good time to share an update with you on what is happening here in the Stockholm office, where we have started back to work after our July vacation season.

1. Michael Slaby to rejoin ECI Team full time, based in Heidelberg, Germany
With the approval of the grant ffor the creation of our new Program on Religion and Sustainability, Michael will now start to work implementing the strategy developed over the past year. Michael will focus first on further development of a general "Earth Charter Guide to Religion and Sustainable Development," but more specifically on an Earth Charter-focused briefing and teaching guide for religious leaders on the ethical issues surrounding climate change.

Congratulations to Michael and to all of us for having successfully navigated from initial Council approval to a well-researched and grant-funded program, in just nine months.

2. Dominic Stucker and Family to Move to Costa Rica and ECI Center at UPEACE
Dominic, the Earth Charter Youth Initiative's International Coordinator, will move to our Costa Rica center as of 1 October 2007. Dominic will ...

3. ECI partnership with Stockholm Environment Institute takes form
ECI is continuing to build its working relationship with Stockholm Environment Institute, with a variety of project ideas and collaborations on communication. One of the first of these will be to work with SEI materials and "translate" them for religious audiences grappling with how to engage on climate change and other global issues. ECI Council Member Li Lailai also serves as Assoc. Director for SEI, so we are especially happy for the link this provides, not just to SEI, but to China as well (Lailai, former director of LEAD China, retains very strong links to the research and NGO world in China). Stay turned for an announcement about a new high-level seminar series, in partnership with SEI, to be launched in February 2008 (among other projects!).

4. Goodbye to Leah Wener ... and shortly, hello to Lisa Panella
Leah Wener worked with us all year as an intern and World Leadership Corps fellow ... and she was an extremely valuable team member. In addition to supporting the Earth Charter Youth Initiative and working closely with Dominic on its design and development, she undertook several specific projects, including the drafting of a new guide for youth to get engaged in global governance issues. She also was an essential part of our communications team, managing the weekly emails and keeping web content updated. And a wonderful, smart, pleasant work colleague on top of all that! We will miss her greatly but wish her good fortune in her new volunteer assignment, working refugee camps near the Thai-Myanmar border zone. And we hope and expect to keep her engaged in the ECI family!

Starting 1 September, we will be joined by a new intern, named Lisa Panella, from Italy. Lisa P. (we will need to start saying Lisa Ö. and Lisa P.!) comes to us via the prestigious, EU-funded Leonardo Da Vinci fellows program, and is funded to work with us through the end of February 2008. With a strong background in communications, she will be picking up some of Leah's functions, and supporting Lisa in communications generally.

By the way, we're not saying goodbye yet to Kat Cooley -- working in Sichuan, China, in connection with our partner Ecologia and WLC, with an Earth Charter-related set of projects there -- because Kat is staying on after the end of her formal internship for at least several more months.

5. Other Updates ...
Here are some other things we are working on currently ...

- As Executive Director, I am trying to focus my time on fundraising as much as possible -- writing proposals, fundraising letters, fundraising materials. Now that we have such a wonderful team in place, and our programs are growing, it's important to build an even stronger financial platform to support this work over the long term. (Can you help, with donations, or links to inspired donors for ECI? Let me know!)

- Lisa Öberg is moving forward (with our new partners Mattias Klum AB, the National Geographic photographer and his colleagues) on the design of a new set of Earth Charter Exhibition Panels that hope to make available around the world, and we are also finalizing the initial agreement with National Geographic photographer Mattias Kum on the further development of our envisioned "Earth Charter Lighthouse" process.

- And finally, I've been in frequent contact with the Council Co-Chairs as the Council continues to develop its thoughts around a long-term vision for "Decentralized Empowerment to Scale Up" (as reported earlier).

There's a lot more, but this gives a you a snapshot of what's occupying our thoughts and time.

Warm greetings,
Alan

The Tällberg Forum, an annual June gathering in the Swedish region of Dalarna, has emerged as a premier global conference event in the field of sustainability. Increasingly, it seems to be playing a role similar to the World Economic Forum, though on a much smaller scale and with a focus on sustainability, peace, climate change, energy futures, global development challenges, and related issues.

The Earth Charter received significant and increasing attention at the Tällberg Forum 2007. Ruud Lubbers -- a member of both the Earth Charter Commission and a founding member of the Earth Charter International Council -- was a prominent plenary speaker, and his mention of the Earth Charter was picked up by a number of others, including Tällberg Founder Bo Ekman. The Charter was also the subject of a number of interventions during plenary sessions and workshops.

Thanks to the informality of the Tällberg environment, and the many conversations the conference makes possible, the Earth Charter is likely to be advanced via a number of new partnerships and initiatives in the coming year.

Continues with photos ...

The Tällberg Forum, founded as a small network 26 years ago, is in its third year of being an expanded global conference of around 450 leaders ranging from academics to ambassadors, multinational business people to local NGO leaders, indigenous peoples to royalty. Founder Bo Ekman, a Swedish businessman and philanthropist, remains the central organizer, and he and his colleagues in the Tällberg Foundation have improved upon the Forum in programmatic terms over the last three years.

Because of the prominence and diversity of those gathered to the Forum, Tällberg is framed as a neutral meeting ground. But the Forum is not, of course, truly neutral: the crisis of environment, poverty and global sustainability is very much at the heart of the gathering.

Tällberg Forum's program moves back and forth between very full plenary sessions (mixing prominent speakers, music, and interactive dialogue sessions under Europe's largest circus tent) to nine workshops or "Tracks" held in various hotels and village buildings. This year, the Tracks were designed to produce more concrete results in the form of agreements about key questions, necessary actions, and some level of consensus on where to go from here. In this, the design succeeded well.


Photo: UNEP Director Achim Steiner talking with Chief Oren Lyons of the Onandaga Iroquois Tribe. Conversations like this are typical of the Tällberg Forum.

Of the nine topical Tracks, ranging from issues of health to investment, Track 1 was a "big picture" session entitled: "If the present path is not sustainable, what is?" This was the track both Ruud and I participated in. It was organized by the Tällberg Foundation and Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI); and it was hosted by Tällberg Forum founder Bo Ekman, with Johan Rockström of SEI facilitating. (ECI has a strategic partnership with SEI.)

Photo: Small group discussion, Track 1, Tällberg Forum.

More Details on the Presence of the Earth Charter

Overall, the Earth Charter ended up having a much larger presence in the Tällberg Forum in 2007 than it did the year before. This year, Ruud Lubbers was asked to close the first plenary, and his optimistic message was very well received.

Ruud referenced the Earth Charter very early in his remarks, which he focused on the call to celebrate life. He also introduced the Charter the next morning, in his opening remarks to the "Track 1" workshop, which was focused on the overall concept of sustainability.

Ruud framed the Earth Charter as an historical extension of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights -- that is, a "new chapter" added to the set of fundamental ethical principles that humanity developed during the 20th century, when we realized a need for ethical principles to guide development at a global scale.

The Earth Charter was then referenced several times by others over the course of two days. Towards the end of the Track, Bo Ekman made, and several others echoed, a call for the "fusion" of the Universal Declaration on Human Rights with the Earth Charter.

What this "fusion" would mean in reality is still an open, and theoretical, question; but this is the second time I have heard Bo Ekman make this suggestion publicly.

The Charter was also mentioned several times in the plenary sessions (including the closing session, which I missed). Most encouragingly, these mentions of the Earth Charter came entirely at the initiative of the speakers, and were not a result of any active lobbying by me.

More on Track 1 (on Sustainability Overall)

This Track included, as participants, representatives from Microsoft, Ericsson, the World Future Council, the Iroquois nation, Vattenfall (European energy company), the Conference Board (meeting point for US corporate CEOs), an indigenous tribe from the far north-eastern corner of India, and an Anglican bishop from South Africa, to give a flavor of the diversity.

Speakers included:

James Hansen, NASA (eminent climate scientist)
Ruud Lubbers, Netherlands Energy Research Center (former prime minister)
Achim Steiner, Director, UNEP
Ray Andersen, Chairman, Interface (global flooring company)
Tariq Banuri, Stockholm Environment Institute
John Elkington, Founder, SustainAbility, UK
Alan AtKisson, Executive Director, Earth Charter International
Graham Barnes, Author & Psychoanalyst, Sweden
Peter Senge, Society for Organizational Learning, USA
Nayan Chanda, Yale Center for the Study of Globalization, USA
Jaqueline McGlade, Director, European Environment Agency
Mattia Romani, Economist, Shell
Kjell Aleklett, President, Association for the Study of Peak Oil
Ola Alterå, State Secretary, Ministry for Enterprise, Energy, and Communication, Sweden
Sverker Sörlin, environmental historian, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm
Manfred Max-Neef, Eminent Economist, Chile
Jonathan Porritt, Forum for the Future & UK Commission on Sust. Dev.
C.S. Kiang, Beijing University Environmental Fund, China

Half the session was spent in small group dialogues, and the final small group dialogue was focused on taking forward thoughts about "big questions, "necessary actions" and elements of a "Tällberg Consensus."

Three of the four small groups mentioned the Earth Charter in the final report to the whole workshop. Two of the small groups echoed Bo Ekman's call for a fusion of the Earth Charter with the Declaration on Human Rights, as part of the emerging consensus.

From Conversation to Action

Thanks to Tällberg, I had a number of excellent conversations. I discovered, just to note a prominent example, that the Swedish Crown Princess Victoria was very familiar with the Earth Charter; and I had wonderful offers of new commitments to help promote the Charter in the Netherlands, from a number of Dutch Tällberg attendees. The list of important conversations and possible new projects I came home with was long indeed.

In the months ahead I will be following up on at least a couple of dozen important follow-up initiatives that were kicked off or strengthened at Tällberg. Let me take this opportunity to thank, publicly, the Tällberg Forum organizers and board for including representatives from Earth Charter International in this exceptionally useful and important gathering.

- Alan AtKisson

The Autonomous University of San Luis Potosi (UASLP), in partnership with Luneburg University, and the Mexican and German Commissions of UNESCO, organized this conference, which followed up the debate that started on the first conference organized by these institutions in 2005, regarding the role of higher education institutions in bringing about changes towards sustainability. The event took place in the beautiful campus of UASLP, and there were approximately 200 participants coming mostly from universities of Mexico and Germany, also from Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, Brazil, Venezuela, Peru, Colombia, Cuba, United States, Canada, Russia, Sweden, Greece, Spain, and Netherlands among others. Outside the Americas and Europe, there was only the participation of representatives from University Sains Malaysia, and from Cameroon Gender and Development Foundation. Besides this Foundation from Cameroon, and myself, I did not find anyone else coming from NGOs; all participants were representing higher education institutions.

The organizers invited us, as Earth Charter Center of ESD, to participate with a full article for the event proceedings, and with a poster exhibition.

The conference had key note speakers and plenary sessions; these addressed our current world’s environmental crisis, the construction of new development models, and the role of higher education institutions to address the issues of unsustainability, more specifically in Europe and United States. In the plenary sessions, the Earth Charter was mentioned by Debra Rowe, the President of the US Partnership for Education for Sustainable Development, who introduced the Earth Charter as an important instrument that several universities in the United States are using to frame their actions to become sustainable campuses, and to address sustainability in different courses.

Panel presentations and discussions in the workshop sessions were interesting too, although I only attended a few of them because they were held simultaneously. A topic I learned and I think would be important for me to share in more depth is about the discussion on defining and reorienting competences for sustainable development. Luneburg University is carrying out research on how to define the competences or abilities that people must have to provoke behavioral changes towards more sustainable societies. The conference participants showed to be very interested in learning more about this research and to generate a network to continue the debate on this topic.

The organizers also launched during the conference a new International Master in Sustainable Development and Management. This will be a joint program between several universities, from Latin America and Western Europe. This master’s program is part of the Alfa Program, an education initiative from the European Union, which aims to promote cooperation between these two regions.

As part of the closing session, the organizers from Luneburg University presented a project to provide network possibilities for the conference participants and other interested in the conference topics. They proposed to create an online resource center for ESD materials, very similar content and format-wise as ours, but also proposed to include an e-community feature to make possible the interaction between participants, and a section to include events, courses and others organized by geographic regions. In this presentation they mentioned the Earth Charter Initiative as one of the important organizations to join efforts to build this resource center; therefore we decided to follow up this possible partnership with email conversations after their summer break.

The conference provided important opportunities to disseminate the Earth Charter message to higher education institutions, especially to those that are actively promoting the Decade of ESD but were not aware about the Earth Charter efforts on this regard. Also, I was able to learn different ways that academicians are trying to put into practice the vision of sustainability in their courses, the administration of the campuses, and in their extension efforts towards their surrounding communities.

Marina Bakhnova, project officer, Earth Charter Center for Education for Sustainable Development at UPEACE

The UN Decade for Education for Sustainable Development is involving a steadily increasing number of eductators and curriculum developers in Europe.
The 5th International Conference on Teacher’s Education, hosted by Debrecen University (Hungary), brought together more than 150 professional, dynamic, energetic, and committed educators from 16 countries, including the Czech Republic, Baltic countries, Italy, USA, Canada, Turkey, Finland and Costa Rica. Led by Prof. Ilga Salite, director of the Institute for Sustainable Education of the Daugavpils University, Latvia, the meeting has grown from a regional conference of educators from the Baltic states into an international forum. This evolution has been largely guided by these educators’ vision, vibrant energy and strong sense of responsibility for teaching a new generation of change agents in sustainable education.

The conference organizing committee gave special attention to the Earth Charter as a framework for education for sustainable development (ESD). As one of the invited key-note speakers, I was grateful for the opportunity to present the Earth Charter role in sustainable education processes, elaborate on the key ideas of the Earth Charter educational philosophy and methodology and, based on case-studies from Michigan University, Costa Rican schools, and the Paulo Freire Institute, offer concrete ways to use the Earth Charter as an ethical framework and useful educational tool for ESD.

I was happily surprised when, as a representative of the Earth Charter Center for ESD, I was officially presented with a membership card of the Baltic and Black Sea Circle Consortium, a fast growing international network of educators.

The Conference turned out to be a great opportunity to meet with old champions and allies of the Earth Charter. One of these, Charles Hopkins of York University, Canada, now actively works with the United Nations University to establish Regional Centres for Expertise (RCE), a global network of existing formal, non-formal, and informal education organizations aiming to deliver education for sustainable development to a regional/local community. RCEs aspire to achieve the goals of the UNDESD by translating its global objectives into the context of the local/regional community in which it operates. Dr. Hopkins expressed his keen interest in forging a strong partnership with our Centre in creating one such RCE in Costa Rica with the Earth Charter as a strong ethical background.

I am happy to report that the Eastern European network of universities is no stranger to the Earth Charter. At the conference, I learned about several places and projects where the Earth Charter is already being employed. It was a very inspiring experience, and one that further broadened horizons for the Earth Charter. Indeed, the Earth Charter is paving its way as an indispensable educational tool for ESD!

The ECI Council was formed in March, 2006, as the successor to the Steering Committee of the Earth Charter Commission. The Commission entrusted the Council to carry on the work of leading and guiding the Earth Charter Initiative. The Commission retains authority over the text of the Earth Charter itself.

ECI Council members are recommended by the broader Earth Charter community, and nominated by the Council's Nominating Committee. The Council selects its members to serve three-year terms. Members may be renewed for a second three-year term, but there is a limit of two consecutive terms before a Member must stand down from the Council.

Council members serve as volunteers. If they require it, their travel expenses for meeting attendance will be reimbursed by ECI; but otherwise Council Members do not receive financial compensation for their service.

To recommend someone to be considered by the Nominating Committee, please send an email to Lisa Öberg, loberg [AT] earthcharter [DOT] org, in our Stockholm office. The letter should include:

- A brief statement (1 page or less) of why the person should be selected
- A brief biography or CV (2 pages or less)
- Full contact information for the person you are recommending

Below, you will find the full text of the Council's "Guidelines for Organization and Operation" as well as the official statement of Council responsibilities.

Guidelines for the Organization and Operation of the Earth Charter International Council

Version 2.0
As adopted by the Council on 10 April 2006

A. Membership

1. The Council shall have no fewer than 15 members and no more than 25. The membership of the Council shall reflect geographical distribution, cultural diversity, gender and age balance, and diverse spheres of professional expertise relevant to the goals and programs of the Earth Charter Initiative.

2. Council members shall be elected for a three-year term and may serve two three-year terms after which they may not be reelected to the Council for at least one year. There will be three classes of Council members with staggered terms so as to ensure some continuity in membership.

3. In the case of any vacancy on the Council for any cause, the Council may elect a new member to hold office for the unexpired term of the Council member whose position has become vacant.

B. Officers

1. The Council shall have a chair or co-chairs and such additional officers as the Council may decide—for example, a vice chair, treasurer, and secretary.

2. Meetings will be chaired by the chair or co-chairs. In the absence of the chair or co-chairs, the vice chair will chair a meeting, if a vice chair has been elected.

C. Meetings

1. The Council shall hold at least one meeting a year at a time and place to be determined by the chair. co-chairs, or Council.

2. Notice of meetings will go out to Council members at least one month prior to the meeting and significantly earlier whenever possible. However, in the case of a special meeting called to address an urgent issue, notice may go out only ten days in advance of the meeting.

3. One of the regular Council meetings will be an annual meeting at which officers (including the chair or co-chairs and the chief executive officer for Earth Charter International) and Council members are elected.

4. Additional meetings of the Council may be called by the chair or co-chairs, the Council, or a group of five or more Council members.

5. The presence at a meeting of half the members of the Council or more shall constitute a quorum for the transaction of business. A Council member participating by telephone conference call shall be considered present.

6. The chair or co-chairs will make every effort to develop a consensus on important issues. When the person chairing a meeting believes that a consensus may have been reached, he/she may call a test vote to determine if all Council members present are in agreement. If a vote reveals that a consensus has been reached, the chair will declare that there is a consensus and the matter has been decided. If the test vote reveals that there is not a consensus, the chair may continue the Council’s deliberations on the matter under consideration or postpone further discussion to a later date. If the chair determines that a decision on the matter under consideration must be made without further delay in order to resolve urgent business of Earth Charter International, the chair may put the matter to a formal vote. Under these circumstances, a majority of those present at a meeting is sufficient to approve or defeat a resolution. A formal vote will involve determining those who are in favor, opposed, and abstaining.

7. As a general rule, resolutions proposed for adoption by the Council will be presented to the Council in writing.

8. When there are compelling reasons to do so, Council meetings may be conducted by conference telephone or another similar mode of communication that allows all persons participating in the meeting to hear each other at the same time.

9. When a Council member is not able to attend a meeting, he/she may send a representative. Representatives of Council members may participate in Council discussions, but do not have a vote.

10. At least once a year, the Council will meet in executive session during one of its meetings.

11. Minutes of each Council meeting will be prepared, distributed to the Council members, and submitted for the members’ approval at the next Council meeting.

D. Action by Unanimous Written Consent

1. The Council may take action without a formal meeting at any time by the unanimous written consent of all its members (an e-mail will suffice) to a written resolution authorizing action of the kind that might be taken at a regular meeting.

E. Committees

1. The Council shall appoint an Executive Committee of five to eight members to transact business on behalf on the Council between meetings. The Executive Committee will be chaired by the chair or a co-chair of the Council and will report to the Council on all actions taken by the committee at the next meeting of the Council.

2. The Council shall appoint a Nominating Committee of three to five persons that presents nominations for Council membership.

3. The Council shall create such other committees as the chair, co-chairs, or Council decides are needed. The Council will prepare a written statement of the responsibilities of all committees.

F. Reimbursement of Council Members

1. Members of the Council shall not receive compensation for their service on the Council but may be reimbursed for travel and lodging expenses directly related to Council meetings.

G. Annual Report

1. The Council will issue an annual report on the activities of the Council and Earth Charter International, including a financial report. The annual report will be prepared by the CEO and senior management team under the oversight of the chair or co-chairs and Council.

* * *

Responsibilities of the Earth Charter International Council

Version 2.0
As adopted by the Council on 10 April 2006

The Earth Charter International Council (hereafter referred to as “the Council”) is responsible for providing leadership in support of the mission of the Earth Charter Initiative, which is to establish a sound ethical foundation for the emerging global society and to help build a sustainable world based on Earth Charter values. The Council has responsibility for overseeing the activities of Earth Charter International, which includes the Center for Strategy and Communications and the Center for Education for Sustainable Development, and for overseeing the progress of the larger Earth Charter Initiative.

More specifically, the responsibilities of the Council and its members are to:

1. Elect the members of the Council.

2. Elect a chair or co-chair of the Council and such other officers as the Council decides are appropriate, such as a vice chair, treasurer, and secretary.

3. Appoint the chief executive officer of Earth Charter International and oversee the activities of the CEO.

4. Appoint an Executive Committee of five to eight members to act on behalf of the Council between meetings and a Nominating Committee of three to five members.

5. Create such other committees as the Council may decide are necessary. The responsibilities of each committee should be carefully defined.

6. Define the mission of the Earth Charter Initiative and revise the mission statement as appropriate.

7. Approve an annual operating budget for Earth Charter International. An operating budget will be prepared by the executive director and submitted to the Council for its review and approval.

8. Set major policies and strategic guidelines for Earth Charter International and approve major programs and partnerships. The CEO and senior management team will bring their recommendations for new policies, strategic guidelines, programs, and partnerships to the Council for approval.

9. Undertake long-range planning, working together with the CEO and senior management team.

10. Approve a fundraising strategy that promises to meet the financial needs of Earth Charter International and support the fundraising initiatives of the Council and Earth Charter International.

11. Promote and monitor an ongoing worldwide, cross cultural dialogue on the Earth Charter and global ethics. Ensure that criticisms and misinterpretations of the Charter are carefully analyzed and that appropriate responses are made to attacks on, or misinformation about, the Earth Charter when a response will serve a good purpose from the perspective of the mission of the Earth Charter Initiative.

12. Ensure that the Earth Charter, the Earth Charter Initiative logo, and the titles “Earth Charter International” and “Earth Charter Initiative” have appropriate legal protection.

13. Provide leadership that keeps the activities of the Council, Earth Charter International, and Earth Charter Initiative in accord with the values of the Earth Charter.

14. Confirm appointment of Earth Charter Ambassadors who have been nominated by the executive management team or Council members.

15. Keep well informed regarding the activities of Earth Charter International and the Earth Charter Initiative.

16. Attend regularly scheduled meetings of the Council.

17. Provide leadership and support for Earth Charter activities locally and regionally and, as appropriate, globally.

18. Be available to provide advice to the Earth Charter International staff.

19. Ensure that the Earth Charter Commission receives the annual report of Earth Charter International and is kept informed of major developments, especially with reference to the dialogue and debate surrounding the Earth Charter document.

20. Prepare and revise as appropriate a set of guidelines for the organization and operation of the Council.

Browse the Transition Blog.

Those who followed the 2006 "Transition Blog" will remember that I periodically attempted to write, from the director's perspective, about the enormous changes we were moving through. You will find plenty of news about our work in 2007 on the main Earth Charter in Action blog - we are happy indeed to see that the Transition process has born such lovely fruit.

That Transition blog has been archived and will soon be available here for those who have historical interest. But meanwhile, here is a short, current update ...

- We continue to work in two main offices, Stockholm and Costa Rica. Stockholm is where we center our work on Strategy and Communications generally; Costa Rica is home to our Center for Education for Sustainable Development, hosted by the UN-mandated University for Peace. (This tells you how important education is to our work. See their site for more detailed information about this very central area of activity.) These centers also, of course, have special additional responsibilities in terms of outreach to their respective regions.

- We also have a network of nearly 100 ECI Affiliates the world over. These are organizations and individuals who formally agree to promote the Earth Charter and run programming in their respective countries and regions. The Affiliate network is still in the process of being restructured, but we are so pleased by the amazing dedication and quality of the work being at the national and regional level with the Earth Charter. (Truth be told, some of these national-level efforts are bigger, in scale terms, than our international secretariat.) (Also, we will soon have a more developed Affiliate page for easier access to information; for now, you can connect to Affiliates by clicking here.)

- And finally, to keep this extremely brief, we continue to roll out the new programs and initiatives that have been in development over the past year or so. These include initiatives in the areas of business, climate, religion, and of course youth, which is an additional area of special priority for us.

We are, as the title notes, dancing as fast as we can. With the whole world as our area of responsibility, and small team around a dozen full-time folks on staff or working with us part-time, there are many more dance-partners we should connect with than there are dancers-on-staff at present. We find ourselves continually asking for other people's patience when we can't immediately respond to requests etc. But we're growing, and we are working especially on developing the resources and materials that will allow folks around the world to empower their own leadership and action to promote the Earth Charter vision, values, and ethical principles.

Questions about our work? Send them to (and now we have to be very careful about putting email addresses on line for spam reasons, hence the funny characters) info [[at]] earthcharter.org. We'll try to address them here.

Thanks for your interest (in reading about us!) and support, and we will do our best to keep you up to date about what is happening at Earth Charter International.

- Alan AtKisson
Executive Director

Photo: Some of the ECI Team at the April 2007 Council meeting in Sao Paulo, Brazil