Agenda 21- Short Version brought on by Smart Growth
Smart Growth the UN and YOU or See What Not Being Informed Can Do for YOU!
To the framers of the U.S. Constitution, property was as sacred as life and liberty. The inalienable right to own, and control the use of, private property is perhaps the single most important principle responsible for the growth and prosperity of America. It is a right that is being systematically eroded.
Private ownership of land is not compatible with socialism, communism, or with global governance as described by the United Nations. Stalin, Hitler, Castro, Mao - all took steps to forcefully nationalize the land as an essential first step toward
controlling their citizens. The UN, without the use of military force, is attempting to achieve the same result.
The land policy of the United Nations was first officially articulated at the United Nations
Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat I), held in Vancouver, May 31 - June 11, 1976.
Agenda Item 10 of the Conference Report sets forth the UN's official policy on land.
The Preamble says:
"Land...cannot be treated as an ordinary asset, controlled by individuals
and subject to the pressures and inefficiencies of the market. Privateland ownership is also a principal
instrument of accumulation and concentration of wealth and therefore
contributes to social injustice; if unchecked, it may become a major
obstacle in the planning and implementation of development schemes. The
provision of decent dwellings and healthy conditions for the people can only be
achieved if land is used in the interests of society as a whole. Public control
of land use is therefore indispensable."
Nine pages of specific policy recommendations endorsed by the participating nations follow the Preamble,
including the United States.Here are some of those recommendations:
"Recommendation A.1
(b)All countries should establish as a matter of urgency a national policy on human settlements,
embodying the distribution of population...over the national territory.
(c)(v) Such a policy should be devised to facilitate population redistribution to accord with the availability of resources.
Recommendation D.1
(a)Public ownership or effective control of land in the public interest is the single most important
means of achieving a more equitable distribution of the benefits of development whilst assuring that environmental impacts are considered.
(b)Land is a scarce resource whose management should be subject to public surveillance or control in
the interest of the nation.
(d)Governments must maintain full jurisdiction and exercise complete sovereignty over such land with
a view to freely planning development of human settlements.
Recommendation D.2
(a) Agricultural land, particularly on the periphery of urban areas, is an important national resource;
without public control land is prey to speculation and urban encroachment.
(b)Change in the use of land...should be subject to public control and regulation.
(c)Such control may be exercised through:
(i) Zoning and land-use planning as a basic instrument of land policy in general and of control of land-use changes in particular;
(ii) Direct intervention, e.g. the creation of land reserves and land banks,
purchase, compensated expropriation and/or pre-emption, acquisition of
development rights, conditioned leasing of public and communal land, formation
of public and mixed development enterprises;
(iii) Legal controls, e.g. compulsory registration, changes in administrative boundaries, development building and local permits, assembly and replotting.
Recommendation D.3
(a)Excessive profits resulting from the increase in land value due to development and change in use
are one of the principal causes of the concentration of wealth in private hands.
Taxation
should not be seen only as a source of revenue for the community but also as a powerful tool to
encourage development of desirable locations, to exercise a controlling effect on the land market and to redistribute to the public at large the benefits of the unearned increase in land values.
(b) The unearned increment resulting from the rise in land values resulting from change in
use of land, from public investment or decision or due to the general growth of the community must be subject to
appropriate recapture by public bodies.
Recommendation D.4
(a) Public ownership of land cannot be an end in itself; it is justified in so far as it is exercised in favor of the common good rather than to protect the interests of the already privileged.
(b) Public ownership should be used to secure and control areas of urban expansion and protection;
and to implement urban and rural land reform processes, and supply serviced
land at price levels which can secure socially acceptable patterns of development.
Recommendation D.5
(b)Past patterns of ownership rights should be transformed to match the changing needs of society
and be collectively beneficial.
(c)(v) Methods for the separation of land ownership rights from development rights, the latter to be entrusted to a public authority."
The official U.S. delegation that endorsed these recommendations includes familiar names.
Carla A. Hills, then-Secretary of Housing and Urban Development became
George Bush's Chief trade negotiator. William K. Reilly, then-head of the
Conservation Foundation, became Bush's Administrator of the Environmental
Protection Agency. Among the NGOs (non-government organizations) present,
were: International Planned Parenthood Federation; World Federation of United
Nations Associations; International Union for the Conservation of Nature
(IUCN); World Association of World Federalists; Friends of the Earth; National
Audubon Society; National Parks and Conservation Association; Natural Resources
Defense Council; and the Sierra Club.1
These ideas came to America in the form of the Federal Land Use Planning Act which failed twice in Congress during the 1970s. Federal regions were created and the principles of the UN land policy were implemented
administratively to the maximum extent possible. NGOs were at work even then,
lobbying for the implementation of UN land policy at the state and local level. Both Florida and Oregon enacted state Comprehensive Planning Acts. Florida created state districts and multi-county agencies to govern land and water use.
Most states, however, were slow to embrace the UN initiative toward centralized planning and land management.
By 1992, the UN had learned to tone down its language and strengthen its arguments. The UN, working in collaboration with its incredible NGO structure, operating at the behest of International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN); the
World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF); and the World Resources Institute (WRI), made sure that the decade of the 1980s was awash with propaganda about the loss of biodiversity and the threat of global warming.
The foundation for the propaganda campaign may be found in three publications published jointly by the UN and its NGO collaborators: World Conservation Strategy, (UNEP, IUCN, WWF, 1980); Caring
for the Earth, (UNEP, IUCN, WWF, 1991); and GlobalBiodiversity
Strategy, (UNEP, IUCN, WRI, 1992). These documents, along with OurCommon
Future, the report of the 1987 Brundtland Commission (UN Commission
on Environment and Development) set the stage for Earth Summit II,
the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio de Janeiro in 1992.
This conference produced Agenda 21, the ultimate plan of action to save the world from human activity. The
document echos the 1976 document on land use policy, though in somewhat muted terms.
From Section II, Chapter 10 (page 84):
"Land is normally defined as a physical entity in terms of its topography and spatial nature; a broader integrative view also includes natural resources: the solid, minerals, water and biota that the land comprises. Expanding human requirements and economic activities are placing ever-increasing pressures on land resources, creating competition and conflicts and resulting in suboptimal use of both land and land resources. It is now essential to resolve these conflicts and move towards more effective and efficient use of land and its natural resources.
Opportunities to allocate land to different uses arise in the course of major settlement or development projects or in a sequential fashion as land becomes available on the market. This provides opportunities...to assign protected status for conservation of biological diversity or critical ecological services.
Objective 10.5
"The broad objective is to facilitate allocation of land to the uses that provide the
greatest sustainable benefits and to promote the transition to a sustainable and integrated
management of land resources:
(a) To review and develop policies to support the best possible
use of land and the sustainable management of land resources, by not later than
1996;
(b) To improve and strengthen planning, management and
evaluation systems for land and land resources, by not later than 2000;
(d) To create mechanisms to facilitate the active involvement
and participation of all concerned, particularly communities and people at the
local level, in decision-making on land use and management, by not later
than 1996.
Activities 10.6:
"(c) Review regulatory framework, including laws, regulations
and enforcement procedures, in order to identify improvements needed to support
sustainable land use and management of land resources and restrict the transfer
of productive arable land to other uses;
(e) Encourage the principle of delegating policy-making to the
lowest level of public authority consistent with effective action and a locally
driven approach.
Activities 10.7:
"(a) Adopt planning and management systems that facilitate the
integration of environmental components such as air, water, land and other
natural resources using landscape ecological planning for example, an ecosystem
or watershed;
(b) Adopt strategic frameworks that allow the integration of
both developmental and environmental goals; examples of those frameworks include
the World Conservation Strategy, Caring for the Earth "2
Between 1976 and 1992 a new strategy for land use control
was devised. It is subtle, sinister, and successful. Reread 10.6(e) above:
"Encourage the principle of delegating policy-making to the lowest level of
public authority consistent with effective action and a locally driven
approach." The reference to "public
authority" here is not to elected city councils or county commissions. The
reference is to newly constituted "stakeholder councils" or other bodies of
"civil society" that consist primarily of professionals functioning as
representatives of NGOs affiliated with national and international NGOs
accredited by the United Nations. This strategy is becoming increasingly
effective.
The Convention on Biological Diversity, authorized the production of the Global Biodiversity
Assessment (GBA).
TheGBA is a massive, 1,140-page document Section 11.2.3.13 (page 767):
"Property rights are not absolute and unchanging, but rather a complex, dynamic and shifting relationship between two or more parties, over space and time."
"Plants and animals are objects whose degree of protection depends on the value they represent for human beings. Although well
intentioned, this specifically anthropocentric view leads directly to the subordination of biological diversity, and to its sacrifice in spite of modern understanding of the advantages of conservation.
We should accept biodiversity as a legal subject, and supply it with adequate
rights. This could clarify the principle that biodiversity is not available for uncontrolled human use. Contrary to current custom,
it would therefore become necessary to justify any interference with biodiversity, and to provide proof that human interests justify the damage caused to biodiversity."3
Under the UN's concept of land and resource management, the owner is not even considered as one who may have a right to determine how his land is to be used. It is a higher authority that represents the "community" to whom "proof" must be offered that a proposed use is justified. This process effectively separates the right of ownership from the right of use, an objective
discussed in Recommendation D.5(c)(v) of the 1976 document. And who, exactly, is this "higher authority" to whom proof must be resented? The authority envisioned by the UN is not local elected officials, but rather local "stakeholder councils" dominated by NGO professionals.
Most Americans are totally unaware of this relentless, 20-year campaign by the UN to gain control over land use around the world. Many people believe that the UN is a distant, benevolent do-good organization that is expensive, but which has no direct affect on America. Nothing could be further from the truth.
The 1992 Earth Summit also produced the UN Commission on Sustainable Development and a new international NGO called Earth Council.
Earth Council, located in Costa Rica, is headed by Maurice Strong, Secretary General of Earth Summit I and II, the first Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), and a director of World Resources Institute (WRI).
The function of Earth Council is to coordinate the work of national councils on sustainable development. Currently more
than 100 nations have created national councils for the purpose of implementing Agenda 21 at the national level.
InAmerica,
The President's Council on Sustainable Development (PCSD) was created by Executive Order in 1993, and presented its report, Sustainable America, A New Consensus, in 1995. It is a compilation of 154 action items patterned after Agenda 21,
to be implemented in America.
At the November, 1995 meeting of the PCSD, Council members who were also Cabinet
members announced that at least 67 of the action items could be implemented "administratively," without Congressional involvement. The document provides 16 "We Believe" statements, which embrace the 27 principles articulated in the Rio
Declaration from Earth Summit II.
Among those statements is this:
"We need a new collaborative decision process that leads to better decisions; more rapid change; and more sensible use of human, natural, and financial resources in achieving our goals."
The report says further:
"Society outside of government, civil society, is demanding a greater role in governmental decisions, while at the same time impatiently seeking solutions outside government's power to decide. Our most important finding is the potential power of
and growing desire for decision processes that promote direct and meaningful interaction involving people in decisions that affect
them."
The election process and representative government created by the U.S. Constitution is clearly unacceptable to the PCSD, which wants "civil society" (read: NGO dominated stakeholder councils) to become the local authority for not only land use decisions, but for a variety of other policy decisions as well.
The PCSD report says (page 113): "What has become clear is that the conflicts over natural resources increasingly are exceeding the capacity of institutions, processes, and mechanisms to resolve them. The Council endorses the concept of collaborative approaches to resolving conflicts."
Conflicts arise because:
"Privately owned lands are most often delineated by boundaries
that differ from the geographic boundaries of the natural system of which they
are a part. Therefore, individual or private decisions can have negative
ramifications. For example, private decisions are often driven by strong
economic incentives that result in severe ecological or aesthetic consequences to both the natural system
and to communities outside landowner boundaries."
In plain English, the PCSD has determined that private land owners make land use decisions that are inconsistent with the land use principles laid down in the Global Biodiversity Assessment, Agenda 21, and the 1976 report of the UN Commission on Human
Settlements. To solve this problem, the PCSD issued the following recommendations (page 115): "Action 1. The President should issue an executive order directing federal agencies under the Government Performance and Results Act to promote voluntary, multi-stakeholder, collaborative approaches toward managing and restoring natural resources.
Action 2. Governors can issue similar directives to encourage state agencies to participate in and promote voluntary, multi-stakeholder, collaborative approaches.
Action 3. Public and private leaders (within the constraints of antitrust concerns), community institutions, non-governmental organizations, and individual citizens can take collective
responsibility for practicing environmental stewardship through voluntary, multi-stakeholder, collaborative approaches.
Action 4. The federal government should play a more active role
in building consensus on difficult issues and identifying actions that would
allow stakeholders to work together toward common goals. Both Congress and the executive branch should
evaluate the extent to which the Federal Advisory Committee Act poses a barrier
to successful multi-stakeholder processes, and they should amend regulations to
help accomplish this."4
Interestingly, a recommendation of the PCSD's Population and Consumption Task Force, which was
not included in the final report, said:
"The President and Congress should authorize and appoint a national commission
to develop a national strategy to address changes in national population
distribution that have negative impacts on sustainable development."5
Compare this recommendation to Recommendation A.1 from the 1976 Habitat
document.
Implementation of the UN's land use philosophy is well under way
in America, and is now being accelerated through the use of the "collaborative process" using stakeholder councils. The
1973 Endangered Species Act has been expanded administratively to now cover not
only endangered species, but the habitat which a listed species may wish to use,
even though the habitat may be privately owned. This policy breathes life into
the GBA recommendation to extend legal rights to biodiversity. It, in fact,
clarifies "the principle that biodiversity is not available for uncontrolled
human use."
The legal status of biodiversity has been further elevated by
the Vice President's "Ecosystem Management Policy," which places biodiversity
protection at the same priority level as human health, and which further
instructs officials to consider human beings to be a "biological resource"
in all ecosystem management activities.
Consistent with other PCSD recommendations, the federal
government is actively funding stakeholder councils throughout the country to
begin the process of creating "sustainable communities" as envisioned in
Agenda 21. Sustainable communities are essential to the concept of land use and resource management envisioned by the Global Biodiversity
Assessment, and required by the Convention on Biological Diversity.
Ultimately, if the UN plan is realized, at least half of the land area of North America will be converted to wilderness, off limits to human beings. An additional 25% will be controlled by government in collaboration with "civil society" in which
individuals will have to prove that a proposed use will not harm biodiversity.
Humans are to be relocated into "sustainable communities" that are described as
"islands of human habitat" surrounded by natural areas.
It
is now clear that the UN's land use policies, though refined over time, have had
a predetermined objective from the very beginning. That objective, as bizarre as
it may sound, is to place all land and natural resources under the ultimate
authority of the UN. The official report of the UN-funded Commission on Global
Governance, Our Global lNeighborhood, calls for placing "the global commons" under the direct
authority of the UN Trusteeship Council, and defines "global commons" to be:
"The atmosphere, outer space, the oceans beyond national jurisdiction and the
related environment and life-support systems that contribute to the support of
human life."6 Moreover, the UN Trusteeship Council is to be selected from
"civil society" representatives. The Commission on Global Governance also calls
for the creation of a new "Petitions Council" which would receive petitions from
"Stakeholder Councils" in each nation for the purpose of directing the
petitions to the correct UN agency for resolution and enforcement actions.
The objectives are real, published in official documents, and
the process is well underway. The strategy originated with the IUCN, WWF, and
the WRI, and is being advanced at the policy level through UN organizations,
international treaties and agreements, and on the ground through a massive
organization of "civil society" NGOs. Here, only the highest peaks of UN
activity have been identified. Virtually every activity, conference, and action
plan devised by the UN since the early 1970s has been aiming toward the ultimate
objective of eventual global governance founded upon the principles of
collectivism, central planning, andomnipotent enforcement,
disguised by the language of equity, social justice, and environmental protection.
Sadly, American policy has failed to honor the Constitutional commitment to life, liberty and property. The next four years in
America may well be the historic watershed, which will be seen by future generations as the point from which the
blessings of freedom were shared with the entire world, or the point from which the world began its descent into global tyranny.
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