ITU: the Communications Wonderland

(as published in CircleID)

I kept wondering if all that I had said about Dr Toure was fair—I hadn't met him before and had written so much to comment on the transcript of his speech at ICANN, Cairo . My discomfort was short-lived and even before a month elapsed I met him at the Internet Governance Forum, Hyderabad. Exchanged pleasantries before saying "I wrote some strong comments about your speech at Cairo". Dr Toure looked happy to see me, beamed with a bit of surprise and said he read my comment, he tried to find me and I was charmed by his unassuming manners and the spontaneity and the responsiveness with which he offered to clarify a few points about his speech and the ITU. I was even more happy to meet him and it was instantly agreed that we would meet the following day at 11 30 hours. In between Dr. Toure visited a Diplo Foundation meeting, he conversed a little and was warm and friendly, it was pleasant to talk to him and he again confirmed the meeting.

Contrary to my expectations of a Diplomat who is very calculative and careful about what he says or does, I found an approachable gentleman, who is spontaneous and speaks without hesitation and with a simplicity that charmed me.

The tête-à-tête on the next day near the ITU booth in the IGF Village was informal and lasted 45 minutes. ITU has a rare Secretary General who has chosen not to be detached at a level that is inaccessible. Dr Toure would not wait for the General Body of members to identify issues, debate and escalate them to his office, but would rather break conventions to set a new style, take the initiative and pro-actively tackle issues. That is very positive. One has to congratulate the ITU on its good fortune of having Dr Hamadoun Toure as its Secretary General.

I had earlier said "Dr.Toure is a diplomat. Every word in his speech has a specific weight". I wondered if it was right to assume an overall design behind everything that he had said at Cairo. It is with the positive doubt that some of his earlier remarks at ICANN were harmless that I listened to the Secretary General attentively and with openness.

Dr Toure, with all his charm, keeps his focus on the ITU agenda. He did not deviate from what he said at the ICANN and maintained that there is no reason for ITU and ICANN to fight each other. He is only bringing up points for discussion, the issues need to be discussed. Did we say we wanted to take over Internet Governance anywhere? The ITU mandate was renewed sometime last year for the next four years. His plate is full. ITU depends on voluntary subscriptions, and where will he find funds if he takes up some thing new? Why is ITU misunderstood?

He talked inspiringly of the 143 year old organization, and in particular of the unanimity at the ITU between member governments. I intervened to ask if the unanimity between ITU member governments is possibly due to the inability of most member states to disagree: no member state can afford to dissent because if it does, its communications with the rest of humanity would be cut off? (What I implied was that Syria votes along with US because Syria can't afford to find its phones off-line.) He said, no, it is both ways, when Iran or Syria proposes something US agreed with it. Just as Syria or Iran agrees with the US. I said that is good, that is positive.

ITU is committed to multi stakeholderism. Any organization has a membership form and somebody has to approve it. ITU also has a membership form for Civil Society participation. To avoid bogus Civil Society members it insists on a certification from the local government for approval. When I agreed that due diligence is important, and gently suggested that there could be alternate ways of verifying the authenticity of Civil Society member-applicants rather than seek a government approval, he didn't get into the point, probably because it was time to go.

There were other points brought up, there were some comments about the early history of the Internet, about the Secretary General's meeting with the ICANN CEO Paul Twomey, about the good work that ITU did in Africa.

I was charmed, I liked Dr Hamadoun Toure. He didn't quite look like Sir August de Wynter, but whenever I think of the ITU I am reminded of The Avengers

The script, largely printed here verbatim, but rearranged with some insertions introduces Sir August de Wynter as a millionaire who owns half of the Highlands. Former head of Special Projects at the Ministry. A recluse with a wife called June. And a daughter somewhere—Julie. June, July ... August: The family does seem to be somewhat meteorologically inclined. Sir August de Wynter was associated with a next generation climate engineering project called The Prospero Project. The plan was to manipulate weather by injecting a chemical cocktail into the atmosphere by laser and satellite. Sir August de Wynter also happens to be the Chairman of BROLLY (British Royal Organization for Lasting Liquid Years), which is profoundly concerned about atmospheric Security, that the weather has been tampered with by aliens.

It all takes shape as the Wonderland Corporation whose line is "Be natural. Act natural. Think natural. The natural beauty of Wonderland Weather." Natural weather delivered to your door on demand. Down your phone line. As real as you wish. Hot or cold. Humid or dry. Anything with reason. People expect weather to be free. They're used to it. They buy water, electricity, gas. Why shouldn't they be able to buy their own weather if they want to?


Wonderland has the technology, equipment and power to make or destroy local weather systems. Wonderland could zap a thousand Chernobyls into the air. If you can control the weather, you control the world

The World Council ministers assemble: slick pin-striped suits or African robes, Chinese Mao-suits, Indian Nehru-jackets, all distinguished men and women, surrounded by fussing officials, minor dignitaries, and butlers, bowing and weaving a web of diplomatic protocol. Sir August de Wynter causes a sudden extreme climate change to coincide by setting off sudden storms and snow blizzards. Outbursts of rain, scattered hailstorms and freezing fog ... Chaos. Transport paralysis. Crop failure. Economic disaster. Frostbite or sunburn ... on a massive scale.

The council is perplexed at the extremely destructive climate change and realizes that there is no magic umbrella to shield the world. Sir August de Wynter arrives to say "Now is the winter of your discontent! You will buy your weather from me! And by God you'll pay for it.”

...

Overture to Take Over Internet Governance: ITU at ICANN Meeting, Cairo

( reposted as published at CircleID )

ITU is 143 years old and it has done a lot of good work. But it is so huge and powerful that it has been monopolizing (or mono-unionizing) Telecommunications for the last 143 years. ITU's hold over communications has been sweeping. But during the last ten years, ITU's member Telcos have seen several challenges from the open Internet architecture. Alternate telecommunication technologies such as email and Internet telephony have been formidable challenges to the ITU.

Despite Internet's dependence on phone lines, ITU hasn't been able to rule the Internet the way it has ruled traditional telecommunications. ITU hasn't been able to block the progress of Voice and Video Chat or Internet Telephony and the business models of those who provided these services online threatens the traditional business models of ITU's Telecom members.

Its program: a very attractively dubbed "Next Generation Networks" design that will pave way for a tiered, non-neutral internet, away from Internet's end to end principle, meant to optimize the Internet for exploitation by the Telcos and susceptible for interference by Governments. The Gameplan: Take over Internet Governance.

ITU and the Internet organizations did not quite get along for this and several other reasons Especially the ITU has had its share of differences with the ICANN. Dr. Hamadoun Toure, Secretary General of the ITU addressed the ICANN Annual Meeting at Cairo on 6 November 2008. Here are some excerpts from the Secretary General's speech with my comments. I have already posted it on the Internet Governance Caucus mailing list, In these comments, I have not included positive remarks that are due: It is positive as a gesture on the part of the ITU Secretary General to have extended an arm to work with ICANN and to pronounce a desire to be committed to the mutli-stakeholder approach. What I have done instead was to read between the lines of the Secretary General's speech transcript, just to raise some points for discussion.

I was not there at Cairo to "feel" the Secretary General's Speech, these comments are based on impressions from the transcript. And these comments are my own and do not represent the views of any organization.

Hammadoun Toure: since 1865, since the creation of the telegraph. And we are very proud of the way the organization has been able to adapt itself over the years and decades and centuries, from telegraph to telephone to teletypewriters, to radio and television. We are talking about digital broadcasting now. And very soon, 3D television. We are talking about the emergence of new technologies

My comment: # ITU adopts itself to own all inter-human communication in any form.

Toure: I was telling to many people from developing countries who were fighting for Internet governance: "Before you get the governance, get the Internet first."

# Yes that allows various interests to give shape to the internet in a manner that is most advantageous for commerce and government. After that any process of debate on Governance wouldn't be able to reverse the practices established.

Toure: ICANN is just ten years old but it's done a great job.

# Yes, ITU is older. We notice that the ITU has governed Communications around the world for over 143 years.

Toure: we had a very successful WSIS. For the first time, a UN body was organizing a summit, where you didn't have demonstrations outside.

# Business and Government kept the Civil Society locked out in several international conventions that were either in the Governments' Diplomatic Territory or Business' Commercial Territory. The Internet is Civil Sphere and the Governments were the latecomers. What ought to have been said here is that the Civil Society included Government and Business and not vice versa.

Toure: Every time a Web browser establishes a secure connection to a server, ITU's work on PKIs, public key infrastructures, and encryption keys, is used. Our pioneering work on electronic authentication enabled jurisdictions around the world to recognize e-mail as legal documents and to give legal studies to electronic signatures.

# I can't help notice that most of the work that the ITU has done relates to "authentication", "security" etc. to enable "jurisdiction". Isn't the ITU working on making the Internet what it is not?

We [ITU and ICANN] just have to learn to know each other better so that we can like each other and work together. And the main reason why I'm here is that is my motto: "

# This sounds dangerous. The DOC-supervised ICANN and the inter-governmental ITU aligned together !

Toure: IGF is just going around and around, avoiding the topics, and becomes sometimes a waste of time.

(In the words of someone, "Dr.Toure is a diplomat. Every word in his speech has a specific weight. Some of it is designed to trigger a reaction, some of it is designed to undermine, some of it is a smoke-screen, and some of it is designed to instill more confidence between the two organizations. Some of it is a specific warning, and some of it is an open hand to make peace." Why would he say something as bizarre as "IGF is just going around and around, avoiding the topics, and becomes sometimes a waste of time"?)

# For the Internet Community, the IGF process is in a sense a huge distraction away from the policy changes and new Internet legislations that get enacted in bits and pieces (leading to an untold comprehensive whole) in different parts of the world — e.g. the move by UK to direct ISPs to retain traffic records for two years. IGF perhaps requires a complete re-redesign.

Toure: Next year, ITU will organize the World Policy Forum, which addresses a number of Internet-related public-policy issues, ranging from cyber security and data protection to multilingualism and the ongoing development of Internet.

# World Policy Forum? For the ITU to psychologically claim its stake as the ICT super-authority?

Toure: I hope you will not tell me here, "Don't talk about Internet." .... we need to talk about it. And you shouldn't see us as an enemy. I always said that I have enough on my plate in ITU and there is no need to add more.

# I don't get the feeling that ITU is content with its sphere of influence.

Toure: If you want an Internet connection for a business or a house, they will ask you first if you have a telephone line.

# Why do I need an ITU regulated and monitored phone line to qualify for Internet Access? Why isn't the Community doing enough to bring in alternate technologies?

I am reminded of the mythical "Breakages Limited of George Bernard Shaw's Apple Cart. Breakages Limited is a draconian monopoly that would suppress any new technology that would threaten its revenues. For instance it would suppress inventions such as unbreakable glass. If that is myth from English Literature, the War of Currents has been closer to home and is better understood: Edison did everything to malign and suppress alternate (pun intended) technologies in order not to lose revenues from his Direct Current architecture...

Toure: During the debates of the WSIS, when people were talking about Internet governance, I was telling them, "Get Internet first before you talk about getting the governance of it." I was giving simple example, comparing Internet and telecommunications to trucks or cars and highways. It's not because you own the highways that you're going to own all the trucks or cars running on them, and certainly not the goods that they are transporting, or vice versa. It's a simple analogy.

# Great. The road analogy isn't all that perfect as an analogy for the Internet. I will let it go to say that those who own the roads get to decide who rides and who doesn't and gets to decide what to charge as toll fee.

Toure: … the relationship between the Internet and the telecommunication world… And they are condemned to work together. It's a condemned marriage. So better enjoy it. If you know that you're not going to get divorced in any case because you're condemned to live together, you better find a way to enjoy each other, and have kids in the process.

# The Internet CAN technically divorce the telecoms or even scale up to include telecoms services as part of the internet. It is a condemned marriage alright, but if one partner is too difficult and drives the other to the wall, a divorce isn't technically infeasible.

Toure: It has been alleged in some corners of the ITU that ITU wishes to govern the Internet. And I have specifically said that I categorically deny that.

# When someone in government or someone connected to government "denies" something, it is always true.

Toure: And I say today again to you, it is not the case. My intention as Secretary-General of ITU is not to govern the Internet. But we need to work together, because there are developing countries that are in need of access. At the end of this year, we'll have four billion mobile telephones in the world. While we try to bridge the gap in telephony, we have to ensure that no new gap is created in Internet and no new gap is created in broadband for us to help other sectors to meet the Millennium Development Goals. Therefore, there is a need for these two societies to work together. Almost half of the people in this room are very active participants in the ITU. And, therefore, I think there is room for us to know each other and to understand.

ITU's role as a multilateral forum for debate is to serve as a source of impartial expert information and guidance, just as we have done for nearly 145 years. We strive to help all parties work together to clarify the issues and build consensus on the most effective ways of promoting the evolution and uptake of this powerful resource. And we have that capability. We are proud of that culture. It's the only organization where you will have countries that are at war on other fronts, are supporting each other with common resolutions, without the people supporting those resolutions being fired. I'm proud to say that we are the only organization where you have Iran supporting "his friends", I quote, of the United States, or vice versa and the people who have supported that are still alive. It happens on a daily basis. We never had any Palestinian-Israeli crisis inside the ITU. They share spectrums. So we are in a position to work with everyone, because we have a technical approach to issues.

# Impressive. But aren't you bidding to take over the internet by saying all this?

Toure: ITU is also actively encouraging the industry-wide move to IPv6. Again, looking on the Web all of last week, I've seen numerous attacks on the ITU for having pronounced the world IPv6.This is a concern for all of us. Every mobile phone will have an IP address, every fridge, every car, it's an inevitable thing.

# What concerns me is the possibility that everything that I ever say on the Internet could be linked to my IPv6 address. My computer will have an IPv6 address. My refrigerator and my MP4 player will have traceable IPv6 addresses. Where is my privacy? (Unless I have the good fortune of being connected to technical experts who would point me to RFC 4941 "Privacy Extensions or Stateless Address Autoconfiguration in IPv6 " and other resources and manage to enhance my computer for privacy). Perhaps I will be able to borrow my refrigerator's IPv6 address to send an email to my top secret girl friend and in case my wife gets hold of that message I could blame it on the refrigerator?

Toure: In 2005, WSIS mandated ITU to take a lead role in building confidence and security in the use of ICTs. I put in place a high-level expert group last year to study the issue and report to the council, with the final report this year. We are gaining a momentum as we move steadily towards agreements on an international set of principles and best-practice approaches that countries around the world can follow to promote cybersecurity.

# Security concerns are center stage on the ITU agenda, pushing the need to build (user) Confidence out of view. What has ITU done on the privacy front, to protest against legislations such as directives by UK to ISPs to retain email logs for two years or directives by governments to facilitate recording of mobile phone conversations?

Toure: Estonian network was down for two days… And during the uprising between Georgia and Russia, we have noticed a large number of botnets or cyber attacks between the two countries. That is scary.

# Thank you for drawing attention to the fact that it is sometimes Governments that cause or engineer some of the major cyber incidents?

Toure: Our children, who spend most of their time in cyberspace, are not taught the basic behaviours in the cyberspace. When they go out in the street, we tell them, "Be careful. Don't talk to strangers, don't accept candy from someone you don't know. It could be a drug that could kill you." But they're out there in cyberspace without telling them what to do or how to behave.

# Yes, in such a way that they don't become paranoid in the process.

Toure: The potential of the Internet to accelerate social and economic development in the world's poorest regions is perhaps its greatest asset. I hope you will support ITU in our ongoing effort to see that everyone everywhere has a chance to benefit from that potential for the betterment of our planet, and for humankind, for all humankind.

# Sounds rhetorical.

Toure: We will never counter terrorism if we don't have a harmonized way of tracing back the IP address. ...

# How would I trust the Law and Order agencies to restrict use of these technologies only against terrorists and criminals and not against the unsuspecting citizens?

Question from Zahid Jamil, DNS Resolution Center Pakistan:

Q: I am a lawyer from Pakistan. Your Excellency, I heard you talk about the important role that ITU can play in everything from IPv6, the coordination of the IP-based networks, cybersecurity, privacy, data protection, cybersecurity, cyberterrorism, multilingualism, IDNs, a whole bunch of things. My only question is, to what extent do you think ITU would have any restrictions, because it seems it would probably become the regulator in convergence of everything. So is there a limitation you can see as far as the ITU's scope?

# Touche'

Question from WOLFGANG KLEINWÄCHTER, University of Aarhus:

Q: what is the future of civil society in the ITU? ITU has nearly 200 member states and more than 700 private sector members. When civil society becomes an equal partner in this setting?

# Is it really possible to believe that the Civil Society would be represented at the ITU so broadly as to balance the 191 member states and 700 private sector companies? ITU is ITU. It could come to the IGF to represent business and government. If Civil Society focuses its effort on getting better represented at the ITU, some day the IGF could become a part of the ITU.

Dr. Toure: Government is in an advisory role. Advisory role! You advise me and I am free to take your advice?

# Advice from Government always comes with the subtle posture of "it is just an advice or a suggestion—but remember where it comes from."

Dr. Toure: During the WSIS process, we had a problem that some member states have genuinely raised. We have countries like China. During a PrepCom in Japan we spent three days out of four not working because there were some so-called civil society, NGO that were government officials from Taiwan. The Chinese delegation came with their photos and information on them from the Web that they are government officials, and they registered as NGOs. It's a problem.

# Thank you for bringing that up. This is really an issue about how the Civil Society is constituted at least in parts. We need to clean up a little bit.

Dr.Toure : Now, let's be clear. Government cannot get into individual people's privacy.

# Please, don't.

Dr.Toure: I'm telling you my intention is not, from ITU, to try and take over Internet.

# When someone in government or someone from an inter-governmental organization talks of an absence of an intention, there is always an intention.

Dr. Milton Mueller of the Internet Governance Project has published a blog post that gives a clear analytical summary on Dr Toure's speech here.

....

On Alexandria

The Project Proposal

(sent as an entry for the Digitial Media Learning Competition of the McArthur Foundation)

The space between Chennai and Arizona / Illinois is zero. In Illinois a 21st Centrury Classroom is being designed. Elesewhere in America and Europe Advanced Digitial Learning environments, modules and methods and lessons exist. These are technologies and trends that are equally applicable with transformatory effect in a rual Indian Classroom.

Alexandria would bring in these technologies to enable an initial group of 1000 studnets to learn participatorily and share experience with the rest of the world. The project would collarborate with other groups by taking and providing intputs to create a model to bridge the gaps in quality of education in schools around the world.

Alexandria / Nalanda will have as infrastructure, a connected learning atmosphere, visualized as built 'around' a 21st Century Participatory Learning Library as Physical Space at Chennai. This 'library' would admit 1000 underprivileged students studying at insufficiently funded schools after a careful admission process to assess their commitment to learn. These students would be a heterogeneous group from different schools, different grades, of age group 15-21 and would include some well connected students from Premier Educational Institutions who are committed to the purpose of participative learning Carefully selected Teachers are to guide the participants in using the wealth of online multimedia tools and content, continuously bibliograph suitable resources, organize and facilitate expert interactions The facility will operate in a cost effective building with a scientific design, with digital facilities, connected classrooms, a Digital Internet Auditorium and a library of books.

The design of the facilities would be by learning and collaborating with MacArthur's ongoing projects such as Arizona State University's 21st Century Classroom and its Colloborative Learning Project , take inputs from the Consortium for School Networking, and from the Illinois Institute of Technology's Institute of Design's Schools in the Digital Age project, with inputs from other MacArthur projects and external projects. These are initial leads found at the proposal stage and the project would devle deeper for resources such as listed at http://learning.asu.edu/application.html

The idea is to Create a Digital Bridge to cover the 'fundamental divide' in quality of education between underprivileged students of low budget schools and the fortunate students of renowned educational institutions.

The project would work to percolate the technical advances down to a rural India setting. The dual objectives are 1) raise the 1000 beneficiaries to the level of students of an affluent school. 2) create a Digital Design for the Government to emulate.

The goals of the project in the first twelve months is to physically establish the learning center, admit 1000 participants, place people in required teaching/ assisting positions, draw up a list of International Resource persons for Internet Classes, begin work on bibliographing available online courses and websites that are suitable for participative learning for the given target participants, ensure that each of them are scheduled for 100 course sessions, review, report and share. During the first year, elaborate work would be carried out to expose the project to inspire others to follow this model, as also to explore further funding and support to continue / scale up this project, possibly with Government participantion in the form of land allocation and other support.

Participatory Learning

The project plans to significantly bring up the knowledge levels of about 1000 students who would otherwise complete their school education as inadequate school graduates, passed out, but way below in knowledge levels / comprehension / self-confidence from the levels of a school of International School standards.

The group would be a heterogeneous group of students from different schools, different school grades, a mix of 90 : 10 underprivileged average students to privileged bright students committed to the idea of sharing their knowledge. Alexandria would offer them a world class school atmosphere with built in exposure to proper methods of learning, Internet, Online Content and participative tools as also to high quality instruction / guidance.

The project would achieve results by offering an uncompromising participative learning atmosphere complete with computers with broadband connectivity, adequate guidance to expose them to well organized online multimedia lessons, specially organized Web sessions handled by teachers from around the world, local participative learning sessions to interact and understand the context of the school syllabus ( Students are taught programming languages or theories in physics without first making them understand the context on which this knowledge is to be used. This is one of the reasons why there is a wide spread tendency to memorize the lessons without understanding and take exams

India has Institutions as renowned as that of the best of European and American Institutions. But in a developing country with a population of 1.13 billion, not all institutions are so fortunate, so the majority of students, especially in a rural setting do not get good education.

The larger portion of the student population do not continue education beyond school level. Statistics indicate that only seven per cent of the country’s youth, in the age group of 14 to 25, had access to higher education. This is true of almost all states in India.

In the State of Tamilnadu, in the southern region which has a total population of 62, 405, 679 . There are 13, 702 urban schools and 34,658 rural schools. The proposed Participatory Learning project is to be implemented in a limited geographical region in this State.

Time Line

15 Nov - 15-Dec 31 Open discussions to further fine tune the project plan, identify supplementary supportive sponsors, explore the possibilities of Government Contribution in the form of allocation of land, explore the possibilities of leveraging this project to make it even more resourceful. Draw up a detailed plan for implementation, invite resource persons to join the think tank to arrive at solutions and call for volunteers to join the project implementation.

1 Jan – 31 March: Construct a building, set up the network and other infrastructure, consult teachers, identify and engage full time faculty and part time faculty, guest speakers, guest international teachers for online classes, identify beneficiary institutions, invite applications and select students with the primary criteria of commitment to participatory learning.

1 April – 31 Dec: First batch of 1000 beneficiaries provided facilities and classes; Schedules are drawn up to spread their sessions to maximize the use of facilities. Gradually connect them to relevant participatory learning groups worldwide and orient them towards interaction with the other groups. the Constantly explore ways of continuing the project on to the next two years, scale up the project, expose the project to inspire other organizations / corporations / Government.

...

ISOC Today

Interested in joining the Internet Society ?

Write to me. You could also learn about the India Chenani Chapter from here

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The Fundamental Divide

Not One Less is a brilliant feature film by the Chinese Director Zhang Yimou set in a remote school in rurual china.

The 13 Year old substitute “Teacher” (Wei) of Shuiquan Primary School, where the most precious property is a box of chalk. Wei can’t remember any more than two lines of the only song that she knows and has to get the class to assist her in doing simple math for a bus fare.

Her instructions are clear. Keep the children in the class until a little before sun set, write down one lesson each day on the blackboard and make the children copy. And make sure that no one drops out. And make sure that the box of 30 chalks lasts for the entire month.

Despite Wei’s attempts to resist, one girl is taken away to a Sports School in the city. Days later another boy is missing, she learns that he has gone to the city to work.

Wei decides to go to the city to bring the boy back. The first estimates of the bus fare for the round trip was 9 Yuan which is not there...

A brilliant movie that triggered ideas that there is a fundamental divide that requires greater debate than the debate on digital divide.

..

Has the World Wild Life Fund noticed that Chicken is a species well past "endangered" status ?

Genetic pollution and threat of extinction



Wild Jungle fowl, specifically “Red Junglefowl” in India and South Asia are the ancestor of all Poultry Chickens. These are thought to be facing a serious threat of extinction because of genetic pollution which is occurring at the edge of forests where domesticated free ranging chickens are commonly kept in bordering villages and towns, says AvianWeb ...

more of this at Instablogs


....

Health of the World we live in

Is Chicken and Egg making our children infertile and impotent?

chicken are engineered to be “meat birds” as distinct from “laying birds” Broiler eggs are engineered to be fully / partially infertile. Isn’t there an imminent possibility of the infertility of the meat and eggs affecting the person whose food habits include chicken and eggs?

Is there any research done on this topic?

Or on the effect of fruits, vegetables and pulses produced out of infertile farm seeds?

(In nature a seed sprouts into a plant which produces seeds. Commercial Farming uses seeds from seed companies who produce engineered seeds that sprout into plants that DO NOT produce seeds)

Is there any research done on the effect of eating fruits and vegetables grown from such infertile seeds?

Some resources about Broiler chickens, though there is not much of information about daughter-chickens* whose reproductivity is controlled by genetic engineering. (* - The term daughter-chickens is coined to denote chickens hatched out of eggs laid by the “parent stock chickens) There is not much information about eggs laid by the “laying-birds”. These eggs are usually engineered not to hatch?

http://greenfield.fortunecity.com/garden/156/broilers.html

There is an interesting movie starring Jude Law directed by David Cronnerberg eXistenZ which has a surrealistic theme of a Virtual Game within a Virtual Game. There is a scene in the movie that takes place in a restuaurant where Jude Law is served meat from “excotic new species” - animals or birds? without a head or with multiple heads. Today’s poultry engineers the birds to have stronger legs, fleshy bodies, smaller intestines, controlled reproduction etc., with the idea of making optimizing prime-meat in chicken. Are we far away from engineering chickens without a head and tail because nobody eats them?

Another dimension of this issue is the conditions in a poultry It is typical of at least 70% of all poultry produced to have cruel conditions. Please see the following images:

http://www.all-creatures.org/anex/chicken-egg-01.jpg
http://www.all-creatures.org/anex/chicken-egg-02.jpg
http://greenfield.fortunecity.com/garden/156/broilers.html

There are a few large poultry farms in countries with stringent regulations where the cage size is more scientific and the space per bird would be larger. These are not what could be taken as representative of the Industry’s practices. A PR executive from a poultry industry might show case the showpiece cages with ergonomic water feed etc... but that wouldn’t be typical.

This is the Question as posed in Linked In

The following has been the Discussion on this Question so far.

The links on the name of the respondents would not work if you have not signed up and logged into Linked In

Eli Roberson Human Genetics Graduate Student at Kennedy Krieger Institute

My initial response would be that I have no reason to believe that the infertility of an animal, fruit, or vegetable would effect the fertility of a person eating it. The only exception to this I would think would be if the items are infertile due to fertility destroying chemical treatment that would affect humans (which the FDA wouldn’t allow if there was any evidence in support of it) or if the food items contained hormones close enough to the human hormone structure that was stable enough to survive stomach acid and intestinal denaturation, cross into the blood stream, and remain stable. Either way, if there was evidence to support this hypothesis then these items wouldn’t be allowed to come to market.

I replied:

Sorry for having taken so long to reply to your response. I have been traveling.

It is perhaps not scientifically established that the infertility of an animal or fruit would affect the fertility. But if you analyse it logically, perhaps in reverse, you would begin to question how an aphrodisiac work. Certain food substances are believed to have aphrodisiac properties, even certain forms of meat, lamb for instance, or parts of lamb, are believed to contribute to enhance the virility of a person. How does it happen ? It happens because the food that one consumes takes effect on a person’s biology. So how could the reverse be untrue ?

He countered by saying:

The logic of your clarification seems circular, like saying all butterflies are moths so all moths are butterflies (not true). Either way, the example of aphrodisiacs of ANY kind is related to sexual desire, not fertility. An increase in sexual desire isn’t an increase in fertility. Even if a person was purposefully, directly exposed to a drug or biological molecule that decreased sexual desire that isn’t the same as decreasing fertility.

I replied:

Hello Roberson

Thank you for your response to my clarification. The difference in our points of view is this: My position: ” I don’t know” Your position “I know, I am certain”

Is it Rene Descartes who said ” Is there anything of which we can be absolutely certain ?”

There is always something that WE DO NOT KNOW. I would copy the response that i sent to Alan just now:

All that is unknown is not to be dismissed as pseudoscience. It is pertinent to recall what Albert Einstein has said:

“We should be on our guard not to overestimate science and scientific methods when it is a question of human problems; and we should not assume that experts are the only ones who have a right to express themselves on questions affecting the organization of society.”

Albert Einstein May 1949
Time Magazine’s “Person of the Century”

Thank you for your response.

Richard Krajewski a writer from Greater New York City area said:

Who says you have to eat that stuff? Just eat organic food and stop worrying. A few flower pots on a porch, and you’ll have all the natural peas, tomatoes, and raspberries you could possibly want. Plant a few walnut and apple trees in the backyard (if you have one), and you’ll have to start giving food away, there will be so much.

I replied:

Hello Richard Krajewski,

Thank you for your response. I am sorry to have taken over two weeks to respond, I was traveling.

I agree with you on the merits of organic food.

It is a good solution for me, I can choose to go organic when it comes to choice of my food, but the question is more universal...

Thank you for your response.

Arnab Sengupata Head New Projects at Living Media India Limited said:

I completely agree with Richard’s POV.That’s applicable even if you are a fish eater. Try a small tank :)

Going back to your worries, Eli’s argument is right. We should actually be more bothered by the huge quantities of “poison” or chemicals entering our systems.

We can be fertile & reproduce only when we live long enough I’d guess.

As an afterthought, as long as the organs function properly, we may not require to add to the global population. Resources are already on such a premium!

I know many who enjoy chewing (cooked) chicken heads.

I replied:

Thank you for your response. Richard’s point of view is quite valid in a limited sense. It is valid for those who have the awareness and knowledge about the goodness of alternate foods But it so happens that chicken and egg are consumed in regular, huge quantities in parts of the world. And as you have pointed out, many people enjoy ‘chewing’ chicken...

The question can not possibly be supported with scientific data simply because there has not been any research done so far in that aspect.

Thank you for your response.

Phillip Sukkar Owner of Owner of BC Biogenics Pty Ltd from Sydney Area, Australia said:

Yhe only way that these types of food products would make us infertile or impotent is if they are deficient in the nutrients that help us maintain our fertility and libido or if they were substantially abundant in nutrients (including hormones, etc) that actually reduce fertility and libido.

Furthermore, one would need to consume these products quite regularly and in fairly large amounts for many, many years to result in substantial genetic mutations that would have ongoing affects on both the individual and the individual’s offspring.

I replied:

Broiler chicken and eggs do happen to be deficient in nutrients. Not much research have gone into identifying fertility related nutrients, nor any research done on the levels or or the total absence of such nutrients in meat from chicken or eggs ‘grown and harvested’ out of infertile seeds.

This is [also] equally true [that] the feed formulated and mass produced have excessive harmones.

In many parts of the world chicken and eggs are regularly eaten in large quantities, for a lifetime. My fear is that it doesn’t take years of regular consumption for the person’s fertility / potency to be affected.

parts of [other parts that are made into animal food etc] indirectly gets back into our food chain in some form.

Prabat Sinha CEO of SMG an Event Services Company, India said:

Hi Siva,

I don’t quite know about the infertility issue, but I can send you part of authentic document

National Geography Survey Quote:

“To provide enough beef, chicken, and pork to meet the demand, the livestock industry has moved to factory farming. Producing eight ounces of beef requires 6,600 gallons (25,000 liters) of water; 95 percent of world soybean crops are consumed by farm animals, and 16 percent of the world’s methane, a destructive greenhouse gas, is produced by belching, flatulent livestock. The enormous quantities of manure produced at factory farms becomes toxic waste rather than fertilizer, and runoff threatens nearby streams, bays, and estuaries.

Chickens at a typical farm are kept in cages with about nine square inches (about 60 square centimeters) of space per bird. To force them to lay more eggs, they are often starved. Chickens slaughtered for meat are first fattened up with hormones, sometimes to the point where their legs can no longer support their weight.

Crowded conditions can lead to the rapid spread of disease among the animals. To prevent this, antibiotics are included in their feed. The World Health Organization reports that the widespread use of these drugs in the livestock industry is helping breed antibiotic-resistant microbes, complicating the treatment of disease in both animals and people.”

Cheers

Prabhat

I replied:

Hello Prabhat Sinha,

That is another interesting dimension of the problem. Thanks for bringing that up.

Some one commented on what you had written about the 9 sq inches space and I had added a clarification as part of the question to emphasize that you are right.

[deleted a line] Most of the responses range from ” Eggs are good on protein” and “no scientific evidence” to a psychologically forceful assertion that the question is “helathcare rumour and hearsay”.

I wish there are some authentic responses to the question, like yours.

Thank you for your response.Please also forward this question to those whom you know are experts.

Soledad Quiroz Graduate Student at Heinz School, Carnegie Mellon University said:

IT IS IMPOSSIBLE!!! I have a Ph.D. in biochemistry and I can ASSURE you there is NO CHANCE for this to happen.

The first answer is very good. Plus, if they were to inject something to make the chicken infertile, they would have to inject 100 times more to make it effective in human. If you add that you eat the meat cook, the cooking process gets rid of most of what may have been injected.

If the infertility is made by genetics, there is NO MEANS to affect the human body.

This is the kind of comments that only scares people with no scientific base. I know the details and I am not scared. Knowledge is power, so please, read more (and not just press articles), ask to the people who knows.

Do not grow this questions into fear with no real facts behind it.

Soledad Quiroz

PS: My profile says “graduate student” because now I am getting another degree.

I replied:

Hello Soledad Quiroz,

There is so much that WE DO NOT KNOW. It is not possible to say “IMPOSSIBLE”.

Thank you for your response.

He countered:

Dear Sivasubramanian,

We know much more than you think, that’s the point. If you are really concern about GM food, learn, do not imagine. Ask to people who knows why they are not concern or if they are concern. Ask for FACTS. That is what I ask you, rely on facts and knowledge, not in unfunded fears.

Do you know when you see a movie how many of the things there are just not physically possible? well, you know enough physics to know that, but many others do not know. This is what I feel when somebody says he/she is afraid of genetically modified organisms.

If you wish, I can look for some information for you on the subject or some other people you can talk to.

best regards,

Soledad

Valentin Chirosca Commercial Driver at Panther Expedited Services from Greater Detroit Area said :

Eggs are the best source for proteins for human! And almost complete!

I replied:

Hello Valentin Chirosca,

Eggs used to be the best source for protein, but is the quality of protein the same now ? There is something unknown beyond the apparent here.

Thank you for your response.

Kevin Mullen Application Specialist at Wyeth, Greater Philadelphia Area said:

9 square inches? What kind of chickens do you eat?

I replied:

Hello Kevin Mullen,

Thank you for your response. I answered your response as a clarification to my question and felt that I should send it to you as a private response as well.

It is typical of at least 70% of all poultry produced to have such conditions. Please see the following images:

http://www.all-creatures.org/anex/chicken-egg-01.jpg
http://www.all-creatures.org/anex/chicken-egg-02.jpg
http://greenfield.fortunecity.com/garden/156/broilers.html

There are a few large poultry farms in countries with stringent regulations where the cage size is more scientific and the space per bird would be larger. These are not what could be taken as representative of the Industry’s practices. A PR executive from a poultry industry might show case the showpiece cages with ergonomic water feed etc... but that wouldn’t be typical.

He wrote back to say:

A 9 square inch cage would measure 3 inches by 3 inches, a chicken would not fit in a cage that small.

I clarified:

Hello Kevin Mullen,

One possibility is that this calculation was based on “floor area” occupied. If the cages are multi level cages, the floor area is area alloted to a chicken in a cage level divided by the number of levels, so the 9 square inch indicated possibly as floor area is actually derived from a study.

Alan Burgess Chief Medical Officer at HealthONE from Greater Denver Area said:

Soledad and Eli are correct. I hope scientific claims and opinions on this forum can remain evidence-based. Pseudoscience and health-care nonsense might best be posted elsewhere...Please?

I replied:

Hello Alan Burgess,

Thank you for your response.

All that is unknown is not to be dismissed as pseudoscience. It is pertinent to recall what Albert Einstein has said:

“We should be on our guard not to overestimate science and scientific methods when it is a question of human problems; and we should not assume that experts are the only ones who have a right to express themselves on questions affecting the organization of society.”

Albert Einstein May 1949
Time Magazine’s “Person of the Century”

Thank you for your response.

Eric Oermann Medical Student at Georgetown University School of Medicine said

I just want to second Alan. Soledad and Eli are correct, and in response to the OP, it doesn’t even make “logical sense” even “in reverse” - whatever that means. This topic belongs in some sort of “healthcare rumors and hearsay” category, not biotech. Incidentally, and more importantly, why isn’t there a larger number of categories dedicated to healthcare, biotech, and pharma?

I replied:

Hello Eric Oermann,

Thank you for your response. In return, I would merely copy the response that i sent to Alan just now:

All that is unknown is not to be dismissed as pseudoscience. It is pertinent to recall what Albert Einstein has said:

“We should be on our guard not to overestimate science and scientific methods when it is a question of human problems; and we should not assume that experts are the only ones who have a right to express themselves on questions affecting the organization of society.”

Albert Einstein May 1949
Time Magazine’s “Person of the Century”

Thank you for your response.

Gerald Lo Director, Engineering and Technical Services at Nycomed from Greater New York city area said:

Vanakkam, Mr Muthusamy

Well, there is the old Western expression “You are what you eat,” which might possibly explain my fondness for goose as well as jerk chicken...

Some scientists believe that the domestic chicken originated in Southeast Asia, and that the noble progenitor of our modern poultry might be at risk of genetic dilution through miscegenation.

In this regard, perhaps the infertility may be a desirable feature of the genetically modified organism, but I am no scientist.

As regards infertility in human consumers, I suspect there are other environmental factors contributing in greater proportion to our modern pathologies.

Again, I am not a scientist, but observe that there are today more of us living longer than ever before.

I have been consuming chicken since I was little, and have yet to acquire any of the aspects of that noble creature (including its procreative habits).

We of Southern Chinese extraction are inordinately fond of roast capon, which consumption has not seemed to yet have deleteriously affected the health or apparent viability of my three children.

It is my very rudimentary understanding that the human digestion process is capable of assimilating prodigious quantities of nutrients, but also at a macromolecular level rather considerably coarser than at the scale of embedded genetic materials.

I believe one may find online many posts to the effect that genetically modified organisms have not yet received statistically sufficient safety testing to qualify as reliable sources of nutrition, and a few to the effect that a vast industrial conspiracy is afoot.

Poyit vareen, Sir.

Links:

* http://www.avianweb.com/junglefowl.html
* http://jama.ama-assn.org/cgi/content/abstract/292/23/2868
* http://www.sujitfoundation.com/index.htm

I replied:

Hello Gerald Lo,

Thank you so much for the response and for bringing up the dimension on “Genetic Dilution” which is a core issue that I am concerned about. I followed the links that you have given and posted a blog at http://isolated.instablogs.com/entry/chicken-extintct-by-gentic-pollution/ based on the information that these links led me to.

On your observation that “there might be a vast industry conspiracy afoot, I could see the signs just by looking at some of the responses to this simple Linked In question. The responses ranges from “Eggs are rich in protein” to “FDA wouln’t allow if there was any evidence” to “it doesn’t make logical sense even in reverse’ to “This topic belongs in some sort of ‘healthcare rumors and hearsay’ category..

And, Vanakkam and Poyit Varren - where and when did you learn Tamil? Have you been here ?

Thank you again for your response

...

Uneducated Notions?

I uploaded this Video at the You Tube booth at the OECD Ministerial Meeting on the Future of Internet Economy at Seoul. This video was meant to be uploaded as part of OECD's Future of Internet Economy video files, but I made an error in uploading (which I now think is a fortunate coincidence)

I have noticed that most of those from the Internet Community I have talked to are fiercely resistant to the idea of any suggestion of "essential controls" even as carefully implemented self-regulatory measures decided and implemented by the Internet Community itself, with total independent authority. I am a bit familiar with one side of the coin, (extreme) undetectable abuse of the internet that affects everyone. From a Security point of view, I have felt that it ought to be made difficult for a commercial spammer, a credit card robber or a DDOS attacker to have untraceable freedom.

Technically I thought that the Transition from IPV4 to IPV6 presented a huge opportunity to clean up the internet of extreme abuses, but I am not sure if this can happen without endangering the essential character of the Internet, which ensures access for all.

The other side of the coin is that such openness, even at the cost of allowing malice, is REQUIRED to ensure access to all parts of the world in all countries, especially in countries with oppressive regimes ...An Internet with even basic controls wouldn't be the Internet as it is ????

...

On Why and How the Internet needs to be governed

On Why and How the Internet Needs to be Governed - Upload a Document to Scribd

Read this document on Scribd: On Why and How the Internet Needs to be Governed

as Posted at Internet Governance Forum website
.

An Open Letter to the Prime Minister of India

Dr Manmohan Singh
Hon' Prime Minister
Government of India
New Delhi

Shri P Chidambaram
Hon' Finance Minister
Government of India
(email address not in the address field)

Shri Ratan Tata
Chairman Emeritus
Tata Sons Limited

Shri R Seshasayee
President
Confederation of Indian Industry

Dr. Charat Ram
Chairman
Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry

Mr Arvind Mayaram
Joint Secretary
Department of Economic Affairs
Government of India

Ms Shyamala Shukla
Director Infrastructure
Department of Economic Affairs
Government of India

Ms Anna Roy
Joint Director
Department of Economic Affairs
Government of India.

Mr Jayant Bhuyan
India Brand Equity Foundation


Hon' Prime Minister,

During the last 20 years India has emerged to be more prosperous, there is visible affluence, enormous business activity and India has gained considerable respectability among the nations of the world.

But, all the progress that we have made so far manifest more as "5 Star Progress" than as improvement in the common man's quality of life, which has also happened, but relatively to a lesser extent. Today we have hotels and restaurants equally or more luxurious than the ones in the West, cars as luxurious, planes as big, shops as various and upper-class as those in the fashion districts of the world. But the quality of treatment in a government hospital or the hygiene there has not improved. Train travel and terminal facilities remain the same. Buses stop en route at wrong, cheap food stalls with no facilities. Middle and lower class "restaurants" and dhaba like outfits remain the same in terms of quality of food preparation. food service and hygiene. Potable water is not only not potable, but also disease prone and Public toilets anywhere in India are a nightmare, and even in an unhygienic form they don't exist in most places where they are needed.

This note is written, largely in admiration of our government that took on a wise, cautious reform path that produced results without repeating the disastrous effects of the Latin American / East Asian nations that followed the reform path. India's reform path is a sustained, wise path. As a result of this necessary caution, the effect of reforms are slow to permeate all levels of society.

To carry the reform to the next level, GOVERNMENT NEEDS HELP, AND IT CAN COME FROM PRIVATE ENTERPRISE, if government is willing to partner with the Private Sector in an imaginative way.

I, as an individual entrepreneur, willing to elaborate further, or to actually initiate the model, am proposing a neo-investment model that would BRING BACK THE PUBLIC SECTOR in a form far more efficient than that of the international private sector. The following is an outline of the concept with some micro examples. Please go through this write up and examine the concept. This is a way of business-thinking that would cause the reforms to percolate down to the level of common man.

Concept: A Government - private partnership, Government of India's share being monetary or non-monetary, Private partnership being enterprise / monetary, with the Government's benefits defined as uncompromising Quality of Life enhancement standards apart from due returns for its monetary / non-monetary share of investment

Example Projects: US $ 1 to 5 billion committed by a consortium of private corporations, as a consortium or as several independent corporations, to modernize Railway station / Bus Terminal infrastructure in exchange for the right to commercially "own" a long time-share of part of the built up space, built up as commercially prime properties, built and developed to a pre-agreed design of futuristic world class standards. The model is not confined to transportation infrastructure but can stretch to several other areas such as housing, health care and sanitation.

Micro Example 1: An area of about 500 hectares that presently houses the Chennai Central Railway Station, Chennai Central Jail, Government Hospital and the Chennai Suburban Train Station together with a 40 foot wide, 500-700 meter long road is to be leased out to a consortium of private companies. The consortium will re-topograph the entire area and rebuild world class facilities - a more modern, more humanitarian and more secure prison at the same location or elsewhere, a more hygienic and healthier hospital building of twice the capacity combined with even more modern equipment, a world class passenger terminal integrated with a suburban terminal, a bus terminal, a taxiway and a Skywalk.

On all this the private partner would spend, FREE of cost to the Ministry of Railways, Prison Authority and the Department of Health, a sum of between $ 300 million - $ 600 million on very rough estimates, within a time span of 2-4 years. The consortium would require the Government of India's partnership in the form of causing the necessary harmony between the various ministries and departments happen. Government of India's participation would also be in enabling the Project Execution at International speed, free of ALL governmental bottlenecks in this project that might not have had a precedent ( for e.g taking a strip of highway underground, or constructing a Sky Walk over the highway with commercial pathway structures.

The re-topography exercise would integrate properties on both sides of the road into a single complex, with a wider road in the same place, a better traffic design for smoother vehicular traffic and safer and convenient pedestrian traffic. The private partner would design and build a world class high-traffic infrastructure as an integrated colossal passenger terminal to International Airport standards as a confluence of a train station, a bus terminal, a suburban station, a taxi station and a world class freight terminal. The private partner would undertake to build such a facility with a clause not to disrupt or dislocate existing operation of any of these facilities during the Reconstruction process.

The private partner would build and operate the public facilities in the Railway Station, Suburban Station and the Hospital to world class standards as free and nominally charged facilities, MAINTAIN the facilities as a five star hotel would, all in exchange for the right to "own" the commercial zone inlaid and built around the entire mega infrastructure complex, The total area leased out by the Ministry of Railways would be an area of about five hundred hectares of prime property (in very broad estimates, not assessed), out of which 300 hectares would be the Train Station Terminal, the Hospital, Suburban Train Station, Long Travel and City Bus Station, a Taxi Port and zones like Lobbies, Public Facilities, Retiring Rooms, Waiting Rooms, Waiting Areas, Toilets, Bath rooms, Emergency Medical Rooms, Reservation counters, Ticket Counters, Water Fountains, Baggage Cart ports, Baggage conveyors, Escalators, Lifts, Automatic People moving lines or level "escalators". The private partner would manage as a 5 star hotel would, the security of the environment, discipline in porter assistance, courtesy in passenger assistance, cleanliness in facilities, quality and hygiene in food courts / food counters / food trolleys, availability of FREE drinking water, standards in bottled water as also make available Vandal-proof, well engineered baggage carts and related passenger comforts. The private partner will pay attention to the quality of food and beverages on an ongoing basis while ensuring mandatory availability of good food at Indian Low Income group prices while not excluding access to high-priced food stalls / restaurants.

Micro Example 2. Purified Water over a stainless steel pipeline : This is a concept for a utility company providing CLEAN water over two pipelines, one potable and other for other uses, to every home in Chennai and other major cities replacing Corporation Water Supply. The pre requisite is an arrangement with the City Corporation to outsource this essential services to the Utility company. The private company may commit to offer a certain quantity of water, free of charge to those below poverty line, provide water to middle and higher income groups at an affordable price while simultaneously engaging in value added products and services such as bottled water, premium bottled water, institutional water supply etc.. without prejudice to the mandatory free and clean water to the poor & at public places objective.

The project would have one central and several satellite water purification / pumping stations and possibly also desalination plants. The pipelines would be stainless steel pipelines, the community water tanks in public places would be stainless steel tanks and so on.

Investment not estimated, but could be US $ 100 - 500 million with a right to "own" the Water Supply service granted to the Utility company for 19 or 29 years. .

3. Engineering Project Concepts : The integral coach factory builds archaic coaches that are neither safety engineered nor ergonomically interiored. A sense of design, a sense of value engineering and a sense of ergonomics is so totally absent that the Coach Factory found it difficult to comprehend why a a state government rejected its coaches. The coaches built today have very bad plumbing, dangerously protruding objects in the interiors such as bolts and other sharp objects ( which are the reasons why mortality and injury rates are so high in case of accidents ) and the overall design is unclean and uncomfortable.

We have built up adequate design expertise in India - the cars that we manufacture in India are world class, but the coaches are not.

The idea is to start a coach building company that would engage as Consultants designers like Dilip Chaabria (name mentioned without any personal knowledge of the person, merely with the object of picturizing the idea) as also the Designers from Indian and International automobile / coach building companies, employ researchers from Design studios and schools who would identify modern, alternate materials for various interior components, come up with a coach design that is ergonomic and safe. The coaches are to built by the proposed private enterprise on the present Coach chassis to start with. Later, the company could progress to assemble the chassis also, with an improved design. The demand can not only be from Indian Railways, but also for Export. A division of this company can use its design expertise to build BUSES as well.

Other Micro examples that can be elaborated: 3. Wayside motels for bus passengers owned and operated by companies such as Hilton and Indian Hotels. 4. Large corporate hospitals in cities and Class A & B towns with a "Government Hospital" in the basement. 5. A luxury omnibus company combined with a safe school bus company....

Sir, Please look into this.


Thank you.
Sivasubramanian Muthusamy
CEO
Isolated Networks
Whitefiled, 389/1 Perundurai Road
Erode 638 011
Tamilnadu
India
www.isolatednetworks.com
network (at] isolatednetworks.com
0424 4030334
(0) 93641 00639

On making the whole world prosperous

[First written as Sample of written work to Society of Fellows, Harvard, and as Research Proposal for Pre-Doctoral Candidacy at John F Kennedy School of Government, Harvard in 1991.Published now, 16 years later, as a blog, verbatim, as what was said 16 years ago remains unchanged and more relevant today.]

Foreword

New opportunities and possibilities emerge for development when the style of thinking and planning is changed to an unconventional model. In these papers, I have endeavored to reverse the process of thinking by first defining the ultimate ideal and then later coming back to list the constraints, to be attacked one by one.

By and large the accepted and practiced model of thinking approaches the problems from the constraints and in the process constraints weight down on the thinking and a lot of possibilities are hopelessly dismissed on their first coinsurance.

These papers talk about making the whole world prosperous, which as an ultimate object of the international system is possible after all. But not everything that needs to be done to make the whole world prosperous are covered in these papers. These papers which at best define a direction are not elaborate enough to be a vivid master plan or blueprint for world development. Many of the basic ideas indicated do not fall in line with the present programs of the governments and the international system. Besides an exhaustive analysis of the needs of the world is not made in these papers and the various proposals do not cover everything that needs to be done to make a more prosperous world. Various facets of the problems outlined are yet to be thoroughly examined and a more thorough examination is yet to be made. At best these few pages could be described as musings on world development) and the thinking is not rigid in any way) or random pieces of a large picture that is yet to emerge in its totality.

These papers originated on the theme of a draft resolution that I introduced as a participant from India at The International Model United Nations organized by Junior Chamber International and held at the United Nations headquarters at New York during July 29- August 2, 1991. Originally what I had said in the draft resolution was that it is no longer necessary for member states to distance themselves from another, it is prejudicial to internationalism for member states to be nationalistic and patriotic and called upon the member states to look beyond their national interests and strengthen the united nations. The draft resolution introduced a specific proposal that the political structure of the united nations be improved and that a resource base be founded for the united nations.

After the model united nations I elaborated on the theme, more clearly defined the idea as a research theme and am submitting it as Sample of written work to The Society of Fellows, Harvard University. I have not had at all any formal education in international development, foreign policy or government. I am not well read either.

These papers do not follow a standardized academic or diplomatic format and there could be errors in expression among other shortcomings. These papers may please be treated as papers of the 'first draft' status, to be further worked on and improved.

Muthusamy Sivasubramanian, Theni, India. 09 November 1992.

On making the whole world prosperous

Towards more ambitious developmental objects

Extensively widening the demands on the international system both by the developing and the developed nations

By the help of God the world is progressing towards the realm of world peace. Not long ago the only object of the international system was to stop war, but today the demands on the international system is wider than peace keeping and as varied from reducing the mortality rates of the world's children to preserving the planet earth for the generations to come.

Not only do the developing nations have demands on the international system - demands for access to markets, access to technology, fair prices for raw materials and commodities, debt relief and more favorable financial flows, - which are for the purpose of comparison, simple demands, but also the developed world whose demands are more complicated in nature developed nations are unable to reconcile the need to promote repatriation of the illegal immigrants with the ideals of generously proclaimed human rights; in the course of history they have built a massive nuclear arsenal but now find it necessary to ensure that the spread of nuclear capability is restricted; on their own they find it difficult to control the illegal economy of the underworld; the legitimate national economy is upset when there are differences in monetary policies of different nations such as different interest rates that cause currency fluctuations; the present economic system of the world has a tenuous and artificial base which is highly vulnerable to manipulation; urban decay, traffic congestion, pollution and environmental degradation are some of the several other problems which the developed world would find it difficult to solve independently.

As the imbalance in development remains and widens not only the developing world, but also the developed world would have persistent problems.

Strengthening the weak without weakening the strong

The present economic system is such that when the weak economies are strengthened the strong economies are jeopardized. This is unacceptable.

The ideal which the world leaders may strive to attain to the extend that is practically attainable, is to increase the income of the third world citizen to that of the developed world without causing a decline in the income of the citizens of the developed world and at the same time not reducing the prospects of higher income. The ideal to aim and get as close as possible is to make the whole world wealthy as expressed in an ancient prayer "Lokas Samastas Sukino Bavantu" (Let the people of the whole world prosper).

Any developed nation of today was once undeveloped and as the nation developed an overall economic uplift happened. It is not that unemployment and poverty are eliminated, but by and large, the people of the developed nations live well and nation can support the unemployed and the poor.

The developed nations have not impoverished the prosperous of their people to make the poor prosperous but merely caused their national economies to prosper and more and more people flourished. When one man bought his second car the other man did not lose his first.

This overall uplift has been proved to be realizable among people of a nation, and it is possible to realize it among the nations of the world.

The possible flaws in this thinking apart, what obstructs such thinking is the fact that the whole world is fragmented. The world is not administratively divided like states within a nation, but politically divided as fragments of nationalistic and conflicting boundaries.

For the world to progress the fragments of waring nations have to become regions of friendly nations. With a climate of profound international relations it becomes possible to evolve and implement comprehensive developmental plans to make the poor nations wealthy without making the rich nations poor.

The world will be a more prosperous place to live if we could reorient the world economy to higher worldwide development. It is understandable that the present economic order can not be disturbed abruptly otherwise there would be unpleasant effects on the world economy.

This new approach has to be introduced smoothly over a long period of time and the transition would be highly desirable for all the nations of the world if planned to take effect smoothly.

The essential prerequisite is an acceptably strengthened united nations. When the United Nations was founded international peace was the need of the hour and so this was the primary object of the international system. But the needs today are vast and the objects of the united nations have to be redefined so as to be far more emphatic about the world prosperity and far more ambitious than what was enunciated in the charter.

World Development

World Development has to be a desirable proposition for the nations of the world, if it is to be carried out without injustice done to any one nation, systematically.

It is time that the nations realized that one nation can not develop in isolation. The world, especially the economy of nations, is becoming increasingly interdependent. When one country in the world undergoes an economic crisis, it has repercussions on the economies of the rest of the world.

A virus found in one continent travels undetected across the oceans and the world wakes up with a dreadful epidemic for which there is no cure at the moment, despite all the scientific and medicinal advances the world has made.

If there is an oil spill on the sea, accidental or strategic, the oceans of the world get polluted. It is of concern to the whole world when someone acquires the capability to build nuclear weapons.

It is as much irresponsible to stand by and watch a child die every other second elsewhere in the world as it is to watch a vengeful soldier mounting a nuclear warhead on his aircraft.Beyond Nationalism

What comes in between is nationalism. It does not reach an inquiring young mind why someone stop stop at and would not move beyond from being a nationalist and a patriot. Nationalism in excess is highly prejudicial to internationalism.

Nationalism is showing compassion towards anyone living on one side of the border but not on the other.

The people of a nation think more about their nation, feel better about their nation, right from their childhood when theory learn more of their national history at school than the history of the world. After they grow up the narrow view of the world learnt at school does not broaden because by and large the media places its emphasis on regional and national coverage and the people's views are largely restricted by the importance the media gives to the region and nation as against the whole world.

This limited thinking should broaden and the nations of the world should think beyond their national interests and become responsible for all that happens all over the world and not only in their nations and cause to develop the whole world.

United Nations

Possible limitations on independent international initiatives

The world is a better place to live today than it was a 100 years ago. The progress that the world has made so far is to be attributed not only to the United Nations but also to a few nations whose independent initiatives have exceeded the efforts of the United Nations.

States that have been noticeably active both within the international organization and outside the system have substantially contributed to the progress of internationalism. But progress can not always be a straight line from darkness to light and history is not a guarantee that the future will be a linear extension of its course. The people's perception of priorities change from time to time and the government of a nation with an international outlook may not be able to pay the level of attention that it wishes to give for international development especially when the nation faces a decline in economic growth rate or a state of political uncertainty or both as how it happens.

Secondly there are times when an independent initiative taken by a country attracts criticism from several other nations, largely because the initiative is taken independently.

Thirdly national governments change from time to time. When a new government gets elected it may announce newer international programs that may be more benevolent, but may not be a linear extension of the programs of the previous government there by causing to lose consistency of developmental involvement.

Such factors necessitate that the international organization has to be strengthened as a permanent foundation to bear the larger responsibilities with the direct initiatives by independent governments taking a supplementary role.

Larger purpose for the United Nations

The founding fathers of the United Nations defined three basic purposes of the United Nations (each of which was seen as a counter to the aggressive policy of the axis Powers that had culminated in World War II)

• To maintain international peace and security;
• To develop friendly relations among nations;
• To achieve international cooperation of an economic, social, cultural or humanitarian nature and encourage respect for human rights.

UN has made considerable progress in those fronts. Territorial aspiration on the part of nations may not yet be extinct, but at least considerably subdued. There remain a few territorial disputes such as the dispute over Golan heights or the stalemate over the group of islands in the Kurile region north of Japan, but with rare exceptions, none of the kind of territorial aspirations that characterized the pre war world order exist today. In spite of the threat of the existence of a massive nuclear arsenal the world has not seen the third atomic bomb. Gas chambers and racial persecutions are no longer considered possible courses of action open to states.

The world today is far more harmonious today and international relations are effectively maintained.In the process the world has become far more interdependent today than it was forty seven years ago.

The world today needs the United Nations to effectively address problems such as economic development and environment than essentially revolve its concerns around the need for military restraint.

It implies that the United Nations has to have a more ambitious object - not merely international harmony, but more emphatically, world prosperity as the ultimate purpose.

With a view to cause the whole world to develop, the objects of the UN have to become more emphatic and ambitious, with world prosperity as the ultimate purpose.

A more functional political structure of the United Nations

United Nations has a political structure which is too cautious. It does not have a President (Executive) and the Secretary General's authority is limited. The Secretary General is to be empowered issue by issue by the General Assembly, as opposed to the President of an evolved presidential form government., who heads the Executive with the parliament and judiciary functioning separately but blindingly.

The political structure of the U.N. is incomplete without a President. The world had just seen two world wars and nationalistic priorities were dominant and the world had not yet began to think truly international when the United Nations was conceived.

The world political environment of this day is not the same as it was 47 years ago. World politics today is much more evolved than it was at the time of the Dumberton Oaks and San Francisco Conferences.

From its inception till the present the United States of America has been a major determinant in the evolution and activities of the United Nations. President Wodroo Wilson's 14 points started a debate which eventually resulted in the formation of the League of Nations, which later gave way to the formation of the United Nations. United States was the major force behind the 1974 World Population Plan of Action, which established the Universal Rights to Family Planning and was instrumental in founding the United Nations Population Fund. The US Declaration of Human Rights inspired the UN Declaration of Human Rights.

The evolved form of the American Government could also be adopted by the United Nations. The united nations could be governed by an international government, headed by; a President, electe4d by the Heads of Government or the Heads of State of the members states of the United Nations for a predetermined period (may be 5 years), with his powers balanced by the U.N. General Assembly and differences adjudicated by the International Court of Justice.

The President should be able to function independently as head of the Executive without having to wait for the approval of the General Assembly in every move he is to make. At the same time the Executive has to be balanced. The U.N. General Assembly could do that very effectively. The International Court of Justice can determine what is and what is not excessive exercise of power or unconstitutional.

As it is considered it is important to remember that:

1. The political equations between nations are changing and would continue to change for the better.
2. All the nations as members of a stronger United Nations would continue to be sovereign, perhaps more sovereign than now, because with a stronger United Nations, thereat of war between nations could be nearly eliminated.
3. A stronger United Nations would not be a government issuing directives to nations, but one that would get the nations ot modify its policies and programs to accommodate international considerations through diplomatic discussions with the nations concerned., or by coordinating discussions and programs between member states.
4. The stronger United Nations would be of a participatory government, in the sense that the United Nations General Assembly becomes world parliament in which all nations are the members of parliament.

With a strengthened united nations with a well evolved and acceptable control structure it becomes possible to evolve and implement significant programs to make a more prosperous world.

Generating Revenues for the United Nations

Because the UN does not have vast resources at its disposal, it depends entirely on contribution from its member states.

It should be possible for the United Nations to reduce its dependence on contributions from member states if the United Nations can generate income, some form of International Income as National Income is to its member states. If the United Nations has to generate revenues on its own, it is necessary that the U.N. creates a resource base, in the form of a geographic zone.

U.N. does not have its own freely accessible geographical territory, not even the size of the smallest state in the world. It is ironical that the United Nations, which ought to be working towards a borderless world has its premises landlocked within the boundary of some its member states. Today not even one square inch of the world, on the world map, is permanently international or non-national. The exceptions are the high seas and the frozen continents.

Founding an Income generating mechanism for the United Nations

If the United Nations is to generate international revenues for world development, it is necessary that it creates a geographical base, that could in effect be the property of all the nations of the world.

A geographical base would open up opportunities for the UN to create a central economy. UN can create a central econonmy by housing non-tariff and several other forms of global trade, global industry and global banks to create an economy, which will generate revenue for the United Nations.

1. The Zone could be, to start with an area of not less than 100,000 hectares granted on lease for a period of, may be 499 years, to the United Nations by broad minded member states in consideration of a value. The land may be acquired on lease or even as outright purchase. 100,000 hectares of developable wasteland could cost between US $ 30 million ot US $ 300 million.
2. If the land has to be developed as an industry and trade district, the infrastructure could be developed at a cost of between US $ 1-10 billion. The foundation cost must be met by a fund set up by all the member states by making a one time contribution and the notional or actual profits earned on the basic infrastructural investments is to be non-dividendable. The total tax revenue or the earnings on the basic infrastructural investment made by all the member states in union, is not to be dividendable to member states but to be utilized for International Development.
3. The United Nations can create a mega company with a capital base of between US $10-25 billion dollars, subscribed by the member nations and private investors.
4. The capital base of $25 billion dollars would enable the company to borrow, on conservative banking norms $225 billion. So the total resources available for investments could be $250 billion. The United Nations could invest this quarter of a trillion dollars to promote companies, with a clearly defined object of making profits.
5. The capital base has to come from member nations and from private investors, who will earn a taxable dividend on their investment. The tax rate has to have a floor rate of 25% on which there will be no concessions to any of the share holder nations, and a voluntary higher rate of any proportion above 25% . All the tax revenue goes to the United Nations.
6. Such tax revenues could be partly reinvested in United Nations owned companies and the income generated by these companies could add to the United Nations fund for World Development.

It is understandable that member states may not be prepared to sacrifice their international business and banking houses to the United Nations. But if a new international land zone in the world is to come into existence as owned by all the nations, it would be an international trade and industry zone, which could foster new international mega cartels of the size and scope of the Airbus Industrie, European Space Agency and Intelstat.

Secondly, it is important to remember that the management and work force will be drawn from the member nations, part of most of the profits earned will be added to the national income of the member states as the investment in these companies have to come from governments and the private investors of the member nations, the input commodities have to be bought from the member nations and so on..

Also, it is necessary to remember that even after the foundation of a geographical zone for the United Nations, the United Nations would not have as much land as it would need for locating the industries. Some of the projects could be located in the UN member nations and if it is done that way, it amounts to attracting UN sponsored investments that would generate employment in the nation of location which is as beneficial as the present foreign investments.

Only a consortium of national investments could create certain mega and ultra mega business establishm
ents. To illustrate without going into aspects such as the economic feasibility or profitability at this stage, it is not possible for a private industrial house or for a single nation to establish an insurance company that would insure national governments against external developments that cause huge unfair economic hardship for the nation, or against natural calamities such as an earthquake that cost the nation billions of dollars of unplanned expenditure.

At present every time there is a natural calamity of a vast scale, most developing nations are forced to appeal for international aid which is some times sufficient and arrives in time, and sometimes not. Even for a developed nation such as the United States of America, it should make sound economic sense to insure the national treasury against such unforeseen demands as a natural calamity or against currency loss during recession.

International construction projects such as the Tunnel between England and France are at present shared by the governments and private investors of nations involved. There is a possibility that there are intercontinental projects at present and more in the future, such as intercontinental roads, railways and waterways. Such projects could be under the jurisdiction of the United Nations.

We already have a world bank and an International Monetary Fund which are under the aegis of the United Nations. The United Nations can found a Global Bank - a global commercial bank with the major banks of various national and interested private banks of every nationals subscribing and dividend-earning shareholders to finance trans-national cartels, to make commercial lending to those nations who have a high credit ranking (The object is to earn profits for the bank which would be taxable by the United Nations or jointly taxable by the United Nations and the investing nations.)

More such institutions could be conceived and inter-governmental and international private investments encouraged with the object of creating tax-paying International Income.

This would make it necessary for the United Nations to think in terms of a world money as a common currency. The Central Bank of the United Nations could start by selling instruments such as Travelers Cheques, denominated, instead of in national currencies, in what may be called world money, which is to eventually become a central currency and ultimately to become the basis for settling exchange rate disputes.

Reorienting the world economy to higher development

If the desirable high ideal of making the world wealthy is to be attained to the extent possible, comprehensive socio cultural economic programs of world wide reach and impact have to be planned by the world economists to reorient the world economy towards higher development.

A comprehensive program, while preserving jobs and generating more jobs, would simultaneously work on ambitious targets for world population control; it would reconcile technological advances with the trends and needs of the job market; while creating promising new inventions for the society of the future would preserve the wisdom of the ancients.; while continuing to send relief supplies to drought affected areas, would simultaneously make the uncultivable wastelands cultivable; it would combat the underworld activities and at the same time consider offering some form of amnesty along with some rehabiliatory financial concessions in the form of legalizing the illegal wealth in inviolable exchange for reformation and reorienting destructive illegal investments to sometimes as lucrative, but legal and productive investments.

Such comprehensive programs should extend beyond economic planning and cover areas such as developing committed and capable men for the governments of the world and making people more productive and less wasteful.

The Concept of National Waste

If we could evolve a method by which we estimate Gross National Waste as against Gross National Product the combined figure for the world would be alarming. We do not make the optimal use of our natural, human and material resources, which is one of the major reasons why we remain undeveloped.

We spend on arms that we can not and should not hope to use when we could instead be buying equipment to strengthen our internal law and order agencies. We spend on espionage and counter espionage when nations find it impossible to trace intra-national criminals and bring them to the court of law.

We misuse our human and material resources to produce soft drinks when we ought to be perfecting techniques of extracting natural fruit and vegetable juices and preserving them free of artificial preservatives. We build mineral water and carbonated water plants when we might instead be building desalination and water sterilization plants or rather using our human and material resources to explore underground water.

We make paper plates instead of metal ware, built more military intelligence satellites than communication satellites, make wall papers instead of smooth plasters, continue with gasoline engines instead of developing electric/battery vehicles. We throw away surplus food when the cost of storage exceeds the national value of the retained surplus food.Sanctions have contributed to the status quo of world economy

For valid strategic reasons, in the recent past, it has become an accepted practice for nations to impose economic sanctions openly as well as covertly mount an economic offensive that in effect weakened the enemy by the economic hardship that results for the nation. Economic sanctions have been in force for a very long time in the case of Cuba, in the recent past in the case of Iraq, Libya and until recently in the case of several Eastern European Nations.

While the validity or the strategic merit of these sanctions could not be doubted, the point made here is that such sanctions, though strategically valuable, have been weakening the economies of the nations, indirectly and in some cases directly, lowering national production, causing the nations to become weak, which in turn has made the world less prosperous than it could have been.

Sanctions also affect the nations that impose sanctions.

For instance, US Trade embargo on Cuba cost the US companies an estimated $30 billion though 1998, according to a John Hopkins University estimate.

If there is a way out of economic sanctions, the world would prosper sooner.The world order was such that Iraq occupied Kuwait and the rest of the world went to war with Iraq. The US cost of war was $61 billion and it cost the Arab countries $620 billion, according to the Arab Economic Report. If the war did not happen and if the UNDP or US AID were pledged $681 billion, half the poor people of the world would have risen above the poverty line.

Manpower shortage also exists all over the world

A chronic manpower shortage coexists along with the much publicized unemployment problem.

This is because the work force (Research, Executive and Labor force) is not distributed in the right proportion between various field of specialization. For instance in the US, where the unemployment problem is mounting, there may be a shortage of Language Teachers or shortage of computer programmers, because theoretically this category of work force is employed to teach languages to personnel employed in projects of narrow and limited economic and social benefit and most of the available programmers are employed by the military or military industries, so to say.

Human and material resources are misused.

If today the US government wants to rebuild all the downtown residential and commercial areas it would not be able to find investors/ bankers because their money is already invested in projects that may not be of optimal utility to the world, for instance, in a renovation project for a corporate office that does not require renovation. The government may not find enough architects and structural designers for they are employed in commercial projects of least social utility; it may not find enough construction workers for they are building a lavish airport in a tiny island in the Caribbean.It may not be possible for the government to build a transcontinental oil pipe line or to connect the river ways nationally - for there may not be enough of the more skilled engineers, workers and mangers left to be deputed for the projects.

The waste-oriented programs - commercial and noncommercial, absorbs a certain number of certain specialized work categories and because such a demand exists, a proportion of the population prepares for careers that the demand which the waste-oriented industry has generated. A proportion of population, instance prepares for careers in a weapons assembly plant, who would otherwise have prepared for careers in agriculture or medicine.

Demand meets supply - even the wrong demand

Reorienting the world economy to higher development - smoothly

It is understandable that the present economic order can b\not be disturbed abruptly lest there would be unpleasant effects on the world economy. An abrupt transition could cost the nation a million jobs and trillions of dollars.This new approach has to be introduced smoothly over a long period of time and the transition would be highly desirable for all the nations of the world if planned to take effect smoothly.

The world would be a more prosperous place to live if we could reorient the world economy to higher worldwide development.

Help for the world's suffering

George C Marshall proposed the plan to reconstruct post war Europe in a graduation ceremony at Harvard University on June 5, 1947.

We need another Marshall Plan at a point of time when even the prosperous of the nation are suffering from economic hardship - it may not be easy for the developed world to substantially increase its foreign aid budget. There is a recession in the United States, with unemployment mounting, trade deficit accumulating and its budgetary deficit widening. United Kingdom and France have similar problems and Germany is attending to the demands placed on its prosperous economy by the integration that has just happened.

The developing countries have an outstanding debt of $1.3 trillion dollars. Due to debt service demand, among other reasons, in the 80's aggregate net resource transfers to the developing countries shifted from positive to negative.

In 1989, aggregate Long Term net resource flows to developing countries (Net-flows) stood at 63.3 billion dollars. If the population of the developing countries is taken as 4 billion people, per capita resource receipts amount to $4 billion dollars for the year.

There is no way the world's problems will be solved with the present level of money flow.

A new born child dies somewhere in the world every two seconds, 1.5 acres of forests are destroyed every second, 25000 people die every day from acute water shortages and polluted water, 100 species of plant and animal life becomes extinct, more than 75 million tons of top soil is eroded or blown away and tons of toxic waste dumped somewhere in the world - EVERY DAY. If current trends continue 1990s will see 1/3 of the world's productive land erode, 1 million species of plant and animals become extinct and 1 billion people born to compete for increasingly scarce resources.

4 million people face death in Somalia, there is a civil war in Eastern Europe because there is an anachronistic ethnocentricity and a revival of nationalism. Russia, the other Republican republics and Eastern Europe have embraced western ideals at a point of time when the west can not afford to support the transition; on their own these nations neither have the knowledge nor the resources to make the transition work. There is the possibility of "bungled reforms discrediting capitalism before it has time to take root".

Arms race has ended but the arms remain stored. World Peace is desirable but military oriented manufacturing plants can not be closed down. They can not be closed down because the industry can not afford the cost of winding up the units and the governments can not re-employ or at least support those who lose jobs. Unemployment is already mounting. The budgets of governments are already on deficit and there is not enough money to be found to acceptably compensate the owners or substantially aid their diversification.

The world - Developing as well as the Developed world, needs a second Marshall Plan, a Marshall Plan of exponential magnitude, longer time frame, broader and more ambitious objects and of world wide proportion funded not only by the United States but by as many nations as possible to reconstruct not only Europe but the whole world.

Extending the NATO model of military alliance to the whole world

Looking beyond the present and ahead, we could consider an extended NATO type of alliance with all the nations of the world as allies.

This could be achieved in several ways. The Rapid Deployment Force, already granted to the Secretary General by the Security Council could be so constituted as to gradually become a world military organization with a balanced and fail proof control structure. It could also be achieved by including for NATO membership the erstwhile Warsaw Pact as well as the remaining countries and transferring control of the larger NATO to UN Security Council, General Assembly and other organs of the United Nations that may be created for the purpose.

The broader alliance could simultaneously constitute a military organization by drawing equitably personnel and other resources from all the members of the alliance or if possible from all the U.N.member states.

The United military organization would require no more than a tenth of the military personnel and other resources to be a complete force.

The alliance could, with the back up of such a military organization positively proclaim that any aggression or a move to war by any nation on any other nation would be considered an attempt to war with the rest of the world.

In the history of the world, wars have been fought for major reasons as well as for ludicrous reasons. The ear of an English sailor sparked a war between Great Britain and Spain in the 18th century. The animosities lasted 9 years.

More recently, in the year 1969, the Latin passion for football boiled over as El Salvador and Honduras competed in an important world cup qualifying match. Riots after the game led to a five day war in which 2000 people were killed and much of the Honduran Air Force destroyed.

With the foundation of the World Security Alliance, it would become very difficult for any nation to be aggressive and the threat of war between nations would be nearly eliminated. Nations could save billion of dollars hitherto over-allocated to defense and utilize them for development, to save the world's children, to preserve the rain forests or to maintain bio-diversity.

Goods such as nuclear weapons that are produced merely to threaten the enemy, aeroplanes and submarines that are built to merely be on guard - one nation builds them merely because someone else is building them - need no longer be produced in such wasteful quantities. Nuclear weapons, especially, were produced in quantities that could destroy the whole world several times over, when nations were still aware that the possession of nuclear weapons could do no more than produce a stalemate. It was said that nuclear weapons could not even be used across the conference table.

Military spending is about 5% of GNP in the industrial as well as the developing countries. About half of the combined spending on health and education in the industrial countries where as the two magnitudes are about the same in developing countries.

A world wide military alliance would not require more than a very small proportion of personnel employed in the militaries of the nations of the world. Once these resources are drawn from the military of all the nations, most of the rest of the world's military resources would be redundant. In such a scenario, military intelligence and counter intelligence could be reoriented to monitor and control the underworld; The military personnel could be reoriented to maintain law and order which at present the nations find it very difficult to maintain.

Billions of dollars of scarce monetary resources could be saved in this scenario.

The model of the French Foreign Legion

The United Nations military organization, could be to the extend that is appropriate, be modeled after the principles of French Foreign Legion, a proud, elite fighting unit, which from an unpromising start in 1831, built its mystique as 'romantic, swashbuckling, totally loyal, terrifying to its enemies, and fearless in the face of death'. The Legion is a unique permanent force, now represented by over 100 nationalities, who have taken the solemn obligation that binds them to serve, not France, but the Legion itself. The force of about 9000 men are eligible to French Citizenship upon their retirement.

The United Nations military organization could be organized with each of the member states deputing 5% of their military men and women. The UN force could be constituted as cosmopolitan divisions of various nationalities, who take the solemn obligation to serve to maintain world peace, and in times of war, fight their own motherlands if need be. The United Nations Military Organization, manned by personnel drawn from the member states' militaries, may be funded by a diversion of the member states' military expenditure, to be based around the world at bases leased to the United Nations in consideration for nominal rents, and equipped with weapons already in surplus in the various national militaries.

With the founding of the United Nations military organizations, well controlled by an elaborate system of checks and balances by all the member nations, it becomes the responsibility of the United Nations to maintain bilateral as well as world peace.

The United Nations' Military Organization could be a World Counter terrorist Force, an elite crack down force, ruthless in its tactics.

In addition to the above, the United Nations could found an intelligence organ, apart from a reinforced Interpol, to deal with trans-national and trans-continental crimes, with a hierarchical advantage over the member states' police, similar to the advantage the Federal Bureau of Investigations enjoys over the State Police organizations.