harmony comments to world day of social justice

8/14/2019 Harmony Comments to World Day of Social Justice

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HARMONY COMMENTS ON WORLD DAY OF SOCIAL JUSTICE

Dear Rene and Norman,

I appreciate your efforts towards harmony on World Day of Social Justice.

Harmony is the most embracing, inclusive, all encompassing and universalcommon value of mankind. I suggest that we propose Harmony Day, asmany will concur, to United Nations to add to World Peace, WorldTolerance and Social Justice Day etc. Peace cannot last without harmony.Harmony belongs to the Universe. No one culture can claim harmony as itsown. Without harmony the universe will not be eternal.

Social justice in a broader sense can also mean social rights along withhuman rights. Social rights and human rights are insufficient whenmankind has no harmony. Social rights can mean the right to health care,

livelihood and society security and so on for the developing world. To thedeveloped capitalist world these are assumed as opportunities rather thanrights. In the West we have taken upon ourselves to criticize thedeveloping world for lack of demo0cracy and human rights that we holddear, such as rights to legal and political representation and rights tofreedom of speech. We maintain that the developing world must practicewhat we value now and forgetting that our democracy and human rightswere also hard earned in the past.

The truth is that all cultures of developing world must go through theirstage of development at their own pace and in concert with cultural

heritage. For the developing nations the most appropriate system is morelikely their appropriate harmonious systems. To the developing worldduring their rise in the 21st Century, social rights may be more relevant andpressing than the Western version of democracy and human rights.Notwithstanding, We are the best because we have democracy is the endall statement to end all value debates by Americans.

From a broad human prospective, the three main pillars of humancivilization, that are highly valued, are harmony, world major religions anddemocracy in that order. Harmony as the most ancient culture as well asthe most universal common value is priceless. Confucius, Laotzi and otherworld like minded philosophers predate Christ, Buddha and Mohamed.Harmony between the government and the governed is more desirable andstable than any brand of democracy and likely will include grass rootrepresentation. Harmony with nature as taught by the ancients meanmankind is part of nature as in Laotzis Tien Ren Ha Yi.

The fact that China as an ancient culture did not create a national religionof her own but adopted Buddhism from India and accepted Christianity and


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Islam demonstrates that she is practicing harmony. In her practice ofreligion freedom because of Western domination of the past 150 years, onecannot blame China for sensitive to Western interference.

A world in harmony with one self, within all nations, and among the nations

and with nature will be most precious. The coming of HarmonyRenaissance and Harmony Civilization are inevitable. They are the nextwave of creative energy that mankind is waiting for to unshackle us fromreligious and ideological strife. Harmony Faith is the ultimate self salvationand the resurrection of mankind from global destruction from war andunsustainable development.

Francis C W Fung, Ph.D.Director GeneralWorld Harmony OrganizationSan Francisco, CA

Dear Francis, Thanks for the nice photos of the Chinese New Year Celebration.We have to hope that the Year of the Tiger will be one of harmony.

I am sending you here and as an attachment a short article on the 20 FebWorld Day of Social Justice. Harmony is one of the goals set out in the UNGeneral Assembly's designation of the World Day of Social Justice. Thus for ourefforts for a harmony renaissance, we can use this World Day as an opportunityfor reflection and planning.

I thought that you might be able to write a little introduction putting "Harmony"in the first line as I did above and send it to the bbc site where you had postedthe review. It looks like an interesting site but it is not clear how one posts things.All best wishes, Rene

World Day of Social Justice: A Sense of Direction

Rene Wadlow*

On a proposal of the Ambassador of Kyrgyzstzan, the United Nations

General Assembly has set 20 February as the World Day of Social Justice. Itwas observed for the first time in 2009, but is not widely known. As with

other UN-designated Days, the World Day of Social Justice gives us an

opportunity to take stock of how we can work together at the local, national

and global level on policy and action to achieve the goals set out in the

resolution designating the Day of solidarity, harmony and equality within

and among states.


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As the resolution states Social development and social justice are

indispensable for the achievement and maintenance of peace and securitywithin and among nations and that, in turn, social development and social

justice cannot be attained in the absence of peace and security or in the

absence of respect for all human rights and fundamental freedoms.

The Preamble to the UN Charter makes social justice one of the chief

aims of the organization, using the more common expression of that time

social progress. The Preamble calls for efforts to promote social progress

and better standards of life in larger freedom. However, in the preparation

of the Charter during the last days of the Second World War, there was no

definition given of social progress. There was agreement that social

justice was definitely more than law courts plus a social policy. It was easier

to recognize social injustice than to define social justice.

The societies created by Nazi Germany and the military in Japan with

slave labor and the abolition of workers rights were the models of social

injustice that the drafters of the UN Charter had in mind along with the

consequences in North America and Western Europe of the 1930s

depression.

Ideas concerning international efforts for social progress were drawn

largely from the experience of the League of Nations and especially the

International Labour Organization (ILO), which had been created in 1919.

The representatives from the USA and Great Britain were most influential in

the preliminary work on the UN Charter, other European states being

occupied by Germany or still in the middle of fighting. Thus US

representatives were strongly influenced in their views of social progress by

the New Deal legislation of President Roosevelt and the British by the

outlines of the 1942 Beveridge Plan, named after its main author, Lord

Beveridge, which led to the setting up of the first unified social security

system. By 1944, with the tide of war turning, the ILO met in Philadelphia,

USA, and set out its aims of post-war world employment policies, freedomof association for workers and the extension of social security measures.

Thus from the start in 1945, the emphasis in the UN system had been

on social justice as related to conditions of employment and the right to

organize which was made manifest in the 1948 ILO Convention number 87

on Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organize.


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Progressively, education was included as an aspect of social justice, in part

because education is closely linked to employment. Later, health was added

as an element, again because of a close link to employment.

It took much longer but ultimately, gender equality has been included

in the aims of social justice as fair employment practices, good education,

and adequate health services could often still overlook the existence of

women. Even today, can education be the only measure of womens

empowerment? Does reproductive health and rights come under adequate

health care?

It is likely that employment, education, health with equality between

women and men is as far as government representatives are willing to go

collectively in discussing policies and programs of social justice. Further

advances will have to come from the non-governmental sector, thoughrepresentatives from some governments at times can take a lead. Today, we

can still see injustices due to social class, ethnicity, citizenship, religion, age,

sexual orientation and disabilities. There is a reluctance on the part of

governments to deal with these issues nationally and an even greater

reluctance to deal with them collectively within the UN system.

However, it is too easy to throw back on others responsibilities for

injustices, if at the same time one does not realize how each of us shares

personally in the benefits of injustice. Thus, we can use the World Day of

Social Justice not only to celebrate the advances made but to get a sense of

direction for the road to be yet taken.

* Rene Wadlow, Representative to the United Nations, Geneva, Association

of World Citizens

Dear Leo, Rene, and Francis,

I salute each of you in our common quest for harmony and

peace for all global citizens as we approach the second UN

World Day of Social Justice.

Is Social Justice critical to our common goals? What is

"Social Justice"? In the year 2000 our Center for Economic

and Social Justice participated in a conference at the UN

at which we presented a "Declaration of Social Development

through Personal Empowerment," a document we prepared

together with the Population Research Institute.


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http://www.cesj.org/thirdway/paradigmpapers/socialdevelopme

nt-un-ppr.htm

You'll see in paragraphs 20-42 a discussion of fundamental

human rights centering around the dignity of every human

person to which all social technologies, including every

nation-state and the UN itself should be subordinate. In

these paragraphs we discuss "Social Justice" not in terms

of social problems but as a set of social virtues essential

for transforming unjust social structures, laws and

constitutions, which in the final analysis lie at the root

of most human conflicts and wars.

We have re-published a pamphlet of Rev. William Ferree, one

of our co-founders, that deepened my understanding of the

nature of "Social Justice."

http://www.cesj.org/thirdway/socialjustice/introtosocialjus

tice.pdf While written from a Catholic perspective, I

think you, just as non-Christians like me, will appreciatethe universal moral power of this expansion of moral

philosophy.

Your comments would be greatly appreciated as we celebrate

this World Day of Social Justice.

In Peace, Prosperity and Freedom for every world citizen,

only through Harmony and Justice,

Norman Kurland

Center for Economic and Social Justicehttp://www.cesj.org
http://www.cesj.org/thirdway/paradigmpapers/socialdevelopment-un-ppr.htmhttp://www.cesj.org/thirdway/paradigmpapers/socialdevelopment-un-ppr.htmhttp://www.cesj.org/thirdway/socialjustice/introtosocialjustice.pdfhttp://www.cesj.org/thirdway/socialjustice/introtosocialjustice.pdfhttp://www.cesj.org/http://www.cesj.org/thirdway/socialjustice/introtosocialjustice.pdfhttp://www.cesj.org/thirdway/socialjustice/introtosocialjustice.pdfhttp://www.cesj.org/http://www.cesj.org/thirdway/paradigmpapers/socialdevelopment-un-ppr.htmhttp://www.cesj.org/thirdway/paradigmpapers/socialdevelopment-un-ppr.htm

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