THE Clinton Global Initiative, timed to coincide with the UN General Assembly this year, brings together leaders from the political, corporate and civil sectors to develop and implement solutions to four global challenge areas: education, energy & climate change, global health, and economic empowerment.
Over 60 current and former heads of states, 500 business leaders and 400 leaders for nongovernmental and philanthropic organizations attended the meeting last September 22. Former President Bill Clinton established the organization in 2005, in the hopes of improving the lives of more than 200 million people in more than 170 countries.
In President Obama’s speech, he emphasized on the mission of the Clinton Global Initiative -- reminding everyone of what individuals can do to change the world through service. "If you want to bring about change in the world, you can’t just be an advocate of somebody else doing it. You can’t just preach lofty goals and wait for somebody else act. You have to step up. You have to serve."
He also highlighted on the fact that we are standing at a "transformational moment" in world history, when our "interconnected world presents us at once with great promise, but also with great peril," and called for the creation of new partnerships and alliances.
"Today’s threats demand new partnerships across sectors and across societies—creative collaborations to achieve what no one can accomplish alone. In short, we need a new spirit of global partnership. And that is exactly the spirit that guides this organization; I hope that it is the spirit that guides my administration."
According to Obama, taking a step towards change is an individual decision. That the beauty of service is that anyone can do it and that everyone should give it a try.
Clinton called on attendees to support political and economic efforts toward climate sustainability. He said that "the best thing we can do is to try to help support this movement by proving that it is good economics."
Attendees are expected to make concrete commitments on steps they will take to work on those problems. Since the first conference, 1,400 commitments have been made, said Robert Harrison, the chief executive officer of CGI. Some have been worth billions of dollars. Those who don’t follow through on their commitments are not allowed to return.Harrison said the economic downturn would probably have an impact on the monetary amounts committed at this year’s conference.
American activist Marian Wright Edelman puts it succinctly in a few words, "We must not, in trying to think about how we can make a big difference, ignore the small daily differences that we can make which, over time, add up to big differences that we often cannot foresee."
Our initiatives as individuals will empower our collective efforts to tackle the world’s problems. There is no easy or elegant solution to the obstacles we are facing, but perhaps, a clever combination of our unique attributes and contributions will enable us to achieve inevitable success, slowly but surely. (AJ Press)
( Published on September 26, 2009 in Asian Journal Los Angeles p. A12 )
| < Prev | Next > |
|---|
