Other ECGS Initiatives: How Can I Serve?

People's Peace Prize

The idea for a Peoples' Peace Prize came to Eric Utne after he was invited to join the Nobel Peace Prize Forum's Executive Committee. The NPPF is an annual peace conference that's been put on by a consortium of Midwest Norwegian colleges for the last 19 years featuring the previous year's Peace Prize laureate. Pondering the visibility and impact that the Nobel Peace Prize confers on its recipients, Eric found himself thinking that the world could use at least one more peace prize and one more laureate each year. The web, and SMS text technology, make it possible for the first time to create a truly global nominating, voting, and donating process.

Then Eric met Tom Perriello, one of the founders of Avaaz.org, the new, global spin-off of MoveOn.org. Avaaz.org launched in January, 2007. As of July, 2007 it already had over one million members in 182 countries and was translated into twelve languages. Eric asked Tom, "If you were to design a truly democratic, global process that allows people throughout the world to nominate, vote for, and contribute to the candidates of their choice, how would you do it?" Tom dived in and soon he and Eric came up with a process that we believe will catch the public imagination, and could easily become the largest cash prize for altruistic behavior in human history.

After several months of open nominations, the top vote-getter from each of the six continents, plus six more finalists, representing the range of peace-related initiatives and chosen by a panel of Nobel laureates, or the newly formed Council of Elders, would be announced at the UN. Voting and contributing would immediately follow, lasting several weeks. The awards ceremony would be televised globally, possibly on November 11, (Armistice Day).

Tom says we don’t need to raise any money because Avaaz is already set up to do this, and the voters would fund the prize through tiny donations. If, however, we could find a funder to guarantee that the prize would be at least $2 million, this would make the PPP the largest peace-related cash prize ever awarded. It’s quite possible that the process and the nominees so fire the public imagination that the entire amount could be raised from individual voters through online donations and via SMS contract deals.

As the originator of the PPP, the ECGS will come to the attention of millions of PPP participants around the globe, many of whom will be inspired to contribute their own time, talents, and expertise, greatly augmenting the pool of service workers and volunteers worldwide.

World Peace Forum

The WPF will be a "Davos for Peace." It will provide an annual opportunity for scholars and practitioners from a spectrum of disciplines and from around the globe to advance our understanding of the arts and science of peace. They will share research and best practices for the nurturance and maintenance of peace, describe efforts that are being successfully implemented, and identify new ideas that need to be further investigated. Peace will be very broadly defined to include efforts to assist with environmental remediation, social justice, micro-credit, green energy, sustainable and intermediate technology, and other enterprises to further planetary betterment. The awarding of the People's Peace Prize will be the crowning, gala event of the WPF.

We are currently in discussion with a steering committee of deans at the University of Minnesota about hosting and sponsoring this event. Our hope is to create an institutional affiliation and home for ECGS at the U of MN. The founding group includes Brian Atwood, Dean of the Humphrey Institute (also former Executive Director of USAID and current Chair of the Board of AFS); Bob Elde, Dean of the College of Biological Sciences; Steve Rosenstone, Dean of the College of Liberal Arts; Meredith McQuaid, Associate Dean of Administration and International Programs; and Gary Smaby, VC-in-Residence and Managing Director of the Carlson School of Management's Ventures Enterprise program.

Peace Telethon

American Idol raised over $70 million in just one two-hour telecast in spring of 2007 to help combat extreme poverty in the U.S. and throughout the world, particularly in Africa. We’d like to participate in the creation of a two-hour television special that would include profiles of the life and works of each of the 12 People's Peace Prize finalists. It could include, as moderators and contributors, notable people such as Nelson Mandela, the Dalai Lama, Oprah Winfrey, Bono, Waangari Matthai, Al Gore, and Angelina Jolie, each speaking on behalf of a nominee. People from around the globe could call in, email, or text message their votes, and make contributions to fund the prize. Turning the reality show genre on its head, the process of allocating the People's Peace Prize money could be a model of altruistic behavior, with the finalists advocating for each other’s projects and sharing the pot, rather than competing in a process of elimination until there is only one candidate standing.

Global Media Campaign

People of all ages, especially young people, feel an urgency to address our global social and environmental crises and to make a meaningful difference in the world. But who or what can mobilize their idealism, energy, and willingness to serve? National service of some sort, either in the military or social service arena, is well established in most countries, but does not go far enough. It's time to go beyond national service to global service. It's time to mobilize a vast planetary force of college-age students, mid-life adults, and post-career retirees to address both human and environmental needs. It's time for a Peace Corps for the whole Earth—the Earth Corps for Global Service.

We plan to mount a worldwide recruiting and marketing effort to attract people to join any member of the Earth Corps Coalition, a consortium of more than 200 existing organizations that enlist people to do social and environmental service projects in places of need around the world. The idea is to mobilize tens of thousands of people to devote a year or more of their lives (an Earth Year for young people or an Earth Sabbatical for mid-lifers and retirees) addressing some of the more pressing needs of our time, such as global warming, HIV-AIDS, and poverty.

Millions more people will be engaged in supporting the ECGS. For example, churches, small businesses, and classes of school children will "adopt" a volunteer and raise money to underwrite the costs of his or her mission. And similar groups will conduct "needs assessments" of volunteer opportunities for their own areas. Participants in the ECGS will come from and go to every nation of the world—Africans working in Kandahar or New York City, Asians in Sao Paulo or Berlin, Europeans in Capetown or Sri Lanka, Americans north, south, and central in Calcutta, Chad, or unfamiliar parts of their own hemisphere.

We have compiled an inventory of over 200 potential affiliate organizations (see Earth Corps Coalition). We have begun talking with these organizations, in order to help them prepare to effectively absorb and utilize a surge of many new volunteers/participants. When this step is complete and our Earth Corps Coalition is in place, we'll promote the idea and ethic of global service in media throughout the world via public service ads. Our message: "Serve Your Planet."

Soon ServeYourPlanet.org website's pages will include:

  • Become a volunteer (in person or online)
  • Adopt a volunteer (a class of school kids, church group, or office pool raises money for and corresponds with the volunteer)
  • Support an individual entrepreneur or organization (make a loan, provide advice, services, etc.).

The website will link to the WISER Earth platform. WISER is a new, collaboratively written, free content, open source networking platform that links over one million organizations and one hundred million individuals who are actively working toward ecological sustainability, economic justice, human rights, and political accountability.

More information will be available shortly.