U.N. Influence on Domestic Policy
By Michael Coffman Ph.D., and Henry Lamb
Introduction
The
United Nations now administers more than five hundred
treaties, of which 175 treaties and protocols directly
influence policies of the federal, state, and local
government. These treaties and agreements often have
noble goals and seem to address a real need within the
global community. However, obscure or statist language
inherent within the treaties often results in U.S. law,
and subsequent regulations, that conflict with the
principle of individual sovereignty interwoven into the
Constitution of the United States (hereafter called the
Constitution).
An Example
For instance, to meet the letter of the Endangered
Species Act of 1973, the DOI had to cut off irrigation
water to 1400 farmers in the Klamath River Irrigation
District in Southern Oregon during the growing season of
2001. While at best unpleasant for the Bureau of
Reclamation which was initially responsible for cutting
off the water at the head gates, it was devastating for
the 1400 families who saw their land value plummet from
around $850 per acre, to $50 per acre.
Their means of making a living was denied by a law
that gave higher priority to sucker fish than American
citizens. All the while, the farmers claim that they had
legal entitlement to the Klamath River water rights that
should have been protected under the Fifth Amendment to
the Constitution. The farmers were not the only ones
harmed in this action. Those businesses that depended on
local agriculture were also hard hit, impacting the
economic base of the entire county by hundreds of
millions of dollars and an estimated 6,000 jobs.
Yet, a close review of the five international
treaties that authorized the ESA would have revealed a
potential conflict with the Constitution.
The Convention on Nature Protection and Wildlife
Preservation in the Western Hemisphere (hereafter called
the Western Convention) calls for preserving,
"in their natural habitat representatives of all
species and genera of their native flora and fauna,
including migratory birds, in sufficient numbers and
over areas extensive enough to assure them from becoming
extinct through any agency within man's control..."
To assure that the species have "natural
habitat...over areas extensive enough to assure them
from becoming extinct" the treaty calls for the
establishment of national parks, national reserves,
nature monuments and wilderness areas. While the
protection of endangered species is a legitimate use of
these designated areas, Article V of the treaty calls
for the government to also control land use "within
their [the nation's] national boundaries but not
included in the national parks, national reserves,
nature monuments, or strict wilderness reserves,"
i.e. all affected private land.
It seems likely that such language led directly to
Section 4a(3) of the ESA whereby
"The Secretary (of Interior)...to the maximum extent
prudent and determinable - shall...designate any habitat
of [an endangered] species... [as] critical habitat."
Such habitat, by definition in Section 3(5)(A)(i and
ii) means "the specific areas within the geographical
area occupied by the species, at the time it is listed
in ..., on which are found those physical or biological
features (I) essential to the conservation of the
species and (II) which may require special management
considerations or protection; and specific areas outside
the geographical area occupied by the species at the
time it is..., upon a determination by the Secretary
that such areas are essential for the conservation of
the species."
Such land use restrictions on designated critical
habitat are to be applied to private land as well as
public land, just as stated in the Western Convention.
Such land use restrictions "for public use" are
Constitutional under the Fifth Amendment providing the
government pay "just compensation" for the use of the
land. After all, most endangered species listings
consider the species as being endangered because of
human destruction of its sustaining habitat.
The application of the Fifth Amendment in this case
would justly compensate a landowner (or property owner
in the case of water rights) for using their property to
restore to health a species that is endangered because
of the actions of all citizens. Society caused the
species to become endangered, so society should pay the
bill to restore it. That enormous financial cost should
not be imposed on the few property owners who still have
some of the habitat remaining, as has been the case
until recently. This is but one recent example of many
in which international treaties are systematically
undermining the Constitution needlessly. The question
then becomes, why?
Two Opposing Philosophies at
Play
While the intent and goals of international treaties
and agreements are noble, they are almost invariably
statist in their application. In almost every instance,
private rights are lost to the direct control of
government authority. The emerging statist approach to
creating and applying law in the United States has
enormous implications and threatens the very foundations
that have made America the greatest nation in history.
Indeed, the seriousness of the threat to America, its
people, and its environment cannot be appreciated
without at least a rudimentary understanding of the
dynamics of two historical philosophies that have been
struggling for supremacy for the past 250 years; those
of John Locke and Jean Jacques Rousseau.
America's Constitution is rooted in the thought of
John Locke (1632-1704), whose Two Treatises on
Government (1689), provided a framework for
England's Glorious Revolution of 1688 and the American
Revolution of 1776. This political philosophy, with its
basis in individual rights and embodiment in limited
constitutional government, has been under attack for
nearly two centuries by the ideas of Jean-Jacques
Rousseau (1712-1778), whose Social Contract
(1762), with its focus on the abstract "general will" of
the people, was hailed by the extremists of the French
Revolution. (1)
Locke demonstrated that the foundation of a
progressive civilization, as outlined in his Second
Treatise of Government, begins with natural rights
- rights to what Locke terms "life, liberty and estate."
These rights do not derive from government, according to
Locke, but are essential to mankind as part of the
scheme of nature.
The great scholars Frederic Bastiat and Sir William
Blackstone refined these ideas until Thomas Jefferson
made them the cornerstone of the Declaration of
Independence. The underlying principle of this
enlightenment was simple. Civilization is governed by
certain natural laws. Violating these laws does not
break nature's physical laws, but only results in man
breaking himself. Blackstone claimed that these natural
laws are: "superior in obligation to any other. It is
binding over all the globe, in all countries, and at all
times; no human laws are of any validity if contrary to
this.... no human legislature has power to abridge or
destroy them, unless the owner shall himself commit some
act that amounts to a forfeiture."
(2)
The purpose of government, according to Locke is to
join with others to: "unite, for the mutual preservation
of their lives, liberties and estate, which I call by
the general name, property. The great and chief end,
therefore, of men uniting into commonwealths, and
putting themselves under government, is the preservation
of their property." (3)
Since much of the Constitution was based on Locke's
pattern of governance, it is not surprising that James
Madison claimed this belief as the backbone of the
Constitution, "Government is instituted to protect
property of every sort; as well as that which lies in
the various rights of individuals.... this being the end
of government, that alone is a just government, which
impartially secures, to every man, whatever is his own."
(4)
Except for a very few instances, such as the
government of the Anglo Saxons, the American form of
governance based on property rights and individual
sovereignty within a constitutional republic has stood
nearly alone in history.
In contrast, the statist approach has dominated the
governments of almost every nation for millennia. It is
best expressed in recent history through the writings of
Rousseau who provided the foundational philosophy that
spawned the bloody French Revolution and inspired the
writings of Immanuel Kant, Georg W. F. Hegel and Karl
Marx (5), thereby
planting the seeds for the European model of socialism
and Russian communism.
Rousseau attacked the Lockean model in the name of
the wholeness of man, arguing that it divides man by
focusing on self-interest, individual rights, and
property. Instead, Rousseau sees "man as a malleable
creature; he favors primitive man, the noble savage who
lives in simple equality with his fellow man, with few
needs, a limited appetite, over man in civilized
society." (6)
Rousseau seeks to achieve this equality through a
vague metaphysical concept called the "general will." To
overcome the tension between individual interests and
the community, Rousseau argues for the creation of the
common good as embodied through an abstract, objective
public will, a will that is free from our subjective
selves and personal interests. The state determines the
general will, or common good of the people.
Rousseau likewise places strict social control on
private property to prevent the inequalities that he
believes will lead to social division and private
interest. In the Social Contract, Rousseau
acknowledges the great force of the state by admitting
that raw force can be used to bring consent to the
general will; "That whoever refuses to obey the general
will shall be constrained to do so by the entire
body.... In this lies the key to the working of the
political machine; this alone legitimises civil
undertakings." (7) In
doing so, Rousseau states the individual "will be forced
to be free."
So much is Rousseau against property rights that he
states that "you are lost if you forget that the fruits
of the earth belong to all, and the earth to no one!"
(8)
Property rights, claims Rousseau, was designed by the
rich to place "new fetters on the poor, and gave new
powers to the rich; which irretrievably destroyed
natural liberty, eternally fixed the law of property and
inequality, converted clever usurpation into unalterable
right, and, for the advantage of a few ambitious
individuals, subjected all mankind to perpetual labour,
slavery and wretchedness." (9)
Hence, the state should be supreme over its citizens;
"The state, in relation to its members, is master of all
goods through the social contract, which, within the
state, is the basis of all rights.In the struggle
between these two major philosophies of governance,
nowhere is the Rousseau model more evident than in the
United Nations and the international and national
environmental movements.
International Treaties and the
Rousseau Model
Rousseau's model of the general will, land policy and
property rights was officially articulated by the United
Nations in Agenda Item 10 of the Conference Report for
the United Nations Conference on Human Settlements
(Habitat I), held in Vancouver, May 31 - June 11, 1976:
"Land...cannot be treated as an ordinary asset,
controlled by individuals and subject to the pressures
and inefficiencies of the market. Private land ownership
is also a principal instrument of accumulation and
concentration of wealth and therefore contributes to
social injustice; if unchecked, it may become a major
obstacle in the planning and implementation of
development schemes. The provision of decent dwellings
and healthy conditions for the people can only be
achieved if land is used in the interests of society as
a whole. Public control of land use is therefore
indispensable...."
Throughout this United Nations document, Rousseau's
model for private property rights is set forth as the
basis for future United Nations policy: Public ownership
or effective control of land in the public interest is
the single most important means of...achieving a more
equitable distribution of the benefits of development.
Governments must maintain full jurisdiction and exercise
complete sovereignty over such land. Change in the use
of land...should be subject to public control and
regulation of the common good.
(10)
In 1976, when Habitat I was held, there was no
unifying science to justify the need for having
government control of property rights to protect the
global environment. Hence, during the 1980s a new
science was created by the International Union for the
Conservation of Nature (IUCN) and the World Wildlife
Fund, both science advisors to the United Nations.
The IUCN, consisting of 112 governmental agencies -
including U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, U.S. National
Park Service and NOAA - and 735 mostly environmental
non-governmental organizations, created the holistic
science of conservation biology,
(11) ostensibly to develop a science with "a
new ethic, embracing plants and animals as well as
people." (12)
Conservation biology is based on the unproven
assumption that nature knows best and that all human use
and activity should follow natural patterns within
relatively homogenous soil-vegetation-hydrology
landscapes called ecosystems. (13)
Since ecosystems cross man-made property lines, and
since conservation biology called for holistic
management of entire ecosystems to ostensibly protect
the perceived fragile web of life, environmental law had
to be superior to property rights.
To legitimize this unproven science, the Society of
Conservation Biology was created by the IUCN in 1985 and
was initially funded by various foundations. The true
goal of conservation biology was made clear when the
journal Conservation Biology began publication
in 1987. Michael Soulé, founder and then president of
the Society of Conservation Biology, outlined the
radical purpose of conservation biology:
The society is a response to the biological diversity
crisis that will reach a crescendo in the first half of
the twenty-first century. We assume implicitly that the
worst biological disaster in the last 65 million years
can be averted. We assume implicitly that environmental
wounds inflicted by ignorant humans and destructive
technologies can be treated by wiser humans and by
wholesome technologies.
While it is true that we have local and global
environmental problems, there is little hard empirical
data to support such a negative, hopeless statement. The
standard by which Soule made this astonishing statement
is based more on the unproven belief that
nature knows best. Since man has had such an impact on
nature, it must consequently lead to an ecological
disaster. At the same time, the theory of conservation
biology serves a very useful purpose to highlight an
emerging, and in some local cases, a real problem that
needs to be addressed.
As an emerging science, therefore, not all within
conservation biology is necessarily wrong. It does
provide a way of looking at environmental problems on a
larger scale. Yet, it is an immature science and much of
conservation biology is pseudoscience based on unproven
assumption after unproven assumption. The lack of
empirical evidence is justified by the precautionary
principle, "Even in the face of uncertainty about the
extent or timing of environmental damage, prudent action
is required when the outcome of continuing along the
same path could be severe or irreversible damage."
(14)
Unfortunately, conservation biology has been used
politically to justify numerous international treaties
national laws, and regulations. These invariably follow
Rousseau's model of state control in antithesis to the
foundational intent of the Constitution of individual
sovereignty and property rights. Entire programs have
been developed around these theories within the federal
government in the past thirty years, especially the past
nine.
The IUCN, WRI and WWF
At the international level, the IUCN, the World
Resources Institute (WRI), and the World Wildlife Fund (WWF),
are responsible for proposing many of the international
environmental treaties that affect the United States.
Most, if not all of these international treaties are
premised on Rousseau's model. A study of publications
from these groups reveals that the concepts of
sustainable development, ecosystem management, water
basin management and other Rousseau-based solutions to
perceived environmental problems all originated in these
three international organizations, especially the IUCN.
That both the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service and the
National Park Service are official members of the IUCN,
along with most major national environmental groups and
United Nations agencies, raises a question that U.S.
agencies could be unduly, and perhaps unknowingly,
influenced by Rousseau's model to the detriment of the
foundational principles of the Constitution and the
people of the United States.
The IUCN has provided many laudable services since
its creation in 1946 as is its current mission
statement; "To influence, encourage and assist societies
throughout the world to conserve the integrity and
diversity of nature and to ensure that any use of
natural resources is equitable and ecologically
sustainable." The problems originate in its very
peculiar vision of "equity," "sustainability," and
natural "diversity."
The Spring 1996 issue of the IUCN's Ethics Working
Group's publication, Earth Ethics, candidly
admits that the IUCN "promotes alternative models for
sustainable communities and lifestyles, based in
ecospiritual practices and principles...to
accelerate our transition to a just and sustainable
future...humanity must undergo a radical change in
its attitudes, values, and behavior.... In response
to this situation, a new global ethics is taking form,
and it is finding expression in international law."
(Italics added)
Despite its pretensions of being a scientific body,
the IUCN eschews the scientific method when doing so is
convenient. The organization's Commission on
Environmental Strategy and Planning (now the Commission
on Environmental, Economic and Social Policy) claims a
mandate to "change human behavior" by using a strategy
"based less on the facts...than on the values they
hold." (15)
Indeed, the IUCN's entire approach to conserving the
"integrity and diversity of nature" is based not on
facts, but on essentially theories of conservation
biology. Those theories are themselves rooted in a
version of naturalism or even pantheism - the belief
that nature is god and therefore knows best. In either
case, the belief is held that most human activity leads
to "fragmentation" of ecosystems, which in turn leads to
a depletion of biodiversity. Fragmentation leaves
"islands" of undisturbed ecosystems that supposedly are
too small to maintain biodiversity.
Protecting and expanding those "islands" of
biodiversity thus becomes imperative, as does connecting
those "islands" by "natural corridors". The most notable
treaty that incorporates these ideas is the Convention
on Biological Diversity (Biodiversity Treaty), which was
initially written by the IUCN in 1981, but not
formalized into an international treaty until the Earth
Summit at Rio de Janeiro in 1992.
The Biodiversity Treaty had no implementing language
when presented to the United States Senate in 1993 for
ratification. The treaty, like most international
environmental treaties, contains the precautionary
principle to justify the need for the treaty in the face
of little supporting empirical science.
Likewise, the IUCN philosophy of conservation biology
was integrated into various parts of the treaty with
goals such as establishing "a system of protected areas
or areas where special measures need to be taken to
conserve biological diversity;" and promoting
"environmentally sound and sustainable development in
areas adjacent to protected areas with a view to
furthering protection of these areas."
Even more important is the understanding that in 1992
the leadership of the IUCN-sponsored Society of
Conservation Biology, Michael Soule and Reed Noss, along
with David Foreman, currently a director of the Sierra
Club, proposed what is known as the "Wildlands Project,"
a plan to put fifty percent of America into wilderness;
"Half of the land area of the 48 conterminous [United]
States be encompassed in core [wilderness] reserves and
inner corridor zones (essentially extensions of core
reserves) within the next few decades. . . . Half of a
region in wilderness is a reasonable guess of what it
will take to restore viable populations of large
carnivores and natural disturbance regimes, assuming
that most of the other 50 percent is managed
intelligently as buffer zones. Eventually, a wilderness
network would dominate a region and thus would itself
constitute the matrix, with human habitations being the
islands. . . . Eventually, a wilderness network would
dominate a region and thus would itself constitute the
matrix, with human habitations being the islands."
(16)
By working with the leadership of the United States
Senate and providing them with the draft version of
Chapter 10 (now Chapter 13) of the UNEP-funded Global
Biodiversity Assessment (GBA), what are now the
directors of Sovereignty International were able to
prove to the Senate that the intention of the treaty was
to use the Wildlands Project as the mechanism to restore
and protect biological diversity. Section 10.4.2.2.3 of
the draft GBA states, "Representative areas of all major
ecosystems in a region need to be reserved. . . .
reserved blocks should be as large as possible. . . .
buffer zones should be established around core areas and
that corridors should connect these areas. This basic
design is central to the Wildlands Project in the United
States (Noss, 1992), a controversial...strategy...to
expand natural habitats and corridors to cover as much
as 30% of the U.S. land area."
(17)
This evidence, along with a strong link to population
control and an obvious bias of the GBA to condemn
Western Civilization and promote the theology of
pantheistically based "traditional societies" resulted
in the failure of the treaty to be ratified in September
of 1994.
What is especially disturbing is that federal
agencies such as the U.S. Environmental Protection
Agency (EPA), also a member of the IUCN, actually called
for implementing the Biodiversity Treaty before it was
given to the Senate for ratification in August, 1993;
"Natural resource and environmental agencies...
should...develop a joint strategy to help the United
States fulfill its existing international obligations
(e.g. Convention on Biological Diversity, Agenda 21). .
. .the executive branch should direct federal agencies
to evaluate national policies...in light of
international policies and obligations, and to amend
national policies to achieve international objectives."
(18)
At the time this EPA document was written, the
Convention on Biological Diversity was not yet accepted
by the United States. Why was it being treated by a
federal agency as if it were? What are the international
objectives referred to by the EPA? And, just how does a
agency of the United States "amend national policy" when
it is clear in the Constitution that this is the sole
responsibility of the United States Congress? These are
disturbing questions originating within the previous
administration. Especially since they potentially have
such enormous implications for the people of the United
States.
Sustainable Development
The concept of "Sustainable Development" arises from
the 1987 U.N.'s World Commission on Environment and
Development, headed by Gro Harlem Brundtland, then
Vice-chair of the International Socialist Party. The
Commission defined sustainable development to be: "...to
meet the needs of the present without compromising the
ability of future generations to meet their own needs."
This vague statement was given detailed meaning with
the adoption of "Agenda 21," by 179 nations represented
at the 1992 U.N. Conference on Environment and
Development, in Rio de Janeiro. Agenda 21 is a
non-binding document that sets forth 300 pages of
specific recommendations that each nation should
implement. These recommendations translate the
philosophy of Jean-Jacques Rousseau into very specific
policy actions to control, not only the use of
biodiversity, but virtually all human behavior.
The recommendations of Agenda 21 were further refined
for the United States by the President's Council on
Sustainable Development, created by President Clinton's
Executive Order #12852, June 29, 1993, to comply with a
recommendation of Agenda 21. This Council consisted of
28 members including Secretaries of several federal
departments, CEOs from several environmental
organizations, and selected businesses. Their purpose
was to transform domestic policy to comply with the
recommendations of Agenda 21.
At least six of the federal departments, and all of
the environmental organizations represented on the PCSD,
were, and continue to be, members of the IUCN. Jay Hair,
CEO of the National Wildlife Federation, and member of
the PCSD, became President of the IUCN. Gustave Speth,
CEO of WRI, joined the Clinton transition team briefly,
before being named to head the United Nations
Development Program. Rafe Pomerance, chief policy
analyst for WRI, joined the Clinton administration's
Department of State - a member of the IUCN. It is little
wonder that the myriad of programs coming from the IUCN,
WRI, WWF, the PCSD and U.N. are coalescing around the
concept of sustainable development, in the United
States.
The question then becomes, what does "sustainable"
really mean? While everyone seems to have an idea of
what it means, its definition remains vague at best. For
instance, the Convention on Biological Diversity defines
sustainable use as: "the use of components of biological
diversity in a way and at a rate that does not lead to
the long-term decline of biological diversity, thereby
maintaining its potential to meet the needs and
aspirations of present and future generations."
What components of biological diversity? And just
what is biological diversity? Its definition in the
treaty is equally vague. And, what constitutes long term
decline? Decline for one component of biological
diversity can mean an increase in another. Which takes
priority? And, just what are the aspirations of this
generation, let alone future generations? They vary
tremendously by culture and change with time and
technology. The concept is so cumbersome that the IUCN
requires several pages to define it.
(20) The United Nations Sustainable
Development website apparently doesn't even try to
define it. (21)
The answer to all these questions is this:
sustainable development is whatever government says it
is, in any given situation. The key, of course, is
"whatever government says." Sustainable Development,
implemented through the recommendations set forth in
Agenda 21, is the manifestation of Rousseau's philosophy
which depends upon government authority to order the
affairs of people to achieve the objectives of
government.
Conclusion
John Locke's philosophy would ensure that government
authority be granted by the people, and exist to protect
the individual's right to achieve his own objectives. In
the United States, we are witnessing the transformation
of a society organized on the philosophy expressed by
John Locke, to a society organized on the philosophy of
Rousseau. Moreover, this philosophy is being dictated by
the international community, most of which has never
embraced Locke's views, through the United Nations and
its affiliated organizations and agencies.
In the United States, public policy should arise from
the people who see a need, and ask their elected
representatives to enact laws to meet the need. What is
now happening, however, is that public policy is
envisioned by a handful of elite members of the IUCN,
translated into international law through the United
Nations, and imposed upon the people through Executive
Order, Rule Promulgation, and top-down pressure to enact
state and local policies.
Every person who is responsible for enacting public
policy, as well as every person who is affected by it,
should measure every proposal by the principles of
freedom set forth in the U.S. Constitution. Those
proposals which respect, defend, and protect the
principles of freedom should be considered; those which
do not - should be rejected out of hand.
Endnotes
1. Weinstein, Kenneth. "Limited
Government Under Assault: Jean-Jacques Rousseau Versus
John Locke and the Declaration of Independence."
CFACT, 2002, Briefing Paper 111, In Press.
2. Blackstone, William.
Commentaries on the Laws of England. Ed. William
Carey Jones, 2 Vols (San Francisco; Bancroft-Whitney
Company, 1916), 1:63 and 93.
3. Locke, John. Second
Treatise Government. Chapter Fourteen, 1690.
http://libertyonline.hypermall.com/Locke/second/second-frame.html
4. 4 Letters and Other
Writings of James Madison, 174. Taken from the
essay "Property" written in 1792 and published
in the National Gazette, March 27, 1792. See
also The Papers of James Madison 266 (Riland,
ed, 1977)
5. Weinstein, 2002.
6. Ibid.
7. Rousseau, Jean-Jacques. The
Social Contract. Book I, 7-The Sovereign, Paragraph
8. 1762.
http://www.constitution.org/jjr/socon_01.htm
8. Rousseau, Jean-Jacques.
Discourse on the Origin of Inequality, Part II,
paragraph 1. 1754.
http://www.constitution.org/jjr/ineq_04.htm
9. Ibid, paragraph 38.
10.
http://www.sovereignty.net/p/land/unproprts.htm
11. Coffman, Saviors of the
Earth?, 130.
12. Steven Rockefeller and John
Elder. Spirit and Nature (Boston: Beacon,
1992), 7.
13. Ibid, 135.
14. Commission on Global
Governance, Our Global Neighborhood, (Oxford
University Press, New York). 1995. Pg 82.
15. Coffman, Michael.
"Globalizing Mining in America", Mining Voice.
6(2):26-35.
16. Noss, Reed,
"The
Wildlands Project," Wild Earth, 1992, pp 10.
17. Global Biodiversity
Assessment, (Cambridge University Press, London,
New York, 1994) Section 13.4.2.2.3, pp 993 of the
published document. The GBA was funded by UNEP and
administered by the World Resources Institute, a partner
of the International Union for the Conservation of
Nature.
18. EPA Internal Working
Document, August 6, 1993, pp 9
19.
http://www.biodiv.org/convention/articles.asp?lg=0&a=cbd-02
20.
http://www.iucn.org/themes/ssc/susg/policystat.html
21.
http://www.un.org/esa/sustdev/index.html |
