Basic Food Income: Option or Obligation?

[ChristineMarie]

Basic food income is a universal payment by the state unconditionally to each member of society with an amount sufficient to cover elementary food needs. It is not a level of income but a state program, by definition. Minimum income describes a certain level of income, but may not be sufficient to provide access to food. Basic food income is an innovative idea. State programs can introduce "smart forms" of targeting.


Indeed, how should the human right to food be guaranteed to households not in a position to feed themselves - even if there were more jobs. The standard development paradigm risks to by-pass some 50 percent of the hungry and malnourished by focusing largely on issues of productivity and wage labor.

Freedom and human rights do not function without institutionalized sharing of income. The right of the hungry to get food as soon as possible has been almost absent in human rights debates as well, even though it is crucial for a large percentage of the malnourished households. This document aims at presenting arguments for basic food income as a state obligation under the right to food.

In the first two sections, the human right to food is analyzed. The full realization of the right to food (which is the commitment undertaken by the Human Rights Covenants) means that food is to be guaranteed individually. Policies and programs that somehow "statistically" improve food security for the poor are welcome but insufficient: They do not do the job. Human rights are not "statistical," but meant to establish individual legal guarantees with judicial remedies. It is here where most programs fail.

In the third section, basic food income will be introduced as minimum income programs with "smart targeting," showing that basic food income is not only more effective but also more efficient than comparable programs. The great importance of basic food income in immediately addressing the oppression and exploitation of women is underlined. The fear of exorbitant program costs is one of the key hesitations about basic income. The financial viability of basic-food-income programs - even in low-income countries - is demonstrated in section 4. The last section is then devoted to asking the big question once again: Basic food income - option or obligation?

Source: FIAN International www.fian.org

[ChristineMarie]

Globalization, Post-materialism and Threefolding

The author defines threefolding as a holistic approach to world governance, reflecting the different kinds of interaction between the three realms of society and the key institutions representing them (corporations, state, and civil society). The different stages of threefolding are established on the basis of the actors' different stances and mutual interactions, categorized according to their visions of the world as "Jihad" (religious fundamentalists), "McWorld" (materialistic neoliberals) and "Civitas" (humanists and spiritualists). The first two types are totalitarian whereas the thrid is pluralistic. The author proposes three phases of threefolding, "de facto", "conscious," and "advanced", which differ in terms of the degree of organization among the 3 realms. Perlas considers "advanced threefolding" as a necessary stage for transforming the world and saving it from its current governance path, which leads to totalitarian destruction or absolute control over society.


Threefolding is not in its complete manifestation when it first appears in social life. There are different kinds of threefolding and there are different stages through which authentic threefolding will have to pass. Threefolding, like a human being, goes through the stages of childhood, adolescence, and adulthood and therefore the actual concrete manifestations of threefolding can vary with time and place, depending on the actual conditions of social life. According to this analogy, "advanced threefolding" (adult phase) will have to first go through two earlier phases: "de facto threefolding" (childhood phase) and "conscious threefolding" (adolescent phase).

De facto threefolding occurs when one of the three global institutional powers asserts its autonomy and defends its realm from perceived or real invasions from the two other powers and realms of society. In recent history, de facto threefolding initiatives have come almost exclusively from civil society. In de facto threefolding, civil society is in a critical, and often "rejectionist" mode. The battle of Seattle is one of the best examples of de facto threefolding.

Conscious threefolding results when the three institutional powers recognize that society has three realms and that they themselves are the three key institutions of these three social realms. In conscious threefolding, the three key institutions are aware that they have consciously entered into a social process that mobilizes the unique perspectives, strengths, resources and capacities of the cultural, political, and economic realms of society. The three key institutions know that in conscious threefolding, they place their respective talents toward the pursuit of comprehensive sustainable development, balancing the economic and political, and cultural, social, ecological, human, and spiritual imperatives of development.

In conscious threefolding, civil society is in a critical engagement mode. The Philippine Agenda 21 (PA21) is exemplary of conscious threefolding at work. PA21 articulates a conscious threefolding image of society and has an understanding of the three key institutions of society and the realms from which they are acting. Civitas in the Philippines, through its civil society, convinced the McWorld government of the Philippines to officially adopt PA21 as its framework of sustainable development for the country.

Advanced threefolding is the adult phase of threefolding viewed from a developmental or evolutionary perspective. In advanced threefolding, mutual trust and respect are established and institutionalized, something that still has to be continuously worked for in conscious threefolding. In advanced threefolding, the substance of the different realms represented by the three key institutions is so well understood that creative, albeit radical new initiatives start to increasingly determine the substance of the threefolding process.

http://www.new-school-of-athens.org/spip.php?article79