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Excerpts from a long article by Robert J. Burrows

. . . Evidence has been published pointing at an elite coup with governments around the world introducing draconian measures severely curtailing human rights and freedoms (including those involving the internet) and destroying national economies. . . .

[One of the articles] cites the Rockefeller Foundation’s 2010 document ‘Scenarios for the Future of Technology and International Development’ with its prescient description of what is taking place now: ‘LOCK STEP – A world of tighter top-down government control and more authoritarian leadership, with limited innovation and growing citizen pushback’ . . .

[Editor’s note: The Rockefeller document describes four possible scenarios:
LOCK STEP – A world of tighter top-down government control and more authoritarian leadership, with limited innovation and growing citizen pushback
CLEVER TOGETHER – A world in which highly coordinated and successful strategies emerge for addressing both urgent and entrenched worldwide issues
HACK ATTACK – An economically unstable and shock-prone world in which governments weaken, criminals thrive, and dangerous innovations emerge
SMART SCRAMBLE – An economically depressed world in which individuals and communities develop localized, makeshift solutions to a growing set of priorities.]

In this article I would like to outline a strategic response to prevent this takeover before we find ourselves moving from a version of the dystopian society described in the novel Brave New World to that outlined in the novel 1984 that many of us read as students. . . .

I have outlined this nonviolent strategy, identifying its political purpose – obviously ‘To defend humanity against a political/military coup conducted by the global elite’ – and I have set out a basic list of 26 strategic goals, of which eleven are as follows:

1. To cause people and groups all around the world to join the resistance strategy by wearing a global symbol of human solidarity, such as an image of several people of different genders .. races .. religions .. abilities .. classes holding hands.

2. To cause people and groups all around the world to join the resistance strategy by boycotting all corporate media outlets (television, radio, newspapers, Facebook, Twitter…) and by seeking news from progressive news outlets committed to telling the truth.

3. To cause people and groups all around the world to join the resistance strategy by withdrawing all funds from the corporate banks that are supporting the coup and to deposit their money in local community banks or credit unions.

4. [Note: The editor is skeptical about claims in some of the references provided to justify a fourth item that proposes refusal to submit to vaccinations: ‘COVID-19 – The Fight for a Cure: One Gigantic Western Pharma Rip-Off’, ‘The National Plan to Vaccinate Every American’ and ‘A Serious Warning about the Toxicity of Aluminum-Adjuvanted Vaccines – Especially for Infants and the Elderly’]

5. To cause people and groups all around the world to join the resistance strategy by boycotting corporate supermarkets and by supporting small and family businesses, and local markets.

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6. To cause people and groups all around the world to join the resistance strategy by participating in other locally relevant nonviolent action(s)/campaign(s) and/or constructive program activities. For this item and many subsequent, see the list of possible nonviolent actions in the document ‘198 Tactics of Nonviolent Action’.

7. To cause the workers in trade unions or labor organizations . .. all around the world to join the resistance strategy by participating in locally relevant nonviolent action(s)/campaign(s) and/or constructive program activities. For example, this might include withdrawing labor from an elite-controlled bank, media, pharmaceutical or other corporation operating in your country.

8. To cause the small farmers and farmworkers in organizations . . . all around the world to join the resistance strategy by participating in locally relevant nonviolent action(s)/campaign(s) and/or constructive program activities. For example, this might include distributing farm produce through (existing or created) grassroots networks to small and family businesses as well as local markets rather than through corporate supply chains.

9. To cause the indigenous peoples . . . all around the world to join the resistance strategy by participating in locally relevant nonviolent action(s)/campaign(s) and/or constructive program activities. For example, this might include utilizing indigenous knowledge to improve local self-reliance in food production and in other ways.

10. To cause the soldiers and military police in army units . . . wherever stationed around the world, to refuse to obey orders from the global elite and its agents to arrest, assault, torture and shoot nonviolent activists and the other citizens of [your country].

11. To cause the police . . . wherever stationed around the world, to refuse to obey orders from the global elite and its agents to arrest, assault, torture and shoot nonviolent activists and the other citizens of [your country].

. . . Conclusion

Humanity is at a crossroads it has never before faced. . ..

the vast bulk of government handouts are going to wealthy corporations. See ‘The Coronavirus Aid, Relief, and Economic Security, CARES Act Is Business Giveaway, “Handout” to Monied Interests’.

If you lack the inclination or courage to do the research to understand the nature and depth of this crisis and/or to join the struggle to resist the elite takeover of our world, you are encouraged to support those who do have the inclination and courage. If you simply believe that the ‘COVID-19 crisis’ will pass and everything will revert to how it was, it might be worth reading some political history (focusing on life in those countries that suffered or still suffer under dictatorship or occupation) or simply checking out what Israel is doing now. See ‘Americans Beware: Trump Could Emulate Netanyahu’s Coronavirus Coup’. We are already so far beyond the possibility of ‘a return to how it was’ that the only realistic question worth asking now is ‘How bad will it be?’

In short, this struggle to restore our rights, economic well-being and freedoms will not be won easily. And it will come at significant cost. But it is only if enough people are willing to risk paying that cost, and apply their energy strategically, that this struggle for our humanity can actually be won.

I intend to do everything I can to ensure that we succeed. I hope that you will too.

About the Author: Robert J. Burrowes resides in Australia and has a lifetime commitment to understanding and ending human violence. He has done extensive research since 1966 in an effort to understand why human beings are violent and has been a nonviolent activist since 1981.

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Article by Joe Downy from the Strong Cities Network

Today, 83% of deadly violence occurs outside of conflict zones, with the majority of this violence concentrated in cities. Nation states have dominated the global political arena for centuries, but with more than half of the world’s population today residing in cities, it may be time to rethink who should be at the table when it comes to decisions on how we can reduce violence.

Video of Glasgow program

Recently, a coalition  of cities and organisations, including the Strong Cities Network, have pledged action to help halve urban violence by 2030, in line with the UN Sustainable Development Goal 16.1 to ‘significantly reduce all forms of violence and related death rates everywhere’. Such a goal is undoubtedly ambitious, but cities hold a number of advantages  over nations that may help to tip the balance in their favour. The gathering momentum of new city-based alliances such as C40 Cities, the Global Parliament of Mayors, United Cities and Local Governments, and the Strong Cities Network is proof of a shift away from solely state-dominated approaches to global issues to new, collaborative forms of decision-making between the national and the local level.

The challenge of reducing urban violence is not just limited to the act itself, but also in overcoming our perception that violence is inevitable. When violence is normalised in this way, it is seen as an inescapable part of everyday life which stymies any attempts to radically reduce it.

This is far from the truth. Cities all over the world have pioneered responses to their own complex and contextualised problems of localised violence, and there are important lessons and insights to be learned from one another.

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How can culture of peace be developed at the municipal level?

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In the early 2000s in Glasgow, Scotland, knife crime and homicide rates were double those of the national level, and Scotland itself was regarded among the most violent countries in the developed world. To help stem this, the city’s leadership established a specialist Violence Reduction Unit, which coordinated community outreach, educational and employment initiatives in the neighbourhoods most affected by violence. Under the motto ‘violence is preventable, not inevitable’, the city’s homicide rate halved  within ten years, and the numbers continue to drop. Lessons learned from this programme are now being applied in London, which established its own Violence Reduction Unit last year.

In collaboration with local governments, Ecuador took a radical step in the way it was dealing with gangs in 2007 – looking beyond solely punitive approaches and starting to engage with them through new and innovative ways. Working relationships  were established between gangs, law enforcement and local government, and members were encouraged to become positive community leaders. Grants were set up and incentives put in place, and gangs could apply for state funding if they fulfilled certain requirements to develop their own initiatives. This saw organic and unprompted partnerships develop between community actors and gang members, such as the Catholic University of Quito, which sponsored 15 gang members to study to become nurses. A decade later, homicide rates in the cities of San Domingo, Quito and Guayaquil had plummeted to a third of what they had been in the early 2000s.

In Oakland, California, which once ranked among America’s most dangerous cities, homicide rates have fallen by almost 50%  since 2012, a drop which bucked the national trend in the same period, which has seen sharp increases in homicides in many major U.S. cities. This remarkable change has been attributed largely to collaboration  between law enforcement, community actors and civil society. It was recognised early on that a law enforcement-led approach was not enough by itself, and was both financially unsustainable and sent the wrong message to the communities it was seeking to serve. Instead, by engaging with the wealth of community actors and violence prevention groups such as Caught in the Crossfire, the Khadafy Washington Project, and Cure Violence, whole-of-society and preventative approaches to tackling the issue were allowed to thrive. One of the most impressive examples of this was seen in the local ‘Ceasefire’ policing programme, which saw local actors collaborate with law enforcement to create a tailored strategy.

All of these approaches display the role that cities areand should be playing in helping to reduce violence. By engaging with communities, forming strategic partnerships with civil society, local organisations, businesses and their national counterparts, and treating violence as a preventable phenomenon, cities are setting the examples for nations to follow.

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An article from the Global Parliament of Mayors

For the first time ever, the Global Parliament of Mayors was officially represented at a World Urban Forum. The World Urban Forum, organised by UN-Habitat, is the world’s premiere international conference on all aspects of urban policy. The World Urban Forum 10 in Abu Dhabi, UAE, in February 2020 brought together 12.000 politicians and city experts from 168 nations.

The GPM, together with the City of Mannheim, hosted a networking event on the topic “The Global Parliament of Mayors (GPM) Virtual Parliament – the solution to accelerate digital democracy.” The event was moderated by Juliana Kerr, Director Global Cities at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and brought together GPM-Mayors and affiliated Mayors from Katowice (Poland), Banjul (Gambia), Dortmund (Germany), Quelimane (Mozambique), Bulawayo (Zimbabwe), Duhok (Iraq).

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How can culture of peace be developed at the municipal level?

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Mayor of Mannheim and GPM Chair, Dr Peter Kurz, whose city administration successfully applied for the GPM networking event with UN-Habitat, gave an opening speech, explaining the idea and rationale of GPM. The major planetary challenges, such as global warming, migration, and the globalisation of the economy, are dealt with through a complicated system of global governance. Within this system, Cities and their representatives are there mainly as observers. That is what the Global Parliament of Mayors project wants to change. The global governance has to be opened to cities and their representatives. “Cities are not primarily a subject for discussion; they are a level of governance” explained Mayor Dr Peter Kurz. “The GPM offers Mayors all around the world, especially from middle sized cities and the global south a unique opportunity to exchange and make their voices heard on the international level.

Mayor Peter Kurz furthermore presented the GPM’s Virtual Parliament (VP) to the interested audience. The VP is an online tool to connect with Mayors around the world, to debate and vote on political issues and to exchange experiences. It was launched during the 2018 GPM summit in Bristol. The first worldwide online voting session for mayors was organised one year later. As a result, a resolution was agreed on, which was presented during the First UN-Habitat Assembly in May 2019. As additional examples for the working procedure of the VP, Mayor Kurz mentioned the survey for Mayors on the roadmap of the Mayors Migration Council and the support of an action of the US congress of Mayors against gun violence.