GLOBALISATION AND SUSTAINABILITY

World Summit Paper #6; essay by Wolfgang Sachs, Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Energy, Environment

From the essay: Symbols are the more powerful the more meanings they are able to admit. They actually live on ambivalence. The Cross, for instance, counted both as a token of victory for conquerors and as a token of hope for the vanquished. That ambivalence raised it above the fray; a single clear message would have meant that it divided rather than united. The same may be said of the image of the blue planet, now a symbol unchallenged by either Left or Right, conservative or liberal. Whatever their differences, they are all fond of adorning themselves with this symbol of our epoch. To fall in with it is to announce that one is abreast of the times, in tune with the world, focused on the future, truly prepared to set off into the new century. In this picture are condensed the opposing ambitions of our age. It is hoisted like a flag by troops from enemy camps, and its prominence results from this plurality of meaning. The photograph of the globe contains the contradictions of globalization. That is why it could become an all-weather icon.

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