12 May 2008

Youth Employment / Open Borders

Mike Davis lays out a number of key questions that we need to find answers to, the main ones for me being: how to link environmentalism with youth employment, and how to talk about open borders and human rights in an age where we will see more environmental refugees. Davis is probably best known for writing "City of Quartz" and "Planet of Slums."

"I think that every environmental demand should be linked to a social justice demand ... and I think most environmental demands should have to do with youth employment and extending the opportunities for the enjoyment of nature and participation in green politics to people in the inner cities."

"Human rights come first. Borders are essentially systems of violence imposed on landscapes and human lives. And it's very important that there's something like an abolitionist minority that reject borders per se as a way to ration rights in the world or to manage conflicts ... A lot more people die now at the borders of Europe than they did in the age of the Iron Curtain."

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