“Agenda 21″ sounds like a daft-but-harmless-idea you can ignore. I found it hard to get enthused, but I was wrong, and no one sums this up better than James Delingpole in “Watermelons” (aka “Killing the Earth to Save it). To paraphrase James’s brilliant work (forgive me James) from page 190:
Some of you still aren’t convinced that you need to worry about Agenda 21 because you are thinking:
a) Agenda 21 sounds way too much like Area 51, (you know Aliens and the Roswell incident). Nut job stuff.
b) It was signed in 1992. If it was that bad, we’d have heard by now. Surely?
c) What sovereign nation would be so insane as to sign itself up for a binding treaty?
James explains that it’s real, it’s important (like an anti-magna-carta), and its’ a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Governments could sign up because it was “voluntary”, but then those voluntary rules are scrupulously and doggedly enforced by the “labyrinthine, democratically unaccountable behemoth that is the United Nations.”
Furthermore, he points out that it’s not like they’ve bothered to hide their aims — they want to control your resources, your money, your actions and every decision you want to make:
“Effective execution of Agenda 21 will require a profound reorientation of all human society, unlike anything the world has ever experienced a major shift in the priorities of both governments and individuals and an unprecedented redeployment of human and financial resources. This shift will demand that a concern for the environmental consequences of every human action be integrated into individual and collective decision-making at every level.” — excerpt from The UN, Agenda 21*
(Did I mention, you really need to buy his book? From James. Through Amazon (paperback or kindle), & the Australian version).
Agenda 21 is very much about property rights (ie. their right to your property). Justice Gilpin-Green quotes Agenda 21:
“Land…cannot be treated as an ordinary asset, controlled by individuals and subject to the pressures and inefficiencies of the market,” Agenda 21 says. “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 interest of the society as a whole.”**
Agenda 21 is so non-threatening, voluntary, and out of date, that Alabama has just written legislation specifically designed to stop it. The legislation has passed. It protects property rights against anything linked to Agenda 21, and also stops the state sending or receiving money to Agenda 21 NGO’s or GONGO’s.
Who knew that Alabama needed legislation to stop private property from being confiscated without due process?
(Who knew there are Democrats against Agenda 21?)
Agenda 21 also appears in other forms like, ICLEI, or the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives. Gilpin-Green says “When countries like the United States fail to adopt the environmentalist agenda promoted by the United Nations, that organization manages to bypass them by providing various incentives to state, county, and municipal organizations.” Apparently some towns get funding from the UN and display their cheques proudly. How does that work — taxpayers pay money to a government, which gives it to a foreign unelected body, which then pays their local council in order to gain influence? So much for your votes. When the chain of voting-to-power becomes so long and distant, it’s a case of your money, used against you.
[Alabama Senate Bill (SB) 477 legislation]
(b) The State of Alabama and all political
subdivisions may not adopt or implement policy recommendations
that deliberately or inadvertently infringe or restrict
private property rights without due process, as may be
required by policy recommendations originating in, or
traceable to “Agenda 21,” adopted by the United Nations in
1992 at its Conference on Environment and Development or any
other international law or ancillary plan of action that
contravenes the Constitution of the United States or the
Constitution of the State of Alabama.
(c) Since the United Nations has accredited and
enlisted numerous non-governmental and inter-governmental
organizations to assist in the implementation of its policies
relative to Agenda 21 around the world, the State of Alabama
and all political subdivisions may not enter into any
agreement, expend any sum of money, or receive funds
contracting services, or giving financial aid to or from those
non-governmental and inter-governmental organizations as
defined in Agenda 21.
Big Hat tip to Simon and GWPF
REFERENCES
* The official “Agenda 21” UN Dept of Economic and Social Affairs. Delingpole specifically references this particular UN link in his book. Some sites attribute the quote to George H Bush in 1992 (presumably at Rio, or rather “signed” by G H Bush?). This is also attributed to — Environmental activist and attorney Daniel Sitarz. Variations of it are quoted from Agenda 21: The Earth Summit Strategy to Save Our Planet (Earthpress, 1993).
**The quote is widely attributed to “Agenda 21” (used in the broader use of the term to describe a movement, rather than the specific document) and appears to have been one of the original driving ideas, with the earliest quotes from the report from “The Vancouver Action Plan” June 1976, UN Conference on Human Settlements.