Part of the green politics series

Green issues Green politics is a body of political ideas informed by environmentalism aimed at developing a sustainable society. ... Download high resolution version (3229x1999, 1840 KB)Sunflowers in Fargo, North Dakota. ... This list of Green party issues aims at giving an overview about Wikipedia articles that have to do with Green parties. ... Worldwide green parties: Global Greens · Africa · Americas · Asia-Pacific · Europe This article is about the green parties around the world. ... This article is about the green parties around the world. ... The Federation of Green Parties of Africa is the organization of Green parties in Africa. ... The Federation of the Green Parties of the Americas is the organization of Green parties in North America and South America. ... The Asia-Pacific Green Network is a federation of national Green parties in countries in the Pacific Ocean and Asia, and is a member of the Global Greens. ... European Greens is the name of the European Green Party, a political party at European level. ... Global Greens Charter: ecological wisdom · social justice · participatory democracy · nonviolence · sustainability · respect diversity The Global Greens Charter is a document that 800 delegates from the Green parties of 70 countries decided upon a first gathering of the Global Greens in Canberra, Australia in April 2001. ... All expressions of values by Green Parties list ecological wisdom as a key value - it was one of the original Four Pillars of the Green Party and is often considered the most basic value of these parties. ... Social Justice is a concept that has fascinated philosophers ever since Plato rebuked the young Sophist, Thrasymachus, for asserting that justice was whatever the strongest decided it would be. ... Participatory democracy is a broadly inclusive term for many kinds of consultative decision making in a democracy. ... Nonviolence (or non-violence) is a set of assumptions about morality, power and conflict that leads its proponents to reject the use of violence in efforts to attain social or political goals. ... Sustainability is a systemic concept, relating to the continuity of economic, social, institutional and environmental aspects of human society. ... The prerogative to respect diversity, often said to begin with biodiversity of non-human life, is basic to some 20th century studies such as cultural ecology, Queer studies, and anthropological linguistics. ...

This series is linked to the Politics and Elections series.

The worldwide green parties are committed to the following Four Pillars: Look up Politics in Wiktionary, the free dictionary Politics (disambiguation) Democracy History of democracy List of democracy and elections-related topics List of years in politics List of politics by country articles Political corruption Political economy Political movement Political parties of the world Political party Political psychology Political sociology Political... This article is about the green parties around the world. ...

1. Ecology (sometimes "Ecological Wisdom" or "Ecological Sustainability")
2. Social Justice (sometimes "Social Equality and Economic Justice")
3. Grassroots Democracy
4. Non-Violence

In German, they are known as Die Grünen: ökologisch, sozial, basisdemokratisch, gewaltfrei. All expressions of values by Green Parties list ecological wisdom as a key value - it was one of the original Four Pillars of the Green Party and is often considered the most basic value of these parties. ... Social Justice is a concept that has fascinated philosophers ever since Plato rebuked the young Sophist, Thrasymachus, for asserting that justice was whatever the strongest decided it would be. ... Grassroots democracy is a political process which is driven by groups of ordinary citizens, as opposed to larger organisations or wealthy individuals with concentrated vested interests in particular policies. ... Nonviolence (or non-violence) is a set of assumptions about morality, power and conflict that leads its proponents to reject the use of violence in efforts to attain social or political goals. ...

The four pillars define a Green Party as a political movement that inherits its philosophy from four predecessors, the peace movement, the civil rights movement, the environmental movement, and the labour movement. Rainbow peace flag. ... Civil Rights Movement in the United States, political, legal, and social struggle to gain full citizenship rights for African American and to achieve racial equality. ... Environmental movement is a term often used for any social or political movement directed towards the preservation, restoration, or enhancement of the natural environment. ... The labour movement (or labor movement) is a broad term for the development of a collective organization of working people, to campaign in their own interest for better treatment from their employers and political governments. ...

History of the Four Pillars

The four pillars were originally defined by European Green Parties, from the foundation of the German Green Party in 1979-1980, and later adopted by the U.S. Green Party. The U.S. Green Party has expanded these into Ten Key Values of the Green Party. The six principles of the Green Charter - which at the Global Greens conference of 2001 were arrived upon as a compromise of the North American and European traditions - added Respect for Diversity and Sustainability. The Green Party of Canada, in 2002 adopted the six principles as its official doctrine. Six Principles of the Global Greens Bündnis 90/Die Grünen (literally: Alliance 90/The Greens), the German Green Party, is a political party in Germany whose regional predecessors were founded in the late 1970s as part of the new social movements. ... In American politics, the Green Party is a third party which has been active in some areas since the 1980s, but first gained widespread public attention for Ralph Naders presidential runs in 1996 and 2000. ... ... The Global Greens Charter is a document that 800 delegates from the Green parties of 70 countries decided upon a first gathering of the Global Greens in Canberra, Australia in April 2001. ...

Explaining the Pillars

1. Ecology or "Ecological Wisdom" encapsulates the teachings of the environmental movement: the need to reduce the impact of human civilization, not merely as a necessary action to preserve human life but to alter the anthropocentric or human-centered worldview that the earth exists for the benefit of humanity - this view is also known as Deep Ecology - with proponents such as E.O. Williams, Daniel Quinn, Donella Meadows, E.F. Shumacher, . . .
2. Social Justice (sometimes "Social Equality and Economic Justice") reflects the general rejection of discrimination based on distinctions between class, gender, ethnicity, or culture. Green Parties are almost universally egalitarian in their outlook, seeing that great disparities in wealth or influence are caused by the perversion of or total lack of social instituions that prevent the strong from plundering the weak.
3. Grassroots Democracy or participatory democracy is embraced by Greens as the only reliable governance model for achieving social change. Many Green parties have rejected or constrained the traditional role of leaders as "party boss", in favor of having figurehead leaders or spokespeople. Many Green party constitutions are configured to prevent the party bureaucracy from accumulating too much power in the organization, in favor of more decentralized or member driven processes.
4. Non-Violence reflects the Green movement's policy of rejecting violence as a means to overcoming its opponents. Green Philosophy draws heavily on both Gandhi and the Quaker traditions, which advocate measures by which the escalation of violence can be avoided, while not cooperating with those who commit violence.

All expressions of values by Green Parties list ecological wisdom as a key value - it was one of the original Four Pillars of the Green Party and is often considered the most basic value of these parties. ... Anthropocentrism (Greek άνθρωπος, anthropos, man, human being, κέντρον, kentron, center) is the practice, conscious or otherwise, of regarding the existence and/or concerns of human beings as the central fact of the universe. ... Deep ecology is a recent philosophy or ecosophy based on a shift away from the anthropocentric bias of established environmental and green movements. ... Social Justice is a concept that has fascinated philosophers ever since Plato rebuked the young Sophist, Thrasymachus, for asserting that justice was whatever the strongest decided it would be. ... Egalitarianism is the moral doctrine that equality ought to prevail among some group along some dimension. ... Grassroots democracy is a political process which is driven by groups of ordinary citizens, as opposed to larger organisations or wealthy individuals with concentrated vested interests in particular policies. ... Participatory democracy is a broadly inclusive term for many kinds of consultative decision making in a democracy. ... Nonviolence (or non-violence) is a set of assumptions about morality, power and conflict that leads its proponents to reject the use of violence in efforts to attain social or political goals. ... Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi (October 2, 1869 – January 30, 1948) (Devanagari: मोहनदास करमचन्द गांधी, Gujarati મોહનદાસ કરમચંદ ગાંધી), called Mahatma Gandhi, was the charismatic leader who brought the cause of Indias independence from British colonial rule to world attention. ... The Religious Society of Friends, commonly known as Quakers, or Friends, is a religious community founded in England in the 17th century. ...

The Pillars as an ethical system

The four pillars are generally considered interdependent, comprising an internally consistent ethical system. None of the four pillars can be regarded as a means to an end, as compared to "Respect for Diversity" in the Ten Key Values, which can be evaluated as a means to achieving both social justice and ecological wisdom. Greens believe that progress to achieving each one of the four pillars is dependent upon progress to achieving the other three.

For example: Ecological Wisdom requires social justice, grassroots democracy and non-violence. Anything other than a just distribution of the earth's finite resources can not be sustainable as an international agreement; unjust distributions lead to violence and a breakdown of the political process. Furthermore, traditional political structures - which are based on patronage, partisanship, and brinksmanship as their internal governance model - have proved themselves generally incapable of negotiating international agreements even while facing the threat of self-extinction.

Arundhati Roy describes the connectedness of Democracy, Peace and Non-Violence: "Where there is oppression, it will always be challenged... I don't believe that there can ever be peace without justice... The two go together. And there cannot be peace in the world with full-spectrum dominance." [1]. This approach arose from shared concerns of the peace movement and ecology movement. Arundhati Roy (Malayalam: അരുന്ധതി റോയ്, Devanagari: अरुंधती राय) (born November 24, 1961) is an Indian novelist and activist. ... Rainbow peace flag. ... The global ecology movement is one of several new social movements that emerged at the end of the sixties, its growth has been stimulated by a widespread acknowledgement of an ecological crisis of our planet. ...