Social Change in the United Term Paper

And SEE-Change, a movement in Australia, which could be emulated in the U.S., claims it has a goal of "empowering" Australians to make good decisions on a local level since political leaders cannot be counted on to lead. The SEE-Change group was launched by Canberra biologist Stephen Boyden; his book the Biology of Civilization apparently provided the spark for this social change movement. The changes that need to be made, according to Boyden's book, can be accomplished through the development of "life centers."

Those life centers will fulfill three pivotal objectives, the article explains. One, they will bring concerned citizens together so they can converse and "explore the nature and scientific underpinnings of future challenges." Two, the life centers will give the local community a "venue" through which they can decide which social change actions are most appropriate. And three, these centers will, the article asserts, give communities a "new sense of engagement, empowerment and communal goodwill." Boyden calls activists who are part of SEE-Change "concerned and interested persons" (CIPs).

Eventually the CIPs got together and changed the name of "life centers" to "SEE-Change Centers," which, Douglas explains, promotes the idea that the organization is committed to "promoting change in Society" as well as in the economy and the environment. The whole point of this organization is that people need to be proactive and to plan for a sustainable future since counting on sluggish governments, politicians and bureaucrats is pointless. In the first eight months of SEE-Change's existence the group reached out to collaborate with already existing organizations. This effort led to individuals going out to shopping centers and distributing questionnaires, in effect, doing the grass roots organizing that social change movements must do to embrace a larger share of the population. Soon, college students were activated and the movement spread outside of Canberra.

Today, SEE-Change is expanding into more organization, including technology-friendly groups. These are people who can put their knowledge of solar energy, retrofitting buildings and houses, car pooling, sustainable vegetable growing, and more, to good use. Pivotal to the continuing growth of SEE-Change, the author writes, is the identification of people who are "sufficiently concerned" and willing to become "prime movers" in their respective suburbs.A coalition of young and older people could come together around this movement, albeit it has not been "comprehensively tested" (Douglas). That said, it is encouraging, the author concludes, that the SEE-Change concept is on solid footing, and may help the Australian society to avoid a world depicted in Al Gore's movie "An Inconvenient Truth."

If societies do not embrace the necessary changes to slow down global warming, the world will not be a very hospitable place in the future and life will be a constant struggle for millions of people. That is the thrust of an Inconvenient Truth, which won an Oscar for best documentary of 2006. A link from an Inconvenient Truth's Web page leads a visitor to WorldWatch Institute (WWI), a respected and important conservation organization. The WWI scientists point out that over 99% of the world's irrigation, industrial and household water comes "directly from rivers, lakes, and aquifers" (Postel, 2007). However, human impacts on those freshwater resources "have reached global proportions" and have "disrupted a wide range of valuable ecological services."

What the world of the future will look like in the eyes of scientists who study these issues is not pretty. Disappearing species (that is happening now) will be common. "Decimated fish populations" is already happening. Water quality that is seriously in decline will worsen. And collectively, these issues (including "shrinking lakes" and "falling water tables") must be addressed through well organized, well-thought-out social change movements.

Works Cited

Douglas, Bob. (2007). A SEE-Change Movement as a Vehicle for Cultural change and Local

Action on Climate Change. Social Alternatives, 26(3), 46-49.

Postel, Sandra. (2007). Safeguarding Freshwater Ecosystems. WorldWatch Institute. Retrieved February 15, 2008, at http://www.worldwatch.org.node.3994.

Vasi, Ion Bogdan. (2006). Organizational Environments, Framing Processes, and the Diffusion

Of the Program to Address Global Climate change Among local Governments in….....