Memorandum on the formulation of
Booklets of Proposals for the 21st Century

Foreword

With the approach of the 2001 Event organized by the Alliance for a Responsible and United World, the moment has come to formulate together a number of proposals resulting from the short but fruitful experience of grouping and developing different initiatives by citizens in the framework of the geo-cultural, topical and collegial directions.
During the first meeting of the International Facilitation Team of the Alliance, held at Barcelona from September 12th to 16th 1999, we discussed at length the process of preparing and organizing this Event, which will take place from January 2000 to December 2001 and culminate with the simultaneous organization of several international meetings on each continent, all "interconnected" together.  These will take place around the solstice of 2001 (June 21st). Each of the continental meetings will bring together local and regional participants as well as those from other continents in order to mark their intercultural and international dimension. These assemblies will be followed by a world assembly in December 2001 which will group the results and consider the next step to be taken by the Alliance. All these meetings will express the allies' desire to build a new world civil awareness at the dawn of the next century and millennium.
Thus it is vital during the following months for the allies to start formulating and discussing the values, experiences and above all the concrete proposals that can be used as intercultural references for the coming decades. 
It is clear that the contribution made by the allies towards building a juster, more responsible and more united world for the next century cannot simply be reduced to highly formal texts. It can and must give an important place to symbolic and artistic expression, in order to put across that which words cannot express. However, it is important to give particular attention to the formulation of documents that set out the allies' visions and proposals in writing.
Putting these texts together will permit wide intercultural, inter-topical, and inter-collegial participation, and it could take three forms (the titles below are only temporary and are given only as indications):
- Charter for a Responsible, Plural and United World (document setting out common values),
- Proposals for the 21st century (documents setting out proposals),
- Perspectives of the Alliance 2002-2004 (document on the next step).
To advance surely and give ourselves the time required for discussion, to confront ideas and proposals, it is vital that we start immediately to write and layout preparatory texts so that they can be debated throughout the year 2000, in view to enhancing them progressively. At the end of 2000 we should have a range of texts that will have been formulated and approved collectively. 
The document on the Perspectives of the Alliance 2002-2004 could be formulated during the first six months of 2001 on the basis of the contributions of those who will be involved in the process of the Event. A first version will be presented during the meetings of June 2001 for enhancement and approval.
The works devoted to the intercultural formulation of an  Intercultural Charter of the Earth have already begun, at the initiative of many allies from several continents. This dynamic is also linked with other initiatives making progress in view to achieving convergence and formulating a basic document for humanity at the dawn of the next century
This memorandum therefore focuses on the formulation of Proposals for the 21st century.
The Proposal Booklets

The aim is to write a booklet of proposals using the topical workshops as basis, or any group formed by the allies to think about the challenges currently facing the world.

The following suggestions do not constitute the backdrop of a "standard proposal booklet". They merely underline the elements we feel essential to give substance to these booklets and above all make them clear: do not forget that these booklets are intended for a wider audience for discussion and re-discussion. 

1. The list of proposals
A presentation of one or two pages listing the proposals. To get the reader directly involved in the heart of the subject, each proposal should have a title followed by a short description of a few lines (no more than 10 if possible). 

2. The context
A text describing the economic, social, technical, and cultural context, etc., forming the basis on which the proposals have been formulated. The boundaries of this context raise a complex question. They entail identifying the scale on which the proposals are formulated: this scale could be a rural or urban district, a country, a continental region, or the world. However, the questions on the link between the local and global and between the short and long terms have to be tackled at every level. What is important is to take this complexity into consideration and not stop mid way. True, we could limit ourselves to making a proposal based on the context of a city in India, for instance, and not presume to widen the pertinence of the proposal to other cities in the world. The challenge will be to formulate the proposals whose scopes are as wide as possible, and viable just as much locally as world wide.

3. The perspectives
The proposals must be oriented by a vision of the near and distant future. This future must be evoked succinctly so as to give the proposals their full meaning. Efforts must be made not to make a simple list of universal values that may give too abstract a vision of the perspective opened up by the proposals. We have already mentioned several general principles in the Platform for a Responsible and United World. The purpose of this booklet is not only to list the "desirable" perspectives, but those that will become possible and realistic from the moment the proposals are implemented. Thus, the formulation of proposals, the context and the perspectives will constitute a coherent whole.

4. The players
In order not to detach the proposals from concrete social realities and prevent them from appearing simply as pious wishes, it is vital to identify the players that contribute or who are liable to contribute these proposals. Regarding this, it would be a good idea to ask oneself what each proposal means for the young, politicians and heads of institutions, scientists, businessmen, farmers, etc.

5. The experiences
To give the previous points more strength and fuel the booklet of proposals with experiences of real successes and failures, an additional booklet comprising several experience sheets could prove very useful. These sheets, placed at the end here, could very well be placed at the beginning insofar as the list of proposals of the first part are influenced by accumulated experiences.

All these elements could be presented in the form of successive texts, but it is also possible to explain for each proposal its context, the perspectives it opens, etc. These elements could then be summarized in the form of "proposal sheets", using the DPH format as model. 
To aid this collective exchange and the debate begun on the proposals, we will present all these booklets in the Alliance database. 

We think that a booklet composed in this way should be a tool that is both solid and pedagogical enough to provide the basis for debate. As underlined by us in the foreword, these booklets will be a precious aid in developing the social, participatory and innovative considerations for the 2001 Event.

To make solid progress, we ask you to take a break from your many activities and devote yourselves to writing this booklet. We know that you have already accumulated a wealth of material during the meetings, seminars and conferences that you have organized or participated in, as well as in texts, booklets, and publications that you have already produced. We ask you to make use of this wealth in these proposal booklets without further ado and write a first version in the next months. 
This period will give us the time required to discuss the subject with you and help you to formulate, translate and link up with the other booklets. In this way we will have all the booklets ready for publication before the end of 2000 in several languages and in several countries, make them available on-line on the allies' web sites, and diffuse them in still other forms.

Thank for in advance for playing the game within the lead-times given.
The important thing is that your proposals are put forward for debate, collective work and diffused as widely as possible. 

Please, send your booklets to:
Olivier Petitjean
Fondation Charles Léopold Mayer
38, rue Saint-Sabin
75011 Paris
Tel: 33+ (0) 1 43 14 75 75
Fax: 33+ (0) 1 43 14 75 99
E-mail: olivier@fph.fr
Warm and sincere regards.