The Earth Charter: An Ethical Framework for a Feasible Utopia

• Authors: Valerio Contini , Enrique Garcia Pascual
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

This research objective is to highlight an innovative, holistic, inclusive, integrated approach to a sustainable future promoted by the Earth Charter and describe the structure of its ethical framework. The main conclusion of the research is that the ethical framework of the Earth Charter is based on a limited number of core concepts: planetary human identity, feasible utopianism, co-responsibility and committed compassion. Planetary human identity is based on the capacity to incorporate nature into the process of identity building and integrate three complementary feelings: singularity, belonging to groups and belonging to the planetary community of life. The Earth Charter stresses the necessity to give a new life to utopianism by working out a critical-radical-alternative, but a feasible idea of future and our responsibility towards it. Moreover, the Earth Charter rethinks responsibility as co-responsibility and assigns it four different qualities: universal, synchronic, diachronic and differentiated and appeals to an innovative politically connoted notion of compassion.

Keywords

EN

Earth Charter; co-responsibility; planetary human identity; committed compassion; feasible utopia; development; education for sustainability

• Publisher: Sciendo
• Journal: Discourse and Communication for Sustainable Education
• Year: 2010
• Volume: 1
• Issue: 2
• Pages: 25-33

Dates

published

2010-06-01

online

2013-06-15

Contributors

author

Valerio Contini

• University of Zaragoza, Facultad de Educaciòn c/o Decanato, C/S. Juan Bosco, 7, 50009 ZARAGOZA

author

Enrique Garcia Pascual

• University of Zaragoza, Italy

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Identifiers

DOI

10.2478/dcse-2013-0012