Global Learning and Sustainability

The 17 global goals outlined are incredibly ambitious, some of them can potentially be achieved, others are a bit idealistic and far-fetched.  Goal number 16, which highlights peace, justice and strong institutions is a goal that will likely never be completed.  To expect governments across the world to all be stable, and all have equal respect for human rights is close to impossible.  Freedom House is a nonprofit institution that analyzes and reports on the state of human rights across the world.  By their assessment, out of the 195 recognized countries in the world, only 87 are actually considered ‘totally free.’  49 are ‘not free,’ and 59 are considered ‘partly free.’  This means that less than half (49% to be exact) of the countries in the world show complete respect for human rights and civil liberties.  With half the countries in the world not adhering to goal 16, it makes accomplishing it a daunting task.  I don’t think activism alone is able to achieve a solid foundation of human rights and strong institutions.  Activism can only do so much in the face of violent and repressive governments.  In order for goal 16 to be fully realized, military interventions might be necessary to force governments to change their ways, and their leadership.  However, military interventions go against the very nature of peace, and can lead to death, poverty, and famine, thus violating other global goals.  It begs the question if achieving goal 16 is worth worsening progress on other goals.  Out of all the goals highlighted, I think goal 16: climate action, is the most doable.  It doesn’t call for solving climate change, it simply mandates that countries and people take steps to act in the face of climate change, something which is already happening with things such as the Paris Climate Accords.

5 thoughts on “Global Learning and Sustainability

  1. I find the stats included in this post to be incredibly shocking. The fact that so much of the world does not consider themselves to be completely free makes me question so many aspects of governmental processes around the world. Especially in a political climate that we are currently living in, where it is so highly debated, I think this post was very important to talk about and recognize.

  2. This reflection is great, you have the ability to condense all of your blog posts, but also elaborate detail with relevant current facts. I think this post did a great job at including information about the corruption within political climate

  3. Although your post is super ominous it is important for people to understand the severity of the situation in many countries in the world. To describe countries in terms of their freedom is an interesting way to categorize them but after I thought about it, the use of the word “freedom” makes sense because it incapsulates all aspects of human life. We can only hope that these countries don’t resort to military action but unfortunately sometimes there’s no other option.

  4. While a lot of people are unhappy with current American politics, it seems that no one really understands the concept of freedom in a worldly sense. Surely if those who are politically unhappy in America were exposed to this information, their perspectives would alter. We should be happy to live in the country in which we do.

  5. I think you’re right. When looking at how countries deal with humanitarian issues all over the world, it is shocking to see the lack of equality or fairness given to certain groups of people or genders. I would say, that these goals are meant to work in coherence with one another. This therefore, could involve satisfying the other requirements prior to peace and through the increased cooperation of accomplishing these other goals, peace and sustainability becomes more of a realistic option.

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