Årets “alternative Nobelpris” er givet til 4 modtagere.
Omtale fra www.rightlivelihood.org
2007 Right Livelihood Awards highlight solutions to global challenges
The 2007 Right Livelihood Award of 2 million swedish crowns (SEK) is shared between four Recipients, who show that there exist practical solutions to pressing global challenges:
Christopher Weeramantry (Sri Lanka) is a world-renowned legal scholar, best known for his landmark International Court opinion on the threat and use of nuclear weapons. The jury honours “his lifetime of groundbreaking work to strengthen and expand the rule of international law”.
Dekha Ibrahim Abdi (Kenya) has engaged in effective peace work and conflict resolution in many of the worlds most divided countries.
The Jury commends her “for showing in diverse ethnic and cultural situations how religious and other differences can be reconciled, even after violent conflict, and knitted together through a cooperative process that leads to peace and development”.
Percy and Louise Schmeiser (Canada) have given the world a wake-up call about the dangers to farmers and biodiversity everywhere from the growing dominance and market aggression of companies engaged in the genetic engineering of crops.
The Jury honours the Schmeisers “for their courage in defending biodiversity and farmers rights, and challenging the environmental and moral perversity of current interpretations of patent laws”.
The company Grameen Shakti (Bangladesh) has shown that solar energy applications can be scaled up massively and rapidly to provide an affordable and climate-friendly energy option for the rural poor.
The Jury commends Grameen Shakti “for bringing sustainable light and power to thousands of Bangladeshi villages, promoting health, education and productivity”.
The Right Livelihood Award Foundation is a Swedish charitable foundation that has so far presented Awards to 123 Recipients from 56 countries. The presentation takes place in the Swedish Parliament, with the support of Members of Parliament from all political parties.
The Awards were founded in 1980 by Jakob von Uexkull “to honour and support those offering practical and exemplary answers to the most urgent challenges facing us today”. Since then, the Award has been supported by individual donors.
Jakob von Uexkull: – The 2007 Right Livelihood Award Recipients highlight existing solutions for todays world: Dekha Ibrahim Abdi and Christopher Weeramantry demonstrate how war and terror can be overcome by peace-building and the rule of international law. The Schmeisers and Grameen Shakti show us how to protect two essential services of our global ecosystem: our agricultural resources and our global climate.
The award presentation ceremony in the Swedish Parliament will be held on December 7th at 6 p.m. It is widely known as the “Alternative Nobel Prize”.
Presented annually, the Right Livelihood Award is usually shared by four Recipients. One of them may receive an Honorary Award, given to a person or group whose work the Jury wishes to recognise but who is not primarily in need of monetary support. The prize money is for ongoing successful work, never for personal use.
The Right Livelihood Award is widely recognized as the worlds premier award for personal courage and social transformation. Besides the financial support, it enables its Recipients to reach out to an international audience that otherwise might not have heard of them. Often, the Award also gives crucial protection against repression. For the Laureates, the Award has opened many doors, including prison doors.
Unlike the Nobel Prizes (for Physics, Medicine, Literature, etc.), the Right Livelihood Award has no categories. It recognises that, in striving to meet the human challenges of today’s world, the most inspiring and remarkable work often defies any standard classification.
For example, people who start out with an environmental goal frequently find themselves drawn into issues of health, human rights and/or social justice. Their work becomes a holistic response to community needs, so that sectoral categories lose their meaning.
