(As prepared)

A clarion call to the young economics students of the FEU-IABF:

Prospective involvement in the public discourse on current global challenges
by
Mr. Nolivienne C. Ermitaño
Instructor, Labor Economics & Corporate Planning

Economics General Assembly

Institute of Accounts, Business, and Finance
Far Eastern University
11 August 2008

Good afternoon!

Would you believe me if I told you that I was pleasantly surprised when I learned
about the theme that the organizers of this meeting have chosen? The theme
intrigued me inasmuch as it manifested a nascent interest in global affairs. Rare
are the students whose concerns go beyond the mundane and immediate such
as papers to submit, examinations to prepare for, and reports to present. It is not
uncommon to hear the older generations rue the passing of the years when
students lived for causes infinitely bigger than themselves.

I flatter myself in thinking that I am fortunate for having been asked to speak
before you and share my thoughts on the prospective nature and extent of your
involvement. Sa totoo lang, lubos kong ikinagagalak ang inyong pagnanasang
makilahok. And it truly merits positive reinforcement. As you very well know, we
live in very interesting times. We are facing a great many challenges at the
global level, and the scale thereof could paralyze us into inaction and
indifference or intoxicate us with dread and impotence.

Of course, even as I cheer you on, there will be others who will view with rabid
distaste or disfavor your interest to get involved. To them, you are being quixotic
and meddlesome, and for this reason, they think, you would be better off
confining yourselves to your customary concerns. As far as they are concerned,
you have nothing worthwhile to offer or contribute; you are to be written off as
mapupusok and nagmamarunong. With a condescending tone, they would
claim that your youth, which they equate with immaturity and inexperience, is to
blame.

But, I ask, why should you listen to them? Why should they decide the merit of
your interest to get involved? Who in the world gave them the right to exclude
you as though they alone know who are capable of dealing with the current
global challenges?
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Indeed, you are young. But why should your youth be regarded a liability? By
your interest to get involved, you show your budding civic consciousness, which,
as I have already said, should even be encouraged and I hasten to add,
allowed to acquire form and substance. The future of our world will depend, in
large part, to your preparedness and willingness to assume in all earnestness, in
the fullness of time, your inalienable duty of stewardship. Yes, your generation
will definitely have its turn, and I pray that it will make the most out of it. And in
this regard, I believe that your pursuing your interest to get involved will ease you
into your future roles as custodians. So turn a deaf ear to the voices of
discouragement around you. Heed the wisdom of the saying: “The dogs bark
but the caravan moves on.”

But what exactly is the nature and extent of the involvement that I believe you
should undertake?

Would I suggest that you take to the streets mouthing slogans, raising a fist
against all the injustices you can think of, and provoking anti-riot policemen at
every opportunity? No, I wouldn’t. Student activism of the militant variety hardly
impresses me and is excluded from my own menu of pet advocacies.

What I have in mind is simple yet effective: I propose that you join the public
discourse on the current global challenges. Yes, I would like you to speak out
and make yourselves heard. As future caretakers of our world, you are
legitimate stakeholders, and as such, you can – you should – resist the stultifying
comforts of passivity and silence.

Quite frankly, I don’t understand why the public discourse on the current global
challenges should be considered a preserve by the multitude who have little
sensible to say, if at all. All they contribute is clutter that aggravates and
alienates everyone who is made their captive audience. The current global
challenges are serious concerns, and they must be taken seriously. So in
addressing them, hard thinking is an absolute necessity. As it is, however,
mindless and impassioned loquacity is more the rule rather the exception.
Crudely put, more mouths, rather than heads, do the thinking, and this state of
affairs diminishes the quality of public discourse, leaving everyone all the poorer
in mind and spirit and even confused or incapacitated.

It’s high time that such a situation was reversed. And that’s where you should
enter the picture. With your involvement, you can help in injecting more sense
and sobriety into the public discourse and make it serve as the cradle of good
ideas, the platform for the cross-fertilization of minds, and the incubator of
consensus and collective action. And in this regard, I propose that your
involvement be effected through your concurrent assumption of three (3) inter-
related roles, viz: purveyors of knowledge, agents of enlightenment, and
advocates of change. Note that your assumption of these roles is a non-
negotiable prerequisite for gaining recognition as a voice worth listening to in the
realm of public discourse.

N. B. You may send your comments or queries to nolivienne@gmail.com.

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As purveyors of knowledge, you have to connect with people through various

media and share your learning with them. And this means that at the very least,
you have to re-define in a patently active sense the way you see yourselves as
students – that is, you have to stop regarding yourselves as mere receptacles of
information provided by teachers and school authorities.

As agents of enlightenment, you have to help de-mystify, deconstruct, and

debunk many of the bad ideas that inhabit the realm of public discourse and
that cause more problems than they solve. And this means that at the very least,
you have to help people distinguish the good ideas from the bad ones and
break the chokehold of the latter over their minds.

As advocates of change, you have to champion enduring solutions to pressing

matters of global significance. And this means that at the very least, you have to
define yourselves in contra-distinction to the exponents of expediency, the
avowed enemies of reform, and embark on constituency-building in aid of your
own advocacies.

Am I expecting too much from you? Are you overwhelmed by the immensity of
my proposed undertaking for you?

It would be unfortunate – nay, even tragic – if you grew cold feet and resorted
to pussyfooting. The magnitude of the current global challenges is truly
staggering, and crafting collective responses is a shared responsibility. Wouldn’t
you, who have shown a remarkable aptitude for engagement in global affairs,
want to be part of such a heroic effort to improve the prospects for humanity?

If the Millennium Project’s report entitled State of the Future 2008 is to be

believed, our world finds itself at a critical juncture. Specifically, it has reached a
point when it runs a big risk of being rent asunder by social instability and
violence arising from these challenges: rising food and energy prices, failing
states, falling water tables, climate change, decreasing water-food-energy
supply per person, desertification, increasing migrations (due to political,
environmental, and economic conditions), over-population, and widespread
poverty. Unless global interventions are made, then it is a foregone conclusion
that a man-made apocalypse will come to pass and a dystopia will
subsequently arise.

To be sure, averting this tragedy-in-the-making is easier said than done. But it

doesn’t have to be more difficult than it has to be. It becomes all the more
difficult only when for one reason or another, some of us choose to do nothing at
all.

Humanity must meet all of the aforementioned challenges head-on if it is to

continue to survive and flourish. So we all have to step up to the plate, as it
were. After all, the responsibility to act is non-delegable and defaulting thereon,

N. B. You may send your comments or queries to nolivienne@gmail.com.

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as I have explained, will necessarily have catastrophic consequences. Johann

Wolfgang von Goethe was right when he wrote:

We must not hope to be mowers

And to gather the ripe gold ears
Unless we have first been sowers
And watered the furrows with tears.
It is not just as we take it,
This mystical world of ours.
Life's field will yield as we make it
A harvest of thorns or of flowers.

Under the present circumstances, humanity is certainly hard pressed to provide

global responses. And I believe that the effectiveness of such responses can be
guaranteed to a considerable extent when they have been forged on the anvil
of public discourse, in which, I believe, you should become lively participants –
contributors concurrently performing the inter-related roles of purveyors of
knowledge, agents of enlightenment, and advocates of change.

Heed the clarion call to involvement and help raise the normative standards of
public discourse in the interest of global stability and peace.

Thank you and good day!

N. B. You may send your comments or queries to nolivienne@gmail.com.