Eva Joly is an amazing woman who I am proud to call a friend.
As a result of her work in Iceland after its catastrophic crash in 2008 an institute has been established to develop the ideas of which she is such a powerful proponent. I am pleased to be on the Institute's Advisory Board with Björk, Helena Kennedy, Edgar Morin, Yoko Ono and Ann Pettifor.
The Institute says of its work:
The world is in transition. The ongoing financial crisis has exposed how large-scale corruption has brought the world to the brink of collapse and threatens the social contract.
In her book, JUSTICE UNDER SIEGE, Eva Joly writes ;
“The nature and size of corruption facing us have no equal in the history of democracy. With the financial globalization of the last 20 years, we have shifted to a whole new dimension. The current large-scale corruption is a radically new phenomenon; it is no longer individual, but systemic and is profoundly undermining our political system."
The challenges our societies are faced with are on an unprecedented scale. New ideas on how to respond to these challenges are being scrutinized and debated.
The aim of the Eva Joly institute is to help improve and strengthen this debate with an emphasis on:
- a better understanding of how widespread and systemic corruption has eroded the social contract
- raising awareness of the role of secrecy jurisdictions in facilitating corruption and tax evasion
- ways to strengthen openness and transparency in government and in society in general
- new ideas in economic thinking that support equality and sustainability
- raising awareness of the importance of the role of the individual as an active citizen
According to the French philosopher Henri-Louis Bergson, “great political mistakes almost always come from the fact that men forget that reality shifts, that it is in continual movement. Out of ten political mistakes, there are nine which consist of simply believing to be true that which has ceased to be”.
We are at a time where it is more important than ever that we all, as individuals and citizens face “that which has ceased to be” and actively seek new solutions. By her example Eva Joly has shown that we all have, each in our own way, the potential to render the world a little better.
The aim of the institute is to support efforts by individuals, organizations and learning institutions who want to promote these ideas and make them accessible to the general public.
I wish the Institute well. It's a powerful beacon for good in a country that needs to recover its moral compass and in a world where the principles Eva embodies need to return to mainstream normality.
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Thanks Richard for posting this.
With your permission, I would like to repeat here some of what I wrote in one of your older blogs:
The Eva Joly Insititute seems to epitomise everything you and many of us here stand for and is a most welcome development.
I have long been an admirer of Eva. She is indeed a most remarkable woman and her integrity and personal courage in fighting for what she believes in are unquestionable. Now that she has decided to launch herself into politics, we in France actually have the opportunity to vote for a Courageous President in the elections next June. The sadness of it is that, short of an earthquake — or maybe I should say a volcano (!) – she has no chance of getting past the first round. But dropping a vote for her in the box will nevertheless be extremely satisfying. Pour moi, c’est Eva!
Sigh. These aren’t ‘our societies’, they’re the banks’ battery farms. Hens lay eggs, we create money in a bizarre pseudo-laundering process. I don’t quite know yet why banks follow the laws they do (requiring signatures to make what they use as money internally and creating equivalents in what we’d recognise as money instead of endlessly spinning it from nothingness) but I do know that what we live in, the cultures, are theirs not ours. That has to change and understanding this is the only appropriate beginning. Everything else is just going about it wrong.
Richard Murphy, have you come across any of Prof. Michael Hudson’s videos about Iceland?
Michael’s good….
Richard,
You are right.
In her book:
‘Est-ce dans ce monde que nous voulons vivre?’
She was threatened by powerful individuals, when she was investigating the Elf Affaire.
Is it an occupational hazard in your line of work?
“great political mistakes almost always come from the fact that men forget that reality shifts, that it is in continual movement. Out of ten political mistakes, there are nine which consist of simply believing to be true that which has ceased to be”.
Noureil Roubini in his article in the FT today says Italys debt is unsustainable at 5% andthe policy to reduce it will make martters worse. Investors are willing to dump the Italian debt to any buyers.
This is an example of a Political mistake in believing something to be true which has ceased to be. Italian debt needs to be restructured, but Politicians believe they can change the Government instead.
Strange how Iceland has vanished from the media, since they told the banker/crooks to get lost. Pretend Iceland does not exist is the current media policy.
@larry levin
Not sure what you mean by this or what (if anything) you are looking for re Iceland.
You might care to try this by Martin Wolf in FT:
http://blogs.ft.com/martin-wolf-exchange/2011/11/21/how-iceland-survived-the-fire/#axzz1eM2dAa8z
and comments thereon by Sigrun Davidsdottir on her Icelog here:
http://uti.is/2011/11/iceland-successful-recovery-and-the-non-bail-out-banking-myth/
Martin Wolf concludes:
“The market economy will not endure if it is seen to be a racket run by a relatively small number of insiders against the interests of a vast number of outsiders. That happened to Iceland. But, as Simon Johnson of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and the Peterson Institute of International Economics pointed out, in a rousing speech, the threat is not to Iceland alone. It could happen anywhere.”
This seems to me far more important than all the often ill-informed media debate (and much even less-informed and hysterical public comment) between Iceland-bashers and Iceland-supporters.
Iceland is surely to be congratulated as the only country to have set up a serious investigation into what happened. This investigation by the Office of the Special Prosecutor (OSP) is still ongoing. As Sigrun says in her latest blog:
“Many Icelanders feel the OSP is taking a long time to investigate alleged fraud related to the three banks that collapsed in October 2008. However, it’s well known that fraud investigations tend to be time-consuming. In terms of the economy, Iceland is doing well but the feeling is that as long as the fraud investigations are ongoing the events of October 2008 and the boom years are still an open book to the Icelandic mind.”
http://uti.is/2011/11/osp-in-action-related-to-glitnir/
Thanks Anrigaut