Address by V. Havel

Some estimates foresee as many as forty billion people living on the Earth toward the end of the coming century and expect that such a number can constitute a serious threat to the very existence of life on this planet. Various non-renewable resources, whether it be fuel or other raw materials, are being consumed at an ever faster pace; entire species are dying out; and, humankind is knowingly depriving itself of such a vital substance as oxygen. At the same time, globalization is progressing at an almost dizzying speed, which means that our planet finds itself - probably for the first time in its history - increasingly covered by a coat of one single civilization. It is becoming a unified and electronically interconnected information, communication, finance and business environment, in which not only news but also billions of dollars; cultural values, or pseudo-values; beneficial as well as harmful properties; and, sound as well as ill-advised attitudes toward life travel at the velocity of light. An extremely dangerous phenomenon consists in the fact that the uniformising pressure which the increasingly globalized civilization brings to bear on the rapidly growing population generates many new social antagonisms. The endeavour of various communities to defend their identity and uniqueness under these conditions multiplies conflicts among cultures, ethnic groups and traditions of civilization. The gigantic urban agglomerations, into which the progress of civilization inevitably compresses the human race, destroy natural, easily surveyable human communities, and thus also natural tools of moral societal self-control, which logically leads to a further growth of the crime rate. Along with global trade, and with an increasingly sophisticated technology, possibilities arise also for an unprecedented advancement of organized crime and terrorism.

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