School for Wellbeing Studies and Research 77, 79 Fuang Nakorn Rd.

, Wat Rajabopit, Pra Nakorn, Bangkok, 10200 Thailand Tel: (662) 622-0955, 622-0966, 622-2495-6 Fax: (662) 622-3228

INTERNATIONAL EXCHANGE PLATFORM

Faculty of Arts, Chulalongkorn University, Bangkok 25-27 August 2011

RE-THINKING PROPERTY: pathway to a WellBeing Society scenario

This scale of disaster is very tough; yet, we, Japanese, will work hard to turn things around. It would take many years to recover. Takayoshi Kusago, Japanese researcher The Fall of Wall Street Is to Market Fundamentalism What the Fall of the Berlin Wall Was to Communism. Joseph E. Stiglitz in an interview with Nathan Gardels The Fall of the Great Firewall of China will bring transformation at last. Ai Weiwei, Chinese artist In nature's economy the currency is not money, it is life. Vandana Shiva in Earth Democracy: Justice, Sustainability, and Peace Dont Own. Share. TIME magazine: 10 ideas That Will Change the World

INTRODUCTION
Welfare State or Well-Being Society? If doubts prevail whether the welfare state is a feasible option for Asian societies, and populism driven by the market-economy and intending to satisfy the needs of citizens at an artificial level only is increasingly rejected as an un-sustainable solution1, other alternatives will have to be explored. Alternative approaches to our governance and economic systems need un-biased evaluation and passionate exploration of prevailing and new development paradigms. Does economic growth result in wellbeing?2 Are the legal foundations of mainstream property-regimes still valid in a context of continuous environmental degradation,
Thailand is not Ready to Start a Welfare State, Editorial The Nation, 19 November 2010. 2 Mis-measuring Our Lives. GDP Does Not Add Up. Report of the Stiglitz-SenFitoussi Commission.
1

land grabbing3 and the accumulation of private wealth fed by unspecified economic growth? Can altruism become central in economics?4 Who Owns the Earth?5 Re-thinking the fundamentals of property may lead the way to unlock new development paradigms. In the second decade of the 21st century our world moves towards a Great Turning6. Alternative ideas that initially emerged in the 1970s are gaining critical mass today. The Club of Rome: Limits to Growth; E.F. Schumacher: Buddhist Economics; the start of IFOAM, the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements in France in 1972; the 4th King of Bhutan who pronounced in 1974: Gross National Happiness is more important than Gross National Product. An enormous diversity of new movements of living alternatives7 has come up since the 1970s. To mention only a few: the World Social Forum, Cultural Creatives, the Eco-villages and Transition-towns movement, social entrepreneurship, the Commons Movement. In Thailand Sulak Sivaraksa established the Sathirakoses Nagapradipa Foundation in 1968. Ajarn Sulak personifies a movement of cultural integrity and engaged spirituality confronting soul-less modernization. He consistently supports the Assembly of the Poor8. Around him a cluster of independent NGOs9 and social enterprises10 are blossoming. Sulak Sivaraksa received the Right Livelihood Award11 in 1985 and the Niwano Peace Prize in 2011. He is a Member of the World Future Council; and Advisor of the School for Wellbeing Studies and Research.

Dakar Appeal against the land grab, World Social Forum 2011. Altruism and Compassion in Economic Systems April 2010. Mind and Life Institute and University of Zurich. 5 Our World is Not For Sale, SIFA Public Dialogues with Vandana Shiva and Helena Norberg-Hodge at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Thammasat University, Bangkok. 6 The Great Turning: From Empire to Earth Community by David Korten. 7 Blessed Unrest. How the Largest Movement in the World Came into Being and Why No One Saw It Coming by Paul Hawken. 8 Farmers and fisher folk affected by the Pak Moon Dam in Ubon Ratchathani. Affiliated with the Via Campesina-movement of small-scale and landless farmers. 9 The Spirit in Education Movement (SEM), Ashram Wongsanit, International Network of Engaged Buddhists etc. 10 Suan Nguen Mee Ma social enterprise is the organizer of the international exchange platform, mandated by the School for Wellbeing Studies and Research. 11 The Alternative Nobel Prize was established in 1980 by Jakob von Uexkull. In 2009 the Right Livelihood College was launched in Penang. The School for Wellbeing develops affiliation with the College. See: Changing Course, Reclaiming Our Future Report of the 30th Anniversary Conference of the Right Livelihood Award, 14-19 September 2010, Bonn, Germany. Edited by Sharan Srivinas, Programme Manager, Right Livelihood College.
3 4

At the dawn of UNCED 201212, twenty years after the groundbreaking conference in Rio de Janeiro, the School for Wellbeing proposes to create a modest but effective momentum 25-27 August 2011 to take stock of what is happening in the world of alternative development, in Asia, Southeast Asia and the Mekong region, in order to contribute to empowering and re-positioning Thai and Asian change agents in the global transformation movement. The School for Wellbeing Studies and Research The School for Wellbeing Studies and Research was established, 20 August 2009, as a result of the 3rd Gross National Happiness conference13 organized in Nongkhai and Bangkok, Thailand, November 2007. The School for Wellbeing is an independent think-tank being shaped by an international network of dedicated academics from diverse disciplines, and by practitioners and policy makers, primarily inspired by the concept of Gross National Happiness. By common effort the School for Wellbeing offers a creative learning space for a diversity of stakeholders inducing cross-cultural studies in happiness, wellbeing and quality of life. The School for Wellbeing is building an evidence-based researchplatform guided by critical holism14 in order to explore alternative development paradigms. It enables (young) researchers to undertake related action-research initiatives. The focus of the School for Wellbeing is on empowering people who are engaged in a much needed integrity-shift towards wellbeingdriven public policy development. The Patron of the School is H.E. Jigmi Y. Thinley, Honble Prime Minister of Bhutan, while Advisors from Thailand, Bhutan and all over the world support this new initiative15. The Prime Minister has conceptualized Gross National Happiness, the national philosophy of Bhutan, in terms of Four Pillars16:
The first United Nations Conference on Environment and Development was held in Rio, 1992. 13 The first GNH conference was organized in Thimphu, Bhutan, 2004; followed by gatherings in Canada, Thailand, Bhutan 2008, Brazil and USA. 14 Development Theory. Deconstruction, Reconstruction. Jan Nederveen Pieterse, 2000. 15 The core partners are Chulalongkorn University (Chula Global Network), Bangkok, Thailand; the Sathirakoses Nagapradipa Foundation, Thailand; the Centre for Bhutan Studies, Thimphu, Bhutan. 16 Among others, presented to the UN General Assembly at various occasions, leading to an unprecedented ovation in September 2010.
12

Environmental conservation Cultural Promotion Good Governance Equitable Economic Development

The progress of Gross National Happiness (GNH) is monitored, since 2008, by the GNH Index with 9 domains17. At present countries like England, France, USA, Thailand and China18 are following the idea initiated in Bhutan by exploring, wellbeing-driven development policies and indicators for happiness. Emerging economies have achieved impressive material growth, but social progress often manifests in not much more than overwhelming consumerism at the cost of little improvement of the quality of life, in particular for the people surviving at the lower strata of society. Cheap labour is (still) the motor of this economic growth. Is the socialist welfare state a feasible option for Asian societies? Market economy-driven populism is increasingly recognized as an un-sustainable solution. State capitalism is the kind of compromise/merger between socialism and neo-liberal ideology that can only thrive under authoritarian governance. Alternative development-movements should be further recognized and supported.

SCENARIO RESEARCH PROJECT

Action-research undertaken by the School for Wellbeing: Summary Is the welfare state a feasible option for Asian societies? Neoliberal market-driven populism is more-and-more recognized as an un-sustainable solution. State capitalism can only thrive under authoritarian governance. Alternatives should be supported. The Well-Being Society scenario project produces research in this direction: can we co-create a new Third Way, a contemporary Middle Path19? The research-project, within its limitations, focuses on a strategically selected number of areas: 1. Re-thinking property 2. Bridging the Urban-Rural Divide with studies on a- farmers as social entrepreneurs (rural perspective) as well as b- creative commons in

The GNH Index was designed by the Centre for Bhutan Studies guided by Dasho Karma Ura. 18 In all countries the question is whether it concerns a genuine integrity-shift or an instrument of populism. 19 See text research proposal to TRF September 2010: APPENDIX 2
17

the field of Information and Communication Technology (urban perspective). The results will feed into the formulation of a broad-specter WellBeing Society scenario, in comparison to neo-liberal and socialist/communist scenarios. The research outcomes will be offered as elements for a participatory scenario-building process among a diversity of stakeholders. Ultimately the project aims to contribute to a public dialogue on the gigantic policy development dilemmas incurred in the aim of securing well-being for all citizens. The International Exchange Platform Re-thinking Property: Pathway to a Well-Being Society scenario draws upon earlier activities on rethinking GDP organized by the School for Wellbeing: the visit of Nobel laureate Joseph E. Stiglitz to Thailand in 200920. And the development of National Accounts of Well-being as proposed by the New Economics Foundation (nef), U.K., explained in person by TED speaker Nic Marks, nefs lead author of the (un-)Happy Planet Index and advisor to the British government. New indicators of wellbeing like Gross National Happiness in Bhutan have been contemplated and have guided us towards in-depth research on utility, contentment and altruism as manifestations of happiness or wellbeing (Amartya Sen versus Matthieu Ricard). And how a shift in producer-consumer orientations from this point of view could result in an alternative approach to economics (Apichai Puntasen: consumption efficiency). The GNH Index is determined by a sufficiency level (cut off) with neutral or negative impact of scores both below and above this level (Dasho Karma Ura). This view resonates remarkably with the concept of Sufficiency Economy launched by the King of Thailand. As much as the aims, impacts and social awareness regarding a wellbeing society-scenario a new Third Way or Middle Path will be articulated, the application of the positive aspects of diverse systems or scenarios, realized on the ground in unique combinations, will be enabled. Evidence-based foresight of the impacts of the wellbeing society in comparison to the neo-liberal and socialist alternatives is to support mindful decision-making and informed public participation. The Well-Being Society scenario project aims to innovate an academic platform and social lab where participatory decision making can be exercised and multiplied into publicly available learning materials (planned in 2013). Assumptions have been tentatively formulated on choices to be made between scenarios for the future. What follows here is a
The title of his speech at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Bangkok, was Globalizing the GDP Debate.
20

provisional overview, with a variety of elements that can be reviewed during the project in more depth.

SCENARIOS (draft)
General characteristics All three scenarios have both good and bad characteristics and impacts. Development reality will always result in a unique mix of systems. However, for right choices to make, principles have to be clearly distinguished so that synergies indeed enable the achievement of intended results. Assumption Local diversity will lead to optimal holistic added value, if global networks serve a common cause determined by consensus building. This common cause is tentatively perceived as the global well-being society with organic agriculture (agro-ecology) as the heart of transformation. Scenario Systemic characteristi c Responsibilit y Indicators of progress Major actors Trends Governance focus Socialist scenario Welfare state Collective responsibility (Basic) income; Equality Major actor is the state Uniformity. Collectivism and state regulation; state-driven global governance Multi-party democracy (in communist system: single party) ruled by majority Justice Duty towards collective aims and equal rights Scenario towards wellbeing societies Wellbeing society Common responsibility in social systems Wellbeing; happiness; altruism Major actor is civil society Dont Own. Share. Community spirit and localized regulation; global inter-cultural networking Democratically supported consensusbuilding mechanisms; free expression of diversity Solidarity Responsibility towards the common good, minorities and shared values Co-responsibility of civil society (families, communities, religious (Neo-)liberal scenario Free market economy Individual responsibility Profit; wealth; individual success Major actor is private business Individual hero-ism. Individualism and deregulation; global governance dominated by multinational corporations Money- (lobby-ism) and strategically financed, media- supported democratic system Freedom Freedom to conquer individual success; competition; charity/philanthropy Social security determined by market mechanism; private

Governance mode

Core values underpinnin g Worldview Ethics

Social security system;

Rights-based social security arranged by state and taxation of

education; health care

business and private persons; state education and health care

and ethics-based organizations), the state and the business sector. Education and health care owned by civil society Multi-stakeholder dialogue between civil society- governmentbusiness- sectors leading to bridging the gap between rich and poor; bridging the urban-rural divide Holistic science Emphasis on common property Community based small-scale organic farming and natural resources management; biodiversity and fair trade through local and international networks; food sovereignty and mindful markets Networks of creative commons; responsible and participatory media; customized service catering specific needs of urban and rural participants

education and privatized health care

Equitable economic developmen t

Wealth distribution by taxation; governance by the masses

Regime that maintains disparity between rich and poor; balanced by opportunities to climb the ladder

Scientific orientation Property Agriculture system and Food security

Historic materialism Emphasis on public property Collective and largescale farming under government regulations; state distribution

Pragmatism Emphasis on private property Large scale farming; land, seeds, processing and marketing channels owned by private business; free market mechanism

Informatio n and communica tion

ICT sector in hands of state enterprises; government sector primary customer; censorship

Private sector driven, commercially structured services and products; purchasing power of urban majority drives product development and services

EXCHANGE PLATFORM ACTION PLAN (some issues)

Organic Asia: the Heart of Global Transformation The School for Wellbeing Studies and Research, and CCFD-Terre Solidaire21 intend to develop a programme Organic Asia in particular in collaboration with partners in the Mekong region (Tibetan plateau and Yunnan, China; Myanmar; Thailand; Laos; Cambodia; Vietnam).

21

French NGO based in Paris.

The organic agriculture policy in Bhutan, National Organic Programme22, and the Green Market Network, Thailand, may serve as inspiration for building up regional and continental networks to develop agroecology approaches, including mindful marketing, that address growing Food Security concerns. The groundbreaking Report recently submitted to the UN Human Rights Council by the Special Rapporteur on the right to food, Olivier De Schutter23, can serve as a guideline for the development of an Organic Asia action-research programme: Cross-country comparisons show that GDP growth originating in agriculture is at least twice as effective in reducing poverty as GDP growth originating outside agriculture.24 Only by supporting small producers can we help break the vicious cycle that leads from rural poverty to the expansion of urban slums, in which poverty breeds poverty. Most efforts in the past have focused on improving seeds and ensuring that farmers are provided with a set of inputs that can increase yields, replicating the model of industrial processes in which external inputs serve to produce outputs in a linear model of production. Instead, agroecology seeks to improve the sustainability of agroecosystems by mimicking nature instead of industry.25 The Green Market Network, launched in Thailand by Suan Nguen Mee Ma social enterprise, aims to support local clusters of smallscale organic farmers (in conversion) to engage in long term fair trade association with institutional consumers, in the first place hospitals. This initiative draws its inspiration from the global Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) movement26. The International Commons Movement In November 2010 the International Commons Conference was held in Berlin, in cooperation with the Commons Strategy Group and sponsored by the Heinrich Boell Foundation27. David Bollier28 introduced his conference summary as follows:
Highlighted by the Prime Minister at the SAARC Summit in Thimphu, April-May 2010. 23 Distributed to the UN General Assembly, 20 December 2010. 24 Quoted from World Bank, World Bank Development Report 2008: Agriculture for Development, Washington D.C., 2007. 25 Reference made to Miguel Altieri, Agroecology: The Science of Sustainable Agriculture, Boulder, Colorado. 26 International network URGENCI. 27 Affiliated with the Green Party, Germany. 28 American activist, writer, policy strategist.
22

For years the commons has been gaining momentum as a new paradigm of economics, politics and culture. Its rise can be seen in countless milieus around the world: among indigenous peoples in Latin America determined to protect their ecosystems and cultures; among farmers in India defending the right to share seeds; among Croatians seeking to prevent the privatization of cherished public spaces; among communities trying to preventing multinational bottling companies from appropriating local groundwater; and among diverse digital commoners who are creating shareable resources such as free software, Wikipedia, open educational resources and open access journals. Until recently, mainstream political culture has regarded the commons as an inevitable tragedy that results in the overexploitation of scarce resources. This has helped make the commons a marginal side-story that could be safely ignored. But after the economic crisis of October 2008, it has been much harder to dismiss the commons as a tragedy, anachronism or novelty. It became even harder after the Nobel Prize in Economics was awarded to Professor Elinor Ostrom, a pioneering scholar of the commons, in 2009. The growth of countless Internet commons has also been a pointed rebuttal to orthodox economists who regard the market as the only serious means for generating valuable resources. For these and other reasons, the commons is increasingly being seen as a rich seedbed of community empowerment and a template for new types of fair and sustainable resource management. It offers a way to critique the failures of neoliberal capitalism while encouraging the development of innovative policy alternatives. Economics of Happiness: Bridging the Urban-Rural Divide In her recent film The Economics of Happiness Helena NorbergHodge strengthens her appeal to bringing the food economy home29. During the GNH-movement seminar on Bridging the Urban-Rural Divide (2010) the diversity of (often conflicting) property regimes uphold by different stakeholders was highlighted, often implying an obstacle for transformation towards sustainable development. As mentioned before, a leading traditional notion of property, the commons30, has been almost wiped out by the primacy of state ownership in communist and authoritarian systems; and neo-liberal monoculture of private property claims. In order to find windows towards re-setting the economy the backbone of the future wellbeing society it is necessary to gain full
29 30

The film was launched in Bangkok in February 2011. See also Earth Democracy: Justice, Sustainability and Peace by Vandana Shiva.

understanding of the issue of conflicting property regimes that influence the capacity to self-determination of societies in its core. It is a challenging research question whether and in what ways property regimes correlate with the perceived urban-rural divide; and how insights can help to bridging this divide. One assumption is that traditional notions of common property are revitalized in organic agriculture and rural development, in a spirit of social entrepreneurship. Can a new social contract between rural food producers and urban consumers be settled? The movement resonates with new approaches to intellectual property, notably the creative commons in the area of Information and Communication Technology (ICT): an urban-driven alternative to the supremacy of mainstream private and public property regimes. ICT for sustainable development: interactive media, social networking Our worldview changed and is still rapidly changing along with communication technology. Recent social uprisings were enabled by unprecedented social networking opportunities. The School for Wellbeing has been involved from the initial stages in the PARADISO Internet for the future project supported by the EU. In his closing remarks at a recent PARADISO planning workshop31 Roberto Peccei32 stated: The goals of the PARADISO project, to explore how society might evolve in the future and how the Internet might help make this future better, are totally aligned with the thinking of the Club of Rome and that of my father, Auerlio Peccei, who was the Clubs founder with Alex King in 1968. The world needs a paradigm shift in economics similar to the one physics experienced at the dawn of last century, when quantum mechanics and the special and general theories of relativity were invented to address new phenomena not explainable by Newtonian mechanics. I believe economics is ready for a similar paradigm shift. Global conversation on Democracy Ajay Chhibber33 concluded in his Opening Statement of the regional Conference on Deepening and Sustaining Democracy in Asia, October 2009, Paro, Bhutan: Today, we are at a crossroads for democratic developments in Asia. The region has made tremendous
A presentation on behalf of the School for Wellbeing was made by Hans van Willenswaard, Project Director, Well-Being Society scenario project. 32 Vice Chancellor for Research at the University of California, Los Angeles, and Member of the Club of Rome. 33 UN assistant Secretary-General, UNDP Assistant Administrator and Regional Director for Asia and the Pacific.
31

10

strides in economic and social progress under many different forms of governance. Multi-party elections have taken place in every country in South Asia over the last few years. This is a significant achievement. It is also a resounding call for all the elected governments now in power in Asia to fulfil the promise of democracy. Either democracy will thrive and deliver benefits for the people in terms of human development, or it will wane and turn into the victim of its own neglect of the people. Later34 the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS), New Delhi, organised a session of the Global Conversations on Democracy. A key dimension of thinking through democracy meant understanding the new mutations of institutional power and global mobility that have registered themselves over the last decades. A global civil society seems to have entered the world stage and was providing in complex ways a monitoring mechanism, overlooking the power of nation-states. This is of course not to simply see global civil society as discrete, easily separable in any way from the nation-state, but rather study it as an index of the changing nature of the relations and networks between state and non-state forms of political power and surveillance35. These mutations obviously are also determining perceptions of property. Human Security: beyond sovereignty of nation-states? Dr. Surin Pitsuwan36, in his keynote address to the 3rd International Conference on Gross National Happiness, 2007, Thailand, made the following statement37: There is a new idea and concept of security. We call it Human Security. It would mean that the state and government cannot claim absolute sovereignty, and nobody can interfere based on responsibility to protect the people. We hope that this new approach will gain currency in the world. Likewise, concepts of property over natural resources like water, air, earth may have to transcend conventional arrangements for public property or state-ownership which is transferable to private property. Consensus-building leadership From the observation, also made in earlier research of the School for Wellbeing, that diverse formal and informal legal, social and political
At Sohna, India, January 2010. Concept Paper. 36 Just before he assumed the position of Secretary-General of ASEAN. 37 Unauthorized transcription.
34 35

11

systems basically in the realms of state, civil society and markets determines concepts of property the conclusion that can be drawn is the need for consensus building leadership capable to fairly (so, in the long term perspective of sustainable development) moderate the often conflicting property claims and subsequent interests. Towards a Well-Being Society? The School for Wellbeing started the Well-Being Society scenario project to explore new possibilities for an alternative (and Asian?) approach to secure well-being in the region. The objective of the Exchange Platform in August 2011 is to engage in multi-stakeholder and interdisciplinary dialogue around rethinking property as a core challenge in various domains, in order to explore these alternatives; as well as to empower transformation movements towards genuine realization.

APPENDIX 1
(Diagram from final report TRF research development project 20082010)

Tri
12

APPENDIX 2
Introduction text Well-Being Society scenario project proposal to Thailand Research Fund (TRF), 15 Sept. 2010 The Third Way between socialism and capitalism has never matured into an alternative in its own right. The most recent attempts to create a Third Way38, notably by political leaders Bill Clinton and Tony Blair have resulted in compromises between freemarket and socialist systems that honoured the negative aspects of both rather than combining the positive dimensions of each. Parallel to this effort a comparable approach was conceived in Asia by Nicanor Perlas, Philippines, but it never reached the mainstream like the Third Way did in England and USA39. The Third Way never matured into a systemic alternative realized massively and consequently on the ground over a longer period of time. A major obstacle towards emergence of a genuine alternative economy has been the assassination of Mahatma Gandhi before he could start his governance experiment, including trusteeship ruling property, and a village-based economy, in independent India. The emerging blend of liberalization within communist China still maintains a lighter ecological footprint than that of the West, but the Chinese economy as it develops, is not genuinely sustainable and just. The European social-market economy, instead of carving out its own course, increasingly followed the principles of the USA economy. It was hard hit by the economic crisis of 2008 which revealed its unsustainable characteristics, in spite of enormous efforts to change the course. The co-operative movement was articulated in modern history as a potentially alternative economic framework, for example by Robert
38

The USA-British initiative of Bill Clinton and Tony Blair was advised by Anthony Giddens author of The Third Way: the renewal of Social Democracy, 1998. After initial success the efforts were reversed and the economies nearly collapsed in 2008. Shaping Globalization. Civil Society, Cultural Power and Threefolding by Nicanor Perlas, Centre for Alternative Development Ininitatives (CADI), 2000.
39

13

Owen (1771-1858) in England. The movement now includes an enormous number of co-operatives, including some of the largest enterprises, spread all over the world. However co-operatives in general adjusted to the economic environment and the movement did hardly offer a systemic alternative for national economies. In Africa Julius Nyerere induced co-operatives nation-wide in Tanzania. However the original impulse evolved towards a restrictive government-driven system. While the inspiration towards endogenous development, including traditional forms of cooperative business, as pioneered by Joseph Ki-Zerbo in Burkina Faso, was marginalized. Nearly all over the world natural resources are governed by private property- (individuals and corporates) or public property- (the state) regimes, often maintained from far and anonymously. In traditional, endogenous and contemporary alternative worldviews nature is considered to be common property shared by all in a multiple generational perspective and cared for not exploited by communities directly involved. Socio-political crisis-ridden Thailands struggle to comply with sufficiency economy, and the positive charisma surrounding the newly constituted democracy Bhutan with its Gross National Happiness, offer two possible important social labs for exploring new combinations that include elements of capitalist and socialist systems but above all could draw their guidance towards a new direction in development, from a possible third scenario: the wellbeing society. In order to facilitate countries and above all civil societies to determine their own unique mix of development philosophy and economic theory guiding practice, it is important to give the wellbeing society a stronger, transformative, profile. The wellbeing society should not be seen as a compromise between neo-liberal and socialist systems but as a development path based on a distinct vision, worldview and authentic, intrinsic values. Bhutan launched its Gross National Happiness philosophy as a new development paradigm. Whether it really can make a difference will be determined within a decade40. Thailand is exploring avenues beyond ritual towards a genuine sufficiency economy and since the political crisis of May 2010, no longer can escape from facing the challenge to bridging the gap between rich and poor. A new development paradigm, however, may as much emerge from efforts to bridging the urban-rural divide, as from focusing on wealth
40

As stated by H.E. Prime Minister Jigmi Y. Thinley of Bhutan at several occasions.

14

distribution, though not at all ignoring the urgent need for economic justice. Best practices gathered in the framework of this project from both agriculture and ICT (Information and Communication Technology) undertakings, as well as contemplation on property regimes will offer analytical material to test this assumption: skillfully addressing the urban-rural divide has strong transformational impact. The relevant pioneering minority in agriculture being the organic agriculture movement. And within the world of ICT this is the creative commons approach. Not only will this assumption be tested by means of academic dialogue but as well in simulation of decision making regarding the policy dilemmas involved. Assessing and re-thinking Food Security policies provide a challenging framework for this exercise. Thailand and Bhutan offer two exemplary opportunities to co-create unique development pathways. Both countries have their complex problems as well as their unique cultural capital. From ThailandBhutan interaction in this perspective, links can be established to regional (Mekong countries, S.E. Asia), continental (Asia Pacific) and global networks operating in the same field of articulating an alternative, new Third Way economy, an economy of sharing. In addition to secular initiatives, a new generation Buddhist Economics is being explored and may offer new windows to alternative development41. Common denominators to be revealed among this diversity of alternatives unique but in many ways representative for other unique cultures in Asia could provide the foundations of a wellbeing society - perspective. If common ground can indeed be found and given a strong profile, this would strengthen the contributions of movements in Thailand and in Bhutan to the debate on re-thinking economic performance and social progress42 in South-East and in South Asia43.
41

See the Buddhist Economics Research platform e.g. the academic papers of Apichai Puntasen, Thailand, and the practitioners exchanges within the International Network of Engaged Buddhists (INEB) guided by Japanese economist Nakamura Hisashi.
42

See the Stiglitz-Sen-Fitoussi Commission Report on Measurement of Economic Performance and Social Progress.
43

Thailand and Bhutan are engaged respectively in the political frameworks ASEAN and SAARC. Neighbouring countries of Thailand are bound together in the Mekong-region network the Mekong river springs from the Tibetan plateau north of Bhutan while Bhutan is an independent country at the core of the Himalayan region, neighboring India and China. Both Thailand and Bhutan are involved in the BIMSTEC regional framework and UN-ESCAP, the regional UN Social and Economic

15

The discourse could influence the new role of Asia in shaping progress towards appropriate global governance, including interaction with initiatives evolving from other continents44. The construction of a wellbeing society scenario is intended to provide a framework for dialogue at various levels. The purpose is to engage the government, business and civil society sectors as equal partners in a common effort to shape development. For this reason the concept deserves an exploration into more depth. Participatory decision making in policy development can be exercised by modes of simulation games with backing of academic research, forecasting the impacts of alternate decisions. The design, experimentation and evaluation of the informed simulation offers material for a multi-media communication project which brings decision-making on contemporary global dilemmas into the direct face-to-face human sphere, and beyond mere intellectual exchange. The simulated decision making process can possibly be shared with the public, including by means of social networking. The School for Wellbeing Studies and Research aims to provide a platform for exchanges and debate on wellbeingdriven policy development. The School intends to be an independent think-tank in this field.

Commission for Asia-Pacific .

44

Asia-Europe is formalized in the ASEM (Asia-Europe Meeting). The first ASEM was held in Bangkok, 1995. Example of a NGO-driven intercontinental network is Asia-Africa collaboration was initiated in the Bandung conference which commemorates its 55th anniversary in Indonesia, October 2010.

16