Basic Christian Community Movement in the Philippines

Background

• This paper examines the Basic Christian Community movement in the Philippines for sustainable development.
• The movement is part of a global coalition against globalization, viewed as a form of imperialism.
• This movement seeks to restructure Philippine society locally and establish international alliances.
• The paper focuses on the Basic Christian Communities' efforts to address human rights violations caused by macroeconomic development processes in the Philippines.
• The movement incorporates environmental discourse into its everyday practice.
• It is a response to the negative aspects of global capitalism, including profit over human life and the environment.

Key Concepts

• The fall of the Soviet Union and communism has led to a new world order dominated by corporate interests.
• The state has become a tool for globalization, prioritizing corporate interests over social needs.
• The September 11 attacks further accelerated this trend, with the state becoming focused on a global war on terror.
• The paper argues for a shift from seeking state-led social transformation to grassroots counter-hegemonic movements.
• These movements aim to resist globalization and emphasize cultural identity.

The Basic Christian Communities (BCC)

• The BCC movement focuses on promoting social, cultural, economic, political, and environmental justice.
• BCC groups work at the local level to improve living conditions and challenge the imposed development agenda.
• The movement emphasizes community participation and bottom-up approaches.
• BCC members use traditional cultural practices, such as mutual self-help organizations, organic farming, and livestock raising, to counter negative consequences of globalization.

Sustainable Development and Development Aggression

• The paper distinguishes between sustainable development, which is based on local needs and consensus, and development aggression, which is imposed from above without consent.
• BCCs are a form of sustainable development.
• The United Nations' Universal Declaration of Human Rights is cited as a framework for understanding human rights and social justice.

Conclusion

• The paper highlights the importance of grassroots movements like the Basic Christian Communities in challenging the negative impacts of globalization.
• BCCs offer an alternative model of development that prioritizes community needs and environmental sustainability.
• The paper highlights the intersection of environmental justice and social justice movements in resisting globalization.

The Basic Christian Community Movement in the Philippines

• The Basic Christian Community (BCC) movement is a grassroots effort to counter some of the negative effects of global capitalism.
• The movement's focus is on developing self-reliant communities that meet the needs of residents by using local resources.
• These communities aspire to be local sustainable development experiments, working to develop diversified organic farming and social services.
• BCC members are encouraged to reinterpret Christian symbols and scriptures to reflect their own themes for liberation.
• The movement advocates for a bottom-up approach to development, providing an alternative to the top-down, export-oriented model of the Philippine government.
• The Philippine government ratified both the covenant on civil and political rights and the covenant on economic, social, and cultural rights but has failed to incorporate them into national policy and practice.

Development Aggression

• Development aggression is defined as the process of displacing people from their land and homes to make way for development schemes imposed from above without consent or public debate.
• The United Nations Declaration of the Right to Development recognizes development as a process for improving the well-being of the entire population through active and fair participation.
• Malignant development aggression involves the use of police and military force to dislodge poor farmers from their land and deprive the urban poor of homes and jobs.
• Benign development aggression involves the co-opting and subversion of local symbols, and the implementation of inappropriate macro-economic technology, such as genetically-modified seeds.

The BCC Movement and Environmental Justice

• The BCC movement views sustainable development as a means of achieving ecological sustainability and human well-being within a community.
• The movement emphasizes the interconnectedness of mind-body-society-nature.
• The BCC movement intersects with indigenous struggles for the right of tribal societies to live in their natural habitats.
• BCC communities are grounded on the idea of growing economic disparity between the rich and poor and the absence of real economic and political power.
• They advocate for a new social consciousness that promotes organic farming and the natural world.

Counter-Hegemonic Movements

• Counter-hegemonic movements such as the BCC are indicative of an international trend towards the development of new social and cultural alternatives to modern capitalism.
• These movements are resisting the ideological distortions, false consciousness and fetishisms of world capitalism.
• They aim to raise people's consciousness about their basic rights, their rich cultural heritage, and the inequitable roots of their poverty.
• The movement's training programs aim to transform the Philippines by developing a new social consciousness that is concerned with promoting organic farming and the natural world.

This quiz explores the Basic Christian Community movement in the Philippines and its role in sustainable development. It delves into the movement's resistance against globalization and its efforts to address human rights violations and environmental issues exacerbated by corporate interests. Test your understanding of these critical topics and their implications for society.