About The CPCS Initiative — The Community Peacebuilding and Cultural Sustainability (CPCS) Initiative

About The CPCS Initiative

Stefan Pasti is the Founder and Resource Coordinator for The CPCS Initiative, and currently the sole organizational person.

The Community Peacebuilding and Cultural Sustainability (CPCS) Initiative (www.cpcsi.org) provides research and analysis for critical challenge alerts, and research and support for collaborative problem solving, community education, and citizen peacebuilding initiatives which seek to maximize citizen participation, and accelerate solution-oriented activity.

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The Community Peacebuilding and Cultural Sustainability (CPCS) Initiative is an effort to apply the accumulated wisdom now accessible to us towards the general goal of integrating spiritual wisdom into the everyday circumstances of community life--and towards the specific goal of generating practical responses to the challenges of our times.
["Growing Wisdom and Compassion in Small Communities (13 Steps)" (78 pages; May, 2017)]

The IPCR Initiative (which preceeded The CPCS Initiative--see “About (earlier) IPCR Initiative”) was more focused on the latter mission statement of The CPCS Initiative. Even as recently as mid-2018, it seemed that there would be decades of time to respond to the challenges identified in numerous risk assessments [from 9/11 on (the beginning of The IPCR Initiative)]. And especially since I had the opportunity to access the teachings of Sri Sathya Sai Baba (first, in 1991; completed 301 page compilation of quotations from Baba’s discourses in 1997), it seemed like my work was to focus on the “marginalization of the world’s treasured wisdom” piece (especially because I had the opportunity to understand how much treasure had been marginalized).

However, the IPCC Special Report on 1.5C, when it came out in October, 2018, was a very abrupt awakening for many people [see Guardian article “We have 12 years to limit climate change catastrophe, warns UN” by Jonathan Watts (October 8, 2018)]. From that time on, I have changed the focus of my work to highlighting the risk assessments specific to Global Warming (while still emphasizing other challenges), and highlighting the potential of the “constellation of initiatives” approach to maximizing citizen participation in solution-oriented activity.

Update: The IPCC has finalized the first part of the Sixth Assessment Report, “Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis”, on 6 August 2021 (see Guardian article “Major climate changes inevitable and irreversible--IPCC’s starkest warning yet” by Fiona Harvey (August 9, 2021)--and it is more alarming than the 1.5oC Report mentioned above.

And for further clarity, during an August 9, 2021 BBC World News interview, Christiana Figueres [Executive Secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) 2010-2016] made this statement:

“The impacts are so much more extreme, and so much more severe, than we had thought;
that all our efforts need to be magnified and improved.” (source: https://twitter.com/clarelcasey1/status/1424752853579702276 )

So… there is a now a most profound need for everyone to do everything possible to avoid the worst consequences (inhabitable Earth). (see “Recommendations” webpage on this website)

Here are three key papers I have contributed (to the better understanding of what we have done, and what will need to do now… in every field of activity):

1) “Global Warming Awareness, Climate Change Awareness, and Climate Emergency Action
A Survey: 1961-2020” (316 pages; 9.65 MB; November, 2020)

240 highlights from reports, websites, articles, books, etc.
--featuring milestones in awareness and action
--with in-depth looks at some key organizations
--bringing into focus pathways for achieving Zero Carbon ASAP

a) “Quick Reference to 10 Key Graphs and Charts” (6p)
[from “Global Warming Awareness, Climate Change Awareness, and Climate Emergency Action
A Survey: 1961-2020” (240 highlights) (p. 311-316)]

2) "Do We Have Moral Compasses We Can Rely On?" (147 pages; April, 2021)
       --supplemental copy "Table of Contents" (13 pages)

                [Note: This paper makes it crystal clear that there is an unprecedented convergence
of challenges happening now (which we will become fully aware of as our efforts to respond to
               the Climate Emergency and the Sustainable BioDiversity Emergency accelerate).]

3) “Triggering Positive Social, Environmental, Economic, and Cultural Tipping Points” (20 pages; September, 2022)
Includes a summary of how close we are to very damaging tipping points (Climate Emergency; Extinction Emergency) (p. 1-15)
and provides a clear outline of how to leverage 1000s of positive tipping point organizations insight
(see https://www.cpcsi.org/231-positive-tipping-point-orgs-and-insti ) into local Community Visioning/collaborative problem solving (p. 16-20)
(which is also the text on the webpage https://www.cpcsi.org/constellations-of-initiatives-approach )

Also, the document “30 Propositions and Premises of The CPCS Initiative” (4 pages) (May, 2017) is a helpful view into the balancing I have done between the second mission statement above and the first. There is much that we may never know about spiritual truths; and yet faith in them may be a very significant part of our transition to another more peaceful and sustainable era on this planet. [Faith helps us move from “it hardly seems possible” to “it must be possible”, because Faith believes Love will prevail.]