2024 Dec 01

Announcement and Program Details

Announcement and other Details

University for Life and Peace (Ling Jiou Mountain, Taiwan; Yangon, Myanmar)

In Cooperation with the University of Munich, Germany and the Catholic University of Linz, Austria

Online School March 9 / March 29-30 / April 12-13 / May 10, 2025

Environmental Transformation and Socio-Economic Justice.

Spiritual Resources for New Perception and Motivation

PROGRAM

Background

The two most important ecological issues are probably global warming and the fast destruction of biodiversity. More and more governments, industries, research centers and large civil movements do see the problems and engage in preventing the ecosystems from collapse. But this is not enough. Why do we (human beings in general) not act, though we know basically what needs to be done? How can we enhance and speed up the processes that would lead to a fundamental turn in our behaviour? Why do we not act with sufficient intensity?

The basic question for our Online School are:

How to create a new perception of reality (aisthesis) that enables us to see things and events in their interrelated settings?

How do we generate individual and collective motivation in order to come to action for the needed ecological and social transformation?

In which ways are the strive for socio-economic justice and the ecological transformation interrelated?

We can learn to live in harmony within ourselves and with our environment, if we get to a deeper perception and unbiased motivation to act sustainably. Many people (especially indigenous cultures in the forests) do still have a mentality we can learn from. In modern sciences this is being taken up by fascinating research about the life (and sensitivity) of plants and animals: Plants and animals are not objects to our disposal but co-beings, and we humans share our life with them. What does this mean for our communication with other forms of life, and for the development of our technologies which are not tools for using and exploiting nature in destructive ways, but instruments for sharing with nature the fundamental resources of life.

Purpose

The purpose of this Online School is twofold:

First we want to enable our students as decision makers of the future to understand the mental condition and social restrictions as well as opportunities to master the ecological turn.

Second we want to enlarge our network among universities and strengthen our ties with them and with research institutions around the globe in order to make the contribution of ULP to the transformative processes in view of the ecological turn viable.

In order to foster these goals, the Online School will bring eminent scholars together so as to inspire the participants to test creative ways of thinking, rethinking, stimulating appropriate emotions and organize action.

Method

The 2025 Online School will focus on the concepts, science and practice of what is being called PERMA culture and how Perma-Culture relates to Spiritual Ecology. What is Perma-Culture? And how it can be implemented locally but within a global perspective so that sufficiency, justice and ecological balance are achieved?

Within the framework of our previously tested scheme of “Basis-Method-Effect” the online School will follow an educational structure on three levels:

Awareness and Consciousness
An Introduction to Spiritual Ecology and Consciousness Development

Healing the Planet

Fundamentals, Concepts and Models for a sustainable economic and social life-style Including Perma-Culture and underlying principles - how they relate to Spiritual Ecology and how they might offer means to foster the ecological transformation on the mental level

Examples of Science and Technology in Action
Applying Spiritual Ecology and Perma-Culture to mitigate challenges and foster transformation
(Including group projects to create action)

We will discuss the concepts of socio-economic justice in the light of examples from PERMA culture and shall develop our own projects on the basis of these findings and insights.

Seminal lectures by outstanding scholars and champions of ecological change will start processes of rethinking with focus on the topics mentioned.

Successful Projects of PERMA culture will be presented and discussed in the light of the quest for socio-economic justice and environmental transformation.

Virtual projects inspired by (2) will be worked out as group papers, taking the general perceptions gained from these projects and applying their core motivation to new local projects which could be worked out in the vicinity and environment of our students.

Under the tuition of experienced professors and alumni of our previous Winter Schools the papers will be made examples for careful study and blueprints for further action in these fields.

The papers will be evaluated by a team of scholars.

Faculty

9 Major Lectures (including Introduction on March 9):

Prof. em. Datuk Dr. Azizan Baharuddin (Faculty of Science, Universiti Malaya, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia)

Mr. Markus Bogner, Entrepreneur, PERMA Culture (Bavaria, Germany)

Prof. Dr. Michael von Brück (LMU Munich)

Prof. Dr. John Grim, (Yale University, USA)

Prof. Dr. Mary Evelyn Tucker (Yale University, USA) 

Prof. Dr. Markus Vogt (LMU, Munich)

Prof. Dr. Ernst Pöppel (LMU Munich)

Prof. Dr. Michael Rosenberger (Catholic University Linz/Austria)

Prof. Dr. Anastasia Zabaniotou (Aristotle University Thessaloniki, Greece)

Panelists

Prof. Dr. Werner Gamerith (University of Passau)

Prof. Dr. Dorothea Greiling (Johannes Kepler University, Linz/Austria)

Prof. Dr. Erika Wagner (Johannes Kepler University, Linz/Austria) 

Prof. Dr. Josef Wieland, (Zeppelin University, Friedrichshafen/Germany)

4. Participation Levels and Course Requirements for Students

To accommodate the different interests and goals of the participants the Online School will enable three different levels of student participation and respective certificates. Next to an attendance certificate (1 ECTS), students can choose to upgrade their participation level by fulfilling an academic task (i.e. writing a summary or reflecting on a question – 3 ECTS) or they can opt for finishing the Online School, supported by faculty, with a draft of a scientific paper (5 ECTS).

To enable the students to create papers and finish the assigned tasks after the final presentation, the facilitators will provide group-/individual coaching sessions upon request and need of the students.

In order to complete the course successfully students will have to actively participate in all sessions of the Online School.

5. Benefit for Students

Students of the Online School 2025 will get in touch with some of the most outstanding academic thinkers in the field of ecology as well as activists sharing their experiences. By identifying areas of holistic engagement and developing virtual project papers with colleagues from other fields they will develop their own contribution and academic proficiency as important fundaments for their further career in the field. Papers will be validated and a Certificate from the University of Munich will be issued. Usually Universities will acknowledge (1, 3 or 5 ECTS) credit points, but students have to discuss this with the administration of their respective universities themselves.

6. Grading Papers

Papers will be graded by a core group of scholars working as advisors with the different groups (Michael von Brück, Ernst Pöppel, Peter Edwards, Anastasia Zabaniotou, Alexander Benz et al.) and one member of LJM. Depending on the subjects of the papers the core group may ask for support from the pool of professors who are nominated as advisors.

Criteria for grading are: