Consultation participants engaged in an inter-disciplinary dialogue based in part on preparatory materials received in advance and presentations during the meeting. This process led to a series of discussion drafts. In compiling these materials, General Editor Midge Béguin-Austin is responsible for the final text, its adaptation to Internet format, and any errors which may remain inadvertently.

Preface

The forty women and men who met for a week of hard discussion at the Bossey Ecumenical Institute near Geneva in early June 1995 came from many different parts of the world including Australia, the Bahamas, Belgium, Brazil, China, Fiji, Germany, Ghana, Greece, Hungary, Ireland, Kenya, Korea, the Netherlands, Poland, Russia, South Africa, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, the United States of America, and Zimbabwe. They were drawn too from a number of different working environments including business, church and ecumenical life, international organizations, trade unions, and universities. This wide diversity of experience was brought together by the Ecumenical Leadership Foundation to consider one of the toughest and most difficult dilemmas facing the modern world as it moves into the twenty-first century: the nature and role of work in a sustainable society.

The report attempts to address that dilemma. In the course of debate and writing, members of the consultation were ever more acutely aware of the tentative nature of the ideas put forward for further reflection and debate. The question is so urgent that there can be no further delay in starting to try to answer it.

This report is shared in the nature of an account of "work in progress" in the hope that it may stimulate many other people in different parts of the world to join the process of deepening understanding of, and seeing ways to resolve, the fundamental contradictions inherent in the increasingly destructive consequences of the way in which the global economy is now functioning.

Acknowledgements

The Board of the Ecumenical Leadership Foundation acknowledges with special gratitude the contribution of the Foundation Secretariat, the Ecumenical Institute at Bossey and the Programme on Justice, Peace and Creation of the World Council of Churches in realizing the consultation, "Work in a Sustainable Society."

Participants provided rich input to discussion and debate, with substantial preparatory papers prepared/provided  in advance by Beat Bürgenmeier, András R. Csanády, (Jr) and András Z. Csanády, Larry Kohler, Marc Lenders, Alan Matheson, Maria Mies, Amata Miller, IHM, Hans Opschoor, José Ricardo Ramalho, Walter Stahel, Lukas Vischer, Mariama Marjorie Williams, ZHANG Junzuo, and Florence E. Ziumbe. Additional documentation was provided for reference during the deliberations. A partial list may be found in Other bibliographical materials.

Francis Wilson served as Consultation Moderator, calling on various participants to lead specific discussion sessions. Leadership in the worship was provided by Paul Abrecht and Jacques Nicole. Bible studies were led by Louis Christiaens, Musimbi Kanyoro and Johannes Petrou. Everyone participated in the group reports which form the basis of the report, facilitated in particular by András Csánady, Bob Goudzwaard, Larry Kohler, Marc Lenders, Sean McDonagh, Maria Mies, Amata Miller, Aba Quainoo, Rob vanDrimmelen, Lukas Vischer, Mariama Williams, Francis Wilson (report introduction) and ZHANG Junzuo.

Members of the Planning Group were: Paul Abrecht, Midge Béguin-Austin, Louis Christiaens, s.j., Rob VanDrimmelen, Musimbi Kanyoro, Viggo Mortensen, Jacques Nicole, Judo Poerwowidagdo, Muriel Ritter and Lukas Vischer. An extended Planning Group, which met in September 1994, also included: Arie N. Bleijenberg (Centrum voor Engergie besparing, The Netherlands), Beat Bürgenmeier (Faculté des Sciences Economiques et Sociales, Université de Genève), Lena Furberg (Church of Sweden Aid), Larry Kohler (International Labor Organization), Julio de Santa Ana (theologian, Brazil), Francis Wilson (Southern Africa Labor and Development Research Unit, School of Economics, University of Capetown), Wilbert Forker (The Templeton Foundation).

In addition to the organizational and preparatory work done by the entirely voluntary Secretariat (Midge Béguin-Austin and Muriel Ritter), during the consultation participants benefited from the help of volunteers, including: Margie Béguin-Nuveen, Barbara Blatt, Peter Damary, Don MacKensie and Jean deMueller. Their generous assistance with documentation, reception and hospitality is deeply appreciated.

Acknowledging the (unpaid) work which made this meeting happen is consistent with the spirit of the meeting itself as evidenced in the report. The Board also hopes that financial contributions to the Foundation will permit support of more interdisciplinary, future-oriented consultations of this kind and widespread sharing of findings.

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