The Twitter effort seeks to raise awareness of the World Environment Day initiative by not only getting followers, but also rewarding them with an actionable result. It’s a great PR move, not only for the immediate program, but it helps the UN build a following for the long term.

This will be especially crucial as the environmental movement braces itself for the United Nations climate change talks in Copenhagen this December. Having a Twitter network will allow the UN to participate in the social context, answer questions, as well as offer news news and facts.  Social media is something traditional green players are struggling to master while newer online brands like Ecogeek, Treehugger and Triple Pundit have risen to the fore.

This campaign is reminiscent of the Nature Conservancy’s Lil Green Patch initiative.  Lil Green Patch is wildly successful, in large part because of the call-to-action is easy (little badge), and creates a feel good action, saving one square foot of rain forest.

The Friends of Live Earth Network (join today) is supporting the initiative, so I’d like to ask any of my green conscious readers to participate, too.   Go plant a tree by following @UNEPandYou.  If you would like your tweet to be tracked, use the hashtag #t4t.  Thank you in advance!

Today marks the 60th Anniversary of the UN’s Declaration of Human Rights, the day after the 60th anniversary of the UN’s pact to end genocide. To commemorate the Human Rights pact, bloggers throughout the world are discussing their first human rights memory of import.  And because so much of our work at the agency involves social causes, the Buzz Bin will participate (image: Fires over the Hills by Timm Williams).

My first memory of human rights was not a good one, a prolonged period of time in which my Jewish family was harassed and attacked by anti-semites for a period of years. I do not like talking about that time, so instead I’ve decided to blog about the thing that had the most impact on me from a human rights perspective this year. By far, reading Amy Chua’s World On Fire had the most weight.

World on Fire: How Exporting Free Market Democracy Breeds Ethnic Hatred and Global Instability is  Yale professor Amy Chua’s unrelenting examination of how sudden free trade and democracy together can actually destabilize countries and cause ethnic hatred and genocide. Region by region, continent by continent, from Burma and Russia to Africa and Latin America, Chua demonstrates her case.  The book clearly shows how Western, and in particular U.S. free market democracy, has created some of the worst human rights violations of our time, including the genocide in Rwanda.

And the secret recipe is simple. Inevitably, when you have a free market, one minority group rises to the top and succeeds financially – this is true of the Chinese in Burma and the Philippines, the Jews in Russia, the Tutsis in Rwanda, etc. etc. Next, enter the democratization aspect.  Now you have a poor, down-trodden and uneducated majority that’s angry about being robbed of the promises of free markets. Stating it in oversimplistic terms, when a minority rises to power, the majority brings political pressure to bear,  leading to everything from ethnic hate crimes and oppression to manipulation of political power by the minorities or even genocide.

World on Fire provides sobering humanitarian reasons to end Friedman-like declarations for simply flattening and democratizing the world (the American version of Empire).

Instead, I advocate for preparing countries to handle free markets and democracy.  We should focus on creating education, building country-wide infrastructure, raising health standards, and ensuring people can eat everyday. By doing so we can help the world embrace the great human rights principles that allow for true democracy and freedom.

Working on the Save Darfur campaign has provided me great relief, in part because I understand some of the underlying causes.  While this is in essence fire-fighting, at least we can stop the flames. Then we can put in some fire codes with better global policies that involve a more sober view of human nature when faced with poverty and hunger.

I encourage you to read World on Fire. And I encourage you to do your part not just today, but everyday, a little something to help human rights efforts throughout the world.  Finally, if you want to help the Livingston Communications team  in our efforts to end Darfur, sign the petition either on Facebook or on the Add Your Voice site.