Word: consensus
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...Recently, I spoke with some friends in Gaza and the conversations were profoundly disturbing. My friends spoke of the deeply felt absence of any source of protection—personal, communal or institutional. There is little in society that possesses legitimacy and there is a fading consensus on rules and an eroding understanding of what they are for. Trauma and grief overwhelm the landscape despite expressions of resilience. The feeling of abandonment among people appears complete, understood perhaps in their growing inability to identify with any sense of possibility. The most striking was this comment...
...major effort that unites my specialist colleagues across disciplines is the periodic debate over the curriculum, which, each time results in a consensus that may last for a decade or more. We debate over which of our disciplines matter—and to what degree in today’s world of business, politics, warfare, and health concerns—with the intent to decide the mental shape of the next generation’s ruling class...
That said, it's easier to forge a historic consensus when the obstacle to change - the U.S. auto industry - is now basically a subsidiary of the Federal Government. And though the new regulations are long overdue - even if U.S. cars in 2016 will be only about as efficient as European autos are now - they're just a start. Despite the positive early signs from the White House, some greens still fret about the future and wonder whether Obama's preference for cooperation over confrontation means he will back away from the truly radical action needed to combat climate change...
...shrunk since the Cold War, despite the fact that the U.S. is still the group's No. 1 financial backer, and they concede that the OAS could vote this week to readmit Cuba without U.S. approval, though it would be rare for the organization not to forge a consensus on the matter first. (New Jersey's Cuban-American Senator Bob Menendez has threatened to cut off U.S. funding to the OAS if it lifts the suspension.) Still, "the OAS's historic journey to become a region that defines itself democratically is not something that can be lightly walked away from...
...itself is all of that - and less. It lacks visible personalities, and doesn't even have a ruling party or opposition to make it clear what is at stake. Instead, power is split among the big political groups - the conservatives, the liberals and the socialists - who rule largely by consensus. "This makes it difficult for people to see how their vote matters," says Karel Lannoo, CEO at the Centre for European Policy Studies think tank. "Since they do not do anything like elect a European government, they do not feel they can change anything...