Creation of the Ten Key Values

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During the weeks following the Founding Conference, a draft of the Ten Key Values statement was composed by the Scribe Committee (Spretnak, LeCain, Satin). They drew from the brainstorming session in St. Paul, from the values statements of other Green parties, and from their own Green ideas. This draft was submitted to the InterRegional Committee, who took it back to their respective regions for discussion and any suggested changes or additions. Following inclusion of the suggested revisions, the Ten Key Values, which were accompanied by open-ended questions under each value to stimulate discussion, were approved and adopted unanimously by the InterRegional Committee. The Ten Key Values were distributed as a one-page document to all local Green groups. They reached many people by being published in the paperback edition of Green Politics (1986).
The original Ten Key Values were Ecological Wisdom, Personal and Social Responsibility, Grassroots Democracy, Nonviolence, Decentralization, Community-based Economics, Post-Patriarchal Values, Respect for Diversity, Global Responsibility, and Future Focus – and included the thoughtful questions under each value.
Local Green groups around the country eventually made slight changes or re-ordered the values or made additions to the exact wording of the Ten Key Values. The most common modifications were changing Post-Patriarchal Values to Feminism and/or Gender Equity; adding “Personal” to Social Responsibility (Personal and Social Responsibility); and adding Sustainability to Future Focus (Future Focus and Sustainability).
When the Ten Key Values were first presented to the future chair of the Green Party Platform Committee, Steve Schmidt, in 1987 in Santa Fe, he saw them as the basis for what became the initial platform of the New Mexico Green Party in 1993-94. This document was then redrafted in 1995-96 (with the questions under each value changed to affirmative sentences) as the foundation for the 1996 Green Platform document – and as the “official” 2000 national Green Party Platform. The Ten Key Values-based platform was adopted at the presidential nominating convention of the Associated State Green Parties in Denver in June 2000. It was subsequently included in the successful Federal Elections Commission filing for national Green Party legal status in 2001. In 2016 the statements under each value were further rephrased and amended by the Green Party’s National Committee.
The political philosophy expressed in the Ten Key Values became a focus on the national level at the 2000 ASGP presidential nomination convention. The Ten Key Values document was presented to the plenary by the Green Platform Committee, chaired by Schmidt from 1995 to 2001. He stated, “It remains for future Greens, whether formally affiliated with the Green Party in the US or greens who share core values of Green parties, to do their best in bringing the values and positions of Green thought into reality. The politics of the present era clearly demand the independent, future-oriented vision of Green, ecologically focused ‘planet citizens.'”
The Ten Key Values turned out to be not only an organizing tool but a major factor in the sustained unity of the U.S. Greens. It has served as a philosophical framework and a broad umbrella through all the tumult and factional disagreements that a new party appealing to many different groups, concerns, and interests inevitably experiences. In 2001, when the Global Greens were founded in Canberra, Australia, and a Global Green Charter was approved by consensus from Green Parties in 72 countries, the U.S. Green Ten Key Values document was cited as one of the inspirational source documents behind the creation of the Charter.

 

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