Barbara Ward, Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
The Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth
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Barbara Mary Ward
23 May 1914 Heworth, York, England, UK
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| Died | 31 May 1981 (aged 67) Lodsworth, Sussex, England, UK
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| Education | Sorbonne, Paris Somerville College, Oxford |
| Occupation | Economist, writer |
| Known for | Early proponent of sustainable development |
| Spouse(s) | Commander Robert Jackson |
| Awards | Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (1974) Life peer (1976) Jawaharlal Nehru Award (1980) |
Barbara Mary Ward, also known as Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth, was an important British economist and writer. She was very interested in helping developing countries (poorer nations). She believed that richer countries should share their wealth with the rest of the world.
In the 1960s, she also started focusing on environmental issues. She was one of the first people to talk about sustainable development, even before the term became widely known. Barbara Ward was also famous as a journalist, speaker, and broadcaster. She advised important leaders in the UK, the United States, and other places. She also founded the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED).
Contents
Early Life and Education
Barbara Ward was born in Heworth, York, England, on May 23, 1914. Her family later moved to Felixstowe. Her father was a lawyer with Quaker beliefs, and her mother was a strong Catholic.
Barbara went to a convent school. Then she studied in Paris, first at a high school (lycée) and later at the Sorbonne. After that, she spent some time in Germany. Even though she first planned to study languages, she became very interested in public affairs. This led her to study politics, philosophy, and economics at Somerville College, Oxford University. She graduated in 1935.
Working Against Nazism
After university, Barbara studied politics and economics in Austria. She saw antisemitism (hatred towards Jewish people) there and in Nazi Germany. This made her want to help Jewish refugees. She also worked to get Roman Catholic support for the UK's efforts against the Nazis.
During World War II, she worked for the Ministry of Information. She traveled across Europe and the United States.
Journalism Career
Because of her 1938 book, The International Share-out, Barbara was offered a job at The Economist magazine. She became the foreign editor before leaving in 1950. However, she continued to write articles for the magazine throughout her life.
Besides her writings on economics and foreign policy, she also gave radio broadcasts about Christian values during wartime. These were published in a book called The Defence of the West. She was also a popular guest on the BBC show The Brains Trust, where she answered questions from listeners. In 1946, she became a governor of the BBC and the Old Vic theatre. After the war, Barbara supported the Marshall Plan (a plan to rebuild Europe) and a strong, united Europe with free trade.
Global Influence and Family Life
In 1950, Barbara Ward married Commander Robert Jackson, who worked for the United Nations. Their son, Robert, was born in 1956. Barbara continued to use her own name for her work and was not widely known as Lady Jackson.
Over the next 20 years, Barbara and Robert lived in West Africa and visited India many times. These experiences helped shape Barbara's ideas about why Western nations needed to help poorer countries grow economically. Both she and her husband traveled a lot for their work. In 1976, she was given a special honor called a life peerage. She chose the title Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth, using her husband's last name.
Sharing Ideas Worldwide
Barbara Ward had been a public speaker since leaving university. By the 1960s, her lectures were respected all over the world. Many of her lecture series, including those in Canada, Ghana, and India, were published as books. She spent a lot of time in the US, with much of her work supported by the Carnegie Foundation. Her book The Rich Nations and the Poor Nations became a bestseller in 1962.
In 1957, Harvard University gave her an honorary degree. She was a Carnegie fellow there until 1968, living in Cambridge for part of each year. She became friends with important figures like Adlai Stevenson and John F Kennedy. She advised many influential leaders, including Robert McNamara at the World Bank and President Lyndon B Johnson.
Barbara Ward also had influence in the Vatican. She helped create a special commission for justice and peace. In 1971, she was the first woman ever to speak at a meeting of Roman Catholic bishops. One of her ideas was that richer countries should give a certain amount of their wealth (GNP) as aid to developing countries. She believed this would help create stability and peace in the world.
Pioneering Sustainable Development
Barbara Ward is remembered as one of the most important thinkers of the 20th century. She was among the first to champion the idea of sustainable development. Her work covered many different areas, making her a historical figure.
Environmentalists know her for her book "Only One Earth" which she wrote with René Dubos. For those concerned about international development (like fighting poverty and promoting social justice), Barbara Ward was a leading author from the 1940s until her death in 1981. Her life's work was about finding ways to create a world with a good balance of social and economic fairness.
What is Sustainable Development?
At its heart, sustainable development means meeting people's needs today without harming the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. It combines helping people with recognizing that the Earth has limited resources.
Barbara's role as a professor at Columbia University in New York allowed her to work closely with the United Nations. She helped organize the Stockholm Conference, which focused on managing environmental problems worldwide. Many of these problems later became central to the work of the United Nations Environmental Programme.
Environmental Concerns
Barbara Ward began to see a strong connection between how wealth was shared and how we protect the Earth's resources. She believed that "the careful care of the Earth is absolutely necessary for humans to survive." She also thought it was important for everyone in the world to have a good quality of life.
She used the terms "inner limits" and "outer limits." "Inner limits" referred to everyone's basic right to an adequate standard of living. "Outer limits" referred to what the Earth can actually handle and sustain. In 1966, she published Spaceship Earth. She is sometimes credited with coining this famous phrase. Many see Ward as a pioneer of sustainable development.
Her book Only One Earth: The Care and Maintenance of a Small Planet, co-written with René Dubos, was created for the 1972 UN Stockholm conference on the Human Environment. This report was requested by Maurice Strong, who was the secretary general of the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment.
Morality and Rational Policy
Barbara Ward's work was based on her strong sense of right and wrong and her Christian values. She saw caring for the environment and caring for all people as a "dual responsibility." She felt this was especially true for anyone with her religious beliefs.
At the same time, she believed that sharing wealth and protecting the environment was a very smart policy. She famously said, "We are a ship's company on a small ship. Rational behaviour is the condition of survival." In 1971, she founded the International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED). She served as its president from 1973 and chairman from 1980.
Later Life and Legacy
Barbara Ward had battled cancer in the late 1940s and recovered. However, the illness returned twenty years later. In 1973, she retired from Columbia University, where she had been a professor of economic development for five years. She then moved to Lodsworth, Sussex.
The next year, she was made a Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire. On October 18, 1976, she was given a life peer title as Baroness Jackson of Lodsworth. She wrote her last book, Progress for a Small Planet, even though her health was getting worse. In this book, she talked about the "planetary community," how wealthy countries were using up resources too quickly, and the needs of poorer parts of the world. It was published in 1979, two years before she passed away on May 31, 1981, at the age of 67.
Awards and Recognition
In 1980, she received the Jawaharlal Nehru Award. Pope John Paul II sent a Cardinal to represent him at Barbara Ward's memorial service. At her own request, she was buried in the graveyard of the local Anglican church.
Her brother, John Ward, was a well-known civil engineer. Her great-niece, Marsha Shandur, is a radio music presenter.
Barbara Ward also lived in Kau Sai Wan, Sai Kung, Hong Kong, for 30 years starting in the 1950s. She worked there as an advocate for fishermen. In the 1970s, she helped convince the Hong Kong government to stop using Basalt Island as a firing range. She also helped fishermen get abandoned houses to live in on land. After she passed away, a special memorial was put up in her honor.
Affiliations and Lectures
Barbara Ward was involved with several important international groups and conferences:
- 1972: Stockholm Conference on Human Environment (also known as Earth Summit I)
- 1974: Cocoyoc Declaration, a meeting about how resources are used and how to develop sustainably.
- 1976: Vancouver Habitat Conference on Human Settlements, which focused on human living spaces.
Barbara Ward Lectures
The International Institute for Environment and Development (IIED) holds 'Barbara Ward Lectures' to honor her memory. She was the first director of the Institute.
- 2007: Mary Robinson, former President of Ireland
- 2008: Lindiwe Sisulu, Minister of Housing of South Africa
- 2010: Connie Hedegaard, European Commissioner for Climate Action
- 2012: Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
- 2014: Fatima Denton, from the African Climate Policy Centre
- 2016: Debra Roberts, a leader in environmental planning and climate protection
- 2018: Gro Harlem Brundtland, former Prime Minister of Norway and head of the World Health Organization
Selected Books
Barbara Ward wrote many influential books, including:
- The International Share-out (1938)
- Defence of the West (1942)
- The West at Bay (1948)
- Policy for the West (1951)
- Faith and Freedom (1954)
- Interplay of East and West (1957)
- Five Ideas that Changed the World (1959)
- India and the West (1961)
- The Rich Nations and the Poor Nations (1961)
- Spaceship Earth (1966)
- The Lopsided World (1968)
- Only One Earth (1972) – with René Dubos
- The Home of Man (1976)
- Progress for a Small Planet (1979)
