by Will Banyan
Nexus Magazine Volume 11 - Number 2

(February-March 2004)

from NexusMagazine Website

John D. Rockefeller III, Laurance, the Cousins and the Rockefeller Network Today

JOHN AND LAURANCE: SAVING THE WORLD FROM ITSELF

Alongside Winthrop and Babs, John D. Rockefeller III and Laurance are the forgotten children of John D. Rockefeller, Junior. On some levels this should be no surprise, given the more prominent public roles of Nelson and David, who clearly overshadowed their siblings in terms of political power and influence; but from the point of view of the New World Order, to ignore the respective contributions of John and Laurance to the Rockefeller globalist ideology is to commit a significant oversight. This error is, however, the inevitable consequence of their much lower public profile, even the invisibility of this duo. John D. Rockefeller III (hereafter JDR3), despite being the titular heir to the Rockefeller fortune and carrying the name of Standard Oil's feared founder, was hardly a prominent public figure during his lifetime, while Laurance has always eschewed public exposure, rarely making public speeches or appearances.

The clues therefore, are fragmentary and can only be expanded into their inevitable implications through deduction, but the evidence of their complicity is there. It is most evident in their avowed enthusiasm for environmentalism, though through the distorted prism of needing to conduct population control amongst the mass of the poor rather than the rich, and, in JDR3's case, of his moves to open the economies of East Asia to American capital.
 

John D. Rockefeller III (1906–1978)
The eldest son of John D. Rockefeller, Jr, and his wife, Abby Aldrich, JDR3 seemed to have inherited all of Junior's less appealing personal traits, including a tiresomely guilty conscience about being one of a number of inheritors of such a vast fortune and with it an obsession with trying to atone for the sins of his grandfather. A perception that Rockefeller gains were ill-gotten was only reinforced by John D. Rockefeller Senior's deliberate refusal to discuss the origins of Standard Oil with his children or grandchildren.

According to Ron Chernow, JDR3 "Like his father…aspired to be a paragon of virtue and, also like his father, paid a terrible price for it". JDR3 strove to meet Junior's lofty standards of personal decorum and sacrifice, devoting himself to charitable works, eschewing luxuries, and displaying seemingly endless self-criticism. 1

Yet, as is the case with all such personalities who indulge in such self-flagellation and sacrifice, a belief that one has earned the moral right to impose one's will upon others soon intrudes. This soon afflicted JDR3, especially as he took his place in the Rockefeller philanthropic network, chairing the Rockefeller Foundation and the General Education Board and later founding the Asia Society and the Population Council. Alex Morris, the author of the otherwise respectful tome Those Rockefeller Brothers (1953), noted that in an 18-year period JDR3 had been a member of at least 36 boards and committees. 2 In fact, his involvement began at the end of the 1920s. Besides the Rockefeller Foundation and General Education Board, JDR3 had also been a board member of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, the China Medical Board and the Bureau of Social Hygiene.

Through his participation in this plethora of for-profit and non-profit organizations, JDR3 soon replaced his guilt with a determination to take further action, to make good on Senior's original contention that the Rockefellers were in fact the "stewards" of God's wealth. JDR3 also seemed to have accepted Senior's accompanying stricture, piously followed by Junior, that it was in fact up to the Rockefeller family to disperse that wealth in a manner that changed people's thinking. JDR3 first displayed this newfound sensibility in the early 1950s, after having served in the US Navy during World War II and later as a cultural consultant to John Foster Dulles, then heading the US negotiation on a treaty with Japan. Out of that period of activity in service of government, JDR3 developed a deep and abiding interest in all things Asian. This more expansive world outlook Junior's eldest son resolved to impress upon Americans in general.

In the 1950s, determined to improve relations between Japan and America, JDR3 revived the then moribund Japan Society. He also sought to restore and upgrade governmental and non-governmental relations between the US and most of Asia. This proved a more difficult task than propping up the Japan Society with his patronage and financial support, for the political environment had changed. The Institute for Pacific Relations (IPR), to which the Rockefeller Foundation had given support, was attacked for allegedly facilitating the "loss" of China to the Communists. Leading the charge against the IPR and foundations in general was the Special House Committee to Investigate Tax-Exempt Foundations (the Reece Committee). Although many of the Reece Committee's charges were perhaps unjustified—especially given Senator Reece's refusal to allow foundation leaders to formally challenge the accusations against them—it had succeeded, if only temporarily, in restraining the operations of the foundations. JDR3 sought to get around this by recreating the IPR under a new guise by dispersing its responsibilities to a range of new and existing organizations. The IPR's academic functions, for instance, were transferred to the Far Eastern Association, while its cultural role was assumed by JDR3's own creation, the Asia Society, formally launched in 1956. 3

Although publicly only concerned with fostering cultural relationships between the US and Asia, JDR3 had in mind another function for the Asia Society in the longer term. As Harr (a former speechwriter to JDR3) and Johnson observe in their curiously titled book, The Rockefeller Conscience (1991), although "comfortable" with cultural affairs JDR3 was "well aware" of the need for and value of a "comprehensive approach to foreign affairs" in the region.
But JDR3 was also conscious that in the mid-1950s "political factors constrained the freedom of action of philanthropy". So, although seemingly devoted to cultural projects, JDR3 in effect planned for the role of the Asia Society to "grow into other activities in due course". 4

Sure enough, evolving from its original cultural beginnings, the Asia Society has grown into an organization that now describes its mission somewhat more tantalizingly as "fostering understanding of Asia and communication between Americans and the peoples of Asia and the Pacific". The Asia Society now considers issues of foreign, economic and defense policy in the region as a matter of routine and describes its "pan-Asian approach" as inherently sensible at a time when "many Asia/Pacific nations are forging stronger economic and political links with their neighbors, and many pressing issues, from trade to security to the environment, cut across national boundaries". 5 The implications of this "pan-Asian approach", especially when seen in the context of Nelson's and David's own advocacy of regional integration, are too obvious to warrant further exposition.

JDR3's other creation was the Population Council, which he founded in 1952. It is a more controversial creation, one that belies the essentially benevolent purposes that some of his more sympathetic biographers have attributed to him. According to Steve Weissman, JDR3 and other founders of the early "Eco-Establishment", which comprised the Population Council and Laurance Rockefeller's Conservation Foundation, are united by the view that natural resources must be conserved or, to be more precise, protected from being exploited by smaller businesses and individuals so as to maintain an ongoing supply of resources for the exclusive benefit of larger business entities in the long run. 6 Controlling the population formed an inevitable part of this program of conservation—something that JDR3 had embraced with obvious enthusiasm since his days with the Rockefeller-funded Bureau of Social Hygiene. This was in tune with the long-term interests of the Rockefellers in this issue, something evident since 1936 when the Rockefeller Foundation had provided funds to the Office of Population Research at Princeton University. 7

JDR3 was arguably motivated by such goals, although he was always careful not to be too explicit, suggesting his objectives were those of an idealist. As JDR3 explained in his lecture to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization in the Second McDougall Lecture in 1961, the "grand mission" of the Rockefeller Foundation, like the FAO, was the "well-being of mankind". JDR3 argued that there was a "relationship between population growth and social development" and that "responsible leaders" in each country needed to "decide whether population stabilization was required". "To my mind," he explained, "population growth is second only to control of atomic weapons as the paramount problem of the day." There was a "cold inevitability, a certainty that is mathematical, that gives the problems posed by too-rapid population growth a somber and chilling caste indeed". The language was indeed careful, but the implications were soon apparent: the "grim fact" of population growth, he warned, "cuts across all the basic needs of mankind and…frustrates man's achievement of his higher needs". 8

In his book, The Second American Revolution (1973), JDR3 persisted in likening overpopulation to nuclear war, arguing that it was the "slow way" to "render [the] planet uninhabitable"; in fact, "no problem is more fundamental in long-range terms". JDR3 noted with some pride the findings of the Commission on Population Growth and the American Future, set up by Congress in 1970 with him as Chairman, 9 that the "time has come for the United States to welcome and plan for a stabilized population" and that "no substantial benefit will result from further growth of the nation's population". But for JDR3, getting population stabilization right in the US was merely a dress rehearsal for applying such methods globally. By being able to "cope with these broad problems on the home front", JDR3 wrote, America would be "better equip[ped] to play a constructive role internationally".10

JDR3's warning about the population explosion was mirrored by others in the Rockefeller family and its organs. The Rockefeller Brothers Fund report, "Prospect for America", raised the prospect of "extreme nationalism" arising out of the "restlessness produced in a rapidly growing population", something magnified by "the preponderance of youth". 11 David Rockefeller also made his contribution, using language perhaps more revealing than JDR3 chose, but hardly out of tune with sentiments of the Rockefeller family, no matter how pious its public image, that the population problem was one of economic and political stability. "Unless we close the gap between population and food supply," David observed in 1964, they risked "unleashing upon this globe a frustration…an anguished fury more explosive than the growth of population itself." It would also impact upon the "economic well-being" of American businesses, should rampant population growth fail to "create a climate of stability and order which is necessary to attract private capital". And noting that America was "rapidly depleting [its] domestic reserves of a vast array of minerals needed by [its] industrial complex", David made the odd suggestion that the "population barrier to development" might prevent those goods reaching the US 12 —the unstated implication being that if there are too many of them, then we cannot continue to take what is surely ours by right…

The implementation of population control programs, with their curious obsession with the developing countries, even though the population density and resource consumption of those areas is frequently far less than that of Western Europe or North America, has given rise to charges of "genocide". 13 This is probably not surprising as the transparent objective of population control activists, at least those residing within the Establishment, is to maintain a global racial balance that favors the rich countries as well as ensures that developing countries' resources can still be exploited with little competition from indigenous peoples.

Hand in hand with advocating population control, JDR3 was an enthusiastic environmentalist—but in a manner that showed he had shifted from being overly concerned with ensuring ongoing profitability to preserving the material gains of his caste; or, to put it another way, his concerns had shifted from owning the estate to maintaining it. Having secured his own well-being, JDR3 was determined to deny it to others, warning that "we must cut down on unnecessary and extravagant consumption" or "the future of 'Spaceship Earth' will be in serious doubt". He followed this prescription with calls for numerous types of environmental legislation, regulation and enforcement as well as energy conservation, and even suggested, in an obvious allusion to the Club of Rome's apocalyptic studies, that the "ethic of perpetual economic growth" should probably be discarded.14

This ideology of sacrificing such wants existed within an overall framework in which JDR3 extolled the virtues of deeper involvement of philanthropic organizations in the business of governing. One of his pet concerns in The Second American Revolution was the "imbalance" between government, business and philanthropy. Government, he lamented, had become "very powerful"; business was strong, but the non-profit sector was "weak". Despite the government's strength, problems were "not getting solved"; in fact, there was a "sheer overload" of government resources. As a solution, JDR3 proposed an "essentially conservative", "long-term policy to decentralize and privatize many government functions". Reading this now, after the tumultuous economic reforms and privatization agenda of the 1980s and 1990s, we can see from which corners this program was supported. By "privatize", JDR3 indicated that he meant "moving as many government functions and responsibilities toward the private sector as possible", and he envisaged achieving this goal through deregulation and the relaxation of anti-trust provisions. To encourage "philanthropy as a social instrument" he pushed for changes to the tax laws to make it easier to contribute to the foundations.15

While an examination of the implementation of all these policy prescriptions, though some were quite vague, is beyond the scope and intent of this article, suffice it to say that with the endorsement of JDR3 and his other siblings their evolution into a variety of actual government policies has been assured. As for John D. Rockefeller III, though, he remains a peripheral figure in most New World Order accounts despite most of his prescriptions playing an integral role in the erosion of national sovereignty: by seeking to reduce the power of governments while increasing that of private groups; lending support to coordinated international efforts to control population growth; 16 and endorsing a range of measures designed to counter environmental damage, but with obvious implications for international regulation.

Such obscurity was no doubt hastened by his death in a car accident on Mt Pleasant on 10 July 1978, even though his demise was in the midst of a particularly virulent dispute with Nelson over control of the Rockefellers' philanthropic empire, particularly the RBF. 17 But in future New World Order accounts, a more in-depth examination of JDR3's agenda, particularly his views on population control and the role of philanthropic organizations, is surely warranted.
 

Laurance S. Rockefeller (1910– )
Pursuing similar themes was the third-eldest of the Rockefeller brothers, Laurance. In most New World Order accounts, when he is actually mentioned it is usually assumed by default that Laurance shares the Rockefeller family goal of achieving world government, for the "Rockefellers are 100% Illuminati" (Icke)—though this agreement is by no means complete. Disputing this apparent consensus is UFO researcher Michael Hesemann who, when queried by Israeli investigative journalist Barry Chamish on his dealings with the nonagenarian philanthropist, declared: "Laurance is the black sheep of the family. I know all about the Rockefellers and their world government plot but, I assure you, so does Laurance and he rejects it." 18 More mainstream admirers and critics tend to pigeon-hole Laurance as a "venture capitalist" (Lundberg), while a more recent account of his life has venerated the philanthropist as "Mr Conservation" who has "done more than any other living American to place outdoor issues…clearly on the public agenda" (Winks). 19

Part of the problem in discerning the most likely explanation is Laurance's deliberately chosen obscurity. Taking a public role has not been his preferred path; instead, he has operated through a variety of organizations to achieve his desired goals, taking the concept of delegation to an even higher degree than his siblings. As Chernow has observed, Laurance possesses "his grandfather's enigmatic detachment", showing little interest in attracting the limelight. Laurance majored in philosophy at Princeton, the exposure to "rational scrutiny" causing him to dispense with most of his religious beliefs. After dropping out of Harvard Law School, Laurance took up the Rockefeller seat on the New York Stock Exchange in 1934, where he soon displayed his business acumen, buying large stakes in a number of aerospace enterprises including McDonnell–Douglas, all of which benefited from wartime and later Cold War boosts to national defense expenditures. 20 Laurance was already a designated beneficiary of the Rockefeller trusts, but his ventures only added to his wealth. The issue, though, is to what end he intended to deploy it.

On 27 September 1991, when receiving the Congressional Gold Medal for contributions to conservation and historical preservation from then President George H. W. Bush, Laurance Rockefeller declared that nothing was "more important" to him than the "creation of a conservation ethic in America". 21 This might seem a somewhat uncontroversial, even laudable, goal in some quarters and, in terms of the New World Order, quite close to being irrelevant. In terms of the Rockefeller goal of changing how people think, Laurance's proclaimed objective warrants a closer look, for such an aim is consistent with the overall Rockefeller strategy of undermining national sovereignty; quite simply, people's thinking must be changed for a world state to work.

There are only a few tantalizing clues as to this direction in Laurance's efforts, but they are worthy of mention. Writing in the Reader's Digest in 1976, for example, Laurance Rockefeller put forward his case for a "simpler life-style". What he appeared to have in mind, however, was the conformity of the American people to a new set of ideals, a new "ecological ethic":

"The last dozen years have been as traumatic and divisive as any in our history. Assassinations, a tragic war, a political and economic upheaval have divided and dismayed this country. In order to face problems like these, a democracy needs themes and common goals which bring unity and commitment. The emerging ecological ethic and the change in life-style which accompany it may be such a force." 22

Laurance went on to observe that a "new pattern of living" had emerged in the 1970s that included a wide range of recreational fads such as fitness as well as the growing commitment to environmentalist practices such as energy efficiency and recycling. This "new pattern", he observed, was proving to be "essential to the well-being of individuals and of the nation". That all Americans adopt this new ethic voluntarily was essential, he opined, otherwise "authoritarian" controls might be necessary to stave off environmental and social degradation. 23

Laurance has pursued this objective further through his own philanthropic efforts. Although a previous Chairman of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and at times involved in a variety of other organizations including the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), Laurance has preferred to set his own philanthropic course. This has ranged from his founding of the American Conservation Association (formerly the Conservation Foundation) in 1958, through to his ongoing financial support for such groups as the Center for Psychology and Social Change (CPSC), the California Institute for Integral Studies (CIIS), the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) and the Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI). Some of these are clearly activist environmentalist organizations; the others have more esoteric concerns.

Laurance's projects seem overly ambitious—more like the experiments of the indulgent rich than anything enduring, though it pays to be cautious. In 2001, for example, Laurance gave the CIIS, for which he is an Honorary Trustee, a grant of US$190,000 for the Institute's "New Story of the Universe" project. According to the CIIS website, project co-ordinator Professor Brian Swimme "sees the amazing the story of the unfolding universe as one that has the potential to unite people of all traditions and faiths". Swimme himself was quick to thank his benefactor and make the bold claim that his effort to create a "new story of the evolving universe" by combining existing religious and scientific accounts of creation would "serve as a link in creating an organizing mythic framework for the new millennium".24

Laurance has also raised more than a few eyebrows with his much-publicized funding of UFO research during the 1990s, some of which persists to this day. The range of UFO organizations and projects he has funded, and alleged contacts with the US Government on the issue, is worth reviewing: 25

• In March 1993 Laurance, assisted by a former naval intelligence officer, reportedly met with Bill Clinton's science adviser to discuss UFOs and present a study entitled "Matrix of UFO Belief".
• It is alleged that, in August 1995, Laurance discussed the UFO issue at length with President Clinton at his ranch in Wyoming.
• From 1993 to 1995, Laurance provided US$500,000 to the CPSC, an organization run by Dr John Mack, the Harvard psychologist who attracted enormous controversy with his endorsement of the alien abduction theory.
• Laurance paid for at least two meetings with the Starlight Group, an organization comprising former intelligence officers and military personnel who shared an interest in UFOs.
• Laurance once funded a plan to establish contact with aliens, not by radio telescope but by signaling them with banks of powerful halogen lamps.
• Laurance also once held a UFO conference at his ranch in Wyoming.
• In 1995, Laurance provided US$30,000 to a project by the BSW Foundation, created by Marie "Bootsie" Galbraith, wife of investment banker Evan Galbraith and one-time US ambassador to France, to prepare a report on the most reliable evidence about UFOs. The report, titled "Unidentified Flying Objects Briefing Document: The Best Available Evidence" and prepared with the assistance of CUFOS (Center for UFO Studies), FUFOR (Fund for UFO Research) and MUFON (Mutual UFO Network), went to designated "leaders of the world" only.

• In 1999, Laurance provided a grant in the "five-figure range" to the BLT Research Team, Inc. to study crop circles. In 2002, BLT announced its findings that many crop circles were created not by humans but by a "mysterious energy force".

 

 

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The purpose of Laurance Rockefeller's dabbling in the UFO field has long posed a puzzle to New World Order researchers. One popular suggestion, drawing on an idea probably pioneered by the late William Cooper in his book, Behold A Pale Horse (1991), is that Laurance's activities serve a more sinister agenda to "present an 'alien invasion'…as a pretext to fully entrench the New World Order" (Watson). The alien presence, though, is to be deliberately and elaborately faked. As evidence of this intent, the public musings of President Ronald Reagan in 1987 and 1988, on how an "alien threat" or being "threatened by…a power from another planet" would cause all of humanity to set aside its differences and "come together" as "citizens of the world", are often cited. Coupled with Laurance's efforts to confirm the existence of an alien presence and those of Hollywood to shape public attitudes towards extraterrestrials, the stage is supposedly being set to deceive the public. 26

The appeal of this theory is obvious; however, compelling proof in its favor is lacking, forcing its advocates to rely on more circumstantial evidence, witnesses with unverifiable claims, and a willingness to speculate. If this theory is true, then its advocates may rest assured they will be fêted for their prescience should the time come. In the view of this author, however, it seems more likely that Laurance's dabbling in the UFO scene, besides reflecting some possible eccentricities on his part, forms part of his broader agenda to try to mould humanity's ethical outlook. Rather than trying to establish the existence of a negative "alien threat", the aim is gradually to reinforce the sense that there is a genuine, possibly benevolent, alien presence out there—a presence that by its very existence challenges existing religious, cultural and political frameworks, surely compelling us to coalesce around a single new idea. Perhaps along the lines of Swimme's "New Story of the Universe"…
 

THE NEXT GENERATION

The five sons and one daughter of Junior gave forth another generation of some 23 children, sometimes known as "the cousins". Their contribution to the globalist ideology launched by Junior in the 1920s and further transformed by their parents is barely recognized yet no less significant, not least because of the major generational rupture revealed at length in Peter Collier and David Horowtiz's book, The Rockefellers (1976). Caught up in the political tumult of the late 1960s and early 1970s, most of the children of the Rockefeller brothers, especially those belonging to David, rejected their family's legacy (and even the name), embracing leftist causes including opposition to the Vietnam War and a version of environmentalism less tied to the plutocratic version of perfection promulgated by JDR3 and Laurance.

Since that time, though, as the cousins have become older their radicalism has been tempered and diluted, and a few of them have taken their place in the Rockefeller philanthropic network, embracing Senior's original notions of "stewardship" and Junior's enthusiasm for a world state.
 

Peggy Dulany
The second eldest of David Rockefeller's three daughters, Peggy Dulany went through a period of rebellion in the 1970s based on her outrage at the level of poverty in Latin America that she was convinced her father had contributed to in some way. After a period in Brazil working on poverty alleviation, she was involved in similar programs in Boston and New York. Since the 1980s, however, a mellowing of Dulany's opinions has been more than apparent, as she has joined many of the organizations in which her father has played such a key role, including the CFR, the Overseas Development Council and the Rockefeller Foundation. 27

In 1986, Dulany used some of her share of the Rockefeller fortune to found the Synergos Institute, an organization devoted to enhancing the ability of philanthropic organizations to collaborate with grassroots organizations to "reduce poverty and increase equity in Africa, Asia and Latin America". 28 Although this agenda is surely laudable, there are at least two reasons for caution. Firstly, there is David Rockefeller's key role in the Global Philanthropists Circle, a Synergos subsidiary—surely a case of the fox guarding the hen house, given David's own admitted role in conceiving the so-called "Washington Consensus", which is behind much of the poverty in Latin America. And secondly, Synergos's focus on enhancing the role and reach of philanthropy throughout those regions seems more a case of enhancing the role of non-state actors into a global enterprise—an explicit objective of both David and JDR3.

In other avenues, Peggy Dulany has proved that her straying from the path of Rockefeller internationalism was indeed a momentary lapse. In early 1997, Dulany participated in a "Global Governance for Sustainable Development" conference held by the Rio+5 Forum, giving a presentation on "The Role of Global Financial Institutions and Networks in Financing Sustainable Development". 29 Also in 1997, she co-chaired a CFR-sponsored Independent Task Force on Promoting US Economic Relations with Africa. Among the recommendations of the task force were: endorsement of an "Africa Growth and Opportunity Act" to increase US private investment in Africa and create the groundwork for free trade agreements in the region; and for the US to pay its outstanding commitments to "the International Development Association, the African Development Bank and Fund, and the United Nations in order to carry a fair share of international cooperation in support of African development". 30

In June 2003, Dulany joined the UN Secretary-General's Panel on Civil Society and UN Relationships. The aim of the panel, claims the UN, is to "review past and current practices and recommend improvements for the future in order to make the interaction between civil society and the United Nations more meaningful". The Panel's definition of "Civil Society", according to a "contextual paper" prepared by the Panel's Chairman, former Brazilian President Fernando Henrique Cardoso, "encompasses a wide variety of non-state actors, including parliamentarians and the private sector" and "non-government organizations". With relations between the UN and Civil Society beginning to "show signs of strain", there was a need for "greater consistency and coherence" to be "introduced in the rules of engagement with civil society".

Cardoso explicitly linked this goal to the UN's "key role" in "strengthening global governance" and "building a cosmopolitan law". Some UN member states were wary of increased NGO participation in such avenues, Cardoso noted, but the proper response was to undermine those objections to "reduce distrust, demonstrate the effectiveness of collaboration and build consensus…" 31 The aim of the Panel is not to exclude NGOs from decision-making processes, but to formalize and entrench their presence within the UN system, giving them an enduring role in building effective structures of global governance. Peggy Dulany's participation on the Panel is unlikely to result in any deviation from this goal.
 

David Rockefeller, Jr
The eldest of David Rockefeller's children, David Junior has also succeeded his father by taking up senior positions in a variety of foundations and policy-planning organizations. He is a trustee and former Chairman of the Rockefeller Brothers Fund and the Asian Cultural Council, an honorary trustee of the Brookings Institution, a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and a former President of the Rockefeller Family Fund. He has also been involved in a number of environmental organizations, including as a member of the Pew Oceans Commission, a trustee of the National Park Foundation and founder of the Alaska Fund for the Future. David Junior's main business role has been as Director and former Chairman of Rockefeller & Co., Inc.

David Junior's take on the world is little known, save for only a few snippets. In a speech on the relationship between business and the arts in 1997, for example, he observed that: "The Internet has fulfilled the prophecy of a global village. I do not believe that big corporations can finesse their responsibility to define and support the particular communities in which they operate most actively." The answer to this dilemma, he opined, was "the arts because they simultaneously embrace the particular and the universal, [and] can best help us to grasp this world full of tension and technology". 32
 

Steven Rockefeller
"The only long-answer to the problem of terrorism is to build a global culture of peace", wrote Professor Steven C. Rockefeller, one of Nelson's sons, on 29 September 2001. 33

Steven's prescriptions were perhaps unsurprising, given his role in formulating the Earth Charter, a document released in March 2000 by the Earth Charter Commission. The purpose of the Charter, according to Steven, who was Chairman of the Earth Charter International Drafting Committee, is to "articulate the ethical principles that should shape whatever institutions of global governance the human community decides to develop". 34 Providing overall guidance to those forces, particularly NGOs, which are taking part in the steady erosion of national sovereignty and the undermining of those democratic systems that exist through the construction of more effective international institutions, seems to be a primary objective. Pointing to the "growth of a new powerful international civil network that includes many influential nongovernmental organizations", Steven Rockefeller has argued:

The emerging global civil society is in a position to exercise significant influence on governments and international corporations in the twenty-first century, and it can benefit from the kind of strong integrated ethical vision that is being developed in the Earth Charter. 35

The Earth Charter Initiative is no enterprise set up by an otherwise obscure academic, but a joint effort involving Maurice Strong, the Chairman of the Earth Council, and former Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev, President of Green Cross International. Funding for the Earth Charter Initiative has come from the RBF (of which Steven is Chairman), some UN agencies, and the Netherlands government. More importantly, the Charter's authors hope for it to receive endorsement from the UN General Assembly, making it into a "soft law document"—much like the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which is a statement of intentions rather than a binding document. However, as Steven notes, "in the history of international law, soft law tends to become hard law over time". With this in mind, a "hard law treaty", the Draft International Covenant on Environment and Development, has been written in tandem with the Charter. 36

The document in question is closer to the visions of a purer world promoted by JDR3 and Laurance—the musings of contented plutocrats intent on leaving a legacy of global change rather than necessarily increasing their personal wealth. According to Steven Rockefeller, besides calling for a "culture of peace" the Charter envisages a "just and sustainable socio-economic order", eradicating poverty, promoting "ecological integrity", "human development in the fullest sense", but in a manner that is "consistent with the flourishing of Earth's ecological systems".

The "New Beginning" that the Charter promotes at its conclusion is for all humanity to undergo a "change of heart and mind"—a message also underlined in the Preamble, with its call for the unanimous embrace of a "shared ethical vision" of "universal responsibility" by securing a pledge of commitment to the Charter's principles from those who endorse it. 37 The ultimate objective of this Utopian document is an Arcadia, a perfect world made possible when we all think alike.
 

THE ROCKEFELLER NETWORK TODAY

While the commitment of the current generation of Rockefellers to the Wilson–Fosdick New World Order model may seem limited, the Rockefeller fortune, directed through a plethora of foundations and organizations, ensures that the ideology has supporters even if they are not family. Leading this effort are the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, the Rockefeller Foundation and the less-well-known Rockefeller Family Fund and Laurance Rockefeller Charitable Trust. Each of these organizations promotes the globalist agenda, some more obviously than others.

On its website, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund describes itself as a "philanthropic organization dedicated to improving the well-being of all people in the transition to global interdependence". This is evident in the plethora of programs to which the RBF devotes resources from its still-deep coffers. In 1997, for example, the then outgoing RBF Chairman, Abby M. O'Neill, noted how the RBF had long been committed to a number of "core program ideas", among them "the challenge of global interdependence and American leadership". These programs were occasionally adjusted, and in 1983 the RBF adopted a "One World" strategy with an "explicitly global perspective and an emphasis on the convergence of national and international frameworks". Some 15 years later, O'Neill observed, "the One World theme is more relevant than ever". 38

During the 1980s, the RBF's "One World" programs focused on nuclear non-proliferation and international relations, development, trade and finance. In 1996, following the end of the Cold War, the RBF revised its "One World" strategy, launching what was intended to be a two-year review of its grant-making. To help develop new guidelines, a "Project on World Security" was started. The RBF also funded a program of research on "transnational governance" at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. The RBF's new guidelines for its "Global Security Program", released in 1999, committed the Fund to building "strong domestic constituencies for cooperative international engagement" and supporting efforts to "understand, adjust to and steer the process of increased economic integration…" 39

A look at the Global Security Program's grants for 1999 and 2000 reveals the RBF gave grants to: the International Forum on Globalization "For efforts to develop a positive vision of global governance"; US$70,000 to the Benton Foundation to bring its oneworld.org website to the US; $500,000 to the Aspen Institute for its role in the "Global Interdependence Initiative" project; $300,000 to the CEIP for its "Managing Global Issues Project"; and $200,000 to the South Centre in Switzerland to support developing-country NGOs and governments on "trade and global governance issues". 40

One of the first reports of the RBF's Global Interdependence Initiative, "Global Interdependence and the Need for Social Stewardship" (1997), noted with alarm the "waning of public and political support" within the US for "cooperative international engagement". To remedy this, the report recommended that US leaders work to convince the American public that such an approach was consistent with their values and interests. And to support the leadership, a wide-ranging "public" constituency should be built, combining NGOs, businesses, educators, unions, the media, religious groups and philanthropic foundations. NGOs would be "central to any constituency-building effort" and could also be used by multilateral and bilateral institutions to "bypass corrupt governments". 41 As with all Rockefeller efforts, changing public attitudes is the key. The implications of this report and others in this project are simple: public attitudes, especially in the US, must be changed to make "One World" possible.

Written into the Charter of the Rockefeller Foundation, when it was originally founded in 1913, is the objective of contributing to "the well-being of mankind throughout the world". During much of its life, the Foundation has realized this goal through its involvement in mostly medical and educational programs around the world and, for a time during the 1920s, the provision of direct financial support to certain operations of the League of Nations. In 1999, however, the Rockefeller Foundation announced a "new global mission" of helping "poor people excluded from globalization's benefits".

The aims or "themes" seemed laudable: to "improve poor people's lives and livelihoods through the application of knowledge, science, technology, research and analysis"; and to "ensure that globalization processes are more democratic and equitable and benefit the most vulnerable, disenfranchised populations, cultures and communities around the world". 42

Though we might note that as this last "theme", actually designated a "cross-theme", is "global inclusion", the ultimate objective is easy to discern: to draw those outside of the evolving "One World" into its grasp. Beyond including "poor people" in "decisions that may affect their lives" is the implicit acknowledgement that if their lives are already not being affected by globalization then they soon will be.

The other funds also contribute, though perhaps less notably. The little-known Rockefeller Family Fund, for instance, acts as a conduit for donations from other philanthropic organizations, including the Rockefeller, Ford, Turner, Scherman and Packard Foundations, to environmental causes such as preventing global warming and promoting a "Green Car". The RFF also provides money to the Funders Network on Trade and Globalization, the organization used by many foundations to fund NGOs. 43 The even more obscure Laurance Rockefeller Charitable Trust funds activist groups, such as the Center for Science in the Public Interest, an organization that has targeted the fast food industry for legal action in its determination to force people to eat healthy foods. 44 The purpose of this funding is always the same: to increase the pressures on governments and to mould public opinion in service of the broader Utopian goal of "One World".
 

CONCLUSION:

The purpose of this series has been to document the evolution of the Rockefeller family's internationalist ideology from the 1920s through to the present day. Underlying this analysis is an assumption, gleaned from the various primary documents cited, that the Rockefeller strategy for a New World Order or "One World" has two essential mutually reinforcing components:

• firstly, the promotion of international economic integration

• secondly, the establishment of strong supranational institutions

The origins of this agenda can be traced to the ideas of US President Woodrow Wilson, which were then passed on to John D. Rockefeller, Junior, by his adviser, Raymond B. Fosdick. Junior's sons, especially David and Nelson, have done the most to promote, expand and implement this agenda. The current generation of Rockefellers, in contrast, seems little more than guardians of a legacy—one that the network of Rockefeller philanthropies and policy-planning groups continues to endorse.

The waning of direct Rockefeller influence does not, unfortunately, mean the decline of the program by any means, for there are plenty of new rich who share the same objectives and who are determined to use their wealth to the same ends.

The notorious currency speculator George Soros, for example, has long portrayed himself as a supporter of a "global open society". Mirroring David Rockefeller's trilateralist concept, Soros has called for an alliance of the "democratic states of the world", led by the United States working with the European Union, to build a "global open society" by reforming the UN and other supranational institutions including the World Trade Organization. 5 45 He has devoted the resources of his main philanthropic organization, the Open Society Institute, to this goal.

Ted Turner, the founder of CNN, is another in this league, who demonstrated his intentions through his US$1 billion donation to the United Nations in 1997. "I see myself as a citizen of this Earth," Turner once told Gorbachev. 46 Though Turner's fortunes have waned, other plutocrats—among them Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, both intent on dispersing most of their fortunes—are waiting in the wings.

The agenda of the Rockefellers and their successors is hidden in plain sight. If we look past the veil of media-led denial and ridicule, one does not have to look far to find it. Whether we just watch it unfold is another matter…

Back to Part 5

Endnotes:

1. Ron Chernow, Titan: The Life of John D. Rockefeller, Sr, Warner Books, 1999, pp. 653-656.
2. Ferdinand Lundberg, The Rich and The Super-Rich: A Study in the Power of Money Today, Lyle Stuart, Inc, 1968, p. 597.
3. John E. Harr and Peter J. Johnson, The Rockefeller Conscience: An American Family in Public and in Private, Charles Scribner's Sons, 1991, pp. 90-96.
4. ibid., p. 98.
5. See Asia Society website at http://www.asiasociety.org .
6. See Katherine Barkley and Steve Weissman, "The Eco-Establishment"; and Steve Weissman, "Why the Population Bomb Is A Rockefeller Baby", in Editors of Ramparts, Eco-Catastrophe, Harper & Row, 1970.
7. Weissman, "Why the Population Bomb Is a Rockefeller Baby", p. 29; and Raymond B. Fosdick, The Story of the Rockefeller Foundation, Odhams Press, 1952, p. 244.
8. John D. Rockefeller III, "People, Food and the Well-Being of Mankind", Second McDougall Lecture 1961, Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations, 1961, pp. 9, 16-18.
9. This was a report that then President Richard Nixon dismissed in a brief but stiff meeting with JDR3, adding to the long list of deliberate snubs Nixon directed at the Rockefellers, possibly to his ultimate cost. For details of this incident, see Peter Collier and David Horowitz, The Rockefellers: An American Dynasty, New American Library, 1976, pp. 374-375.
10. John D. Rockefeller III, The Second American Revolution: Some Personal Observations, Harper & Row, 1973, pp. 62-63.
11. Quoted in Weissman, "Why The Population Bomb Is A Rockefeller Baby", pp. 30-31.
12. David Rockefeller, "The Population Problem and Economic Progress", Vital Speeches of the Day, April 1, 1966, p. 367.
13. See, for example, "Genocide" at http://www.africa2000.com ; and Mark and Louise Zwick, "Population Control: Ethnic Cleansing: Return of Nazi Eugenics", Houston Catholic Worker, July-August 1999.
14. Rockefeller, The Second American Revolution, pp. 66-68.
15. ibid., pp. 106-110, 117, 119-120, 125-130.
16. For a more detailed account, see Weissman, "Why The Population Bomb Is A Rockefeller Baby".
17. For one of few accounts of this dispute, though one that is severely limited by being from David Rockefeller's point of view alone, see David Rockefeller, Memoirs, Random House, 2002, pp. 336-355. Nelson died six months later, when, according to David, most of the dispute had been resolved.
18. David Icke, "Crop Circle Mystery Solved. Phew! What Would We Do Without The Rockefellers? Thanks, Colin", at http://www.davidicke.com/icke/articles2/crop-circles.html ; and Michael Hesemann, quoted in Barry Chamish, 'My Disappearance Explained', Insight, July 8, 2001 (emphasis added).
19. Lundberg, The Rich and the Super-Rich, p. 596; and Robin W. Winks, "Laurance S. Rockefeller: Catalyst for Conservation – Chapter One", New York Times, November 23, 1997.
20. Chernow, Titan, pp. 658-659.
21. Quoted in Winks, "Laurance S. Rockefeller".
22. Laurance Rockefeller, "The Case for a Simpler Life-Style", The Reader's Digest, February 1976, p. 61 (emphasis added).
23. ibid., pp. 64-65.
24. "Laurance S. Rockefeller Grants $190,000 for Faculty Projects Support for 'New Story of the Universe' Projects", Inner Eye, February 8, 2001, at CIIS website, http://www.ciis.edu  (emphasis added).
25. The following list is derived from: "Rockefeller Greets Aliens! A Rich Guy's UFO Dream", New York Observer, April 8, 1996; Peter Carlson, "Fertile Imaginations", New York Times, August 10, 2002; and Paul Joseph Watson, "Counterfeit Foe – The Ultimate Hegelian Dialectic", at PropagandaMatrix.com.
26. See Watson, "Counterfeit Foe"; and Milton William Cooper, Behold A Pale Horse, Light Technology, 1991, pp. 232-235.
27. See Susan Adams, "The Reluctant Rockefeller", Forbes, May 3, 1999, p. 86.
28. See the Synergos Institute website at http://www.synergos.org .
29. Rio+5 Forum, "Global Governance for Sustainable Development", March 18, 1997 at http://www.ecouncil.ac.cr/rio5/mar18/workben.html .
30. Statement of CFR Task Force, Promoting US Economic Relations with Africa, May 22, 1997, at CFR website, http://www.cfr.org .
31. Fernando Henrique Cardoso, Civil Society and Global Governance, High-Level Panel on UN-Civil Society, June 13, 2003, at UN website http://www.un.org/reform/pdfs/cardosopaper13june.htm .
32. David Rockefeller, Jr, "Reflections and Visions: Business–Arts Alliances", October 14, 1997, at http://www.bcainc.org/programs.asp?pg=5 .
33. Steven C. Rockefeller, "Building a Global Culture of Peace: The Earth Charter", Orion Online, September 29, 2001.
34. Steven C. Rockefeller, "Rockefeller Speaks Up for the Earth Charter", The New American, November 4, 2002.
35. Steven C. Rockefeller, "An Introduction to the Text of the Earth Charter", at http://www.earthforum.org .
36. ibid.
37. ibid.
38. Abby M. O'Neill, Chairman's Essay, from the 1997 RBF Annual Report, at http://www.rbf.org .
39. "Global Security Program: Introduction to the RBF's New Global Security Guidelines", at http://www.rbf.org .
40. "One World: Global Security, Grants", at http://www.rbf.org .
41. Laurie Ann Mazur and Susan E. Sechler, Global Interdependence and the Need for Social Stewardship, Rockefeller Brothers Fund, 1997, pp. 5, 25-30.
42. See Rockefeller Foundation website, http://www.rockfound.org .
43. See "Rockefeller Family Fund" at http://www.undueinfluence.org .
44. On both the Trust and the CSPI, see http://www.consumerfreedom.com .
45. See George Soros, Open Society: Reforming Global Capitalism, Little Brown & Co., 2000, pp. 330-359.
46. Quoted in Janet Lowe, Ted Turner Speaks, John Wiley & Sons, 1999, p. 187.