“I believe that ordinary people can make a difference on a global scale,” said Dr. Warkentin. Three stories of people who exemplify Dr. Warkentin’s message, that everyone is capable of making a change in the world, are featured on his Web site Laptops, Rats, and Taxis.

Dr. Warkentin believes the framework to positive social change consists of the use of the internet and a fundamental belief in a global civil society: “The internet allows people to interact on a global scale and connect on so many levels be it religious or social and by living in a global civil society we become part of socially constructed and transnationally defined networks of relationships that provide opportunities for everyone to become politically involved.”

“People can make a change based on their own personal interests,” said Dr. Warkentin, “and that is exactly what Bart Weejens did with his love of rats.” Weejens, Dr. Warkentin’s second example, began APOPO, a non-profit organization that trains rats to sniff out and uncover land mines that are planted underneath the ground in African countries, like Mozambique. The rats are trained to sniff TNT and are a safe alternative to using machinery to detonate mines that endanger the livelihood of the people living there: “These mines handicap the whole economic system, field workers are in danger of being hurt while working and it gets very expensive to detonate these explosives and dig them out with machines. The use of the rats is much cheaper and safer because no one gets hurt.” Dr. Warkentin explained that although these “hero rats” are two times the size of American rats they are not large enough to set off the explosives underground.
Dr. Warkentin’s encouragement of students to use their own interests to create ways to help the larger community is founded in the belief that small things really can make a difference in someone else’s life. Whether it is donating $25 for a student in Uruguay to have a laptop or sponsoring a rat that will help protect millions of citizens, there are so many distinct and meaningful ways that St. John’s students can become a part of the global justice movement.

Exerpts taken from article published in St. John's News. Dr. Craig Warkentin, is an Associate Professor of Political Science at the State University of New York, Oswego, where he teaches courses in International Politics, Global Issues and Women’s Studies. For the full article, click here (http://www.stjohns.edu/academics/pr_aca_080428b.stj).