The Green Party differs from many political parties because it is not hierarchical and centrally controlled. Instead, the local group is fundamentally where decisions are made and actions are taken. Greens throughout the world can unite regionally, statewide, nationally, or even internationally to take on issues bigger than a single locality. We can unite because we share a common value system, which specifically includes the following ten key values:

1. Ecological Wisdom. The Greens recognize that the Earth sustains all life processes. Green ecology moves beyond environmentalism by understanding the relation between abuse of people and abuse of nature.
2. Social Justice and Equal Opportunity. Greens want to replace the worldwide system of poverty and injustice with a world free of oppression based on class, gender, race, citizenship, age, sexual orientation, disability, or belief.
3. Grassroots Democracy. The powerless suffer the most from resource depletion and toxic pollution. Greens believe in direct participation by all people in the environmental, political and economic decisions that affect their lives.
4. Nonviolence. Greens reject violence as a way of settling disputes - it is shortsighted, morally wrong, and ultimately self-defeating.
5. Decentralization. Power and responsibility must be restored to local communities within an overall framework of ecologically sound and socially just values and lifestyles.
6. Community Based Economics. Greens seek a new economics based upon the limits of our natural resources, which meets the basic needs of everyone, under democratic, localized community control.
7. Gender Equity and Cooperative Values. The ethics of cooperation and understanding must replace the values of domination and control over others. Our primary focus is in the nurturing of our world and each other.
8. Respect for Diversity. Greens honor the biological diversity of the Earth and the cultural, sexual, and spiritual diversity of Earth's people. We aim to reclaim this country's finest ideals: popular democracy, dignity of the individual with liberty and justice for all.
9. Personal and Global Responsibility. Greens are committed to global sustainability and international justice through political solidarity and in personal lifestyles based on self-sufficiency and minimal resource impact.
10. Future Focus and Sustainability. Greens seek a society where the interests of the seventh generation are considered equal to the interests of the present. We must reclaim the future for our children and ourselves.

The above statements of the ten values were created and agreed upon by the Prairie Greens, and incorporated into our bylaws. They reflect in substance the values expressed by other national, state, regional and local Green groups.