Thinking about peace requires understanding peace itself as thought, as knowledge, and as a critique of its others, its opposites: violence, terror, and war. Peace is encyclopedic in terms of the knowledge that it generates as well as the knowledge upon which it draws. This essay is a brief attempt to explore what the circumstances are for peace as thinking and what goes into that thinking. What I'm saying here rests on three important assumptions: first, we cannot simply point outward to terror and "hit" the right target; second, to have peace one must extend peace; and third, the necessary counter to notions of a "just war" is a "just peace."
There are combinations of circumstances and environments that work against peace. A few examples here will have to suffice--some historical, one current: (1) the circulation of state-supported terror in the form of white supremacist vigilante terror--lynchings--that continued until the middle of the 20th century, (2) general U.S. citizens' refusal and/or inability to grieve for those who were victims of our government's and our government's allies' support of terror throughout Central and South America, and (3) general obedient trust in U.S. authority in times of crisis, exemplied by the willingness of our elected representatives to give a blank check and almost unlimited power to president George Bush.
I mentioned the "others" of peace -- I want to take up one word that represents a most powerful "other," terrorism: terrorism1, the act--the use of force or threats of force to demoralize, intimidate, and subjugate--especially such use as a political weapon or policy, and terrorism2, the outcome--the demoralization, intimidation, and subjugation so produced.
Terrorism refers both to the act (the verb) and its accomplishment (the noun). The effect of terrorism, the noun, is accomplished by various means. We can "read" back from the effect and recognize the means. The dead bodies are the effects, and we read back from those bodies and their circumstances, the means that produced them. Our understanding of peace as knowledge might productively begin then with the effects of war itself as terrorism--the demoralization, intimidation, and subjugation of people especially as a result of a political weapon or policy. The effect of terrorism is not so very different from the effect of war; in fact, the dividing line between terrorism and war has long depended upon the difference between the use of force legitimated by a state as opposed to the laissez faire or ad hoc use of force or threat by individuals and/or non-state groups.
War is the means to many ends. The ends of ruthless dictators, of land disputes, and lives – each play its part in the reasoning for war. War is controllable. It can be avoided; however, once it begins, the bat...
On this planet there is only the one sure way to ensure peace, government. Luckily throughout history there have been big societies that helped countries establish governments of their own. One of the biggest and well shaped government is the democracy of the United States of America. The U.S. had two societies in particular to look to for guidance, and those two were ancient Greece and ancient Rome.
The idea of a lasting, ideally global, peace has been present in the minds of people for centuries. The most notable formulation of this is Kant’s vision of perpetual peace. “He saw it as a condition that needed to be maintained by politics between states with governments which represented society and separation of power. From this basic framework stems the idea called “democratic peace theory” (pg. 82). Democratic Peace Theory (DPT) asserts that democracies do not generally fight other democracies because they share common norms and domestic institutions that constrain international, state actors from going to war. Sebastian Rosato states, “In practical terms democratic peace theory provides the intellectual justification for the belief that spreading democracy abroad will perform the dual task of enhancing American national security promoting world peace” (pg. 585).
“Just War” theory defines war as the absence of peace.Peace can be the absence of war, but finding peace in such judgmental groups is almost impossible. Nations, also known as enemies, will never come eye to eye. They differ in various areas for example religion and race. Inequalities between humans will always exist. Equally seeing the other as the same will lead to peace. Justice and peace go hand and hand. Peace is a thirst for justice in human society and while acting and behaving with fairness and mortality will settle conflicts without the use of arms. Peace, as many say, is a state of mind. It can be seen as a behavior almost. It can entail being a union. Coming together to see everyone as one and not seeing anyone as different. It is the absence of war, but until there is mutual trust in nations there will always be war. The absence of all conflict is not
... the recent past, the idea of global security has been used as a reason for war. For example, the USA engagement in war against Afghanistan and Iraq was based on the argument of promoting peace in the name of democracy. This is a perfect example of how the interpretation of democracy can lead to hostility among nations.
... of war or violence” (Canadian Oxford Dictionary). When Canada revised their peacekeeping methods, they became violent, which is the exact opposite of peace.
...s toward peace”. Proving that being pacifist does not necessarily mean that war is unacceptable, it can also stand for bringing peace by a different point of view.
McLaughlin, Greg, and Stephen Baker. The Propaganda of Peace. Bristol, UK: Intellect Ltd., 2010. Print.
The threat of global terrorism continues to rise with the total number of deaths reaching 32,685 in 2015, which is an 80 percent increase from 2014 (Global Index). With this said, terrorism remains a growing, and violent phenomenon that has dominated global debates. However, ‘terrorism’ remains a highly contested term; there is no global agreement on exactly what constitutes a terror act. An even more contested concept is whether to broaden the scope of terrorism to include non-state and state actors.
DuNann Winter, D., & Leighton, D. C. (2001 ). Structural Violence . Peace, conflict, and violence: Peace psychology in the 21st. New York : Prentice-Hall.
The U.S. Department of State defines terrorism as, “The calculated use of unlawful violence or threat of unlawful violence to inculcate fear; intended to coerce or to intimidate governments or societies in the pursuit of goals that are generally political, religious, or ideological”. Whereas the Belgium Red Cross says that terrorism is committed “for the purpose of intimidating the population, forcing a third party to act or destablishing or destroying the fundamental structures of a country or of an international organization”.
The democratic peace theory was not always seen as the substantial argument and significant contribution to the field of International Relations that it is today. Prior to the 1970’s, it was the realist and non-realist thought that took preeminence in political theoretical thinking. Though the democratic peace theory was first criticized for being inaccurate in its claim that democracy promotes peace and as such democracies do not conflict with each other, trends, statistical data, reports have suggested and proved that the democratic peace theory is in fact valid in its claim. Over the years having been refined, developed and amended, it is now most significant in explaining modern politics and it is easy to accept that there is indeed a lot of truth in the stance that democracy encourages peace. The democratic peace theory is a concept that largely influenced by the likes of Immanuel Kant, Wilson Woodrow and Thomas Paine.
Non-violence. Many people confuse this term with pacifism. Pacifism is defined as the belief that any violence, including war, is unjustifiable under any circumstances. Non-violence is defined as the use of peaceful means, not force, to bring about political or social change. The difference between the two are fairly simple to see when we define them side by side. Pacifism states that war is unjustifiable, however, it does not specify that Pacifism shows any inclination toward preventing war. Compare this to non-violence, which states that issues should only be solved in peaceful means. In this comparison, it would appear that Pacifism allows war, whereas non-violence tries to completely eradicate or avoid it. Now that we have clarified the
The word terrorism was first used during the French Revolution from the reign of terror inflicted by the French from 1784-1804 ("International Affairs"). It was used to describe the violent acts perpetrated on the French that inflicted terror on the various peoples and instilled fear within them. However, at the time it had a more positive connotation than the term that instills fear today. During the French Revolution this was because it referred to state-sponsored terrorism in order to show the need of state instead of anarchy, sometimes promoted by other groups (Hoffman 2). Therefore, even though terrorism has taken a new nature, terrorism can refer to official governments or guerrilla groups operating outside national governments ("International Affairs"). In order to encompass terrorism’s various sectors and explain it to the public, in both positive and negative aspects, many analysts have tried to put it into a few words. Terrorism is a method used by tightly of loosely organized groups operation within states or international territories that are systematic in using deliberate acts of violence or threats in order to instill...
Terrorism has a tremendous impact on society. It is a rational act of violence and its purpose is to change behavior in a specific society. Terrorism is a political act that is meant to achieve a goal through the act of violence. The nature of terrorism is the nonselective targeting of individuals or a group in society with a goal. The intentions of