write an essay on culture and peaceful coexistence

100 Words Essay On Peaceful Co Existence In Nigeria In English

Living together in peace rather than in constant hostility is termed as peace co-existence. Nigeria is a multi-ethnic and culturally diverse country. This is a country where peace seems rather like a dream for them to accomplish. There have been constant destructions, fights and wars.

The cause of this has been due to the activities evil men who have consistently taken undue advantage of the endemic ethnic biases or religious bigotries in the society to perpetrate their evil agenda. It is not only the fault of the government but the people as well who are equally corrupted. The stress in Nigeria has brought in a lot of concern world-wide and many countries are trying to help them but till date there has been no major effect.

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  UNIZIK Journal of Religion and Human Relations Journal / UNIZIK Journal of Religion and Human Relations / Vol. 13 No. 1 (2021) / Articles (function() { function async_load(){ var s = document.createElement('script'); s.type = 'text/javascript'; s.async = true; var theUrl = 'https://www.journalquality.info/journalquality/ratings/2404-www-ajol-info-jrhr'; s.src = theUrl + ( theUrl.indexOf("?") >= 0 ? "&" : "?") + 'ref=' + encodeURIComponent(window.location.href); var embedder = document.getElementById('jpps-embedder-ajol-jrhr'); embedder.parentNode.insertBefore(s, embedder); } if (window.attachEvent) window.attachEvent('onload', async_load); else window.addEventListener('load', async_load, false); })();  

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Main article content, national integration and peaceful co-existence in nigeria: the role of inter-ethnic/inter-religious marriages, christian emeka chukwu.

It is no longer news that Nigeria as one united political and geographical entity has continued to experience inter-religious and inter-ethnic sentiments bickering, misunderstanding, mistrust which have constantly snowballed into crisis of tremendous proportion. As a result, many innocent lives and properties worth billions of naira have been lost. This ugly situation has continued to threaten the corporate existence of Nigeria and retrogressively affected the socioeconomic development of Nigeria. However, when there is no genuine effort to bring about genuine national integration, peaceful coexistence will definitely be a mirage. One of the factors or strategies identified as capable of fostering national integration and  guaranteeing peaceful co-existence is inter-ethnic, inter-religious and even inter-communal marriages among the people of different ethnic groups and adherents of different religions in Nigeria. This paper clarifies concepts in the write-up and also points out how intermarriages can foster peace and unity. It also recommends that traditional and religious leaders should be encouraged to inspire those they watch over to embrace this type of mixed marriage in order to achieve sustainable national development and most importantly promote peaceful coexistence among different ethnic groups in Nigeria

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Cutting Edge | Overcoming barriers to peace through culture

Overcoming barriers to peace through culture

As a powerful force that bridges across differences, culture brings people together, and thus underpins social cohesion, peace and security. Notwithstanding this unifying function, the past 20 years have witnessed a growing instrumentalization of culture for divisive purposes. This negative exploitation of culture has not only contributed to more protracted crises and relapses into conflict, but also the denial of human rights, including cultural rights. Culture is integral to who we are and where we come from. From heritage to creative expression, culture contributes to identity, belonging and meaning. As a resource for community vitality, well-being and expression, it shapes peaceful societies through the recognition of and respect for the diversity of cultures and freedom of expression.

However, by virtue of its significance and deep-rooted connection to people, culture has increasingly been brought to the frontlines of conflict as a tool for division. Across the globe, contemporary armed conflicts are increasingly complex and taking place within national borders. These clashes are stoked by a multitude of drivers, involving more non-State actors and groups, some of which connect to criminal and extremist networks. Moreover, conflicts are increasingly fueled by ethnic and belief differences, grievances and identity misinterpretation. The increased movement of peoples through migration has brought cultures into closer proximity, increasing the points of interaction and friction that can give rise to identity-related tensions. Growing rifts among communities of different cultural backgrounds, religions and beliefs have often been accompanied by incitement to violence that, at times, have seized culture as its justification. Often rooted in a fear of “the other,” these acts are governed by exclusion and a rejection of diversity. Attacks on heritage and people based on their cultural, ethnic or religious affiliation are tragic illustrations of the depths to which fear and exclusion can take root. Instances of disinformation and hate speech have surged, while increasing reports of attacks on artists – both online and offline – contribute to this alarming scenario. Media have also been used for recruitment, manipulation and coordination by non-State armed groups, and to facilitate illicit trafficking of cultural property. The protection of culture is not only a cultural issue; it has become a security imperative.

Culture in the crossfire of conflict

During the past two decades, culture has increasingly been instrumentalized to stir division. Attacks on cultural heritage bear witness to how heritage can be used – and abused – by non-State armed groups in attempts to obliterate cultural diversity or to impose their own symbols and identities linked to a specific community. Attacks on cultural heritage often target significant areas of rich cultural diversity, where communities of different cultural and religious backgrounds have coexisted and forged unique cultural expressions. These attacks on culture can also be part of broader and systematic strategies. Following the war in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s, the reconstruction of the UNESCO World Heritage-listed Mostar Bridge in Bosnia and Herzegovina was, therefore, highly symbolic. It was not only about rebuilding the heritage to its former glory, but also about re-establishing identity and solidarity as part of the post-conflict healing process. The Dayton Accords peace agreement, which brought the war to a close, included in its provisions human rights, the return of refugees and displaced persons, as well as cultural heritage protection. This process was a particular turning point as – for the first time in modern conflict resolution policy – cultural heritage was recognized as a fundamental component for sustainable peace.

Attempts to destroy culture is a bid to wipe out people’s past, present and future. Poverty, lack of education and unemployment are key underlying factors driving attacks on culture. Twenty years ago when the Buddhas of Bamiyan in Afghanistan were destroyed, the event was broadcast around the world as part of a tactic to spread an ideology of terror and exclusion. This also led to the adoption of the Declaration on the Intentional Destruction of Cultural Heritage in 2003 by UNESCO’s Member States. A decade on, when a non-State armed group attacked Timbuktu in Mali, intentionally destroying its mausoleums, the group’s first strategy was to destroy the sacred gate of the mosque of Sidi Yahia, a religious and cultural landmark, and to halt all cultural practices and religious ceremonies. UNESCO's work in the reconstruction of the mausoleums and the conservation of ancient manuscripts in Timbuktu demonstrates the successful integration of culture into peacebuilding and reconciliation strategies. Backed by the European Union and Switzerland, the Organization mobilized cooperation to reconstruct and safeguard the cultural property in close partnership with the Malian authorities, the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) and local communities. Attempts to ban or expunge the cultural life of societies by depriving them of music, heritage or rituals are an affront to freedom and critical thinking. As a response for the recovery of the city of Mosul in Iraq, UNESCO launched in 2018 the Revive the Spirit of Mosul initiative to revitalize cultural and intellectual life in the city by empowering local communities in rebuilding their historic landmarks and neighbourhoods to build hope and resilience. Like many of Iraq’s archaeological sites, Babylon has endured years of looting and economic crises during which precious artifacts have been sold off. Two years ago the city was inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage site, signaling hope for its recovery and future. In the Syrian Arab Republic, the 12th Century Crusader castle Crac des Chevaliers has been left exposed to damage and was a strategic stronghold for armed groups for some periods of the conflict. When bombs were dropped on the Yemeni capital Sana’a it resulted in loss of lives and damage to one of the treasured urban jewels of the Islamic world, leaving the city vulnerable to ongoing conflict, food shortages and weather shocks. These attempts to attack UNESCO World Heritage sites and to undermine and destroy cultural diversity cut to the heart of communities and draw on media to spread ideological propaganda.

Lack of education and unemployment can also lead young people to enroll in armed groups as a way of making a living. Historic settlements and archaeological sites, both as targets or as collateral damage of armed conflict, can be left vulnerable to looting and illicit trafficking of cultural objects. This can sometimes inflict irreversible damage to a country’s collective memory and social cohesion, thus hindering its capacity to recover. This issue has been highlighted in statutory meetings of the 1970 Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property, which celebrates its 50th anniversary this year. Article 9 of the Convention lays down the conditions for the prevention of irremediable injury to cultural heritage endangered by the pillaging of archaeological or ethnological materials.

This upsurge in conflicts and increasing threats on culture have contributed to a global setback on cultural rights, notably by curtailing the right to practice cultural activities and access to culture, but also by jeopardizing cultural diversity itself. A growing number of alerts formulated by the United Nations and other intergovernmental organizations over the past years made reference to cultural rights infringements in situations of violence with regard to attacks on cultural heritage and cultural minorities. Echoing this concern, the 2019 report of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights reiterates economic, social and cultural rights as essential building blocks for staying on track towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

Yanggiri/Getty Images Pro*

Crossing new frontiers in heritage safeguarding : the humanitarian, security and peacebuilding nexus

UNESCO has taken a leading advocacy role in addressing attacks on culture, and crimes against culture. The magnitude of destruction and long-lasting impacts on communities have acted as a wake-up call to combat the instrumentalization of culture. It has raised awareness among the international community about the need for future generations to know about their identity and where they come from through heritage. Intense advocacy efforts have advanced the concepts of heritage and why it is important for countries to ratify international conventions on culture. The lack of awareness of the value of heritage and the lack of opportunities to engage in preserving and safeguarding heritage in the public sphere puts heritage at risk of being irremediably lost. It also impoverishes young generations’ sense of identity and belonging, thereby limiting their ability to engage and contribute meaningfully to society at large, while also weakening the foundations of peace and security. This is why UNESCO carries out a comprehensive programme for heritage education that facilitates the engagement of youth in the promotion, protection and transmission of heritage in all its forms. On a broader level, education plays a critical role in equipping young people with the skills and cultural literacy they need to understand their environment and make informed choices. The UNESCO-led #Unite4Heritage global campaign launched in 2015 reached millions of people around the world to mobilize against deliberate attacks on cultural heritage during conflict. Civil society and decision-makers alike contributed to the campaign to counter propaganda, sectarian agendas and extreme violence, as well as promote cultural diversity as a positive unifying force. The deliberate destruction of heritage was pronounced by UNESCO as a war crime and a tactic of war in a strategy of cultural cleansing. These efforts made several breakthroughs in the adoption of UN Security Council resolutions for the protection of heritage, and the first International Criminal Court (ICC) ruling on cultural heritage as a war crime. In doing so, it has also contributed to bringing culture to the core of the international security agenda.

The Organization’s active commitment has contributed to strengthening the position of culture in humanitarian, security and peacebuilding work. This enlarged cooperation is promoted in UNESCO’s strategy adopted by the UNESCO General Conference in 2015 to prevent, mitigate and recover the loss of cultural heritage and diversity resulting from conflict. A core idea of this strategy is to engage partners outside the “culture box”, and to work closely with local communities. In this respect, UNESCO has strengthened and broadened cooperation in the area of cultural heritage with other UN entities and key IGOs and NGOs, including the UN Counter-Terrorism Centre and the Counter-Terrorism Implementation Task Force, United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), INTERPOL, World Customs Organization (WCO), International Institute for the Unification of Private Law (UNIDROIT), International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property (ICCROM), International Council of Museums (ICOM), International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), the Blue Shield, International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the UN Security Council. Human rights education in schools on the importance of respecting one's culture and those of others has further anchored these efforts.

Bamiyan (Afghanistan)

Picassos/Getty Images*

Strengthening international legal frameworks in culture

Setting a historical precedent, in 2016 an international trial regarding the destruction of the mausoleums in Timbuktu in Mali resulted in the first war crimes charge by the ICC for the destruction of cultural heritage. Such deliberate destruction of heritage was defined a war crime under Article 8 of the International Criminal Court’s statute. The perpetrator was sentenced to nine years’ imprisonment and, in 2017, was ruled to pay €2.7 million in individual and collective reparations. The decision was instrumental in strengthening international justice and re-establishing hope in Timbuktu. A symbolic reparations ceremony was held in March 2021 in Bamako, organized by the Trust Fund for Victims and the ICC in collaboration with the Malian Government, to commemorate the destruction of the cultural heritage of Timbuktu. During the ceremony, the Malian authorities and UNESCO were given a symbolic euro in recognition of the harm caused by the destruction to the Malian people and to all humanity.

The adoption of UN Security Council resolutions for the protection of heritage has given new impetus to multilateral cooperation in cultural heritage protection in situations of armed conflict. The adoption of resolution 2199 in 2015 underlined the link between looting and smuggling of cultural heritage items and financing terrorism activities, as well as introduced legally-binding measures to combat the illicit trafficking of antiquities and cultural objects from Iraq and the Syrian Arab Republic. The recognition of the deliberate destruction of cultural heritage as a war crime was reaffirmed in resolution 2347 , unanimously adopted by the UN Security Council in 2017, and marked the first time the UN Security Council adopted a resolution devoted to the protection and recovery of cultural heritage.

This achievement was further underpinned by the policy instruments developed within UNESCO Culture Conventions to prevent and mitigate the impact of conflicts on culture. Over the past 70 years, UNESCO has refined its conceptual frameworks and provided legal provisions to defend culture through its Culture Conventions. The protection of cultural heritage is part of international humanitarian law under the 1954 Hague Convention for the Protection of Cultural Property in Armed Conflict and its two (1954 and 1999) Protocols, which forbids the targeting of cultural property and the use of its immediate surroundings for military purposes. In addition, calling for extreme vigilance to the possible export of illicit property through the 1970 Convention on the Means of Prohibiting and Preventing the Illicit Import, Export and Transfer of Ownership of Cultural Property, is part of UNESCO’s work to protect and safeguard our world’s culture and its diversity.

Geralt/Pixabay*

In addition to shaping a legal framework for culture to be safeguarded, UNESCO’s normative instruments have also helped to safeguard cultural diversity and advance cultural rights through various angles, providing an enabling environment for conflict prevention. The protection of cultural rights is central to sustaining peaceful and inclusive societies, and a critical condition for cultural diversity to flourish. The right of access to, participation in and enjoyment of culture – enshrined in Article 27 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and further reiterated in the 2001 UNESCO Declaration on Cultural Diversity – is fundamental to peacebuilding efforts. The Declaration brings to the fore the importance of pluralism in societies and that cultural diversity “is as necessary for humankind as biodiversity is for nature”. These core principles of cultural access and participation have been put into practice through the UNESCO Culture Conventions. For example, by promoting inclusive, participatory management of World Heritage sites, the 1972 World Heritage Convention places individuals and communities at the centre of conservation efforts, while also ensuring that they can access and benefit from their cultural heritage. The 1970 Convention promotes peaceful societies by stating that communities should not be deprived of their cultural heritage. Likewise, the 2003 Convention for the Safeguarding of Intangible Cultural Heritage ensures – through its Operational Guidelines – that local communities, including indigenous peoples, have access to and can participate in the identification, inventorying, safeguarding and transmission of their cultural heritage. By providing a normative framework and policy instruments, the 2005 Convention for the Protection and Promotion of the Diversity of Cultural Expressions and the 1980 UNESCO Recommendation concerning the Status of the Artist support countries in protecting, defending and monitoring fundamental freedoms, including the right to freedom of expression and creativity, while also recognizing the importance of intellectual property rights. The concepts and, to some extent, legal provisions provided by the Culture Conventions across different cultural domains have therefore supported Member States’ efforts in strengthening national cultural policy frameworks with a view to better protecting cultural rights.

More recently, UNESCO has expanded its scope of work to protect artistic freedom . This is understood as a bundle of rights protected under international law encompassing the right to create without censorship or intimidation, the right to freedom of association, the right to protection of social and economic rights, the right to participate in cultural life, the right to have artistic work supported, distributed and remunerated, and the right to freedom of movement. The rights of artists to express themselves freely are under threat worldwide, especially where artistic expressions contest or critique political ideologies, religious beliefs and cultural and social preferences. These threats range from censorship - by corporations, political, religious or other groups - to imprisonment, physical threats, and even killings. In 2020, there were reports of 978 acts of violations of artistic freedom in 89 countries and online spaces . 74% of all documented imprisonments of artists concerned criticizing government policies and practices.

Other global platforms and policy mechanisms developed over the past two decades have been instrumental in highlighting the importance of cultural rights, notably of indigenous peoples. In a global landscape marked by the urgency of climate change, countries and communities are urged to recognize their interdependence and the critical importance of protecting cultural rights, notably for indigenous peoples. Echoing this recognition, culture is one of six mandated areas of the United Nations Permanent Forum on Indigenous Issues, and integral to indigenous peoples’ identity, traditional knowledge, and connection with the natural environment. The Permanent Forum increasingly reflects, in its Recommendations on Culture , the importance of cultural rights. UNESCO’s cross-cutting 2018 Policy on Engaging with Indigenous Peoples takes a rights-based approach to ensure that the Organization’s work upholds the 2006 United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) – including in relation to cultural heritage, environmental conservation, knowledge, expressions, languages and intellectual property rights. In this respect, Member States are increasingly confronted with issues of cultural appropriation, which is further amplified by accelerated digital transformation. Recent cases linked to, for example, the use of traditional medicines by pharmaceutical companies, or the appropriation of traditional cultural expressions by the fashion industry without appropriate remuneration or economic benefits for custodian communities, testify to this growing trend. This aspiration is also increasingly underlined by regional organizations, including the African Union, which emphasizes cultural memory in its Charter for African Cultural Renaissance, as well as fostering a common heritage in its strategic framework Agenda 2063: The Africa We Want.

Building on these conceptual and normative advances, further work is needed in the coming years to codify cultural rights . Cultural rights remain a rather “underdeveloped” category of human rights, therefore, more efforts will be needed to define their scope, legal content and enforceability. This deficit was recognized by the Human Rights Council, which in 2009 created the mandate of Special Rapporteur in the field of cultural rights. Since then, the Special Rapporteur has produced 21 thematic reports on issues related to cultural rights. The accelerated digital transformation makes these efforts even more critical, as it has deeply reshaped the exercise of cultural rights relating to diversity of cultural contents, intellectual property rights and multilingualism in cyberspace, as well as challenges related to the remuneration of artists. Against this backdrop, wider policy dialogue and concerted action will be required, building on existing frameworks, notably the guidelines developed by the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights to support Member States in monitoring cultural rights. Although constructing universal frameworks may raise specific challenges, the respect of cultural diversity remains a global commitment, enshrined in all UNESCO Culture Conventions, to frame the scope of cultural rights.

Bfk92, Getty Images/Signature*

The struggle for inclusion and social cohesion

In a globalized world, migration, urbanization and digital transformation are bringing cultures together into closer proximity. To a growing extent, cultural and religious diversity is an intrinsic component of societies in all parts of the world. This increased diversity, particularly in urban settings, has generated fresh opportunities for exchange, learning and ideas, but it has also brewed tensions. Record numbers of people who are forcibly displaced due to persecution, conflict, violence, human rights violations, can face persistent barriers in enjoying their cultural rights. Migrants, in general, come up against significant challenges in host communities in terms of stigma, exclusion and xenophobia. Migrations are also fueled by protracted economic crises, youth unemployment and, to an increasing extent, climate change and related disasters.

The digital transformation has introduced new forms of innovation and possibilities for dialogue and creative expression, while also raising new challenges, notably related to hate speech. UNESCO’s work with UNITAR/UNOSAT in the use of post-conflict satellite imagery, for instance, has been a gamechanger for damage assessments of built heritage in inaccessible areas, such as in Syrian Arab Republic, Iraq, Libya and Yemen. Media, while being an effective advocacy tool that can mobilize the international community around an issue, can also provide spaces for inciting violence and polarization, and channels to spread discrimination and hate. Social media has been used to facilitate illicit trafficking of cultural property, and for recruitment, manipulation and coordination by non-State armed groups. Artists and cultural workers have been turning to the Internet and social media to promote their work and access new audiences, which has introduced new challenges for their online safety . Countering the growing spread and use of hate speech globally underpins the UN Strategy and Plan of Action on Hate Speech launched in 2019. The Strategy and Plan of Action contains 13 commitments to address the root causes and drivers of hate speech and its impact on societies, while upholding the right to freedom of opinion and expression.

In this regard, engaging youth in culture and boosting their livelihoods are particularly critical to combatting hate speech and nurturing social cohesion. The cultural exclusion and marginalization of youth can indeed generate broader repercussions for social cohesion and peace - stemming from grievances, political distrust, isolation and a sense of hopelessness. Within the UN-wide system, UNESCO leads on the implementation of the United Nations Secretary General's Plan of Action for the Prevention of Violent Extremism (PVE) adopted in 2016. This leverages “soft power” in preventing hatred and ignorance through tools and trainings to tackle disinformation, hate speech and violent extremism on social media, and build learners’ resilience to violent extremism. Since the start of the conflict in Yemen, UNESCO World Heritage properties have been severely impacted while the vibrancy of cultural life has been suspended. In some parts of the country, this has given way to radical sectarian narratives that erode the pluralist social fabric needed to unify and stabilize societies. Commentators observe that the cultural void caused by the war has produced despair and disillusionment among young people, which incurs secondary political risks, such as an increased likelihood of youth involvement in violent extremism. The UNESCO/EU project “Cash for Work: Improving livelihood opportunities of urban youth in Yemen” recognizes the important value of cultural heritage preservation, but also youth participation and access to culture as confidence-building measures for peace. Through cash-based urban rehabilitation works, the project is currently employing over 1,300 skilled and unskilled youth under 35.

Golubovy/Getty Images*

Harnessing cultural diplomacy and intercultural dialogue for conflict prevention and reconciliation

Culture should be a force of unity, not division. Numerous experiences demonstrate how culture can provide a crucial entry point for international cooperation to unite people across borders in the protection of shared cultural heritage or cultural exchange. Cultural diplomacy is at the heart of the UNESCO Silk Roads programme, which for more than 30 years has engaged several countries in building links between people from different communities along these routes. Culture was also the catalyst for reopening dialogue to overcome the contentious frontier between Thailand and Cambodia through the safeguarding of the Temple of Preah Vihear. The 2018 joint inscription of Traditional Korean wrestling (Ssirum/Ssireum) on the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity brought together the two Koreas in a sign of solidarity and rapprochement. In the Lake Chad Basin region, the UNESCO project “Biosphere and Heritage of Lake Chad” (BIOPALT) has taken a multidisciplinary approach to strengthen national capacities in shared natural resource management across five countries (Cameroon, Central African Republic, Niger, Nigeria and Chad). In Nigeria, for instance, UNESCO has conducted training in management of transboundary water resources using a “Potential Conflict to Potential Cooperation (PCCP)” approach, thereby strengthening water diplomacy and collaborative natural resource management for peace and sustainable development. Likewise, in Ivory Coast, UNESCO joined United Nations Development Program (UNDP), United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) and the Ministry of Culture last October to roll out a series of dialogue and peacebuilding mechanisms to promote inter-ethnic alliances between local communities, including youth. These efforts were followed up in January as part of World Day for African and Afrodescendant Culture with the launch of an awareness caravan that provides content on the history of ethnic alliances in order to support peacebuilding. To date, 400 young community relays for peace have been trained, who act as peace mediators for the consolidation of inter-ethnic values throughout Ivory Coast.

When the UN General Assembly adopted the Declaration and Programme of Action on a Culture of Peace in 1999, it became the universal blueprint for the international community to promote a culture of peace and non-violence. This was carried forward across the UN with thesubsequent International Decade for a Culture of Peace and Non-Violence for the Children of the World (2001-2010), the International Year for the Rapprochement of Cultures (2010) and the Programme of Action for a Culture of Peace and Non-Violence. A culture of peace promotes the values, attitudes, institutions and structures that create and sustain peaceful societies through a range of human rights-based actions, including education, culture and media. The increased recognition of the value of intercultural dialogue resulted in the UN International Decade for the Rapprochement of Cultures (2013 – 2022), which is led by UNESCO.

Within the UN-wide system, the shift towards sustaining peace and conflict prevention has placed greater emphasis on the role of culture in peacebuilding frameworks. When UN Member States adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015, the reciprocal links between peace and sustainable development were brought to the fore in building “peaceful, just and inclusive societies which are free from fear and violence”. Sustaining peace and conflict prevention are articulated in SDG 16 that focuses on achieving peaceful and inclusive societies and to significantly reduce all forms of violence and related deaths everywhere. In the following year, the UN twin resolutions on sustaining peace (A/RES/70/262) and (S/RES/2282)  addressing the root causes of conflict defined prevention as the avoidance of “the outbreak, escalation, recurrence, or continuation of conflict”. Peace is more than the absence of war, it is a dynamic process, that requires tools, resources and political will. This task is explored in UNESCO’s 2018 publication “Long Walk of Peace : towards a culture of prevention” , which compiles the experiences of 32 UN bodies and highlights the dynamic reconfiguration of UN peacebuilding from a post-conflict context to a framework of sustaining peace. Responding to crisis rather than investing in prevention generates untenably high human and financial costs. This therefore gives impetus for policymakers at all levels – from local to global – to focus on preventing violent conflict more effectively through culture.

As a critical tool in conflict prevention, education nurtures values of understanding, tolerance and respect. Multicultural and interfaith approaches to education are fundamental, particularly in situations of growing ethnic, linguistic and religious diversity. In the long-term, such approaches help build inclusive societies that are resilient in the face of crisis. Based on principles of solidarity, dialogue and respect for diversity, UNESCO’s Global Citizenship Education programme empowers learners with the skills, values, attitudes and behaviors to shape more peaceful and sustainable societies. Similarly, UNESCO’s intercultural competencies tool “Story Circles” has been piloted in five countries (Thailand, Costa Rica, Zimbabwe, Austria and Tunisia), where it has demonstrated positive results in the inclusion of migrants and dialogue among indigenous peoples.

Likewise, UNESCO is committed to tackling prejudice, racial discrimination and social injustices that have been left in the aftermath of slavery and have long-lasting repercussions on peoples’ identities, inclusion and opportunities. The Slave Route Project, launched in 1994, examines the foundations and consequences of this painful legacy in different regions of the world. Through research, pedagogical materials, conservation of archives, oral traditions and sites of memory, it aims to contribute to a better understanding of the continued impact of this history. The International Decade for People of African Descent (2015-2024) also promotes the fulfilment of all human rights and fundamental freedoms of people of African descent and a greater knowledge of their contribution to humankind.

HomoCosmicos/Getty Images*

Intercultural dialogue is increasingly recognized for its role in preventing conflict. Based on a 2017 UNESCO survey amongst Member States, some 71% of countries have policy frameworks in place on intercultural dialogue. However, gaps remain in how intercultural dialogue can be better supported to tackle culture or identity-based grievances that may be reported as triggers of community tension and conflict and - in the worst case - violence and genocide. UNESCO is working with the Institute for Economics and Peace to develop data to better understand the structures, processes and skills needed to render dialogue effective towards these peace-related outcomes.

In addition to supporting intercultural dialogue, the arts can also provide learners with an open environment to exchange experiences and personal worldviews. In times of crisis, the arts can be a significant source of solace and healing to help cope with trauma and loss. In Bosnia and Herzegovina, interactive theatre has been used as part of human rights-based approaches to boost intercultural competences in schools to fight against hate speech and prejudice. The integration of cultural diversity into curricula has also demonstrated benefits in nurturing intercultural understanding and tolerance. UNESCO’s Art Lab for Human Rights and Dialogue highlights the power of art for memory, rehabilitation and reconciliation. Launched in 2018 in collaboration with the National Theatre of Chaillot (Paris, France), the programme works to mainstream arts to strengthen human rights across development and humanitarian programmes. Last December, Art Lab put forward recommendations for boosting the arts for inclusion and justice.

Inherently connected to the understanding of community, intangible cultural heritage is a vehicle that enables social cohesion, inclusion and a sense of belonging. It helps intergenerational and inter-ethnic communication, fosters respect for the linkage between intangible and material values, and promotes a balanced approach to the use of renewable natural resources, thus strengthening sustainable development. Intangible cultural heritage can also be a basis for resilience, reconciliation and peace. For example, in the village of Conejo in Colombia’s Guajira Department, a UNESCO-funded project led by the Fundación Universidad del Norte from 2018 to 2020 made a difference to the lives of former combatants through their reintegration into civil life and the revitalization of the social fabric, while building on living heritage as a tool for dialogue and reconciliation in this territory affected by the armed conflict. Social agreements for coexistence were established between the two communities (former combatants and the inhabitants of Conejo), which resulted in joint practices, such as a community-based entrepreneurship initiative on rural tourism, and the creation of a community museum.

Indigenous knowledge, in particular, plays a crucial role in establishing dialogue to address conflict and ensure climate and food security. The Los Pinos Declaration [Chapoltepek] – Making a Decade of Action for Indigenous Languages (2022-2032) was the outcome of the high-level closing event of the International Year of indigenous Languages (IYIL2019) held last February in Mexico. The Declaration underscores the value of indigenous languages in peacebuilding processes and in creating better futures for peace, development, justice and reconciliation. UNESCO has been working in conjunction with indigenous pastoralists in Africa to promote peace-building in the context of climate stress and adaptation in the Sahel and East Africa, under the umbrella of the Organization’s Local and Indigenous Knowledge Systems (LINKS) programme. Pastoralists have emphasized that resource conflicts can be eased through understanding indigenous knowledge of weather and climate. Through dialogue with scientists, policy-makers and neighbouring communities there is greater awareness of climate sensitive adaptation.Building on a process that began in 2016, the Expert Mechanism on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples stresses the importance of taking a human rights-based approach to the repatriation of indigenous peoples’ ceremonial objects, human remains and cultural heritage, in recognition of their rights to self-determination, culture, property, spirituality, religion, language and traditional knowledge.

Wayne Quilliam/Canva

Moving forward with a rights-based compass

In a world marked by fracture and tensions, both within and between countries, culture should be harnessed as a crucial component of conflict prevention, building on its “soft power” to address their root causes. At the outset, this entails addressing the appropriation of the memory of the past, and the lingering impacts of colonialism and the Slave Route. Teaching about culture and heritage is also crucial to counter stereotypes and help prevent violent extremism. Moreover, inclusion must remain the touchstone of actions to ensure the participation of all segments of society, including through intergenerational dialogue.

Culture – with its unifying quality and capacity to bring people together – should be integral to peacebuilding efforts. This perspective supports the UN Secretary-General’s reform of the UN system and peacebuilding architecture and the focus shift to conflict prevention and sustaining peace. It also echoes the vision and rationale of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development. The benefits of culture to conflict prevention and resolution processes can be seen in practices ranging from the arts, education and media, to mediation and traditional conflict resolution mechanisms. This approach should be more firmly enshrined in global policy discussions on culture, such as the upcoming Ministerial Conference on Culture to be held under the Italian Presidency of the G20 in July 2021, which is slated to raise this issue.

When conflicts do happen, culture also contributes to easing tensions and supporting reconciliation and trust. As seen in numerous cases, from the Mostar Bridge in Bosnia Herzegovina to Timbuktu in Mali, or currently in Mosul in Iraq, culture represents a unifying force. In doing so, culture-based actions lay down the groundwork to strengthen national unity and reconstruction, and support inclusive, locally-led actions where communities can shape their future societies. For that reason, culture is increasingly taken into account within cultural diplomacy and intercultural dialogue efforts deployed at national, regional or interregional levels, in particular by Member States or regional intergovernmental organizations, both in terms of regional integration and external action, thus signaling that the issue is gaining ground.

Mosul (Iraq)

UNESCO/Moamin Al-Obaidi*

Acknowledging and ensuring the respect of cultural diversity must be central to these peacebuilding efforts. Against a backdrop of broader global trends – such as mobility, urbanization, digitalization and trade flows – cultural diversity should not be viewed as a threat or instrumentalized for divisive purposes. Rather it should be understood and promoted as an asset and as an element of cohesion and stability, and defended as such by countries. Leading up to the 20-year anniversary of the adoption of the 2001 UNESCO Universal Declaration on Cultural Diversity its message still resonates : “respect for the diversity of cultures, tolerance, dialogue and cooperation, in a climate of mutual trust and understanding are among the best guarantees of international peace and security”. In this regard, States have a key role to play in promoting cultural diversity, as guarantors of fundamental rights but also from an educational standpoint.

As a critical condition for cultural diversity to flourish, the protection of cultural rights is central to sustaining peaceful and inclusive societies. The right of access to, participation in and enjoyment of culture is fundamental to peacebuilding efforts. The disturbing escalation of violence ranging from attacks on cultural heritage and cultural minorities to artists and cultural professionals, increasingly call to attention the need to develop and uphold cultural rights as a condition for peace, stability and security. The concepts and, to some extent, the legal provisions provided by the Culture Conventions across different cultural domains can support Member States’ efforts in strengthening national cultural policy frameworks with a view to better protecting cultural rights.

Looking forward, building on the progress made in upholding individual rights, the subject of collective rights – which has garnered increased attention – also requires further policy engagement. The magnitude and urgency of the climate crisis compels a rethinking of policy action based on a stronger recognition of the relationship between people and their environment, and the intrinsic link between cultural and biological diversity. This is not only critical for shaping more sustainable forms of development, but also peace and social cohesion. Protecting cultural rights, including for indigenous peoples, will be critical in this context to foster climate adaptation and mitigation. Expanding policy discussions on cultural rights, including individual and collective rights, and strengthening related policy and legislation options, will therefore be an important area of policy discussion in the coming years and a critical foundation for harnessing the power of culture for peacebuilding and stability.

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Perspective article, building a culture of peace in everyday life with inter- and transdisciplinary perspectives.

• Facultad de Comercio, Administración y Ciencias Sociales, Universidad Autónoma de Tamaulipas, Nuevo Laredo, Mexico

In this article, peace is emphasized as a vital condition for all aspects of our existence, as individuals, as a society, and in our planet. The importance of inter- and transdisciplinarity in promoting a culture of peace and peace education is presented. Some examples of initiatives aimed at cultivating a culture of peace from diverse areas of knowledge are also provided. The paper presents a current and interconnected viewpoint on peace study, as well as some ideas for combining peace with education in the everyday routine of teaching and research work, regardless of discipline.

Introduction

Peace is a global concept that is more relevant than ever in today’s society. It is not simply a concern for countries and governments; it is also a concern for individuals in their relationships with others and with the planet. According to Capistrano (2020) , peace is linked to the harmonious coexistence of individuals in their environment, which depends on principles such as social justice, sustainability, democracy and tolerance. A culture of peace can be fostered and promoted via education not only in large projects but also in everyday life. As stated by Cuéllar (2009) , ordinary life is a key object of philosophical reflection from which “a humanism up to the mark of our time” can be derived, and everyday life is “where we begin to forge ourselves as people, where we can completely fulfill ourselves, in terms of work, production and rest, in married and family life, in the experience of love, freedom and recognition of the other.”

This article highlights the importance of promoting peace education and a culture of peace through inter- and transdisciplinarity. The paper also provides examples of initiatives aimed at fostering a culture of peace from diverse areas of knowledge. Additionally, various concepts for integrating peace with education in everyday life are given, regardless of discipline.

An Imperfect and Everyday Peace

When asked “what is peace?” we tend to define it in terms of the absence of war, warlike conflicts, or discord. Known as a negative conception of peace, this perspective has persisted since ancient times. Conversely, positive peace emphasizes the promotion of values, respect, justice, equity, communication, collaboration, empathy, collaboration, and non-violence. Positive peace desires peace and wellbeing and avoids conflict at all costs. However, this concept appears perfect, utopian, or unattainable. As a result, a new approach termed “imperfect peace” has been developed ( Comins-Mingol, 2002 ). The reason it is imperfect is that we are perpetually reconstructing it; it is a dynamic, continuous, and multifaceted concept. Imperfect peace admits that peace and conflicts coexist. Acosta Oidor et al. (2021) explain that peace and violence are both present in every aspect of daily life and not only in a single field such as politics. Furthermore, they quote that peace is a road and not a state. Imperfect peace alludes to the imperfect nature of every human. The concept of imperfect peace is a productive field on which we can produce from our regular work routine.

Culture of Peace

Culture of peace refers to “lifestyles, belief patterns, values, behaviors, (…) wellbeing, equality, equitable administration of resources, security for individuals and families, (…) non-violence, and harmony” ( Cabello et al., 2016 ). Culture of peace is inclusive and complex because it incorporates knowledge, values, and communication. It also integrates physical, biological, and social aspects. Culture of peace is all-encompassing. Page (2008) defines peace education as “the process of acquiring values, knowledge, attitudes, skills, and behaviors to live in harmony with oneself, others, and the natural environment.” Peace education encompasses personal, social, and planetary dimensions. Thus, can we integrate peace into every facet of our lives? Is it possible to improve coexistence between people to foster a culture of peace? Personally, I believe we may achieve both goals through our daily life activities.

Rationale for Inter- and Transdisciplinarity

Should we continue to foster a culture of peace by focusing on a single discipline or collaborating on several? According to Edgar Morin’s complex thinking ( Morin, 1994 ), our contemporary reality, phenomena, and problems are complex by nature. Complexity entails more than just difficulty; it also signifies that the problems are interconnected in a framework spanning several knowledge domains. Accordingly, to address problems and better comprehend our reality, they must be regarded as interconnected and inseparable in a feedback loop, that is, from a holistic and collaborative perspective of multiple disciplines. For this reason, reductionist perspectives are no longer enough for a pertinent understanding of our reality. In this context, two key elements emerge, namely the integration of diverse specialties and collaborative work, which facilitate inter and transdisciplinary work.

According to the literature, the concept of inter- and transdisciplinarity derives from an advanced and mature level of collaboration between multiple disciplines ( Escobar, 2010 ). First, disciplinarity occurs from specialization in a single area of knowledge. Then, multidisciplinarity emerges when several fields study the same object without interacting with one another. Pluridisciplinarity is the result of uncoordinated collaboration between different areas of knowledge. Finally, inter- and transdisciplinarity are achieved when some methodologies are transferred between disciplines (the former) and when a comprehensive and holistic perspective supports collaborations between disciplines, through them, and beyond them (the latter) ( Klein, 2010 ). In transdisciplinarity, cognitive schemes intersect disciplines. As a result of this advanced level of collaboration, disciplines often face problems, difficulties, or challenges. Transdisciplinarity itself is not an exception; the different approaches to its conceptualization have led to contradictory points of view. For Rigolot (2020) , these contradictions can be surpassed, by considering transdisciplinarity both as a discipline by itself and as a way of being. As a way of being, transdisciplinarity is fully incorporated into the human life and cannot be reduced to professional activities. This vision is compatible with that of Edgar Morin, who fully integrated transdisciplinary work with his personal life experiences ( Rigolot, 2020 ).

Inter- and Transdisciplinary Peace Education

Considering the aforementioned perspectives, effective peace education should be inter- and transdisciplinary. But how can we develop peace education through these approaches? First, embracing a complex conception of reality. In other words, reality should be viewed and understood from a broad perspective to avoid self-serving simplifications that prevent us from collaborating across disciplines. Second, our education should connect key issues such as life, humanity, culture, the planet, complexity, literature, art, philosophy, sustainability, and values regardless of field of knowledge. Third, teaching-learning processes should be adaptable, allowing teachers and students to see each subject as part of a complex whole interconnected through various mediations.

Accordingly, Lappin (2009) explains that it has been well acknowledged that peacebuilding is complex; however, there is a long-standing tendency to address peacebuilding from the point of view of a single discipline. Nicolescu (2012) adds that there is a direct and inexorable link between peace and transdisciplinarity and that any fragmented way of thinking is incompatible with peace research. Hence, education and the university must evolve to welcome a new humanism and adopt transdisciplinarity in their organization and conceptions. Along the same vein, Galtung (2010) asserts that true transdisciplinarity must be present in all aspects of the human condition, as multiple restricted or skewed perspectives will not provide a clear overview or an encompassing understanding of the whole.

Cabello et al. (2016) advocate that peace should be built on “education for justice and freedom; for reconciliation and brotherhood; for critical conscience and solidarity; for integral development and democracy; for the common good and participation; for human rights, and all the values that support and enable a culture of peace.” Acevedo Suárez and Báez Pimiento (2018) explain that educating for peace is inviting to act in the school microcosm and at the macro level of social structures. They conclude that peace education is a necessity that every educational institution must assume. París Albert (2019) exposes that peace education is also a primary tool to achieve the sustainable development goals of the 2030 Agenda; this tool consists of creativity to imagine careful alternatives to face daily situations, as well as situations of injustice, social inequalities, environmental crises, and sustainable development.

Now comes the question of how we can educate for peace in our daily teaching and research work. Some guidelines ( Zurbano Díaz de Cerio, 1999 ) include cultivating values, learning to live with others, facilitating positive experiences, educating in conflict resolution, developing critical thinking, combating violence, educating in tolerance to diversity of dialogue, and rational argumentation. Furthermore, as educators, we must remember that our example is a powerful ally in all educational processes. We can deliver beautiful and eloquent speeches, but it is our everyday example that sows the most seeds of peace in others. We are also educating for peace via our own actions. We, as teachers, may encourage active listening, empathy, depersonalization of conflicts, and respect for limitations and opinions. In this approach, we may take small steps toward strengthening our coexistence and promoting a culture of peace.

Peace education must also be established at all levels, for all ages, and for all people. However, peace education has a significant impact on youth. Peace education is crucial during childhood and youth because the seeds we sow in them when they are young will flourish henceforth and bear fruit in the future for the benefit of our society. For this reason, youth represents both present and future peace and play a key role in peace education.

Currently, several discourses, initiatives, and indicators from different disciplines describe peace education. Many of them, though, remain limited to inert speeches. Peace, on the contrary, requires action ( Jordan et al., 2021 ). We can make peace education a reality in our teaching activities through inter- and transdisciplinary approaches. Teachers can have influence in everyday life by building meaningful relationships between education and research, as well as by consistently implementing curricular and extracurricular activities that foster a culture of peace through formal and non-formal training.

Examples of Peace-Building Initiatives From Institutions, Research, Teaching and Personal Experience

Initiatives aimed at fostering a culture of peace are commonly promoted by institutions, researchers or teachers. For example, the study by Jordan et al. (2021) highlights an institutional peacebuilding initiative at the University of New Mexico School of Engineering and Health Sciences Center, where summit of the World Engineering Education Forum and Global Engineering Deans Council were hosted. The theme was “Peace Engineering” with the focal point of science and engineering-based solutions to the world’s transcendent challenges. The event responded to the urgent need for engineers to reflect, understand, measure, and anticipate the intended and unforeseen implications of their work in a global context. The results of these events comprised establishing academic programs, starting new areas of education, research, and innovation relating to climate change, water, healthcare, food security, ethics, transparency, resilience, sustainability, social equity and diversity, as well as face-to-face and virtual academic events addressing peace, and engineering concerns.

In the research context, the project by Del Río Fernández et al. (2019) attempts to promote peace via the use of plastic and visual languages. The researchers gained this interdisciplinary experience with early childhood education student teachers through photographic exhibitions and mural workshops. They focused on developing respect for the ideas and beliefs of others, improving peaceful community life, and fostering pacific conflict resolution. This project is a clear illustration of how peace can be promoted from a variety of perspectives, such as the plastic arts.

In the teaching field, Miralay (2020) found that according to teachers’ perceptions, the awareness of the culture of peace by students through arts education would promote individual and social peace. They also found that families, school administrators and governmental institutions have an essential role in promoting peace. Also, it was evident that there are deficiencies in the institutions while performing this process. On the other hand, the work of Domínguez and Ordinas (2019) describes the application of a novel methodology to promote socially equitable education in university teaching in courses involving the past and present of relations between human societies and cultures on a global scale. The aim of their work is to use ludic methods instead of traditional methods of study. Their students were encouraged to have a critical, pluralistic, cooperative outlook on the meaning of peace. This pedagogical approach has enriched the way of teaching and generating historical knowledge by using cooperative games in the classroom.

I can present my personal experience with teaching software development. In the classroom I have incorporated agile approaches which recognize that software development has a strong human dimension. Thus, people take precedence over tools ( Beck et al., 2021 ). When these approaches are used in the classroom, students not only learn to program but also to collaborate while also learning to be tolerant. The principles of Egoless Programming ( Waychal and Capretz, 2018 ) are also addressed during the practical lessons to help students understand the importance of good interpersonal relationships when collaborating. These approaches have been incredibly helpful in software development teaching because they strengthen understanding, respect, empathy, tolerance, and collaboration among students. In addition, I have found through quantitative and mixed research approaches that collaborative programming can produce software with better attributes than those of individually developed programs. For example, pair programming has produced elevated levels of acceptance and well-structured programs in our sessions.

Peace and peace research are pertinent needs in our society. As teachers, we must promote peace education and a culture of peace from various angles. However, this is not an exclusive duty of teachers, but also requires the enthusiastic collaboration of institutions, students, parents, families, and communities. In this process, it is important to reflect on the contributions to peace that we can make in our everyday practice. Then, let us promote collaboration, dialogue, respect, active listening, and inclusion, using a cultural vision and living example of our behavior, thereby creating a culture of peace based on values and love in our daily lives as teachers or researchers.

Data Availability Statement

The original contributions presented in the study are included in the article/supplementary material, further inquiries can be directed to the corresponding author/s.

Author Contributions

RR-H: conception, research, writing, editing, revising, and final draft.

Conflict of Interest

The author declares that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher’s Note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Acknowledgments

We thank everyone who contributed to my encounter with the ideas presented in this manuscript. We thank Universidad Autónoma de Tamaulipas for the support provided to carry out this work.

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Keywords : culture of peace, peace, peace education, higher education, interdisciplinarity, transdisciplinarity and interdisciplinarity, transdisciplinary education

Citation: Roque-Hernández RV (2022) Building a Culture of Peace in Everyday Life With Inter- and Transdisciplinary Perspectives. Front. Educ. 7:847968. doi: 10.3389/feduc.2022.847968

Received: 03 January 2022; Accepted: 06 June 2022; Published: 23 June 2022.

Reviewed by:

Copyright © 2022 Roque-Hernández. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY) . The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) and the copyright owner(s) are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

*Correspondence: Ramón Ventura Roque-Hernández, [email protected]

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Fifty Years Later, Andrei Sakharov’s Seminal Essay Is a Powerful Model of Writing for Social Change

By Masha Gessen

The following is adapted from a keynote address delivered on July 22, 2018, at the beginning of the Provincetown Fine Arts Work Center’s week devoted to “writers and artists as activists.” In cases, the author has revised the Times translation of the Russian original and reinstated original emphasis.

We are here to talk about writing for social change. Fifty years ago today, the New York Times devoted three full pages to an essay by the Soviet physicist Andrei Sakharov, who was about to emerge as that country’s leading dissident and one of the world’s most visionary humanitarian thinkers. On Saturday, the Times published an essay about the essay , headlined “The Essay That Helped Bring Down the Soviet Union.” (I think Sakharov might have turned over in his grave at that title, both because he was an almost unimaginably modest man and because he would have found the Cold War framing that birthed the headline objectionable.) In the column about the essay, the Israeli politician and the former dissident Natan Sharansky writes that Sakharov “championed an essential idea at grave risk today: that those of us lucky enough to live in open societies should fight for the freedom of those born into closed ones.” The United States, Sharansky continues, has been retreating from this obligation, and, under Donald Trump , has shirked it altogether. That is indisputably true, as far as it goes, but it doesn’t do the Sakharov essay justice. The essay is a great piece of writing, and a great piece of writing for social change, not only because it is an exercise in thinking in public, on paper, but because it is an invitation to think—and to argue with the author.

Let me quote the end of Sakharov’s essay:

With this article the author addresses the leadership of our country and all its citizens as well as all people of good­will throughout the world. The author is aware of the controversial character of many of his statements. His purpose is open, frank discussion under conditions of publicity.

The essay was called “Thoughts on Progress, Peaceful Coexistence and Intellectual Freedom.” It was written by a forty-seven-year-old man who had spent a decade reconsidering his own life’s work, his world view, and his personal responsibility to humanity. Sakharov was a physicist who, starting in 1948, had played a leading role in developing the Soviet nuclear arsenal. “I never doubted that Soviet superweapons were vitally important for our country, and for maintaining an equilibrium of forces around the world,” he wrote in a different essay. But in 1957 he came to feel personally responsible for the contamination caused by nuclear-weapons testing. He began campaigning for a moratorium on testing. The Soviet Union’s most brilliant young nuclear physicist was, in the course of a few years, transformed into one of the world’s best-qualified crusaders against nuclear testing.

Of course, campaigning in the Soviet Union, a country without a public sphere, was tricky business. Sakharov could campaign precisely because he was integrated into some of the most powerful institutions in the country. He spoke out at top-secret, high-level meetings; he addressed the Soviet leader, Nikita Khrushchev, directly. All of this was fruitless. (An aside: while I was preparing this talk, I came across Sakharov’s recollection of an exchange with Khrushchev, in which the Soviet head of state took credit for the election of John F. Kennedy; according to Sakharov, Khrushchev lamented, “But what’s the damn use of Kennedy when his hands are tied?”)

The more helpless Sakharov felt, the more he seemed to notice how helpless other intellectuals felt to express their views, or to undertake their research. He started speaking out on behalf of geneticists, whose discipline was banned in the Soviet Union. This, in turn, led him to meet dissident thinkers. By 1968, he realized that he was in the process of reconsidering everything he had ever thought about the way the world worked. He began writing “Thoughts on Progress, Peaceful Coexistence and Intellectual Freedom.” He referred to it variously as a book or a brochure—since it was fated to be circulated only in “samizdat,” the underground self-publishing network, it fell outside the standard categories of books and articles—but probably its most important incarnation was in the Times . Following the publication of the essay abroad, Sakharov was stripped of his Soviet titles and honors and demoted far down the academic ladder. Around the same time, he had made the decision to donate all of his savings to the Red Cross and for the construction of a cancer hospital. So now he was also virtually penniless.

Sakharov’s writing process was evolutionary and collaborative. He circulated drafts of his ideas and incorporated feedback. The ideas in this essay were ones he would continue considering for many years to come. When he was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize, in 1975, he wrote a lecture titled “Peace, Progress, and Human Rights,” a much more polished and, in some ways, clearer version of many of the ideas in the earlier piece. (Sakharov was not allowed to travel to Oslo for the ceremony, so the speech was delivered by his wife, Yelena Bonner.) He did not even include the 1968 piece in a collection of his political essays that he put together in the nineteen-eighties; presumably, he believed he had found better iterations of its ideas. But his fifty-year-old essay remains a historic document and an achievement. I want to focus on it in no small part precisely because it contains a lot of raw ideas and uncertainty, and these are two elements that are essential to thinking, good for writing, and very important for the potential for social change.

For the Russian version of the essay, Sakharov chose an epigraph from Goethe (the Times omitted it, or perhaps Sakharov added it to a later version):

He only earns his freedom and his life Who takes them every day by storm

To me, this choice of opening is oddly inspiring, but not because I share the sentiment. In fact, the sentiment is antithetical to the concept of human rights, which holds that people do not have to earn the right to live or the right to be free—these rights are theirs from birth, and no idea of “deservedness” can be applied to them. I don’t think Sakharov believed that people had to earn their lives or their freedom, either. I suspect he chose this epigraph to assert his own right to speak. There is something immodest about sticking one’s neck out and demanding attention to one’s ideas. Sakharov is making the claim that he has the right to speak, the right to think in public, because he is trying to think in the name of freedom. This is a beautiful claim. (It’s also interesting that when Sakharov uses the concept of human rights in this piece, he puts it in quotation marks. Twenty years after the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, it was still a novel enough concept for someone living behind the Iron Curtain.)

Sakharov began by expressing deep anxiety about the future of humanity. “This anxiety is nourished, in particular, by a realization that the scientific method of directing policy, the economy, arts, education and military affairs still has not become a reality,” he wrote. By “scientific,” the scientist explained, he meant a method rooted in facts and based in analysis. Today, those of us who are deeply anxious about the future of humanity may not choose to use the word “scientific,” but we are similarly lamenting a lack of regard for facts, the loss of a shared sense of reality, and the absence of transparency in politics.

“The division of humankind threatens it with destruction,” Sakharov wrote. This was the height of the arms race, during the Cold War and the Vietnam War; Sakharov wrote specifically about the threat to humanity posed by the Vietnam War.

In the face of these perils, any action increasing the division of humankind, any preaching of the incompatibility of world ideologies and nations is madness and a crime. Only universal coöperation under conditions of intellectual freedom and the lofty moral ideals of socialism and labor, accompanied by the elimination of dogmatism and pressures of the concealed interests of ruling classes, will preserve civilization.

In a footnote, he reminded the reader that what he said did not mean that there could be compromise, rapprochement, or any kind of peace with racist, fascist, militaristic, Maoist, and other extremist ideologies. The Times incorporated the footnote in the body of the text. I don’t know whether this decision was based on “house style”—most newspapers reject the possibility of a footnote—or on other considerations. But incorporating the note in the text had the effect of flattening Sakharov’s attempt to create an intellectual hierarchy between peace that is desired and peace that is nonetheless morally untenable. Placing these paragraphs on the page one after the other made it, perhaps, easier for readers to hold the two contradictory thoughts at the same time. It also served to encourage passivity: if possibility and impossibility are weighted equally, your inaction is excused. Sakharov’s approach demanded that you do the impossible: create peace where compromise is immoral.

Sakharov went on to enumerate the threats to humanity. First among them was the threat of nuclear war. He acknowledged that nuclear parity between the U.S.S.R. and the U.S. serves as a sort of deterrent, though clearly not enough of one to alleviate his anxiety. Fifty years later, we can no longer make the same statement about nuclear parity with respect to, say, the United States and North Korea. Yet our anxiety seems to have dissipated, perhaps simply because we have spent half a century with the knowledge that the world is capable of imminent suicide. Even over the roughly six months when Donald Trump was actively goading Kim Jong Un into nuclear war, we found other controversies to focus on. Sakharov wrote:

Every rational creature, finding itself on the brink of a disaster, first tries to get away from the brink and only then does it think about the satisfaction of its other needs. If humanity is to get away from the brink, it must overcome its divisions . A vital step would be a review of the traditional method of international affairs, which may be termed “empirical-competitive.” In the simplest definition, this is a method aiming at maximum improvement of one’s position everywhere possible and, simultaneously, a method of causing maximum unpleasantness to opposing forces without consideration of common welfare and common interests. If politics were a game of two gamblers, then this would be the only possible method.

Indeed, this still seems like the only possible method for most teachers and students of international relations and diplomacy, for political analysts and journalists. When we analyze Trump’s meeting with Putin, we talk about which one of them won. (I am guilty of this kind of commentary as well.) We almost always neglect to note that humanity lost. Moreover, humanity would have lost regardless of which one of them won (though the extent of the loss would have been different). Fifty years ago, Sakharov was arguing that as long as international politics are framed as a zero-sum game, humanity is imperilled. If politics is the process of finding evolving agreement on how people live together, then Sakharov was arguing for a truly political approach to understanding international relations, where success would be measured by whether the planet became a better place for all its inhabitants.

One of the things that made Sakharov a great thinker was his capacity for moral critique, which was all the more extraordinary if you consider how isolated he was, how little access he had to news or scholarship from outside the Soviet Union. Even more remarkable was his capacity for hope and vision. Here is how he was trying to imagine a new global politics: “International affairs must be completely permeated with scientific methodology and a democratic spirit, with a fearless weighing of all facts, views, and theories, with maximum publicity of ultimate and intermediate goals, and with a consistency of principles.”

What might that look like? At the end of the essay, Sakharov took a stab at a forecast. He was beginning to develop his concept of “convergence,” a gradual coming together of the socialist and capitalist systems. (Like most people who grew up in the Soviet Union, Sakharov was more likely to speak about the competition of two different economic systems rather than two competing ideologies or two political systems.) In the best possible scenario, he wrote, “Convergence will reduce differences in social structure, promote intellectual freedom, science, and economic progress, and lead to the creation of a world government and the smoothing of national contradictions.”

In this best possible of all worlds, Sakharov imagined that this coming together would occur between 1980 and 2000. He was well aware that he was calling for a psychological revolution, a moral one. And, though he was writing for citizens of the world, but counting only on being read by the few hundred or few thousand regular consumers of samizdat, he included a radical prescription for the American public. It came in the section on another threat to humanity: world hunger and overpopulation. He wrote:

At this time, the white citizens of the United States are unwilling to accept even minimum sacrifices to eliminate the unequal economic and cultural position of the country’s black citizens, who make up 10 per cent of the population. It is necessary to change the psychology of the American citizens so that they will voluntarily and generously support their government and worldwide efforts to change the economy, technology and level of living of billions of people. This, of course, would entail a serious decline in the United States rate of economic growth. The Americans should be willing to do this, solely for the sake of lofty and distant goals, for the sake of preserving civilization and humankind on our planet.

Sakharov saw clear parallels between the economic inequalities in the Soviet Union and the United States. In both societies, he estimated, the top five per cent enjoyed extraordinary privilege while a far larger group—his estimates were twenty-five per cent for the U.S. and forty per cent for the U.S.S.R.—lived in poverty. His greater concern, however, was with the inequality between countries. He proposed a twenty-per-cent tax on the gross national product of developed countries for a period of fifteen years. He imagined that this money could be used to help developing countries and have a healing effect on their politics while also “automatically” lowering the amount that developed countries spent on defense.

From behind the Iron Curtain, Sakharov saw the role of American racism in exacerbating the plight of the poor people of the world. Fifty years later, his observation is no less relevant. The U.S. has never been further from achieving a moral consensus that would compel its wealthier citizens, or its white citizens, to contribute in thought, deed, or gold to the welfare of humankind globally.

Sakharov could not have foreseen a new kind of coming together of cultures. Take, for example, Mariia Butina , a Russian woman who was recently arrested on suspicion of acting as a Russian agent. Her links to virulently racist and homophobic political circles in the U.S. have been interpreted as an expression of Russian influence on that politics. Just a few years ago, observers of these politics generally favored the opposite narrative: that American fundamentalists and other extreme social conservatives, having apparently lost their foothold in the U.S., were exporting their politics to Russia and elsewhere. The facts are less neat and more painful: there is a sincere meeting of the minds between American and Russian white supremacists, and this meeting of the minds has fostered an international movement in opposition to everything Sakharov was advocating. This movement—which traffics in white hysteria and fights so-called gender ideology and, of course, the queers—is a rare example of convergence in our world today, and the very opposite of what Sakharov envisioned.

Just as Putin has done in Russia, Trump and the Republican Party have used white demographic panic in the U.S. to shore up their power. That gets me to another threat to humanity that concerned Sakharov in this essay. He addressed the danger of cultural “dumbing down.” (The Times translation did not use this term, but I believe it’s closest to the Russian original.) He wrote:

Nothing threatens individual freedom and the meaning of life like war, poverty, terror. But there are also indirect and only slightly more remote dangers. One of these is the stupefaction of man . . . by mass culture with its intentional or commercially motivated lowering of intellectual level and content, with its stress on entertainment or utilitarianism, and with its carefully protective censorship.

Again, Sakharov was making the point that different threats, typical of different societies, were not equal in scale but posed similar dangers. While a police dictatorship may damage and even destroy people’s ability to think, a consumerist society can lull them into the same state. These words read as prescient in a time when Russia is run by what used to be its secret police, while the U.S. is headed by a reality-TV star. Many of the people who are dismayed by this President fall into the trap of increasingly reductionist rhetoric. Last week, for example, we saw the word “treason” become central to what passes for political conversation. While that turn in the debate reflects genuine concerns about what may prove to be actual crimes, it also represents yet another turn away from complexity.

It is also as far as possible from Sakharov’s vision of a global politics. When Sakharov wrote about totalitarian leaders, he accused them of a “combination of crime, narrow-mindedness and short-sightedness.” Consider the meaning of thinking about these acts and traits in combination: crime, narrow-mindedness, and short-sightedness go together and become one another. Crime is a rejection of laws—the product of the political process. The refusal to think broadly or imagine the future is a rejection of politics itself. Blatant disregard for future generations is an attitudinal trait that unites Trump, Putin, and many of today’s other dictators. Sakharov’s thinking here echoes Hannah Arendt’s concept of the “banality of evil,” which focussed on the willful rejection of thought and depth.

And yet he saw hope. A section in the essay titled “The Basis for Hope” began with the concept of “moral attractiveness.” Many of the specifics in Sakharov’s plan are no longer relevant: he was trying to deal with overcoming the contradictions between what then seemed like two competing economic and intellectual systems in the U.S. and the Soviet Union. But his larger concept seems as essential and as remote as it did fifty years ago: humanity needed to achieve a moral consensus that would enable people to live in peace, with ever less regard for borders. Each nation, and most human beings, would come to see their own investment in the survival of the other.

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War No More: Using Education to Advance Peaceful Coexistence

The Preamble to the United Nations Charter states: “We the peoples of the United Nations, determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war…” This lofty goal was quickly thwarted by new wars, some of which continue to this day. Is “War No More” an idealist’s fantasy or a dream deferred?

On 28 February people of all ages gathered in the Trusteeship Council at United Nations Headquarters in New York for the 2020 Committee on Teaching about the United Nations (CTAUN) conference eager to learn about the role of transformative education in advancing the possibilities for peace at home, in the neighborhood, and throughout the world. The conference was co-sponsored by the Mission of the Republic of Korea and speakers included 2011 Nobel Peace Prize Laureate Leymah Gbowee, feminist organizer and author Gloria Steinem, and president of Intercultural Virtual Exchange of Classroom Activities Eunhee Jung, UN Under-Secretary-General for Disarmament Affairs Izumi Nakamitsu, and the Permanent Representative of Liechtenstein to the United Nations, Christian Wenaweser, among others. The Faculty Excellence in Education Award and the Student Poster Competition Awards were also presented.

Cora Weiss, President of the Hague Appeal for Peace, in her final remarks rebutted the claim that as long as there are people there will be war. She underscored the numerous alternatives to conflict, including full participation and mediation, and the need for education to prepare future generations for peaceful co-existence. She noted that the climate crisis and the availability of nuclear weapons are issues that could lead to war but that can be addressed through other means.

Ms. Weiss and other speakers presented ideas and examples of education and schooling to advance peaceful alternatives. They discussed the importance of ethics in examining laws and standards of morality, and of distinguishing between and among the responses to tragedy: sympathy, empathy, and compassion – the last combining emotion with action.

Transformative education liberates individuals from their provincial origins, whether in the Bronx or the Balkans. This is an education that frees people from thinking only about what they are told to think; they have the freedom to think on their own. The liberated student not only advances in knowledge, skills, abilities, and values but also learns to reflect, to listen fully, to consider alternatives and consequences, and to continue learning on his or her own.

Peace is not simply the absence of conflict; it includes the active participation of all men, women, and children in living in harmony with each other and the earth. Peace requires respect for all individuals and the belief that everyone is deserving of equal treatment and should not be seen as “others”.

The conference speakers emphasized that peace is a process that requires intentions, i.e., design, as well as solutions. As with everything worthwhile, peace also requires an investment. Yet the United States as an example spends as much each year on nuclear weapons alone, about 7 percent of the defense budget, as it spends on international aid.

In all too many cases, it seems that we do not think through the possible consequences of actions and then must use extraordinary means to correct our mistakes. With advances in the weapons of war, we must learn to anticipate so that we do not annihilate.

Thoughts of peace are not naïve; nor must peace be a dream deferred. The 2020 CTAUN conference showed the way forward.

Robert A. Scott, President Emeritus and University Professor Emeritus, Adelphi University, contributed this article.

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Cultural Perspectives on Peace and Social Harmony in South Asia

2020, Cultural Perspectives on Peace and Social Harmony in South Asia

The article looks into the shared traditions and cultural characteristics, including the idea of composite heritage, among apparently different cultures to serve as an instrument of sustaining or building peace (after conflict) in South Asian States ie Pakistan, Bangladesh and India.

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Emmanuel S Dandaura

This paper discusses the role of traditional rulers and local government authorities in the promotion of peace and national security particularly within the global template of growing rate of terrorism.

Zhu, Y. and Logan, W. (2022), "Guest editorial: Heritage interpretation, conflict and reconciliation in East Asia", Journal of Cultural Heritage Management and Sustainable Development, Vol. 12 No. 1, pp. 1-4.

Yujie Zhu , William Logan

Heritage and sites of memory play a fundamental part in the way national narratives are formed and articulated, both internally for the citizens of a state and for the people and their governments in other states. This special issue focuses on the latter, extra-territorial role of heritage and sites of memory, using examples from the East Asian region which may be taken as a microcosm of wider world problems, processes and policies. The papers show how heritage and sites of memory may serve constructively, on the one hand, as powerful tools of dialogue between nations, informing relationships and highlighting points of agreement and difference. But, on the other hand, they can also be used to exacerbate and legitimate international frictions. The papers not only focus on the power that nation states have to remember and forget, interpret and reinterpret the past in order to fulfil their various political and diplomatic goals, they also explore the ways in which cultural policies have been or might be formulated to manage international tensions flowing out of past conflicts and to achieve more harmonious futures.

Rana P.B. SINGH

Heritage is a cultural identity to be reflected in the purview of individual, unique and multiple layers of pluralism, especially with respect to religion, at least in Oriental cultures that maintained their traditions and continuity together with examples of contestation, destruction and also sometimes harmonious co-existence. In the span of time the layering of various cultures put their marks, which in the sequence of time turn to be the issue of conflicts due to claims and controls by the different groups. As a consequence there resulted issues of representation, belongingness, control and power, dissonance and contestation. Despite all theoretic constructs and human concerns for peace and harmony the issue of dissonance dominates, especially with reference to ethnicities and religion. The religious built environments are the pitiful sufferers in such happenings of turmoil recorded every parts of the world. In South Asia the Muslim invasion in medieval period (15th to 18th centuries) had been the major force and process for destruction and superimposing Islamic structure, like in case of major sacred cities of Hindus in north India. In the areas of old culture one finds heritagescapes that are subject to ‘ill construction and jumbled space’ where ‘several sites appear incompatibly’. The conflicts between secularist democracy and democratic religiosity are the common phenomena in South Asian region. So on, conflicts between archaeological sites or monuments and lived cultural heritage. It may be accepted rationally that if the two communities, Hindus and Muslims, are ready not to heap defeat and humiliation with an aim to re-establish the history of the medieval times, the issues can be resolved amicably. This essay reviews the emerging literature dealing with the enduring role and context of religion in the issue of contesting heritage (mostly cultural). Emphasis is further laid on the contextual constructs of analysis, examples from different parts of Southern Asia, and finally role of religion in policies, mitigation and management of contesting heritage.

Jimmy Marcos Immanuel

Dr. Rimli Basu

Gustav Wollentz

Linguistics and Culture Review

Surachai Phutchu

This research paper is qualitative research, and the objectives are as follows: 1) To study the context of the community and society Political Culture and economy that facilitate coexistence 2) To study the factors contributing to coexistence and peace based on diversity in a multicultural society. Data was collected by gathering them from relevant documents, In-depth interviews with informants, small group chat, and participatory observation. The groups that provide information consists of community leaders, religious leaders, ethnic leader’s expert and the villagers, totalling 39 people. The researcher found out that: The social community context has strong relationships between networks. In terms of governance, there is a decentralized government to divide the government into a community worthwhile. Common village rules in terms of culture, beliefs, traditions, and rituals are inherited from ancestors and economic aspects, the concept of sufficiency economy is applied to the pr...

The basis of religious and cultural dialogue and mutual understanding are to foster peaceful relations among nations and peoples. Religion must actively serve the purpose of peace and religion and cultural peace complement economic peace and political peace. Traditionally many people focus on how wars and conflicts are seemingly undertaken for religious reasons, or at least undertaken in the name of religion. Following UNESCO's lead in holding two conferences on "The Contributions of Religions to a Culture of Peace" (both held in Barcelona, Spain, in April 1993 and December 1994), -this paper will focus instead on how religious and spiritual traditions can contribute to promote culture of peace and create a more peaceful world. The paper will force to disclose the conceptual framework and inter-relation among religion, culture and peace through three important components.

emolot allan david

Religion and culture have throughout history been at the forefront of positive social change that is meant to create an atmosphere of peace, harmony, and happiness for humanity. Religion and culture are two but also ONE. Religion might be defined as an organised collection of beliefs and world views that relate to humanity to an order of existence that explains purpose and destiny. Culture, on the other hand, might be defined as the sum total of ways of living built up by a group of people, which is passed on from one generation to another. This being the case, both religion and culture, directly or indirectly, singly or together, inevitably impact people’s self-perception and self-identity. The two, religion and culture, while influencing people’s identity, play a big role in determining what people view as effective means to attain meaning, harmony and happiness. By their definitions, both religion and peace operate at the forefront of the peace building project. Peace building here refers to elimination of conflict and creating institutional practices that ensure social stability and prevent eruption of new conflicts. Aware of the unmanageable breadth of this topic and considering the intended purpose of this paper, every effort will be made to briefly examine the positive and negative roles played by religion and culture in peace building. The inspiration of writing this paper came from my travel to Rwanda with the Guild Government however for the most part, the discussion will be limited to the Ugandan context. A conclusion drawn from the discussion will lead to a critical look at the role of religion and peace. This critical view will purposefully be presented in question form in order to invite the audience to join the discussion.

Cultural Diversity in Malaysia and The Reconciliation for Integration

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The clash between Hindu and Islam keeps them apart, but relatively Malaysia displays a moderate and tolerant model for both believers to live together and respect the mosque and the temple's existence. The embedded Islam and the influence of Hinduism in the past resulted in the fusion of cultural mosaic that knits society. However, a few social deficits are stable tensions that may turn into conflict if they are ill-managed. Thus, the need to create and recreate a platform of integration is essential. The idea of preserving the cultural heritage, including the mosques and temples, the freedom to practice, and other fundamental rights protected by the Constitution, nurture the self-attachment feelings. This article applies a qualitative analysis using secondary data for historical narratives to discuss the social cohesion and reconciliation concepts about the cultural mosaic between Hinduism and Islam. In sum, the Federal Constitution, religious festivals, foods, and places are reconciliation processes to bridge the social cohesion gaps in a multiethnic society, packaged in tourism industries yet politically contested.

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Tolerance and Respect for Cultural Differences Essay

Introduction, organization of the essay, tolerance and respect in relation to cultural diversities, reasons why tolerance and respect solve societal challenges, recommendations and conclusion, works cited, background information.

Conflict is the most common form of challenge facing the human population today. An in-depth analysis of interactions between people from different backgrounds reveals that the said conflict is as a result of societal diversities. The diversities include differences in, among others, social status, race, affiliations to ethnic groups, and political beliefs. According to Agius and Ambrosewicz (1), the diversities in any given society are brought about by cultural variations.

In this essay, the author seeks to provide a solution for these conflicts in a bid to promote peaceful coexistence among people from different cultural and social backgrounds.

Thesis Statement

Tolerance and respect help to reduce conflicts in multicultural societies .

Most contemporary societies are characterized by cultural diversities. The differences are increased by globalization, where physical and geographical borders have reduced and movement of people increased. Tolerance and respect for these diversities is the only way through which people from different backgrounds can live peacefully. The author of this paper bases their arguments on the sentiments held by Basso (7). Basso provides solutions on how to deal with diversity in a society. The author relies on Basso to support the thesis statement in light of the readings specified for this course. A number of factors that support tolerance and respect for diversity are clearly outlined in this essay. In addition, the author of this essay illustrates how the said respect and tolerance can be realized.

The essay is divided into three major sections. The first section constitutes the introduction where an overview of the essay is outlined. The second section is made up of the body of the essay. The definition of terms, position of the author on the subject matter, and justifications for the arguments made is contained in this section. The author concludes the essay in the third section by revisiting the thesis statement and highlighting the various approaches used to develop attitudes that promote respect and tolerance. The conclusion borrows heavily from the course readings as outlined by Basso (4).

Definition of Terms

Tolerance draws its philosophical meanings from the accommodation of divergent behaviors in a given society. Agius and Ambrosewicz (11) argue that this concept can be regarded as the formula required for the peaceful coexistence of a socially and culturally divergent people. The two scholars point out that diversity in a society can be brought about by many factors. For instance, the society today is characterized by individuals from various ethnic backgrounds. Such individuals come together to form groups that exhibit diversities with regards to race and ethnicity. Religion is also another reason that brings about divergence in a society.

For example, the American society is made up of people from Christian, Muslim, Hindu, and other religious groups. Tolerance can be viewed as the adhesive that holds people together and helps them to live harmoniously despite their cultural differences. It averts conflicts, which may lead to societal disintegration. Conflicts consume a lot of resources that could have been used to promote the society economically and socially. For example, money, time, and human resources are used to resolve disagreements that arise among people in the society.

Tolerance is closely related to the concept of universal equality. Agius and Ambrosewicz (11) argue that a single group in a society can claim superiority over others. For example, the whites can hold the opinion that they are superior to blacks, Hispanics, and other minority groups. Tolerance comes in to address these issues. It promotes the acceptance of other people’s rights to exist regardless of the cultural differences. Basso uses the narrative Number Our Days to illustrate this notion.

Respect and cultural diversity

Respect refers to the way an individual regards other people in the society. In the opinions of Agius and Ambrosewicz (17), this concept is considered as the conduct of an individual with regards to the ethical traits of another person or group. In the matrix of a multicultural society, there are bound to be differences in behavior owing to varying cultural backgrounds. Under such circumstances, respect is seen as the manner in which one party in the society treats their counterparts. It overlooks the biases that would result from the diversity in the community.

Respect and Tolerance

From the definitions provided above, it is evident that the two terms are closely related, especially with regards to cultural diversity. Agius and Ambrosewicz (19) argue that tolerance results from the respect that an individual has towards the diversities evident in the society. Similarly, respect relies on the understanding that people are entitled to their behaviors. The author of this essay relies on this relationship to make arguments in support of development of attitudes that enhance respect and tolerance for diversity.

Solving Societal Challenges in Light of Cultural Diversities

In the previous sections of this essay, the author suggested that attitudes that promote respect and tolerance can solve many of the challenges threatening cohesion and coexistence in the society. As envisaged by Agius and Ambrosewicz (12), conflict is the most common challenge facing a multicultural civilization. The central argument in this essay agrees with the notion that the attitudes supporting respect and tolerance go a long way in solving societal problems, including conflicts. In this regard, several cases of intolerance and disrespect are examined to outline their negative impacts on the society.

A multicultural civilization can be regarded as one that is defined by the existence of people from different racial and cultural backgrounds. By virtue of their ethnic diversity, the individuals are likely to hold clashing schools of thought. For example, the natives may hold religious and political views that are different from those promoted by the whites. The variations are likely to create frictions between these two groups. The demographics of the various racial and ethnic groups vary. In light of these demographics, the dominant group tends to feel superior to the minority class. Agius and Ambrosewicz (13) give an example of racial profiling in Europe and America, some of the most advanced nations in the civilized world. Caucasians are the dominant race in these two societies. As a result, people from other races have received prejudicial treatment in these communities.

Racism is one of the major effects of ethnic diversities in a society. The phenomenon is brought about by the perception that Caucasians are superior to other races, such as the blacks and Hispanics. The act is a classic example of disrespect and intolerance with regards to diversity (Basso 29). Based on the definition of tolerance, it is evident that intolerance is the direct opposite of this concept. A group of people may consider others as unworthy of certain privileges. An example of such kind of intolerance exhibited itself in America where African Americans were denied several rights owing to the color of their skin. The result was a bloody struggle for freedom.

History is replete with several accounts and cases where tolerance and respect for diversity provided solutions to many conflicts. Agius and Ambrosewicz (21) make reference to the gradual decline of sexism. For a long time, most societies believed that men were superior to women. Religions like Christianity and Islam had doctrines that suggested women were inferior to men. Consequently, women were denied certain rights. For instance, in Europe, women were not allowed to vote. However, through dialogue and respect for equality, the group was eventually allowed to exercise this right.

Discrimination is often a manifestation of intolerance and disrespect. Societies that do not embrace tolerance are torn apart by conflicts (Basso 43). Racism and sexism are some of the attitudes that have changed significantly over the years. The shifts in attitudes have led to various changes in the society. For instance, it is now common for an African American to take a Caucasian woman for a wife without societal uproar. Such are the ‘attitudinal’ changes that made it possible for the United States of America to elect a black president for two terms.

The peaceful coexistence between people from different backgrounds is better than conflict. In their analysis of tolerance, Agius and Ambrosewicz (11) argue that conflict is resolved by changes in attitude. The two argue that human existence can be traced back to more than 3000 years ago. However, societies have spent more time in conflicts than in actual peaceful coexistence. That notwithstanding, many of the conflicts were resolved with the help of dialogues. In The Spirit Catches You , Basso (45) suggests that dialogue is an attribute of respect towards others.

As a societal challenge, conflict is not attractive. The many wars experienced in the past support this assertion by Agius and Ambrosewicz (4). It is expensive for a society to comfortably enjoy life amidst conflicts. During was, for instance, basic amenities become scarce. To achieve these social amenities, peaceful coexistence is a requirement. A look at attitudinal shifts reveals that very few resources are spent to achieve coexistence. As such, attitudes that enhance respect and tolerance are inexpensive ways of resolving conflicts.

Another reason why these attitudes are a solution to societal challenges is the importance of peaceful coexistence. Agius and Ambrosewicz (18) argue that an increase in the size of global population highlights the need for coexistence. Land is not increasing. It remains static as population size rises. As such, it is important for people to coexist in harmony. Through tolerance, people are able to appreciate their diversity and share the available resources without bias. However, in the absence of tolerance and respect, chaos would reign and nobody stands to benefit. Basso (45) makes a similar assertion in the narrative The Spirit Catches You.

Recommendations

The discussions in this essay have expounded on the challenges facing humanity. The illustrations about the negative effects of conflict have made it necessary to address attitudinal changes in the society. Agius and Ambrosewicz (23) argue that tolerance and respect are the responses needed to address the problems associated with multicultural societies. Globalization comes with diversities, making it necessary for people to adjust their attitudes. In light of this, the report makes the following recommendations:

Future generations require peace if they are to enjoy their life. The thesis statement envisages tolerance and respect as the key to ending conflict. Education can be used to promote tolerance and respect (Agius and Ambrosewicz 23). People should be taught about the importance of equality. A comprehensive form of education is needed to help the public understand the benefits of diversity. The education should be viewed as beneficial, not as a threat.

Legislation

The author of this essay finds that intolerance may be brought about by legal loopholes. It is important for societies to ensure that intolerance and disrespect are treated as crimes. According to Agius and Ambrosewicz (24), punitive measures are important in phasing out criminal activities. As such, if intolerance and disrespect are criminalized, individuals may begin to appreciate each others’ diversity.

Conflict is one of the problems facing people in a multicultural society. Depending on the background of different individuals, biases are bound to occur when there are divergences in terms of culture (Basso 47). Tolerance and respect are attitudes that can help people appreciate their diversity. Rather than viewing people from different cultures as threats, tolerance and respect helps to illustrate the benefits of the same. Diversity in a multicultural society has a lot of benefits. However, the only way to exploit these benefits is by allowing tolerance and respect to thrive.

Agius, Emmanuel, and Jolanta Ambrosewicz. Towards a Culture of Tolerance and Peace, Montreal: International Bureau for Children Rights, 2003. Print.

Basso, Keith 1984, Course on Language and Thought in Native American Cultures , Yale University, School of Social Sciences. Print.

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IvyPanda. (2024, January 7). Tolerance and Respect for Cultural Differences. https://ivypanda.com/essays/tolerance-and-respect-for-cultural-differences/

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IvyPanda . (2024) 'Tolerance and Respect for Cultural Differences'. 7 January.

IvyPanda . 2024. "Tolerance and Respect for Cultural Differences." January 7, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/tolerance-and-respect-for-cultural-differences/.

1. IvyPanda . "Tolerance and Respect for Cultural Differences." January 7, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/tolerance-and-respect-for-cultural-differences/.

Bibliography

IvyPanda . "Tolerance and Respect for Cultural Differences." January 7, 2024. https://ivypanda.com/essays/tolerance-and-respect-for-cultural-differences/.

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Violent armed conflicts such as civil war, violent extremism, and political violence are significant challenges to peace and security in Africa and a major setback to Africa’s aspirations for peaceful and prosperous societies in 2063. Armed conflict thrives and escalates particularly in fragile or deeply divided societies. Building peace in fragile and post-conflict contexts therefore requires a variety of measures and strategies to strengthen societal capacities to manage diversity and divisions in order to pursue sustainable peace and development and address the underlying conditions that lead to conflict or conflict relapse. Current approaches to building peace in Africa have been inadequate and have equally struggled to ‘silence the guns by 2020’. Against this background, this chapter examines three inter-related approaches; coexistence, reconciliation, and social cohesion as strategies to achieve peace and security in Africa. Drawing from the examination of these three inter-related approaches, the chapter then and in the process provides concrete recommendations for decision-makers and policymakers. The chapter argues that strengthening social cohesion should be an integral part of peacebuilding because reconciliation and social cohesion combined with strong state–society relations is key to building lasting peace in Africa.

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Machina, I.M., Cheri, L. (2022). Promoting Peace and Reconciliation in Africa. In: Kuwali, D. (eds) The Palgrave Handbook of Sustainable Peace and Security in Africa. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-82020-6_28

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Beyond Intractability

The Hyper-Polarization Challenge to the Conflict Resolution Field: A Joint BI/CRQ Discussion BI and the Conflict Resolution Quarterly invite you to participate in an online exploration of what those with conflict and peacebuilding expertise can do to help defend liberal democracies and encourage them live up to their ideals.

Follow BI and the Hyper-Polarization Discussion on BI's New Substack Newsletter .

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By Angela Nyawira Khaminwa

Originally published in July 2003, Current Implications added by Heidi Burgess in December, 2019

See also our " Things YOU Can Do To Help" article on Coexistence  and the  Coexistence Infographic .

Current Implications

When Angela wrote this essay in 2003, she and the peace and conflict field were primarily framing "coexistence" in terms of recovery from war or other violent conflict.  Living now in the United States in 2019, it is clear that the same ideas are sorely needed to recover from our largely non-violent, but extremely destructive racial, gender, and political conflicts that are tearing the U.S. (and other developed democracies) apart.   More...

Coexistence is a state in which two or more groups are living together while respecting their differences and resolving their conflicts nonviolently. Although the idea of coexistence is not new, the term came into common usage during the Cold War. The policy of 'peaceful coexistence' was used in the context of U.S. and U.S.S.R. relations. Initially, it was a cover for aggression, but then it developed as a tool for reframing the relationship between the two powers. In the late '80s, the policy of peaceful coexistence included principles such as "nonaggression, respect for sovereignty, national independence, and noninterference in internal affairs."[1]

Coexistence has been defined in numerous ways:

• To exist together (in time or place) and to exist in mutual tolerance .[2]
• To learn to recognize and live with difference.[3]
• To have a relationship between persons or groups in which none of the parties is trying to destroy the other.[4]
• To interact with a commitment to tolerance, mutual respect, and the agreement to settle conflicts without recourse to violence.[5]

At the core of coexistence is the awareness that individuals and groups differ in numerous ways including class, ethnicity, religion, gender, and political inclination. These group identities may be the causes of conflicts, contribute to the causes of conflicts, or may be solidified as conflicts develop and escalate. A policy of coexistence, however, diminishes the likelihood that identity group differences will escalate into a damaging or intractable conflict.

Coexistence and Conflict

Conflict is ubiquitous and occurs at the individual, community, institutional, and national levels. Many conflicts are localized and expressed nonviolently. In fact, conflict can be constructive and in many instances it is fundamental to social change.[6] However, conflict that is widespread and expressed destructively or even violently appears to have increased over recent decades, impelling the global community to examine the root causes of conflicts and analyze conflict theory and management in greater detail. While times of coexistence do not exclude conflict, they do exclude widespread violence and acts intended to psychologically, socially, economically, or politically, destroy the other side(s).

The Coexistence Continuum

Coexistence exists before and after destructive or violent conflict. However, it is not static. Like all social environments, it fluctuates, depending on the level of social interaction. Coexistence exists in situations where individuals and communities actively accept and embrace diversity (active coexistence) and where individuals and communities merely tolerate other groups (passive coexistence). Communities that are not experiencing destructive or violent conflict can be located anywhere within this range.

Passive coexistence. This type of coexistence occurs where relationships are characterized by unequal power relationships , little inter-group contact, and little equity. In short, the principles of social justice are not apparent here. While this type of environment may lack violence, the continuation of unequal relationships is unlikely to lead to the resolution of conflict.[7] Institutions in this environment are not designed to support equality; consequently unjust and oppressive structures can be maintained. These structures often impede community growth, peace processes, and the development of democracy. Yet since inter-group conflict is not widespread, the groups can still be said to coexist without violence.

Active coexistence. In this type of coexistence, relationships are characterized by a recognition and respect for diversity and an active embrace of difference, equal access to resources and opportunities, and equity in all aspects of life. This type of coexistence fosters peace and social cohesion based on justice, equality, inclusion, and equity. In addition, institutions in this environment are designed to ensure fairness.

The Value of Coexistence

Finding peace in the whirlwind of war or non-violent, but highly destructive conflict is a difficult and sometimes impossible task: "... the continuation of killings that accompany wars tends to perpetuate hatreds and stimulate vengefulness, thus fueling the continuation of the conflict. Such emotions not only hinder efforts to settle the conflict, but produce conditions that make the renewal of war more possible."[8]

A state of coexistence provides psychological and physical conditions for individuals, organizations, and/or communities to reduce tensions, and for peacemakers to attempt to resolve the causes of the conflict. This period of nonviolence is especially useful post-war, as it provides an environment in which the causes of conflict can be addressed and peace can be envisioned, negotiated, and achieved. "The onset of a coexistence era allows common interests (such as economic ones) to emerge among the antagonists, giving both parties a strong stake in making the temporary stage a permanent one. It is this ongoing dynamic that ... makes the concept of coexistence a particularly useful one in the resolution of intractable ethnic conflicts."[9]

Coexistence in Many Contexts

While much of the scholarly writing on coexistence has focused mainly on international conflicts, its basic tenets -- recognizing diversity, the worth of the 'Other,' and nonviolence -- are applicable in other contexts. In fact, mediation at all levels (for example, interpersonal, organizational, and community) fosters coexistence as mediators encourage resolution and promote "the parties' mutual recognition of each other as fellow human beings despite their conflict."[10]

Getting to Coexistence

Coexistence work is that which brings individuals, communities, and/or nations away from violence and destructive conflict and towards social cohesion (see table below). This includes efforts that aim to address past wrongs, search for justice and forgiveness, build/rebuild communities, and explore ways for community structures and systems to embody fairness, justice, and equity.

These tools of coexistence are all geared towards preventing, reducing, and eliminating violence and highly destructive conflict in an effort to take societies towards increased integration. In addition to functioning as a framing mechanism, coexistence therefore becomes a term with which different types of peace work can be discussed. This usage implicitly promotes a multi-pronged approach to conflict prevention and resolution, one that looks not at a single field for a solution, but that acknowledges the need for cross-sectoral (such as conflict resolution, economic development, and public health) and multi-level (from grassroots to policy) efforts. This broad and inclusive approach is fundamental in the transition from war to passive coexistence and then to active coexistence, to the development of peace practice, and to the creation of sustainable peace .

As we move further into the 21 st century with an increasingly complex international political system and a multifaceted field of stakeholders, our language and concepts must adapt to the realities of conflict, violence, and combat. Efforts to mainstream the notion of coexistence in both the peacebuilding and conflict-resolution fields and in everyday interaction are a priority.

The opportunity that increased coexistence presents -- a reduction in violence, an active embracing of diversity, and collaboration within and across fields -- is of increasing value and significance worldwide. The promise of coexistence is that it provides a needed pause from violence, and a springboard into stronger, more respectful inter-group relationships.

When Angela wrote this essay in 2003, she and the peace and conflict field were primarily framing "coexistence" in terms of recovery from war or other violent conflict.  Living now in the United States in 2019, it is clear that the same ideas are sorely needed to recover from our largely non-violent, but extremely destructive racial, gender, and political conflicts that are tearing the U.S. (and other developed democracies) apart. For that reason, I have changed the text of Angela's original essay to include the term "destructive conflict" in addition to "violence" in most places where it appears. 

Consider Angela's definitions:

All of these things are absent from the relationship between races in the United States, between the Left and the Right, and to some extent (and with some people) between genders. The result has been unprecedented political polarization and stalemate, the rise of hate speech and crimes, the kidnapping and imprisonment of children on the southern border, the the very real threat that democracy and rule of law is being destroyed.  Clearly, these situations call for the pursuit of coexistence rather than the current into-the-sea framing where both sides are still trying to utterly discredit or even destroy the other. 

The same is true for the many very destructive, but still non-violent conflicts that are raging around the globe:  in the United Kingdom over Brexit, in much of Europe over immigration, EU economic policy and other matters, in China with respect to its treatment of the Uigurs, Tibet, Taiwan, and Hong Kong... All of these conflicts could be improved by fostering an attitude of co-existence and engaging in what Angela calls "co-existence work" to get there.

-- Heidi Burgess. December, 2019.

Back to Essay Top

---------------------------------------------------------

[1] Eugene Weiner, "Coexistence Work: A New Profession." In  The Handbook of Interethnic Coexistence , ed. Eugene Weiner (New York: Continuum International Publishing Group, 1998): 13-24. < http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0826411363 >.

[2] The Oxford Dictionary, 1997 ed., Frank R. Abate.

[3] Kumar Rupesinghe, "Coexistence and Transformation in Asia: Some Reflections." In Culture & Identity: Ethnic Coexistence in the Asian Context , ed. Kumar Rupsinghe (Washington, D.C.: The Sasakawa Peace Foundation, 1999): 3-37. < http://books.google.com/books?id=5Kl3HAAACAAJ >.

[4] Louis Kriesberg, "Coexistence and the Reconciliation of Communal Conflicts." In The Handbook of Interethnic Coexistence , ed. Eugene Weiner (New York: Continuum International Publishing Group, 1998): 182-198. < http://books.google.com/books?vid=ISBN0826411363 >.

[5] The Coexistence Initiative. Organizational brochure.

[6] Morton Deutsch, The Resolution of Conflict (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1977) < http://books.google.com/books?id=qmGEiPU-O-cC >; Lewis Coser, The Functions of Social Conflict (Glenco: Free Press, 1956/1964) < http://www.amazon.com/Functions-Social-Conflict-Examination-Sociological/dp/002906810 >; Jay Rothman, Resolving Identity-Based Conflict in Nations, Organizations, and Communities (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1997) < http://unitednationstest.beyondintractability.org/bksum/rothman-resolving >.

[7] Touval, op. cit.

[8] Saadia Touval, "Ethical Dilemmas in International Mediation," Negotiation Journal 11:333-38. < http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1571-9979.1995.tb00749.x/abstract >.

[9] Weiner, op. cit.

[10] Robert Baruch-Bush, The Dilemmas of Mediation Practice: A Study of Ethical Dilemmas and Policy Implications. A Report on a Study for The National Institute For Dispute Resolution. NIDR, 1992. < http://www.colorado.edu/conflict/transform/bush.htm >.

[11] Weiner, op. cit.

Use the following to cite this article: Khaminwa, Angela Nyawira. "Coexistence." Beyond Intractability . Eds. Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess. Conflict Information Consortium, University of Colorado, Boulder. Posted: July 2003 < http://www.beyondintractability.org/essay/coexistence >.

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Tolerance is essential for peaceful coexistence in the modern world

Intolerance has no place in a society where our differences make us not only unique but stronger.

Sheikh Abdullah bin Zayed, Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, led hundreds of people at the Walk of Tolerance in Umm Al Emarat Park in Abu Dhabi earlier this year. Saeed Jumoh

Matilda Rice, 17, is the winner of the UAE Young Journalist Award presented by the British embassy, in partnership with The National. Submissions were open to UAE students aged between 16 to 18. Below is her prize-winning essay on tolerance called An Enduring Paradox.

Tolerance is a powerful word. It represents a set of values that we as a society hope to follow, conveying inclusion, openness and respect, and encouraging acceptance of others. It is a virtue that many aspire to as it creates a world where discrimination is obsolete.

Modern societies are more globalised, diverse and multicultural than ever. Societies that were once monocultural have been transformed into eclectic melting pots, filled with people from across the globe. In this new complex world, our differences have never been so evident. This new reality means that interactions with people who hold different viewpoints to our own are something that we experience on a daily basis. Tolerance has become a necessity for peaceful coexistence in the modern world.

But tolerance is more complex than it may first appear. Here we encounter one of society’s oldest dilemmas: the paradox of tolerance. Proposed by Karl Popper in 1945, the paradox is a philosophical principle that states: “In order to maintain a tolerant society, the society must be intolerant of intolerance.” For Popper, tolerance had boundaries. Unfettered tolerance would open the door for dominance by the intolerant. In the words of Charles Spurgeon" "Give them an inch and they will take a mile”.

Should we condone the intolerant? Can we truly call ourselves tolerant if we choose not to? For many, the answer is no. They believe that if we do not tolerate intolerance, then by definition we are intolerant because we are discriminating against those who hold different views.

It is my belief that the exact opposite is true. Popper’s belief that tolerance can only truly exist in a society where people who are intolerant are not accepted is one that I agree with. By allowing intolerance to exist, you risk it spreading and destroying unity and tolerance. I believe that this is a risk that we should not be willing to take. This sentiment is one that many countries are beginning to agree with, including the UAE.

The UAE is one of the most multicultural countries in the world, with people from more than 200 nationalities living here. For decades, it has worked to establish itself as a global capital for tolerance, fostering acceptance and unity and integrating open-mindedness into the very fabric of its society. When 2019 was declared the Year of Tolerance in the UAE, it was an important step in highlighting the value of tolerance and raising awareness of the country’s aims to engender morals of collaboration and coexistence, both locally and internationally.

Tolerance also has strong connections to the UAE’s origins. It was a key pillar of Sheikh Zayed’s thoughts and formed the bedrock of many of his principles. His work to instill peace and unity through the creation of the UAE’s tolerant approach formed a country where acceptance and compassion eclipse hostility and acrimony.

The UAE also ensures its residents understand that intolerance will not be accepted. Legislations such as the Anti-Discrimination and Hatred Act , which states that residents should "refrain from discriminating against people for reasons based on their religion, doctrine, caste, race, colour, or ethnic origin", emphasises the UAE's strong condemnation of prejudice.

Intolerance leads to hatred and discrimination. It has no place in society where our differences make us not only unique but stronger. The UAE is one of the few countries that has worked to effectively remove discrimination. By inspiring peace and understanding and condemning prejudice , it is creating a society in which all are equal. It has taught us that when we choose to embrace others, we choose to change the world for the better.

Matilda Rice is a student at British International School Abu Dhabi

Essay On Peaceful Coexistence For Students

In a world marked by diversity, understanding and promoting peaceful coexistence becomes an imperative step toward creating societies that thrive on harmony, mutual respect, and progress.

Peaceful coexistence is a philosophical principle that pertains to the ability of diverse individuals, communities, or nations to live together in harmony, mutual respect, and understanding, with zero reliance on violence or aggression to resolve conflicts. It is an ideology that champions the repudiation of war, advocates for mutual tolerance, recognizes diversity and promotes non-violence.

Table of Contents

Essay: Peaceful Coexistence – A Pathway to Harmony and Progress

The importance of peaceful coexistence.

The significance of peaceful coexistence cannot be understated in our world today. Peaceful coexistence fosters social harmony, a vital ingredient for any progressive society. It acts as a bulwark against violence and conflict, ensuring tranquility and stability in the community. Furthermore, it paves the way for a more just and equitable society, where every individual has an equal opportunity to thrive and prosperity is shared amongst all.

The Challenges to Peaceful Coexistence

Despite its importance, achieving peaceful coexistence is fraught with numerous challenges. Prejudice, discrimination, and inequality remain persistent issues that sow seeds of discord and conflict. Political and economic factors, such as corruption, poverty, and unequal distribution of resources, further fuel the flame of conflict, making peaceful coexistence a hard-fought battle.

Strategies for Promoting Peaceful Coexistence

Promoting peaceful coexistence requires a multi-faceted approach. Education and raising awareness about the virtues of tolerance, empathy, and understanding are critical in this regard. Conflict resolution mechanisms and mediation also play a crucial role in managing disputes peacefully and fostering understanding among differing parties. Additionally, the promotion of human rights and social justice serves as a cornerstone in our quest for peaceful coexistence, ensuring every individual enjoys equal rights and opportunities.

Personal Reflection on Peaceful Coexistence

As a Nigerian student, I believe peaceful coexistence starts with each one of us. By demonstrating empathy, tolerance, and respect in our daily interactions, we can instigate a wave of change that promotes peaceful coexistence. Schools, families, and communities must work in unison to inculcate these values in our younger generations, fostering a society that values peace, harmony, and mutual respect above all else.

In conclusion, peaceful coexistence is not a distant concept, but a tangible reality that we can achieve through mutual respect, understanding, and tolerance. As we promote peaceful coexistence in our personal lives and communities, we help sculpt a more just, equitable, and peaceful society for all.

Hello! Welcome to my Blog StudyParagraphs.co. My name is Angelina. I am a college professor. I love reading writing for kids students. This blog is full with valuable knowledge for all class students. Thank you for reading my articles.

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• Personal Development

The Importance of Peaceful Coexistence

In response to the enduring North Korean nuclear threat, the United States has led the international community in reinforcing a pressure-based campaign against North Korea that involves diplomatic isolation, military deterrence and economic sanctions. While this type of approach has successfully deterred major conflict on the Korean Peninsula for the last 70 years, it has not changed North Korea’s defiant behavior, prevented North Korea’s military advancement, lowered security tensions, or improved mutual trust and understanding.

The current status quo is a dangerous, adversarial stalemate in which the two sides are not engaging to resolve disagreements but rather strengthening their military capabilities and posture in the name of deterrence, which is exacerbating a regional arms race and the potential for an inadvertent nuclear conflict. At the same time, the diplomatic estrangement is impeding the nongovernmental and people-to-people engagement that could improve the humanitarian and human rights crisis of the North Korean people.

USIP invited subject matter experts to offer creative perspectives on how the pursuit of peaceful coexistence with North Korea across the diplomatic, security, economic and people-to-people domains can help the United States and South Korea advance peace and security and reduce the risk of conflict on the Korean Peninsula in a tangible and realistic way. The essays in this series address, among other topics, risk reduction, arms control, health cooperation, joint remains recovery operations, economic assistance, a two-state system and climate change collaboration. These perspectives highlight an alternative to the current hostile stalemate that can reduce risks and advance peace in a more productive way.

Essay Series

Increasing Information Access for the North Korean People

Sokeel Park discusses how knowledge-sharing and public diplomacy initiatives that challenge the North Korean government’s control over information can help facilitate a positive transformation of the country that improves security on the peninsula and in the region in a sustainable way.

It’s Time to Resolve the Korean War

Dan Leaf argues that making resolution of the Korean War an explicit U.S. policy objective is a necessary first step on the road to peaceful coexistence with North Korea today and could reduce the risk of deliberate or accidental conflict.

Three Conditions for Successful Engagement with North Korea

Mark Tokola writes that near-term U.S.-North Korea engagements that are win-win, founded on equality and not reliant on monitoring can spur incremental progress that leads to future broader agreements.

Building Trust through Health Cooperation with North Korea

Kee B. Park offers a new framework for sustaining health cooperation with North Korea based on humanitarian principles and a comprehensive, multi-year, multi-donor, and politically-protected approach.

Climate Change as a Path to Engagement with North Korea

Troy Stangarone describes how cooperation on climate change, specifically related to reforestation and mitigation, could provide a pathway for U.S.-DPRK engagement.

Increasing Stability in a Deterrence Relationship with North Korea

Adam Mount argues that the U.S.-South Korea alliance’s efforts to increase its military advantage over North Korea is producing a fragile standoff and that modest initiatives focused on North Korea’s tactical nuclear arsenal are the best way of moving beyond the standoff to a more stable peace.

A Framework for Meaningful Economic Engagement with North Korea

Brad Babson argues that engaging economically with North Korea could help address its security and human needs and would be instrumental in finding a path forward for its foreign relations.

Why Calls for Regime Change in North Korea Can Be Counterproductive

Lauren Sukin contends that indirect U.S. support for North Korean regime collapse is counterproductive, fueling North Korea's desire to maintain its nuclear arsenal, and that U.S. messaging should reduce this perception.

A New Approach to Recovering U.S. Servicemen’s Remains from North Korea

Donna Knox describes efforts to recover the remains of U.S. servicemembers from North Korea and suggests that NGOs taking the lead on this effort could sidestep, and eventually help overcome, U.S.-DPRK friction.

How to Reduce Nuclear Risks Between the United States and North Korea

Ankit Panda writes that coexistence with a nuclear-armed North Korea will require the proactive consideration of pragmatic risk reduction measures.

If You Want Peace, Prepare for War, and Diplomacy

Robert Einhorn underscores the limits of deterrence and argues for prioritizing risk reduction over denuclearization on the Korean Peninsula.

Revisiting the Two-State System for Peaceful Coexistence on the Korean Peninsula

Bong-geun Jun argues that advancing a two-state system can mitigate the unification competition between the two Koreas that is fueling tensions and impeding peaceful coexistence on the Korean Peninsula.

Seeking Peaceful Coexistence with North Korea: What Would Kennan Do?

Paul Heer analyzes George Kennan’s views on North Korea, how they might be interpreted today, the applicability of his view of containment and his support for diplomacy leading to peaceful coexistence.

Exploring Peaceful Coexistence with North Korea

Frank Aum explores the concept of peaceful coexistence between the United States and a nuclear North Korea, arguing that the current status quo of hostility could lead to inadvertent conflict and that a new modus vivendi could reduce the risk of conflict, improve security, and build mutual trust in a tangible and realistic way.