Peace 591Turning to modern societies, the Peace Forum’s (2000) so-
phisticated index of the peacefulness of contemporary na-
tions is based on a combination of measures of external and
internal conflict and measures of domestic justice. The index
reveals the relative peacefulness of the developed but small
nations such as Denmark, the Netherlands, and Portugal, as
contrasted with many of the less developed nations and the
powerful permanent members of the Security Council (the
United States ranks 51st among the 74 nations for which data
are available). The people of these smaller nations may feel
more secure because their life is more predictable. People can
trust one another and their social institutions (Fogarty, 2000),
and they may find it easier to accept the need for the mutual
obligations and responsibilities stressed by Hearn (1997).
Although powerful societies are often relatively violent,
Boulding (2000) has described how there are always many
peaceful elements mixed in with the violent components. In
religion, for example, there is the idea of a holy war but also
the image of the peaceful garden. And it may be noted that
after the putatively Islamic terrorist attack on the United
States, the president of Iran phoned the pope to discuss the
importance of Christian-Muslim dialogue (Catholic Free
Press, 2001). Boulding argued that these peaceful elements
make it possible to conceive realistically of developing
peaceful cultures in modern society.
How might we conceptualize what such cultures could be
like? One way is to consider the transformations that would
be involved in moving from the culture of violence to which
many of us have become accustomed to a culture of peace.
Adams and True (1997) suggested that these transformations
might be characterized as follows:
1.The redefinition of power so that it was understood to
involve joint problem solving and active nonviolence
rather than the use of hierarchies that require violent
domination.
2.The mobilization of people and the attainment of solidar-
ity by building relationships of understanding and trust
between groups rather than having one group dominate
another or by achieving solidarity by focusing on the
defeat of a common enemy.
3.The participation of all people in the decisions that affect
their lives.
4.The open sharing of information in the press and in civic
society.
5.The development and empowerment of the caring and
nurturing qualities traditionally associated with the role of
women.
6.The development of a cooperative and sustainable (rather
than exploitative) economies.
We may imagine a global culture of peace involving the
previous transformations along with an environment in
which armaments were controlled and human rights were en-
sured. Such a culture has been advocated by 20 Nobel peace
laureates and promoted by UNESCO. To assist this develop-
ment, the General Assembly of the United Nations has
launched a decade of initiatives to achieve a culture of peace
and requested a progress report from the secretary general
(see Adams, 2000). Current research is attempting to develop
indicators for the eight aspects of such a culture so that it will
be possible to assess progress toward its development.
Of course, a global culture of peace both influences and is
dependent upon the specific cultures of peace developed by
different societies. Each nation has its own particular chal-
lenges, and it seems clear that peace, like human rights, must
be developed by a discourse between groups from within each
society as theses groups dialogue with groups from without
(An-Na’im, 1992). The movement toward a culture of peace is
the first social movement that includes nation states as well as
people. However, progress toward its goal cannot depend on
the initiative of those powerful states whose interest is in
maintaining the status quo. Rather, the development of each
of the components of cultures of peace will depend on the less
powerful nations and on the hundreds of grassroots initiatives
by nongovernmental organizations that are constructing the
paths of peace described previously. Each of these paths,
along with an understanding of aggression, violence, and evil,
is critical to developing the aspects of peaceful culture.
International arms control and the maintenance of human
rights require some system of international security. Given
the current state of human development, this security must
rest on the strength of some international authority that can
take aggressive action when it is required, but whose vio-
lence is checked by a division of power and civilian control.
Whenever that system of authority is reduced to the use of vi-
olent means, this must be publicly acknowledged as an evil.
Such an authority will develop only when the strengthening
of emotional ties leads powerful nations to surrender their
monopoly of violence. NATO and other regional forces are
steps in this direction, and we may see a strengthening of UN
police forces in an effort to control terrorism.
The challenges to achieving a consensus about interna-
tional norms on terrorism involve issues that must be aggres-
sively negotiated. The path of negotiation, as well as an
understanding of the structural changes that perpetrate con-
flict, is also involved in attempts to increase democratic par-
ticipation, the sharing of information, and intergroup trust.
The latter rests on a mastery of transformative as well as prin-
cipled negotiation. Such negotiation will be much easier if
synergistic societal structures lead those who want power to
meet the needs of those without it.