February 2002

LONDON – Jonas Savimbi was like the war in Angola itself: he went on and on, seemingly forever. Whatever peace deal was negotiated he was sure to break it, sure to find another sponsor who’d trade diamonds for guns. He outlasted most of his principal rivals and he certainly outlasted his godfather, the Cold War, and the earnest need of the superpowers to woo friends who were prepared to engage in a proxy war against the friends of the rival superpower. In the end, such was his tenacity and his masterly improvisation, he showed that he could survive and live to fight another day without a superpower behind him. When America finally but belatedly turned against him he wooed the malevolent and rich dictator of neighbouring Zaire, and when that ended with Mobutu’s death he befriended the presidents of Togo, Rwanda and Burkina Faso. Anyone who’d sell him a gun or...

To be human is to recognize the cultural perspectives that bind us to tribe, sect, religion, or nation, and to rise above them. It is to feel the pain of the dispossessed, the downtrodden, the refugee, the starving child, the slave, the victim. To be human is to break the ties of cultural conformity and group-think, and to use one’s own mind. It is to recognize good and evil, and to choose good. It is to consider with the heart. It is to act with conscience. To be human is to be courageous. It is to choose the path of compassion. It is to sacrifice for what is just. It is to break the silence. It is to be an unrelenting advocate of human decency and human dignity. To be human is to breathe with the rhythm of life, and to recognize our kinship with all forms of life. It...

For over 100 years the Ku Klux Klan, White Citizens Council, other hate groups and individuals used terrorism and all types of violence in the United States. They have produced some of the bloodiest years in United States history. There appeared to be no limits to their hate and violence which included lynching of blacks, castration, and bombing of blacks homes, churches and businesses. This same tactic was used against Dr. Martin L. King, Jr., and others during the Civil Rights Movement. As we examine this era, the weapon of Kingian nonviolence was successful. Therefore, it would behoove us to examine some basic aspects of Kingian nonviolence and its application to terrorism and violence. My paper will examine Dr. King’s experiment with nonviolence in the 1960’s and hopefully stimulate serious discussion concerning the Kingian nonviolence application to terrorism today. We will examine the Kingian nonviolent approach to terrorism and war...

LONDON – “Sunshine is dead. Long live the darkness.” Is this what President George Bush would have liked to have said this week during his visit to Seoul? Even he, so soon after his “axis of evil” speech, might think that would be over the top. Nevertheless, President Kim Dae-jung of South Korea is clearly fighting tooth and nail to save what remains of what he calls his “sunshine policy”, his ambition to forge reconciliation with communist North Korea. The opposition at home has been buoyed by the sounds of jihad from Washington. The fact that the political pros in the European Union and the awarders of the Nobel Peace Prize, who in these matters tend to reflect sophisticated liberal opinion, have supported “sunshine” all along cuts no ice in the Bush entourage. Bush’s tactic when he feels he has upset his interlocutor is to turn on the charm and stress...

"Enough is Enough!" Women Demonstrate for Peace in Cyprus A small group of Cypriot women, calling themselves "Hands Across the Divide", has started actively campaigning for peace in Cyprus…. They have to communicate by e-mail, because face to face meetings between people living in north and south Cyprus are so difficult to achieve. Since 1974, the island of Cyprus has been divided by a barbed-wire fence, which runs from coast to coast and through the heart of the principal city of Nicosia. Partition… This UN partition line was set up after a long period of ethnic violence beginning back in 1963, compounded by meddling on the part of other nations with an interest in the region. Ever since, the Turkish Cypriot population of the north of the country has lived in complete separation from the mainly Greek Cypriot population of the south. There’s only one checkpoint in the ‘Green Line’,...

By Cynthia Cockburn for ‘Hands Across the Divide’, London   A small group of Cypriot women, calling themselves “Hands Across the Divide”, has started actively campaigning for peace in Cyprus…. They have to communicate by e-mail, because face to face meetings between people living in north and south Cyprus are so difficult to achieve. Since 1974, the island of Cyprus has been divided by a barbed-wire fence, which runs from coast to coast and through the heart of the principal city of Nicosia. Partition… This UN partition line was set up after a long period of ethnic violence beginning back in 1963, compounded by meddling on the part of other nations with an interest in the region. Ever since, the Turkish Cypriot population of the north of the country has lived in complete separation from the mainly Greek Cypriot population of the south. There’s only one checkpoint in the ‘Green Line’,...

Præsident Bush’s erklæring om unionens tilstand var retorisk vellykket, han var selvbevidst og visionær. Jeg tror han var en trøst for amerikanske sjæle. Kongressens medlemmer rejste sig entusiastiskt og klappede igen og igen. Talen er interessant også for andet end det, medierne hidtil har taget op fra den. Jeg opfatter talen som krigerisk, uden respekt for andre og som ildevarslende for verden. Jeg tror vi alle nu har en pligt til at tale med amerikanere om hvorfor mange af os, som aldeles ikke er “anti-amerikanske,” føler os fremmedgjorte af hvad vi ser og hører. Jeg, for min del, blev opdraget til stor beundring for De Forenede Stater. Mine forældres generation pegede altid på, hvordan amerikanerne hjalp Europa, på Marshall-planen, det amerikanske samfunds dynamik, dets kunst, litteratur og musik og dets økonomiske mirakel. USA i de sene 1950ere og 1960erne var et land, der blev beundret af millioner, det havde en...

President Bushs tal om tillståndet i nationen var storartat retoriskt sett, fyllt av självförtroende och visionär kraft. Jag förmodar att han skänkte tröst till amerikanerna. Medlemmar av kongressen reste sig och applåderade honom gång på gång och med entusiasm. Jag har bemödat mig om att lyssna till talet och läsa det noggrant och analysera det. Varför uppfattar jag, innerst inne, detta tal som krigshetsande, som att det brister i respekt för andra och som att det är illavarslande för världen? Jag tror att vi alla nu har en skyldighet att försöka föra en dialog med amerikanerna om att en del av oss som på intet sätt är “antiamerikanska” känner oss alltmer främmande inför det vi hör och ser. Jag, exempelvis, uppfostrades med stor beundran för Förenta staterna; mina föräldrars generation pekade alltid på hur amerikanerna hjälpte Europa, på Marshallplanen och på dynamiken i det amerikanska samhället, dess konst, litteratur och...

President Bush’s State of the Union address was great rhetorically, he was self-confident and visionary. He comforted, I assume, the souls of Americans. Members of Congress rose to their feet and applauded him repeatedly and enthusiastically. I’ve taken the trouble to listen to the speech, read it carefully and analyse it. Why do I, deep down, perceive this speech as bellicose, disrespectful of others and as boding ill for the world? I believe we all have a duty now to try to dialogue with Americans about the fact that some of us who are by no means “anti-American” feel increasingly alienated by what we hear and see. I, for one, was brought up with great admiration for the United States; my parent’s generation always pointed to how Americans helped Europe, to the Marshall Plan and the dynamism of American society, its art, literature and music, and the miracles of its...

(forthcoming in the Second Edition of “Searching for Peace: The Road to TRANSCEND” by Johan Galtung, Carl G. Jacobsen and Kai Frithjof Brand-Jacobsen. London: Pluto Press, 2002) 1. Diagnosis. Politics, like communication is seen in terms of who does what to whom, how-when-where, and why. The what-how-when-where of the September 11 attack in New York and Washington is clear; the problems are who and why. But why is at least clear up to a certain point. Like the presidential palace in Santiago, Chile, also bombed on a September 11 (1973) somebody had something against what happened inside some buildings: the capitalism of the US world trade and the militarism of the US Pentagon for year 2001/1/; the politics of the Unidad Popular for year 1973. The text was written in building language, and like for all texts what is not written may be equally important: no museum, no cathedral, no parliament. The...

The undertaking of this chapter is to consider the record of the United Nations System since its inception, with an eye focused on prospects for renewal and reform at the present time. The main criteria relied upon for assessment are considerations of effectiveness and legitimacy in relation to the operations of the United Nations. The chapter begins with a discussion of why the present global setting is resistant to renewal and reform, but with the qualification that such a climate of resistance could change rapidly. And that over time, the sheer complexity of international life and the salience of global scale problems is likely to exert pressures to strengthen the United Nations. From matters of context, the chapter moves on to discuss the historical origins of the United Nations, and the extent to which the experiences with global security prior to 1945 shaped the character of the UN in relation...

For the project INSTEAD OF NUCLEAR WEAPONSBy the Swedish Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (SLMK) in cooperation with International Physicians for the Prevention of Nuclear War (IPPNW) Ten years after the so-called end of the Cold War, nuclear weapons are still with us. There is the BMD, the risk of diversion of fissile materials, the fear of nuclearisation of terrorism. The weapons and their means of delivery have become ever more sophisticated. Through base systems, sub-marines, aircraft carriers, the global reach of militarism has intensified. Still, in proportion to the increasing threat all this represents to humankind’s survival as well as to democracy and global development, public debate with visions of a nuclear-free is desperately feeble. Advocates of a nuclear-free world, face immensely powerful governments and military-industrial-scientific structures. We also face the arrogance of power of the roughly 600 individuals (presidents, prime ministers, defence ministers, chiefs of staffs and commanders)...