The Peace Movement Needs a Better Strategy -- Start with a Comprehensive Vision
Peter Bergel
New_Strategy_Needed) I offered these critiques of current peace
movement strategy and its results:
1. We are still using the social change tactics that we have used for
decades even though they are proving less and less effective as time
goes on. We have definitely lost ground over the decades I have been
active.
2. We invest a lot of resources in public education and we have been
effective in that area. Yet we have not figured out how to effectively
transform public support for our point of view into access to the
levers of power in order to create real change.
3. When it comes to action, we are devoting almost all our movement
resources to lobbying and demonstrating, even though our success
levels in those areas have been minimal in recent years.
4. We are mostly an anti-war movement, not a real peace movement.
5. We don’t place enough emphasis on pointing out the flaws in war
itself and the mentality that supports it. Rather, we confine
ourselves largely to criticizing particular wars and addressing
particular weapon systems.
6. We have been ineffective at stopping wars once their advocates have
built up momentum for them. However, we can anticipate future resource
wars (over oil, water, food, land, and raw materials) as a result of
global warming. Now is the time to focus on those and work to head
them off.
7. Most important, we do not have a shared movement-wide vision of the
peaceful world we are trying to create. We have no collective answer
to the question, “if peace broke out, what would it look like?”
Two Initial Suggestions
In “The Peace Movement Needs a New Strategy,” I made two initial
suggestions:
1. Use cultural work (film, music, theater, art, etc.) and social
media (Facebook, Twitter, MySpace, LinkedIn, etc) in a planned and
targeted way to transform conventional wisdom and public judgments
toward support for a more peaceful, sustainable world.
2. Use the same tools to encourage transformation of the popular
perception of war from seeing it as “wicked” (terrible, but
attractive) to seeing it as “vulgar” (terrible and absolutely
unattractive).
Further Proposals
I now believe that prior to discussion of broad strategy initiatives,
we need to clarify where we want to be heading - that is, we need a
broad, shared vision of the peaceful world we want to create. (See
point 7 above.)
With that in mind, some additional proposals are:
3. Convene brainstorming sessions in a number of towns to which
thoughtful people with backgrounds in social change work and other
relevant expertise are invited to group themselves by sector and throw
out answers to the question: “If peace broke out, what would it look
like?” Record all responses and use them to develop a comprehensive
and unified vision of the future. Sectors would include, but not be
limited to: Conflict resolution — local, regional, global Defense
Housing Energy production and distribution Food production and
distribution Transportation & shipping Environmental protection
Education Recreation Economics/business/merchandising Medical care/
wellness Government Justice/crime/human rights/civil liberties
4. Create an independent think tank to digest this material and assist
with the construction of the vision.
5. Organize a “Visions of Our Future” series of seminars during which
knowledgeable people with relevant expertise are invited to present
their own visions of how a sector of the future can function
sustainably and lead discussions about them. This can be done all over
the country with the intent of generating a consensus vision of where
we want to go.
6. Review the visions already developed by the world community and
enshrined in international law, including the UN and Nuremberg
Charters, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the Four Geneva
Conventions, and a series of derivative international covenants that
have evolved throughout the intervening years addressing a variety of
emergent issues (e.g., nuclear non-proliferation, torture, prohibited
weapons, terrorism, global warming) as well as watchdog institutions
(e.g., Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, UN Human Rights
Commission). Electing international law as a base has the advantages
of (1) painstaking development by a broad multi-cultural array of
scholars, attorneys and political realists, (2) endorsement by most of
the 192 nations comprising humankind, (3) potential for implementation
with the force of law supported by reliable evidentiary documentation,
and (4) no need to sell it to a breathlessly awaiting world. These
international standards are pretty much what we were all supposed to
have learned in kindergarten: play fair; share with others; clean up
after yourself; don’t take other peoples’ stuff and if you do, give it
back; don’t hurt other people and if you do, say you’re sorry and make
it up to them. (Thanks to Jack Dresser for this formulation.)
7. Focus more on motivating people than merely “educating” them.
Principles for Building a Powerful Strategy
Here are a few litmus tests against which we can measure the work we
do in developing a new vision and strategy.
1. We must engage our adversaries on ground where we are strong rather
than pitting our weaknesses against the strengths of our adversaries.
2. To do that we have to inventory our strengths - such as numbers,
existing non-governmental work towards change, the tide of history,
the self-preserving mechanisms of the planet’s ecosystem and our faith
in basic human decency.
3. If a strategy depends critically on large sums of money to be
effective, it will almost certainly be co-opted by our adversaries.
They have a lot more money and are expert at manipulating it.
Therefore we should seek strategic initiatives that do not require
major funding or that can be funded by large numbers of people
donating relatively small amounts.
4. We need to “think outside the box” in terms of both vision and
strategy. We must free ourselves from the bonds of the status quo
because we all know the status quo is not serving us well. Believing
that we must continue to function within the status quo means hobbling
our collective creative power.
5. Any major change will probably require a lot of time to be
accomplished. This does not excuse us from beginning work on it right
away. Responding from a crisis mentality has not, and will not, serve
us well. Neither has devoting almost all of our energy to stopping
something someone else is already doing.
Hopeful Signs
Many authors have noted that despite the grim threats confronting
humanity on many fronts, there is already functioning an enormous
number of small and large independent groups addressing a plethora of
issues. Evidently a great many people understand that “something has
to be done” regarding these threats. Pessimism is certainly warranted
by the information science is serving up about the state of our world
and our species, yet redemptive surprises have been experienced by
almost everyone at some time or other in their lives. I think we have
to take action with hope and determination and leave the rest in the
Creator’s hands. We must do our homework and hope for a redemptive
surprise.
“Doing our homework” includes reviewing the visionary thinking that is
being done and has been done, adding to it our own creative ideas, and
then fusing it all into a comprehensive vision. This vision can then
be shopped around to the entire progressive movement for improvements
and mutual acceptance. If we can form a consensus around such a
vision, we can use it to guide our actions (strategize) and reaffirm
our connections with one another (build community).
No group needs to stop what it is doing nor "get on board" with anyone
else's projects. Instead of shared activity, we need a shared vision
toward which we are all working and which we can assert and re-assert
every time we take action to address our particular concerns. In this
way we can all work toward a peaceful world, in the broadest sense,
while continuing to do the work we regard as the most important or the
most promising.
This group is a forum in which the work of exchanging peace vision
ideas and forging a comprehensive joint vision can be pursued. I
invite your creative participation.
- Peter Bergel
RA
issues. As you may know, I've written a number of recent essays for
more mainstream audiences (ie, not just academic ones) likewise
arguing for a proactive peace movement to cohere, including these:
http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/23366
http://www.commondreams.org/view/2009/03/20-3
I'm sharing these by way of introduction, and also as a reminder that
there are indeed many peace people out there thinking along these
lines. What seems to be lacking is a vehicle for fostering these
visions and networking through action, with a particular emphasis on
the positive aspects of peacebuilding. You've given us a good start
here, and I look forward to seeing how it evolves....
All the best,
Randall
Peter Bergel
Randall. Nice work. I recommend others read it and I sent the second
one out on my Twitter feed.
Peter
David Hazen
Town Halls. (http://www.culture-of-peace.info/books/worldpeace.html)
It is based on the author's responsibility for the United Nations
International Year for the Culture of Peace (2000), the Manifesto 2000
signed by 75 million people, and the United Nations Declaration and
Programme of Action on a Culture of Peace. It foresees the coming
collapse of the global economy and nation states as an opportunity to
refound the United Nations on the basis of those who understand the
need for a culture of peace: individuals, civil society organizations
and local governments. It provides descriptions of initiatives already
underway, as well as approaches that can be used by those who wish to
take up the task.
Peter Bergel
Peter
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Peter Bergel
Executive Director
Oregon PeaceWorks
104 Commercial St. NE
Salem, OR 97301
503-371-8002
John Bostrom
One of the main problems with the peace movement's lack of growth and
effectiveness is it's sloppy, ill-defined concept of itself and what
it's doing. Many factors contribute to this confusion. Different
organizations who want to retain their own identity (and mailing and
donor lists) can treat each other more as competitors than allies.
Smaller groups who cherish their independence can resist any attempts
by movement leaders or even leaders of their own organizations to
define what they should and shouldn't do. The meaning and purpose of
actions such as demonstrations can be muddled and even corrupted by
the desire to have a "big tent" of participation. The very idea of
actions can then become habitually entrenched as things worth doing in
themselves, without any real examination of purpose or effectiveness,
so that the whole thing becomes a relatively mindless rote
repetition..
Finally, and most notably in my opinion, the focus of definition,
responsibility, and action can be projected onto "the world" to an
extent where almost no responsibility at all is taken for the movement
or its organizations itself. Instead of thinking, talking, and acting
to make an effective peace movement, people start thinking, talking,
and acting ONLY about making "a peaceful world." Goals become
completely out of scale and inappropriate. You get scenarios like
twenty or so people in a room talking about how they're going to end
the war in Iraq. None of them have anything like the realistic
connections or power to do anything of the sort. They can't even grow
their own stagnant organizations. But they're going to fix the world.
Right. If the participants knew that they're just entertaining
themselves with a game of Fantasy Peace World, it wouldn't be so
tragic. But they don't.
The first thing this Peace Visioning Think Tank needs to address, I
submit, is the vital distinction between indulging ourselves in
another entertaining round of What I'd Do If I Ran The World, and
knuckling down to talk seriously about what we actually can do and
actually do have responsibility for - the functionality,
effectiveness, and growth our own organizations.
I am interested only in the latter. I am not a world leader. I had
nothing to do with forming the U.N., and I cannot possibly "reform"
it, if such a thing were even possible. I do not start wars, and I
cannot stop them. What I can do, however, is create a forum at a
local church or hall, invite a good speaker, make up and distribute
posters and fliers, hold the event, form a mailing list of those who'd
like to stay involved, and encourage participants to meet among
themselves. I can make a YouTube video, a blog, a Facebook site or
Google Group, and administer it. I can host a party with a peace-
related theme. I can create a small local peace group.
All I'm interested in talking about here - and very enthusiastically
interested - is how to do those things better, and how to get more and
more people doing them, or doing the other things that they CAN do,
whatever they might be, to make their little communities, their "small
circle of friends" more aware of peace issues and more able to connect
with each other.
Let's get good at that. Let's map every existing local peace group in
the U.S. on a Google Map (I already have registered the domain name
peacemap.us for this purpose) and count them. Let's aim to double the
number of these "small circles of friends" who proudly call themselves
"peace advocates" in the next six months. Let's triple the number by
this time next year. Let's get peace groups going in every single
state of the Union, in every major city, and finally in every zip
code. Let's talk about how to do that, and nothing else. The peace
movement desperately needs - and, I believe, is fully capable of -
explosive, viral growth. That, we can do. That, we must do. We're
not going to get that unless we aim for it, plan for it, and engage in
making it happen, all the while comparing notes on what works and what
doesn't. That's all I'm interested in. I have neither the time nor
the inclination to play Fantasy Peace World in a "movement" that
hasn't gone anywhere in decades.
Turning that vision into reality, of course, requires a clear,
distinct idea of what a peace group is and is not. Part of the
problem, it seems to me, is that a large part of the current
definition of a peace group is "people who play Fantasy Peace World,"
and that the playing of that game is so easily ridiculed as naively
unrealistic, especially in a post-9/11 world where every other
teenager is enthusiastically hooked on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare
II. Until we have rock-solid clarity on who we are and what we do on
the micro level, anyone will be free to assume that the peace movement
is the protest movement, and that peace activists are a bunch of old
sixties leftovers who get together every six months or so to walk
around behind police barricades holding signs that say NO and STOP and
END, and complain about nuclear weapons, and have demonstrations at
Congressional offices and other places, and write letters, maybe get
arrested, with varying positions along the spectrum of protest from
"peaceful nonviolence" to "rage against the machine."
Knowing what kind of a world we want is easy. But it's not enough.
It's not even Step One. Step One is getting a clear and distinct idea
of what a peace group is - and isn't - and what it does - and doesn't
do. And that begins by knuckling down to face, realistically, the
scale of what we can - and can't - do.
Please excuse the boring, didactic repetition. That's just me. Behind
that, there's an essential, valuable idea for a workable plan of
action.
John Bostrom
On Dec 22, 5:30 pm, Peter Bergel <pber...@igc.org> wrote:
> In “The Peace Movement Needs a New Strategy” (http://bit.ly/
> New_Strategy_Needed) I offered these critiques of current peace
> movement strategy and its results:
...
Peter Bergel
the case in the past, I both enthusiastically agree with your general
thrust and disagree with some of your points. Here are my
disagreements. You can assume agreement on the rest.
1. I am interested in more than getting good at creating local groups.
What I am interested in first is figuring out what we want local
groups to DO when we create them. What MAKES SENSE for them to do.
Otherwise, we wind up with the kind of activities you described so
critically because we have convinced them (or they have convinced
themselves) that they need to do SOMETHING, but neither they nor we
can figure out what that really should be. That is where the vision
comes in.
2. I don’t think “knowing what kind of a world we want is easy.” Nor
do I think it has been done – at least as far as the larger “we” of
the progressive movement is concerned. That, in fact, is precisely why
we don’t know what to do. We have not agreed on where we want to end
up. All we know is it isn’t this and it isn’t that. That’s why our
message is “NO and STOP and END,” as you put it. And that’s why
defining our vision IS Step One, in my opinion. I would love it if all
the peace groups we map and all the ones you would like to see us
create all said YES to a comprehensive vision of the peaceful world we
are trying to build. Then we could realistically ask local groups –
and not just peace groups either – to employ their creativity and
enterprise to devise their own local strategies derived from that
vision. Getting “a clear and distinct idea of what a peace group is -
and isn't - and what it does - and doesn't do” as you said, seems to
me to turn on this question of vision Instead of striving for unity
of action – something that’s unlikely to happen – we could profit
enormously from unity of vision. We could then ask every local
progressive group to link every action to the vision. Some will work
on this project or tactic, some on that, on a large variety of fronts,
but each could begin to see itself as a crucial part of a real
movement that knew where it was going and why. Some tactics would work
and some wouldn’t, but we would not have to compete or argue, all we
would have to do is try things out. If they moved us toward the
vision, they’d be successful, if not, not. We would no longer argue,
for example, whether a demonstration that brought out large numbers
but received little media and impressed no power holders was a success
or not.
Peter Bergel
John Bostrom
and I just read your reply today. Thank you. I really value this
space and the chance to talk to you like this.
Briefly, I agree completely with your first point, that it makes no
sense to try to create local groups without defining what they would
do. The vision is important. On your second point, however, little
red flags pop up for me. I really do think most peace activists
already know what kind of world we want and it's unproductive to spend
much time at all on that. The problem isn't that we don't discuss that
- Peace Action for example discusses practically nothing else. It's
that discussing that is so often a substitute for discussing what kind
of peace movement we want, what a peace groups should look like, what
they should do, how they should conduct themselves in the world,
relate to other progressive groups and all kinds of "public."
Frankly, I'm open to almost any form of group and I go mostly by my
gut in how I feel about a group, but i believe the field should be
open for NEW GROUPS to form. Big part of the problem is that growth
doesn't happen to existing forms without new forms budding and
growing. Plants don't grow except when they bud and make new leaves
and flowers. Too often growth is intepreted as stuffing new people
into existing groups. It doesn't work that way
"Vision" is nice but where does focusing on it get us? You still need
to talk about what groups are and what they do, and create templates
and road maps that allow them to be formed.
John