The Road to Global Peace

THE ROAD TO GLOBAL PEACE

In the light of the current state of the world, here are a few personal thoughts that may be of interest, based on the "rather miraculous" transformation of South Africa. From one time "pariah" apartheid state wracked by violence and conflict... to a relatively peaceful country governed according to the "will of the people", a new power-house and leader on the African continent.

As their neigbour of Zimbabwe slides miserably down an apparently bottomless slope of corruption, violence and economic collapse, the moral shadow of Nelson Mandela looms over the failings of leadership across the continent.

Which leads to a powerful message to other places of seemingly intractible conflict...

What is required to solve the seeming impossible and insurmountable problems of this world today is flexibility, creativity, effort and especially the moral will by world leaders. The political process can and needs desperately to change. Things, circumstances change for the better from pressure (mainly internal - based upon basic common human needs), but also external pressure and co-ercion from other countries. Though economic sanctions on their own have never proved to be particularly effective and always hurt the ordinary people hardest and not those in power. Other countries should look at the big picture and just do what is RIGHT for the ordinary citizens of war-torn countries and other "rogue states" and not take actions out of vested interests. So wouldn't the world be a better place and the myriad of seemingly insurmountable problems, like Iran, Iraq, North Korea, Zimbabwe and countless other countries around the globe be solved.

Once ordinary people see the benefits of security, stability and consequently economic growth, they will feel better about their individual lives and will no longer tolerate living in the darkness of fear and opression. When the masses of ordinary people express their needs, their wishes, their aspirations, no matter how long that may take.

As with the opening up to China (but still the world can continue putting pressure on that country's human rights record through dimplomacy), the process starts with the seed of initially helping to create conditions to open the lines of communication through talking (even amongst enemies).

I believe the solution to all conflicts and wars throughout the globe is a lasting and comprehensive peace plan agreed to by all parties. Initially there has to be an understanding among all parties willing to negotiate that a regional approach to peace is required...and peace benefits all through a "win-win" situation. There needs to be vision and planning for a long-term solution, so politicians think ahead. Most major world problems come about due to neglect and the lack of will and mental effort needed to tackle them by leaders. And military solutions are always the LAST option for an enduring peace, once all other avenues have been exhausted).

Communication, negotiation and ultimately the prospect of possible reconciliation offers hope and benefits to conflicting interests, as well as prospects for a peaceful, secure and vibrant future. In the short term world leaders must concentrate on education, reconstruction, unoffiocial dialogue (as with some representatives of the apartheid SA government and ANC leaders in Lusaka and Dakar in the late eighties, setting the pre-conditions for dialogue) and diplomacy. The road to peace always begin with dialogue (that is conversation), which leads to better understanding of opposing viewpoints. As South African writer, Michael Cassidy in 'A Witness For Ever' once wrote: " It's a matter of creating conditions in society which provide the basic framework for a harmonious and fruitful human community. " Albert Einstein once said, the problems of the world can never be solved at the same level of thinking that created them. We can in our own ways raise our levels of thinking, our individual "consciousnesses" (and consciences).

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"In South Africa repression and resistance cycled and spiralled. But there was no possible military victory against the people, no matter how powerful South Africa's military machine. In the end, only a negotiated settlement could end the violence - and that required moral leadership, from all sides. Israel, Sudan, Sri Lanka, Zimbabwe, the United States and many others will one day get the point; alas for those doomed to suffer till then."

- Andrew Ladley (director of Victoria University's Institute of Policy Studies reviewing 'Mandela: A critical Life' by Tom Lodge and 'Mandela: The Authorised Portrait' writing his excellent review of the forementioned books in the Dominion Post Indulgence, Wellington, New Zealand of Sat Nov 4 2006.
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As US President Barack Obama said:
"A just peace includes not only civil and political rights - it must encompass economic security and opportunity. For true peace is not just freedom from fear, but freedom from want."

The vital ingredients to nurture it are "Agreements among nations. Strong institutions. Support for human rights. Investments in development. And something more, the continued expansion of our moral imagination; an insistence that there is something irreducible that we all share." #

# from an article by David Usborne in The Independent (as published in the Weekend Herald, Auckland, New Zealand on Sat, Dec 12 2009)

Each ONE of us can be part of the solution to these seemingly insurmountable global problems, if we so chose: by doing our "own little bits", what we can do in our individual spheres of influence. Enough ripples can someday make a giant wave. As in the "beloved country" of South Africa, global peace is one day possible... but only if as many of us work towards it and encourage others to do the same with all of our hearts and beings... a time that may herald a new dawn for the world.

As Norman Vincent Peale (the US preacher and author of the classic 'The Power of Positive Thinking') said so eloquently: "I'd rather attempt something great and fail rather than than attempt nothing and succeed."

No matter where we may live in the world, let us ALL succeed in doing what we can do ... towards a better and more peaceful world.

The path to peace is hardly ever through war... and peace can one day arise from the ashes of war.

Many small (though significant) steps by many people with eventually reach their destination.

Shared by "dreamer" Craig Lock

"I am one. I cannot do everything...but I can do something. And because I cannot do everything, I will not refuse to do the something that I can do. What I can do, I should do. And what I should do, by the grace of God, I will do"
- Edward Everett Hale

PS:
"We have come to a time in the history of the world, where we need to rediscover the path to peace, and the path to peace can never be war. This pathway is lined with the concept of co-existence and co-inhabitance of the world."
- the words of former Archbishop of Cape Town Desmond Tutu

"A moment comes, which comes but rarely in history, when we step out from the old to the new, when an age ends and when the soul of a nation, long supressed, finds utterance."
- Jahrulal Nehru, first Prime Minister of India

P.S: I am reminded of something Mahatma Gandhi's said not long before he was assassinated: "When I despair, I remember that all through history the way of truth and love has always won. There have been tyrants and murderers and for a time they seem invincible; but in the end, they always fall. Think of it, ALWAYS."

"When the world is filled with love, people's hearts are overflowing with hope."
- craig

Wars are poor chisels for carving out a peaceful tomorrow."
- Dr Martin Luther King, Jr

# "Let us reach for the world that ought to be, that spark of the divine that still stirs within each one of our hearts."