Local peace vs Global peace

Over the years I have heard a variety of proposals and strategies for achieving a more peaceful and harmonious world. I have worked for some of them, and I can't think of one I have been opposed to. Yet I find myself with some critical thoughts.

Violence covers a spectrum from what goes on between friends and family, up through larger groups to the question of violence between nations. There is a widespread sense that this constitutes a single thing, an aspect of life that calls for a single approach. Between family and friends, within workplaces, within a group such as FUSN, the proper methods to eliminate violence include personal ones. Adopting a more peaceful inner state is important. Teaching nonviolent conflict resolution, learning about appropriate ways to manage anger, and empathy with others' points of views -- all are important.

But people often say that these transformations are the way to work towards nonviolence in the world of international relations. "Peace: Let it begin with me." "The journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step."

I disagree. At the level of national and international politics, these are not what matter. The idea of a Department of Peace perplexes me, and I feel ambivalent about the draft UU proposal: "Should the Unitarian Universalist Association reject the use of any and all kinds of violence and war to resolve disputes between peoples and nations and adopt a principle of seeking just peace through nonviolent means?" Does the journey of a thousand miles begin with a single step? Or are we trying to reach the moon by climbing a mountain?

As I left grad school in 1982, I was deeply concerned about the possibility of war, in particular nuclear war between the US and the USSR. In an attempt to take action, I became impressed with the late Randall Forsberg, and worked for her for three years. Randy was a principal author of the Nuclear Freeze, a movement which swept the nation and forced Reagan to take a more peaceful approach to the USSR than he otherwise would have. Randy was a radical, passionately committed to peace and justice, but the Freeze proposal was very moderate: not to forswear all violence or even military action, but simply to stop building new nuclear weapons if the USSR would agree to do the same. Her genius was to find a moderate first step that ordinary folks could embrace. That's the kind of proposal we need to find. The ordinary person is, I am afraid, left scratching his or her head and looking puzzled at those who want to forswear all violence, now.

The way to international peace is by a series of steps in the real world, the peaceful resolution of one conflict, and then perhaps another. With luck, this will transform the world into a place which Americans perceive as somewhat less dangerous, allowing them to consider a less violent posture or solution to the next crisis. Few Americans like war, they just feel it may be necessary to stay safe.

A personal commitment to a more profound nonviolence is useful for the goal of eliminating the (often fairly subtle) violence within FUSN and our own families, but if intended as a way to international peace, it is mostly a distraction.