Shifting the Planetary Conversation

Too Quick to Use the Carrot and Stick During the past decade, diplomatic efforts have sadly failed to produce satisfactory results needed to solve numerous international challenges. In the Bush administration, a popular theme to international problem solving has been the so-called “Carrot and Stick” approach. Perhaps overly reliant on this approach, the US has been too quick to use its stick: employing armed force, sanctions and political isolation. Zero-sum diplomacy always amplifies the likelihood of violence. The US policy has been, in plain language, “If you do not do as we say you will be punished”. This approach is based on coercion and control and, to put it bluntly, bullying.  Taking Responsibility for Harm Done in the Past  It is necessary to eliminate past-based or pre-existing resentment before countries in conflict can demonstrate the essential willingness to negotiate and cooperate.

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 A World in a Dramatic State of Change                                                                                                          The winds of change are whirling ever faster on our shrinking planet. If we could grasp why so many people around the world are caught up in deadly conflicts with each other, ones which cost so much suffering to so many, would we want to know that? I spent a week in intensive study in Boulder, Colorado recently, sponsored by Spiral Dynamics Integral with the primary exponent of the Spiral Dynamics theory, Don Beck. The Missing Piece for Peacemakers? On of the main challenges for peacemakers is that we tend to apply one size fits all solutions. If you bad people (terrorists or bad governments, take your pick) would just stop your violent ways, the rest of us could live in peace.

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Weighing the Lessons of Love What does love have to do with it? Everything!  If I want to live in a peaceful world I have learned that I have to be loving-everywhere, every place, with everyone.    I’ve been weighing the lessons of love this month when so much has gone on in my life, from the marriage of my nephew to miracles of reconciliation with my family, from the sudden death of a beloved sister, to saying no to a man who wanted to love me. What is This Thing Called Love? What is love? Why do all people, even hardened killers, dream about love? Why do so many people despair of ever finding love and kill themselves when they don’t? Who knows how many human conflicts are rooted in the desire to be affirmed, seen and honored, a hunger that would be immediately sated in the presence of love.  To be treated with kindness and tenderness is, I believe, a universal yearning, counterbalanced by one thing-a great fear of the vulnerability that comes when we are undefended and open to hurt as we were at some point in our past.                                                                                                                                                                   A Wordless Yet Full Emptiness Love, I have discovered is spaciousness, a simple emptiness and fullness at the same time.  I sit and watch the rains of Seattle fall on the tall pines outside my windows.

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 The U.S. Election Deteriorates As We Watch Many of us in the U.S. are watching  as the Presidential race deteriorates into a combination of celebrity worship, media bashing, attack ads, sarcasm and fear. Two extraordinary candidates, each one a man of conscience and courage, are being sucked into a maelstrom so strong even they cannot resist its compelling pull.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                        Thoughtful Discussion and Gravitas is Lost We are paying a terrible price for allowing ourselves to get swept up in this trance. All sense of thoughtful discussion of the issues, and the gravitas of wisely choosing a leader who will have to make critical decisions that may affect the future not just of the U.S., but of the entire world, is being lost.    How Did American Politics Get So Off-Course? American politics has been off-course for years and Americans and the whole world knows it.

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                                                                                                   Divided Conventions, A Divided Nation  Watching the Republican and Democratic conventions the past two weeks has been an illuminating experience.  While speakers at both conventions made appeals to unifying the American people and to creating change, a tone of blame, derision and outright sarcasm for the “other side” was much in evidence.  In the U.S. such partisanship is thought necessary to winning elections.  It is divisive however, and ruinous when the goal is bringing a divided nation together. Skills for Bringing a Divided Family Together As someone who has paid a dear price for participating in a conflict which nearly destroyed a family, I understand how such apparently intractable conflicts work. I also understand what it takes to reconcile and I know it is possible to find peace after years of terrible bitterness and anger.  I learned many things in my journey back to my family and developed skills, all of which are applicable to making peace at the larger, collective level. One of the most important of these is the skill of seeing the world as other people see it.

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 (Note: I am indebted to Jane Mayer’s groundbreaking work The Dark Side for contributions to the ideas I wrote about in the following blog.) Bush Administration Response to 9/11 Rooted in Shame and Humiliation The tragic mistakes made by the Bush administration provide lessons for those of us who yearn to see a happier world.  Now that the Bush team’s decision making process is coming to light, it is critical that we understand what happened here. The Bush-Cheney response to 9/11 was rooted in shame and humiliation. They were caught, one might say, with their pants down. They had been repeatedly warned that Al-Qaeda operatives were in the U.S. and chose to ignore that information.  When the planes hit the Twin Towers Bush was the Commander-in-Chief.  Three thousand lives were lost on his watch.  Somewhere inside themselves Bush and Cheney knew they were responsible. The Lust for Revenge These two men are not self-reflective people.

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(Editor’s Note: Today I introduce you to my friend and colleague Susan Partnow, the founder of Global Citizen Journey, a new citizen diplomacy NGO that takes American citizens on trips to third world countries. GCJ is now planning its next trip, to Burundi, in July 2009.)                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  Is a Peacemaker Born or Made? Q: Susan, How did you come to be so interested in and passionate about peace and social justice? Does a particular memory come to mind? It’s been that way since I was a child. WWII and the Holocaust deeply affected me.

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Understaffed, Under-funded Diplomatic Corps Nicholas Kristof’s column in ( 8/10/08) New York Times, “Make Diplomacy, Not War” was an interesting piece of journalism, both for what it said and for what it didn’t say.  Kristof makes the case that the American Foreign Service is woefully under-staffed and under-funded.  The US has more musicians in its military bands than it has diplomats. Something is seriously out of whack, he suggests, especially when it comes to fighting terrorism. Firepower Isn’t Effective Against Terrorists The US is still doing the same thing it’s  been doing since 9/11. It has continued a habitual pattern of using firepower against terrorists. We still haven’t learned that this approach is ineffective.

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Book Review:  Reconciliation: Islam, Democracy, and the West. Benazir Bhutto. Harper Collins, New York, New York, 2008.                                                                                                       Finished Just Before Her Assassination This book was finished days before Benazir Bhutto was assassinated in Pakistan last December.  With the publication of this book we can now honor the contribution she made in leaving it to the world.  It is an important work and forwards the reconciliation and democracy building she was engaged in as she lived. I have never read anything as comprehensive as this about the Muslim world.

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The Long Hunt Is Over                                                                                                                                                                Radovan Karadzic, one of the most wanted war criminals in the world, was arrested Monday in Serbia, ending a 13 year manhunt. He will be transferred soon to the Hague for trial at the International Criminal Court. I hope that Ratko Mladic, the third chieftain of evil in the Bosnian wars, will also be arrested soon. All societies create agreements for people to live together. When someone breaks one of those agreements he or she is “called to account” by the community. He must satisfy the group that he will be safe for everyone to live with.

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