Nov 15, 2015


In our 24 hour news media circle, it is difficult to escape the stark and often depressing reality that we live in troubled times. One gets the impression that the world is caving it around us. A combination of domestic social disruptions and global political upheavals pose serious threats to the stability of local communities, the integrity of states and a fragile international order.

In the Middle East, the promise of an Arab spring has not only failed to materialize but has, in some countries, ushered a dark age of brutality and human misery. The fall of long standing dictatorships has triggered political instability and upheaval from Libya to Yemen. In Syria, a protracted civil war rages - a situation made worse by the role of extremist groups such as Al Qaeda and ISIS. An estimated 250,000 Syrians (a quarter of a million people) have lost their lives since the start of the conflict.

We must remind ourselves that these are not just numbers. 250,000 lives is about half the entire population of my city, Hamilton. In pondering this figure I am reminded of that quote by Stalin: “The death of one man is a tragedy; the death of millions, a statistic.” It is cynical but also sadly true. At some point, we lose count and the shock value disappear. Lost lives become simply numbers.

The disheartening images of thousands of Syrian refugees streaming into Europe and living under squalid conditions reflect the international repercussions of this conflict. Who can forget the heart-wrenching image of the three-year-old Syrian boy, Aylan Kurdi, whose little body was washed up on a beach in Turkey only a few weeks ago? His family was making a final, desperate attempt to flee the war in Syria to join relatives in Canada. Migration charities say that as many as 20,000 people may have died at sea trying to reach Europe in the last two decades.

In a sign of how troubled the Middle East has become, the Israeli-Palestinian issue, long considered the central peace and security question in the region, seem to have taken a back seat in the face of more urgent and grave threats to regional and global security.

In Ukraine, local identity politics and big-power geo-politics have triggered a civil war that threatens the post-Cold War peace and stability in Eastern Europe. In Afghanistan, Pakistan and Kashmir, Taliban militants continue a long-running insurgency that has resulted in the loss of thousands of lives.

In North Africa, the new nation of South Sudan remains embroiled in conflict and in West Africa, the militant Islamist group Boko Haram has unleashed terror and indiscriminate violence against civilians, including innocent school girls.

In Asia, the nuclear threat posed by North Korea remains unresolved while the territorial ambitions of a resurgent China raises political tensions and new security concerns in the region. From Myanmar and Thailand in Asia to Columbia in South America, states and societies remain embroiled in internal conflicts and militant insurgencies that adversely affect the daily lives of ordinary people.

Even in the relatively stable Western democracies tensions simmer just beneath the surface. In Europe irregular migration of refugees fleeing wars in the Middle East and North Africa has given rise to a resurgent xenophobia and the dawn of new right-wing extremisms. In the United States, the civil rights legacy on Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. in his struggle for inclusion and against racial injustices has found new voices in the Black Lives Matters movement.

In Canada, Australia and New Zealand, indigenous people continue to struggle against the legacies of historical marginalization and for socio-economic inclusion. In Canada, the Idle No More Movement and the recently released Report of the Residential School Truth and Reconciliation Commission paint a picture of continued alienation and exclusion of indigenous communities that challenges the country to confront and address a historical injustice perpetrated against some citizens.

It is ironic that a bi-polar Cold War world of superpowers, nuclear proliferation and the threat of mutually assured destruction now seem far more stable than a fragmented unipolar world. The end of the Cold War was expected to usher an era of unmitigated world peace. Now, we know better. Our world remains deeply troubled and conflicted. The quest for global peace remains as relevant today as it was at the height of the Cold War.

Our Troubled and Conflicted World

11/15/2015 08:18:00 PM ,

Nov 14, 2015


The spate of terrorist attacks from Paris to Turkey, Lebanon to Nigeria demands our collective reflection on the price of peace.

The Institute for Economics and Peace, an policy think-tank, issues an annual Global Peace Index (GPI) that uses a variety of indicators to score and rank peacefulness in 162 countries around the world. In its latest report, the Institute stated that while the overall number of wars being waged around the world is declining, the world has become much less peaceful.

In fact, such peacelessness cost the global economy about thirteen hundred dollars ($1,350) per person last year. What is the value of peace? In 2012 the Institute for Economics and Peace estimated that world peace was worth $9.4 trillion. A year later, that number had grown to $9.8 trillion—or 11.3 percent of global GDP (I like to recite these numbers because they get the attention of those bean counters obsessed with quantitative measurements). Numbers and dollars signs also grabs the attention of politicians and policymakers.

So, how exactly do wars and peace decline at the same time? How can we have fewer wars, but less peace? The post-Cold War period has seen a spike in internal conflicts and civil wars, but overall conflicts between nations and state militaries are becoming less frequent. However, global peacefulness has been falling for the past seven years, and over 500 million people currently live in countries at risk for further declines in peacefulness in the short-term. 

This is principally because War is no longer the preserve of national armies and sovereign powers. Non state actors increasing have the capacity to engage in armed conflict thereby reducing overall peacefulness around the world. This takes the form of domestic terrorism, insurgencies, rebellions, revolts and uprisings.

In other words, we have fewer wars and less peace today because conflict has become democratized. It is easier today for non-state actors such as militant insurgent groups with no fixed addresses to unleash wide scale violence than at the height of the Cold War. Today, the weapons of mass destructions are not confined to state armories. They are also in the hands of terrorists, insurgents and unregulated militias who have less qualms about deploying these weapons. 

We need to think of peace not simply in terms of pressuring governments to avoid war but also in terms of good governance, mass education, economic and social reforms to address the alienations and hopelessness that drive so many young people into the hands of crazed Islamist terrorists.

What is the price of Peace?

11/14/2015 12:18:00 AM

Nov 13, 2015


Amidst the rise of Nazism in Germany in 1939 and Hitler’s aggressive militarization that foreshadowed the Second World War, Mahatma Gandhi, the pacifist leader of the non-violent movement against British rule in India wrote a letter to Adolf Hitler. It was a short and simple letter, just 12 lines; 126 words in all.

Dear Friend, Friends have been urging me to write to you for the sake of humanity. But I have resisted their request, because of the feeling that any letter from me would be an impertinence. Something tells me that I must not calculate and that I must make my appeal for whatever it may be worth. It is quite clear that you are today the one person in the world who can prevent a war which may reduce humanity to the savage state. Must you pay the price for an object however worthy it may appear to you to be? Will you listen to the appeal of one who has deliberately shunned the method of war, not without considerable success? Any way, I anticipate your forgiveness, if I have erred in writing to you. I remain, Your sincere friend, - Signed - M.K.Gandhi

Later in December 1940 with the outbreak of war, Gandhi sent another slightly longer letter to Hitler. In it, he once again urged Hitler to heed the appeals for peace coming from millions of voices around the world. 

He stated: “We have no doubt about your bravery or devotion to your fatherland, nor do we believe that you are the monster described by your opponents. But your own writings and pronouncements and those of your friends and admirers leave no room for doubt that many of your acts are monstrous and unbecoming of human dignity… Such are your humiliation of Czechoslovakia, the rape of Poland and the swallowing of Denmark. I am aware that your view of life regards such spoliations as virtuous acts. But we have been taught from childhood to regard them as acts degrading humanity. Hence we cannot possibly wish success to your arms.” 

Gandhi went on in the letter to explain the philosophy behind his non-violent resistance to British rule in India stating, “We have found in non-violence a force which, if organized, can without doubt match itself against a combination of all the most violent forces in the world.”

Gandhi never received an acknowledgement or reply from Hitler and it is unclear today whether his letters even reached Hitler. Some historians of the period have speculated that senior Nazi officials would have found the letter imprudent and might have been unwilling to pass it on the Fuhrer. Others theorize that Hitler would have been highly offended by Gandhi’s letters and not taken them seriously. Hitler proceeded with his war. World War II would turn out to be the deadliest military conflict in history with over 60 million people killed. 

Students and scholars of peace have long asked: Was Gandhi naïve? Did he really expect this letters to have an impact on Nazism or Hitler’s vision of the Third Reich? Were his letters to Hitler a waste of time? Did they amount to appeasement as some have suggested? 

Hindsight, they say, is 20/20 and half a century later, it is easy to speculate as to what should have been the right course of action. True, Gandhi’s letters were ineffectual. But were they a waste of time? I think not. 

As a leading moral voice of his era, Gandhi felt an obligation to his conscience and the world, to make an appeal for peace irrespective of the odds of success. Ultimately, peacemaking is about pragmatic risk-taking and Gandhi took his risks for the sake of peace. Given the unspeakable horror and brutality of terrorism and war that afflicts many countries today, our world is in depsrate need of a new generation of risk takers for peace. 

A Peacemaker's Appeal: Gandhi's Letter to Hitler

11/13/2015 11:38:00 PM

Oct 8, 2015

It is encouraging that many more people seem interested in learning about peace and what we can do as individuals to promote peace and transform conflict in our communities, our nations and our world. 

Public Talk: Global Peace and Local Action

10/08/2015 11:50:00 PM ,

Sep 20, 2015

I reflect on the possibilities and perils of peacebuilding in an uncertian and conflicted world. 

Making Impossible Peace

9/20/2015 10:16:00 PM ,

Aug 18, 2015


Thought of the Week

8/18/2015 12:08:00 AM

Jun 9, 2015


After 6 years of deliberations, the Canadian Truth and Reconciliation Commission last week released its long-awaited report. The TRC was established following the settlement arising from the abuses by state agents against indigenous people in the residential school system.

The landmark report details accounts of the forced assimilation of aboriginal children and physical and sexual abuse in state-funded, church-run boarding schools. It concludes that what happened at the schools, and the broader aboriginal policy that they were a part of, “can best be described as ‘cultural genocide.’”

The use of the term “cultural genocide” has sparked a furor in Canada’s normally staid public political discourse. Deeply divided opinions have been voiced on the appropriateness of using a term typically reserved of mass killings to describe these historical events.

The polarized reactions that have greeted the Canadian TRC are strikingly similar to the reactions that followed the release of the South African TRC Report a decade ago. Scholars of South Africa often question whether the South African TRC was a “miracle” or model. Can it serve as a model for other countries in the aftermath of serious human rights abuses? Or was it a miracle of the sort that occurs but rarely in the life of nations, dependent on the compelling personalities of extraordinary leaders? The answer seems somewhere in-between.

In their tribute to Nelson Mandela, Justice Sinclair and the other leaders of the Canadian TRC acknowledged that the South African TRC was an inspiration for their work. They stated that their understanding of the purpose and value of truth-telling and reconciliation “owe a great deal” to the South African TRC. Reading through the Canadian TRC Report and its 94 recommendations, the influence of the South African TRC is indeed evident.

As was the case in South Africa, many Canadians have welcomed the Canadian TRC Report as a step towards national catharsis and reconciliation. But as in South Africa where some derisively dismissed the TRC as the “Kleenex Commission” (in reference to the emotional scenes at the Commission’s public hearings), some Canadian have been critical of the Report.

One newspapers contributor commented: “If you want the average Canadian to turn their backs on you, keep using the term ‘Cultural Genocide.’ This is a nonsensical appellation and one sure to get everyone’s backs up. Genocide is what happened in the deliberate and methodical extermination of 6 million Jews by the Germans in WW2 and by the Turks against the Armenians.” The TRC Report need not get anyone’s back up.

This is where I think Canada can learn from South Africa. In South Africa, the TRC did not resolve the complex questions of historical injustices perpetrated under apartheid and opinion remains divided about its record on promoting national reconciliation. What the Commission so effectively did, however, was to provide a forum for open discussions about historical and continuing injustices that had long been ignored or mentioned in hushed tones.

Even amidst the divergent reactions it garnered, the South African TRC Report provided the essential first step in the journey towards coming to terms with a nation’s dark past and charting the path towards reconciliation.

The Canadian TRC Report can play a similar role. It will take the commitment and goodwill of political and civil leaders to push a national program of restitution and reconciliation. Archbishop Desmond Tutu who chaired the South African TRC used Ubuntu, the traditional African notion of interdependent humanity, to legitimize the work of the TRC and to sell its vision of reconciliation to a skeptical nation.

In Canada, a nation that celebrates tolerance and diversity, the TRC Report can provide the foundation of a long overdue program of national learning about a dark chapter of Canadian history.

A first step will be to heed the call of the Report that students in Canadian schools be required to take courses in the history and legacy of aboriginal people and in particular, the history of the residential schools.

Truth and Reconciliation in Canada: Lessons from the South African TRC

6/09/2015 07:50:00 AM ,

Jan 31, 2015


Winston Churchill has been written into the history books as a heroic wartime leader. His resolute stand against Nazism rallied Britain and the Allies to victory during World War II. But now, a BBC News Magazine story sheds light on his more uncertain and complicated record.

While many may condemn these revisionist accounts of Churchill’s legacies, the lesson here is that all great leaders are products of their time. In the quest for culture heroes, societies often construct one-dimensional narratives about leaders who often lived complicated lives.

We put them on a pedestal and deify them. But our heroes need not be unblemished. If anything, their failures and foibles humanize them and make them more realistic role models. We can emulate their many good sides and learn to avoid what, with hindsight, we now recognise as their not-so-good sides.

Mandela’s legacy as a peacemaker is not diminished by his armed militancy and resort to violence at a critical point in the struggle against apartheid. Gandhi’s humanism and philosophy of Ahimsa (Non-violence) is not diminished by his support for British mobilization of Indian troops during World War I. These aspects of their lives help us better appreciate the realities of the times they lived.

In the same way, drawing attention to Churchill’s racism, anti-Semitism and support for the wartime use of poison gas doesn't make him any less a great wartime leader.

In my book Imperialism and Human Rights, I argued that although Churchill was idolized in Britain and its allies, many African nationalists struggling against British colonialism during the war considered him a duplicitous and die-hard imperialist. I received a lot of flak for this claim.

Winston Churchill: Wartime hero and an Uncertain Legacy

1/31/2015 11:34:00 PM , ,


After months of fighting, Kurdish fighters battling the Islamic State jihadists in Syria finally succeeded in recapturing the key town of Kobane. The Kurds defeat of the Islamic State jihadists was widely celebrated as a victory for the forces of moderation and toleration against extremists. Rightly so.

If ever there was a just war, this would appear to be one. But even in this war, there are ultimately no real winners. Everyone involved loses something – lives, dignity, relationships, hope, aspirations, community, property. This Associated Press photo of the “liberated” Kobane tells it all. It could well be a scene from the apocalypse. A remainder that in war, there are no real winners.

More photos below

War has no real winners

1/31/2015 10:29:00 PM ,
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