Culture of peace as an alternative to peacekeeping
(Coordinator Comment)
The original call in 1992 for a culture of peace programme at UNESCO, Executive Board Document 140 EX/28, considered the culture of peace programme as an alternative to UN peacekeeping operations, stating that military force by itself could not bring peace:
"The world has reached a turning-point in history. It is a moment of opportunity for global co-operation for peace. It is a moment that should not be lost.
It has become clear that military force cannot solve the global problems of violence and injustice. Military force can only continue the vicious cycle.
We need peace-building, not just peace-keeping, as stated by United Nations Secretary-General, Boutros Boutros Ghali. We need peace culture, not war culture, as stated at Yamoussoukro, and now we should make the ideas operational. We should put the ideas into action. in this framework, I suggest the following four-point plan:
(1) make an agreement with the United Nations Security Council to fund a Culture of Peace Programme with 1 per cent of the peace-keeping budget;
(2) carry out this Culture of Peace Programme in the zones where United Nations peace-keeping forces (the blue berets) are already deployed or where a situation has developed that threatens to require such intervention in the future.
(3) administer this Culture of Peace Programme by an international centre under the joint control of UNESCO and the United Nations Security Council;
(4) use the talents of all existing United Nations progrmmes, especially those of UNESCO, on a rotating basis, so as to avoid creating a permanent staff.
II. Proposed Culture of Peace Programme for United Nations peace-keeping
UN peace-keeping, greatly expanded in recent years, needs a strong component programme of peace culture. The blue berets, by themselves, cannot produce peace."
Unfortunately, despite initial success in El Salvador and Mozambique, the national culture of peace programmes ultimately failed because of lack of support from the rich member states of the UN, as described in page 9 and page 10 of the early history of the culture of peace.
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Visitor CommentsTo add your own comments in this box, send them with title "game comments" to the following email:  |
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game administrator Jun. 13 2819,08:44
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Readers' comments are invited on this topic
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fighter Oct. 11 2010,08:11
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Hello, that is a very good idea, education for peace. Unfortunately, not all members of a siciety are inclined to that. As in each country there is a police, so there needs to be a global police, just in case ...
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