The United Nations resolution for a culture of peace calls for a "global movement for a culture of peace", including the civil society, and for exchange of information among all the actors involved to promote a culture of peace.
In 2005, at the midpoint of the UN culture of peace decade, the UN received a detailed report from 700 civil society organizations on the state of the global movement for a culture of peace. They reported that progress is being made, but that few people know about it because it is not considered newsworthy by the mass media.
The influence of the global movement for a culture of peace would be much greater if all the social movements were to cooperate in association with local authorities around the eight programme areas of the culture of peace. As it is now, they tend to go their separate ways and not to recognize their relation to a culture of peace.
Until now, most social movements have concentrated their lobbying efforts on the state and on a UN dominated by its Member States, both of which are tied to the culture of war. Because of this, they encounter great resistance to their efforts to promote the various programme areas of a culture of peace.
There is a major problem with the idea of delegating power to social movements and civil society organizations. It would contradict a fundamental aspect of the culture of peace, the necessity for democratic participation. Civil society organizations are not fully democratic because they represent only their own members, not the people as a whole
