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The New Peace Report, #6
By Louise Diamond, Ph.D.
Welcome to The New Peace Report, an occasional set of reflections on world and national affairs in these times of change and challenge, as seen through the lens of a global shift toward Deep Peace, the living experience of our inter-relatedness.
Independence Day Revisited
Fireworks, parades, and watermelon. That’s what I associate with July 4. I remember family picnics and sparklers, a sense of celebration and joy.
But what is it we are truly celebrating on this holiday? Many of us recall the famous ‘We hold these truths to be self-evident…,’ yet when is the last time we read the full Declaration of Independence?
[go to www.ushistory.org/Declaration for the complete text]
I just re-read it for the first time in decades, and was struck by how the tyrannies and injustices spelled out as the reason for the Declaration have resonance today, both in the United States and elsewhere. But mostly I was amazed at the sensibility of the authors of the Declaration [and of the Constitution and the Bill of Rights: www.usconstitution.net] to the cause of right relationship between a people and its governing authority, an issue we continue to be concerned with today.
That relationship, at its best, we call Good Governance. In these days, it is one of the five most critical topics for the well-being of the world, I believe. The others are Peace and Social Justice, Economic Equity, Environmental Sustainability, and Religious and Cultural Harmony. Each of these are areas where humanity is greatly challenged; where there is untold suffering with the potential of more to come; and where there are urgent and exciting opportunities for real transformation.
This July 4th, 337 years after the Declaration of Independence was signed, is a good time to reflect on the state of Good Governance in the United States and around the world.
At their core, our two founding documents lay out certain assumptions about power and justice, rights and responsibilities, autonomy and accountability. Certainly these ideas were visionary in their day, and still now challenge us to live our highest ideals.of citizenship, democracy, freedom, and equality; ideals as deep and boundless as the human soul.
The interesting thing about ideals is that they are as much or more about the journey than the end result. They are goals to reach for; glimpsed from the path. The tension between where we want to be and where we actually are on that journey is, at its best, generative and creative. What strikes me is that these two amazing documents launched a conversation that is exciting, complex, and ever-changing – often messy, yet always lively.
We are engaged in this conversation in so many ways. Our elections, court decisions, presidential pronouncements, political discourse, internet chat, legislative struggles, town hall meetings, media commentary – pick up any newspaper and you’ll notice how much of the news is ultimately about the relationship between the people and their government.
We discuss and debate our views on gun control, wiretapping, the war in Iraq, the limits of executive power, the right response to Iran, health care, zoning laws, budgets, city ordinances, and who should be on the Supreme Court. It’s all part of the same conversation.
It’s easy enough to judge where we are falling short of our ideals. We wish that the atmosphere were not so polarized, the politics not so mean-spirited, the voting process more just, and the dialogue more inclusive. We lament decisions we disagree with, rage against perfidy in high places, display our grievances with all kinds of protest, and bewail the harm done to millions, here and abroad, by government action and inaction, as well we should. But we continue to explore the true meaning of rights and responsibilities. We vote our conscience, our values, our hopes, and our political convictions. We stay on it, and in it.
Things don’t always change the way we want them to. The key, though, is that we are able to sustain this vigorous and engaging conversation about what constitutes Good Governance. The people in Zimbabwe cannot do this. The people in Saudi Arabia cannot do this. For the people in China, and Russia, and Gaza, and the Congo, and many other places in this world this kind of conversation is unthinkable, yet so profoundly desired.
In an interdependent world, relationship is central. The relationship between the people and their government is critical to the well-being of the nation. Like any intimate relationship, it has its power struggles, its love/hate roller-coaster rides, its deep disappointments and despair, its ever-present hopes and dreams, and its continuous opportunities for creativity, learning, healing, and improvement.
I believe this relationship has fallen on particularly hard times these past seven years. Looking back over three centuries, however, gives me great faith in the living set of documents on which this country was founded as basically wise and sound, holding the potential for an ever ‘more perfect union.’
This Independence Day, I will wave sparklers at dusk to light up my little patch of sky in honor of my freedom, our freedom, to be fully engaged in this relationship. I sense we’re on the edge of an evolutionary jump, and I’m proud and pleased that the platform of shared meaning provided by these documents can sustain our lift off.
See you at the parade!
Interdependence Comes to Washington
 I’ve recently started exploring how to encourage systems thinking in the foreign policy community in Washington, with those who determine U.S. relations with the rest of the world. This is important because though we now live in a Quantum world of interdependence and globalization, our institutions, policies, and worldviews are still very much conditioned by Newtonian assumptions of separation and dominance.
In my early rounds of consultation on this topic, I found both heartening and disheartening data. Sadly, like most businesses, the world of foreign policy is heavily ‘silo-ed,’ or separated into policy areas. People who work on nuclear issues are not necessarily in contact with those working on climate change, for example, or human rights. At a time when we need to see the inter-relationships between issues, this separation is not productive.
However, I also found some wonderful creative thinking going on in pockets here and there. At one think tank positioned to become a key player in a possible Obama administration, the Center for American Progress, I discovered a wonderful article on Sustainable Security by Gayle E.Smith.
The traditional view of national security holds the nation pre-eminent: our own security here in the U.S. is paramount. She speaks for the need to combine that with human security (the well-being and safety of people, not nations) and with collective security (the shared interests of the world). You can read the whole report at (www.americanprogress.org/issues/2008/06/sustainable_security.html).
From another think tank, the New American Foundation, comes an article by Sherle Schwenninger, called Beyond Dominance. He takes on the policy and assumption that the U.S. is and should be the dominant power in the world, braving the conventional wisdom to argue that the interdependence of our world does not allow for this outdated view. You can read it at www.newamerica.net/publications/policy/beyond_dominance.
The Global Interdepence Project at the Aspen Institute, too, is beginning to explore how an understanding of systems/holistic thinking, can benefit their activities, as are other projects throughout the Washington area. I have only begun to discover these points of light; I’m sure there are many. The key now is to link these disparate initiatives and help others who make and influence foreign policy shift into the Quantum understanding of our oneness, wholeness, and interdependence. I look forward to the opportunity!
The Heroic Journey
 On July 11 we continue our exploration of How to Change the World with a three-month study of Transformation, the Way of Quantum Change. We will explore:
- The Spectrum of Change and Transformation – to understand the range of processes involved with change
- The Tranformative Journey – to explore the heroic journey that takes us beyond the familiar to discover and implement new possibilities
- Managing the Challenges of Change – to consider how to deal with the many obstacles and resistances to change
- Transformation Writ Large – to learn success factors from previous large social change movements
- Transformative Leadership – to examine the dynamics of leading self and others on this journey
You can participate in this course from home, online. There’s still time to join this vibrant international Learning Community. Call me at 802-453-7194, or go to www.louisediamond.com/training.html to learn more and to register.
Upcoming Conferences
September is a good month for conferences and special events.
 Engaging the Other: The Power of Compassion. September 4-7, in San Mateo, California. Explore the power of compassionate dialogue for Good Governance, Peace and Social Justice, Environmental Sustainability, Economic Equity, and Religious and Cultural Harmony. Go to www.cbiworld.org for the complete program and to register.
Healing Communities: Using Peace Psychology to Transform Violence. September 19-20, in Boston, Massachusetts. Brings together academics, organizational leaders, and grass-roots workers searching for psychological contributions to peaceful solutions for complex problems in our neighborhoods and in our world. To learn more and to register go to www.mspp.edu/academics/continuing-education/programs/hc12.asp.
International Day of Peace Vigil. September 21 every year is designated by the U.N. as the International Day of Peace, so the whole world can observe a day of peace, nonviolence, ceasefire, and prayer together. There are many activities locally on that day. One international activity is the Vigil. Go to www.idpvigil.com to learn more and see how you can participate.
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