The Accessibility of Peace and Non-Violence Discussions

Upon reflecting on recent worldwide events, and comparing them with class discussions

and readings, it is possible to notice a significant difference on thoughts about peace and non-

violence. This great contradiction leads to the questioning of the accessibility of peace discussions

to the public. The lack of comprehension of peace and non-violence is reflected on the rise of

intolerance and violent responses to crises. Therefore, this short essay will focus on exploring the

possibility of these discussions being too ‘academicized’, and distanced from popular knowledge.

The first barrier to understanding peace and non-violence is comprehending their

definitions themselves, which can not be easily defined and, therefore, affects clarity. One of the

basic definitions of peace is described as positive or negative, and violence as being direct or

structural (Galtung, 1985). Although many readings use these basic definitions, each author has

their own approach and understanding of what peace and violence means. Barash and Webel (2013)

mention that peace can have undesirable connotations such as coma, death, and emptiness; and

war can have good metaphors like “war on poverty” or “war on cancer”. During a class exercise

about the necessity of violence to implement peace, the biggest obstacle to come to a consensus

were the different perspectives on peace and violence. Some people think of absolute world peace

while others focus on more realistic notions, and also have trouble determining if certain actions

are violent or not. If people who study the subject have difficulty discussing peace because of

definitions, the problem is certainly more severe with the public. Even though this issue is intrinsic

of peace discussions, and can be a good thing for academics, it is important to look for ways to

simplify the ideas of peace and violence for the general public.

Another issue regarding the discussions on peace is the distancing from reality when

talking in an academic environment. Considering the readings, discussions, and overall nature of
the classes, it is normal to lose sight of what is too idealistic and what is realistic. True (2015)

wrote a great article explaining that scholars are claiming that global violence is declining, but

they actually neglect structural forms of violence. This shows how it can be easy to forget reality

by just focusing on data and overall numbers, and ignoring issues that are present in everyday life.

During practice exercises in class, the students always prefer the options related to non-violence,

e.g. stating that after a war, the responsible would be required to do community work, instead of

being sentenced. This view reflects our convictions of how a situation should occur, but does not

consider several factors (e.g. emotional ones), that would be present in a real situation. Although

there is no problem in having these ideal types in academic discussions of peace research, it is

important to remember that they do not intend to reflect reality. However, this realization seems

to be difficult, and people tend to forget and disconnect from everyday life. This can constitute

another barrier both in searching for solutions to violence, and in promoting peace, as it fails to

represent the people the discussion needs to reach.

It is fundamental to continuously question the accessibility of peace research if we want to

spread these ideas. As mentioned, the increased violence and intolerance in today’s world is an

example that we are not able to articulate to most people. There are many obstacles to promoting

peace and non-violence; some are difficult to overcome like the case of definitions, but other

problems are approachable. The distancing in some discussions and disconnection to reality needs

to be constantly remembered, and they might be too ‘academicized’ for the public to really

understand. Considering the facility to spread hate ideologies, there is an urgent necessity to make

non-violent ideas easy to comprehend as well.

References
Barash, D. P., & Webel, C. P. (2013). Peace & conflict studies (3rd ed.). Thousand Oaks, CA:

SAGE Publications.

Galtung, J. (1985). Twenty-Five Years of Peace Research: Ten Challenges and Some Responses.

Journal of Peace Research, 22(2), 141-158.

True, J. (2015). Winning the Battle but Losing the War on Violence. International Feminist

Journal of Politics, 17(4), 554-572.