Our Peace Philosophy

Our vision is a sustainable peaceful resolution of the Cyprus conflict, leading to a unified multicultural state where individual and group human rights are respected and nurtured. These rights should be nothing less than the fundamental rights and freedoms embodied in the United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and whatever new resolutions and declarations are adopted by the UN and its Agency Organisations.

Committed to working for the human development by the creation of a Social Learning Environment where the attributes of a Peace Culture are identified, analysed, adopted by the society and enshrined in legislation. Such a socio-political environment will help create the conditions for the resolution of the conflict in Cyprus and help manage any future social or political conflict that can normally be expected in conditions of a healthy democracy.

To work for the local and global recognition that multicultural states are the right answer to intra-state ethnic conflict and that the break-up of states along ethnic lines is a regression to the malady of nationalism and separatism, instead of a forward movement in the spirit of the multicultural brotherhood of the peoples of the one humanity of nations.

To collaborate with all local state and non-state actors (including those actors who have opposing views) for the formation of a dedicated Institutional mechanism, that will bring together all social actors willing to work for social change towards the development of a Peace Culture.

To co-operate with other National, Regional and International Organisations working for similar causes locally, regionally and internationally. For this, we will formally network with organisations who are dedicated to the cause of Peace and the development of the human person.

Peace is honouring and celebrating the humanity and brotherhood of ‘others’ and the resolve to work with them towards prosperity and development for all.

The opposite of peace is not war. It is the absence of a Peace Culture where the ‘other’ is denied the satisfaction of the same needs one seeks to satisfy for one’s self. This is caused by an attitude of separateness, greed, perceptions and stereotypes about the ‘other’, a failure to acknowledge the good and the bad in all groups, and the effects of teaching historical half-truths.

War is a violent, vicious, and extremely costly system, put together with immense human effort and human sacrifice, in order to protect the group’s happiness from real or perceived threat. No consideration is given to the loss of life and unhappiness that it will cause to the ‘other’ and ones own group. Furthermore, the outcome for the perpetrator could be quite the opposite of expectations.

Although ‘war begins in the hearts and minds of men…’, minds and hearts are shaped by cultures and religion, which shape and are shaped by economics, politics, history, education, and many other factors. Therefore, building a Peace System and a Peace Culture involves close consideration of all these components of the present reality and human activity.

A Peace System needs to be designed with the same determination, diligence and attentiveness that governments design and execute the strategies of war. Despite the fact that a Peace System will produce harmony and prosperity, compared to a War System which can only produce misery and catastrophe, people and governments alike, instead of methodically and painstakingly designing Peace, expect Peace to manifest as a result of prayer and wishful thinking.

Sustainable Peace, in a conflict situation, cannot be the result of a political settlement alone. On the contrary, a political settlement can be greatly facilitated by the emergence of a Peace Culture within the societies of all parties to the conflict.

Peacebuilding is a long-term, complex, as well as fundamentally value-laden project that entails core decisions about how to construct the ‘good’ society and involves both formal and informal institution-building. (Johan Galtung)

Building a Sustainable Peace System cannot be the work of a single actor or group of actors, however politically and financially powerful, working in isolation. It should involve the given polity and take into account the historical, the socio-cultural and the political-economic environment. 

The two major Cypriot communities, possessed by the Greek and Turkish ‘Motherland Syndrome’, unable to break away from historical ethnic enmity, and fed by the attitude of winning-over-the ‘other’, have engaged in an ongoing conflict  for over fifty years now. What follows, is our philosophy for the Greek Cypriot part of the road to peace. Since our dream for a common Peace Organisation is still politically not possible, we will wait for the Turkish Cypriot members of the Centre to define the road to peace for their own community.  

In conditions of unequal power and military occupation, a Peacebuilding Attitude could be interpreted as a ratification of oppression and capitulation to injustice. This is not the case. A Peacebuilding Attitude is simply the denial of war and the adoption of alternative approaches to defence and conflict resolution.

 

The adoption of a Peace Culture begins by acknowledging our side’s responsibility to the conflict, forgiveness of the past, substituting the idea of a single ethnic state with that of a multicultural state and accommodating the rights of the ‘other’ in our proposals for a solution.

 

Resorting to nationalism and calls for ‘patriotism’, apart from failing to resolve the conflict may, over time, jeopardise the very existence of the Greek Cypriot community on the island. On the contrary, we need to redefine ‘patriotism’ as the defence of the human rights of whoever lives on the island.

 

The self-deception that “we are okay as we are – us here and them over there”, instead of seriously engaging in negotiating a resolution of the current Cyprus conflict, is a denial of the real danger of losing our existence and common distinctive identity as a Cypriot people.

 

A policy of Unilateral Disarmament will obviously be opposed on grounds of the risks it entails. The question is: Does a policy of defense by a constant build-up of the War Infrastructures pose lower risks?   

 

I am of the strong conviction that nothing less than a ‘Peace Revolution’ can stop the partition of our country. Traditional Peace Actions, which I call ‘Peace Rituals’, may make us feel that we are doing something but, to my opinion, they produce no effective results towards the Development of a Peace Culture. Without such a change in attitudes, the two communities will be unable to resolve the conflict. We may have something to show on the web and exchange lots of emails, but in effect we are only ‘preaching the converted’.

 

Peace is an innate natural development in all human beings. However, it is not a place where one automatically finds one’s self. It is a journey, often painful at the beginning, which starts with the first step.  This journey has to start in the very private place - the psyche - of the human person and gradually followed by the individual and consequent group progress to a Peace Culture. It is only possible if the following values are accepted at the individual and group level:

• It is a condition that everybody’s basic human needs should be recognised, honoured and satisfied, otherwise no single human person can develop to the next step.
  
• The current state of individual and group development should be recognised, and embraced as the factual next stepping stone. Then, a process of human development can be conceived, wisely designed, and thoughtfully cultivated and implemented.
• Humans must abandon the idea of separateness and the hate and dislike for other groups and people. They should recognise that, these people have nothing to do with historical mistakes, conflict, and barbaric actions of the nation with which they today affiliate themselves. Should each nation look to their own history through the lens of the truth, it will not be difficult to trace at least a similar behaviour by their own national group.
  
• Regarding people within ones own national group, one should let go of hate and dislike for all those who have different ideas and ideologies from oneself. Let us not forget that, for them, our ideas may be equally wrong and destructive, and that, most likely, they are as altruistic as we are and, probably, motivated by the same love for our country like ourselves.
  
• Consequently we have no right to hate anybody. We have differences in ideas and approaches – and these can often be very strong -, but these people are members of our larger group. It is with these people and for these people that we have to work. Therefore, ‘anti’ attitudes are not considered to be in the spirit of a Peace Culture. Our only choice is honest dialogue with every group with different ideas.

SOME OF THE UNDERLYING ASSUMPTIONS

Conflict is a natural human trait. It exists at all levels, within and between individuals, groups, communities, countries and cultures. The important issue is how one deals with conflict. It is either allowed to deteriorate into violent action, or it may be recognised as an opportunity to address and transcend the underlying contradictions and deep cultures into a positive and creative opportunity.

 

Simplified approaches to conflict resolution do not bring sustainable results. We need to address the deep cultures of the ‘collective subconscious’ lying below the surface and made up of assumptions and unquestioned beliefs inherited by people as members of a community or ethnic group. They compose our underlying values and perceptions about the ‘self’ (humane, brave, honourable, clever, industrious, right religious beliefs) and the ’other’ (barbarian, coward, cannot be trusted, stupid, lazy, wrong religious beliefs).

 

 

Social change from popular ideologies of the past can only take place through persistent, often painful, and well- designed long processes of public education that will eventually lead to a grass roots understanding of the Peace Culture and secure grass roots support for the need for change.

 

 

Most cultural change strategies fail not because of their content, but because of deficiencies in their process. This imperative need for process is rarely recognised.

 

 

Traditional education, being departmentalised into disciplines and state controlled, is too slow, or unable, to recognise new realities and the need to design for social change. Consequently, we consider the process of the development of a healthy, effective, and sustainable Social Change Process as being beyond the capacities of the State. An outstanding example is the current teaching methodology and the content of the history curriculum. Contrary to International and EU Conventions it breeds national supremacy ideology and blind 'patriotism'. 

 

Politicians are not best suited to bring about social change because, in so doing, they run the risk of being voted out by those who they seek to change. Furthermore, people in power are usually too busy with their personal agenda of maintaining that power indefinitely and they are not themselves motivated for change.

 

 

We consider political action in the interest of Peace as a legitimate activity of civil society. Therefore, we will question the idea that only politicians can talk politics. We will seek to upgrade civil society from its current charity function legitimacy, to that of a Social Change Agent engaged in active citizen diplomacy.

 

Therefore, the Centre is dedicated primarily to the development of a Peace Culture through experiential, participatory and democratic Collective Social Learning Methodologies. To this end, the latest theory and practice for human Collective Social Learning and Development will be adopted for members and friends of the Centre and the ultimate rolling out to the total population - minors, the youth, and the adult population-, both in towns and the rural communities.

 

THE TOOLS AVAILABLE FOR SOCIAL CHANGE TOWARDS A PEACE CULTURE 

For Peacebuilding Work to be successful, it should cover all the problem areas applicable to all the levels of human expression, namely: the intra-personal; the inter-personal; the intra-social, the inter-nation, the inter-state; the inter-region; and the inter-civilisation.

Our scope of Peace Work involves action for:

1. The recognition, by the whole of the society, of the attitudes and behaviours leading to a conflict culture and the appropriate steps to transcend itself to a Peace Culture;
2. The development of skills and processes in the Centre that will empower current and new volunteer participation and help in the efficient goal achievement.
3. The dissemination and training in skills and human development methodologies that will lead to social transformation.
4. The collaboration with all other Peace Actors by sharing know-how and resources.
5. The empowerment of Potential Peace Actors to participate in the process of developing a Peace Culture.
6. The empowerment and mobilisation of citizens to get actively involved in the process of Peacebuilding and the recognition that they have the power to shape their own and their children’s future.

The available Social Change tools are many. The actors are individuals, families, organised groups, state and other institutions and, last but not least, the State itself. 

For those who want to elaborate more on the tools, as well as current and potential Peace Actors please CLICK HERE  →   

• Multiculturalism: We believe that in the changing global environment, all countries will eventually become multicultural. Therefore, we are working for a multicultural membership at the Centre.
• Proliferation of members of the Centre into different groups is recognised as a healthy human need. Such groups will continue to be our partners in our work for social change.
• Global Activity: We will contribute, to the level of our capacity, in the global effort to build a more peaceful world.
• Experiential Learning is our primary objective, while we do not underestimate the benefits of advocacy work. 
• Flexibility: Since both human organisations and socio-political circumstances change, the Centre will both encourage and welcome evolvement and change.
• Transparency is a major defence tool in the local hostile environment for advocacy social change activities. Therefore, we feel responsible to set new local standards in financial and activity transparency.
• Prosperity: We respect the human need for a reasonable standard of living for the self and ones family. Therefore, we assume that volunteers who devote many hours to our cause need to be moderately compensated for their loss of income.
• Quality Culture in our work is an expression of respect to all our stakeholders and the larger society within which we operate.
• Internal Financial Control is a protection against weaknesses present in every human person. Consequently, processes of internal financial control are an integral part of our responsibility to our stakeholders.
• Cooperation: We will collaborate with whoever promotes social transformation towards a Peace Culture, both locally and globally.

The U.N. with its different Agency Organisations is the main actor in world peace and human development. Therefore, we consider them to be our most valuable partners.

 

The E.U. and its Institutions offer an unprecedented opportunity for the development of a Peace Culture on the island. We consider the EU and its agencies as the second most valuable partner in our Peace effort.

 
National and International Peace Organisations are our natural partners. We look to them to gain from their experience, their methodologies and their wisdom, until such time that we become capable of contributing to the international peace effort.

Locally, our potential partners are whoever is receptive to the idea of engaging in questioning rigid ideas and modes of thinking that may have been responsible for the current adversarial culture on the island. We will work together with all state and non-state actors involved in human development, without engaging in ‘anti’ campaigns towards those with whom we are in disagreement. We consider the State, the Political Parties, the Media, the Church, Civil Society, the Trade Unions, Educational Institutions, Corporations and Professional Organisations, as our partners in developing a Peace Culture.

Other Civil Society Organisations: In defining Peace Culture, many interlocking factors such as politics, good governance, economics, history, religion, gender, and ecology, need to be addressed. While we are concerned with all these factors and we may, occasionally, decide to voice our concern, or join others working for social change in any of these issues, our activities will focus on that cultural change that will lead to the development of a Peace System and Peace Culture.

 
The State: We will be working with, around, and if necessary, against the political establishment, but always with tolerance, flexibility, and other values conducive to the Peace Culture we seek to promote.

Groups with Opposing Ideas: Our ambition is to create the circumstances for dialogue with those groups that oppose our ideas. Efforts will be made to engage with them in a process of joint Self Development and Experiential Learning in pursuit of the common good. However, we will be ready to resist hard line intransigence and nationalism whenever we believe this is necessary in order to serve our primary objectives.

Proliferation of Peace Groups: Recognising that different individuals or groups have different preferences for work methods and styles, the Centre does not propose to remain a single oversize institution. On the contrary, a decentralised peace movement will provide for multiplicity of initiatives, individual needs for diversification, new modes of work, and safeguard against total failure in the event of individual group failure. Therefore, the proliferation of groups from the Centre will be encouraged and facilitated by the continuation of the sharing of resources with new and old groups.