Whither Peace Studies? Fragmentation to a New Integration?
In spite of the surface appearance of flourishing, peace studies now faces a crisis of dilution and fragmentation though concerned voices have long warned against it. The root of the crisis is traced back to the years around 1970, when Johan Galtung proposed the theory of structural violence. At that time, there were heated debates about whether to broaden the research agenda to include poverty and underdevelopment or not. It is shown that, though it was a great contribution to peace studies, the theory of structural violence also brought about the excessive expansion of the research agenda of the discipline, because, according to the theory, every important social problem could be a legitimate research subject of peace studies. More than two decades after the debates, however, there have appeared several symptoms which show the reorientation of the discipline toward the original narrower focus on war and conflict. Since a simple return to the past is impossible, it is suggested that, by focusing on the issues of war and conflict, peace studies should try to eliminate one of the major obstacles to the final goal of peace in the broadest sense of the word. To complicate the matter, however, there have recently been debates between the narrower and wider agendas in security studies. The wider agenda in security studies tends to broaden peace studies as well because an issue or problem like environmental degradation is claimed to be a peace studies issue on the ground that it is a security issue. Thus, peace studies will have to tackle with the same problem for some time to come.
The Greening of Peace Research
military aspects of East-West confrontation are subsiding in the face of a transformation of the major concerns in international relations. An important aspect of this transformation is an emerging consensus that the changing relationship between human beings and the sustaining capabilities of the global ecosystem is rapidly becoming a significant source of human suffering. Thus, it could be expected that the concerns of peace research should similarly shift away from weaponry and military conflict to these new sources of conflict and misery found in the growth of human numbers and impact within the limited capabilities of the global environment. Homo sapiens is one species among millions and is governed by the same laws of nature that regulate the growth and development of all of them. Populations of Homo sapiens have been involved in life and death struggles over resources with each other and other species throughout human history. More recently, however, Homo sapiens has relied more heavily on fossil fuel-based technologies with the associated problems of pollution and depletion to prevail in conflicts among themselves and with other species. The contemporary agenda of global environmental issues results from very rapid recent technological and ecological changes that are radically altering relationships among human populations and between them and the global ecosystem. Because of our increasing numbers and the more resource-intensive lives that we lead, the natural systems that are essential for sustaining all forms of life are increasingly under stress. The more obvious problems, such as the depletion of the ozone layer that protects the planet from deadly ultra-violet radiation from the sun and the gradual buildup of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere leading to greenhouse warming, are now receiving significant international attention within the framework of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). But many less visible problems, such as the growing tendency of Homo sapiens to displace other species (the so-called vanishing species problem), and the adverse effects of the by-products of industrialization, such as toxic wastes, herbicides and pesticides, have as yet received much less international attention.'
Global resources and international conflict : environmental factors in strategic policy and action
This volume examines the extent to which global deficiencies and degradation of natural resources, coupled with their uneven distribution, can lead to unlikely alliances, national rivalries, and even war. The study evaluates the influence of such factors as geographical distribution, availability, scarcity, and depletion of the world's natural resources--including oil, natural gas, minerals, fresh water, ocean fisheries, and food crops--on strategic and military policy-making. Westing also studies the effect of differential population growth on the actual and perceived availability of resources and presents an expanded, environmentally based view of international security.