|
Peacebuilders - Ongoing Conversations |
|
|
|
|
Marianne Perez answers questions from her inbox about Peacebuilding. Have a question or a comment? An idea for future discussion?
This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it
.
12-16-2008
Hi Marianne,
I work for the Youth Federation for World Peace and grew up in a State Department family and fully understand the need for peace, interfaith dialog and acceptance, etc. However, we already have the United States Institute for Peace which is highly regarded. Why we need another peace organization, it seems to me that this is just duplicative and that we can turn all of this wonderful peace momentum and energy towards actual second tier diplomacy or for support of the existing peace institution.
Thank you for your time and consideration.
Richard
Dear Richard,
Thank you for the work you are doing with the Youth Federation for World Peace. I laud you for your commitment to world peace and for your support of rising leaders.
To address your concerns, I offer the following:
- The United States Institute of Peace (USIP) was in fact part of a broader proposal to establish a Department of Peace, National Peace Academy and peace research institute. USIP was the only piece of the proposal that had a wide enough appeal to get passed by Congress and to be signed into law by President Reagan.
- USIP's director does not sit on the President's Cabinet and therefore does not have much heft in influencing the President. The Secretary of Peace would sit on the Cabinet and would have an opportunity to provide recommendations in the same way that the Secretaries of State, Defense, Homeland Security, Justice, Education, etc., do.
- USIP's focus is international. The Dept. of Peace bill also has a significant domestic component to address domestic abuse, violence in schools, gang violence, etc. The first bill presented by Congressman Kucinich in the summer of 2001 was exclusive focused on domestic issues. Only in his second introduction of the bill, after Sept. 11, did he include an international component because he felt that the existing programs were not sufficient.
- As a graduate of the School of Foreign Service at Georgetown (and with many former classmates serving in the diplomatic corps), I can attest to the fact foreign service officers currently have little to no training in conflict resolution or peacebuilding. While the State Department does conduct some dialogue and mediation projects, these are not done within a holistic peacebuilding framework and therefore are not as successful at producing peaceful outcomes as they could be.
- The Dept. of Peace would work in collaboration (not competition) with other departments. Therefore it would support Track 2 and Track 3 diplomacy efforts if and when it would help the Department of State do its job better. The Dept. of Peace could also work with State to develop effective dialogue and mediation models by using techniques such as conflict mapping, identification of basic needs, creative proposal generation, etc.
- The current US Dept. of Peace campaign is part of a global campaign to establish departments and ministries of peace in governments around the world. The idea is to have all these departments and ministries mutually reinforce each other.
As you are interested in working for peace with youth, you might consider taking a look at the Student Peace Alliance website to see what makes them excited about the Dept. of Peace. There might also be some opportunities for collaboration.
In peace,
Marianne
|
