Towards A People's Peace – A Webinar Series on the Transformative Role of Social Movements In Resisting Violence and Building peace

WEBINAR I Speaking of Violence: Mapping the Terrain
Date: 29 January 2025
We introduce the series with a first webinar exploring different categories of collective violence and examining the roots and manifestations of this and how these are understood and experienced by social movements. 
 
(Updated 5.02.2025) Six Points Emerging from WEBINAR I

1. Properties of violence and the violence of property. Systemic violence is not class neutral. Systemic violence requires understanding of how society and state are organised. In class differentiated society the state is constituted by the exploiting classes. In a capitalist state violence is initiated in defence of capitalism, capital and the capitalist class.  Companies and capital own and control violence.

    

2. The clash of symbols. Violence is not simply its direct physical manifestation. Violence in addition to being about silencing and exploiting also attacks and undermines cultural and spiritual foundations, including breaking the connection with nature. Violence operates symbolically by dehumanising and stripping victims of their dignity and controlling people through narrative tropes of exclusion and non-belonging.

    

3. The three violated territories. Contemporary systemic violence intersects with poverty and violates three territories— the body, the land the digital space. Violence breaks the inviolability of the physical body and undermines personal autonomy, self-ownership, and self-determination of human beings over their own bodies. It destroys our relationship with land – our connection with everything that sustains us and where life’s interactions take place. It eliminates public spaces and the digital commons.

    

4. Talking love to hate. Violence on the bedrocks of colonialism, capitalism and patriarchy are interconnected. Combating this pervasive kind of violence requires solidarity without borders to restore humanity and create spaces for healing using the transformative power of love. Ends do not justify the means, so the question is, what justifies the means.

    

5. Violence of the lambs. The legal right to self-defence is universally acknowledged. The violence of aggression and the violence of self-defence are not equivalent or morally symmetrical. True peace prevails when there is justice and equality.

    

6. Desirable States. The reasons of state incline to both violence and peace. Through the course of history states have created the institutions of violence and the institutions of peace according to context, contingency and circumstance. The desirable state mediates peaceful solutions to conflict, in the interest of general welfare.

WEBINAR II  In Another’s Land: War and Militarization
Date: 5 February 2025
Exploring dynamics of war, militarization and the influence of private companies and business interests in contemporary geopolitics; how it impacts world peace and how nonviolent movements organise in the midst of war.

Updated 18.02.25 Six Points Emerging from WEBINAR II 

1) The profits of loss
All the losses of the occupied—lives, land, infrastructure and resources—swell the coffers of the occupier.  But modern warfare has another dimension. It is also waged to sell the merchandise of destruction, occupation and reconstruction. 

2) The assembly line
Between the manufacturers and the wars they manufacture stand a long line of intermediaries—advocates, agents, abettors and politico-administrative functionaries, all of whom share in the profits of loss. The weapons industry oils the wheels of the political system.

3) The mechanics of modern war
As societies become increasingly militarised new operatives have emerged to execute wars as public private partnerships. These include private mercenaries on the frontlines, ungoverned by the laws of war, and techno operatives engaged in propaganda, disinformation, espionage, social conditioning and creating polarisation in occupied society.

4) The stranglehold
A handful of large armament corporations are large investors in fossil fuel, banks and the most prominent media establishments. Twisting the truth is obligatory, spreading the lie is easy.

5) The price we pay
To feed the insatiable beast, budgets are diverted from social spending to military expenditures, with inevitable consequences. As military preparedness increases, large sections of the world’s population are barely able to survive.

6) Ways and means
How can we systematically resist and transform this lopsided system and introduce a peaceful and just turn in the workings of the world?
Through upward and downward solidarities, taking inspiration from the values of the Palestinian sumud, co-creating the space for civil disobedience, forming alliances between organised solidarities—trade unions, local resistance committees, women’s groups—to forge networks of transnational opposition, establishing alternative digital avenues and regaining control of our creative imagination to think of different futures and tell other stories.

WEBINAR III The Violent State: Dealing with Repression
Date: 19 February 2025
Understanding the nature and mechanisms of state violence and the role of social movements in confronting it, focusing on how movements can be supported in their efforts to combat state oppression.

Register Here: https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/the-violent-state-dealing-with-repression-tickets-1203161561619?aff=oddtdtcreator

(Updated 05.03.2025 Six Points Emerging from Webinar III) 

1) A broken covenant
By charter, on the 26th of June 1945, “We the peoples of the united nations determined...
to reaffirm faith in fundamental human rights, in the dignity and worth of the human person, in the equal rights of men and women and of nations large and small…”. That intent has gone astray as many states large and small have turned against sections of their own people and set them at war with each other, while expanding the sphere of government without a corresponding or proportionate increase in the welfare of the population.   

2) Civic curtailments
The normal mechanisms that enable civic life to be civil are being systematically undermined in many countries that purport to be democracies. The quality of democracy globally has declined as other forms of power disguised in democratic credentials have surfaced on various pretexts. Apart from the old bogey of national security, internal threats to public order and social peace are also routinely deployed to curtail due process and the rule of law.

3) The repertoire of repression 
Along with the traditional modus operandi, of physical brutality, legal harassment and incarceration, states now use new technological and psychological strategies to intimidate the population and perpetuate elite control of the polity and economy. Introducing new laws, suspending constitutional safeguards ostensibly to protect public order, using social media to spread disinformation and the unregulated use of new surveillance methods are among the many methods states adopt to redefine governance.

4) The broken body politic 
In a global public sphere that has been reshaped by information technology, states resort to magnifying internal division by focusing its attention on contentious issues, such as the pre-eminence of the monarchy and military in Thailand, the leading role of language and religion in Sri Lanka, the dangers of gang violence and unrestrained gold mining in El Salvador, to keep the public in disarray.

5) The return of the strong man 
In all of these developments the historical strongman has re-emerged, stronger than before, armed with a new array of civil and military weapons, to unleash violence and strike fear among the divided populace.  Among sections of the people disillusioned by the failures of democracy as it is practised by a corrupt political class, there is a growing reverence for the strongman who will restore normalcy and usher prosperity.

6) The beginnings of hope 
Despite these alarming trends, the tyranny faces resistance. Despite all the threats to life and personal safety, despite the danger to their families, despite all the naming and shaming and despite all the attempts to sustain social discord, the resistance continues. Sri Lanka’s Aragalaya stands out, particularly because of the exceptional brutality of the apparently unshakeable government it ousted. Likewise in Thailand, despite the status of the monarchy and the power of the military, protests have repeatedly shaken the authorities. It has only been three years of exceptional rule in El Salvadore, and if the history of the continent and the history of what happens to tyrants is any guide, then hope will spring to life again.  

WEBINAR IV Uncivil Society: Ending Violence in People vs. People Conflicts
Date: 5 March 2025
This webinar explores the concept of "uncivil society"—forces within communities that disrupt harmony and democracy. We’ll discuss civil conflict, majoritarianism, and how social movements navigate and respond to these challenges.

Register Here: https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/uncivil-society-ending-violence-in-people-vs-people-conflicts-tickets-1203268250729?aff=oddtdtcreator

WEBINAR V The Peaceful Play of People’s Power: Violence, Nonviolence, and Social Change
Date: 19 March 2025
Non-violent resistance has proved to be the most effective way to confront and change unequal power structures. However, the meaning and limits of violence itself is contested. In this webinar, we will deepen our understanding of strategic non-violent action and civilian based defense structures for social movements.

Register: https://www.eventbrite.ca/e/the-peaceful-play-of-peoples-power-violence-nonviolence-social-change-tickets-1203305191219?aff=oddtdtcreator 

WEBINAR VI Towards a People’s Peace: Pathways to a Just and Nonviolent World
Date: 9 April 2025
Location: Global People Power Conference, Copenhagen
We conclude the series by bringing the various threads together in order to map out the contours of a contemporary global peace movement; promising approaches on how people’s movements can be supported to create just and inclusive peace.