Wednesday, September 11, 2013

Pillars of Peace...hey St. Croix


There are loads of other people writing about the 9/11 anniversary that can do it much more justice than i can so instead i'm going to focus on the report that came out yesterday that was written by the Institute for Economics and Peace.

Publishing the Global Peace Index for the past 7 years has been a primary focus of the institute but in addition this year they have published a Pillars of Peace report that can be read at http://www.visionofhumanity.org/sites/default/files/Pillars%20of%20Peace%20Report%20IEP.pdf

i've skimmed and read most of the report and came away with an additional affirmation in my belief that working for peace and peaceful environments works for all of us economically, culturally and in cases of disaster.

The Pillars of Peace report creates a bench mark by which countries can measure their resilience during social upheavals and or their overall aspects of social development. Today, we on St. Croix, are facing economic upheaval that has the potential to lead us into more conflict. If we ignore certain aspects of the eight pillars we could find ourselves impacted negatively. But if we attack our problems from all angles not just the economic one we may find ourselves in a place where we can honestly say we live in paradise.

The Eight Pillars

A Well Functioning Government
Sound Business Environment
Equitable Distribution of Resources
Acceptance of the Rights of Others
Good Relations with Neighbors
Free Flow of Information
High Levels of Human Capital
Low Levels of Corruption

were found to be mutually reinforcing in both positive and negative aspects. If one pillar becomes too negative it can upset the balance. No one pillar can be viewed in isolation because they all interact all the time. We have some tippy pillars on St. Croix and if we don't recognize that they all need to work together we could be in for a rougher ride than we thought.

Over the past seven years the Institute has been able to show that peaceful societies enjoy greater economic benefits, higher income levels, stronger social cohesion, and higher educational attainment. According to the report countries with higher levels of peace were also able to absorb shocks to their society and recover more quickly. Those that were less peaceful suffered longer and recovered more slowly.

Benefits flow from establishing peaceful environments. According to Galtung “cooperation for mutual benefit creates an environment where individuals and society are in harmony.” “Pillars of Peace is the first study to use statistical analysis to identify the factors associated with peaceful societies.”

The first pillar a well functioning government includes rule of law, government effectiveness and the citizens voice and accountability. On St. Croix we have these things but maybe we are lacking too much in the effectiveness and accountability categories. The intricacies of all these aspects also interact with the free flow of information and the acceptance of the rights of others which are also pillars. I don't think we are that strong in the acceptance dept. either which means so far our tippy pillars could use a bit of strengthening.

A sound business environment is crucial to peace and prosperity. Infrastructure, the quality of employment opportunities, business sophistication and innovation, and the level of regulations applied to business all should work in tandem to further a peaceful society.” Our infrastructure and the quality of our employment opportunities could use some TLC.

Equitable distribution of resources, another pillar, Some of the institutes analysis said that those countries that have had the lowest declines in their peacefulness also had greater equality in terms of land distribution and acquisition, but that this was not a defining criteria for all countries. This is a touchy subject and I'm not going to attack this one here.

Good relations with neighbors this is more a group thing and we do have good relations with those other islands that surround us.

High levels of human capital relates to our skills, knowledge, and behaviors. Apparently the lack of opportunities for youth could be seen as failure of the community to educate. “Health and education tend to increase social cohesion.”

Low levels of corruption hmmmmmmm

The report is long at 68 pages but the conclusions are that if a country strives to balance the eight pillars of peace they may also be able to weather economic, cultural and natural disasters that send nations into conflict locally and on a broader basis. Would we as a community find this daunting? i don't know but its certainly something to consider.

See ya next week

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