Making peace between warring parties is something that everyone should approve of but there will be different ideas about what is peacemaking and how to achieve it. Conflicts are often rooted in ethnic, religious, cultural or economic divisions which have led to discrimination and resulted in protest movements.
Often people sympathise with those who have suffered and therefore will take sides and offer support to them. Unfortunately, this often encourages others to offer support for the other party. The evidence from recent international conflicts such as in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria is that taking sides in these conflicts has made the outcome worse.
The conflicts in Ukraine, Sudan and Israel/Palestine seem to be similarly destructive. Some will argue that peace needs to be imposed by a stronger, more powerful body. The United Nations has the capability of setting up peacekeeping missions but they are usually only successful if the parties have a will to negotiate peace.  So how are we to build a culture of peace which can help to resolve conflicts before violence erupts?
What is Peacemaking?
Some may argue that human beings are naturally selfish and that conflict will inevitably arise from the pursuit of self-interest at the expense of others. However, there is a lot of evidence that kindness and cooperation are also natural human qualities that have contributed to the success of human evolution.
We have also evolved the ability to predict the consequences of our actions so we should be able to see that the pursuit of narrow self-interest is likely to have negative consequences. Enlightened self-interest should lead us to recognize that resolving the problems which could threaten the future of human life on earth will only be achieved by international cooperation. The United Nations provides a forum to enable diverse national communities to achieve this cooperation.
There are many ways in which we can encourage peacemaking. Quakers have a long-standing commitment to supporting peaceful resolution of conflict and in their book of Christian discipline ‘Quaker Faith and Practice’ several ‘practical expressions of our peace testimony’ are identified such as: public protest; relief of suffering; reconciliation and mediation; disarmament; building the institutions of peace and social justice; and right sharing of the world’s resources.
What is Peacemaking?
Of course, Quakers have also worked with others to develop peacebuilding strategies and in the UK over 50 concerned organisations that are part of the Rethinking Security Network sent a letter to the Prime Minister in July asking for greater investment in peacebuilding activities. The letter argued that:
 Recent polling suggests the public supports both ‘peacebuilding’ and ‘maintaining defence capacity’ at similar levels, while placing even greater importance on climate action and international cooperation.  Meanwhile, most Britons’ concerns around security centre on domestic issues such as affordability, access to healthcare, food and energy and street crime.
It is clear that British people conceive security in a broad range of ways beyond military force.
So we need to persuade the public and politicians that it is in our self-interest to find better ways of resolving international conflicts than by the use of armed force. Most nations of the world are governed by some form of democracy. Democracy is also a form of government intended to resolve problems peacefully so I suggest the following actions that individuals and groups can take:
- Supporting organisations who are developing and applying peacebuilding strategies and engaging with governments on these issues.
- Engaging with political parties and our government and encouraging them to:
acknowledge that armed conflicts have negative consequences for many communities that are not parties to the conflict.
- Not supply arms to either party to a conflictReach agreements with other countries to reduce the production and supply of all weapons, especially those that are classed as weapons of mass destruction.
- Support actions which address the underlying causes of conflicts such as discrimination, deprivation, climate change and corruption.
- Weave peacebuilding goals into their strategies for diplomacy, trade and aid.
- Work with others under the auspices of the UN to help the parties to a conflict to find actions which could resolve the conflict and bring benefits to both parties.
In all of these actions we should respect the views of others but not be afraid to say what we value.
https://www.quaker.org/legacy/minnfm/peace/index.htm
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Testimony_of_peace
(Trevor Evans is Clerk of the Harpenden Quaker Meeting in Hertfordshire.)