‘Doing Nothing’ for Positive Peace
TRANSCEND MEMBERS, 21 Mar 2016
Tim Bryar – TRANSCEND Media Service
Inherent in the definition of ‘positive peace’ is the need for structural transformation. For example, Galtung (1973, p. 165) argues that his theory of power negation “is a rejection of the idea that there are technical solutions available for…problems without structural changes” and he asserts that “the theory of power negation is the missing link explaining how structural conflicts can nevertheless be solved” (Galtung, 1973, 104).
Whilst the concept of structural violence appears relatively straight forward – inequalities in power and resources give rise to a number of adverse outcomes in quality of life – the way we understand structural violence and what to do about is, however, a contested matter. Under Galtung’s concept of power negation structural violence and what to do about it takes on a very particular meaning. For example, he argues that power negation is based on “freedom essentially according to the old liberal formula of ‘free mobility of persons and ideas…that is needed at the personal level to bring about consciousness formation as insight in the forces acting upon oneself” (Galtung, 1973, p. 162). This ‘liberal formula’, which has hegemonized contemporary discourses on structural violence, is perfectly captured by recent comments from Kofi Annan that ordinary citizens can help bring about the change simply by voting, making noise using social media and using our power as consumers. The underlying premise being that structural violence results from corrupt and undemocratic leadership within the existing liberal-capitalist structure, and that exercising participation and voice is the solution.
This hegemonisation means that the transformation of structural violence necessarily requires overcoming what Zizek terms ‘symbolic violence’. More than simply being synonymous with cultural violence (e.g., see Galtung 1990), symbolic violence involves a more fundamental violence “that pertains to language as such, to its imposition of a certain universe of meaning” (Zizek 2009, p. 1). Therefore, Zizek (2009, p. 61) argues, “There is thus a direct link between the ontological violence and the texture of social violence (of sustaining relations of enforced domination) that pertains to language”. Or in other words, structural violence today is sustained by a liberal-capitalist frame that links structural transformation to individual action, participation and voice.
It is in this way that Zizek claims the problem today is not passivity but over-activity in which we are active all the time to ensure that nothing really changes. Therefore the key challenge for overcoming the structural violence of contemporary liberal-capitalist democracy is to resist the way the latter interpellates us to resist though greater participation and voice. Or as Zizek (2008, p. 309) puts it, ‘It is better to do nothing than to contribute to the invention of formal ways of rendering visible that which Empire already recognizes as existent”. It is in this way that we should repeat Galtung’s theory in order to claim its missed opportunities by redeploying his concepts of decoupling, negative transcendence and fundamental doubt as the basis for the transformation of structural violence.
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Tim Bryar is a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace, Development and Environment from Australia.
This article appeared first in the International Peace Research Association-IPRA March 2016 Newsletter.
Download PDF file: IPRA Newsletter March 2016
This article originally appeared on Transcend Media Service (TMS) on 21 Mar 2016.
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