Articles by René Wadlow
We found 534 results.
David Cortright – Peace: A History of Movements and Ideas
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
21 Apr 2014
David Cortright, Director of Policy Studies at Notre Dame’s Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies and an activist especially on nuclear arms issues, has set out a clear and up-to-date history of the ideas and movements that make up the colors on the peace pallet. While the book has been out for some time, I review it now as a first rate overview of peace efforts and ideologies.
→ read full articleGeorge Hewitt – Discordant Neighbours: A Reassessment of the Georgian-Abkhazian and Georgian-South-Ossetian Conflicts
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
7 Apr 2014
Creating new types of political association takes time, goodwill and a willingness to compromise, to do with “less than the best”. Unfortunately, the years of Soviet rule did not create these traits in the leadership of the republics now become independent, nor within the ethnic-based regions within the new republics as we see currently in Ukraine.
→ read full articleW.H. Auden: (1907-1973) Poet of the Age of Anxiety
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
7 Apr 2014
Wystan Hugh Auden, is appreciated as a bridge builder by two separate groups of poetry readers. Each group celebrates half of his poetic life and rather tries to forget about the other half, seeing one part of his life as the perfect image of the modern poet who then lost his way.
→ read full articleAdam Curle: Tools for Transformation
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
31 Mar 2014
Adam Curle was the first chair of the School of Peace Studies at the University of Bradford, UK in the early 1970s. He had been active in mediation efforts in conflicts in Africa, Asia, and Eastern Europe, usually on behalf of the Society of Friends (Quakers). He stressed the need to train mediators, and as he points out, one of the first steps for a potential mediator is to look deeply into one’s self, into one’s values and experiences.
→ read full articleSean Byrne and Jessica Senehi – Violence: Analysis, Intervention and Prevention
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Mar 2014
Sean Byrne and Jessica Senehi, of the University of Manitoba, have written a useful analysis of approaches to violence and conflict resolution. It is written as a textbook for the increasing number of university-level classes in Peace and Conflict Studies.
→ read full articleReconciliation, Reform and Resilience: Positive Peace for Lebanon
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Mar 2014
Syria and Lebanon have been historically entangled — economically, politically and socially, both having been parts of the Ottoman Empire. At the end of the First World War, the Ottoman Middle East was divided between France and England and placed under the mandate system of the League of Nations.
→ read full articleAlexandre Marc (1904-2000)
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Mar 2014
Marc was a complex man, one of the bridges who helped younger persons to understand the debates which surrounded the Russian Revolution, the rise and decline of Fascism and Nazism, and the post-Second World War hopes for a united Europe.
→ read full articleConflict Resolution: Dynamics, Process and Structure
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
24 Feb 2014
“One of the most serious global problems facing the world as it lurches into the new millennium is how to manage destructive and protracted conflict between groups with differing identities who are interacting within the same political system…”
→ read full articleConflict, Conquest and Conversion: Two Thousand Years of Christian Missions in the Middle East
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
17 Feb 2014
Proselytization in the Middle East was exceedingly complex. As the authors note “Muslim opposition and the enforcement of regulations against apostasy as well as Jewish disinterest quickly forced the missionaries largely to abandon that goal and to substitute for it the attempt to ‘improve’ the state of the Eastern Christian churches.”
→ read full articleGandhi and the Middle East
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Feb 2014
In the light of continuing tensions in the Middle East, it is useful to recall the efforts to have Mahatma Gandhi play a bridge-building role in the Jewish-Arab conflict of 1937 in Palestine. Mahatma Gandhi was a man of dialogue and compromise.
→ read full articleEileen Babbitt and Ellen Luts – “Human Rights and Conflict Resolution in Context”
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Feb 2014
To prevent wars and massive human rights violations and rebuild societies in their aftermath, an approach that incorporates the perspectives of both human rights advocates and conflict resolution practitioners is required. This goal is easier to assert than to achieve.
→ read full articleGandhi and Nationalism: The Path to Indian Independence
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Feb 2014
The understanding of the ways spiritual concepts are used in political life is made even more complex in the case of Gandhi in that he was not a thinker in terms of systems but in terms of action. “My life is my message.”
→ read full articlePamela Olson – Fast Times in Palestine: A Love Affair with a Homeless Homeland
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Feb 2014
Pamela Olson has written a lively and personal account of her two years (2004-2006) in the West Bank of Palestine as an editor of the Palestine Monitor and as foreign press coordinator for Dr Mustafa Barghouthi’s 2005 presidential campaign.
→ read full articleGeneva II: «A Modest Beginning On Which We Can Build»
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Feb 2014
There is only a short time for private discussions to reach an agreement before the 10 February public restart. In any case, humanitarian aid is needed to limit the current heavy suffering. Thus we must use the influence we have in the next few days to push for an accord on relief supplies.
→ read full articleGandhi: A Political and Spiritual Life
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Jan 2014
Mahatma Gandhi was assassinated in New Delhi on 30 January 1948 – Unfortunately, Gandhi surrounded himself only with “yes men” and more often by “yes women” who were not in touch with the violent movements among the Hindus. There were no representatives of orthodox Hinduism in his entourage nor did orthodox Hindu religious leaders take part in his satyagraha campaigns.
→ read full articleIsak Svensson and Peter Wallensteen
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Jan 2014
The Go-Between: Jan Eliasson and Styles of Mediation, Washington, DC: US Institute of Peace, 2010 – “The lessons on mediation resources can all be connected to one key word—cooperation.” There is a need for cooperation with local efforts and forces for peace and between official and unofficial mediators.
→ read full articleGreen Parties in Transition
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Jan 2014
With the campaign for the 2014 elections to the European Parliament starting, it is useful to look at the ways political parties structure themselves for pan-European elections.
→ read full articleModernizing the United Nations System: Civil Society’s Role in Moving from International Relations to Global Governance
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
13 Jan 2014
Professor John Trent of the Department of Political Science, University of Ottawa, Canada sets out clearly the framework of this important study of the possible reforms of the United Nations.
→ read full articleMuriel Mirak-Weissbach
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
6 Jan 2014
Muriel Mirak-Weissbach in her new book Through the Wall of Fire uses a sequence from Dante’s Divine Comedy to stress the need within the wider Middle East for a fundamental revolution in thinking and a far-reaching shift in moral outlook leading from wrath to reconciliation.
→ read full articleJeff Unsicher
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
30 Dec 2013
“Policy advocacy is the process by which individuals, NGOs, other civil society organizations, networks, and coalitions seek to attain political, economic, cultural and environmental rights by influencing policies, policy implementation and policy-making processes of governments, corporations and other powerful institutions.”
→ read full articleFred Halliday
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 Dec 2013
It is useful to have an overview of the life and thought of others working in the same vineyards of political analysis and conflict resolution. Fred Halliday was such a co-worker.
→ read full articleMaxine Kaufman-Lacusta
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
16 Dec 2013
Refusing to be Enemies: Palestinian and Israeli Nonviolent Resistance to the Israeli Occupation (Reading, UK: Ithaca Press, 2011). The book of Maxine Kaufman-Lacusta comes at an opportune time when the US Secretary of State John Kerry is making a concerted effort to mediate in the Israeli-Palestine tensions.
→ read full articleIn Memoriam: Howard Clark
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 Dec 2013
Howard Clark, long time co-editor of Peace News and “coordinator” of War Resisters International died Nov. 28, 2013. He was more tuned to broader social change — “Nonviolent Revolution” became a subtitle on the Peace News masthead and Making Nonviolent Revolution was Howard’s most widely circulated booklet within WRI.
→ read full articleIvana Milojevic – Breathing: Violence In, Peace Out
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 Dec 2013
Ivana Milojevic analyses the long-term impact of trans-generational trauma by looking at the personal experience of her family over three generations caught up in the Stalinist repression in the Soviet Union, the Second World War, especially in Yugoslavia, and the 1990s breakup of the Yugoslav federation.
→ read full articlePeacebuilding, Power, and Politics in Africa
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 Dec 2013
This is a useful collection of essays, a cooperative effort between the Centre for Conflict Resolution in Cape Town, South Africa and the Centre of African Studies at Cambridge University, England including a policy seminar held at the University of Botswana.
→ read full articleViolence against Women: Walls That Imprison
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Nov 2013
It is available worldwide evidence that violence against women exists to an alarming degree. It is an attack upon their bodily integrity and their dignity. As NGO representatives stressed, we need to place an emphasis on the universality of violence against women, the multiplicity of its forms and the ways in which violence, discrimination against women, and the broader system of domination based on subordination and inequality are inter-related.
→ read full articleAlbert Camus at 100: Stoic Humanist and World Citizen
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Nov 2013
Albert Camus (1913-1960) would have been 100 this November had he lived beyond the car crash which took his life in 1960. In 1948, he was still a highly regarded editorial writer for Combat, which began as a clandestine newspaper in 1941 when France was partly occupied by the Nazi troops, and half of France was under the control of the anti-democratic regime of Vichy.
→ read full articleStorm Warning: The Disappearing State of the Central African Republic
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
14 Oct 2013
On 10 Oct 2013, the UNSC in a resolution issued a “storm warning” calling for help to the CAR and its UN Peacebuilding Office. The skies have been so often cloudy since its independence in 1961 that the new dark clouds are hardly noticed. However, there are currently danger signs and storm warnings concerning the disappearance of all State structures.
→ read full articleSyria: Chemical Weapons and Restraints in War
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 Sep 2013
The UN investigations and the appropriate responses are yet to be made. More shelling of military installations in Syria is unlikely to bring about the negotiations in good faith needed in the Syrian conflict. Thus there is a short-term need to stop beating the drums of war while at the same time stressing the condemnation of the use of chemical weapons.
→ read full articleNew Fires Relight in Eastern Congo
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
26 Aug 2013
In a 24 August 2013 message addressed to the United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, the Association of World Citizens highlighted that the Democratic Republic of Congo’s eastern capital of North Kivu Provence, Goma, had been shelled for the past three days, including Saturday the 24th.
→ read full articleWorld Citizens Call for the Unconditional Respect of the Right to Life, Liberty and Security of Person in Egypt
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
19 Aug 2013
The Association of World Citizens is gravely concerned at the human rights violations committed by both the security and armed forces and the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt. Article 3 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights clearly provides that “Everyone has the right to life, liberty and security of person ». This right belongs to everyone, not just to people who think as we do. Democracy and the rule of law should never be a one-way flow.
→ read full articleDarfur: A Decade of Agony
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Aug 2013
Spring 2013 marked a decade of violent conflict and agony in Darfur, Sudan. Although the conflict has faded from the headlines, it continues, producing many refugees, internally-displaced persons, unused farmland, and political unrest. It is a classic case of how violence gets out of control and goes beyond the aims for which it was first used.
→ read full articleGarry Davis: « And Now the People Have the Floor »
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
29 Jul 2013
Garry Davis, who died 24 July 2013, in Burlington, Vermont, was often called “World Citizen N°1”. The title was not strictly exact as the organized world citizen movement began in England in 1937 by Hugh J. Shonfield and his Commonwealth of World Citizens, followed in 1938 by the creation jointly in the USA and England of the World Citizen Association.
→ read full articleA World Citizen Passport and Edward Snowden’s Catch 22
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Jul 2013
To break out of Snowden’s “Catch 22” situation of no passport-to travel-no travel- no asylum – a world citizen passport was issued to Snowden on July 7, 2013 by Garry Davis, who founded the Registry of World Citizens in 1949, and today is the president of the World Government of World Citizens. The world passport is now reportedly in Snowden’s hands.
→ read full articleEgypt: The Sphinx and the Muslim Brotherhood
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
8 Jul 2013
Al-Afghani was a Sufi but wanted to build a pan-Islamic movement. Thus al-Bamma created the Brotherhood on the model of a Sufi Order with an initiation ritual, a Murshid as leader to whom loyalty is due, a broad ideology with strict organizational control. Al-Afghani was also a French Mason with a tradition of ‘secret’ membership, of loyalty to the leader and a spirit of cooperation and mutual help among its members who recognize each other by codes but who do not advertise their membership.
→ read full article20 Years of Human Rights Progress – Yet a Long Road Ahead
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
1 Jul 2013
The World Conference on Human Rights was held in Vienna 14-25 June 1993 to look at how well human rights were protected and promoted. These days there is a “Vienna plus 20” conference to review the advances of the past 20 years. It would be wrong to overlook the real progress made.
→ read full articleThrough the Wall of Fire — Reconciliation
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
24 Jun 2013
Reconciliation is a process which requires spiritual understanding as it goes beyond the type of pragmatism that rests in the careful calculation of causes and consequences. Reconciliation needs to be seen not only as reconciliation between two persons or groups, but as reconciliation for something. It is not merely the repair of the past, but reconciliation is a bridge to the future. Reconciliation has to do with how antagonists construct a new future together.
→ read full articleRapprochement of Cultures and Creative Education
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
17 Jun 2013
The United Nations General Assembly has proclaimed the Decade 2013-2022 as the International Decade for the Rapprochement of Cultures building on the efforts in the UNESCO General Conference which had called for “the development of a universal global consciousness.”
→ read full article8 June: International Day of the Oceans
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Jun 2013
8 June has been designated by the United Nations General Assembly as the International Day of the Oceans to highlight the important role that the United Nations has played in creating the Law of the Sea and the World Court in facilitating adjudication of maritime delimitations.
→ read full articleMyanmar: Sectarian Strife and Universal Compassion
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Jun 2013
The current tensions with the Muslim community are an important challenge. Will Buddhist groups within Myanmar and its neighbours be able to respond creatively to this wave of violence?
→ read full articleLe Sacre du Printemps — 100th Anniversary: A Quartet of Creators
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 May 2013
29 May marks the 100th anniversary of the first presentation of Le Sacre du Printemps (The Rite of Spring) in 1913 in the then newly built Théatre des Champs-Elysées designed by August Perret in the then new Art Déco style.
→ read full articleSri Lanka: Four Years after the War’s End, Little Reconciliation, Few Creative Changes
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 May 2013
In the end, no offer of compromise was ever enough, and all forms of moderation were seen as betrayal. The war continued with the last months being particularly destructive. The psychological wounds are deep, and the healing of individual traumas with psycho-spiritual techniques remains a real priority, for the sufferings of the war may sow the seeds of future unrest and a desire for revenge.
→ read full articleKorea: Challenge and Response
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
22 Apr 2013
The Association of World Citizens highlighted that the Tumen River Development Project, now often called the Greater Tuman Initiative, is probably the best framework for rapid cooperative development— a vast free economic zone which would involve parts of Mongolia, China, Russia and the two Korean States as well as Japan as a logical regional development partner.
→ read full articleChinua Achebe: A Reflection of When Things Fall Apart
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Mar 2013
The death in a Boston hospital of Chinua Achebe, on 21 March 2013, the Nigerian novelist about whom it was said that his writings were “concerned with universal human communication across racial and cultural boundaries as a means of fostering respect for all people” came just at the start of the UN-sponsored 2013-2022 International Decade for the Rapprochement of Cultures.
→ read full articleKorea: Crisis and Opportunity
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Mar 2013
Tensions on the Korean Peninsula have recently increased, highlighted by the nuclear weapon test of North Korea and the subsequent reactions. An UN-sponsored Korean Peace Settlement Conference can build upon past partial measures and especially meet the new challenges of security and cooperation in Asia.
→ read full articleSyria: An Orderly Transition
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Feb 2013
Can there be an orderly transition within Syria toward a new regime which reflects Syria’s pluralistic society? Can this orderly transition process avoid additional violence, and increased hostility among segments of society?
→ read full articleMali: Hijacked Autonomy, Outsized Ambitions, French Intervention
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
14 Jan 2013
It may be fairly easy for the French forces to take the three major cities of the north, much of whose population has already fled. North Mali is roughly the size of France. Much of the rural areas have little or no population. It has always been difficult, even during the colonial period, to create an infrastructure and an administration. There are fears that the Islamic groups will move toward Niger or Burkina Faso, both fragile States. One knows how an armed conflict starts but rarely how it ends.
→ read full articleDamascus and the Tariqa (The Way by Initiation)
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
7 Jan 2013
The small non-violent movements in Syria such as the “Stop the Killing! We want to build a country for all Syrians” while stressing useful issues are still overshadowed both by the government and the violent opposition forces. Yet could such groups play a larger role if they received more non-governmental support from outside? Governments seem to have resigned themselves to the force of arms or to watch and wait. Can peace groups working together actively strengthen Syrian non-violent alternatives?
→ read full articleThe Silent Violence against Women Worldwide
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
26 Nov 2012
November 25th is the UN-proclaimed International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. Violence against women is a year-round occurrence globally and continues to an alarming degree.
→ read full article10 October: Abolition of the Death Penalty
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
8 Oct 2012
10 October is the International Day against the Death Penalty, set by the United Nations General Assembly. Since the end of World War II, there has been a gradual abolition of the death penalty with the rather obvious recognition that death is not justice. In some countries, executions have been suspended in practice but laws allowing executions remain; in other cases there has been a legal abolition.
→ read full articleSyrian Stalemate: Late in the Day – Are Negotiations Still Possible?
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
1 Oct 2012
Paulo S. Pinheiro said that the escalating conflict in which civilians bear the brunt of the killed and wounded now has an increasing presence of “foreign elements”. Some have joined anti-government forces and some operate independently. Pinheiro, who has long experience in UN human rights efforts, went on to add that such foreign elements “tend to push anti-government fighters toward more radical positions.”
→ read full articleReconciliation, Reform and Resilience: Positive Peace for Lebanon
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
13 Aug 2012
With the growing intensity of the conflicts in Syria, with the flows of refugees and increased foreign participation, the dangers of serious, negative impact on neighbouring countries is real. This impact is already being felt in Lebanon which has its own multi-level divisions and scars from its own long civil war (1975-1990).
→ read full articleSyria, Late in the Day: Are Negotiations Still Possible?
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 Jul 2012
A useful next step would be to explore the possibility of setting an agenda of issues that could be the basis of negotiations. The setting of such an agenda may be more productive than the current proposal of creating by mutual agreement a government of transition: issues before new ministers.
→ read full articleCommunal/Religious Clashes Threaten Progress in Burma
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Jun 2012
What I believe is true is that there have been few efforts of reconciliation and of training for conflict resolution. This is a major need and perhaps, with the greater openness of the Myanmar government, courses in conflict resolution could be organized.
→ read full articleMali: Refugee Flows and Increased Hunger Point To Need for a Mali Federation
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
4 Jun 2012
The creation of a federation of north and south Mali rather than having the country split into two independent States with uncertain frontiers could be a measure acceptable to both the MNLA and the government of Bamako. A federal constitution could maintain the unity of the country while at the same time providing the needed autonomy to the north and a preservation of the Tuareg way of life.
→ read full articleSupporting Young Syrians Who Say “Stop the Killing”
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
28 May 2012
A group of young nonviolent Syrians have created a movement, “Stop the Killing,” not related to a political party or a confessional religious group, but which wishes to unite those of good will to stop the violence and to develop a society in which all can contribute. Therefore, we who are outside Syria, send our support and willingness to cooperate.
→ read full articleA New Mali Federation?
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 Apr 2012
Since the fall of northern Mali to the forces of the Tuareg at the end of March 2012, the situation has grown in complexity. Can a new Mali Federation of the two sections of the current Mali work better than the earlier Federation of Mali? With good will and imagination, federalist structures should be able to be worked out. Yet there are times when good will and imagination are in short supply.
→ read full articleWith the Fall of Timbukutu, Is there an Azawad in Mali’s Future?
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 Apr 2012
Timbuktu was once a metaphor for the middle of nowhere. Now it is in the middle of a struggle that has important implications for the whole Sahel zone that runs from Senegal to Sudan. Tuareg armed forces coming from further north have taken control of the key towns of northern Mali: Kidal, Gao, and Timbuktu, largely cutting the country in two.
→ read full article8 March: International Day of Women – Women as Peacemakers
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Mar 2012
8 March is the International Day of Women first proposed by Clara Zetkin (1857-1933) at the Second International Conference of Socialist Women in Copenhagen in 1911. Zetkin, who had lived some years in Paris and active in women’s movements there, was building on the 1889 International Congress for Feminine Works and Institutions held in Paris under the leadership of Ana de Walska.
→ read full articleWorld Day of Social Justice: The People’s Revolution is On the March
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Feb 2012
The United Nations General Assembly, on the initiative of Nurbch Jeenbrev, the Ambassador of Kyrgyzstan to the U.N. in New York, has proclaimed 20 February as the “World Day of Social Justice”.
→ read full articleEconomic Sanctions: Balancing Principles, National Interests and the Advancement of World Law
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
6 Feb 2012
The ongoing UN Security Council discussions concerning sanctions against Syria and greater US and European Union sanctions against Iran have brought to the fore the justice, aims and effectiveness of economic sanctions and the prohibition of arms sales to countries in conflict.
→ read full articleSyria: Opportunities and Limits of International Observation Efforts
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
30 Jan 2012
The League of Arab States Observer Mission to Syria is in an administratively critical time with the Observer Mission members from Saudi Arabia and the Gulf Cooperation Council States of Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, and the United Arab Emirates leaving the Mission on Tuesday 24, January. This represents 52 persons of an estimated 160, already badly understaffed.
→ read full articleHungary and the EU: A Constitutional Crisis
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 Jan 2012
The Right Wing-Populist policies of the Hungarian Prime Minister Victor Orban, symbolized by dropping the term ‘Republic’ from the name of the country, has created a constitutional crisis within the European Union (EU).
→ read full articleThe Cooperative Spirit and Its Many Manifestations
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 Jan 2012
The United Nations General Assembly in Resolution A/RES/64/136 has designated 2012 as the International Year of Cooperatives in order to highlight the large role that cooperatives can play in ecologically-sound development and poverty reduction.
→ read full articleVaclav Havel (1936-2011): His Revolt Is an Attempt to Live Within the Truth
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
19 Dec 2011
Vaclav Havel, the former President of the Czech Republic, who moved to another dimension on 18 December 2011, had analysed that “There are good reasons for suggesting that the modern age has ended. Many things indicate that we are going through a transitional period, when it seems that something is on the way out and something else is painfully being born. All my observations and all my experience have, with remarkable consistency, convinced me that, if today’s planetary civilization has any hope of survival, that hope lies chiefly in what we understand as the human spirit.”
→ read full articleCitizen Diplomacy: Russia and the Gorbachev Years (1985-1991)
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Oct 2011
There is in the Agni Yoga teachings of Helena Roerich, to which Raisa Gorbachev was particularly devoted, a line that says, “Not the new is proclaimed but what is needed for the hour.” This idea became a guideline for Mikhail Gorbachev, whose “new thinking” was not really new. Many of us had been saying the same thing for years before, but none of us was head of state.
→ read full articleDisintegrating European Diplomacy and the Necessary Rise of NGO Mediators
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
26 Sep 2011
Currently the Palestine Liberation Movement (PLO) has an observer status as an “entity” at the UN from the time that the South African African National Congress, another South African movement, a South West African liberation group and the PLO were given “observer entity” status. With the changes in South Africa and what is now Namibia, the status of the other movements disappeared and only the PLO remains.
→ read full articleThe Next Earth Summit: Rio Plus 20
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
26 Sep 2011
The United Nations, member governments, and Non-governmental organizations (NGOs) are preparing policies and evaluations for the next Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, June 2012: 20 years after the original 1992 Rio conference that drew up guidelines for ecologically-sound development for the 21st century expressed as Agenda 21.
→ read full article(Arabic) Appeal: Association of World Citizens
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
1 Aug 2011
اتصل الكاتب العام للأمم المتحدة السيد بان كي مون بالرئيس السّوري بشار الأسد في العشرين من شهر يويليو 2011, قصد التهيئة لحوار عاجل و شامل و ذلك من أجل الرّد الفعلي و الملح بخصوص الضّيم الضاغط منذ فترة طوية على الشعب السوري, و هو نداء استحوذ على اهتمام رابطة مواطني العالم.
→ read full articleWill the UN Be a Fairy Godmother for the Birth of South Sudan?
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Jul 2011
On July 9, 2011, South Sudan became an independent State, six months after the January referendum in which the south Sudan population voted overwhelmingly for independence. However, Sudan is not really structured to be divided in two. There are no natural dividing lines, neither physical nor social. During much of the English colonial period, southern Sudan was administered from Uganda as road communications were easier than from Khartoum, the capital in the north of the country.
→ read full articlePalestinian Status at the UN: Breaking the Logjam
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
4 Jul 2011
There is a good deal of discussion in the halls of the UN, both in New York and Geneva, concerning a possible application of full membership in the UN by the Palestinian Authority. The discussions reflect similar discussions within Foreign Ministries in the hope that there can be an agreed-upon program of action (or non-action) by September when the new General Assembly meets.
→ read full article8 June: Day of the Oceans
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
6 Jun 2011
The Spirit of Thor Heyerdahl Sails On – The United Nations General Assembly has designated 8 June each year to be The Day of the Oceans and the Law of the Sea.
→ read full articleRatko Mladic’s Arrest and Coming Trial: A Step Forward for World Law
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
30 May 2011
The wheels of karma turn slowly. As there is no longer anything at stake, more people today will agree that killing people who thought that they were protected in UN-proclaimed safe havens is not a good thing.
→ read full articleHanna Newcombe: The Passing of a Peace Research Pioneer
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 May 2011
Hanna Newcombe, who with her husband Alan, were leading Canadian peace researchers, died on 18 April 2011. As an In Memoriam I would like to highlight some aspects of her work. Hanna and Alan were long time friends and colleagues in the world citizen/world federalist movement and in efforts at conflict resolution.
→ read full articleLibya-Tunisia: Cross-frontier Conflict and Peace-building
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
9 May 2011
Tunisia’s deputy foreign minister, Radhouane Nouicer said his government had summoned a Libyan government envoy to complain about the incursions. “We are not a party to the conflict” he said to al Al Jazeera reporter. Whenever there is a spill-over of fighting from one country to another, officials will usually say “We are not a party to the conflict”. However, armed conflict does not respect political or territorial borders. Often there is a spill-over effect through refugee flows, ‘nomadic’ armed groups, small arms flows, narcotic or other criminal networks and sometimes as in the Democratic Republic of Congo, the sale of natural resources.
→ read full articleSyria: The Downward Spiral
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
2 May 2011
The United Nations has tried to stop the downward spiral of Syria into repression and potential chaos. It has been five weeks that what began as peaceful protests and demands for limited reforms have been increasingly met by government violence. Discussions on what the UN could do to help the Syrian people and to speed up necessary reforms started in both New York and Geneva.
→ read full articleWorld Citizens Call For a Thai-Cambodian Peace Zone: From Periodic Flair-Ups to Permanent Cooperation
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
25 Apr 2011
The World Citizens’ proposal for a Thai-Cambodian peace zone is based on a “peace park-condominium zone of peace” between Ecuador and Peru proposed by Professor Johan Galtung at a time of growing military confrontations between the two South American countries and published in his collection of peace proposals: Johan Galtung, 50 Years-100 Peace and Conflict Perspectives (Transcend University Press, 2008, 263 pp.)
→ read full articleThe Ivory Coast: Behind Laurent Gbagbo’s Last Stand
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
18 Apr 2011
UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said that what would happen in the Ivory Coast would have an impact on UN policy in the rest of Africa. The follow up to the arrest of Laurent Gbagbo will merit watching.
→ read full articleCreate Space for Peace
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
4 Apr 2011
“But what do you do in practice” was a question often asked of me when I started to represent Peace Brigades International (PBI) shortly after its creation in 1981 at the United Nations in Geneva.4
→ read full articleWorld Citizens Call For a Cease Fire in Libya and Start of Negotiations on a Broadly-Based New Libyan Republic
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
21 Mar 2011
Historically in Libya, there were sixteen marabtin tribes renouned for their religious wisdom who served as mediators and arbiters within the political structures of tribal, pre-colonial Libya. The tradition of reconciliatory mediation may still exist, and traditional avenues of mediation should be explored. A cease fire must be a first step, and the United Nations the most appropriate institution for maintaining a cease fire while constitutional discussions start.
→ read full articleMarch 8: Women and the People’s Revolution
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
7 Mar 2011
8 March is the International Day of Women and thus a time to analyse the specific role of women in local, national and the world society. 2011 is the 100th anniversary of the creation of International Women’s Day first proposed by Clara Zetkin (1857-1933) at the Second International Conference of Socialist Women in Copenhagen in 1911.
→ read full articleSelf-Liberation: Is There Any Other Kind?
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
28 Feb 2011
The largely non-violent people’s revolutions in Tunisia and Egypt followed by large protest demonstrations throughout the Arab world as well as Iran have drawn attention to the use of non-violent strategies in the process of deep social change. When people want to end oppression and achieve greater freedoms and more justice, there are ways to do this realistically, effectively, self-reliantly and by means that will last.
→ read full articleEarth is Our Common Home: The Forest Year
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
7 Feb 2011
The United Nations General Assembly in Resolution 61/193 has proclaimed 2011 as the International Year of Forests “recognizing that forests and sustainable forest management can contribute significantly to sustainable development, poverty eradication and the achievement of internationally agreed development goals, including the Millennium Development Goals.”
→ read full articleMahatma Gandhi: Freedom Is Our Goal; Our Lives the Price We Pay
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
31 Jan 2011
There is a certain irony that two of the most violent and dangerous conflicts which face us as peacemakers today are conflicts which Gandhi also faced but left unresolved. The first is violence within the Muslim community of what is now Pakistan. The second is violence and the political status of the Pathan (Pushtun) area that is on both sides of the Pakistan-Afghanistan frontier.
→ read full articleTunisia : The Last Days of Ben Ali
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
17 Jan 2011
The wave of a peoples’ revolution has swept over Tunisia and pushed President Ben Ali to exile in Saudi Arabia.
→ read full article2011 Higher Prices for Food: World Citizens Call for Coordinated World Food Policy
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
10 Jan 2011
In its most recent January 2011 analysis of the world food situation, the UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) noted with alarm the extreme price fluctuation in global agricultural markets. This fluctuation in global agricultural markets is leading to higher food prices and is a threat to world food security. The impact falls heaviest on the poor who spend a high percentage — up to 70 percent — of their income on food.
→ read full articleWikiLeaks and World Citizen Diplomacy
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
3 Jan 2011
WikiLeaks’ release of a large number of US diplomatic archives gives us a broad vision of the culture of US foreign policy policy-making. Such a vision could also be gained from reading the diplomatic archives as they are published after a “25 or 50 year rule”, but it is more fun to read material of a nearer time, especially if it is classified “Secret”.
→ read full articleThe OSCE Looks East
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
13 Dec 2010
The OSCE remains very much a governmental organization. Unlike the United Nations where the UN Secretariat members come from a wide range of backgrounds, the OSCE Secretariat is made up of national diplomats or other national civil servants such as the police. Many will return to national posts after serving at the OSCE. There is less a spirit of being world civil servants than there is at the UN.
→ read full articleNobel Peace Prize: The New Age Sun Rises in the East
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
11 Oct 2010
On Christmas Day 2009, a court in Beijing convicted Liu Xiaobo of “inciting subversion of state power” and sentenced him to 11 years in prison and two additional years of deprivation of political rights. The verdict cited as evidence passages from six essays Liu published online between 2005 and 2007 and his role in drafting Charter 08, an online petition for democratic reform issued on December 9; 2008 which has since been co-signed by some 10,000 persons, mostly Chinese in China. This December 2010, Liu Xiaobo will receive the Nobel Prize for Peace, though his presence at the ceremony in Oslo is in doubt.
→ read full articleOct 2 – Day for Non-Violence: Middle East Mediation
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
27 Sep 2010
On World Day for Non-violence, 2 October, chosen to mark the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi, it is useful to recall the efforts to have him play a bridge-building role in the Jewish-Arab conflict of 1937 in Palestine. Mahatma Gandhi was a man of dialogue and compromise. A British-trained lawyer, he always knew the limits of the law and knew when not to push too far even in his satyagraha – non-violent campaigns.
→ read full articlePreparing for South Sudan’s Crucial Referendum
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
20 Sep 2010
In diplomatic language, the UN Human Rights Council’s Independent Expert on the Situation of Human Rights in Sudan, Mohammed Chande Othman, warned the Council, which began its current session on 13 September 2010, that “With the referendum on South Sudan yet to be conducted, it is essential that the Government provide an environment conducive to the exercise of political rights, with firm guarantees of the fundamental freedoms of expression and assembly in accordance with the Comprehensive Peace Agreement and the Interim National Constitution..”
→ read full articleHenry Steel Olcott (1832-1907): The Buddhist Bridge
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
13 Sep 2010
The United Nations General Assembly has proclaimed the year 2010 as the International Year for the Rapprochement of Cultures. Thus we are pleased to present the creative efforts of individuals who have helped to create bridges of understanding among cultures.
→ read full articleJean Giono (1895-1970): The Energies of the Earth
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
6 Sep 2010
The United Nations General Assembly has proclaimed the year 2010 as the International Year for the Rapprochement of Cultures. Thus we are pleased to present the creative efforts of individuals who have helped to create bridges of understanding among cultures.
→ read full articleEarth is Our Common Home: UN Desert Decade
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
30 Aug 2010
God created lands filled with water as a place for man to live; and the desert so that he can discover his soul.
→ read full articleThe Rom: World Citizens Ahead of Time
Rene Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
23 Aug 2010
There are estimates that there are 10 to 12 million Rom living in the European Union with the largest concentration in Romania — some two million according to unofficial estimates. There are also fairly large Rom groups in the former Soviet Union, in particular the Russian Federation, Ukraine, Belarus, as well as in Turkey. Originally from India, the Rom have spread through Europe probably between the ninth and fourteenth centuries. Why they left northern India is not clear. They seemed to have been from the start a nomadic population living from handicrafts and providing music and dance to settled populations. It is only recently that some Rom intellectuals have become interested in their Indian heritage and have been making contacts with groups which still live in India and which may have had common ancestors.
→ read full articleLeopold Sedar Senghor (1906-2001) – Who will teach rhythm to the world laid low?
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
19 Jul 2010
The United Nations General Assembly has proclaimed the year 2010 as the International Year for the Rapprochement of Cultures. Thus we are pleased to present the creative efforts of individuals who have helped to create bridges of understanding among cultures.
→ read full articleJames H. Cousins (1873-1956)
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
12 Jul 2010
The United Nations General Assembly has proclaimed the year 2010 as the International Year for the Rapprochement of Cultures. Thus we are pleased to present the creative efforts of individuals who have helped to create bridges of understanding among cultures.
→ read full articleSarvepalli Radhakrishnan (1888—1975)
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
5 Jul 2010
The United Nations General Assembly has proclaimed the year 2010 as the International Year for the Rapprochement of Cultures. Thus we are pleased to present the creative efforts of individuals who have helped to create bridges of understanding among cultures.
→ read full articleLalon Shah (? – 1890) Men are vessels made for holy uses
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
28 Jun 2010
The United Nations General Assembly has proclaimed the year 2010 as the International Year for the Rapprochement of Cultures. Thus we are pleased to present the creative efforts of individuals who have helped to create bridges of understanding among cultures.
→ read full articleAimé Césaire: (1913 – 2008) A Black Orpheus
René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service,
21 Jun 2010
The United Nations General Assembly has proclaimed the year 2010 as the International Year for the Rapprochement of Cultures. Thus we are pleased to present the creative efforts of individuals who have helped to create bridges of understanding among cultures.
→ read full article