A peaceful world to some may sound like a utopian ideal. When you look at the many conflicts facing the world today, it feels unrealistic to even imagine that possibility. Yet, across history and into the present day, peace has existed in and between neighboring societies. Recent research on peace systems, or groups of neighboring societies committed against war, indicates the key factors that contribute to their existence. They found that above all other factors, non-warring norms, values, and rituals have the greatest relative importance in contributing to a sustained peace system.
This study identified historical and present examples of peace systems and compared them to a random assortment of other non-peace systems. It affirmed the hypothesis that certain peaceful features are more present in peace systems and non-peace systems have a stronger presence of war features, such as war leadership and war values and norms.
Then, they looked at the possible peace-related factors and ranked them in order of importance. This is where non-warring norms, values, and rituals stood out among other key factors, such as security & economic interdependence (as seen in the European Union) and overarching institutions. Non-warring norms, values, and rituals can be thought of as principles and rules within a society that reinforce peace, such as how in Nordic countries, there is a strong emphasis on consensus decision-making and peacebuilding rather than more aggressive approaches.
Understanding the contributions of non-warring norms and values to peace system has major implications for peacebuilding, development practice, and international relations. Rather than solely emphasizing economic or material factors in reaching peace and stability, perhaps more attention could be given to nurturing peace-oriented values within and between groups. Leaders can model and promote pro-peace values and norms and even embed them into laws and institutions. They can also be fostered within society through cultural narratives and rituals that celebrate peace between groups.
Fry, D. P., Souillac, G., Liebovitch, L., Coleman, P. T., Agan, K., Nicholson-Cox, E., ... & Strauss, S. (2021). Societies within peace systems avoid war and build positive intergroup relationships. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, 8(1), 1-9.