Editor’s Note
One way of thinking about “contrast” is as a tool of measurement. We know how far we have come by contrasting the present with the past. We gain understanding and a deeper level of passion, commitment, and appreciation,
through contrast. Having experienced both grief and joy, we feel each emotion more intensely, and the celebration is greater because the prodigal son has returned.
It has been a year of contrasting revelations. Snowden shattered our insular illusions of privacy with disclosures of all-encompassing global surveillance. Activists learned the various social medias they relied upon to organize are being used to track, manipulate, and exploit. Net Neutrality further threatens our connectivity and reach through Orwellian “fast lanes.” As glaciers melt, fires rage,
crops shrivel, and cities flood, we are still faced with the relentless upsurge in greenhouse gases, oil and fracking fluid spills, radiation poisoning from nuclear plants and their waste, and increasing pushback against activists and whistleblowers. The stakes are higher than ever, and despite forces designed to intimidate and keep us in the dark, the work we receive from young writers indicates that they know. They care. They are acting. Our goal at Writing for Peace is to support this global awakening, and continue building a platform for connection and expression through the arts, two essential elements in the development of empathy.
This year Erica Chenoweth, assistant professor at the Josef Korbel School of International Studies at the University of Denver, joined our Advisory Panel. Chenoweth’s research indicates that nonviolent resistance is statistically more effective than violent resistance, in part because anyone is able to participate. It’s not necessary to be an armed combatant, and the personal risk isn’t nearly as high. Nonviolent civil resistance gives a voice to every citizen, the young and the
elderly, men, women and children. My own daughters can attest to this; they both carried candles and marched beside me in anti-war demonstrations, even when one was still in a stroller. According to Erica Chenoweth, greater numbers of
participants is the key to victory. She writes, “In fact, no campaigns failed once they’d achieved the active and sustained participation of just 3.5% of the population—and lots of them succeeded with far less than that.” She does, however, point out that 3.5% isn’t as miniscule as it sounds; in the U.S. that’s
actually about 11 million people.
At some level, Chenoweth’s findings seem counterintuitive. We are conditioned to equate violence with power. But, anyone who has participated in peaceful demonstrations knows to be wary of agitators, troublemakers who feel
the need to destroy property or pelt objects at riot police. We know militarized police need little, if any, provocation to fire on citizens. And yet, we will not be deterred. Activists across the globe continue to demonstrate, knowing they
risk gas, pepper-spray, beatings, and persecution. Artists play a key role in waking a sleeping populace. As Chenoweth explains at length in the book she co-authored with Maria J. Stephan, Why Civil Resistance Works, The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict, creativity is the hallmark of nonviolent resistance. For those of us who write for peace, her research confirms our belief in Bulwer-Lytton’s words, “The pen is mightier than the sword.”
Congratulations to the outstanding winners of our 2013 Young Writers Contest, and thank you to all of the talented young writers who submitted works from 21 countries. We would also like to thank all of our superb contributors. Your commitment to Writing for Peace not only introduces young writers from all over the world to new ideas, approaches, and exceptional art, but you set an example
of social consciousness. Your work in this issue explores the contrasts of life —war and peace, truth and deception, weakness and power, harmony and discord, and the implicit contrasts within a single word or phrase. Within death there
are shades of life (and vice-versa); within darkness there is
light, within despair, hope.
On behalf of all of us at Writing for Peace, I thank
each of you for the hope that your mighty pens inspire.
Peace,
Carmel
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