Peace Journalism: Signs and Trends

EDITORIAL, 29 Jul 2019

#597 | René Wadlow – TRANSCEND Media Service

A task of Peace Journalism is to be able to discern trends and to detect signs of emerging political and social issues.  One aspect is what I call “raising a storm warning flag”. This is to highlight growing tensions or inappropriate responses to situations which are not yet on the world security agenda–that is, neither being discussed at the United Nations Security Council nor leading to action in a regular way.

A “storm warning flag” example is the political, social and ecological currents in the Sahel states of West Africa.  The tensions and difficulties are growing. Increasing the number of French and African Union military troops is not an appropriate response.  Another example are the conditions of the Rohingya from Myanmar–an issue to which TMS has given considerable attention, but to which world response is still not adequate. Another ‘flag warning’ would be the state persecution of the  Uyghur Muslim minority in Xinjiang, China–Tibet redux?

A related task is to see signs and trends of a positive nature and to encourage them in all ways possible.  I would stress four positive trends that are developing slowly but surely within our world society:

1. A deepening of the inner life of individuals in alignment with the Higher Self;
2. a greater concern with living in harmony with Nature;
3. an awareness of the need to act together on the local, national, and world level; and
4. a growing role of women, their equality and their special contributions to society.

As the saying goes, “good news is no news.” Our challenge for TMS is to increase our role in both warning and encouraging so that such positive trends find the place they deserve in the mainstream media.

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René Wadlow is a member of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace Development Environment. He is President of the Association of World Citizens, an international peace organization with consultative status with ECOSOC, the United Nations organ facilitating international cooperation and problem-solving in economic and social issues, and editor of Transnational Perspectives.

This article originally appeared on Transcend Media Service (TMS) on 29 Jul 2019.

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