CIAO DATE: 11/03

The State of International Relations Research and Perspectives in Germany

Gunther Hellmann, editor
August 2003

Concept, Theories and the Practice of Peace by Harald Müller

Abstract

The debate about the meaning of „peace“ has incrementally enlarged the scope of the term to become equivalent with „the good“. In this process, its utility to distinguish between peaceful and non-peaceful situations within and between states was lost. The motivation was not to legitimize social situations of injustice, discrimination or ecological destruction as peaceful. The problem might be solved by distinguishing between peace – as a social situation in which physical violence is absent and not considered by organized social groups – and its causes – which includes a minimum degree of justice, equality, and sustainability. Recent theoretical approaches such as „democratic peace“ and the concept of civilization have theorized more or less complex causes of peace, trying to combine internal and external conditions of non-violence.