Announcing the First War Abolisher of 2021 Awards
World BEYOND War
(October 6, 2021) — On September 27, World BEYOND War announced the first-ever War Abolisher Awards. On October 6, the Lifetime Organizational War Abolisher Award of 2021 was presented to Japan’s Peace Boat, the David Hartsough Lifetime Individual War Abolisher Award of 2021 was presented to Mel Duncan and the War Abolisher Award to Montenegro’s Civic Initiative Save Sinjajevina.
World BEYOND War is a global nonviolent movement, founded in 2014, to end war and establish a just and sustainable peace.
The purpose of the awards is to honor and encourage support for those working to abolish the institution of war itself. With the Nobel Peace Prize and other nominally peace-focused institutions so frequently honoring other good causes or, in fact, wagers of war, World BEYOND War intends its award to go to educators or activists intentionally and effectively advancing the cause of war abolition, accomplishing reductions in war-making, war preparations, or war culture.
Between June 1 and July 31, World BEYOND War received hundreds of impressive nominations. The World BEYOND War Board, with assistance from its Advisory Board, made the selections.
Here is a video of the entire awards presentation:
The awardees are honored for their body of work directly supporting one or more of the three segments of World BEYOND War’s strategy for reducing and eliminating war as outlined in the book “A Global Security System, An Alternative to War.” They are: Demilitarizing Security, Managing Conflict Without Violence, and Building a Culture of Peace.
War Abolisher 2021: Civic Initiative Save Sinjajevina
Civic Initiative Save Sinjajevina (Građanska inicijativa Sačuvajmo Sinjajevinu in Serbian) is a popular movement in Montenegro that has prevented the implementation of a planned NATO military training ground, blocking military expansion while protecting a natural environment, a culture, and a way of life. Save Sinjajevina remains vigilant to the danger of ongoing efforts to impose a base on their treasured land. (See https://sinjajevina.org )
Montenegro joined NATO in 2017 and the rumors began in 2018 of plans to impose a military (including artillery) training ground on the grasslands of Sinjajevina Mountain, the biggest mountain pasture in the Balkans and the second largest in Europe, a unique landscape of immense natural and cultural value, part of the Tara River Canyon Biosphere Reserve and surrounded by two UNESCO World Heritage sites. It is used by more than 250 families of farmers and nearly 2,000 people, while many of its pastures are used and managed communally by eight different Montenegrin tribes.
Public demonstrations against the militarization of Sinjajevina gradually arose from 2018 onwards. In September 2019, ignoring over 6,000 signatures of Montenegrin citizens that should have compelled a debate in the Montenegrin Parliament, the parliament announced the creation of a military training ground without any environmental, socio-economic, or health-impact assessments, and NATO forces arrived to train.
In November 2019, an international scientific research team presented its works to UNESCO, the European Parliament, and the European Commission, explaining the bio-cultural value of Sinjajevina. In December 2019 the Save Sinjajevina association was officially launched. On October 6, 2020, Save Sinjajevina launched a petition to stop the creation of the military training ground.
On October 9, 2020, farmers demonstrated at the doors of Parliament when they knew that the EU Commissioner for Neighborhood and Enlargement was at that moment in the country’s capital. Beginning October 19th, rumors started to appear about a new military training on Sinjajevina.
On October 10th, 2020, news broke and the rumors of a new military training being planned were confirmed by the Minister of the Defence. About 150 farmers and their allies set up a protest camp in the highland pastures to block soldiers’ access to the area. They formed a human chain in the grasslands and used their bodies as shields against the live ammunition of the planned military exercise. For months they stood in the way of the military moving from one side of the plateau to another, in order to prevent the military from firing and executing their drill. Whenever the military moved, so did the resisters.
When COVID hit and national restrictions on gatherings were implemented, they took turns in four-person groups set in strategic spots to stop the guns from firing. When the high mountains turned cold in November, they bundled up and held their ground. They resisted for more than 50 days in freezing conditions until the new Montenegrin Minister of Defense, who was appointed on the 2nd of December, announced that the training would be cancelled.
The Save Sinjajevina movement — including farmers, NGOs, scientists, politicians, and ordinary citizens — has continued to develop local democratic control over the future of the mountains threatened by NATO, has continued to engage in public education and lobbying of elected officials, and has offered its insights through numerous fora to those working in other parts of the world to prevent the construction of, or to close existing, military bases.
Opposing military bases is very difficult, but absolutely crucial to abolishing war. Bases destroy indigenous people’s and local communities’ ways of life and healthier ways to make a living. Stopping the harm done by bases is central to the work of World BEYOND War. The Civic Initiative Save Sinjajevina is doing the educational and nonviolent activist work that is most needed, and with stunning success and influence.
Save Sinjajevina is also making necessary connections between peace, environmental protection, and local community promotion, and between peace and democratic self-governance. If war is ever fully ended, it will be because of work like that being done by the Civic Initiative Save Sinjajevina. We should all offer them our support and solidarity.
The movement has launched a new global petition at https://bit.ly/sinjajevina
These representatives of the Save Sinjajevina Movement participated in the October 6 ceremonies. They were:
• Milan Sekulovic, a Montenegrin journalist and civic-environmental activist, and the founder of the Save Sinjajevina movement;
• Pablo Dominguez, an eco-anthropologist who specialized on pastoral mountain commons and how they work bio-ecologically and socio-culturally.
• Petar Glomazic, an aeronautical engineer and aviation consultant, documentary film maker, translator, alpinist, ecological and civic rights activist, and a Steering Committee Member of Save Sinjajevina.
• Persida Jovanović is currently pursuing a Master’s degree in political science and international relations, and she spent most of her life in Sinjajevina. She is now working together with local communities and the Save Sinjajevina association to preserve the traditional way of life and ecosystem of the mountain.
Lifetime Organizational War Abolisher: Peace Boat
Accepting the award on behalf of Peace Boat on October 6 will be Peace Boat Founder and Director Yoshioka Tatsuya. Several other people from the organization will attend, some of whom you can meet during the breakout room session.
The purpose of the awards is to honor and encourage support for those working to abolish the institution of war itself. With the Nobel Peace Prize and other nominally peace-focused institutions so frequently honoring other good causes or, in fact, wagers of war, World BEYOND War intends its award to go to educators or activists intentionally and effectively advancing the cause of war abolition, accomplishing reductions in war-making, war preparations, or war culture. Between June 1 and July 31, World BEYOND War received hundreds of impressive nominations. The World BEYOND War Board, with assistance from its Advisory Board, made the selections.
The awardees are honored for their body of work directly supporting one or more of the three segments of World BEYOND War’s strategy for reducing and eliminating war as outlined in the book “A Global Security System, An Alternative to War.” They are: Demilitarizing Security, Managing Conflict Without Violence, and Building a Culture of Peace.
Peace Boat (see https://peaceboat.org/english ) is a Japan-based international NGO working to promote peace, human rights, and sustainability. Guided by the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), Peace Boat’s global voyages offer a unique program of activities centered on experiential learning and intercultural communication.
Peace Boat’s first voyage was organized in 1983 by a group of Japanese university students as a creative response to government censorship regarding Japan’s past military aggression in the Asia-Pacific. They chartered a ship to visit neighboring countries with the aim of learning first-hand about the war from those who had experienced it and initiating people-to-people exchange.
Peace Boat made its first around-the-world voyage in 1990. It has organized more than 100 voyages, visiting more than 270 ports in 70 countries. Over the years, it has done tremendous work to build a global culture of peace and to advance nonviolent conflict resolution and demilitarization in various parts of the world. Peace Boat also builds connections between peace and related causes of human rights and environmental sustainability — including through the development of an eco-friendly cruise ship.
Peace Boat is a mobile classroom at sea. Participants see the world while learning, both onboard and at various destinations, about peacebuilding, through lectures, workshops, and hands-on activities. Peace Boat collaborates with academic institutions and civil society organizations, including Tübingen University in Germany, Tehran Peace Museum in Iran, and as part of the Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict (GPPAC). In one program, students from Tübingen University study how both Germany and Japan deal with understanding past war crimes.
Peace Boat is one of the 11 organizations forming the International Steering Group of the International Campaign to Abolish Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), which was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 2017, the prize that in recent decades, according to Nobel Peace Prize Watch, most faithfully lived up to the intentions of Alfred Nobel’s will through which the prize was established.
Peace Boat has educated and advocated for a nuclear-free world for many years. Through the Peace Boat Hibakusha project, the organization works closely with atomic bomb survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki, sharing their testimonies of the humanitarian impact of nuclear weapons with people around the world during global voyages and recently through online testimony sessions.
Peace Boat also coordinates the Global Article 9 Campaign to Abolish War which builds global support for Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution — for maintaining and abiding by it, and as a model for peace constitutions around the world. Article 9, using words nearly identical to the Kellogg-Briand Pact, states that “the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes,” and also stipulates that “land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained.”
Peace Boat engages in disaster relief following disasters including earthquakes and tsunamis, as well as education and activities for disaster risk reduction. It is also active in landmine removal programs.
Peace Boat holds Special Consultative Status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations.
Peace Boat has around 100 staff members who represent diverse ages, education histories, backgrounds, and nationalities. Nearly all staff members joined the Peace Boat team after participating in a voyage as a volunteer, participant, or guest educator.
Peace Boat’s Founder and Director Yoshioka Tatsuya was a student in 1983 when he and fellow students started Peace Boat. Since that time, he has authored books and articles, addressed the United Nations, been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize, led the Article 9 Campaign to Abolish War, and been a founding member of the Global Partnership for the Prevention of Armed Conflict.
Peace Boat’s voyages have been grounded by the COVID Pandemic, but Peace Boat has found other creative ways to advance its cause, and has plans for voyages as soon as they can be responsibly launched.
If war is ever to be abolished, it will be in great measure due to the work of organizations like Peace Boat educating and mobilizing thinkers and activists, developing alternatives to violence, and turning the world away from the idea that war can ever be justified or accepted. World BEYOND War is honored to present our very first award to Peace Boat.
The David Hartsough Lifetime Individual War Abolisher: Mel Duncan
Mel Duncan is a co-founder and Founding Director for Nonviolent Peaceforce (see https://www.nonviolentpeaceforce.org ), a world leader in Unarmed Civilian Protection (UCP). While the award is for Duncan, it is in recognition of the work of many people around the world who have developed through Nonviolent Peaceforce a powerful alternative to war. Joining Mel Duncan for the event on October 6 will be Ms. Rosemary Kabaki, Nonviolent Peaceforce’s Head of Mission for Myanmar.
The Nonviolent Peaceforce was founded in 2002 and is headquartered in Geneva. Nonviolent Peaceforce builds teams of trained, unarmed, civilian protectors — men and women who are invited into conflict areas all over the globe. They work with local groups on violence deterrence with great success, demonstrating a superior alternative to war and to armed peacekeeping — achieving more effective and longer lasting results at far smaller expense. And they advocate for the wider adoption of these approaches by groups ranging from local civil society to the UN.
Members of Nonviolence Peaceforce, bringing to mind Mohandas Gandhi’s idea of a peace army, are visibly nonpartisan and unarmed in uniforms and vehicles indicating their identity. Their teams are formed of people from all over the world including at least half from the host country and are not associated with any government. They pursue no agendas other than protection from harm and local violence prevention. They do not work — as, for example, the Red Cross at Guantanamo — in partnership with national or multi-national militaries. Their independence creates credibility. Their unarmed status creates no threat. This sometimes allows them to go where armed forces could not.
Nonviolent Peaceforce participants accompany civilians out of danger, and even stand in doorways protecting people from murder through their international, nonviolent status and prior communication with all armed groups. They accompany women to collect firewood in areas where rape is being used as a weapon of war. They facilitate the return of child soldiers. They support local groups to implement ceasefires. They create space for negotiations between warring parties. They help prevent violence during elections, including the 2020 U.S. elections. They also create a link between local peace workers and the international community.
Nonviolent Peaceforce has worked both to train and deploy more Unarmed Civilian Protectors and to educate government and institutions on the need to greatly scale-up the same approach. The choice to send people into danger without guns has demonstrated the extent to which the guns bring the danger with them.
Mel Duncan is an eloquent educator and organizer. He has represented Nonviolent Peaceforce at the United Nations where the group has been granted Consultative Status. Recent UN global reviews have cited and recommended Unarmed Civilian Protection. Although the UN continues to focus on armed “peace keeping,” the Department of Peace Operations has recently funded NP’s training, and the Security Council has included Unarmed Civilian Protection in five resolutions.
Nonviolent Peaceforce is engaged in a years-long effort to compile case studies, hold regional workshops, and bring together a global conference on good practices in Unarmed Civilian Protection, to be followed by publication of the findings. In doing so they are facilitating a community of practice among the growing number of groups implementing UCP.
The war system is altogether dependent on people believing that organized mass violence is essential for protecting the people and values they love. With his advocacy and implementation of Unarmed Civilian Protection, Mel Duncan has dedicated his life to proving that violence is not necessary for the protection of civilians, that we have alternatives to militarism that are effective.
The establishment of UCP as a field of practice is more than a strategy to accelerate direct protection responses. It is part of a global movement that is triggering a paradigm shift, a different way of viewing ourselves as human beings and the world around us.
The award is named after David Hartsough, a cofounder of World BEYOND War, whose long lifetime of dedicated and inspiring peace work serves as a model. Separately from World BEYOND War, and some 15 years prior to its founding, Hartsough met Duncan and began the plans that would make them cofounders of Nonviolent Peaceforce.
If war is ever to be abolished, it will be in great measure due to the work of people like Mel Duncan who dare to dream of a better way and work to demonstrate its viability. World BEYOND War is honored to present our very first David Hartsough Lifetime Individual War Abolisher Award to Mel Duncan.
David Hartsough commented: “For those like Presidents Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Donald Trump, and Joseph Biden who believe that when violence is inflicted on civilian populations the only alternatives are to do nothing or to start bombing the country and its people, Mel Duncan through his important work with the Nonviolent Peaceforce, has shown that that there is a viable alternative, and that is Unarmed Civilian Protection. Even the United Nations has come to understand that Unarmed Civilian Protection is a viable alternative that needs to be supported. This is a very important building block to ending the excuse for wars. Many thanks to Mel Duncan for his very important work over many years!”
