"You know, People in War Also Fall In Love"

Uncertainty and Confusion are my constant companions.
It is the only life I have known so far. There are few things I am sure about.
But one thing that I do know, almost fully, is that literature is my passion.
I worry at times that it has become my indulgent drug but I cannot help myself
from getting moved by the ways in which people can express themselves. Thats how I realize
that Arundhati Roy's political thoughts has such a strong influence on me. Its because she writes well.

Anyways, unlike my normal entries, I do have a point of mentioning about my passionate affair with literature.
I am always up for listening to new thoughts- and more so to new perspectives on old thoughts-but sometimes, when accuracy of the definitions are over-rated and sophistication is all I can hear and appreciate from a lecture ( or for that matter, a reading), I get disillusioned. See, many insightful researches are conducted to create better awareness about issues. Then you must know that as important are your thoughts, so is the expression you use. What is the point of saying complicated ideas if people cannot understand it? And you know what bothers me most, when I know that someone can use something so much more simpler to convey the same meanings. Its not about how many words you know. Its about how many ways you can use the words you know. Thats when literature comes in. Literature frees us from cloak of complications. It gives us WAYS to express complicated thoughts but in simple language. Unfortunately, I find very few people who has authority over such talents.

The speaker that we heard in a TED video in my peace and justice class, to my luck, just happened to be one of them. As an Iraqi war survivor and a founder of Women for Women International, she was urging the audience to see the war from both the frontline and the backline. War is not only about soldiers fighting. It is also about the less visible but equally important faces of people who survive through the wars. She says this story is not about some unknown refugee, with dirty faces and scared eyes. She gives each woman she mentions an identity. That was graceful.

Look how beautiful she is.

Conflict is not only on the battle line. She is challenging our own attitude of "casually treating the casualties of war". Such million people were killed, Oh how interesting. She wants us to look beyond the statistics and look at war from, permit me to use this word once more, humane way.

She asks us beautiful questions. Do you know, people in war also fall in love? That kisd go to school, adults go to work, there are dancing, there are marriages, divorces and life goes on. She talks about a women who in four years of war, opened her music school so that learning continues.I find it provoking. Indeed, life goes on. Those who live must live when they are alive. For them, the living is difficult. They can die from inside. That is the worst- when you die by living. Still, we endure.

And now the important question is who keeps this living going? The Women. Yes. Then why are women not included in the table that matters- that is the negotiating table of peace? When the lives of women are affected so irreparably, dont they deserve a voice? Dont they deserve a seat on the table?Ask yourself.

Rumi

At the end, she leaves us with words of a 13th century Sufi poet Rumi,

" Out beyond the worlds of right doing and wrong doings,
   There is a field.
   I will meet you there.
 
  When the soul lies down in that grass,
  The world is too full to talk about.
  Ideas, language, even the phrase "each other"
   No longer makes any sense."

Here is the link to the talk. http://www.ted.com/talks/zainab_salbi.html

I dedicate this page to TED- for giving wings to ideas worth listening to.

Liberia's Civil War

I am fond of people who have purposes in their life- people who know why they are doing what they are doing. I like them because most of the time, their conviction stands out. They perform better because they believe in the work they do. And that inspires me. The conviction that leads them towards their goals. It does not necessarily have to be something big. In my case, it is mostly individuals who are my inspirations.For example, when my room-mate sits down and creates her art, I see passion in her.I see that this is something that gives her satisfaction. I like feeling inspired. Its like you are temporarily on wings, flapping as hard as you can.

For quite some time, we have been discussing about woman's role in peace-making and peace-building processes. It is a coincidence that in my politics class, we ended up watching a documentary on the role of women peace activists in Liberia's civil war. Just to give you a brief summary, the documentary presented Liberia as a country in chaos. The then President Mr. Taylor and a rebellious faction called LURD fought for power. As each sides gets more violent, the situation erupted into a civil war. Many common people were forced to abandon their home and displaced to slums and roadsides. In this process, the soldiers from both sides took advantage to their greed and inflicted harrassment on women. At this point, the peace activists- whose name has already escaped me but whose face and voice I will not forget- realizes that something must be done to stop the situation. She calls her church to action and cooperates with muslim women. Despite their religious differences, both sides wisely agrees that a bullet does not discriminate on religion. When a woman is killed, they do not see whether she is Christian or Muslim. She was given support my other women of Liberia who decided to play a more active role. They protested on the roads and asks for a peace agreement between the two factions. By bearing the scorching heat and giving up their comforts, they stay on throadsand demands the government to intervene.

Their patience is rewarded when both sides finally decides to form a peace agreement. The peace talks was to be conducted at an African peace summit. The women sends their delegates to make sure that work was done. They sits outside the main buildings and continues to watch over the whole process. Finally, the summit comes to a conclusion and ousts Taylor. A transitional government is put into place. They go back to Liberia and takes part in the political process, campaigns for a better democracy and the documentary ends with a new female president of Liberia thanking the women peace organization.

This is a rather lame summary. However, the documentary reinforces the concept that peace is a process. The women peace activists continues their action for years and years because for them, peace was not merely negative peace, it was also about creating a new environment where democracy can thrive. Moreover, seeing other women work with so much conviction inspired me. When one woman supports another woman, it empowers both of them. By sticking together when it mattered, these women were able to create remarkable changes in their country.

It was a long journey. The odds loomed insurmountable. The easiest option was to give up. In the beginning of the documentary, I asked myself what could these women really do? But when people have purpose and they believe in what they do, the odds can be overcomed. It was a good lesson to myself as well.

" A world that is good for women is good for everyone "

The Raging Grannies of Boston

The grannies came, sang and won my heart.

I am glad I did not miss this class. Because, this is one of the most touching class experience I had at Wellesley. We were joined by Boston raging grannies- a group of older women who have defied stereotypes and became active peace activists. This morning, as I hurriedly went to get breakfast, I met Carter and she told me that the grannies were visiting. I thought that is a rather bizarre event so I decided to check my readings. I was almost late for the class so I quickly skim through the raging grannies article. I came excited because part of me was still unsure of what to expect.

Our class discussion was on war and women. We briefly watched the trailer of Lioness; American women combatants in war in Iraq and Afghanistan. I was surprised to learn that in the US, women are legally not permitted to join the combat. Like many other class mates, I assumed that when women join the war, like the Tamil tigers, they are also sent to fight. It made sense to me; somehow that this will hurt men's ego or at least the men who are in the army. As Catia said, many wars are fought with justification to protect women; the idea that feminine women who are supposed to be protected are fighting the war is unsettling to many people. It does not fit into the image of a warrior- strong built and masculine. But we also discussed that war can be good for women. When the WW2 occurred and men left to fight, it was the women of all these countries who ran the workforce. Wars, strangely enough, can be empowering to women. 

Still, I asked myself: Why does women need to acquire masculine qualities to be respected in the society? Why can we not empower the very idea of feminine qualities? These qualities; though not overt has strength in it. Why is elegance only a quality of beauty, why not of strength and respect? 

Anyways, so with topics of war and masculinity versus peace and passivity, we focused on the dilemma that Goldstein articulated, "Activism that brings power in peace versus the concept that peace are for women while war is for men". Interesting, no? With this question, we were joined by the most unexpected group of older women. Actually, I dont want to call them old because I do not like the social connotation that it is associated with aging. The first thing I noticed about them was the way they dressed up. It was almost hippy with all the colorful hats, badges, colorful skits- it was a metaphor of what they stand for. A starking juxtaposition. I also liked the fact that when they talk, they were normal.

I like seeing normal people -people I can relate to- do something special. Often Leaders are put on such high pedastals that they seems too good to be true. But when you see people like yourself achieving great feats, the confidence builds in. Well, well, so the grannies sang us some beautiful songs- songs that have deep political reasonance. Indeed, as we continue our discussion, I realized that many of the grannies possess political maturity- one granny talked about the use of war as a job program-they understand how the laws are passed, how protest are strategically planned- and they talked about facebook and youtube-And the best part, some of then have been to jail and when Catia asked about the experience-she said it was fabulous- all I could do there was sit and smile- it was an inspiring site.

As a closing line, the raging grannies left us with a question to ponder on. Let me widen the circle of ponderers. During the grannies youth, protest movements are mobilised through people and it was the activism that was solid. However, our generation might be activists online but it is hard to point where our efforts go. A letter confirming signature of 5000 people is more effective or say 500 people going to a particular place and protesting? Hm...Good question, no?

Race: The Power of Illusion

In life, you hear things and see things that are so different or new that it completely takes you off guard. Those moments often become turning points in people's lives because it resonates deep within the individual.

I went to class today just like any other day. I knew that we were going to learn about race. It does not feel like a completely new topic even though I have never studied it in a formal setting. That is because race is always part of my consciousness.  I think this is true to some extent for everyone else as well. The fact that I am an Asian is always at the back of my mind. Often it also affects me to see a situation differently as well ( I guess I am wearing my ethnic lens at the time).

But by the end of my class today, I had so many questions in my mind. I was startled by some of the things I saw and some of the things that I have taken for granted. I became aware of the many things I do not know. First of all, I was struck by the fact that Thomas Jefferson, the man who created the founding principles of America, the land of equality is the very man who had 225 slaves at one point. It turns out he was also the first person who gave a theory about race when in Notes on Virginia, he wrote about "a suspicion only" that among the inhabitants of this new land, the Africans seems to be inferior in body and mind". That makes me wonder, did Jefferson really meant it when he said, " All men are created equal" or does he not include certain race as human?

Secondly, Charles Darwin, the survival of the fittest guy also said, "with population influx of South, people will be darker, smaller in stature. Criminal acts will increase and will insanity". I really wonder what kind of science, what kind of logic could that possibly stem from?

Another observation I made that I didn't know about is in early times, social discrimination or status is not based on the color of a person's skin. Religion and economy decides class. But over the time through theories such as the one Jefferson made and the practice of law, this new concept of race and discrimination started to emerge.

 " It does not matter how you look. It matters how people assign meaning to how you look".

Despite my reservations about America's interfering and reckless wars all over the world, I have always associated the American society with a progressive nation. It is moving towards the future and growing up in a third-world country, America always dawned to me as the land of endless opportunities, if you work hard, you can be anyone you want. But it seems that America's newness is a cliche. This country had its own dark history; history of internally displacing people.

I thought it was only blacks who suffered the greatest discrimination. Hearing Ozawa and Thim's case, I really did wonder does America look at the color of your skin to decide allegiance or does it look at the values you uphold and practice? And who are people to blame for the habitants of Dudley street to be economically low when history has worked against them? When the system they live in was a system that discriminates one race over another?

With such more questions, I felt fortunate that I was able to correct many of  my own understanding about Race.

Dudley Street: Yes, You Can

One thing that always bothered me about charity is the psychological effect it has on the people who are helped. I know people who go to developing countries to help have the best intentions in their heart. But imagine you are a child growing up in a poor neighborhood. Adults to whom you are supposed to look up are all failing in their lives. There is nothing people of your kind can do about it. And the only way things seems to change is with the ability of an outsider. Unconsciously yet very firmly, it creates a belief that "those" people are more able than you. That could be true. But then, the kid will not realize the potential within one's community. So long story short, does too much charity disable the mindset of people who are hurt? Does it hurt their self-image? Does it make them question their own ideas? And if it does, will this inhibit them from making a change? If they do deprive them of confidence, that will be disheartening. Because, I am sure, somewhere deep down within each individual, there is always capacity to reach a higher potential. It might take one person longer time to achieve one goal but with persistence and confidence, miracles do happen.

And look what we learned in class today. The Dudley street initiative is a real life miracle story of such a change. Unlike other successful movements,  this initiative was not started by people in business suits, not by politicians, not by money from this and that. It was started by the very people who you see across your streets. With the effort and dedication of local people, Dudley forced many people to change their stereotypes about many things.

I like this spirit. This spirit of fighting back. This fight against repression. Rather than lamenting that everything in life is going wrong and waiting for someone to fix it up, if you stand up and start fighting, it encourages other people to follow your lead. People in Dudley street stood against economic, racial odds to rebuild a community.

These stories reinforces in me the belief that things do change. Maybe, there are not so dramatic as is cliched. Call me an idealist, if you want but I still believe, despite the rationality that works against it, Everything can change. Bringing this belief close to home, I know, somehow, I feel, no I don't think, I feel justice will occur in Tibet. Maybe, we need to think more, sacrifice, be patient and give our best. As long as we don't stop believing in our cause, nobody can change our reality. We are the masters of our own fate.

Bod Gyalo.

I pray for a day when I think of Tibet, it is happiness that comes to my mind. Not sadness, we have enough of the tears. Not frustration, we had enough of rage as well. Happiness. Yes, thats what I pray for.

Michael Chertoff- Future of National Security

Michael Chertoff was the second United States Secretary of Homeland Security under President George Bush and co-author of USA Patriot Act. He talked about challenges facing the US in a long perspective.

During the cold war, stakes were too high for real war to occur. However, a multi polar world will create an unstable world.

What has changed in the last two decades are three things:

First is the globalization phenomenon. There are new international actors who do not act within a certain geographic boundary. There is unity through networking, whether it is for better or for ill. As such, threats cannot be localized anymore.

Second is technological leverage. This affects threats or terrorist acts. Earlier, no country had technology to make war but now with possibility of radiological, chemical, biological weapons- technology has been weaponised and more civilian damage continues to occur. September 11, 2001 had the biggest civilian damage in a day in US history.

Third is the rise of ungoverned space- government are unwilling or unable to control those territories and those territories, in turn has become a Petri dish for terrorism. People can operate freely whether it is piracy or terrorism.

These three features have radically changed how security is perceived. Earlier, the US sees security in two ways. One is through war which is military and defense, other is through criminal violations. Security department’s first job was to see which bucket to put the problem in. However, division between war and criminals no longer exists. These are now integrated and posed a unique challenge. It is no longer a binary issue but rather a spectrum of threats. It challenges us (?) to rethink about legal and organizational structures.

In terms of geography, a place to look at is South Asia. Apart from the Afghanistan war which has provided Al Qaeda with a safe haven, Europeans and Americans are trained in SA and sent back to orchestrate terrorist attacks.

Especially in Afghanistan, real domain over activities of borders needs to be valid. Otherwise, there is threat to the rest of the world. 

Al Qaeda is an umbrella organization which offers to train and finance different groups. So in this new age, it will be networks fighting, so US has to deal through network fighting.

The strategy for short term is through military strike. In a longer time, we need to have an ideological response, looking at prone societies and help build up alternatives.

Taliban will regain if US doesn’t help, Pakistan will become less stable- Al Qaeda’s recruiting will reach optimum.

Danger or threat is also in western hemisphere such as Mexico with drug trafficking. It is a race against time.

Consequential Threats

Major biological terrorism threat/ anthrax/ materials already in nature but how to weaponised?

Cyber security- difficulty of finding answers of security of enemies- structural imperfections- to protect people’s privacy-

He stressed that sometimes, behind the door will work to implement change.

Cool term he said:

NYMTOF: Not in my term of office

Ann Tickner Comes to Wellesley

Ann Tickner came to Wellesley, specifically to our peace and justice class. She gave a talk and since it has so many provoking ideas, I dedicate this journal to her thoughts. 

This is me typing down fiercely so lack of coherence and structure is regretted. Reader apology is asked for the inconvenience.

Since Professor Tickner is primarily an International Relation thinker, she gave an overview of how IR became a course. International Relations is usually taught as a part of political science. It originally began as an interdisciplinary course; to understand why wars occurs and what scholars can do to prevent or end war. While the primary areas of study focused on wars and security, it has since evolved into a study of economics and human rights as well.

 Goldstein became interested in one characteristics of war. All societies have engaged in war, overwhelmingly fought by men but nobody has looked at the question of why is it only men who talks about war, why, despite having 1000 books of war, not one of them links war to masculinity.Not one of them has been curious enough to explore this relation. He reaches the conclusion that war is not due to men's inherent aggression and therefore decides to further analyze the association of war and masculinity.

States go to war for reasons. However, decision makers, who are charged with implementing military policy has been generally men. Why? A heroic citizen warrior has always been a celebrated image in Greek tradition, where manliness is associated with citizenship and warrior. It is still part of our society. For example, to die for one's country is patriotic. Until recently, this "duty" has been denied to women. Military service carries first class citizenship-politicans play up their military service career even if it is not so much relevant and the president of the US naturally becomes the commander of chief. It is interesting to note how Obama fits into the image of a commander of chief.

The discipline of IR has also been field largely populated by men- particularly in security studies, there has been very few women. It is true of peace research as well- a field mainly dominated by men.

Society has a way of defining Gender that illustrates the set of social structure of unequal power.  Masculinity and Men, Femininity and Women where social construction of characteristics-protector, rationality, power are associated with men. The opposite weaknesses are associated with women and femininity. If you are protecting, you are not being protected- opposite yet dependent.. Positive values are part of masculine characters. Individual men and women does not necessarily embody one or other set of characteristics- it is possible for women to display masculinity and men to be feminine- however, it is easier for women to wear pants than men to wear skirts- so this gendered view is not only against women but also against men who are feminine. 

Looking at IR and Security studies, in the beginning of 20th century, there were various school of thoughts within IR. One of them calls themselves REalists, with a capital R. a name chosen by themselves. Most of security studies has been conducted by realists- they discusses power politics- great powers in International systems- they believe that states have to be autonomous and look after themselves- anarchy does not mean that everything is in chaos- it means there is not sovereign body overstating to preside rules- great power ends up prescribing rules- it is almost like a soccer game without a referee- this creates a potential for a dangerous world. 

Realists have a lot of attributes which fits well with masculinity- States also behave in more cooperative ways, but the realists do not talk about that- it gives us a one sided picture of State behavior- Feminists argue that this has real world consequences- the way we study about war affects the way we behave. It is interesting to see that a lot of foreign policy makers has been professors of IR- Kissinger, Rice- they were all Realists- is Something going on there?

The term women is still not in congruent with National Security- women have little of interest- Hilary Clinton is the secretary of State- nuclear arms treaty discussions are led by women- still, national security carries very masculine connotations- argues Clinton has to display masculine character to get into this field.

IR and Gender Studies- Why has feminist theories have a hard time getting together- It is also true that people in women studies are not interested in IR- Because these were two different fields- feminist theories have different goals and draws from different traditions than IR- Realism draws primarily on Inter-state relations- talks of States as individual units in asocial environment- feminist is much more social- starts at the level of individual ( social economic individual)- IR talks more about States than individuals- primary focus of IR is to explain the behavior of states- Feminist is to understand women subordination in order to prescribe strategies to end it- Feminist movement comes out of political realities- IR don’t think improving the world should not be part of theory and focus on behavior of State- Feminist thinks these two are inter-related.

Feminist IR-1980s- feminist theories into the discipline of IR- Ford sponsored conference- well known scholars of IR and some from Feminists- mostly feminists who were trained in IR- Book came out edited by Spike Peterson- launched the field- Ford came back after 10 years- Conference under auspices of Ford- Wellesley is an important place- Keohane-it has grown into a series of

Feminists IR has been questioning concepts of IR- the way it defines it- questions about States and citizens- areas such as global economy, human development- now more feminists look at security- in a different way- they are not talking about wars between states- looking at war at a more micro-level, concerned with what goes on during wars, the impact of war on women and civilian generally- end of cold war, when feminism started- focus on religious and ethno-national conflicts- conflicts with small arms- involve killing of large no. of civilians- feminists have a lot to contribute- because it is about ethnic and religious identities- feminists are suited as they have been studying gender as an identity

Examples: Feminists talk a lot about rape in war- War Crimes Tribunal- Yugoslavia has been first to confess rape as a strategy of war- another issue is military prostitution- Moon called “ sex among allies”- South Koreans clean and making the prostitutes more attractive around US camp to persuade US military to stay at Korea- extraordinary.

What does these stories tell us about the role of the state, the protectors and protected- a lot of today’s world, women killed in huge numbers- whole sense of protectionism needs to be thought through- state as a security – provider- not all states necessarily offer security to its citizens

How does these themes fit into IR- interesting topics- they say it is not really IR-What is and is not IR- not the real business of national security- particularly with aggression and men- worry that feminism are raising good women and bad men. A problem in the discipline- most contemporary feminists reluctant to embrace the simplistic notion of women and peace, if gender is a social construction, this is not taken at face value

Association of women with peace in a passive sense- devalue women-devalue the way we talk about peace- quite often, peace is associated with passivity- unrealistic- so remember the IR Realists- against idealists who are more peaceful- a problem here- peace is non violent struggle for justice- how the passive idea of peace is associated with feminism- IR feminists have new ways of thinking about war and security- useful in conflicts today like ethno-national ways-

IR feminist use the word security differently- usually it is about military- feminists define it in economic and environmental issues- multidimensional- provide security for everyone- Goldstein- he concludes suggesting no men are more aggressive- cant separate biology and social relations- Goldstein- a father of boys- primarily socialization effects  of men and women that affects men’s participation in wars- not optimistic about changing them- it is hard to overcome- harder to overcome than biology-

Definition of Masculinity does change- feminists Cooper- Masculinity and State- different types of masculinity- less warrior like masculinity- linked to globalization- Bill Gates and its sweater- there are other models- in 1990s, emphasis on UN peacekeeping forces- use of military for peace- strikes a different image of what military do- gays in military- this is all tied up.

If we want to think about security in more positive ways- overcome the gender dichotomies- valorization of warrior masculinity-devaluation of conflict resolution- get to the point that comfortable thinking about these things- so that you can be valorized to be a peace maker than to be a warrior-