 October 2003
American Friends Service Committee Peacework Magazine Patrica Watson, Editor Sara Burke, Assistant Editor Pat Farren, Founding Editor 2161 Massachusetts Ave. Telephone number: Fax number:
pwork@igc.org Peacework has been published monthly since 1972, intended to serve as a source of dependable information to those who strive for peace and justice and are committed to furthering the nonviolent social change necessary to achieve them. Rooted in Quaker values and informed by AFSC experience and initiatives, Peacework offers a forum for organizers, fostering coalition-building and teaching the methods and strategies that work in the global and local community. Peacework seeks to serve as an incubator for social transformation, introducing a younger generation to a deeper analysis of problems and issues, reminding and re-inspiring long-term activists, encouraging the generations to listen to each other, and creating space for the voices of the disenfranchised. Views expressed are those of the authors, not necessarily of the AFSC. |
From the editor's desk "When President Bush informed the nation last Sunday night that remaining in Iraq next year will cost another $87 billion, many of those who will actually pay that bill were unable to watch. They had already been put to bed by their parents." NYT, 9/14/03 Realization of responsibility, acknowledgement that acts, and failures to act, have enduring consequences--the seventh generation factor--should be always present of course, always in the foreground of our moral arguments and decision-making. Civilizations get judged by this standard. It claims its place with particular urgency these days, at home and abroad, and troubles our sleep. Under the weight of this responsibility, thousands traveled to Cancún for the latest round of world trade deliberations, many at considerable hardship and expense. Inside the paneled conference rooms and in the streets, the representatives of poor countries and their allies stood firm, unwilling to barter their children's futures. It was by all accounts an exceptional performance, combining radical economic analysis with principled nonviolence. We offer you snapshots. Globally there are plenty of candidates for more such sustained outrage and action; George Bush's deceptive Millennium Challenge Account is one such; the United States' use of Private Military Corporations to do in secret what we would never countenance in public is another. And then there're the wars--the one we're losing, the one we've already lost--carrying that $87 billion price tag. "I for one will not simply rubber-stamp this request," thundered the indefatigable Robert Byrd (D-WV). "Congress is not an ATM." Thinking about better ways to spend that money may be a useful exercise to organize our thoughts about the upcoming presidential election, and the second half of this October Peacework begins an overview. A thoughtful citizenry can list the issues and press the contenders on them, helping to mold a campaign agenda to topple this dangerous Administration of would-be emperors. There's our crumbling infrastructure; there's health care--nation-wide and for all ages in disarray. There are the nation's schools, in real and present danger of being left at the starting gate. There's the growing reality that many of us, working hard, can't earn enough to stay above poverty. Beyond price tags, there are our civil liberties, also crumbling under the current Administration. And there's our nest, this green and lovely planet, which we are fouling at a quickening pace. We are living in a world at gravest risk, as David Orr points out in his extraordinary essay "Walking North on a Southbound Train." We offer you a reminder of historical irony with Arnold Oliver's account of a regime change that happened 50 years ago in Iran. How does the saying go? "Those who do not remember..." Such a history is surely being written today in Palestine. We like to try in each issue of Peacework to offer a gift--something beyond political analysis, at times something light-hearted or lyrical, at times even foolish. Well, there's not much funny for you this month, but W.S. Merwin's poem, in its shocking totality, is a gift of sorts. The testimony of the four young women at their civil disobedience trial is an inspiration. And the passage from Maxine Hong Kingston's The Fifth Book of Peace is a gift indeed. If you're nearby, join us when she gives a benefit reading for Peacework October 15. That Pat Farren Lecture on the 15th honors Peacework's founding editor. Pat was our mentor and we've been thinking about him a lot as we worked on this October issue, our last time sitting in the editor's chair. Peacework was Pat's grand idea, and one of the major passions of his life. He intended to do nothing less than change a world that badly needs changing, and he believed that engaged journalism was a powerful tool in the activist's toolkit. It has been an honor and a terrifying responsibility to work in Pat's tradition and to try to take it to a next level. Sam Diener, who takes over as Peacework's third editor next month, is an activist and teacher, as was Pat. He inherits a terrific job, a quixotic but durable tradition, and a great set of readers. Welcome him.
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