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SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
Peace and Sustainable Development
The idea of peace is seldom addressed when talking about sustainable development. Throughout the Earth Summit demilitarization and peace issues were strongly brought up by youth, women's groups and Indigenous People, yet Agenda 21 is a document void of any mention of the role of militarism in environmental degradation. The results of 12 years of war have left El Salvador, a country once rich in diversity and with fertile soil, as the most ecologically devastated country in Latin America. We have yet to find out the environmental impact of the Gulf War in 1991. Young people see peace as an essential pre-requisite to environmental sustainability and development.
Peace is more than the absence of war. Peace is people in harmony with themselves and with nature. Peace means respect for the land, other species and people. Everyday a war is waged against the forests in Canada and Brazil, through forestry practices which allow clear cutting and burning. A war is waged against species whose habitat and lives are not respected as humans exploit the environment, through the building of dams and highways, and through industrial pollution. We continue to wage wars among people, and violence against women is increasing in some parts of the world.
The World Youth Statement for UNCED states that: "Peace means tolerance..., the satisfaction of basic needs and human rights, and it also includes responsibility to all generations. There can be no peace where there is injustice, exploitation, over-consumption and hegemony; nor without freedom of expression, thought, religion, information and association". When we begin to see peace in this way, we will begin putting together the building blocks for sustainable development. There can not be one without the other.