By Robert Schlesinger
How to get past decades of deadly sectarian differences?
Happily we can look to Northern Ireland for lessons, as Bree Hocking (friend of the blog) notes in an op-ed in Eugene’s Register-Guard discussing her recent trip to the now-peaceful north:
While negotiators avoided dispensing easy prescriptions for hot spots such as Afghanistan and Iraq, they emphasized the need for the humanization of the other and the acknowledgement that true security can only be obtained through interdependence.
“If you get total respect for differences you can build a world with peace,” said former Social Democratic and Labour Party leader John Hume, a nationalist who in 1998 shared the Nobel Peace Prize with then-UUP head David Trimble.
Of course, it’s easier to practice tolerance when things are going well for you — there’s nothing like prosperity for cooling ancient hatreds.
The negotiators may not want to dispense easy prescriptions, but I will. Ask yourselves this, have Iraqis used the relative calm of the “surge” to humanize each other?
There is some wonderful work being done on this, thanks to Padraig O’Malley from UMass Boston. He brought the Irish to South Africa years ago– the Irish from north and south declined to fly on the same plane, nor did they sit in the same room, if I remember correctly! In fact, the So. Africans thought the Irish were harder cases than they themselves. But the humanization worked, for now the Irish are helping Iraqis. The second meeting went forward this past week.
O’Malley’s belief is that only people who have survived sectarian violence can help others get thru it. He deserves the Nobel ,if anyone does.
P.S. Nice work on The Daily Show!