Prof Johan Galtung

a professor of peace studies, dr hc mult, is founder of the TRANSCEND Network for Peace, Development and Environment and rector of the TRANSCEND Peace University-TPU. Prof. Galtung has published 1670 articles and book chapters, over 450 Editorials for TRANSCEND Media Service, and 167 books on peace and related issues, of which 41 have been translated into 35 languages, for a total of 135 book translations, including ‘50 Years-100 Peace and Conflict Perspectives,’ published by the TRANSCEND University Press-TUP.

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Winter Conference, The Inland University, Rena, Norway, 16 Feb 2017

Take current deep conflicts in our unstable world and go back in time, aided by dialogue with the parties about “when did it go wrong”.  Chances are a year will emerge.  There was a basic event, or process, polarizing something that used to be more cohesive. A faultline had emerged that can last for centuries, more or less polarized, up till today, and beyond, if there is no intervention.

The faultlines function like tectonic plates.  Nothing may happen for long periods. Then they shock against each other, with earthquakes geo-physically; Norway-, Euro-, World-quakes socially.

The tern “karma year” is used. Not destiny-Schicksal-skjebne; too deterministic. Karma is destiny that can be changed through awareness.

The reader will find on the next page a Table with seven “current conflicts” and their Karma year(s) as hypotheses.  And analysis, forecasting, solutions, here called diagnosis, prognosis, therapy.  That table, or matrix, is a two-dimensional discourse for karma years.  The table can be read in several ways.

Horizontally it reads like the   TRANSCEND approach to conflicts: get a hold on the basic incompatibility, make a prognosis of what will happen without intervention; if unacceptable, intervene with therapy.

Vertically the first column is a study of karma years, the second of (alarming) forecasting, the third column a repertory of solutions. Our focus being on the karma years we shall read vertically.

The first impression is that the years are by and large unknown. And yet they set the tone, or throw the shadows, for centuries.  How can we allow ourselves the arrogance of such ignorance?

Take Libya.  How many in Italy were aware of the horrendous 1911 crime of bombing oases, the open spaces for women-young-old-infirm? Given the general rule that perpetrators forget easily, victims never?

A Discourse for Karma Years and Current Conflicts

The key karma years are bold faced.

For the Islamic State, there are Western escalations to killing 100,000 in Afghanistan from 2001 and one million in Iraq from 2003.

For Israel, there is none as it is unclear exactly when Yahweh approached Abraham; hence a verse in the Tora’h-Old Testament-Qur’an.

Understanding karma years is not sufficient, but necessary; being the key to prognosis and therapy.  Something created faultlines with much direct and structural violence. Undo them, and solutions may be possible. Ignore them, and whatever you do will be unsuccessful.

Take Libya.  Berlusconi apologized, and there has been no Islamic State terrorism in Italy, or from Libya, only massive migration.

Take Afghanistan. There is no claim that all fighting is due to dividing the Pashtun nation, but it is a key factor. Undo it, open the border, and more borders, for a wealthy Central Asian Community.  Or build a border wall (the USA right now) and worsen the conflict.

Take Iraq-Syria, two of the four colonies from the Sykes-Picot treason; a lesson in what a Western promise is worth. The Ottomans brutally conquered the area in 1516, but ruled peacefully for four centuries. Generate something similar, province-based federations.

Take the Islamic State and acknowledge that it was generated by escalating Western–“US-led coalition”–warfare.  Kill them, and get more effect from that same cause over time.  Instead, use Western military defensively to protect exposed sites, try to understand their Mecca-Medina spiritual mission against the Saudi kingdom, negotiate.

Take Ukraine with a karma year 1,600 years back. Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill declared their Christianities one and the same, with regional conflicts to solve–like the 1812 and 1941 karma years when Russia was invaded by Napoleon and Stalin–and go for Swiss solutions.

Take Israel-Palestine, and invite Jews to live all over in that land (as they did, being people of “The Book”), but not as a big state for Jews only.  Go for a modest Israeli state–like in 1-2-6-20.

Take the USA, that now may take care of themselves; soldiers and politicians denounce foreign wars and focus inward, “buying American-hiring American”. Trump is ambiguous, but may not last even 100 days.

Undo the karma years.  Or ignore them, at considerable risk.

First published at :TMS: The “Karma Year” and Current Conflicts