Thread by @JohanGaltung

A strange climate, when social scientists & authors of all backgrounds, who rightfully detest war, must fear for their reputation & standing for speaking critically against the profiteers of war & for speaking constructively about avenues to the #peaceSjg: negative & positive.

It is one thing to hate war & it is another thing altogether to love & want peace [be it #negativepeacejg (mutually accepted ceasefire, cessation of hostilities & anger management) or #positivepeacejg (cooperative project to reinstate mutually beneficial resource allocation)].

Ideally, both of the #peacesjg are pursued simultaneously. In concrete proposals & empirical strategies via dialogical needs-assessment on the ground & in the field. No theoretical blabla. But imagine proposing a cooperative project between the "West" & Russia in THIS climate.

And yet, in the end; there will be no other way than dialogue, negotiation, conciliation & cooperation. Those of us who already know how this scenario ends, - barring nuclear escalation in a #negativeprognosis this conflict dynamic too will simmer down as described - are forced

to sit in dismay & watch thousands of soldiers & civilians get slaughtered, because of the proliferation of meta-conflicts accumulating on top of the original underlying unresolved issues. We watch this tit for tat vicious cycle of #ViolenceSjg (cultural + direct + structural)

in a climate of media induced pre- & hyperpolarization. Many journalists, perhaps through no fault of theirs, clearly lack #peacejournalism essentials & inflate vindicative-confrontational narratives of justified indignantion. Instead; simply identify the underlying conflicts &

(nobody ever said that simple tasks aren't difficult) strive, issue by issue, to arrive at violence-averse & #traumaconciliation sensitive solutions. Simply put: What are the underlying unresolved territorial, ethnic, economic, cultural & political conflicts? Too much focus on

military responses contributes to too little focus on ethno-territorial, economic, cultural & political responses. Information conditions us into opinion formations. The information brokers must incorporate more of these types of constructive, mending, healing responses. Now.