Designing for Peace: Reflection on our Schumacher College short course

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There ended up being twenty of us. An international group: South Africa, Germany, Turkey, Brazil, Israel-Palestine, France; typical for Schumacher College. Many came from England, and India was present too, once Satish Kumar arrived. All places with histories of violent conflicts, many with unmet yearnings for peace. Jon Young and I represented North America, fermenting in me a familiar internal mix of pride and shame in my own heritage. I refer to the persistence of lineages of wisdom traditions in spite of systematic genocide. And the historic attempts to empower an enlightened society, encouraging everyone's best, replacing fear with hope. A 400-year-old dialogue, in recent years fanned into a raging debate, between humanity's baser and better natures.

Jon arrived on Thanksgiving, a national holiday in the US. Deborah and I had prepared a feast: wild rice pilaf with roasted chestnuts, dried cranberries, celery, and thyme; mashed potatoes; mashed swede; orange-glazed sweet potatoes; brussels sprouts from the garden; a giant roast chicken from the neighbour's organic farm; gravy; wine; cider; pumpkin pie with clotted cream. In North America we celebrate to remember the assistance the Wampanoag people of Massachusetts gave those first few 17th-century English pioneers, far from their temperate island climate warmed by Gulf Stream waters. In what they romantically called “New England,” they did not foresee the ferocious frigidity of a winter with an entire unyielding continent behind it. So many of them died. Come springtime, their new neighbours approached – with the compassion of moral human beings everywhere – and showed those left how to forage and survive. In summer, the newcomers learned to plant the three sisters – corn, beans, and squash – how to fish and hunt deer, how to preserve and cache food for the “hunger moon” they had learned to respect. And that autumn, they all feasted together on the shared harvest, especially the wild turkeys endemic to the region. My ancestors felt immensely grateful: for the precious gifts the dying bestow upon the living; for nature's bounty, revealed in its own terms. And for the kindness of their neighbours, who had doubtlessly saved them. From then on, we would forever honour the Wampanoag, and mark that first feast as a day to give thanks.

“How to begin? What if I make a mistake?”

It's a beautiful story, marred by the tragedy of ensuing events: one broken treaty after another; too many trails of tears. My ancestors' children repaid kindness with cruelty, so that today, if I seek reconciliation with any of the First Nations, I must first hear of my neighbours' pain, grief, and longsuffering thoughts of retribution. If I want to build bridges and mend fences, I must also clear a multigenerational tangle of wrongfootedness, resentment, anger, mistrust, and fear. How to begin? What if I make a mistake?

We gathered at the end of November 2017 to discuss a topic Deborah Benham and I had begun calling “Designing for Peace.” I had had some apprehension going in. Peace can be defined in many ways, so not even all the United Nations agree. I was uncertain how useful our four-day programme might be for the centuries-old strife of South Africa or the Middle East.

Not so my compatriot. He cheerfully carries a bundle from his friends, teachers, and indigenous elders, many now ancestors, whose voices come alive when he tells their stories. Through Jon, Kanien'kaha:ka elder Jake Swamp told us how the Five Nations of the Haudenosaunee found a pathway to peace after generations of war. How the central council is reserved for those in their “upright mind,” and how we must care for those who exhibit any of the 11 signs of grief. How the right hand, the 3 principles of peace, must join with the left hand, healing from grief, before nations can find peace. How we must communicate cleanly with each other to reinforce good habits, and to generate a sense of unity by matching our words and our deeds. And most importantly, that we are not the first to grapple with these questions: ancient social technologies can help us to lay the foundations for a peace that future generations will enjoy.

“...we are not the first to grapple with these questions”

To Jon's dauntingly complex vision of a future we all yearn to dream awake, Deborah added a bunch of practical next steps. Start small. Stay connected to nature. Stay sane. Do easy things first. Get support from your elders, anchors, mentors. Practice with your friends and family. Make agreements. Hold each other accountable. Invite others to join you, slowly. Keep doing your best. Have good intentions, and make mistakes. Learn from them. Ask forgiveness. Give thanks. Adjust, and try again. She calls this “failing forward,” and invites us to have compassion with ourselves. We may never live to experience the global peace we yearn for. And, if it's ever going to manifest, we need to start building it now.