Dark underbelly of the world's most 'peaceful' countries

Some nations that rank well in the Global Peace Index are notorious for violence against women and children.

from the July 26, 2007 edition

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The current index rightly seeks to measure the "level of disrespect for human rights." But according to the report's methodology, this level was based on the "Political Terror Scale" – a scale that ignores the fact that the most ubiquitous human rights violations worldwide are, as a UNICEF report noted 10 years ago, violations of the rights of women and children.

That the index fails to include this violence is particularly shocking in light of the longstanding availability of international statistics such as:

• Twenty percent of women and 5 to 10 percent of men have suffered sexual abuse as children.

• Between 100 million and 132 million girls and women have been subjected to genital mutilation worldwide. Each year, an estimated 2 million join their ranks.

•Female infanticide, selective female malnutrition, and medical neglect of girls are far too common. In India's Punjab State, girls between the ages of 2 and 4 die at nearly twice the rate of boys.

Similarly, while the index rightly includes "level of violent crime," it fails to take into account that much of the violence in families is still not considered a crime in many nations – and hence not reported, much less prosecuted, as such.

It's unrealistic to expect "cultures of peace" so long as children grow up in families in which the use of violence to impose one's will on others is considered normal, even moral.

The good news is that not every one growing up in such families perpetuates violence. The bad news is that many people do – be it in intimate or international relations.

Intimate and international violence are inextricably interconnected. But we can only see this once we include in studies of violence the majority: women and children. If we are serious about peace – not just about measuring it but about creating more of it – we have to look at the whole picture. We must pay particular attention to those formative experiences when young people first learn either to respect human rights or to accept human rights violations as just the way things are.

Only as we leave behind traditions of domination and violence in the human family will we have solid foundations on which to build global peace.

Riane Eisler is the author of "The Chalice and the Blade" and "The Real Wealth of Nations." She is president of the Center for Partnership Studies and cofounder of the Spiritual Alliance to Stop Intimate Violence. Her website is www.rianeeisler.com.

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