Conflict Research avant la lettre
Political conflict grew in salience in the 19 th
Century as war became more important as a curse of human kind. Other traditional curses, such as famine and the plague, were yielding to the application of scientific rationality to our human and social environment, especially in
Western and Central Europe and the Atlantic seaboard of North America. The Agrarian
Revolution, the Industrial Revolution, the growth of capitalist enterprise and a Eurocentric globalisation, were all reflected in an alteration in mental attitude, so that change was welcomed and became virtually an ideology. This, in turn, led to major societal reform, mass production, globalisation and the establishment of the welfare state at home, as exemplified first by Bismarck’s Germany, which created an atmosphere of rationality and progress. The world was getting to be a better place! But war can, and did, threaten it all. In the 19 th
Century war became industrialised as exemplified by the American Civil War, the Franco-
Prussian War, and later the First World War. In addition, another revolution, besides the
Agrarian and Industrial, added fuel to the flames, in the shape of the French Revolution and
Napoleonic Wars, which became the precursor of the growth of nationalism throughout
Europe. There was global integration at one level through capitalism, and at another level, national separation as nationalism led to integrated but separated nation states.
War was on the agenda in a new way. A systemic war could threaten the Eurocentric global civilisation, and in the shape of the First World War, it did. But we must ask first how the
19 th Century handled the threat of war. Major Powers, beginning with the Quadruple
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Alliance
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in 1814 created a system of global governance in a 19 th
Century style, to deal with their rivalries and difficulties that arose as a result of clashing ambitions. This successfully obviated a system-wide war between 1815 and 1914, but it was unable to deal with a major systemic threat which was the non-viability of multinational empires due to the rise of nationalism. An example of this, the question of Serbia, was the trigger for the setting in march the events which led to the Great War.
At a second level, globalisation required the establishment of technically-based functional public unions, for post, telegraph, health, education, intellectual property and the like, The number of international institutions expanded from approximately five in 1815 to hundreds a century later, and it pointed to world-wide functional integration, arising from the increasing globalisation due to the spread of Eurocentric capitalism. But international organisations also gave States a role in that, while they facilitated the movement of good services, ideas and people, States could act as gatekeepers since they controlled the institutional framework.
In addition to the Concert system of the great Powers handling their rivalries, and the growth of functional public unions, there was also the development of the civilisation of war which took the shape, first of all, in the Hague Peace Conferences of 1899 and 1907, in which arms control and the normative rules of war were set out. In addition to this, there was the protection of civilians, which build upon the activities of the International Committee of the
Red Cross, and other activities through which civil society made an impact on international relations, such as the abolition of slavery, and later that of the slave trade. In short, the 19 th
1 Russia, Austria, Prussia and Britain agreed jn the Quadruple Alliance of 20 November 1814 to meet regularly for consultation on matters of common interest and “for the repose and prosperity of Nations and for the maintenance of the peace of Europe.” Quoted in F.S. Northedge: The League of Nations , Leicester, Leicester
University Press, 1988, p. 8.
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Century was revolutionary in the agrarian, industrial and national senses, and this revolution was taking place in a wide framework of the growth of globalisation and the attendant need for some form of global governance, which we can see through the Concert system, the spread of international organisation and a growing interest by the rising middle class in having a new world order.
The 18 th Century and the 19 th Century were the high points of the manipulation of the balance of power by Kings, Princes and the aristocracy, to further their own dynastic and class needs. The Industrial Revolution gave rise to a bourgeoisie whose political position was that of liberal internationalism. To that extent they proposed and then tried to impose a new world order in 1919. But it was not only the bourgeoisie which developed an interest in global affairs, there was also the establishment of a Marxist tradition, through which the working class of the world was uniting in its interests to bring about a global revolution. The upshot was that nationalism undermined the validity of multinational dynastic empires. A liberal internationalist world was created to thwart the new revolutionary ambitions of Soviet
Russia and provide a political framework for a new liberal international world order to protect capitalism and the quickening process of globalisation.
This gave rise to a literature of quality, dealing with the question of the causes of war and the conditions for a sustained peaceful world order. Many of these authors are presently being rediscovered and appreciated once again.
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Names such as Angel, Woolf, Bourgeois, Toynbee,
Noel-Baker, Zimmern, Mitrany and Webster are now current again, and we must not forget the massive political and intellectual influence of Woodrow Wilson. This literature was
2 Recent explorers of this literature include Lucian Ashworth, Michael Cox, Guillaume Devin, Jonathan Haslam,
Charles Jones, David Long, Brian Schmidt and Peter Wilson.
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common to the new field of International Relations as an academic discipline, which had been founded in 1919, and whether or not acknowledged as such, it was also common to the early conflict researchers. It was a literature that was both analytical and activist in that it was an intellectual contribution to the making of a better world.
The liberal internationalist world crumbled with the failure of collective security as it had been embodied by the League of Nations, and a new challenge arose to the notion of liberal democracy, nation-states, and a League of Nations based on a perceived harmony of interest, kept in line by a global public opinion. This new threat was social Darwinism, and fascism, which were the negation of the liberal democratic world order, and a challenge that could be met only on the battlefields of the Second World War. However, despite the calamitous nature of the rise of fascism and the horrors of the Second World War, there were two founding fathers in the area of conflict research, who were not dismayed, and indeed, their interest was quickened by the catastrophes which were befalling the international political system and the moral degradation of genocide.
Two Founding Fathers
Two founding fathers were writing either before, or during, the Second World War. Lewis
Fry Richardson was a meteorologist by profession and a Quaker by conviction. He put his scientific training and skill into the collection and writing of two volumes which were published postpostumustly in 1960, namely Statistics of Deadline Quarrels and A
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Mathematical Theory of War .
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At the time of their publication there was a fertile ground for such research in both Britain, and especially, the United States. This led to institution building in the UK, in the form of the Richardson Institute, and appealed to those in both countries of a scientific bent, who were increasingly concerned with war and conflict.
Nuclear physicists and mathematicians, especially, shared Richardson’s political concerns.
Hard science was coming to conflict research! In Britain Richardson was essentially isolated and, in fact, a path breaker before his time. Quincy Wright, on the other hand, was more in the American mainstream as a leading Professor of International Law at Chicago. His massive Study of War
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not only provided a path-breaking database, but it was interdisciplinary in nature, drawing on history, anthropology, demography and its publication in 1942, went further to inform the planning for peace. It is a magisterial work. Peace and conflict conflict research had gained two founding fathers, one British the other American, whose work still bears consideration in the 21 st
Century.
Setting-up Shop
The years immediately after the end of the Second World War were curiously quiet for the development of conflict research. Perhaps this was due to a number of factors, such as, the practical concerns of rebuilding Europe physically and morally after the degradation of destruction, occupation and genocide. Much effort was also being put into building a better world in the form of welfare states throughout the European peninsula, and by 1960 the
European economy had recovered from the worst effects of the Second World War. Moral
3 Lewis Fry Richardson: Statistics of Deadly Quarrels , Pacific Grove, CA, Boxwood Press, 1960. For A
Mathematical Theory of War see A Rapoport, Lewis F Richardson's mathematical theory of war, J. Conflict resolution 1 (1957), 249-299.
4 Quincy Wright: A Study of War , Chicago, University of Chicago Press, 1942.
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numbness at the catastrophe of war and genocide had lessened and the testing of the first Hbomb brought about a reaction, or a political awakening, as did the costs of colonial wars, whether it be in Indo-China, both for the French and the United States, Suez for the British and French, the British in Malaya, Kenya, Aden and Cyprus, the French in Algeria and the
Dutch in what was to become Indonesia. All of this suggested that there was an important question to consider, why did big States lose small wars?
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The general environment was one of fear. Fear of the Cold War, and fear of the nuclear consequences of that Cold War, such as was exemplified by the Cuban Missile Crisis. Such questions quickened an interest in conflict research in the 1950s and 1960s.
First was the question of nomenclature. Were we talking about peace research or conflict research, and did the two mean the same? In fact, over time a difference in emphasis began to develop. Peace research tended to be activist-oriented concerned with education, and had a reputation for being ‘left wing’, indeed fellow-travelling, such that peace became, in the minds of some, a dirty word. In order to get a clearer, less prejudiced, consideration of the issues that were being raised, the phrase conflict research proved to be less provocative to the mainstream. It also indicated a more academic status, rather than an activist status. The second issue was whether conflict should be studied under the rubric of strategic studies, or indeed, conflict research.
Strategic studies inherited the mantle of the realist school. Indeed, a strategist was the manipulator of threats and military hardware in the context of the balance of power in the
Cold War. The dominant writers in the field of international relations were for the most part
5 See Andrew Mack: ‘Why Big Nations Lose Small Wars’, World Politics , Vol. XXVII, No.2, 1975.
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realists who saw power politics as inevitable due to the security dilemma, the ambitions of great Powers, and indeed, the individual drive to dominate. Writers such as Morgenthau,
Schwarzenberger, Carr, Niebuhr, and others, provided the general framework for the strategists. The strategists themselves, varied between the enlightened explorations of the nuclear world of Brodie to the machinations of the Doomsday Machine by Kahn. There was also an important intellectual contribution by practitioners, such as Sir John Slessor, Sir
Anthony Buzzard, and in France, General André Beaufre.
The enormous power of the hydrogen bomb also pricked the conscience of an elite, both in the military and civilian life, many of whom, exhibiting Christian concerns, took the lead to set up what was later to become the International Institute for Strategic Studies in London in the late 1950s. This was followed in Sweden by the setting up of the Stockholm International
Peace Research Institute by the Swedish Government a decade or so later. Both institutions were concerned with disarmament, the arms race and arms control, but the IISS tended to be more from a Western, NATO, centre-right perspective and SIPRI from a non-aligned centreleft perspective. In the meantime, conflict researchers felt ill at ease in this realist-strategist framework, and pointed to the changed nature of the world in which cooperation could be possible, as for example, where Western Europe had been transformed from the cockpit of global war to being a zone of peace as European institutions built up and Franco-German reconciliation flourished. What were the academic developments in conflict research at this time? Much of what follows is historical hearsay and personal experience from someone who was in a junior position at that time, but had the good fortune to meet many of the academic leaders. It therefore represents a personal evaluation.
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People and Places
This section essentially concerns four principal centres where conflict research developed, namely, in Scandinavia, Germany, Britain and the United States. Two individuals played an important formative role, Johan Galtung and John Burton. We shall come back to Burton later in a tribute to a pioneer. Galtung, by any standards, is an impressive person. He made a major institutional contribution in struggling for the establishment of the First Chair of Peace
Studies at the University of Oslo. He organised many conferences and networks emanating from that Chair. His contribution peppers the academic literature and he can be credited with giving currency to the phrase ‘structural violence’. In addition to his intellectual leadership, he was important in establishing a major journal, The Journal of Peace Research . Elsewhere in Scandinavia, Copenhagen proved to have a fructuous intellectual climate for peace and conflict research, with an institute established under Anders Boserup who died at a very young age. Subsequently, the Copenhagen School was established with leading scholars, such as Barry Buzan, Ole Waever and Jaap de Wilde. Like its predecessor it is now defunct.
However, there are some lively scholars in Finland, especially gathered around the University of Tampere, where for a while there was a research institute called TAPRI. All of these
Scandinavian links formed an invisible college and a network to which others in the three centres mentioned, particularly in Germany, participated.
Coming out of a different framework was SIPRI seeking to celebrate 150 years of peace for
Sweden. This really grew out of the Pugwash movement, which in its turn was the result of the Russell-Einstein Manifesto of July 1955. In recognition of this long period of peace, the
Swedish Government put the money forward for SIPRI, which although based in Stockholm,
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is international in spirit and was concerned with the collection of information and the furthering of negotiations for disarmament and arms control. Pugwash itself, although its headquarters was in London, nevertheless, had a strong Scandinavian input. It was the place where scientists, social scientists and politicians from both sides of the Cold War could meet for off-the-record discussions primarily about nuclear issues, and coming out of the Pugwash movement, was not only SIPRI, but also IPRA, the International Peace Research Association.
John Burton proved to be a leading figure in the setting-up of this body, although it has to be admitted that with the passing years it has become somewhat chaotic in its organisation and also split between those on the one hand who are activists and dedicated to peace education, and those who are of a more academic bent. However, it has to be acknowledged that without the Scandinavians, and particularly Galtung, the fate of conflict research would have been different. He gave it an institutional setting, a journal, and important analyses and concepts.
In Germany the political environment was important. Germany was clearly in the front line of the Cold War and a prime candidate for devastation. It also had a past which was reflected in its present, which had strong anti-militarist tendencies and constitutional limitations on the role and the use of armed force. There were, in essence, three centres, one in Frankfurt, one in
Bonn and one in Berlin. In Frankfurt was the Hessen Peace and Conflict Research
Foundation, in which the leading lights were Ernst-Otto Czempiel and Dieter Senghaas.
There were also a number of scholars with a Marxist orientation. In Bonn was the German
Society for Peace and Conflict Research (DGFK), which was more concerned with the question of nuclear weapons and the Ostpolitik. The Hessen Peace Institute (HSFK) is still a lively place, whereas the DGFK has succumbed to cuts of a financial nature. In Berlin there was the Science Centre, for a while under the direction of Karl Deutsch, where several scholars from the United States also gathered who formed teams with German scholars which
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were clearly in the tradition of American social science, with its emphasis on collecting data and testing hypotheses. This was not, however, the major inclination in other peace and conflict research centres in Europe, with some individual exceptions, such as Michael
Nicholson in the UK. David Dunn in his survey of conflict research after 50 years describes the German situation as a “mix of American social science, Scandinavian Peace Research, general philosophy and Marxist scholarship, not to mention Critical Theory”.
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The overwhelming tone of the German conflict research community was left wing, anti-Cold War and with a Marxist tinge, and as such it produced some exciting work.
In Britain, the Richardson Institute at the University of Lancaster founded in 1962 was the beginning of the institutionalisation of conflict research in the UK. The Richardson Institute, which was influenced greatly in its early days by Paul Smoker, moved eventually to London under the directorship of Michael Nicholson and the Deputy Director was Andrew Mack. It proved a home for a number of visitors from the United States and elsewhere, such as Bruce
Russett, Cynthia Enloe and British scholars such as Adam Curle. The latter at that time was preparing his manuscript Making Peace
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and then went on to be the first Head of the
Department of Peace Studies at the University of Bradford. Bradford became a major centre of research and influence in the area of peace and conflict studies. It survived numerous broadsides in public and private from Mrs Thatcher, and has, over the years, had significant influence over British policy makers and the military, as well as the media. In some ways it acts as a counter to the more establishment IISS or military RUSI. However, before
Bradford, John Burton had secured funding to set up a Centre for the Analysis of Conflict
(CAC) which became fully active in 1967. A number of conflict researchers joined its
6 David J. Dunn: The First Fifty Years of Peace Research , Aldershot, Ashgate, 2005.
7 Adam Curle: Making Peace , London, Tavistock, 1971.
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network with Burton and John Groom, including, Chris Mitchell, Michael Banks, Michael
Nicholson, Frank Edmead, Denis Sandole, and others. The Centre grew out of meetings organised by Anthony de Reuck at the CIBA Foundation, in which two scientists from
University College London, Burton and others met to discuss the interaction between social scientists and physical scientists over the study of conflict. What resulted from this was not only the CAC, but also the Conflict Research Society. This society was meant to bring together scientists, social scientists and others who were interested in conflict, and it still exists, and holds regular conferences and seminars. At the same time the CIBA meetings led to the publication of a book entitled Conflict in Society
8 edited by de Reuck and Julie Knight.
It included many of the great and the good of conflict research on both sides of the Atlantic, such as Kenneth Boulding, Anatol Ratoport, Harold Lasswell, Johan Galtung, Herbert
Marcuse, Bernard Röling and Karl Deutsch, and its proceedings were translated into German by Dieter Senghaas.
Later an important intellectual contribution came from CAC, as it began to produce its work to develop the concept of world society as opposed to a state-centric billiard ball model of the world and to develop problem-solving workshops as an element of second track diplomacy in the context of a win-win relationship. These words are now very common and banded about, but when they emerged from the CAC framework in the late 1960s and early 1970s, they were intensely innovative. Burton, using his diplomatic experience brought together actors representing the parties to actual disputes. They joined together in an analytical framework, which for the academics who acted as facilitators was a form of laboratory, and for the actual parties to a dispute was part of a pre-negotiation. Among those who participated in the early exercises, besides Burton, Groom, Mitchell, Banks, Nicholson, Edmead and Sandole from the
8 A.V.S. de Reuck and Julie Knight (eds.): Conflict in Society , London, Churchill, 1966.
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CAC framework, were Chadwick Alger, Herbert Kelman, David Singer, Robert North and
Roger Fisher. The London group had considerable influence in the United States in such places as Harvard, but also in the International Studies Association which published a monograph of the London perspective of world society and conflict.
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There was already a considerable critical mass of students in the area of conflict research in the United States. In 1954 the Centre for the Advanced Study of Behavioral Sciences at
Stanford University had started work in the area, chiefly under the influence of Boulding and
Kelman. Later it was to move to Michigan, and established a journal, called The Journal of
Conflict Resolution . A great institutional development in this subject, which was spreading rapidly through departments in the major universities, was the setting up of the United States
Institute for Peace, and a major centre of research at George Mason University under the direction, for a while, of Chris Mitchell, originally from the London group. The USIP was government funded and meant to shine a different light on the problems faced, not only by the United States, but by the whole world community with the prospect of global war and new forms of conflict, which were becoming ever more evident. Its size, variety and the importance of the burgeoning area of conflict studies in the United States was impressive.
This is not to say there was not dross too, as there was elsewhere, but a range of participants from mathematicians to scientists, to social scientists, to the general public, psychologists and others easily overwhelmed European efforts, at least in size, if not necessarily in quality. In any case, it did not matter, since the normative framework between Europe and America was a shared one, at least insofar as conflict research was concerned. Increasingly the range of
9 J.W. Burton, A.J.R. Groom, C.R. Mitchell, A.V.S. de Reuck,: A Study in World Society: A London
Perspective , International Studies Association, Occasional Paper No. 1, 1974.
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university degrees, summer schools, centres and the like formed an impressive network, which helped to put ideas, which at that time, were novel, into the mainstream.
Apart from the four principal centres there were a number of other groupings which made a significant contribution, and sometimes it was surprising that there was not such a contribution. A case in point is France, where apart from Gaston Bouthoul, there was little by way of conflict research. There was, however, a very healthy and questioning number of scholars and practitioners looking at deterrence theory, revolutionary war, and counter insurgency.
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The latter became items which were to feature later in the repertoire of conflict researchers. A stronger case was in Japan where there were a number of researchers working on peace studies, sometimes with a left wing political orientation or being grounded in pre-
Second World links with German philosophers. There was also a penchant for mathematical analysis. However, the works of Japanese scholars did not circulate far beyond Japan itself, because of the language problem. Of a different order was the early influence of the Institute of Polemology in Groningen, under the direction of an international lawyer, Professor
Bernard Röling. For a while the Groningen group were the leaders of the pack, but they gradually fell behind, although they have recently been resuscitated. In South Africa there was much innovative practice, and one of the leaders was HW van der Merwe. Van der
Merwe led the Centre for Intergroup Studies of the University of Cape Town, and because of his personal connections, was able to play a major role in bringing together the Broderbund and the ANC. The work of the Centre for Intergroup Studies is perhaps an example of where conflict researchers have been able to make a major difference. Apart from van der Merwe there were other groups in South Africa. It was a hive of mediation, facilitation and second track diplomacy among the major actors. Finally in the Soviet Union there was a group of
10 For example, the work of André Beaufre, Pierre Gallois, Régis Debray, Frantz Fanon and David Galula.
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systems theorists who interested themselves in conflict analysis, led by Professor Gantman of
IMEMO. Burton’s London group had numerous contacts with these specialists and a series of seminars which were education for both parties!
One person who linked much of this endeavour through IPRA and through his own centre in
London was John Burton, and it is to Burton that we now turn as an example of a pioneering conflict researcher. Along with Galtung he was, perhaps, the leading European conflict researcher, and had an impressive influence in the United States.
As a practitioner and academic, Burton had a career in two parts, which took place in three countries, Australia, the UK and the USA. He was born in Melbourne on the 2 nd
March 1915 and died in Canberra on 23 rd June 2010, at the age of 95. His family came from Yorkshire and his father was a Methodist clergyman, who was very active in the South Pacific Islands.
Burton’s father was to become Head of the Methodist Church in Australia.
Burton’s education was firstly at the University of Sydney, where he received a BA in
Psychology, then a PhD from the University of London in 1942 in Economics, where his supervisor was Lionel Robbins. He also received a DSc from London in 1970 for his contribution to the study of international relations and conflict studies. On completing his
PhD he returned to Australia and entered the public service, first of all in the Commerce
Department, then working on post-war reconstruction. He joined the External Affairs
Ministry in 1943 and became its permanent head from 1947 to 1951. The tandem of the
Minister ‘Doc’ Evatt and Burton was a familiar one on the international scene, and well
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known for its outspokenness and radical ideas. Burton attended many of the conferences dealing with post-war reconstruction, such as FAO in 1943, the ILO in 1944, the UN Charter negotiations in 1945, the Paris Peace Conferences, 1946, the Commonwealth Prime Ministers
Conferences, 1945-1948, the Delhi Conference on Indonesia, 1949, the Philippine
Conference on Asia Relations in 1950 and Bandung Conference in 1955. As we have noted,
Burton and Evatt in tandem were controversial figures. Burton, in particular, saw Australia as an independent Power, and in many ways he was responsible for inventing an independent
Australian foreign policy. Burton was critical of British and US Cold War politics, and certainly not willing to take the lead offered by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office.
Rather, he favoured the non-aligned movement which was emerging in Indonesia, India,
Yugoslavia, Ghana and Egypt. However, some of the controversies about Burton have refused to die down as exemplified by a recent series of articles on Burton in The Australian by Des Bull stating that he was a communist fighting to protect certain ‘spies’ in his
Department. To be sure, Burton had controversial views about the origins of the Korean War and he was willing to go to Beijing to talk to the Chinese about prisoners and other such issues, but after 45 years of working with him, I have seen no indication, whatsoever, that the charges of Des Bull are of any substance. Indeed, it is a cowardly attack on someone who is now no longer able to respond, and every inquiry into Burton’s work as an official, led to him being fully exonerated at the end.
As the Cold War grew worse, following the outbreak of the Korean War and the involvement of the United States and China, in that conflict, Burton resigned from his position in the
Public Service, and ran for election in Australia, and failed to be elected. It was a time of
McCarthy-ism, in Australia as in the United States, and he fell foul of it. He therefore had a career switch. He had always been a farmer, and he began to continue that activity, bought
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and managed a bookshop in Canberra. He built furniture, made terrible homemade wine, and he began to take part in the academic world and held several research positions funded by foundations. This led to two books, the first was The Alternative ,
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published in 1954, rethinking Australian relations with Asia, and the second was a more academic, rather than policy oriented book, entitled Peace Theory ,
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and published in 1962. At this point he was looking for a stage, and the second part of his career developed in the UK as an academic, where he ended up at University College London, appointed by Georg Schwarzenberger in
1960.
At UCL Burton set up international relations degrees with a strong content in the area of conflict studies. In his first early phase he challenged the realist framework in a number of books, such as International Relations: a General Theory , 1966, Systems, States, Diplomacy and Rules , 1968, and World Society , 1972,
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most of which were translated into a variety of languages. In these books, he developed the notion of a cobweb model, as opposed to a billiard ball model. He stressed the importance of systems thinking, and like Deutsch in the
United States, saw the crucial factor of moving from power towards steering in response to negative feedback. He became a world-recognised academic and was elected Vice President of the (North American) International Studies Association. In the meantime, he had founded
IPRA and organised the Conflict Research Society in Britain, as well as attending various conferences. With his colleagues in London he made a major presentation to a ISA
11 John W. Burton: The Alternative: A dynamic approach to relations with Asia , Sydney, Morgans, 1954.
12 John W. Burton: Peace Theory, New York, Knopf, 1962.
13 John W. Burton: International Relations , London, Cambridge University Press, 1965; Systems, States,
Diplomacy and Rules , Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1968; World Society , Cambridge, Cambridge
University Press, 1972.
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Conference, which was published as a monograph called A Study in World Society: a London
Perspective .
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Burton was also an inspirational teacher, but technically, not a good one.
The next phase was a reaction to his work, particularly from state-centric power oriented academics, who challenged Burton and his ‘behaviouralism’. Burton was one of the targets of a widely read article by Hedley Bull which appeared in World Politics in October 1966.
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Burton was challenged to explain the Cuban Missile Crisis with his ‘behavioural’ approaches.
Burton’s argument was he could not do this because he was not sure that what was left in the archives was other than an incomplete self-serving documentation. After all, he had himself contributed to the archives and knew what sort of material was there. His argument was that the need was to bring the parties to a conflict together for a controlled communication, which was the beginning of second track diplomacy.
He suggested a case study of the ‘confrontation’ between Malaysia, Singapore and Indonesia then raging. The leaders of those three countries were invited to send informed, highly placed, trusted, individuals to state their views and perceptions as private individuals in a supportive framework with academic facilitators. This was at a time of violent conflict, with the British, for example, having fifty thousand troops in the region, attempting to damp down on the confrontation. The academic team who were facilitating included, Kelman, Singer,
North and Alger besides members of the London group. The aim of the exercise, was first of all, to control the communication, test for stereotypes, explore the difference between action policy and declaratory policy and the like, and the final goal was a self-sustaining resolution
14 John W. Burton et al . : op. cit.
15 Hedley Bull: ‘The case for a Classical Approach’, World Politics , Volume 18, Issue 03, April 1966, pp. 361-
377.
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of the conflict without any coercion, in which all the values and interests of the parties would be on the table together with a full range of information. It would be a contrast to an imposed settlement by either the victor, the United States, given the area, or the UN. It would go beyond merely a truce. Following the successful first exercise Burton set up a Centre for the
Analysis of Conflict and many other such exercises took place and ideas of conflict research were put to the test and not found wanting. Win-win became the order of the day. Burton wrote about his experiences in Conflict and Communication , 1969, Conflict Resolution:
Theory and Practice with Azar, 1986, Resolving Deep Rooted Conflict , 1987, and a series of four books on conflict published in 1990 edited with Frank Dukes.
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If the first stage of Burton’s career was concerned with criticising the dominant power politics framework and the second phase with that of seeking to develop second track diplomacy, the third phase was equally controversial. Burton became greatly influenced by
Abraham Maslow and his human needs theories, in which he argued that individuals would pursue such human needs come what may. Thus, for peace to occur institutions had to bend to the needs of individuals, rather than the other way round. Such human needs, therefore, constituted navigation points for governments at all levels. Individuals, not states and the like were the basic unit of analysis. Burton’s writing at this time included Deviance, Terrorism and War , 1979, Dear Survivors , 1982 and Violence Explained , 1997.
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By now, Burton had moved from UCL to Kent with Groom, and then, after reaching the compulsory retirement age, he continued to work mainly in the United States, where he was an important figure in
16 John W. Burton: Conflict and Communication , London, Macmillan, 1969; (with E. Azar, eds.: Conflict
Resolution: Theory and Practice , Brighton, Wheatsheaf, 1968; Resolving Deep Rooted Conflict , Lanham
London, University Press of America, 1987; Conflict resolution and Provention, Conflict: Human Needs
Theory (ed.), Conflict: Readings in Management an Resolution (edited with Frank Dukes), Conflict: Practices in Management, Settlement and Resolution (edited with Frank Dukes), all published in New York, St Martin’s
Press, 1990.
17 John W. Burton: Deviance, Terrorism and War , Oxford, Martin Robertson, 1979; Dear Survivors , London,
Pinter, 1982; Violence Explained , Manchester, Manchester University Press, 1997.
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setting up the United States Institute for Peace and the major conflict group at George Mason
University, as well as at the University of Maryland. He retired in 1990.
Burton was a man of great conceptual power, wide practical experience and skill, and an institution builder. He left the world in many ways, a better , and certainly a better informed, place. Many of his controversial ideas are now mainstream. In short, he was something of a renaissance man – an intellectual, activist, farmer, diplomat and furniture builder, as well as an atrocious home-made wine maker. Some found him difficult, especially those in authority, but he could charm the hind legs off a donkey. He was a sociable man who liked his grog, as he would call it, and an evening at the Burtons was always well lubricated with good conversation and good tucker. He was a supportive friend and a mentor. His Friday soirée in
Canberra continued with friends and family until he died at the age of 95. He never stopped thinking or caring.
Perhaps a flavour of the man can be found in a message that he was asked to send as cofounder of IPRA to the 2010 IPRA Conference in Sydney. He wrote it a few days before he died,
“We now require to draw attention to the conflicts and problems humanity faces and means by which they can be resolved. For example, in Australia the Federal government is changing the education system and making four subjects – history, science, English and mathematics – its basis, but with no mention at all of the main subject which now faces humanity: relationships. We need to be teaching relationships at every level of society, so as to help family relations and
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relationships at schools, at the workplace, in governments, and so on. The former area of interest of IPRA would not be neglected because of the close relationship between harmony in societies and what happens between identities at national and international levels. The human need for identity, and transformation in identities as a basis for conflict resolution, applies at all levels of society, from the bedroom to the boardroom and the international negotiating table. How we communicate and relate with each other is fundamental to producing harmonious and hence peaceful societies.”
Looking backwards and forwards
The Editors invited me to look backwards by acting as a voice from the standpoint of the past regarding a forward-looking agenda that they have specified. The first point to make is that the forward-looking agenda does not reflect the old terminology so that we are using a different language and conceptual framework which makes communication difficult. Perhaps it is just a case of no longer being up-to-date, as is the lot of many ‘senior’ scholars, or is it merely the reinvention of the wheel? But some changes are striking.
In the old days there was a greater emphasis on disempowerment of the strong rather than empowerment of the weak (except where that empowerment was technical and not political, such as the provision of reliable means of communication). Now there seems to be a tendency to want to empower the weak so that they are better able to fight the good fight. In other words, it reinforces the win-lose framework rather than dispenses with it. In the old
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days the mantra (at least in the Burton approach and in the philosophy of non-alignment) was to put the emphasis on the problem, not the parties. The problem was a joint one since if A had a problem then B might have a problem with A as a consequence. So the emphasis for B was to help A to resolve its problem whether it be security, identity, participation or whatever, by removing its fears and helping it to realise its hopes. Then A might not be a problem for B – and vice-versa. We emphasised a mutual process of problem-solving supportive of all, not empowerment of the weak in a framework of power politics.
In this sense the goal has changed. Resolution was achieved when all parties were satisfied according to their own values and interests with full knowledge of the problem and without coercion either manifest or structural. The new relationship, either close or distant, was selfsustaining. It was based on the notion that we all need to have a sense of security, identity, participation, development and like basic needs, and that such needs are not necessarily in short supply. They might be seen as such but one man’s security need not necessarily be at the expense of another’s. We can all have an ample sufficiency of them and the role of the conflict researcher is to aid the process whereby they can be achieved. Needs are not in short supply, although wants may be. We all need calorific intake but we do not all need a particular steak. Nowadays the goal seems to be a more limited conflict management and transformation or is the difference merely a question of semantics?
The literature a century ago concerned imperialism, race and internationalism. The former was the domain of power politics and the latter that of liberal internationalism while, in many ways, race was ignored. This dichotomy came to an abrupt end with the growth of realism during the Second World War and the Cold War. Liberal internationalist thought was
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hijacked by the two ‘wars’ but it has now returned in many guises as we broach the phenomena of ethnicity and particularly its manifestation in ‘failed’ or ‘failing’ states. The response of the new imperialism of liberal internationalism such as peace keeping, peace building and peace enforcement conducted through international organisations is old fashioned and has failed in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya, and now it is likely to fail in Mali.
To overturn regimes is relatively simple but what happens next? When did the United States last win such a war in the long run? Grenada? As I write, the French press carries pictures of
President Hollande in Timbuktu but he searches in vain for a viable exit strategy.
We spent much time 50 years ago discussing structural violence with its implication that the only solution was revolution, not reform or evolution. If conflict was incompatible interests built into structures, the only way to peace was to destroy those structures, or so the argument went. Moreover, even if some structural differentiation could be properly legitimised was this merely the creation of ‘happy slaves’? Such concerns no longer seem to loom so large or is it simply a different form as the liberal peace is challenged by a new generation of ‘Young
Turks’ such as the Editors of this journal?
But the present generation is less conscious of ‘the Other’ than my generation and the earlier liberal internationalists. However, they are less well informed chiefly by linguistic weaknesses even in European languages as well as the career structure that compels them to play according to the rules of Anglo-American academic life. Now, there is a structural violence ripe for demolition. It is encouraging that a courageous few are versing themselves in ‘difficult’ languages and willing, like the imperial scholars of old, to immerse themselves in different cultures.
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Imperialists almost invariably thought in terms of the big picture. Fifty years ago there was no picture bigger than the threat of nuclear war. Now we live in a world of big pictures in many domains but contemporary conflict research does not seem to do justice to such global problems. It concerns itself more with the trees than the wood. A global problem is one from which there is no escape. Everyone is necessarily involved. Whatever the tactics followed to divert, deflect or delay, ultimately it must be broached or the consequences paid for the failure to do so. Nuclear war, the environment, globalisation of the economy, demands for basic human needs, human rights and human security, for self-actualisation, participation, identity and parity of esteem are all part of this problématique. Yet unless we hang together in broaching such issues we shall surely hang separately. Global problems as such do not appear to be at the heart of the current concerns of conflict researchers. They should be, otherwise we shall hang separately.
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A final point to remember is that conflict is the occasion and possibility for fundamental and deep learning. An individual or a society without conflict is dead. Without conflict we cannot learn. It tells us about our environment and our role within it. But we must ensure that the price is not unacceptable in terms of destruction of human life, human relationships and material assets.
AJR Groom, Canterbury, February 2013
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