The Cultural Dimensions of Peacebuilding
By Marty Branagan
Anthem Press, 2024
274pp
Author Marty Branagan examines how our language, film, history, museums, parks, journalism, education, families, parenting styles, gender issues, the arts and religion “can contribute either to cultural violence or to cultures of peace” in his 2024 book, The Cultural Dimensions of Peacebuilding.
“Delving into these diverse areas means that the analysis is multidisciplinary while being centred in Peace Studies theory," writes Branagan, who is Associate Professor in Peace Studies at the University of New England, and a longtime artist and activist.
Branagan was recently a key organiser of an international conference in Parramatta, Sydney, featuring peace organisations, scholars, lawyers, doctors, unionists and students. The conference called for a fore fronting of peace and justice, and a recognition of the connections between the two.
“You can’t have sustainable peace without addressing issues of justice,” Branagan said at the event. “At the same time, societies that aspire to be just, egalitarian and democratic require a commitment to peace, non-violence and the dismantling of militarism.”
The conference highlighted the growing opposition to the AUKUS military alliance and criticised Australia’s failure to sign the 2017 United Nations Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons. A rally held during the conference exposed the Commonwealth Bank’s funding of nuclear weapons.
In his book, Branagan writes that culture can be “a powerful promoter of consumerism, militarism, nationalism, totalitarianism or other ideologies”.
“Art-forms such as racist literature or music can contribute to cultural violence, wherein they inspire direct violence, or they can be psychologically violent.
"Is it possible to transform these cultures and make them more peaceful?" he asks.
The book’s chapters — from “Screen Violence and Peace” to “Peace Journalism and Writing”, “Peace Education”; “Gender, Sexuality and Peace”; “Artistic Activism”; and “Peace Within” — reflect some of the themes Branagan pursues in seeking to answer this question.
Branagan notes that the overarching military industrial complex that promotes war today “has been expanded to include media, entertainment, finance and academia”, including terms such as the “military-entertainment complex”.
“Militarism and war are big business, worth trillions of dollars, and this complex has a vested interest in ensuring … that ‘defence’ spending and its enormous profits are maintained,” Branagan writes. It achieves this through “phenomenal lobbying power and ‘revolving door’ connections with governmental elites”.
Branagan quotes peace scholar and director of the Tokyo-based Toda Peace Institute, Kevin P Clements on Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza and the West Bank, where violence is only part of the conflict: “The second battle is for control of the narrative.”
Branagan's book tackles not only war and military violence directly, but links these to cultural aspects of society, such as violence in language, films, TV and the mass media, museums and memorials glorifying war, jingoistic journalism, and education systems promoting violent behaviour. Added to this is the role of divisive parenting practices, gender divisions, and other social and religious conflicts in creating the conditions for violence and war.
But all is not lost. "Peace in our time" is really possible on a wide scale. For a start, we can draw important lessons from the, on balance, more peaceful societies which exist now, or in the past — especially examples of First Nations and tribal societies here, in Latin America and elsewhere.
Branagan provides many examples of anti-war and peacemaking actions, including the remarkable “Christmas Truce” between Allied and German troops, led from below, during World War I. The mass movements that rose up to oppose the US war on Vietnam, and the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, represent other key periods of popular peacemaking.
The campaign for a Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, and other international peace agreements, are important milestones in the promotion of a more peaceful world. So are the establishment of “peace parks” and museums, such as the Hiroshima Peace Museum.
Anti-war journalism is also crucial in a world of corporate-controlled mainstream media, often with interests in promoting war and civil strife.
Pro-peace fiction, poetry and other cultural creations have an important role to play and “peace education” provides a vital antidote to the war-glorifying and pro-violence education system in many cases. In that regard, the integration of universities into the military industrial complex is a serious, and inreasing, problem.
Branagan also emphasises the key role of patriarchal and gender-based oppression in contributing to violence and war. He stresses the importance of feminism in combatting a repressive and war-like social order — noting the importance of women’s anti-war movements, such as the 1981–2000 Greenham Common anti-nuclear missile “peace camp” in Britain.
“Major social change requires cultural change and nonviolent action, supported by high-level political and economic reform,” Branagan concludes. Perhaps he needed to add that “major social change” requires a mass movement to challenge and eventually overthrow the imperialist, capitalist system that imposes war and repression on the world’s peoples — particularly in the Global South.
While "cultural dimensions of peacebuilding" are an important part of this struggle, in most cases non-violent action cannot alone defeat the imperialist war machine. A key relatively recent example is that of the heroic armed struggle fought so successfully by the Vietnamese people, which defeated the brutal US (and Australian) invasion of the 1960s and 1970s — with the critical support of a mass anti-war movement in the West.
Today, the Palestinian people are mounting an existential struggle against the US-backed Israeli genocide in Gaza. While the international pro-Palestine anti-war movement will be vital in eventually defeating this war of starvation and mass murder, the armed support of other forces will also be decisive in the end.
Branagan’s book is a fascinating and informative read, covering a broad spectrum of elements of the cultural dimensions of peace building. However, at more than A$160 a copy for the hardcover version, it has limited availability as a resource to many in the peace movement.
[Jim McIlroy was a student activist during Australia’s anti-Vietnam War movement, is a lifelong socialist and writes regularly for 鶹ý.]