Development and diplomacy are two of the “Ds” in “3D security,” a multidimensional security framework that relies not on military firepower to solve global problems but methods like economic development, conflict prevention, community building, negotiation, and advocacy.
“This is what I call God’s security strategy because it’s all laid out in the Old and New testaments of loving our neighbors as ourselves, and living as if everyone matters,” said Schirch, who was a keynote speaker at the recent 2008
Intergenerational Peacemaking Conference of the Presbyterian Church (U.S.A.)
[www.pcusa.org/pcnews/2008/08526].
The Mennonite professor is program director of the 3D Security Initiative at EMU’s Center for Justice and Peacebuilding and has worked in more than 20 countries with communities and government leaders to build peace and
security.
She told about 270 peacemakers that in an increasingly globalized world, U.S. security is interconnected with global security, and the only way the U.S. can address pressing issues such as climate change, drought, famine,
infectious diseases, and terrorism is in partnership with other countries.
With American society obsessed over security concerns, Schirch encouraged conference-goers to consider how development and diplomacy are security strategies, and suggested their understanding of defense — the third “D” in 3D security — may need adapting to fit the new global landscape.
Schirch said more military leaders and political experts in the U.S. are recognizing the ineffectiveness of using overwhelming military force for addressing many of the security threats facing the world.
She said a robust diplomatic corps with people trained in conflict resolution is capable of resolving many serious issues.
“Through diplomacy you have forums to work out problems, so then if you still have a [military] defense it really is as a last resort,” Schirch said during her speech at the four-day conference here last month on the campus of
Chapman University.
The author of books about peacebuilding and conflict prevention said terrorism is born out of humiliation and despair that often is a result of overzealous U.S. foreign policy.
Schirch, describing a trip she made to Iraq in 2005, said Iraqis feel very insecure about the U.S. military presence inside their borders and find the occupation humiliating. Young men in villages have little to look forward to as
they face unemployment, war and despair, and that leaves them vulnerable to insurgents looking for men to join them.
“Do Americans know that they have made the situation worse?” Schirch said quoting from interviews she conducted with Iraqis. “There was no al-Qaeda here before the war and now our cities are full of terrorists.”
She said another Iraqi asked, “Why would they focus on hunting down the terrorists rather than building the security? It’s a backwards strategy. It only helps the insurgents in their recruitment.”
Political negotiations and economic development, not military force, are the solutions for countering the insurgency and the path to a lasting peace in the war-torn Gulf nation, Schirch said.
“Security doesn’t land in a helicopter, it grows from the ground up,” she said as pictures of the earth, drought, and war were beamed onto a large screen behind her.
Schirch told the audience that active peace-building initiatives are taking place within Iraqi civil society and through community leaders that are moving peace forward. Many efforts to build community-based, non-governmental
organizations are also in place.
She pointed to these developments as examples of how 3D security is helping to grow security from the ground up.
“Community development creates job opportunities and a chance for earning respect and dignity in ways other than through the gun,” Schirch said.
Climate change is a factor that causes suffering in many parts of the world as food and water become more scarce, a reality many in the U.S. are shielded from by the nation’s well-stocked grocery store shelves, Schirch said.
“There’s this cognitive distance of disparity in our heads between what other people are suffering and what we are living,” she said.
Schirch urged the group to build relationships with people in the military, many of whom believe it is not military force, but diplomacy and development that will bring peace and security.
“There’re more people around the world, especially leaders, who say using military power to suppress [terrorist] groups in Iraq, Lebanon, and Afghanistan is like taking a hammer to a beehive,” Schirch said. “More and more people are saying this fantasy, this idea of a quick solution of dropping a
bomb and obliterating people who we say are evil, isn’t a solution.”
Schirch told the group that 3D security has been promoted by Canada, the United Kingdom, Sweden, and other European countries for a number of years. Only recently have bi-partisan congressional leaders and the Bush
administration started to embrace 3D security as a new vision for rethinking U.S. security.
“You can overthrow somebody with military might, but you can’t build something,” Schirch said. “So that awareness in Washington gives me hope that a number of people are saying that.”
She said 3D security advocates the United States increasing
its investments in development and diplomacy. Now just 4 percent of the national security budget goes for development and diplomacy security tools, while 90 percent goes to the military, Schirch said. About 6 percent of the
budget goes to homeland security.
“You can see that our budget prioritized spending is so perversely disproportionate to what we need,” she said.
However, more money alone will not build America’s security, Schirch said, emphasizing that it is important to spend security dollars wisely. Some kinds of development, diplomacy, and defense efforts are a waste of money.
Another problem is building enough political will on Capitol Hill to prompt change.
Quoting a development expert, Schirch said, “the greatest puzzle in economic development is not how to alleviate the suffering; we know how to do that, we know how to build peace. The problem is building the political will here in the United States to have our leaders go to the United Nations and work with the international community to actually address these problems.”
Peacemakers are charged with lobbying members of Congress about important issues, such as national security, at least once a week and to enlist others to join the effort, said Schirch, who works part-time speaking with military personnel and policymakers about grassroots initiatives in preventing violence and building peace and security.
“We need to ask Congress to do these two simple things,” Schirch said. “Invest more in development and diplomacy to address the root causes of global insecurity, and to partner and empower local people to build peace and
security from the ground up.”
She said not only do Christians need to think about the government’s foreign policy decisions but also their own personal policy when it comes to consumption and how their habits impact others in the world.
This is important at a time when the consumption rate of an American is 32 times higher than that of a Kenyan, Schirch said. And at a time when the United States accounts for 6 percent of the world’s population while owning 50 percent of the wealth.
Schirch challenged participants to redeem themselves from their consumer-based lifestyles, and churches to help them reform.
“The complicated truth has a simple solution: live simply,” she said. “As a Mennonite I was told live simply so others might simply live. But I also think it comes back to our own soul success. That living simply is good for our own
soul, that we are more in harmony with the world and we are more aware and mindful of our connections and interdependence.”
