User:Kitty McVey
The account of this former contributor was not re-activated after the server upgrade of March 2022.
My interest is in conflict issues, broadly mirroring the remit of the new all-party group on conflict issues within the UK parliament [1] which aims to "encourage dialogue, on the basis of expert information and opinion from across the political spectrum, on issues relating to conflict; especially on the practical means to prevent, transform and resolve violent conflict."
'Conflict issues' is a multi-displinary area and I have no claim to expertese in any of the relevant disciplines. I am just one of a group of concerned citizens who wanted politicians and experts to get together and listen to each other.
In summer 2006 we started to experiment with setting up a wiki. But then it seemd that a 'project' within wikipedia might be better. I was just starting to learn how such things worked when I heard of citzendium, which seems better still.
I started to create an article stub thinking that the talk page of that article might be the right place to plan a series of articles broadly mirroring the remit of the parliamentary group. But I haven't yet got the hang of what should go where, in citizendium, and very quickly had to rename it, at Larry Sanger's suggestion. It is now at Conflict issues (U.K. Parliament) but there's hardly anything on it. I think for now I'd better use this user page as a sandbox until I work out where to put my contributions, and how to use mediawiki mark-up.
Just one other thing I'd like to say (in case it is not obvious to everyone who might read this): if I include something in a list of 'alternatives to war', that does not imply that I’m in favour of it. As a Quaker I'm none too keen on, for example, covert assassination. But it is no use pretending that this is not on the list of options which politicians consider.
MY SANDOX
CONTENTS
Drafts of material to go on the page Talk: alternatives to war (?) or in discussion forum?
Unsorted jottings, notes to self.
Drafts of material to go on the page Talk: alternatives to war (?) or in discussion forum?
CONTENTS
1. Introduction: the motivation behind this page.
2. Ways of classifying alternatives to war.
3. Politicians’ views on alternatives to war: what may / may not be reported on CZ?
1. Introduction: the motivation behind this page
This page was set up with the intention of cataloguing alternatives to war and linking to articles in which the arguments for and against the various options are summarised.
There is a need for such a list, to support informed dialogue between citizens and politicians. Politicians sometimes claim ‘We are going to war because there is no alternative’. Citizens sometimes wonder if there might be alternatives which the politicians are unaware of, or have found it convenient to ignore.
Citizendium (because of its transparency, public accessibility and strong policy on impartiality) seems a good place in which people might collaborate to build such a list. I hope the editors will not rule that this is not what such a compendium is for.
Inclusion of an option in this list would not imply that that course of action has many supporters. It would merely imply that the proposal has been sufficiently ‘published’ not to breach citizendium’s policy on ‘no original research’.
As I understand it, this means that if you (or I) should wake up tomorrow with a bright idea for world peace, citizenium is not the place to air it. But if an idea has been published, then it should be included in the list even if you, I and everyone we know thinks it is crazy. Kitty McVey 08:05, 24 February 2007 (CST)
2. Ways of classifying alternatives to war.
We will need to give some thought to the ways in which the listed items are grouped, and may perhaps need to maintain several different ways of classifying them.
An alphabetical list seems good as a starting point.
Does anyone know of any ‘standard’ taxonomies (e.g. as used in peace studies)?
I have also outlined a classification based on whether or not the proposed alternative involves coercion, force or violence. This seems to me to be an ‘obviously necessary’ way of classifying options – at least for the purpose of dialogue with politicians. The distinction between war and other uses of force is seldom made explicit in debates in the UK Parliament (at least it wasn’t, in the debate on 18th(?) March 2003 about whether to invade Iraq). I wonder how much of this is due to politicians genuinely not knowing the difference, and how much is due to deliberate attempts to ‘spin’ by using words to mean different things at different points in the debate.
Maybe we need as many ways of classifying alternatives to war as there are world views on this subject. The personal construct psychologist Dorothy Rowe has pointed out the way we classify things is just a reflection of our own world view. In one of her books she cites a delicious example of this, which one of these days I’ll find again and be able to cite properly (I think it was a way of classifying ‘everything’ which was used in ancient China but strikes modern readers as bizarre).
3. Politicians’ views on alternatives to war: what may / may not be reported on CZ?
I’m confused as to where to draw the line between what can be included in citizendium articles, and what can’t (because it counts as ‘original research’).
I’ve listed below some examples of what might arise, in connection with the proposed articles such as ‘Alternatives to war’ , ‘Conflict Issues (U.K. Parliament)’ and maybe ‘Alternatives to war: the views of UK Parliamentarians’.
Can anyone advise on how the following example cases should be treated? Can the ‘research’ referred to be cited in citizendium articles?
For examples **** (which refer to research which might be conducted collaboratively, using wikis) – if it cannot be cited in citizendium articles, may we at least use citizendium talk pages to discuss what might be a better place?
COMMON BACKGROUND TO THE EXAMPLES BELOW: Some people have done some ‘research’ into politicians’ views on alternatives to war (perhaps based on questionnaires, interviews or discourse analysis). Their ‘findings’ have been published in one of the ways listed as acceptable here ***** (which appears to include anything published on any web-site, so long as that web-site is not a wiki?).
VARIANTS:-
What if it is research carried out by citizens (rather than professional researchers) in connection with a web-site such as TheyWorkForYou.com or one of its sister sites. Perhaps ‘We asked people to write to their members of parliament, here are the replies and an analysis of them).
What if it is research conducted by some well-intentioned but more-biased-than-they-realise-they-are group of people? Or by some group whose work is going to be seen as biased (because of who they are) however scrupulously they try not to be?
What if the research is by academics, but other academics think it is flawed?
What if it is ‘research’ only in a weaker sense of the word (e.g. the ‘findings ’ of someone who has only consulted his mates in the pub)?
What if the research had been carried out by a group of teenagers, as part of their school citizenship curriculum , had been published on the web-site they created, and had earned them good marks (i.e. their examiners asserted that the work met certain published standards, though not such high standards as would be expected of academics).
What if the research is ‘published’ before being ‘finished’?. E.g collaborative research co-ordinated via a web-site? Maybe it is intended always to be a work in progress (like citizendium, and like cancer research or science generally).
What if it is merely anecdotal, but honestly so – e.g. a collection of interviews or incident reports which are presented without bias, and which may be of interest to people to take a serious interest in the subject, but from which no-one is suggesting that any particular inference be
What if it is totally biased rubbish but has been uncritically reported in the tabloid press?
What if it is good enough for –say – the Conflict Research Society to invite the researchers to present at one of its conferences?
Unsorted jottings and notes to self
Classification scheme:-
Nonviolent and non-coercive
Involving coercion but not force
Involving force but not premeditated violence.
Involving armed force but short of war.
[War itself – various types of]
Beyond war: other violent options (e.g. covert assassination)
Options to be included
Do nothing – war weariness – not our business.
Conflicting defintions of violence, force and coercion: which used in this classification.
External links
Conflictpedia: an action-research project with these aims:-
· To produce a series of impartial (spin-free) briefings on conflict issues, which may be trusted by parliamentarians of all parties
· To encourage citizens to engage in dialogue with their elected representatives, informed by (and in turn contributing to) such as series of articles