Building a Peace Structure on the Korean Peninsula

Dedication To

All soldiers and civilians who were killed, wounded, traumatized, separated, and persecuted in the origins, conduct, and aftermath of the Korean War (1950-53) -victims of 20th century inability to create a powerful theory and practice of nonkilling global political science; and

To

Korean political leaders President Kim Dae Jung and Chairman Kim Jong Il who during June 13-15, 2000, took first steps toward potentially transforming nonkilling Korean leadership for the 21st century world.

___________________________________________________________________

Special Address, International Conference in Commemoration of the 50th
Anniversary of the Korean War, “Fifty Years after the Korean War: From Cold-War Confrontation to Peaceful Coexistence,” co-organized by The Korean Association of International Studies (KAIS) and the Korea Research Institute for Strategy (KRIS); sponsored by the Ministry of Defense, Seoul, Korea, July 14-15, 2000.

Is a Nonkilling Korea Possible?

Is a nonkilling Korea possible? If not, why not? If yes, why?

But what is meant by a “nonkilling Korea”? For present purposes let it be Korea, people and peninsula, distinguished by the following characteristics:

First, there is no killing of Koreans by Koreans and no threats to kill;

Second, there is no killing of Koreans by foreigners -Americans, Chinese, Japanese, Russians, various UN contingents, or by any other people -and no threats to kill;

Third, there is no killing or threats to kill by Koreans of foreigners;

Fourth, there are no weapons for killing targeted by Koreans against each other, by foreigners against Koreans, and by Koreans against foreigners;

Fifth, there are no ideological doctrines -political, religious, military, economic, legal, customary, or academic -that provide permissions for Koreans to kill Koreans, for foreigners to kill Koreans, and for Koreans to kill foreigners; and

Sixth, there are no conditions of Korean society -political, economic, social, and cultural -or relationships between Koreans and foreigners that can only be maintained or changed by threat or use of killing force.

Is such a “nonkilling Korea” possible? If not, why not? If yes, why?

No!

Of course there are many reasons to consider a nonkilling Korea to be, if not completely unthinkable, at least for the present highly improbable. In the year 2000, fifty-five years after armed foreign imposition of division, fifty years after the outbreak of the murderous, ultimately stalemated, war for reunification -the sons and daughters of Korea fearfully face each other in the armed forces of two militarized states -mobilized, indoctrinated, trained, equipped, and prepared to kill. Each are allied with deadly foreign forces: with the United States in the South; with China and Russia in the North. For Koreans who have been killed by each other and by intervening foreigners (in the 20th century by Japanese, Americans, Chinese, Russians, British, Turks, Australians, Canadians, French, Thais, Greeks, Dutch, Colombians, Ethiopians, Filipinos, Belgians/Luxembourgers, New Zealanders, and South Africans) -it is improbable readily to envision a Korean society without killing and threats to kill. Historically, killing is feared as the principal threat to the survival of the Korean people and nation, whether divided or united. Readiness to kill, alone or in concert with allies, has been considered the best guarantor of ultimate independent Korean existence.

Oddly enough, strategic planners in the four great powers who have massively impacted upon the people of Korea over the past century also fear victimized Korea -as well as manifestly or latently each other. The heirs of former colonial Imperial Japan, apprehensive about the possible threat of a retributive regime in Korea, whether divided or united, cautiously strengthen “Self-Defense Forces” to kill in future combat with Korea, China, Russia, and not unthinkably in some circles with the atom-bombing United States, now a military ally of Japan and the ROK.

The nuclear-armed United States, co-partitioner of Korea with the Soviet Union and wartime savior of the ROK, presently the world’s leading military and economic superpower, fears and distrusts DPRK potential for lethality and employs fear of North Korea, whether called “rogue state” or something else, to strengthen its own ideological, organizational, technological, and economic capability to kill in Korea, in the Asia-Pacific region, and throughout the world. Nuclear-armed China, wartime savior of the DPRK -killer of Americans, Koreans, and UN forces -victim itself of horrendous killing and casualties -mindful of claims upon and potential threat from Taiwan, maintains a watchful readiness to kill in Korea to deter any peninsula-related threat to the PRC regime. Nuclear-armed Russia, heir to the co-partitioner Soviet Union, original sponsor of the DPRK anti-capitalist regime and principal wartime supplier of its lethal capability, maintains a vigilant awareness of the nuclear and other military capabilities of the United States and China as well as the present conventional and possible future nuclear capabilities of Japan.

There are other obstacles to a nonkilling Korea. Both Koreas as well as the four powers maintain the death penalty. (Although 73 states have completely abolished capital punishment -Appendix A.) Both Koreas impose mandatory conscription for military service and lack legal provisions for conscientious objection to killing. (Although 47 states accept it -Appendix B.) Both Koreas have big armies. (Although 28 countries have no army at all -Appendix C). Both Koreas have well established institutions for military, police, and intelligence lethal training; for the manufacture, import, and export of lethal weapons; for celebrating heroes and heroines of revolutionary and wartime violence; and for spiritual, educational, and cultural indoctrination of Koreans for readiness to kill as the highest form of patriotism; and for building and maintaining advantageous lethal alliances with external forces.

In short, it is difficult to see the two militarized Korean states and the four major intervening powers (three nuclear-armed) as readily accepting relationships among themselves based upon the principles of nonkilling, no threats to kill, no weapons to kill, and no ideological or material preparations to kill.

Yes!

On the other hand, rooted in Korean culture, experience, and present creative potentials, there are grounds for taking seriously the possibility of realizing a nonkilling Korea that can provide unique leadership for nonviolent global transformation in the 21st century.

First of all must be noted the reverence for life expressed in the ancient creation story of the origin of the Korean people. Rather than associated with a battle of the gods, the Korean story has the son of God (Heavenly Creator) descend to earth on a mountain, unite with a bear-turned-woman, create the Korean people, and teach them to follow the principle of hongik ingan (“devotion to the welfare of humankind”). Echoes of this ancient ethical foundation can be seen in the March First Independence Declaration of 1919 and in the manifestos of numerous political parties that spontaneously emerged to proclaim Korea’s aspirations following defeat of Japanese colonial rule in 1945.

Insight into the vital significance of the Korean creation story for the future of a nonkilling Korea is indebted to the privilege of instruction by two great teachers of Korean history and culture: by the respected religious leader Ham Sok Hon in Seoul and by the distinguished historian Professor Pak Si-hyong in Pyongyang. To both I asked the same question, “What are the roots of nonviolence in the Korean tradition?” Both answered spontaneously in exactly the same way: “They are found in the Tan’gun creation story of the Korean people.” Both added, “The basically peaceful character of the Korean people throughout history is evidenced by the fact that they have never been aggressors against their neighbors -but have been the victims of aggression.” At least two exceptions can be recalled: when Koreans were conscripted by Japan to kill in Asian imperial conquests; and when taken as allies of the United States to kill in Vietnam.

A second factor of enormous importance for confidence in the attainability of a nonkilling Korea is the theoretical and practical potential of purposive creative leadership in politics and in other sectors of society to bring about remarkable social changes in a relatively short period of time. The leadership lesson of divided Korea since 1945 has been that political leadership is not a passive puppet of socio-economic forces and other structural conditions, but can independently translate new societal values into significant social change (Paige 1966/1971 and 1977). This is how one homogeneous, traditional, and post-colonial Korea was transformed from the “top down” into two significantly different societies -one “socialist,” one “capitalist” -in less than fifty years. Admittedly such leadership (some might prefer the term “coercive command”) was exercised for change backed by the threat and use of domestic and foreign killing force. But the dramatic changes achieved by purposive leadership in divided Korea hold forth the promise that similar leadership initiatives exercised through nonviolent processes of problem-solving can bring about a unified Korea with uniquely significant nonkilling characteristics. Whereas creative violent leadership can divide, creative nonviolent leadership can unite. In the year 2000 — with the unprecedented June meeting of President Kim Dae Jung and Chairman Kim Jong Il -a precedent is being set for independent, creative Korean political leadership initiatives to realize a united, killing-free Korea.

A third factor of immense significance is found in the capabilities of the creative, skilled, hard-working, and adaptive Korean people to engage in nonkilling transformation of Korean society and its relations with the world. Dramatic evidence of their extraordinarily strong and resilient human potential for change can be seen by comparing two sets of panoramic photographs: the first set, showing the utterly devastated wartime cities of Pyongyang (mainly from U.S. air bombardment) and Seoul; the second set, showing the reconstructed cities today. Koreans in both South and North rebuilt and carried forward in new directions all the institutions of society: political, economic, social, and cultural. One example is the remarkable development of education in both societies, so characteristic of Korean respect for learning. When mutually understood and combined, achievements in education and in other sectors of society unquestionably constitute an extraordinary force of potential citizen competence to build and maintain for future generations a pioneering, united, killing-free Korea that is faithful to the genius of Korean culture and becomes a model for global emulation.

A fourth factor favorable for Korea-led nonkilling transformation is the existence of nonkilling cultural elements in all four of the principal powers that have hitherto impacted violently upon Korean society (Paige 1984). Assuredly Korea has suffered from American, Russian, Chinese, and Japanese readiness to kill. But realistic hope for a nonkilling future lies in combining Korea’s assertion of its own nonkilling potential with discovery of nonkilling elements in the United States, Russia, China, and Japan -and then working cooperatively with them to create a powerful ethical force for mutually beneficial liberation from lethality.

However much violated in practice, virtually all faiths and philosophies contain injunctions not to kill. For example, the first precept of Buddhism is “to abstain from taking life.” Christianity, Judaism, and Islam share the Biblical Commandment “Thou shalt not kill” (Exod: 30:13). In Confucianism, where morality among rulers prevails, no death penalty will be needed (Fung 1952: 60). In Taoism, when humans live simply, spontaneously, in harmony with nature “although there might exist weapons for war, no one will drill with them” (Fung 1952: 190). In secular humanist socialism, when workers in hostile countries refuse to support killing each other, wars will cease (True 1995: 49). The law of nonkilling is the predominant law of human life; otherwise humanity long ago would have extinguished itself.

Practical expressions of nonkilling ethical principle can be found in the histories and contemporary life of all four Korea-intervening powers. Brief notice can be taken of some. The United States has an alternative nonkilling tradition coming down over 300 years since colonial times expressed in resistance against armed revolution, against extermination of indigenous peoples, against slavery, against civil war, against imperialist expansion, against foreign interventions, against international wars, against military conscription, against military taxes, against nuclear weapons, against the death penalty, and against many proviolent aspects of American political, economic, social and cultural life. There is a nonkilling America as well as a violent one (Lynd and Lynd 1995). Korea can purposively evoke it.

In the Russian tradition, nonkilling elements can be found that periodically reassert themselves despite centuries of repression. They include pacifist religious sects and peasant communities that take seriously Christ’s teachings of love and nonviolence, courageously refusing to kill. Among them are Mennonites, Molokans, Doukhobors and Tolstoyans (Brock 1972: 407-50; 540). On the night of June 28-29, 1895, seven thousand Doukhobors in three villages simultaneously burned their weapons to resist military conscription, bequeathing a globally historic example of nonkilling disarmament (Tarasoff 1995). The powerful literary voice of Tolstoy (1828-1910) continues to echo in the Russian tradition -calling for an end to religious-patriotic complicity in killing by the violent state, in war, conscription, capital punishment, and enforcement of economic injustice (Tolstoy 1974). In post-Soviet Russia there is a resurgence of interest in the ethical and sociopolitical relevance of nonviolence (Apressyan 1996). There is a nonviolent Russia as well as a violent one. Koreans can reach out to it and engage it in mutually beneficial nonkilling social transformation.

In China also, there is a tradition of nonviolence and peace bequeathed by ancient philosophers such as Mo Tzu (c. 468-c. 376 B.C.E.), a proponent of “universal love” and a rational critic of the economic and social costs of war and oppression (Fung 1952: 76-105). China’s three main philosophical traditions -Buddhism (cultivating nonviolence in the self), Confucianism (promoting nonviolence in social relations), and Taoism (living nonviolently in nature) [Li 1996] -offer grounds for combination with Korea’s own interpretations of these traditions for cooperative discovery and realization of nonkilling potentials. As for Chinese Communist thought, Mao Zedong’s dictum that “politics comes out of the barrel of a gun” is widely quoted. However, in his May 1938 essay “On Protracted War,” Mao gave another definition: “politics is war without bloodshed” [zhengzi shi buliuxue ti zhanzheng -Mao 1960: 469). This provides a point of discussion for exploration of possibilities for a new kind of “politics without killing” in China, in Korea, and the world. So does a 1981 article entitled “We should positively affirm nonviolence” in the Beijing journal World History: “The view that one-sidedly advocates violent revolution without regard to time, place, and situation, and deprecates nonviolent revolution is wrong in theory and harmful in practice” (Zhang 1981: 79).

Nonkilling cultural elements are discoverable also in Japan. According to Nakamura Hajime, “in the [Buddhist] Heian period (794-1192) capital punishment was not practiced for about three hundred and fifty years” (Nakamura 1967: 145). Among other outcroppings of nonkilling potential in Japanese culture are a nonviolent Shinto sect (Omotokyo) with its Universal Love and Brotherhood Association (Jinrui Aizen Kai); a nonkilling defensive martial art (Aikido) based on “love” created by Morihei Ueshiba, a converted martial arts master of killing; Buddhist anti-war movements (the Rissho Koseikai and the Soka Gakkai International); as well as Christian and socialist pacifist traditions (Bamba and Howes 1978). Post WWII revulsion against war can be seen in the Hiroshima-Nagasaki movements to abolish nuclear weapons, struggles to maintain a no-war Constitution, efforts to limit military expenditures, resistance to remilitarization, and efforts to remove United States military bases.

These glimpses of nonkilling aspects of the United States, Russia, China, and Japan offer promise of four power and civil society responsiveness to powerfully principled Korean nonkilling transformational initiatives.

A fifth source of confidence in the possibility of realizing a nonkilling society in Korea (as elsewhere) lies in the existence of prototypical components needed for such a society that have already emerged in various parts of the world. Reversing the 20th century process whereby modernizing states emulated the violent institutions and practices of “advanced” countries, Korea can become the 21st century world leader in creatively adapting the nonviolent achievements of global civilization to serve its needs. Korea can become the most advanced nonkilling country. Reciprocally Korea can contribute new knowledge, policies, and institutions to assist nonkilling transformation in other societies throughout the world.

Among aspects of nonkilling global experience available for study and possible adaptation are the following (Paige, Forthcoming, Chapter 2):

(1) nonkilling human nature – most humans who have ever lived have never directly killed anyone,

(2) nonkilling ethical proscriptions – found in virtually all religions and philosophical traditions,

(3) nonviolent scientific discoveries – diverse findings from bio-neuroscience and anthropology even to political science that can assist nonkilling problem-solving,

(4) nonkilling public policies – abolition of the death penalty [Appendix A], recognition of conscientious objection to military service [Appendix B], and countries without armies [Appendix C],

(5) a nonkilling political party – The Fellowship Party in England,

(6) nonviolent economic institutions – mutual funds, labor unions, and village development programs,

(7) a nonviolent university with a Shanti Sena [Peace Brigade] instead of training for military service – Gandhigram Rural University in India,

(8) training institutions for conflict resolution and nonviolent social change,

(9) nonviolent security institutions -unarmed citizenry, police without firearms, and an association for unarmed civilian defense,

(10) a research institution for study of the strategy and tactics of nonviolent political struggle and social defense -the Albert Einstein Institution in Cambridge, Massachusetts,

(11) nonviolent problem-solving institutions -for demilitarization, economic change, human rights, and environmental sustainability,

(12) nonviolent media of communication – newspapers, books, journals, and publishing houses,

(13) nonviolent arts – music, poetry, novels, theater and films,

(14) nonviolent popular movements for social change -Gandhian, Kingian, Buddhist, Christian, Green, eclectic, and pragmatic,

(15) nonkilling historical precedents and traditions, and (16) courageous examples of nonkilling individuals, co-gender pairs, and groups in world history.

Building upon its own unique nonkilling inspiration and cultural capabilities, Korea can draw upon the nonkilling heritage of humankind to lead the world, as can any society with genius for learning from others.

Three Generals on Nonkilling

Despite evidence of nonkilling potentials in Korean culture and in cultures of the four intervening powers -despite evidence of nonkilling capabilities to be found in spiritual, scientific, and practical global human experience -it may still be argued that a nonkilling Korea is some kind of utopian fantasy. Therefore, before proceeding to suggest some practical steps toward nonkilling in Korea, let us consider some powerful appeals for abolition of war and its correlates made by three professional experts in killing -three American generals.

General Douglas MacArthur.

In a speech to the American Legion in Los Angeles on September 26, 1955, General MacArthur argues that the abolition of war is no longer a “spiritual and moral question” but has become an imperative of “scientific realism” for the survival of humankind. Consequently the General challenges the people who are the greatest victims of war and their leaders courageously to think new nonkilling thoughts and to “break out of the straight-jacket of the past.”

You will say at once that although the abolition of
war has been the dream of man for centuries, every
proposition to that end has been promptly discarded as
impossible and fantastic. Every cynic, every pessimist,
every adventurer, every swashbuckler in the world has
always disclaimed its feasibility. But that was before the
science of the past decade made mass destruction a reality.

The argument then was along spiritual and moral grounds,
and lost….But now the tremendous and present evolution
of nuclear and other potentials of destruction has suddenly
taken the problem away from its primary consideration as a
moral and spiritual question and brought it abreast of
scientific realism [emphasis added]. It is no longer an
ethical question to be pondered solely by learned
philosophers and ecclesiastics but a hard core one for the
decision of the masses whose survival is at stake….The
leaders are the laggards….Never do they state the bald
truth, that the next great advance in civilization cannot take
place until war is abolished….When will some great figure
in power have sufficient imagination to translate this
universal wish -which is rapidly becoming a universal
necessity -into actuality? We are in a new era. The old
methods and solutions no longer suffice. We must have
new thoughts, new ideas, new concepts….We must break
out of the strait-jacket of the past (Cousins 1987: 67-9).

General Dwight D. Eisenhower.

Speaking as President of the United States to the American Society of Newspaper Editors, on April 16, 1953, General Eisenhower laments the economic costs of militarization as “theft” and suggests enormous benefits that can accompany liberation of Korea and humanity from the colossal waste of human and material resources produced by preparations to kill.

Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every
rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft [emphasis
added] from those who hunger and are not fed, those who
are cold and not clothed. This world in arms is not spending
money alone. It is spending the sweat of its laborers, the
genius of its scientists, the hopes of its children….This is not
a way of life at all in any sense. Under the cloud of
threatening war it is humanity hanging on a cross of iron
[emphasis added].

We can only wonder what General Eisenhower’s response would be to the “theft” exemplified by the costs of the U.S. nuclear weapons program alone from 1940 to 1996 conservatively calculated by the Brookings Institution in Washington to total 5.821 trillion dollars (Schwartz 1998).

General Eisenhower also expresses keen understanding of popular yearnings for peace: “Indeed, I think that people want peace so much that one of these days governments had better get out of their way and let them have it” (emphasis added) [BBC TV interview, August 31, 1959]. Thus General Eisenhower would not have been surprised by the outpourings of emotion by millions of Koreans in North and South and abroad in response to the first peaceful meeting of President Kim Dae Jung and Chairman Kim Jong Il in Pyongyang during June 13-15, 2000. People’s needs for peace are a powerful force that can lead to a future nonkilling Korea.

General Lee Butler, USAF (Ret.).

The former Commander-in-Chief of the United States Strategic Command with responsibility for all U.S. Air Force and U.S. Navy strategic nuclear war-fighting forces, speaking to the National Press Club in Washington, D.C. on December 4, 1996, precisely states four compelling reasons for the complete abolition of nuclear weapons by the United States and other actual or potential nuclear weapons powers:

Nuclear weapons are inherently dangerous, hugely
expensive, militarily inefficient, and morally indefensible
[emphasis added].

General Butler succinctly summarizes General MacArthur’s warning against the military suicide of humanity, General Eisenhower’s alarm about economic poverty caused by militarization, and ancient spiritual-moral imperatives of nonkilling respect for life.

Principles for Nonkilling Transformation

If we take seriously the possibility of transition to a nonkilling Korea, what are some principles that can be expressed in practical actions and institutional developments?

1. Nonkilling ethic. The imperative value of a nonkilling ethic, spiritually and scientifically based, must be given high prominence in individual, national, and international consciousness. Powerfully stated: “No more killing!”

2. Participation in problem-solving. Since violence comes from violation of human needs -such as for love, respect, recognition, justice, and material well-being -processes of nonkilling problem-solving must provide for participation in reaching acceptable solutions by all those whose needs are not met. (Past refusal by contributors to violence in Korea to engage in problem-solving dialogues has been vastly dysfunctional; e.g., past U.S. refusal to engage in dialogue with the DPRK until a threat of atomic bomb development emerged).

3. Need for empathy. Since killing is customarily correlated with inability to see opponents as human beings and to understand their needs and viewpoints, systematic processes for increasing empathy between Koreans in North and South -and between the intervening powers and Korea -need to be established. Koreans born in 1950 are now 50 years old with different socialization experiences. They need opportunities to share their experiences and judgments of them as bases for cooperation toward nonkilling integrative problem-solving.

4. Conversion of lethal institutions. Institutions supportive of killing must be transformed to serve nonkilling human needs -as when military forces, bases, arms manufacturers, and weapons scientists are redirected to humanitarian civilian service (Keyes 1982). As taught especially by Gandhi and Martin Luther King, Jr., the goal of nonkilling conversion processes must be mutual respect among all participants.

5. Building new institutions for nonkilling creativity. Since violence-based institutions tend to suppress nonkilling creativity, new institutions are especially needed to facilitate research, training, and policy implementation to assist nonkilling transition. In Korea, institutions to encourage combinatorial North-South creativity are an exceedingly important priority.

Putting Principles into Action

Nonkilling transformational principles call for implementing actions. Thus a nonkilling ethic must become creatively embraced as a source of distinctive Korean cultural pride in family socialization, child rearing, education, religion, politics, economics, the media, arts, sports, and in every vocation and institution of society. Research has shown that cultures with strong nonviolent self-identity are less violent than those that perceive themselves as violent (Fry 1994: 140-41). Provisions for participation in cooperative problem-solving to meet needs must be provided within and across every sector of Korean society, South and North, and in transcendent processes of reintegration. Empathic understanding can be promoted through distance learning and reciprocal visits for study and service in every walk of life from youths to adult vocations to elder generations. Nonkilling conversion of existing institutions can be assisted by including courses on the theory and practice of nonkilling security and conflict resolution in the training of military, police, and intelligence forces. Parallel training can be given to dissident groups and even “criminal” elements in alternative nonviolent methods of action to meet unmet needs and to contribute constructively to building a nonkilling society of benefit for all. Entire universities, colleges, and schools need to take nonkilling seriously in their research, teaching, and other services to society.

As for institutional innovations to improve the quality of life for all Koreans, a strong commitment to the ethic of nonkilling will be as productive of creativity as has been the introduction of the computer and Internet in global life. The perceived value and utility of nonkilling means and ends will stir innovations in politics, economics, education, culture, arts, and in regional and global relations. Nonkilling will evoke unprecedented expressions of creativity in Korean culture and society that hitherto have been constrained by violence. Nonkilling will become increasingly profitable in spiritual, social, and material satisfactions for all Koreans and for all who learn from their experience.

Nonkilling Korea Leadership Academy

Since the past 55 years have shown that violent leadership can divide the Korean nation (and violently prevent reunification) -and since theory and reality now predict that nonviolent leadership can reunite it -an institutional expression of principles to facilitate emergence of nonkilling leadership for the transformative tasks of reunification is appropriate. This could take the form of a Nonkilling Korea Leadership Academy. Its role would be complementary to intergovernmental relations between the ROK and the DPRK in the first stage of seeking and implementing acceptable accommodations between the Commonwealth (yonhapch’e) and Confederal (yonbangje) proposals recognized in the June 15 Joint Declaration.

Initially the Academy could function through educational centers in Seoul and Pyongyang. Later when a coordinating Commonwealth/Confederation governance center is built -perhaps in the DMZ transformed into a Korean World Peace Park with a gigantic World Peace Pyramid composed of discarded weapons of war -the Academy could be established in an adjacent complementary location.

The Academy should seek dual leadership and participation from both North and South -with special attention to participation by women who have borne heavy burdens of postwar reconstruction and who have infinite promise for contributing with men to the future nonviolent well-being of the unified nation.

The Academy’s mission would be: (1) to introduce nonkilling knowledge from Korean and world experience, (2) to encourage nonkilling creativity and mutual understanding among leaders in all sectors of Korean society, and (3) to suggest leadership initiatives to enhance the nonkilling quality of Korean life for consideration by governmental and nongovernmental decision makers. The Nonkilling Korea Leadership Academy would not supplant existing institutions devoted to peaceful reunification in South and North, but would seek to combine and amplify their contributions through creative reflection by present and emerging leaders capable of facilitating processes for nonkilling reintegration.

A core group of seven persons each from North and South, fourteen in all, could initiate the work of the Academy. They would share paired responsibility for performing seven computer-assisted tasks: (1) scanning Korea and the world for nonkilling knowledge, (2) scanning for useful nonkilling education and training methods, (3) scanning for governmental and nongovernmental policy experiences, (4) communicating findings among leaders and the public, (5) providing material support and accountability, (6) conducting all-Korea and global correspondence, and (7) providing overall Academy coordination and liaison with participants in its leadership programs. The work of the core group itself should exemplify the independent co-determination needed for peaceful reunification.

The Academy could be the host-facilitator of six Nonkilling Study Groups to engage leaders cooperatively in seeing creative solutions in problem areas such as the following:

Nonkilling Common Security Study Group. How can Korea become secure, domestically and internationally, without killing and threats to kill? Participants from the military, police, security agencies, and civil society in South and North would review nonviolent security thinking and critically consider potential Korean applications and innovations (e.g., Keyes 1982; Sharp 1990; Burrowes 1996; Weber 1996; LaFayette and Jehnsen 1996; Radhakrishnan 1997, Galtung 1998). The question of the conditions under which both Koreas can agree of the impermissibility of foreign military bases -and on the impermissibility of military alliances with foreign powers to kill Koreans -will be central issues. How can Koreans not kill Koreans and remove themselves from lethal alliances with other peoples? Furthermore, how can Koreans help Americans, Chinese, Japanese, and Russians not fear each other so that they use Korea as a base and ally in preparations and threats to kill each other?

Nonkilling Economy Study Group. What kind of economy can be created in Korea that does not depend upon the threat or use of lethal force and that provides for the well-being of all Koreans? Because of unique experience in building “socialist’ and “capitalist” economies departing from a common economic base in 1945, the combined economic thinking of North and South is potentially capable of a creative synthesis of theory and practice of enormous significance for Korea and the world. Both sides need mutual empathy and frank exchanges of “successes” as well as “failures” in performances of the two economic systems. Truthful exchanges are needed to understand the “crises” both have experienced and to discover how strengths can be combined to increase satisfactions and decrease suffering. Based upon such shared experiences, creatively transcendent economic thinking expressed in humanely integrative policies will be possible.

Nonkilling Environment Study Group. What kind of protection and sustainable use of Korea’s natural resources will not kill the life-supporting capabilities of the homeland and its surrounding seas? If Koreans, either divided or united, kill the environment, the environment will kill them. As it will kill their neighbors and all peoples (Commoner 1990). The creative work of the Environment Study Group will be inextricably related to that of the nonkilling Common Security and Economy study groups. The noxious effects of military industrialization will need to be removed as well as the ecocidal-genocidal potentials of regional nuclear weapons and nuclear power production. (Note: on June 15, 2000, the German Government announced that it would shut down by 2032 all 19 nuclear power plants that now produce 30% of Germany’s energy needs.) Without doubt combined traditional Korean love of their beautiful homeland -expressed, for example, in paintings, poetry, and songs -can produce a life-enriching environmental economy for a new nonkilling era.

Nonkilling Culture Study Group. What kind of cultural traditions and creations can contribute to nonkilling Korean reintegration? This problem presents a challenge to the life-respecting spirit and creative genius of the Korean people in all the arts, sciences, faiths, humanities, and professions. Violent culture conduces to killing. The evidence is overwhelming (Grossman and DeGaetano 1999). Nonviolent culture promises liberation from lethality. If Koreans, and all other peoples, can creatively break out of proviolent cultural pessimism -moving forward purposively from celebration and lamentation of past killing -to celebrate cooperative sharing of the gift of life, they can uplift themselves and all humanity to more happy, creative, and satisfying lives.

Nonkilling Regional and Global Relations Study Group. What kinds of mutually beneficial relationships in all aspects of life can be established with proximate and distant neighbors that are free of lethality and threats of violence? Here skills of the North in relations with Russia and China, and skills of the South in relations with the United States and Japan can be combined and creatively advanced to promote transition into a new nonkilling era. Adding lessons derived from dual Korean governmental and civil society relations with peoples throughout the world will further enhance Korea’s nonkilling transformational capabilities.

Nonkilling Leadership and Citizenship Study Group. What kinds of leadership skills and citizen competencies are needed in all sectors of Korean society to assist transition from violence-based and violence-threatening division to nonkilling national reintegration? For a nonkilling society, new skills of leadership and citizenship are needed. One leadership skill to be revitalized is leadership by moral example, combining the wisdom of an ancient Korean ideal with new needs for responsive innovation to bring about peacefully integrative social change. The June 15, 2000, Leadership Summit has provided a glimpse into the powerful potential of “transforming leadership” by moral example. As defined by the eminent leadership scholar James MacGregor Burns “transformational leadership” means leadership by interactive moral example in which both leaders and the led are uplifted by common commitment to life-respecting means and ends. Transformational leadership differs from inauthentic “coercive” leadership based upon threat of violence and from “transactional” leadership based upon market-style bargaining for political advantage (Burns 1978). Burns cites Gandhi (with Einstein one of the 20th century’s most respected figures) as a pioneering example of transforming leadership (Sharp 1979; Paige 1999).

Of course, there can be no leadership without followership. Nonkilling leadership depends upon nonkilling followership. Thus this Study Group would explore citizenship skills needed to initiate, recognize, support, evaluate, and improve nonkilling leadership actions and policies. Nonkilling followers also need nonkilling leaders. Therefore both must share ideas on how to recognize and support each other in processes of nonkilling social problem-solving.

Nonkilling Leadership Training Programs

The discoveries and experiences of the suggested Study Groups (or others) can be focused in training programs that assist leaders to develop comprehensive understanding of the contributions principled leadership can make to processes for solving problems of transition to a nonkilling Korea that is secure, prosperous, and creatively free. Such programs may be short, medium, or long-term in nature according to need. An example that can be drawn upon for experience in bringing leaders from diverse backgrounds together to focus upon problems of common concern is the International Leadership Programme of the United Nations University’s International Leadership Academy (UNU/ILA), headquartered at the University of Jordan. (The UNU/ILA programs involve young emergent leaders, senior mentors, expert resources, travel for onsite learning, and formulation of problem-solving recommendations.)

The inaugural program of the Nonkilling Korea Leadership Academy could focus on training leaders who understand the unification proposals of both the DPRK and the ROK. Participating leaders would be invited to think creatively about leadership opportunities and responsibilities for securing processes of fair consideration and comparative evaluation of the proposals in the initial stage of reaching consensus on common features to be implemented. And they could engage in futures study exercises in envisioning skills that would be required by leaders with all-Korea responsibilities in any agreed-upon governance structure designed to coordinate cooperation between the two governments and two systems in the early stages of unification.

An exploratory three-week training program with perhaps twenty-five participants each from South and North might be offered as follows:

Week 1: Study of first unification proposal. (Chosen randomly or by

consensus of participants).

Week 2: Study of second unification proposal.

Week 3: Identifying common elements and envisioning leadership

requirements to assist processes of decision and

implementation.

The planning, operation, and evaluation of this program should itself be an opportunity for cooperative problem-solving among leaders from the North and South. Co-directors should guide it; resource persons from each system should assist; and all participants should contribute constructive evaluations for improvement of subsequent joint training efforts.

The goal of the program should be that each participant returns to his or her responsibilities with deeper and more comprehensive comparative understanding of both reunification proposals, with a sense of leadership requirements for facilitating national decision and implementation of agreed upon features, and with a sense of possibilities for nonkilling collegiality in solving future unification-related problems.

Korea’s Unique Potential for Globally Transforming Nonkilling Leadership

As humanity advances into the 21st common century and 3rd common millennium, there is widespread global yearning for new leadership that can demonstrate ways out of the lethal legacy of past atrocities and point the way toward a sustainable nonviolent human future. Evidence for this aspiration can be found in the decision of the UN General Assembly in 1999 to declare the first decade of the new century to be the “International Decade for a Culture of Peace and Nonviolence for the Children of the World (2001-2010).”

Recent dramatic evidence of humanity’s often suppressed peace aspirations can be seen in the outpouring of emotion by Koreans and world approval in response to the human qualities (Korean ingansong) demonstrated by President Kim Dae Jung and Chairman Kim Jong Il in their unprecedented Pyongyang meeting that produced the South-North Joint Declaration of June 15, 2000. Since leadership is defined by capacity to take independent initiatives in response to human needs, the seeds of Korea’s potential for nonkilling global leadership can be seen in all four points of the Joint Declaration, especially in point one: “The South and North agreed to work together independently to solve the problem of unification of the country by combining the strengths of our people (minjok) who are the masters of it” (author’s translation).

From this starting point in the year 2000, Koreans -as victims of the first large-scale Hot War of the misnamed lethal “Cold War” era -have an opportunity to develop a unique nonkilling nation that can provide transforming leadership for the world in the 21st century. Koreans can transform themselves and their traumatized divided country from victims of historic world system violence into nonkilling leaders for nonviolent global transformation. To accomplish this, Koreans in the unification process must creatively detach themselves from the historical momentum of inter-reinforcing local, regional, and global systems of violence. Two other violently divided nations from the “Cold War” era that have been reunited -Vietnam and Germany -have not done this. Vietnam has been reunified as a conventional violent state product of victorious civil and international war. Germany has been reunited as a violence-accepting state, remilitarized, and imbedded in a military alliance system.

Korea can be different. For Korea, by comparison, has a unique opportunity to provide a model for humankind’s liberation from violence as it proceeds with the process of nonkilling reintegration of the nation (minjok). The idea of a neutral Korean nation permanently disengaged from combat but constructively engaged in mutually beneficial peaceful relations with its neighbors and the world is not new (e.g., Hwang 1990). But what is new is the presence of domestic, regional, and global resources of nonkilling spiritual, scientific, technological, institutional, public policy, cultural, and other elements that can assist purposive nonkilling Korean combinatorial transformation. An era of unprecedented human capability for nonkilling creativity is now becoming possible to liberate humankind from the threat of physical extinction and from the deadly economic consequences of colossal waste of resources in global militarization.

Korea’s unique potential for globally transforming nonkilling leadership paradoxically derives from its unique experience of being heavily impacted over the past century by four of the world’s most dynamic revolutionary and violently modernizing countries. No other people has been so intimately influenced by all four of them in political, military, economic, social, and cultural life: Imperialist Japan, Truman’s America, Stalinist Russia, Maoist China, and their contemporary successors. Korean knowledge of the languages, behaviors, and institutions of the four impacting societies -and Korean ability to adapt to them for Korean survivability and successes on the peninsula and in emigration -is extraordinary. Koreans know far more about Japanese, Chinese, Americans and Russians than these people know about them. Koreans thus have asymmetrical knowledge advantages in the new informational era for purposive efforts to induce cooperative nonkilling social transformations. When the special knowledge in the North since 1945 of Russia and China is creatively combined with the special knowledge of the United States and Japan in the South, powerfully sensitive policy initiatives for mutually beneficial nonkilling change will be possible.

And since the United States, Japan, China, and Russia exert such wide-ranging influences upon global life, nonkilling Korean leadership initiatives can be expected to resonate through them throughout the world. The four great powers can become global transmitters and amplifiers of nonkilling Korean innovations to improve the quality of Korean life and global life in the 21st century. This in addition to the direct effects of exemplary nonkilling Korean leadership in the United Nations, in other intergovernmental and nongovernmental bodies, and in civil society relationships with people throughout the world.

In the year 2000, Korean leaders and people, emerging from a half-century of hostility and bloodshed, have the unprecedented opportunity to create the institutions and policies for nonkilling national life that can help lead humanity toward 21st century nonkilling global transformation. If Koreans refuse to kill each other, no outsiders can force them to do so. The main lesson of the Korean War for Korea -as for the United States, China, Russia, Japan, and all who contributed to it, as well as for the world -is “No more killing!”

Is a nonkilling Korea possible? Yes! And so is a nonkilling United States, a nonkilling Russia,a nonkilling China, a nonkilling Japan, and every other human community. The people of Korea, South and North, can lead the way.

Appendix A

COUNTRIES AND TERRITORIES WITHOUT DEATH PENALTY (73)

Andorra
Angola
Australia
Austria
Azerbaijan
Belgium
Bulgaria
Cambodia
Canada
Cape Verde
Colombia
Costa Rica
Croatia
Czech Republic
Denmark
Djibouti
Dominican Republic
East Timor
Ecuador
Estonia
Finland
France
Georgia
Germany
Greece
Guinea-Bissau
Haiti
Honduras
Hungary
Iceland
Ireland
Italy
Kiribati
Liechtenstein
Lithuania
Luxembourg
Macedonia
Marshall Islands
Mauritius
Micronesia
Moldova
Monaco
Mozambique
Namibia
Nepal
Netherlands
New Zealand
Nicaragua
Norway
Palau
Panama
Paraguay
Poland
Portugal
Romania
San Marino
Sao Tomé and Principe
Seychelles
Slovak Republic
Slovenia
Solomon Islands
South Africa
Spain
Sweden
Switzerland
Turkmenistan
Tuvalu
Ukraine
United Kingdom
Uruguay
Vanuatu
Vatican City State
Venezuel

Source: Amnesty International, April 2000.

Appendix B

COUNTRIES AND TERRITORIES RECOGNIZING

CONSCIENTIOUS OBJECTION TO MILITARY SERVICE (47)

Australia
Austria
Azerbaijan
Belgium
Bermuda
Brazil
Bulgaria
Canada
Croatia
Cyprus (Greek-Cyprus)
Czech Republic
Denmark
Estonia
Finland
France
Germany
Greece
Guyana
Hungary
Israel
Italy
Kyrgyzstan
Latvia
Lithuania
Malta
Moldova
Netherlands
Norway
Paraguay
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Russia
Slovakia
Slovenia
South Africa
Spain
Suriname
Sweden
Switzerland
Ukraine
United Kingdom
United States
Uruguay
Uzbekistan
Yugoslavia
Zimbabwe

Source: Horeman and Stolwijk 1998.

Appendix C

COUNTRIES WITHOUT ARMIES (28)

No Army (16)

Costa Rica
Dominica
Haiti
Kiribati
Liechtenstein
Maldives
Mauritius
Monaco
Nauru
Saint Kitts and Nevis
Saint Lucia
Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
Samoa
San Marino
Solomon Islands
Tonga

No Army (Defense Treaty) (12)

Andorra (Spain)
Cook Islands (New Zealand)
Iceland (USA)
Luxembourg (NATO)
Marshall Islands (USA)
Micronesia (USA)
Mustang (Nepal)
Niue (New Zealand)
Palau (USA)
Panama (USA)
Tuvalu (UK)
Vanuatu (Papua New Guinea)

Source: Barbey 1989: 4, updated.

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