Why peace remains elusive: Beyond democracy and reason

The Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded over a hundred times since 1901 for remarkable efforts to promote peace. Yet, few have examined the deeper question of why violence emerges in the human mind in the first place, or how it can be nipped in the bud.

The pursuit of peace is a worthy endeavor, and numerous organizations reward exemplary efforts in this field. The Nobel Peace Prize is the most prominent among them, having been awarded 105 times since its inception in 1901.

But is the world any more peaceful now than it was in 1901? In the century since, humanity has witnessed two world wars and countless regional conflicts. The answer, unfortunately, is an unequivocal no. This is because we possess a flawed understanding of why violence emerges and how it can be prevented at its source.

We must identify the root causes of war rather than simply trying to prevent the next one. To do so, we must address the two “elephants in the room”: (1) Democracy does not necessarily ensure peace, and (2) Reason alone is insufficient to solve all problems.

Democracy Does Not Necessarily Ensure Peace

There is a widespread conviction that democracy, as a form of government, ensures peace. A survey on NobelPrize.org found that 83% of respondents concurred that democracy is a precondition for lasting peace.

For example, regarding the Nobel Peace Prize and the recognition of figures such as Venezuelan leader Maria Corina Machado, the Chairman of the Norwegian Committee has remarked on the importance of “keeping the flame of democracy burning during a growing darkness.” While the tireless efforts of leaders like Ms. Machado are laudable, they cannot, by themselves, guarantee peace.

Democracy can only ensure peace when the internal and emotional excellence of its citizens is sufficiently high.

A high level of internal/emotional excellence implies that the vast majority of citizens possess qualities such as truthfulness, honesty, steadfastness, equanimity, loving-kindness, empathy, and compassion. Conversely, a low level of excellence is characterized by anger, hatred, hostility, resentment, frustration, jealousy, fear, guilt, and sorrow.

In the Bhagavad Gita, Sri Krishna counsels that the societal level of internal/emotional excellence undergoes transformation over thousands of years. As this level rises, society rises; however, it cannot increase indefinitely. When it reaches its peak, it begins to decline, and society follows suit. This recurring transformation induces the rise and fall of civilizations over millennia. (For more on this, see the author’s article: A Chemical Engineer Learns New Lessons from the Bhagavad Gita).

There are no exceptions to this rule. All civilizations, no matter how great, have eventually declined. Some, like India and China, which declined thousands of years ago, are now rising again. Quantitative evidence of this cyclical nature can be found in the Encyclopedia Britannica.

Therefore, democracy is not the true arbiter of peace; internal and emotional excellence is. Concerted efforts must be made to enhance this excellence in everyone for sustainable peace to become a reality.

Democracy is not the true arbiter of societal excellence; internal/emotional excellence is.

Reason Alone is Insufficient to Solve All Problems

The tremendous human progress driven by scientific discoveries in the West since the Renaissance has led much of the world to conclude that reason alone is sufficient to solve all problems. The products of reason—science, laws, and policy—are viewed as the ultimate tools.

This confidence in the primacy of reason is reinforced by the philosophy of the 18th-century German philosopher Immanuel Kant, who asserted, “All knowledge begins in the senses, flows then to the understanding and ends in reason. There is nothing higher than reason.” The myriad approaches to achieving peace currently being tried fall into this category.

In contrast, the 19th-century yogi Swami Vivekananda asserted, “Indian thought dares to seek and succeeds in finding something higher than reason.”

Journalist Ann Bardach has noted the surprising and continuing influence of Swami Vivekananda in America (The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal). The Vedas and Upanishads are examples of this “something higher than reason” from the ancient past; the ancient seers made these discoveries without a preexisting database of human knowledge to draw from.

Examples of “something higher than reason” in modern times include:

1. Cultivation of intuition: Knowing something without access to the five senses.
2. Mind reading.
3. The discoveries of S. Ramanujan: The mathematician who would write down theorems and proofs without knowing the intermediate steps.

The relevance of this to peace is clear: if a society transforms itself to a higher level of internal/emotional excellence—embodied by truthfulness, equanimity, and compassion—it will emerge peaceful. If negative emotions like anger and hostility remain widespread, it is a recipe for conflict.

Preponderance of negative emotions is a recipe for conflict, discord, and violence.

This transformation is not an intellectual exercise; it cannot be brought about by reason alone. The only way to achieve this is to transcend reason. Meditation—or more generally, yoga, bhakti (devotion), and samarpan (surrender)—are pathways to enhance focus and achieve the transformation that brings peace.

It is, of course, impractical to expect all eight billion inhabitants of Earth to sit in meditation. This is where the late Maharishi Mahesh Yogi’s wisdom comes to the rescue. The concept known as the “Maharishi Effect” holds that even a very small percentage of the world’s population meditating will make the world as a whole more peaceful. Recognizing this potential, the Global Union of Scientists for Peace published a full-page letter in The Wall Street Journal on November 3, 2023, urging the President of the United States and world leaders to adopt this technology for world peace.