AFWW
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  • Overview
    • Study Guide
    • The Single Most Important Idea
    • Mission Statement
    • War Is Not Inevitable keynote speech
    • Capstone Essay: "To Abolish War"
    • An Action Plan
    • The Nine Cornerstones
    • How Far We Have Already Come
    • The Secret Ingredient
    • The Vision Thing
    • How Long It Will Take
    • What You Can Do
    • The AFWW Logo Explained
    • Examples of War Expenses
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    • What Makes People Happy
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    • Summary of the Nine Cornerstones
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    • Enlist Young Men
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    • Newsletters >
      • #44 Ending War Is Achievable
      • #43 A Global Peace System
      • #42 Women Rising!!
      • #41 Good News on Peace vs. Tragedy in Paris
      • #40 About AFWW and Shift
      • #39 Hague Conference and "Shift"
      • #38 Shift-Chapters 1-4
      • #37 Women and Ending War
      • #36 Four Notable Events
      • #35 Peace Systems and Opting out of War
      • #34 New book Shift on Kindle
      • #33 War Is Over - If You Want It
      • #32 Three Books and a TEDx Video
      • #31 An Ending-War Plan, Drones, Belfast
      • #30 Two Calls for Action
      • #29 Dismantling the War Machine
      • #28 Biology and Ending War
      • #27 Drone Warfare
      • #26 Ending War IS Possible
      • #25 Warmongers, Women, People & Change
      • #23 Special Edition - The Mutilation of Wonder Woman
      • #22 Special Edition: Film Launch
      • #21 Shaping our Destiny - Paradigm Shift
      • #20 Women on the Frontlines
      • #19 Media Favorites: Peace Movements Worldwide
      • #18 Capstone Essay
      • #17 AFWW, Sarah Palin, Origin of War, Empathy
      • #16 Women and Girls
      • #15 Abolishing Nuclear Weapons
      • #14 - Twitter, Ardi and more!
      • #13 Economics, Ending War, Building Lasting Peace
      • #12 - Nuclear Disarmament
      • #11 - Nonviolence: Powerful and Necessary
      • #10 - Economics and Social Transformation
      • #9 - Proof That Humans Can Live Without War
      • #8 - Changing History: The Next Big Shift
      • #7 Global Women Leaders Flex Security Muscles
      • #6 Economic Change
      • #5 Report: World Peace Conference
      • #4 AFWW Goes to a World Peace Conference
      • #3 Democracy in Action
      • #2 Seasons Greetings!
      • #1 A Newsletter for AFWW
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    • General & Miscellaneous
    • Empower Women
    • Enlist Young Men
    • Ensure Essential Resources
    • Foster Connectedness​
    • Promote Nonviolent Conflict Resolution
    • Provide Security and Order
    • Shift Our Economies
    • Spread Liberal Democracy
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Newsletter #18

#18 Capstone Essay "To Abolish War", Suffragists & Voting, and Male Biology (October 2010)

Ghandi
AFWW Capstone Essay - "To Abolish War"

Arguably the single biggest barrier to our ability to abolish war is skepticism: the vast majority of us don't believe it's possible.
 
In this capstone essay, "
To Abolish War," Dr. Judith Hand takes the major threads of her work on war and weaves them into a coherent whole. She addresses the fundamental error of such skepticism and explores essentials of a successful campaign to end this barbarity that is a curse on us all.
 
With the addition of "To Abolish War" to the website's others essays, the AFWW website is basically complete.
 
Over time, other essays, blog entries, book and movie reviews, links to key organizations, and similar relevant items will be added, but they are ancillary to the website's central goals to explain:

  • why we make war, 
  • what it would take to end war if we choose to do it, 
  • why our time is history is actually poised to make this huge transition, and
  • how long it would take to make the shift once a critical mass of the world community resolves to do it.

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The website's essays, taken as a whole, present the basic strategy for a "warfare transition." They describe a movement in which we take charge of shaping our future in positive directions to create a massive paradigm shift in how we resolve conflicts, including ending war. Actually, tending to all of the elements essential to accomplishing that goal and maintaining it would arguably create a shift as massive in its long-term implications as the Agricultural Revolution. Dr. Hand has called such a vision of a more egalitarian, just, ecologically sustainable, and war-free future the result of an Egalitarian Revolution. The essay introduces two different components of an ending war campaign: Constructive Program and Obstructive Program. It's vital that the role of both types of activities are understood and supported.

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​​Constructive Program

AFWW's 9 cornerstones embrace efforts that the great social transformation expert Mohandas Gandhi would have called "Constructive Program."  These are "good works" we do to prepare the ground for living in and sustaining a war-free future. If you are a social, environmental, or peace activist, it is likely that your work or the organization you belong to is focused on one or more of these cornerstones.

Obstructive Program
"To Abolish War" also explains why "Constructive Program" must be accompanied by and backed up with "Obstructive Program" directed specifically to the war machine. Obstructive Program is the kind of nonviolent noncooperation and civil disobedience Gandhi and other nonviolent social transformers have used. The essay explains why good works alone will not only fail to dismantle the war system, they can actually enable the war system to persist in spite of our well-meaning intentions. The essay also explains:
  • why we are poised at this time in history to accomplish this thing that no others before us have been able to do, and
  • two other elements that are essential to any successful campaign: female+male partnership at every level, and a group of visionary leaders to give the movement coherent clout.
Read the full essay online "To Abolish War".
Citation:  Hand, J L (2010) "To Abolish War." Jour. Aggression, Conflict and Peace Research 2 (4): 33-56.

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​Women, Male Biology, and Ending War

To end war, empowering and engaging women is essential to success. It isn't an option or side issue.  It lies at the heart of the problem. "
To Abolish War" describes three major, sometimes overlooked or not well understood keys to a successful ending war campaign. One of these keys is full female+male partnership in decision making in our lives. Why we need gender partnership is also explored from a biological perspective in the essay "Locked in the Embrace of Male Biology: A Barrier to Positive Paradigm Shift."

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Nonviolence: a Realistic Tactic for Waging Peace?
 
It is perhaps self-evident, or at least should be, that a campaign to end war can't be waged using violence, nor can a campaign to combat terrorism succeed if the chosen tactic is to kill. Violence only feeds hopelessness, futility, and anger that breeds another war, another terrorist. That being our true dilemma, what, if any, tools can we command to bring an end to the war system? "To Abolish War" explores the workings of nonviolence. It provides citations to articles about nonviolence and how it has been successfully used as a tool of social transformation.
 
But the question can be fairly asked: "If nonviolence can transform our cultures, why hasn't' it already done so?" Jesus preached nonviolence. So did Buddha. So have many other prophets and visionaries. Yet violence, including the ultimate use of violence in war, persists.
An essay, "To Date, Nonviolence Movements Were 'Before Their Time.' Now They Are Poised to Change History," tackles this critical, potentially fatal flaw of nonviolence. It explains why nonviolence works, giving examples. It also explains why the time is right now, in ways it has never been before in our history, for massive, global use of nonviolent struggle to finally succeed and produce results that last.

Quotable Quote

"Activist women-the suffragists-of the late 1800s and early 1900s and the men who supported them worked to give women the vote. Activist women of the mid-1900s and the  men who supported them worked to give women equal legal protections and access to jobs and educational
opportunities. For this generation of activist women and the men who support them, their task, their challenge, could be to abolish war."
- Judith Hand
La Jolla, CA, Rotary,
June 2008


AGood Movie
Hilary Swank as Alice Paul in Iron Jawed Angels. How women in the U.S. won the vote.

A Good Book
Sharp, G (2005) Waging Nonviolent Struggle. 20th Century Practice and 21st Century Potential. Boston: Porter Sargent Publishers Inc.
Follow Judith on Twitter
Follow Judith on Facebook
Subscribe on YouTube
A Future Without War
Believe in it.
Envision it.
Work for it.
And we will achieve it.

 
QuickLinks

​How Long Ending War Would Take


Why Women Are the Key to Security

The Nine Cornerstones

AFWW Newsletter Archives
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Why Women Should Vote (and Men Too)
 
"Governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed".
​~ The United States Declaration of Independence. 

In the United States, it's election time. We, the People, ARE the government. If we do not vote, we should not complain. If we do not vote, we should be ashamed of our indifference to this great gift of freedom that others have fought, suffered, and died for. Using remarkable old photos, this article offers an excellent reminder of why all of us should vote. It does so by reminding us of the heroines of the past in the United States who suffered to win the vote.  Around the world, their female counterparts in many countries still struggle to gain that bit of real power. The vote is how we, the governed, give our consent.

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One of the 9 cornerstones of the AFWW campaign to end war is "Spread Democracy."  Without democracy, kings and tyrants can begin wars at will. It is through our vote that we, the people of earth, can make our will heard. If we vote for war mongers, we will have war.  If we vote for leaders who believe we can end war and are willing to take steps to make that happen, we do our part.
 
So....go out and vote!!!!!  And check out the article.

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A Future Without War ​

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A Future Without War
Believe in it. Envision it. Work for it.
​And we will achieve it. 
AFWW is continually developed and maintained by Writer and Evolutionary Biologist Dr. Judith Hand.
Earth image courtesy of the Image Science & Analysis Laboratory, NASA Johnson Space Center. Photo Number AS17-148-22727
eol.jsc.nasa.gov
​
©2005-2019 A Future Without War. All rights reserved.  Login ​
  • Home
  • Overview
    • Study Guide
    • The Single Most Important Idea
    • Mission Statement
    • War Is Not Inevitable keynote speech
    • Capstone Essay: "To Abolish War"
    • An Action Plan
    • The Nine Cornerstones
    • How Far We Have Already Come
    • The Secret Ingredient
    • The Vision Thing
    • How Long It Will Take
    • What You Can Do
    • The AFWW Logo Explained
    • Examples of War Expenses
    • Biological Differences
    • What Makes People Happy
  • Nine Cornerstones
    • Summary of the Nine Cornerstones
    • Embrace The Goal
    • Empower Women
    • Enlist Young Men
    • Ensure Essential Resources
    • Foster Connectedness
    • Promote Nonviolent Conflict Resolution
    • Provide Security and Order
    • Shift Our Economies
    • Spread Liberal Democracy
  • Videos
  • Books
    • A Future Without War: 2nd Edition
    • Shift: The Beginning of War, the Ending of War
    • War and Sex and Human Destiny
    • Women, Power, and the Biology of Peace
  • Blog
    • List of Blog Posts
  • More
    • Archived Blog
    • Map of Non-warring Cultures
    • Newsletters >
      • #44 Ending War Is Achievable
      • #43 A Global Peace System
      • #42 Women Rising!!
      • #41 Good News on Peace vs. Tragedy in Paris
      • #40 About AFWW and Shift
      • #39 Hague Conference and "Shift"
      • #38 Shift-Chapters 1-4
      • #37 Women and Ending War
      • #36 Four Notable Events
      • #35 Peace Systems and Opting out of War
      • #34 New book Shift on Kindle
      • #33 War Is Over - If You Want It
      • #32 Three Books and a TEDx Video
      • #31 An Ending-War Plan, Drones, Belfast
      • #30 Two Calls for Action
      • #29 Dismantling the War Machine
      • #28 Biology and Ending War
      • #27 Drone Warfare
      • #26 Ending War IS Possible
      • #25 Warmongers, Women, People & Change
      • #23 Special Edition - The Mutilation of Wonder Woman
      • #22 Special Edition: Film Launch
      • #21 Shaping our Destiny - Paradigm Shift
      • #20 Women on the Frontlines
      • #19 Media Favorites: Peace Movements Worldwide
      • #18 Capstone Essay
      • #17 AFWW, Sarah Palin, Origin of War, Empathy
      • #16 Women and Girls
      • #15 Abolishing Nuclear Weapons
      • #14 - Twitter, Ardi and more!
      • #13 Economics, Ending War, Building Lasting Peace
      • #12 - Nuclear Disarmament
      • #11 - Nonviolence: Powerful and Necessary
      • #10 - Economics and Social Transformation
      • #9 - Proof That Humans Can Live Without War
      • #8 - Changing History: The Next Big Shift
      • #7 Global Women Leaders Flex Security Muscles
      • #6 Economic Change
      • #5 Report: World Peace Conference
      • #4 AFWW Goes to a World Peace Conference
      • #3 Democracy in Action
      • #2 Seasons Greetings!
      • #1 A Newsletter for AFWW
  • About
    • About the Author
    • Movie Reviews >
      • Pray the Devil Back to Hell
      • A Force More Powerful
      • Iron Jawed Angels
      • Gandhi
      • Amazing Grace
      • Frontier Gandhi: Badshah Khan
    • Book Reviews >
      • Fry - Beyond War
      • Hrdy - Mothers and Others
      • Myers - Why Women Should Rule
      • Zak - The Moral Molecule
    • Speeches and Workshops
  • Related Projects
    • General & Miscellaneous
    • Empower Women
    • Enlist Young Men
    • Ensure Essential Resources
    • Foster Connectedness​
    • Promote Nonviolent Conflict Resolution
    • Provide Security and Order
    • Shift Our Economies
    • Spread Liberal Democracy
  • Contact