A Plea in Favour of a Vulnerable Peace

Extract

The fall of the Twin Towers in New York on September 11th last year shattered the confidence of many people in the security of modem society. Modern society was supposed to guarantee a safe and happy human existence. It promised solutions of difficult problems through its impressive technological developments, it protected the individual against arbitrary decisions of government through its democratic institutions and kept poverty away thanks to the benefits of the free market economic system. The western world looked like a rather peaceful world, apart from some small pockets of violence such as Northern Ireland, the Basque country and Cyprus, and, at the edge of the western world, Israel and Palestine. Democratic states do not make war against democratic countries. It is difficult to count wars for it depends how one defines a war, but since the Second World War almost all the wars in the world were civil wars.

The destruction of the Twin Towers showed how vulnerable modern society is. Individuals and small groups can terrorize a neighbourhood, a community, or a state by killing key figures in society, by attacking power stations and destroying vital communication systems. In all those cases the use of rather simple weaponry suffices. There is no foolproof protection possible against those who carry a bomb on their body to make it explode on a market place, near a power station or a TV station. While in the 19th century churches often were the target of terrorist attacks and of mob violence, at present banks and large commercial buildings are the sacred places that symbolize the value system of society and thus are attacked.