Kenneth E. Boulding Quotes

Let us ask Mary to help us respond to violence, to conflict and to war, with the power of dialogue, reconciliation and love. She is our mother: may she help us to find peace; all of us are her children!

There is no time left for anything but to make peace work a dimension of our every waking activity.

Our first and most pressing problem is how to do away with warfare as a method of solving conflicts between national groups or between groups within a society who have different views about how the society is to be run. If you look back, you will see that warfare was an invention, just as ways of handling government or taxes are inventions. You will see, too, that once people use an invention they go on using it until they find another which they think is superior.

I think nonviolence and the mediation of conflict by means of respecting civility must be promoted. But being the kind of beings we [peoplep] are - wrestling with greed, and wrestling with fears and security, anxieties, wrestling with hatred that's shot through all of us - wars are here to stay.

I want to say a simple thing, that the dividing line exists not between Jordan and Israel, but between the proponents of peace and the opponents of peace.

Middle East history is replete with examples of missed and lost chances to make peace.

Peace is never a perfect achievement.

People who talk about peace are very often the most quarrelsome.

There is a science of war, but how strange that there isn't a science of peace. There are colleges of war; why can’t we study peace?

War is a ritual, a deadly ritual, not the result of aggressive self-assertion, but of self-transcending identification. Without loyalty to tribe, church, flag or ideal, there would be no wars.

Many Syrians understand that the only option that exists is the option of peace, which means the option of compromise, .. Nobody can have 100 percent of his desires. He must compromise.

I hate the way war is seen as something inherently brutal and ugly. Yes, much of war brings out the worst part of our [people's] nature. But in war, all kinds of noble human traits have been developed, such as discipline, cohesion, pride.

Those who love peace must learn to organize as effectively as those who love war.

Peacemaking calls for courage, much more so than warfare.

Citizens across the United States are now uniting in a great cause to establish a Department of Peace, seeking nothing less than the transformation of our society, to make non-violence an organizing principle, to make war archaic through creating a paradigm shift in our culture for human development, for economic and political justice and for violence control.

I consider violence an uneconomical way of attaining an end. There are always better substitutes, though they may sometimes be a little less direct.

even when peaceful cooperation is the obvious thing, the only thing that will keep any of us alive- There are still people who won't make that choice

Every victory accomplished with weapons is a funeral that should be mourned.

Some people say, therefore, that violence and war are inevitable. I say rubbish: Our brains are fully capable of controlling instinctive behavior.

I was reminded as I was reviewing my life, that I have been in too many conflicts, too many wars, political battles, military battles, civil strifes in government. And always one lesson stands out and that is, those whom you fight most passionately often turn out to be your best friends.

If the time comes when our culture tires of the endless homicidal feuds, despairs of the use of force and war as a means of bringing peace, becomes discontent with the half-lives that its members are living - only then will our culture seriously look for alternatives.

When we seek reconciliation with our enemies, it is commonly out of a desire to better our own condition, a being harassed and tired out with a state of war, and a fear of some ill accident which we are willing to prevent.

As a nation, this is the moment to start seriously investing our time, energy and resources into proven methods of reducing violence, both within our nation as well as internationally. The cost of violence to our culture and our children is simply not sustainable.

Peace is a question of will. All conflicts can be settled, and there are no excuses for allowing them to become eternal.

We extend our hand towards peace. Our people are committed to peace. We know that peace entails painful compromise for both sides.