ABSTRACT
Confronted with the question of world peace, the concerned observer usually comes face-to-face with the need for "system transformation." That is, we come to recognize that the organization of peoples into nations and the patterns of interaction among those nations have given us unacceptable amounts of poverty, exploitation, and indignity, as well as an average of two international wars every three years. The possibility of system change, however, brings with it the probability of violence. We now have a global system in which almost all important change either rests upon, or leads to, violence. Whether it is the redistribution of wealth, power, or status, and whether the protagonists are individuals, ethnic groups, classes, or nationalities, we seem unable to achieve the desired changes without a high level of associated violence. Clearly, any global system that is so impervious to change without violence must be radically transformed.
