Paris Peace Conference makes fitting mark of First World War centenary

By Mark Ballard
16 November 2018

The most momentous event last week - the most momentous for a century, surely - was the Paris Peace Forum, convened by that wily, mischievous-eyed young optimist, the French premier, Emanuel Macron. Yet to witness the silence that followed it, you might say, it ought to have been the most momentous, for a century, since the end of the First World War, the great war, the war to end all wars, in which 17m people died. The silence that marked the end of Macron’s forum was much like the three-minute silence that marked its start, at the cenotaph in Paris, where world leaders convened in an act of remembrance of its horrors and those who died by them.

And so you might say, what effort of diplomacy could do justice to the occasion of the centenary of that war, after a century in which war continued to rage, and slaughter and ruin, and continues it seems endlessly to thrive, when it seems fears and threats are greater than they ever where, and the need for decisive commitment to counter them is imperative? What treaty came out of Macron’s peace conference? What great declaration of friendship and co-operation? What commitments to end all war? Where was the photograph of great leaders stood side-by-side on the steps of their conference chamber, with signed papers clutched pridefully and waved modestly, with smiles and touches and humble feet dancing about one another as they compete for to take the lesser place in front of the camera? War continues to rage and the Peace Forum seemed to pass without moment beyond a brief news skit. What opportunity was missed? What heritage squandered?



Yet there could have been no more fitting way to mark the WWI centenary, than to do what Macron did instead of forging a great solution, a single text by which a knotted world of growing complexity could simply declare a peace and adhere to it. Oh, they might have done, if only they could all see, if only we could all see, beyond our grievances and if justice were a given, universal truth.

What he did instead was the greatest honour to those who died. He satisfied the pacifist rallying call: why expend so much effort and ingenuity building more fearsome and sophisticated weapons, so much money and time fighting wars, when you would clearly achieve so much more by investing all that instead in instruments and initiatives dedicated to peace and understanding, to prosperity and happiness. War just begets war.

So that is what happened in Paris last week - a diplomatic initiative of proportions seemingly as varied as humanity produced a forum programme of 80 sessions, seemingly as abundant as all its problems, in which some world leaders at least and (as it was billed) 20,000 officials, do-gooders, technologists and corporates dedicated themselves to sharing and discussing potential solutions to the world’s problems. A committee of representatives from the continents selected a shortlist of 119 projects, picked from 900 submitted, from 119 of the world’s 195 countries, each dedicated to a little bit of something that might help bring about, as they say, a lasting peace.

Their goal - the forum’s theme: to increase dialogue, encourage co-operation, aid multilateralism. Its theme was the antithesis of the world of treaties, of the world in which great powers fought great wars and signed great declarations. It was, fittingly, the antithesis of the Treaty of Versailles, by which the end of the First World War was marked with, many have said, spiteful punishments that led directly to the horrors of the Second World War.

Its programme was forged in the spirit by which a great problem solver might tackle a great problem: break it down; grasp it with optimism and ingenuity. Hence, its sessions addressed all those things for which we might expect solutions to be given, that demonstrated how much work there is to be done and may always be so. And it was peppered with words such as:

security, multilateralism, sustainable peace, climate change, inequality, debt, interfaith dialogue, gender equality, trade, arms control, government transparency, blockchain, fair elections, biodiversity, radicalism, cyberspace law, food security, tax evasion, Antarctica, human rights, energy, democracy, migration, philanthropy, global governance, the oceans, aid, culture, diplomacy, civic engagement, nature, knowledge, collective trauma, healthcare, climate finance, inhumanity, trust, violent extremism, sustainable peace, artificial intelligence, cybersecurity, conservation, civic technology.
Alongside it were France’s annual GovTech summit and the Internet Governance Forum, whose programmes shared the theme. And where is the hack who can cover all that and report to his readers what solution has been found to the world’s problems and still meet a Friday deadline to write up some guff? Every one of the projects presented at the Forum was worthy of journalistic attention and yet came up from the churn of a world that has become too great to credit. Here, though, are the projects the world came up with for the sake of peace, in bites:

interfaith dialogue; 3D-printed satellites for territorial and water governance; wildlife conservation; a programme to involve common people in sustainable development programmes; plastic waste; climate change in the Niger Delta; AI ethics; protection of cultural assets; protection of Antarctic waters; helping businesses address climate change; Africa-Europe youth schemes; agricultural collaboration on environmental problems in Israel, Palestine and Jordan; China's Belt and Road Initiative; hunger; philanthropy; financial literacy; protecting civilians in conflict; sustainable soil fertility and irrigation; climate justice education; solar energy; counterterrorism on Facebook; blockchain-driven, decentralised solar energy; Taekwondo for refugees; sustainable tourism; collaborative dialogue; digital democratic charter; digital peace; diplomatic history; water fragility; entrepreneurs in Palestine; electric vehicles; refugees mentoring business leaders; multi-stakeholder collaboration in cyberspace; ending violence against migrants; index of environmental conventions; schools of forgiveness and reconciliation; increasing people's awareness of governance systems; election security; gender-responsive budgeting; the future of the internet; international norms of behaviour in cyberspace; decent jobs and inclusive growth; terrorism and propaganda on the internet; data governance; governance of geo-engineering; labour conditions in the garment sector; new technology to aid economic development; government corruption risk indicator; journalism; innovative ways to protect conflict; innovations in deep future energy; cultural heritage to engender peace; censorship and online harassment; security and justice in global governance; healing social trauma; cleaning the oceans of plastic; nuclear weapons ban treaty; ending torture as a tool of investigation; temporary employment of poor and vulnerable people; fight against fake medicines; global missing persons project; international finance for low-interest community loans; building resilience to handle population displacements; dialogue for sustainable peace-building; culture of giving; knowledge-sharing for international development; open and accountable government; global environmental treaty; ocean governance; empowering women; peace-building through health; smart cities to address climate change, terrorism and employment; a manual on atrocity prevention in Uganda; a way of measuring social good produced by companies; making wildlife laws effective; protecting human rights defenders; peace-building in Venezuela; resilience of Syrian refugees; governance of internet and telecommunications companies; restoring civil services in conflict zones; green finance; restoring trust in global finance; rescuing the Aldabra Giant Tortoise; financial sustainability of security and justice systems; hate speech; entrepreneurs in conflict zones; entrepreneurialism in refugee communities; building a village on the moon; visualisation of natural capital and well-being; global mechanisms for tackling global risks; innovation in green investment treaty law; governance and transparency in the charity sector; corporate sustainability benchmarks; opposing tobacco; preventing civilians being harmed by conflict; election interference; turning organic waste into clean coal; turning the United Nations Charter into the basis of a World Parliament; childhood malnutrition; citizen activism in Russia; conservation of the Mountain Gorilla; tackling problems caused by e-commerce; cross-border employment; youth climate schemes; nuclear test-ban treaty.

Write a treaty to deal with that lot. Better still, read that lot. Do read it. And take faith in the immense work being done for the sake of the legacy of those who died in the First World War and those who have struggled since to avoid it ever happening again. Read it and take faith that it might even be possible, with enough effort, to increase the amount of such work, so that it might soon grow and thrive more vigorously than the wars, the conflicts, disputes and misunderstandings it all seeks to prevent and allay. Read it and celebrate the fact that Macron intends to convene his conference next year and thereafter as well. That surely is an initiative momentous enough to mark the centenary of the Great War. Blessed are the peacemakers.

< Originally published in Engineering & Technology >