In my job related Private Sector Role as peacebuilder, I think the most amenable are companies with interest in natural ressources. The reason: Maybe because they are in conflictive regions and many eyes are overthem.
One way to encourage peace activities is strengt relationships with many actors, for example in Colombia there is a net created by business, churches, NGO’s, Universities, etc. and it have been a good tool to create peace.
That’s a great example, Alexandra! What kind of activities related to peace are the businesses undertaking?
My view on this is that peace and wealth is somewhat a vertuous cycle. Certainly my own experiences in Africa, East Timor and Cambodia have shown me that business can’t start until war has ceased yet violence increases when economic growth faulters. The importance of our work is that peace is much more than just the absence of war. When peace is viewed as the absense of violence then no country today has reached it’s potential and increasing levels of peacefulness therefore result in improved business conditions.
I am not sure of the contradictions that you are posing about the GPI. Mean years of schooling correlate at 0.58 which is a moderately high correlation, however % of GDP spent on education has a low correlation. Per capita income has a correlation of 0.57, again a moderately high correlation which most independent commentators would say shows a relationship between peace and wealth. Two other indexes that correlate with the GPI are Ease of Doing Business Index and Business competitive Index. There is more but think that this is enough to demonstrate the point.
Hi Sean -
I think for business to be successful, you cannot be trying to operate in a war zone. It isn’t peace or business like black or white. It’s hard to collect payments when bullets are flying.
That does not mean that business cannot be a factor in maintaining and expanding peace. Pick a country where we have some form of (reasonably) stable diplomatic relationship that has a resource you value.
In my case, in 1999, I picked Ukraine. I had visited the country two years before, so when I received an inquiry from a young programmer, I started talking with him and after six months of casual conversation to build trust, I told him I could put him and his brother to work. I knew that Ukraine had and has a ton of well-trained programmers who are very hungry to improve their quality of life. My partner and I paid them six times the going rate over there (which was still five times less than American programming wages for young programmers) and they gave us years and years of excellent work. We finally got them into America after six years, and they still support my partner’s business.
The price has gone up, but I know the dynamic is still there: these guys are quality programmers and they are ready to work. The money they took home to Ukraine helped their local economy tremendously and led to enormous good will towards Americans.
The difficulty now with doing this is the shortsighted whiners in the U.S. who complain that I should have paid Americans and that I “stole” jobs. That’s the wrong way to look at it. Not only did I help a potentially very friendly ally grow in a peaceful and positive way, I created two jobs (my own and my partner’s) out of nothing, and our web systems helped many American businesses grow and be more effective.
Ukraine is a country that is struggling to get out from under the shadow of the old Soviet empire and the new arrogance of the current Russian power structure. Our U.S. government deliberately left them hanging out to dry twice in the last two years when the simplest statements of support would have meant worlds to these people. They are trying to stabilize their free democratic republic, but it is up to us entrepreneurs to help them build the economic momentum necessary to maintain peace and grow beyond dependence on the old Soviet trade networks (such as the natural gas supply).
Do I believe in this? I am headed to Ukraine in two weeks. 
Elsa, I could not agree more. People in struggling countries have many things to bring to the table. They have time, they have intelligence, and they have hunger. I speak not of hunger in the belly, but hunger in the heart and mind that drives them to do more to get ahead.
Before there is a vision of peace creation, there must be a vision of individual prosperity. In my case, I put young Ukrainian programmers to work. Their income helped their families and their communities escape dependence on the Ukrainian version of the Mafia.
Not every country has the groundwork in infrastructure and education. In fact, the two primary programmers I hired helped install the top end of the Internet infrastructure of their country. This is why India and China are surging ahead now, but there are many other countries with similar situations to Ukraine that can be leveraged for different industries. Not enough to entice a multinational, but plenty big enough for a small business to develop a profitable trade relationship. As you say, economic instability creates opportunity!
I still have a long way to go before I read all the comments but I wanted to stop for a moment and write down my thoughts about UNGC. I have also seen some similar skeptic comments here, too - businesses not really willing to support peace, or businesses trying to make profit from conflicts -.
Although these comments do reflect part of the reality, I would say organizations like UNGC show us a paradigm shift. Robb underlines the concept of ecological capitalism. As far as I can see, however we name it, this is going to be the new dominant paradigm. Business has a deeper mission than just making money.
Addressing the second issue will as well contribute to peace, I believe. In fact, a decent infrastructure (let it be the energy resources or clean water or just transportation infrastructure) will highly impact the conflicts. Shortly, there will be more resources distributed more evenly with the help of infrastructure and as Roger Dow claims, interactions among parties might decrease the level of tension.
I most definitely agree with Elsa’s and Donald’s optimistic comments about today’s economy.
I see “asking businesses to promote peace” not as an extension of CSR but as a paradigm shift. And the speakers obviously prove that it is possible for any kind/size of business operating anywhere on the world to promote peace.
Hopefully, the businesses/entrepreneurs will also see this downturn of the economy as an opportunity to change their visions, their understandings about how they should run their businesses.
This difference statement, in my point of view, also answers the questions about Mozambique and USA/South Africa and Rwanda. (The questions were asked earlier this week). When there is an ongoing or recently ended conflict in your lands, the numbers in Global Peace Index might be a little bit misleading.
May I jump in? Sorry I’m late to the party. 
Business’s goal is, first and foremost, sustainable profit. I happen to know, I ran myself into the ground while spending too much time trying to “do good”.
The first thing that needs to happen is an attitude shift by those who “make news” that profit is not A Bad Thing. All too often, people whose salaries and benefits come from the public trough or from some kind of populist group castigate businesspeople for building a profit into their relationships. Year after year, people who never created an ounce of value from their own minds decry the “obscene” profits of Exxon-Mobil without ever bothering to do the math and discover that their profits are actually fairly small compared to the amount of money they have to handle to get them. In this last year, they reported a profit margin of less than ten cents on the dollar.
Let’s contrast that with a typical government-funded boondoggle. I live near Austin, Texas, USA. The local transportation planning agency is building toll roads as fast as they can, and they set the toll at EIGHT TIMES what it costs to run the system, and FOUR times what it costs to be in the black (counting debt repayment). Despite known bottlenecks that cost travelers hundreds of hours of waiting every year, they refuse to consider any project on which they cannot extort such revenue. Is this atypical? Well, let’s just say that the buses in the same city run with costs that are more than twenty times their fare revenues.
As governments have collected more power for themselves, they have destroyed opportunities for business outside of their blessing. One critical factor in business is the ability to predict future stability. Politicians think they have a need and a right to “do something” – usually by writing bad checks which will be repaid through fiat money or taxing the labors of successful businessmen – and their actions, because they are imposed externally, make no predictable sense in the marketplace.
So, the next thing that has to happen is that governments and do-gooders need to stop trying to “improve” things by interfering. If I, to make a fictitious example, build an electric motor assembly plant in Mexico and thousands of people flock to my hiring call because I’m paying cash money and 20% more than anybody else is paying, I am making motors less expensive for American consumers in their washers and dryers. The laborers are happy because they have more money,. the consumers are happy because they can afford to buy a new dryer as well as a washing machine, and I, because of my profit, do not need to be a wage slave. Everyone should be happy.
The fictitious little Mexican town in my example is more peaceful, too. The workers are happy because they see the improvement in their quality of life and they can dream about what they might be able to achieve for their families next month and maybe even next year.
Okay, so why is this not happening all over the place? Well, the simple answer is that IT IS. Business is already a huge force for peace. Both multinationals and small business entrepreneurs spend far more money on overseas trade relationships than any government “foreign aid” program ever will, and far more effectively.
We do not need government to “foster this new initiative,” because it is not new. On the contrary, we need government to get out of the way and stop sabotaging successful business relationships by robbing them of profit or demanding that they comply with burdensome regulations.
Remove regulations? Yes, that is my third demand as an entrepreneur. It is politically popular now to decry “deregulation” in the banking sector of the American economy as the ‘mistake’ that caused evil greed to take over. Never mind that everybody in DC was quite happy with the tax money they were collecting and thousands of people with very few skills were making money fixing up houses to sell (“flipping”). Never mind that cable TV was actually educating people, not just turning them into vacuous idiots. Never mind… I could go on.
Now that the Progressives are coming into power in America, we will see more whining about how we need to regulate this and regulate that. My electric motor plant, for example, must be shut down because I don’t give the workers subsidized health insurance (yet). The plant next door that makes the connectors that plug my motors into the dryer has to be shut down because it includes a metal plating line and we all know how bad those are. Right?
Miemie, government isn’t the solution to poverty. Well, it is in the sense that Imelda needed to stop buying so many shoes. Business exists in the poorest of countries. It exists whether it’s the free exchange of goods without money in barter transactions or international tourists spreading cash on the streets.
Business can do much much more. Business IS doing much, much more in spite of government. It is South Korean businessmen that are driving the opening of trade with the north, and they are pushing their government out of the way.
Governments cause wars, people don’t. Governments – and those that they cause to hate them – are the problem, not the solution.
I tried to extend the last post a bit, but I guess I took a bit too long.
I make my point very strongly, and one could argue that I make it one-sidedly. Please excuse me where my jumping up and down bruises toes! I do not mean to imply that business does not include greed as a motive and that business people many times create negative consequences. My fictitious laborers choose to take my paychecks in spite of the “less than perfect” working conditions. I chose to take the paychecks of a former employer in spite of their incredibly excessive greed that put me in a hospital ICU twice and almost killed me. We each make free choices based upon our circumstances.
I would argue that government creates wars, not people. Governments – and the people they cause to hate them – are the obstacle to peace and the impediment to productive trade.
Yes, business is imperfect. Corporations can do evil things. There is one essential difference between government and business, and it is crucial to this discussion. Business is accountable, and government is not. Businesses fail or are bought up all the time – except when government props them up – and CEOs are fired on a daily basis. In government, on the other hand, egregious abuses are tolerated and excused. An individual politician or bureaucrat may take a fall here and there, but, in America for example, the Republicans and Democrats still control the machinery despite repeated proof of their corruption and incompetence… and greed.
I see very few real business people in this discussion, but it is understandable. They’re too busy keeping their companies out of the toilet because profit is really, really difficult to keep making day in and day out.
I think the most important message we can give to government out of this is that they should be dealing with the log in their own eye before they worry about the splinter in mine.
It feels great to be a part of this and I would like to thank everyone involved.
A lot of good points have been made on what is a complicated topic.
I just want to give you an example of how business joint ventures can contribute to peace. This article from the Economist talks about how joint cheese production has brought people from Armenia, Turkey and Azerbaijan closer.
http://www.economist.com/world/europe/displaystory.cfm?story_id=11412925
For those who don’t know the context, the borders that Armenia shares with both Turkey and Azerbaijan are closed due to a ‘frozen conflict’ dating back to the early 90s. That makes this effort very commendable and a real contributor to peace.
It’s wonderful to be sitting here in Armenia and sharing thoughts with people from around the world through this e-conference!
Dear colleagues I am delighted to join this discussion and may I take this opportunity of thanking WBI&ICR for this great initiative.
I agree with Mr.Robb point of view and consider that the level of awareness or consciousness of business leaders makes the difference, there will be always ‘leaders and followers’ and we could encourage leaders (persons and/or companies) to be open and share best practice/show benefits in order to involve others, to promote their way of decision making and results that they get. Invite them to develop programs on level of public-private partnership, because those people - on mission and think free and strategicly. It is highly important competence especially in our time. By the way, SME owners/leaders in many cases more open to CSR and other initiatives.
I think particularly in area of Corporate Governance there is a lack of professional ethics and ‘holistic sense’, I am not sure if I am clear, let me give an example - as co-founder of the Association of management consultants I see the role which management consultants and other consultans can play, because they are individually commited to their professional codes of ethics and responsibile for own actions and solutions. The problem could appear when there is conflict of personal and corporate interests - people choose peace. What price they are ready to pay for True Peace?
I hear from local businessman a lot that the recent global economic downturn disclose ‘was your decision based on true values?’, ‘Who are people around you’ and so on. So it is good time to reconsider personal/corporate/state/world visions and join hands opening new initiatives.
I see it is very profoundly discussion.
Yours,
Gaukhar
As a college student I have noticed that my peers and I have become increasingly concerned with the origins of the products we purchase. I choose to support products that are not made through the use of sweatshop labor or through processes that will negatively effect our environment. However, these products typically sell at a premium and with the economic crisis purchasing products, spending on what many view as “extra” is not always feasible. I have sometimes had to substitute purchasing products that carry the label of free trade or organic, for cheaper less sustainable products. I believe that the economic crisis will greatly effect the movement towards the more ethically driven spending.
I agree with you Steve. Once the private sector is able to see that peace is in their self-interest they will begin to invest in it.
With the increase of transnational companies it is in many companies interests to begin to become a partner in the prevention and resolution of these global conflicts. I believe that the more globalized the world becomes the less developed countries will treat developing countries as a means to an end. The transnational companies will instead invest in the development of these countries.
Katherine, I agree. Perhaps we can make a statement by encouraging ourselves and others to point out to businesses (when we enter their stores) that their products/services could better support the environment/peace/social development if they developed more environmentally friendly packaging, provided a ‘recommendation’ book in store, used metal spoons instead of throw away wooden or plastic utensils, etc etc. I was wondering this weekend how difficult it is to even give a friendly suggestion to a store without sounding like a complaint.
Hi everyone,
Thank you to the organisers for the opportunity to discuss this topic. I am currently doing a Phd at Deakin Uni in Australia which explores the actual and potential role of transnational corporations (TNCs), specifically those in the oil and mining industries, in assisting peace processes in intra-state conflict. This can include for example, advocacy and mobilising business support for peace; providing economic advice for peace negotiations; shuttle diplomacy; organising or joining ‘peace’ focused business organisations; assisting conflict resolution meetings/workshops between conflict parties at the local level or even national level mediations between conflict parties. While my interest lies in the full spectrum of conflict phases, I specifically focus on pre- and during conflict (peacemaking).
In identifying examples of TNCs’ involvement in peace processes, my research has necessarily incorporated the peacemaking work of domestic business involvement as often, TNCs appear to be involved via the peacemaking activity of domestic business. I am looking at examples which are at the global level, national (eg. The Consultative Business Movement in South Africa and Group of Seven in N. Ireland) and at the local levels (again, S. Africa/N. Ireland are good examples).
While I realise this is a contentious area, and am not yet convinced that TNCs have a broad role in peacemaking (my phd is a work in progress…), there are egs out there, TNCs are already involved in diplomacy and politics generally, and hence, there is a window of opportunity here for deeper analysis of what exactly could TNCs (and also domestic business) do in assisting peace processes/negotiations in a collective, coordinated and monitored fashion. Further connections need to be made between the conflict resolution fields and the business world.
I agree we will see a paradigm change in communities’ expectations of business. I think the expectation for business to show its responsibility in assisting ‘peace’ (in many forms) will become the norm. And possibly, where appropriate, this may lead TNCs to develop policies which allow them to be open to assisting the peaceful resolution of conflict in conflict-prone countries. The fact we are having this great conversation proves this may be possible as this area of research has developed so quickly in the last 10 years.
Stephanie, a couple of egs of places to look on business building bridges etc is the Institute for Multitrack Diplomacy (IMTD) in the US – they had some work in Kashmir I think. Check out Palestine International Business Forum (PIBF) – there may be something there. And the regional work of the CBM in South Africa. But, as I think you pointed out earlier, International Alert have fabulous work in this area.
In answering the original questions to this conversation:
- ‘Peace’ must be part of CSR. While we have to avoid generalisations, much of what progressive business is already doing in CSR could be placed under the umbrella term of Peace. This could help business people to then be more open to other activities which might more specifically assist peace (I think a lot of CSR work by business in Colombia illustrates this). It might also help the paradigm change in corporate culture, both at individual company and global levels.
- Most industries have a role in supporting peace. Some are on the frontline I think. For eg, the extractives but also media and communications – powerful opportunity there. But I would say most foreign companies could develop initiatives in a collective manner, which may for eg, begin by supporting the peacemaking (or post-conflict reconstruction) efforts of domestic business, NGOs and others in the country in question.
- While the global economic crisis has forced many companies to reconsider their CSR efforts, possibly this is THE time for pushing forward the ‘paradigm change’ as well as the ideas we are discussing.
Sorry to take up so much space! Just enjoying reading your ideas and conversing. Thanks!!
Stephanie, a couple of egs of places to look on business building bridges etc is the Institute for Multitrack Diplomacy (IMTD) in the US – they had some work in Kashmir I think. Check out Palestine International Business Forum (PIBF) – there may be something there. And the regional work of the CBM in South Africa. But, as I think you pointed out earlier, International Alert have fabulous work in this area. Good luck!
Hi everybody ,
I am a malagasy in Madagascar ,perhaps you can have a real case study by considering Madagascar just in time now .
It is important to acte after the conflict ,because as you say the country can go again to conflict because of its weakness .
Please support Madagascar to go in this way ,and the President of Madagascar is now discussing in SADEC meeting to introduce good business to fignt against poverty .
Thank you and may God bless you all .
Hellow everyone,
I think the question of asking business to contribute to peace would easily fit into being an extension of corporate responsibility. Businesses need peace for them to operate without disruption and be able to have maximum productivity.At the same time, where there is peace customers, will be able to focus their attention to new products on the market and probably buy more than in conlfict situations. It does make sense for businesses to contriobute to peace if they are to generate longerterm profits and get value for money