TFF in its 26th year goes pro-peace

Welcome to TFF's new virtual home consisting of this page, the Associates & Themes Blog and - soon - the "Imagine A Better World" community.
We are here for pro-peace research, policy formulation and public education.
Unique for a policy think- and action-tank, TFF is exclusively people-financed and therefore independent of government and business.

A much better and more peaceful world is possible. To realize it, we need more than diagnoses, doomsday prognoses and debates. We need constructive thinking, imagination, concrete proposals and dialogues.

Since 1986, TFF has consistently been working for the UN norm of 'peace by peaceful means'. At 25, we now switch the balance even more in the direction of solution-oriented work. Like the doctor, we will propose solutions that can bring healing, reconciliation and peace. Peace-making is a professional activity but, like art, it requires imagination and creativity.

We invite you to share positive energy, to think and act creatively and to build bridges between research, politics, culture and arts. - The Board

PRO-PEACE INSPIRATION

Here we highlight stories, facts, individual acts, initiatives, trends, events that convey the idea that a better world is possible.

World poverty is decreasing fast and one major reason is that China has lifted 660 million people out of poverty in just 30 years - says TFF Associate Jonathan Power
World poverty is decreasing

Oscar Arias' moving and deeply convincing plea for reduction of world military expenditures
The Power of Demilitarization

Israeli citizens reach out to the Iranian people!
Iranians, we will never bomb you!

AIDS appears to have stabilized
The spread of HIV appears to have stabilized in most regions, and more people are surviving longer
Explication: The UN Development Goal for AIDS is: Have halted by 2015 and begun to reverse the spread of HIV/AIDS.
Situation: The number of people newly infected with HIV increased rapidly from 1990 to 1996 but has since fallen by more than one fourth. In 2004 the number of people who died from AIDS peaked and has since then begun to fall.
This is a most remarkable achievement. We have not developed a vaccine against AIDS, we have not found a cure. Still, education about the disease, how it is spread and how to avoid infection through the use of condoms and other measures, has been successful in many regions.
To proceed further in the fight against AIDS, the most important killer among infectious diseases, education and general access to medical treatment in every region is necessary. Sexual violence is an important cause behind infections in young women and must be decreased by education of all men.
The number of children orphaned when the parents have died from AIDS remains appalling. Fourteen million children in sub-Saharan Africa alone have lost both parents in AIDS.

Breaking - positive - news about Nigeria. And why did we never hear that?
TFF Associate Jonathan Power has just returned from the country with a series of good news

New pro-peace magazine from the Swedish Peace and Arbitration Society
Positive stories and experiences from peace-making around the world

12,000 fewer children die each day
The number of deaths of children under the age of five declined from 12.4 million in 1990 to 8.1 million in 2009.
This means that nearly 12,000 fewer children are dying each day. Between 2000 and 2008, the combination of improved immunization coverage and the opportunity for second-dose immunizations led to a 78 percent drop in measles deaths worldwide. These averted deaths represent one quarter of the decline in mortality from all causes among children under five.
The Millennium Development Goals Report 2011, p 4

Hopefully a Burmese spring
Critical voices may be right that it is the result of big power games, the US getting a foothold in a Chinese-allied country. But whatever the reasons, if millions of people get more freedom and opportunities for a better life, if parties to decades of killings agree on a cease-fire, it should fill us with joy and hope - as much as the next war will fill us with sadness, anger or despair.
Here a link to a balanced discussion of causes from Yale University

Charlie Chaplin in 1940
Still one of the most succinct statements on world affairs and ethics. Of the greatest relevance today, more than 70 years later.
Final speech in "The Great Dictator"

Send us your suggestion for a story here, preferably with documentation!

IMAGINE A BETTER WORLD

Soon to be uploaded

This is the Foundation's new project and signifies its new direction: A diverse site for the community of people worldwide who see the need to think, dialogue and act constructively; in addition we want to help build bridges between science and the arts in a broad sense.
We at TFF hope there will soon be groups and forums on a rich, multi-media variety of peace dimensions - music, movies, literature, photography, architecture, art...whatever contributes to imagining and creating a better world.
Peace is found in so many places, it's time to bring things together. Make peace visible and the better future more tangible! TFF will provide the overall idea and framework only; this community will become what pro-peace people worldwide make it!
Look out for the launch!

FEATURED ASSOCIATE

Johan Galtung

Johan Galtung, one of the founders of academic peace and conflict research in the 1950s and indisputably one of the most productive and innovative social scientists living today. A man of honour for his life-long commitment to peace by peaceful means.
He is the founder of PRIO in Oslo, of the Journal of Peace Research and of Transcend.
At 81, he travels around the globe twice a year, lectures, writes and directs projects along the way. Galtung joined TFF as an Associate in 1986, 12 years after Jan Oberg and he met at the Inter-University Center (IUC) in Dubrovnik, Yugoslavia.

Galtung on TFF 1986-2011
On TFF Associates and Themes Blog since 2012
His production with Transcend

FEATURED SECTION

Sweden - refugee integration

TFF has carried through three projects aimed at making the integration of refugees into Swedish society smoother by providing dialogue opportunities between refugees and Swedes.

The third - and current - project is called "Like Bridges Over Dark Water". The overall purpose is to strengthen individuals in transition periods of life. One part of the project deals with the hardships young Afghan boys have had to go through during their long travels alone from their home country, arriving in Sweden without any relatives to welcome them. Telling their stories - and being listened to - by means of texts, drawings and photos is both healing and empowering for these boys.

This project - funded by the Swedish Inheritance Fund - has become a traveling exhibition. First shown at an art gallery in Malmoe, it is still on the move and is being exhibited in libraries, schools and other meeting places. At openings the boys are there to introduce the exhibition, explain and answer questions by the audience. You can practically see them 'grow'!

More about these projects here, mostly in Swedish

FEATURED PHOTO

A pheasant looking out on the sky and trees, from the windowsill with cakes and a book...could that have anything to do with peace?