Canadian Papers in Peace Studies

This book in itself is testimony to transition in the affairs of the north circumpolar region. Written in 1988 and updated in 1990, the papers assembled here have been overtaken by events. Non-military or civil requirements thus seemed to warrant a new and far more important place in our understanding of security. It's appropriate to explore not only the potential of civil cooperation in countering the force of militarism, but the utility of a comprehensive conception of Arctic security. This book will look at how these views fare, once we've had a look at the region and its problems.

It has been said many times that the human future is clouded by multiple and mutually interacting problems. While in the 19th century we had the luxury of believing in almost automatic progress - an "onward and upward" assumption - that belief has been shattered by two world wars, more than 150 smaller ones, the invention of weapons of mass destruction, increasing degradation of the environment, both by pollution and resource exhaustion (i.e. adding "bad's" and subtracting "good's" from our natural endowment), a horrendous (and increasing) gap between rich and poor within and between nations, explosions of racism and chauvinistic nationalism, increasing use of torture as a police method, totalitarian regimes, repeated episodes of genocide…not a picture of progress toward a better world. And yet, we have not quite lost faith in the human potential for more beneficial and harmonious development.