Values for Peace and a Just World Order

Twentieth-century philosophy and culture have moved away from experience and the prescience of emotions, making studying values more abstract and academic. Amid the twenty-first century's pervasive uncertainty and disruption, the quest for values and peaceful coexistence has never been more crucial. Values are the fundamental principles or standards individuals hold, guiding decision-making, problem-solving, and behavior, fostering heroic qualities of life.

Source: Oil on canvas, 2024 by Frank John Ninivaggi, M.D.

This entry discusses values as practical virtues closer to everyday experiences, for example, life and death, war and peace, acknowledging that definitive answers may be and often are elusive. Highlighting values, especially shared values, reminds us that agreeableness is an essential human super-trait, putting hate and other forms of negativity, for example, global disruption, into a sobering perspective. Thus, a positive roadmap is presented as a realistic lens for navigating these harsh seas.

Historical Context and Meanings of Value

Philosophers Paul Lapie and Eduard von Hartmann introduced the concept of "value" in the early 20th century. It gained prominence in philosophy before declining with postmodernism in the 1950s. Understanding value and virtue helps explain how cultural trends emerge across generations.

Values, linked to worth, beliefs, and ideals, guide behavior and influence attitudes, preferences, and actions. Conscious values, distinct from implicit virtues, are tied to moral excellence and motivational goals. Values and virtues, resonating together, correlate with endogenously shared psychological super-traits: agreeableness with cooperation and neuroticism with irritability, disruptive, and hostile behavior. Values and virtues have individual roots but can be shared, becoming group behaviors.

Though distinct, values and virtues are interwoven. Values provide standards and motivation. Virtues like wisdom and justice act as behavioral compasses leading to moral excellence. Aristotle’s virtues, foundational for a good life (that is, eudaimonia), on law and social relations, reached far beyond the Western world and comprised

• prudent individual judgment
• fair treatment
• impulse control
• courage

Additionally, value has meaning in other disciplines. In art, it refers to the lightness and darkness of contrasting colors eliciting emotionality, as in the accompanying painting. In economics, it signifies monetary worth. In the life sciences, standards of value are respect for life and ethical responsibility, and standards of virtue are called character traits: honesty, respect, and fidelity to data. Thus, aggression and war prompt value and virtue thought-provoking questions: motivations, dissonance, long-lasting trauma, and intergenerational repercussions, such as revenge.

The Role of Values and Virtues in a Twenty-First-Century Culture

How do you get into someone’s head to change them when thousands of years of culture have been dominant?

Herd mentality or groupthink in soldiers is driven by rigorous training that fosters unity and obedience, strong bonds, and loyalty, often overshadowing personal judgment. The military's hierarchical structure and high-stress combat environments reinforce reliance on group behavior and conformity for survival. Individual, social, and national survival has warranted thoughtful discussions of justice regarding the emergence and inevitability of war. Social and psychological pressures, such as the desire for acceptance and fear of ostracism, further encourage soldiers to adopt group norms, leading to suppression of dissent, diffusion of individual responsibility, dehumanization of the enemy, and often moral disengagement.

A strong case for values and virtues, that is, meaning, in a twenty-first-century culture is the reality of and challenge that war presents. Material and economic gratifications, often marked by greed, have eclipsed sober and thoughtful realities of considering the life narratives of mothers, fathers, children, and families. The trauma of war obscures rational thinking, eliciting intense and conflicting emotions. Acts of aggression and threats of control, harm, and violence breach acceptable boundaries, culminating in an ultimate power struggle. This often results in killing, mass destruction, and significant collateral human damage regardless of collateral being defensively considered “stochastic.” My understanding of stochastic events: They are ultimately random, although there may be a probability effect.

On empirical levels, not only brave soldiers and defense-offense military forces but also non-combatant men, women, and children, that is, mothers and babies, are injured, displaced, or killed. Entire life narratives are disrupted, reaching through generations yet to come. The tenacity of the human aggressive drive, metaphorically described by some as a “death instinct,” is unquestionable. Coupled with the drive toward life and survival, this binary pair, that is, life and death, has been the subject of innumerable debates.

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Imagining a world where compassion, justice, and integrity are the shared values guiding nations is necessary. These principles act as a moral compass, steering societies toward ethical behavior, fostering resilience, and building solidarity against global challenges. When ethical excellence becomes the norm, the allure of war fades, replaced by a collective pursuit of life-affirming values and virtues leading to shared well-being. By embracing diplomatic engagement and the active mediation of women, the echoes of war are given a chance to be silenced by the harmonious symphony of global unity and peace, and the chances of a Third World War can be lessened.

Pathways to Peace: Key Strategies

• Diplomatic Engagement and Economic Interdependence
• Diplomatic engagement and fostering economic interdependence act as deterrents to war. Robust trade partnerships create mutual interests in stability and prosperity, encouraging cooperation over conflict.
• Education and Cultural Exchange
• Unbiased education and cultural exchange programs build mutual understanding and respect. Experiencing diverse cultures fosters empathy and solidarity, raising awareness about life's unique value and diversity, the importance of global peace, and the destructive consequences of war.
• Dialogue and International Institutions
• Continuous dialogue between nations is crucial. Open discussions aim to clarify misunderstandings and defuse conflicts. International bodies, such as the United Nations (UN) and the International Court of Justice (ICJ), founded in 1945, like the UN, play a key role in mediation and arbitration, preventing minor disagreements from escalating into crises. Their structures and functioning need to be redesigned so that more in-depth precision, women’s perspectives, and enforceability become intrinsic givens.

Cultivating a Landscape of Shared Values

In a world where the specter of a Third World War looms ominously, the imperative to embrace shared values and virtues has never been more urgent. We build bridges of understanding and cooperation by fostering diplomatic engagement, economic interdependence, and cultural exchange.

Strengthening international institutions and embracing in-depth women's active mediation further amplifies our efforts toward a harmonious global order. Together, these strategies offer a compelling narrative for peace, illuminating a path forward where compassion, justice, and integrity foster unity and shared well-being, replacing the echoes of war. Nation bullying and brute strength must be tempered by reason, perseverance, self-determination, and the right to life.