Mutual Accountability for Sustainable Peace

This chapter explores some of the ways that other-than-human guidance can help to restore the mutually beneficial relationships that bring peace and sustain life. Building on the chapter “Restorative Peacebuilding in Liberia” (in this volume), the authors examine some of the underlying principles that make relational peacebuilding such a compelling path to reconnection after violence. They look at how, in the Liberian context, conventional aid reinforces learned helplessness; how communities riven by bloodshed long for reconnection above all; how ecocide exacerbates and often precedes genocide; how a radical shift in perspective from “Me” to “We” opens fresh possibilities for healing; and they consider the role of borders, edges, dreams, and chance encounters as loci of unexpected support. They look at how trauma distorts our perceptions and compromises our decision-making, and they consider the false narrative of “progress.” In its place, they advocate that Westerners seek reciprocity rather than dominance for all our sakes. The authors have included an appendix with benchmarks and questions designed to help us make the necessary changes in ourselves so that we can redefine progress in relational rather than material terms. Above all, the events and stories related here invite us to consider a new kind of relationship with the natural world and each other, based on mutual healing and mutual accountability.