Introduction
How can we effectively address the threat of terrorism?
What helps bring about long-term security?
What stops cycles of victimhood and violence?
And what does trauma have to do with all of this?
The last century may have been the most brutal in human history, measured by the number of people affected by violence. Early in the new millennium, hundreds of conflicts continue to rage across the planet. Yet as our fractured global family struggles to find answers, little is said about the links between trauma, security, and violence.
Trauma and violence are integrally linked.
Politicians, negotiators, peacebuilders, and the general public alike tend to think of trauma healing as soft, a warm fuzzy that has little or nothing to do with realpolitik and no role to play in reducing violence. Yet trauma and violence are integrally linked: violence often leads to trauma, and unhealed trauma, in turn, can lead to violence and further loss of security.
Trauma affects our very physiology, including our ability to do integrated, whole-brain thinking. John Gottman’s research on couples and predictors of marital success or failure has found that when our pulse raises as few as 10 beats above our usual baseline, the rational part of our brain begins slipping out of gear.1 We then begin talking, acting, and reacting from the lower part of our brain where our automatic survival instincts are located.
If this physiological change occurs over disagreements about who cleans up the kitchen, what happens when political debates rage, terrorists attack, or negotiators discuss disputed territory at a bargaining table? Understanding trauma—physiologically, emotionally, mentally, and spiritually—may help to explain a wide range of phenomenon, including feelings of insecurity, loss of cultural identity, racism or extreme nationalism, and violence in general.
Trauma as a call to change and transformation
But there is another side to trauma. Indeed, the primary premise and challenge of this Little Book is that traumatic events and times have the potential to awaken the best of the human spirit and, indeed, the global family. This is not an automatic process, however. It requires that we acknowledge our own history and our enemy’s, search honestly for root causes, and shift our emphasis from national security to human security. At the core, it is spiritual work of the deepest sort, calling forth nothing less than the noblest ideals and the faith, hope, and resilience of the human spirit.
About this book
In the aftermath of events on September 11, 2001, The Center for Justice and Peacebuilding (CJP) at Eastern Mennonite University, and Church World Service, the relief and development agency of 38 religious groups, worked together to better equip religious and civil-society leaders for dealing with traumatic situations. One of the outcomes is a program called STAR—Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience—that brings together middle and grassroots leaders from areas of conflict in the United States and around the world for seminars that are both experiential and academic.
STAR integrates concepts from traditionally separate fields of study and practice: traumatology (including neurobiology), human security, restorative justice, conflict transformation, peacebuilding, and faith/spirituality. Tying it all together is a three-part model called The Trauma Healing Journey: Breaking the Cycles of Victimhood and Violence.
We adapted this model from the work of the Center for Strategic International Studies in Washington, D.C., which with David Steele, Olga Botcharova, Barry Hart, and others conducted workshops in the former Yugoslavia in the late 1990s. We are indebted to them for their pioneering work.2
Change begins with me, with you, with us.
Obviously this approach goes beyond the traditional mental health medical model, which focuses on individual trauma. Instead, the primary emphasis is on communities and societies caught up in cycles of victimhood and/or violence, although many of the concepts are readily adaptable and applicable to individuals. Indeed, the STAR approach is based on helping people understand and heal from traumatic events, while helping to develop societal and structural responses that address the causes and consequences of conflict and violence. It explores how to think about and respond to traumatic events—including terrorism—so that communities do not get caught in a cycle of tit-for-tat violence or see themselves as perpetual victims.
Although the concepts explored here apply to a whole spectrum of traumatic events, STAR initially arose as a response to an act of terrorism. Later the model was adapted further to apply to natural disasters such as the tsunami of 2004 and Hurricane Katrina in 2005.
The term “terrorism” is often used loosely, but according to Cunningham,3 it has four key elements:
1. It involves an act in which violence or force is used or threatened.
2. It is primarily a political act.
3. It is intended to cause fear or terror.
4. The goal is to achieve psychological effects and reactions.
Objectivity breaks down when talking about terrorism precisely because terrorist acts engender an emotionally charged trauma response in the victims, in their communities, and in those who sympathize with them.
This is not a book of answers but of information, ideas, theories, and questions emerging from our experiences. The question of how to work toward human security in these turbulent times without adding to the violence and trauma of our world is a huge topic without definitive answers. Sometimes it seems naive to address the question of security in the face of enormous problems. But change begins with me, with you, with us, as together we explore, observe, listen, imagine, pray, experiment, and learn.