Major wars are down, but rebellions within states and rising murder rates in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa account for decline in peacefulness
WASHINGTON (Thomson Reuters Foundation) - The world has grown more violent over the past six years, driven by political instability, a rising murder rate in Latin America and sub-Saharan Africa and higher levels of military spending, according to the 2013 Global Peace Index.
While state-on-state violence has declined as the Iraq and Afghanistan wars wind down, rebellions within states have risen both in number and intensity, contributing to the overall decline in peacefulness between 2008 and 2013, the Washington-based think tank Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP) said in its latest report.
Syria’s ranking has plunged by 70 percent over the past six years, the biggest decline ever seen in the index, followed by Cote d’Ivoire. Meanwhile, Chad, Haiti and Georgia have seen the most improvement since 2007.
Overall, the Global Peace Index has declined by five percent in the 2008-2013 period, and the gap between peaceful and violent states has widened.
“Peace is becoming more unequal,” said IEP research director Daniel Hyslop. “The bottom 10 countries have really separated out, and Iraq and Afghanistan have become less peaceful than they were in 2008.”
Meanwhile, the top 10 countries - mostly in northern Europe, plus Japan and New Zealand - have remained quite constant.
The failure of fragile states to make much progress despite the billions of dollars of development aid funneled into them and attempts to enforce peace through military intervention raises questions about the type of assistance for highly unstable environments. Afghanistan, Somalia and the Democratic Republic of Congo all have seen their scores deteriorate.
HOW TO SPREAD PEACE
In a more optimistic sign, there were improvements in the Positive Peace Index, which measures attitudes and institutional structures considered building blocks for a peaceful society.
This index has gained by 1.7 percent since 2005, providing some clues as to what works in spreading peace. The gains were led by countries that saw improvements in resources distributed more equitably, respect for the rights of others, the level of human capital, free flow of information and a well-functioning government.
Melanie Cohen Greenberg, president of the Alliance for Peacebuilding, said this points to the importance of including peace measures in the next round of Millennium Development Goals, which the United Nations is working on as the new yardstick for guiding development aid to impoverished countries from 2015.
Here are other key findings:
- Europe remained the most peaceful region overall, with 13 of its countries in the top 20, though it slid somewhat in 2012, largely due to political upheaval from the euro-zone debt crisis.
- South Asia was the least peaceful region.
- Countries that have become more violent saw a 15 percent drop in official development aid.
- Homicides rose by 8 percent over the last year. In Mexico, there were more than 2,500 deaths from its drug wars in 2012 - twice as many deaths as there were lives lost in the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. Homicides also have risen in Honduras, El Salvador and sub-Saharan Africa, but stayed flat in the United States.
- Military spending as a share of GDP rose in many countries from 2012 to 2013, though in the United States it has declined from 4.6 percent to 4.1 percent.
COST OF VIOLENCE
The report also estimated for the second year in a row the cost of containing global violence. It measured economic activity associated with the prevention of violence, such as policing and prisons, or the impact of violence such as the destruction of people and property.
It put the bill at $9.46 trillion in 2012, or 11 percent of gross world product. To put the sum in perspective, that is more than double the value of the world’s agricultural production. Homicides accounted for 15 percent of the costs.
The Global Peace Index ranks 162 countries and is based on 22 measures in three categories - safety and security in a nation, the extent of domestic or international conflict, and the degree of militarization. The Positive Peace Index measures 126 countries.
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