Peace.(from the editor)(Editorial)

We've descended from a people who have always desired for peace. We are a people who have been repressed, mutilated, raped, murdered, silenced for the sake of peace. Ours is a history of violence and war. For some of us, peace is unnatural.

And we are not just talking about the sporadic skirmishes, the revolts, the wars and Martial Law. We are also talking about the continuing violence of our inexorable integration into the dominant society which is, itself, being pulled towards a global culture of materialism accumulation and individualism. We speak of the continuing oppression of patriarchy, sexism, poverty and political inequity. We have, as a people, waged war against all these evils--a battle that has gone on far too long and cost far too many lives.

As 2003 draws to a close, we are given yet another opportunity to reflect on our troubled world and our distressed individual lives. Several revolutions later, more than a hundred years after, we are still confronted with exactly the same problem that our awakened forebears have faced: of powerlessness and repression. Our struggles for peace have failed. Where have we gone wrong? Have we been looking for peace in all the wrong places? Have we been following the wrong road? Have we done enough?

Peace is a universal search. In a world of perpetual tensions--ethnic, racial, political, social and economic conflicts--every one dreams of peace. Ironically, every one is willing to fight the other for ...