As we move through the 21st century the notions of peace and peacebuilding have evolved time and time again to include an array of understandings with regards to what these highly politicized terms entail. Previous development discussions of war and conflict have been trapped in the same discourse, where similar themes emerge ranging from land acquisition to corrupt government rule. But the 21st century is facing a new war, a war taking place across all geographical spaces, a war that is rooted in climate change. Arundhati Roy’s The Briefing is an allegorical story that provides a metaphorical interpretation of climate change, the war on terror and the corporate raj (Outlook, 2008). Climate change is upon us and it is being made worse by the false sense of security that is provided by the solutions proposed under the convenient capitalist system. In teaching this lesson about these impeding conflicts and crises, Roy demands a call-to-action from her readers.
A Summary of the Story:
The Briefing is written from the perspective of a tour guide speaking to a group of people that have come to visit the largest fortification in the Alpine region. The fort was constructed during the 19th century by the Hapsburg family in order to halt the advance of the revolutionary changes rooted in anti-imperialism that were being provoked by the French Revolution (Jett, 2011). The guide starts by describing the fort and the motives that the people who built it must have possessed to have built such a bold structure. According to the guide book, the fort was built to store anything that ought to be defended, including weapons, gold and ambiguously, civilization itself.
After exploring the setting within which the fort is located, the guide moves on to explain the current Snow Wars which are sweeping through the region. Due to increasing temperatures the vast mountains where the fort is located are no longer covered with snow, putting a severe strain on the ski resorts and tourism industry in the area. In response, two brothers founded two separate companies, MountainWhite Snow and Scent n’ Sparkle. MountainWhite claims to provide the highest quality snow using water directly sourced from pristine drinking water networks. Alternatively, Scent n’ Sparkle promises whiter, brighter snow with a fragrance to satisfy the tourists’ nostalgia for what would have once been the sights and smells of the alps before the snow began to melt - a product described as having a true eye to the future. The tour guide explains to the group that Scent n’ Sparkle has expanded to markets beyond artificial snow and owns a TV channel and controls shares in a company that makes and defuses land-mines. Through reference to Macbeth, the guide explains how trees have unrooted themselves and are on the move, migrating from their homes in search for cooler weather. But trees are not the only ones, animals ranging from birds, bees and mosquitoes are moving up the mountains to safer grounds. The story comes to a close with the guide returning focus to the Fort That Has Never Been Attacked. The guide explains that the fort is beginning to crumble and only a few have learned to live within the rubble. The hypothetical question is then posed, that perhaps when the dust from the rubble has settled the snow that has disappeared from the mountains will then return. Before dismissing the group, the guide calls on them to commit to memory the story they have heard and go forward, leaving no footprints.
Breaking it Down:
Roy strategically weaves her story in a way that makes it seem as though it is a work of non-fiction. While the issues being described seem completely absurd, after taking a moment to ponder what has just been said, it is realized that they may not be quite so absurd at all and in fact are a depiction of our very own society. Roy roots the story in the Fort That Has Never Been Attacked, a real location in the Alps to provide a foundation for the story which gives it an element of realism and believability. However, the fort is described in the story to metaphorically represent capitalism itself. Roy both subtly and successfully creates a story that mocks societal norms, practices and attitudes which are undertaken everyday and are met with very little if any resistance. In the face of climate change as portrayed by Roy’s interpretation of the Snow Wars, if one looks at the actions of humanity and the way in which people continue to live their lives, it would appear that humanity remains oblivious to the pressing issues at hand. Like Werner Voltron, the Ski instructor in the story, is more concerned about the collapse of the ski resorts and resulting loss of jobs and money, or the Holzhausen brothers who are creating products that can withstand the changing conditions. Humanity as a whole fails to see the bigger picture or rather refuses to see the bigger picture. Rather than changing our actions to prevent snow melts and changing climates we have been consumed by the imperative to maintain economic progress as defined by our capitalist structure. We continue to form solutions that enable us to live within the environments our actions have produced, further compounding and advancing the ramifications of climate change.
In the story, Roy refers to the current time period as “Europe’s time of peace and plenty.” This statement is a blatant attack on the disillusioned state in which we live and propagate a monolithic fixation on hyper-consumerism. We take little notice of the production, power relations and transformation in our relationships with each other and the natural world, more! more! more! has become the war cry of modern day (Brownhill, L., Turner, T. E., & Kaara, W., 2012). Roy delves into depth about the the setting on the Snow Wars as she explains it is vital to understand the texture and fabric of the place to know why it has been chosen for a mission. A failure to understand the contextual dimension of a location has not only caused a lot of the issues that have arisen as part of the environmental crisis but also in terms of war and conflict around the globe. This ignorance only amplifies the violence and problems that are experienced on the ground whether it be during a peacekeeping mission or the way in which humans interact with the environment. Context can mean everything.
The reader is initially confronted with a metaphorical rendition of the expansive fort that sits astride in the mountains like a defiant lion (Outlook, 2008). The Fort That Has Never Been Attacked, on initial glance this could be seen as a symbol of peace for the lack of material conflict it has encountered. It has never seen conflict, never been under attack, or been able to live up to the purpose for which it was built. But this fort’s mystique must not be mistaken for peace. The fort symbolizes capitalism, a representation of the way in which our capitalist society has largely remained an unquestioned system which influences our mode of development. Because the walls of this capitalist entity have never been deconstructed or questioned, the system has become a tower of strength and a primary actor responsible for the war on climate change and conflicts around the globe. As the economic, political and ecological crises unfold, there is an increase in military spending around the world along with the proliferation of small arms (Brownhill et al., 2012). The military and its associated spending are the band-aid solutions used to respond to situations of insecurity and conflict in countries around the globe. This malady is no ones fault as these solutions are the ones proposed by the evil force of capitalism, or rather the Fort That Has Never Been Attacked. Just as the transformation of a country into one controlled by corporations has been institutionalized, there must be a transformation back into societies that are for people and work on behalf of the planet (Brownhill, et al, 2012).
The all too common approach to achieving sustainable peace is through liberalizing the economy and entering into the spirit of globalization while softening state boarders (Pugh, M. C., Cooper, N., & Turner, M., 2008). In the story, MountainWhite dominated the market in Dubai and Saudi Arabia and moved to push its product into the Indian and Chinese markets. Scent n’Sparkle expanded its business and began retailing prosthetic limbs in Central Asia and Africa. This was Roy’s way of emphasizing the expansive grasp that corporations have worldwide and the way in which they have liberalized the economy. But it is proven that economic liberalization and increased global commerce do not necessarily help create peace and may actually hinder the peace process because they are processes which are paralleled by increased global and civil inequalities (Pugh, et al., 2008). Furthermore, this transfer of resources to global corporations makes states more militaristic. Arming themselves on behalf of commercial interests, states start wars against their own people. Globalization in itself is a violent system that is maintained through the use of violence (Shiva, 2001). Like the fictional MountainSnow that extracted water from drinking sources, real-life corporations exploit natural resources with minimal regard for the people and communities that rely on them. Like so many past conflicts and emerging crises, improper use and management of resources is a contemporary problem of conflict and will continue to be an issue of contention in the future under the current capitalist structure.
The world is in need of a new type of corporate social responsibility where companies are making a conscious effort to reduce their impact on the environment. In turn, people throughout the world must learn to do the same. The emphasis on the well-being of the market and advancing our ability to consume is an expression of violence against nature in a system that puts profit above life, commerce above justice (Shiva, 2002). The capitalist system that is fueled by corporations has surrounded the world with processes of ecological and social breakdown (Shiva, 2002). The snow is melting, the climate is changing; as Roy suggests in her story, it is time to replace the noisy undirected spray of machine-gun fire with cold precision, choose your targets carefully. We cannot continue to consume and exploit incessantly, we must choose to either respond to the environmental crisis before the fort collapses, or wait until it does and be prepared to deal with the messy aftermath. The latter is the most common response in a post-conflict zone and the most vulnerable to the destructive capitalist re-building.
With the ecological crisis we are seeing catastrophes such as drought and famine creating societies and communities that are facing constant insecurities which then become breeding grounds for war zones (Brownhill et al., 2012). As we destroy these resources and continue to change our landscapes, we will need to find new ways of surviving on the shaky ground that no fort will be able to protect people from. It is precisely in this way that climate change has implications for peace and security (Rotberg, 2010). In The Briefing, Roy ponders how a fort that was built to withstand heavy artillery fire will mount a defense against an army of mosquitoes that is moving up the alps because temperatures keep rising. The liberal peace theory will not stand a chance when societies worldwide are denied natural resources and left scrambling to find arable land or clean drinking water. Peace processes as they stand are reformist, conservative and often do not provide a basis for the social transformations necessary for sustainable peace in the truest sense of the term (Pugh et al., 2008). Sustainable does not mean creating products that can withstand the changes occurring throughout the world because of climate change. Sustainable does not mean hoarding weapons and gold behind the stone walls of a fort and consuming goods and services at the expense of natural resources like the capitalist system would like us to. Sustainable peace will incorporate solutions that attempt to prevent further changes in the environment and provide people with a sense of security for the future. These solutions will likely be distanced from the capitalist system as a whole. The world has overestimated the potential of corporate power to build peace (Pugh et al., 2008). Environmental challenges have been placed on a second tier to more traditional pre-post conflict issues such as justice reforms, they must be raised to first tier priority (Rotberg, 2010). A paradigm must be developed that takes local voices seriously, rejects universalism, re-conceptualizes the abstract individual as a social being and limits damage to planetary life - in short we must adopt a life-welfare perspective (Pugh et al., 2008). It is then that the world will achieve a truly sustainable peace that will create a strong foundation on which post-conflict societies will be able to rebuild and the war on climate change can be won.
Conclusion:
Arundhati Roy’s The Briefing provides a much needed insight into the new security challenges that the world is only just beginning to realize, princely through the extraction of oil. Through this allegorical interpretation, an extremely valuable lesson can be learned from the Fort That Has Never Been Attacked and the Snow Wars being fought in the Alps. The greater themes of climate change, capitalism and the war on terror are presented in such a way which forces the reader to question the way in which these issues are currently being handled. None of these issues can be completely separated from one another and thus they exhibit the complexity of violence, conflict and peacebuilding. Climate change, is a war that is transforming every community and home into a war zone (Shiva, 2002); it is a war in which each and every individual holds a stake. We are ill-equipped for the war on climate change. All the ammunition, soldiers and military forces cannot protect us from this type of enemy. As Roy emphasizes, one of the greatest faults of society is to leave capitalism un-problematized, ignoring the limitations of the status quo is doomed to failure for as we move through the 21st century (Pugh et al., 2008) there will be a need for a drastic paradigm shift so as to have a future of peace and ecological security.
I invite you you read the full story online, if for no other reason than a quick read or study break! :) It can be found at the following link: http://www.outlookindia.com/article.aspx?238011
References
Brownhill, L., Turner, T. E., & Kaara, W. (2012). Degrowth? how about some "de-alienation"?. Capitalism nature socialism, 23(1), 93-104. Retrieved from http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/10455752.2011.648844
Jett, M. (2011). Fortress of Fortezza / Markus Scherer with Walter Dietl. ArchDaily. Retrieved from http://www.archdaily.com/168769
Outlook. (2008, 07 28). And a fleece that's as white as snow. Outlook India. Retrieved from http://books.google.ca/books?
Pugh, M. C., Cooper, N., & Turner, M. (Eds.). (2008). Whose peace?: critical perspectives on the political economy of peacebuilding. New security challenges series. Basingstoke [England] ; New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Rotberg, F. (2010). Peacebuilding and environmental challenges. In O. Richmond (Ed.), Palgrave advances in peacebuilding, 393–414. Basingstoke [England] ; New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Shiva, V. (2002). Violence of globalization. Canadian Woman Studies, 15-16. Retrieved from http://search.proquest.com/docview/217445573?accountid=6180g
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