I snapped a photo of this sticker on the back of a pickup truck at a stop light. I often wonder if this sort of person realizes what this quaint little sticker really implies.

Regardless of the 26th annual United Nation’s International Peace Day, a suicide bomber detonated a truckload of explosives at the Kirkuk police academy this afternoon in Northern Iraq killing three recruits. You wonder if the bomber was pissed that the police recruits had disrespected Peace Day by not laying down their fire arms. I doubt the bomber had any such intentions, but what exactly is “peace” when police officers and military men must enforce it?

The word “peace” is so overused and abused it has become cliché. The word has lost all potency. We, the privileged of powerful nations, toss it around invoking warm tingly sensations justifying everything we do, as if we were its vanguard. The way we spout the word it seems it should be easy to accomplish if it just wasn’t for all those big bad people out in the world who screw it up, right? But what is peace? Or, at least, what meaning is really intended when we use the word?

Peace is a still pool of water. Peace is a wave at equilibrium. It is an element at rest. It is an element that has been left alone, seeing that when a stimulus is introduced unrest is created. It is therefore hypothesized that peace can also be made to exist by removing the stimuli which brings about unrest. If wind ripples the pool, remove the wind. But when the concept is abstracted to the social level, the meaning becomes difficult to ascertain.

Life itself is a rift in the peace of the universe. The human body is never literally at peace. We hunger and we thirst. We want and we need. Perhaps in death we are brought nearer peace, but our bodies do not rest in peace–they decompose. When the word peace is applied in social terms, it is obviously not to be interpreted literally. So, what is really meant?

In general, it is understood to mean social congruity, whereas social incongruity brings about conflict. But as life has proven to most of us, the desires of one person quite naturally conflict with the desires of others. And naturally, the desires of one nation will also conflict with the desires of another nation. This is inherent. How then is social congruity achieved?

There are two methods by which to attempt social congruity. The first can be achieved through social intimacy, where a tribe of humans are bound to each other emotionally because their fate is shared. This was the way of the Native Americans and primeval people. In this way natural social congruity is achieved. The second method is accomplished by means of power, where a ruling group first subverts the tribe and second imposes order upon the tribeless men. This is the method implemented by the organization we call the nation-state. This is imposed social congruity.

As Peace Day is an initiative of the United Nations, and the United Nations is an organization of nation-states, we can infer that Peace Day refers to the social congruity that is imposed and achieved through power. Despite best intentions, the U.N. is not concerning itself with peace among men. It concerns itself with peace between nations.

A nation itself, however, fails it’s purpose of social congruity outright. The people automotically react against the imposed order of a state. There is nothing that binds the people intimately to the state, therefore, the people do not serve willingly. Some people follow the imposed order only by fear of law and by the threat of law enforcement. Some people become cunning, and find ways to circumvent laws for their own benefit. Some develop a faith in the state and strive to change it though they disagree it. But in all cases the state is socially disintegrated. In all actuality, the state is just a precarious arrangement, that if not carefully put into order and maintained, tends to divide itself back into smaller intimate social units. But as long as the power’s that be exercise their power, the citizens of a state are obliged to act in accordance.

When you think about it, conflict of nations, be it a civil conflict within a nation or a conflict between borders, is likely one of the greatest causes of violence. Frankly, the world would be a lot more peaceful without them. Nonetheless, the U.N. hopes to bring peace by literally uniting nations under international law. And if you know anything about international law, you’re aware that there is really no effective way of enforcing it, unless a powerful nation decides to exercise influence and take measures to see it enforced.

While the U.N. aims at facilitating international cooperation, it still falls prey to inherent problems that arise from a world of independent nations. The U.N. only has the power that its member states grant it. It cannot demand nations to disarm their police force or military. It cannot stop a nation from exercising its power. The U.N.’s political influence is about as effective as the faint words of a mother to a schoolyard of bullies, outcasts and runts. With this dismal picture, what strategy does the U.N. have imposing world peace?

Obviously, “imposed peace” must be imposed by means of power, and if we’re talking world peace, it would have to be one world power. The U.N. itself could never serve as the hegemonic power that would be required to impose peace around the world, but it could potentially facilitate one powerful nation or a group of powerful nations into a position of hegemonic power.

Such a world order would act similar to the federal government of a nation, but it would have no other nations to war against, because it would be the only entity to influence war. It is obvious that a certain level of order may be accomplished by a world power, but do we really want this peace if it requires hegemony?

Even though the U.N. hasn’t thought this far ahead, ultimately, this is how world peace is to be won. One should be reminded, that this type of peace, just as with the nation-state, is imposed, and therefore always tends to disruption. Similar to the nation-state, this world order would have to take police action against it’s own people who break it’s laws and challenge it’s dominance. And we’re back where we started. What is peace where it must be enforced by police officers or military men?

After this analysis, it becomes difficult to use the word ‘peace’ at all to describe what is intended by Peace Day. The word becomes completely inappropriate. In essence, the “peace” which the U.N. intends to promote is the same peace that is won when a hostage submits because he has a gun held to his head. The more fitting term is “order.” Thus, Sept. 21 should be more appropriately called Order Day.

The way I see it, the concept of peace is not at all applicable to humanity. Social interaction inherently involves conflict. The characteristic that marks a good social group is the way in which these conflicts are handled. When these conflicts are handled well, I would call this social harmony, not peace. Peace is lifeless and still. Harmony is a progression of diverse and changing tones, which work themselves together in a complimentary fashion.

So then, if the question is how to accomplish social congruity, we must take a step back to the two methods by which it can be achieved. Since we have found that social congruity imposed by power is detestable, we must choose the route of social intimacy. Only in this way may social harmony be restored.