Peace Study in/of the Web of Life

Abstract

What questions are the COVID-19 pandemic posing to modern civilization? While countermeasures against COVID-19 are converging on vaccination, spontaneous healing ability of organisms and ecological background of the pandemic, like deforestation and global climate change, are underestimated. This pattern of behavior stems from modern civilization’s presumption that human beings can separate themselves from nature and control it as an object. In this context, the fundamental question is how reconnect humans with nature. An essential feature of life is spontaneity. This ground of life is impossible to be objectified, owned or controlled. Both nature and humans are rooted in this common ground and connected to each other. From the perspective of indigenous peoples who have been colonized by “modern” countries, not only individual organisms but also the world itself is living. In this living world plants and animals as well as mountains, rivers and earth are living and taking care of each other. Every living thing is living in this connectivity (immanence). This caring connectivity is inherited by the next generation (intergenerational peace). Decolonization is headed for this living world. The web of life is an appropriate image to express the state in which diverse entities including human being are connected to each other. This is a dimension that is ontologically fundamental to both indigenous and modern peoples. Based on the ontology of the web of life, various aspects of the world, like research, language, technology, economy and even relations with the pandemic would change by itself.