ABSTRACT
This introduction presents an overview of keywords covered in the subsequent chapters of the book. This book explores the pragmatic interest of peace research as a tool of reducing suffering caused by war. Its contributes to the reduction of the number of people killed by conflicts and political violence by offering understanding that can help remove causes of war, criticize the knowledge that constitutes the legitimate forms of violence, deconstruct social realities within which war is a rational strategy, and construct interpretations and social realities that help create peace. The book focuses on East Asia, rather than Asia-Pacific, South east Asia and North east Asia separately, or the entire Asia. It also focuses on East Asia, including the current ASEAN area, China (and Taiwan), the Korea's, Mongolia and Japan, even if it is true that the security dynamics of North east and South east Asia are somewhat independent of each other.
