ABSTRACT
In 1967, in a project for the Council of Europe, a theory was developed for positive peace, inspired by what at that time was the European Economic Community (EEC), the Nordic Community, the beginnings of what became the Association of South East Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Panchsheel 2 between China and India, and above all by Switzerland. The aim of the project was to resolve under what conditions different states, and nations within states, could not only handle conflicts without violence-negative peace, but engage in cooperative projects for mutual benefit-positive peace. Diplomacy was needed; as an institution, diplomacy had evolved from ad hoc envoys via resident bilateral diplomacy and multilateral ad hoc conferences to multilateral permanent organisations, with the United Nations (UN) as the crowning achievement so far. Conflict theory points to multilateralism rather than bilateralism, since a two-party situation has a built-in polarisation less open to deals that can lead to resolution.
