This is Rotary’s moment to step up and take action...

Five years ago, I noted a grim milestone at the Rotary Convention in Toronto, Canada. At the time, there were 25 million refugees across the world – 25 million stories of heartbreak and hardship.

My own parents experienced this during World War II when they fled Ukraine in the face of an advancing Soviet army. They walked away from everything in their lives, ending up in a refugee camp in Southern Germany. And then they finally made their way to the United States and a new life.

Rotary members throughout our history have opened our homes, our wallets, and our hearts to refugees just like my parents, and we continue to do so today. Unfortunately, since 2018, this global crisis has skyrocketed. The number of refugees worldwide due to war, famine, and natural disaster, has now grown to more than 100 million.

Put another way, the number of refugees has multiplied by four in only five short years – a growth rate that no one saw coming.

We recently held this year’s Rotary Convention in Melbourne, Australia. Much of the convention took place in Rod Laver Arena, a popular venue for concerts and sporting events. Today, we would need a stadium four times larger than Rod Laver Arena to fit the total number of refugees who flee each day.

And in the next five years, if these horrifying growth rates were to continue, we would need two Melbourne Cricket Grounds – one of the largest stadiums in the world – to represent the total daily number.

Five years ago, I offered an optimistic vision of peace in the world. I noted that the world was on a long-term trend towards greater peace and prosperity. This is still true. And I still believe that we have all the tools we need to create lasting, durable peace in the world.

But I don’t need to tell you it’s been a rough five years.

The brutal and unprovoked war that Russia has unleashed on Ukraine has shaken peace across Europe and created instability worldwide. As a result of this war, progress has slowed in reaching the sustainable development goals. It has also brought terrible hardships to the people of Ukraine.

It's not just Ukraine, either. There are conflicts in Myanmar, Ethiopia, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Cameroon and in many other spots around the globe.

Now, building peace is more than just ending war. It’s also about taking on the challenges of food insecurity, the climate crisis, civil unrest, and toxic polarization.

These are huge challenges, but this is a not a moment for despair. Rather, this is Rotary’s moment to step up and take action. Because this is what we do. We are practitioners of peace, and this gives us an opportunity to fulfil our historic role, one that has been built through our decades-long investments in peace.

Because today, peace is an imperative, and that imperative begins with us, because we have the means to wage peace as aggressively as nations can wage war.

So, what does all this mean in practice?

First, we need to act in ways that have the greatest impact. The high impact work we do each day creates the conditions for peace. We know this because the Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP) has done research on this subject.

The IEP collects data that quantifies the kinds of activities and projects that have the greatest measurable impact on creating peaceful societies. Each year it publishes a Global Peace Index to indicate which nations are the most peaceful, along with the specific factors that contributed to that peace.

The data from the IEP clearly demonstrates that the interventions Rotary does in each of our seven Areas of Focus directly lead to peace. It also tells us that the projects that our members focus on can contribute to peace.

So, if you are taking action to create equitable access to water, improve sanitation, educate young girls, or to provide improved healthcare in a rural community, you are also a peacebuilder.

When you help alleviate poverty, you are a peacebuilder.

When you promote treating all people and all living beings with dignity, you are a peacebuilder.

And when you care about community over personal gain, you are a peacebuilder.

Rotary’s peace system fits nicely into something called “the pillars of positive peace”. This framework has eight factors that research shows work together to make for more peaceful societies.

One is Creating High Levels of Human Capital. That means giving every human being an opportunity to improve and grow, to have access to health care, to be free from disease, and to help their community thrive. These are precisely the types of outcomes we hope to achieve through many of our Areas of Focus.

Another is Acceptance of the Rights of Others, and we put this pillar into action through our global grant projects. These projects are not something we do for people. Rather, we design them as collaborations with people. This is because Rotary is a place where people from all backgrounds can connect, find support, and reach a level of belonging. And in doing so, we help others find that same connection, support and belonging in their own lives.

A third pillar of positive peace is Equitable Distribution of Resources. Peaceful countries have equitable distribution of income. They also have equal access to resources such as education and health. Our programs in the Areas of Focus contribute to this and help bring peace.

Finally, and perhaps in support of the most important pillar of positive peace, Rotary acts to create good relations between neighbors. This is true for how both people and nations relate to one another. And Rotary builds these good relations in three ways.

First, we are advocates for peace. Our members are often viewed as respected, impartial actors within communities affected by conflict and division.

Second, we are educators in peace. Our Rotary Peace Centers have trained over 1,600 peace fellows to become effective catalysts for peace through careers in government, education, and international organizations.

And third, we are conveners of peace. Now, when you think about convening peace, our polio work might not immediately come to mind. But over the decades, we have built community and national public health systems throughout the world and have recruited and supported public health workers who continue to have an impact – not only on polio eradication – but on scores of other deadly diseases, as well.

As part of this effort, we’ve done something else that’s simply incredible. Rotary and our partners helped negotiate Days of Tranquility that led to ceasefires so that children could be safely vaccinated. These Days of Tranquility opened the door to peace talks and the resolution of civil wars in places such as Sri Lanka, El Salvador and others.

Taken together, all the work that we and our partners have done to eradicate polio is perhaps our greatest, lasting contribution to world peace.

Now, because of Rotary’s systematic approach, I am hopeful that we can continue to make an important impact in the world and foster peaceful conditions even in places of greatest conflict. However, at times, the mere fact of achieving an end to a conflict is not enough.

The wounds and divisions of conflict are often deep and long-lasting. When this occurs, we must ensure that the cause of sustainable peace overrides any instinct for retribution – no matter how just it may be.

Recently, I had the opportunity to visit Cape Town for a Rotary event cosponsored by the Desmond Tutu and Nelson Mandela Foundations. While there, I visited Robben Island where Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for 24 years. Mandela spent 18 of those years in the highest security block of the highest security prison, in a tiny cell.

There he was permitted only one guest per year. He was allowed to write one letter every six months. Despite these hardships, Mandela found ways to smuggle in paper and pencils, and he spent much of that time writing his magnificent autobiography, “The Long Walk to Freedom.”

He also spent that time thinking of his life once he achieved that freedom. He understood the standing he had among his people. He knew that if his country were ever permitted to have free and fair elections, he would be its first choice.

When he achieved that freedom and later rose to leadership, Mandela could have sought retribution for all that was taken away from him, his comrades, and his people. Instead, he put in place a process for reconciliation that permitted everyone in South Africa to receive amnesty for the actions taken during apartheid in exchange for only one thing – admitting the truth.

That process remains a model for the world. It offers hope that all the wounds, hatred, and recrimination can be healed. It shows that even those most damaged by conflict can put aside hurt and hatred for the good of a nation.

I am inspired by Mandela’s example. I suspect that you too are inspired by his example.

And this is one of the reasons why I still have hope – even in the face of all the division, the pandemics, the wars and disasters, and our continued failure to address our greatest risks.

I have hope, because every day we as Rotary members follow in the legacy of Nelson Mandela – because we are all about bringing people together by bridging continents, connecting generations, healing divisions, and replacing resentment with hope.

That’s why I can’t help but be optimistic. But we must continue to be peacebuilders through our work in the Areas of Focus, alleviating poverty, treating all people with dignity, and caring about community over personal gain.

If we continue to be peacebuilders, we will solve the greatest problems that lead to conflict. We will help the world to heal and forgive. And we will lead the way to lasting positive peace.