Democracy and social justice for peace

Iranian women shout slogans during a protest against women who violate the strict Islamic dress code in Tehran, Iran, on July 12, 2014. Hijab, a coverage of hair and body for women, has been obligated in public after the Islamic revolution in Iran in 1979. (Photo : Xinhua)

These days, peace is endangered in the world. Many good people, public institutions and international organizations are working to establish peace in the world, but the question we should ask is: what is “peace”? In other words, the question is: “Does peace mean no war?” The answer is “NO.” This definition belongs to some centuries ago, but in the 21st century and current situation, we have to define the new meaning of peace. There is no difference if a man is killed by being shot by an enemy in the battlefield or by inaccessibility to safe drinking water or a lack of access to health and medicine. There is no difference if a man is imprisoned for many years because of writing an article or due to being arrested by foreign enemies. So, although there is no war in many countries in the classic and formal sense, it is still not peaceful. Therefore, peace should be defined as “the set of conditions where man can live freely with dignity.” In order to make peace stable in one society, two factors need to be paid attention to: 1) democracy and 2) social justice.

Without these two factors there will be no stable peace in any community. Democracy also does not mean rule of the majority or rulers being chosen in elections. Do not forget that many dictators came to power through democracy- like Hitler.

Upholding human rights
Democracy has a specific framework that should be adhered to. The framework of democracy is the criteria of human rights. This means that the majority, which has come to power through a democratic election, only has the right to rule in the context of democracy. Winning the votes does not give them the right to ignore the rights of other regions or ideologies of citizens. In other words, governments do not get their legitimacy just from the ballot box, but also from the people’s votes with respect to human rights. Obviously, when we talk about human rights, we cannot forget that half of the population are women.

An example of this case is Iran, where in a referendum in April 1979, more than 90 percent of people voted for the “Islamic Republic.” Hence, the constitution was ratified by a large majority.

In other words, theocracy was established by the majority of Iranian people’s votes, not by a coup. But the government almost from the first year started to ignore human rights and lost legitimacy. It even made discriminatory laws against the women – half of the population. Below, I mention a few examples of these rules.

According to the law in the court, two female witnesses are equivalent to one male witness. The worth of a woman’s life is half of a man’s life. It means that if siblings go into the street and get in a car crash or are attacked by someone and both are equally wounded or killed, the compensation for a man is twice that of a woman. According to the law, a man is allowed to have four wives and he can divorce his wife any time he wants without any legitimate excuse. But, divorce is very difficult for women because of these adverse conditions. These laws have made unfavorable and unfair conditions for women in Iran.

I will mention one last example. On June 20, 2014, when the Iranian and Italian volleyball teams had a match, a number of Iranian women wanted to watch the match and cheer on the Iranian volleyball team. But, when they went to the stadium, they faced an irrational order in which women were not allowed to enter the venue because the male athletes were wearing shorts. The women protesters were opposed by the violent reaction of the police and some female protesters were arrested. This is just a small example showing how little things can cause social tension.

One man equivalent to two women
Another basis for peace is “social justice.” Societies with high distinctive classes cannot be in peace. Wealth due to corruption and robbery are the main causes of tension and riots. It is not possible to keep people in hunger forever and violate their rights and expect them not to react. When we look at the revolutions and uprisings, especially in the Arab Spring, we can see that the root of the problem lies in the lack of democracy and social justice. If people like Gaddafi had paid more attention to democracy and respected people’s rights, he would not be facing a painful destiny and Libya would not be suffering from violence and tensions now.

Any government seeking stability should inevitably consider the real meaning of democracy and the fair distribution of wealth, not just the number of votes. Otherwise, they will face people uprising not far in the future.