Julie Titone
Director of Communications

For a small institute, Kroc has its finger in an amazing number of peace pies.

The daily buzz of business includes running an ambitious M.A. program, teaching Notre Dame undergrads, organizing lectures and conferences, conducting research, writing for scholarly journals and editorial pages, responding to media requests, and nurturing a global alumni network. Even someone like me, who is paid to know what’s going on, can’t keep tabs on it all.

How, then, can I give Colloquy readers some sense of the breadth and depth of what goes on here? One way is to open my notebooks and share a sampling of voices from Kroc.

“If there is indeed such a thing as the afterlife and you get to meet your grandparents, I’d like to thrash it out with him.” — Yoder Dialogues lecturer Rajmohan Gandhi, when asked why the Mahatma Gandhi was not a pacifist despite his doctrine of non-violent social change.

“We will be in the field. We are not just discussing how we are going to change (the world), we are going to try it.” — Graduate student Elizabeth Serafin, in an interview for the CBS News “Voices of Peace” program.

“Countries need to learn that war is a bad bet.” — Political scientist Dan Lindley, explaining that since 1945 states have won only 33 percent of the wars they started. Dan was summarizing his analysis of all 79 major interstate wars since 1815. His presentation, “Is War Rational?,” was one of the regular sessions held for faculty to get feedback on their research. However serious the topics, these meetings are lively, with people tossing out ideas and batting them around.

“In international diplomacy, one size fits one size. There’s no case where one size fits all.” — Guest speaker Thomas E. McNamara, career Foreign Service officer. Using Libya as an example, he showed how political and economic pressure, rather than invasion, can be used to defuse a dangerous regime.

“You’re going to be faced with this stuff all the time. This is the real world. It’s global. It’s controversial. It’s tough.” — Advisory council member Ilona Kickbusch, discussing the visa revocation of Swiss scholar Tariq Ramadan. She and other council members shared their insights about crisis management during their annual meeting last September, when the institute was in the midst of the storm surrounding its appointment of Ramadan to a distinguished professorship.

“We think very often that the less a culture is westernized, the more it is Islamic. Which is wrong.” — Tariq Ramadan, talking via videoconference link to the Islamic ethics class he had been scheduled to teach. This was “distance learning” at its finest. The students were deeply engaged with the soft-spoken, sweater-wearing professor in Geneva. They asked good questions. He in turn discussed the complexities of interpreting the Qur’an, the need for Muslims to be active citizens, and the value of dialogue among people of various religions and within Muslim communities.

“We’re losing two soldiers and ten civilians a day. What we’re losing is bad, but it’s not a crisis yet. It’s not beyond the threshold of hope.” — Gary Masapollo, assistant professor of military science, in a November faculty panel discussion titled “Iraq: What now?” As someone who has been on the ground in the Middle East, Gary provided a valuable perspective. His presence on the Hesburgh Center auditorium stage was a reminder of Kroc’s longstanding dialogue with the Notre Dame ROTC program.

“We don’t have guards with us. We take public transportation. I would never dress like this — they would assassinate me.” — Guest speaker Ala Talabani, wearing a pantsuit, when asked about security for women’s rights activists in Iraq.

“Maybe people are too busy chasing money to make trouble.” — Visiting fellow Jennifer Connolly, describing an economically booming and peaceful region of conflict-ridden Indonesia. As Jennifer described her anthropology research, it struck me that most studies focus on dissecting or understanding problems. Instead, she’s asking: What can the world learn from the success of East Kalimantan?

“We ought to be dealing with big ideas, the kind which may not be doable in our lifetimes.” — Senior fellow Robert Johansen, explaining the need for a United Nations emergency service designed to stop genocide. We can always count on Bob, a Kroc pioneer, to aim high. From what I see and hear, big ideas abound here.

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Home > Publications > Peace Colloquy > Issue 7, Spring 2005