Creating Positive Peace: Transitional Justice & A State’s Hierarchy of Needs
Transitional justice practitioners help states build stable societies by using various tools that help a state meet diverse needs as it emerges from conflict. They reform corrupt government institutions. They compensate victims of tragic crimes. They facilitate painful conversations to inform history. They punish those responsible. Transitional justice practitioners operate in complex and tentative situations, where complete information is rare, emotions are high, and the needs are many. Despite transitional justice’s increasing presence in peace building efforts, however, experts have not yet produced a comprehensive framework that helps practitioners anticipate how a society’s various needs will emerge over time, or evaluate what tools they can use to best satisfy those needs.
It is the goal of this paper to produce such a framework – a Hierarchy of State’s Needs. This hierarchy draws on psychologist Abraham Maslow’s theory on man’s five needs, to formulate the five needs of a state. After demonstrating how man’s needs relate to society’s needs, this paper will address how schools of international relations thought have traditionally failed to provide adequate insights into a state’s peace building process, and present the Hierarchy as an alternative approach. Finally, it will explore the Hierarchy’s practical application in post-conflict settings by relating seven mechanisms used within transitional justice. Through this, a new perspective is offered on how practitioners may approach both the imminent and emergent needs of a post-conflict society to help create positive peace.
Introduction
In 1943, American psychologist Abraham Maslow introduced his theory on man's hierarchy of needs. The theory meant to identify and organize the essential needs and aspirations human beings seek to fulfill in life. Drawing on psychological and biological research, Maslow determined there to be five motivational factors driving peoples’ actions. Following the hierarchy from the most urgent needs at the base upward, the five factors include: Physiological Needs, Safety, Sense of Belonging, Esteem, and Self-Actualization. Independent of one another, each factor represents a unique need, that when unsatisfied, becomes of primary importance to the individual. When all needs are met, they amount to a life fulfilled.
Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs
While none of the needs is sufficient in defining an individual’s success, all are critical. Maslow explained this progression, noting "It is quite true that man lives by bread alone when there is no bread. But what happens to man's desires when there is plenty of bread, and his belly chronically full? New (and higher) needs emerge" (38). Hence, the hierarchical structure Maslow chose to frame his theory of “relative prepotency” (38). A need’s position towards the top of the hierarchy is not interpreted as it being either superior or inferior to needs lower on the hierarchy. Instead, each need within the hierarchy can be seen as a critical building block. Needs at the base form the foundation from which all other needs can emerge. Needs at the pinnacle represent the culmination of all other needs being met. Each of Maslow’s five needs is examined in greater detail below.
Physiological
Maslow notes that at his most basic, man is primarily concerned with his own wellbeing. To achieve and maintain wellbeing, a person must have – among other things – food to eat, opportunity to sleep, and air to breathe. Many physiological needs can be explained by findings from clinical studies on homeostasis. Biology dictates that humans need to maintain a constant level of nutrients to function. When any one of these nutrients is deficient, the body craves its replenishment. Thus, a person’s actions revolve around correcting these chemical imbalances. Some physiological urges – like exercise and sexual desire – are independent from homeostatic demands. Nevertheless, they constitute biological needs drawn from innate sources. These needs are involuntary, and thus, they shape an individual’s behavior. They are also nonnegotiable. Ignoring or depriving these needs greatly diminishes a person’s quality of life, and in some instances leads to death. As will be explained, these constraints on an individual’s wellbeing are the same constraints that affect a state’s stability at a societal level. Only once these physiological needs have been met do additional types of needs then concern man.
Safety
Safety occupies the second tier in Maslow’s Hierarchy. It includes security, stability, protection, and freedom from fear, anxiety and chaos, among other aspects. Maslow argues this need is most easily discerned among babies, who have not yet been desensitized to fear-invoking stimuli. Loud noises that startle babies – like thunder or sirens – are examples. Unlike babies, adults have experiential and educational foundations that help them rationalize their responses to startling stimuli. These foundations are strongest when an adult lives in a society governed by liberal, democratic ideals. Maslow contends, “The peaceful, smoothly running, stable, good society ordinarily makes its members feel safe enough from wild animals, extremes of temperature, criminal assault, murder, chaos, tyranny, and so on” (41). In this sense, the safety need extends itself beyond an individual level to a societal level.
Belonging
Maslow argues that man, upon gratifying his physiological and safety needs, will then look to meet a newly-emerged need: Belonging. Belonging involves overcoming feelings of isolation, rejection, or rootlessness. To capture the effects of these feelings, Maslow reviewed anthropological and literary accounts describing individuals’ struggles with urbanization, familial relocation, and breakdown of community groups. He observed that these social trends led to the destruction of identity among individuals, who by nature have a tendency to associate with “one’s own kind” (44). He concluded that without relationships, individuals cannot define themselves by comparison with another. This perpetuates a dangerous feeling of isolation inspired by the unknowingness of what meanings underlie a person’s actions and preferences.
Subsequent research within the last 60 years from the fields of psychology and international relations echoes Maslow’s theory of belonging. Dr. Erik Erikson, whose theory on “Identity Crises” forms the basis today for much work in psychoanalysis, concurs that individuals who have not found “contact with the productive aims of the machine age or that they themselves belong to a social class,” are likely to be “schizoid” or “delinquent” (185). These consequences affect not only the individual, but also their family, community, and society writ large.
The societal implications for these individuals’ behavior can be seen in the emergence of violent extremism – from local street gangs, to religious fundamentalists, to Right Wing organizations. Social scientists Tore Bjorgo and John Horgan articulate the root causes of the phenomenon in their book, Leaving Terrorism Behind. They explain, “individuals do not necessarily join extremist groups because they hold extremist views; they sometimes acquire extremists views because they have joined such a group for other reasons” (3). These reasons can include, among others, protection, drifting, the search for families and father figures, the search for friends and community, or the search for identity and status (Bjorgo 32). A look at the Nazi Wehrmacht in World War II through the analysis of sociologists Edward Shils and Morris Janowitz supports this reasoning. They assert that, “more important in the motivation of the determined resistance of the German solider [than his political convictions] was the steady satisfaction of certain primary personality demands afforded by the social organization of the Army” (281). Writing a decade later, Maslow built on Shils’ theory, positing that the belonging need can play an important role in people’s decision to join extremist groups. In his analysis, the connection between individual and societal needs becomes evident:
My strong impression is also that some proportion of youth rebellion groups – I don’t know how many or how much – is motivated by the profound hunger for groupiness, for contact, for real togetherness in the face of a common enemy, any enemy that can serve to form an amity group simply by posing an external threat. The same kind of thing was observed in groups of soldiers who were pushed into an unwonted brotherliness and intimacy by their common external danger, and who may stick together throughout a lifetime as a consequence. Any good society must satisfy this need, one way or another, if it is to survive and be healthy (44).
Some critics argue that Maslow and Schils and Janowitz’s emphasis on social benefits overstates the case. They contend that draconian discipline, peer pressure, and ideological brainwashing play greater roles in forming group cohesion than does the appeal of social belonging (Bartov 104). However, the idea that any violent extremist is influenced – to any degree – by the social benefits afforded to him or her through membership retains relevance; Bjorgo and Horgan note a sense of belonging can be one of several motivations for joining extremists groups. Interestingly, their research also confirms that extremists will likely leave, or desert, these groups if and when their own physical safety is threatened (20). This affirms the notion that individuals have a hierarchy of needs, and that when one more necessary need is threatened (in this example, Safety), higher needs (Belonging) are sacrificed.
Esteem
Maslow posits that Esteem marks the penultimate need for man. This need has two aspects. First, man desires mastery of his technical skills. Second, he desires reputation or prestige for achieving this mastery. When fulfilled, these two aspects will lend an individual satisfaction in the form of confidence, self-worth, credibility and adequacy (Maslow 45). Without them, an individual can feel inadequate or weak. As the fourth need in the hierarchy, esteem is less essential to an individual’s survival than the needs identified at the base of the hierarchy. Unlike certain physiological, safety – and to an extent, belonging – needs, esteem needs contribute more to an individual’s quality of life. It gives meaning and weight to all other achievements. By satisfying this need, man can then think about realizing his fullest potential.
Self-Actualization
The culminating point in man’s hierarchy is Self-Actualization – where Maslow suggests man advances beyond technical skills and adopts a personal mission. At this stage, he recognizes a social need or injustice outside of himself and works to rectify it. He is selfless because he can be as he has satisfied all of his own needs. Maslow uses the inventive German word gemeinschaftsgefuhl – meaning “social interest” – to capture the essence of the self-actualized man. He notes, these individuals “have a deep feeling of identification, sympathy, and affection…they have a genuine desire to help the human race” (145). The notion of self-actualization suggests man’s life is unfulfilled until he moves beyond his own concerns. Maslow proposes there is an innate desire among people to help others. Logically, this desire can only be addressed once essential, life-sustaining needs of the individual have been met. Then, and only then, can man concern himself with helping others, correcting prejudices, establishing norms, and advancing humanity.
Maslow’s Hierarchy is a powerful tool for understanding human nature. It accomplishes two important tasks. First, it identifies five sources of motivation that influence a person’s behavior. Second, it organizes these five needs based on degree of necessity – which needs must exist before other needs can exist? It is this aspect of Maslow’s theory that is most genius. He bonds together seemingly discrete needs – creating a single unit that respects the dynamic relationship between an individual’s fundamental and abstract needs.
A State’s Hierarchy of Needs
Like individuals, societies also have fundamental and abstract needs. Traditionally, however, transitional justice and legal scholars have made unconvincing arguments about how to anticipate any given society’s needs, and how those needs might dictate a response from its government (assuming the state is an established or emerging liberal democracy). These arguments have relied most heavily on either of the two dominant schools of international relations theory – Realism and Liberalism.
Realism posits that global or regional hegemony and national security interests drive states’ actions. Because the world is a naturally violent place, realists argue, peace and stability can only be achieved through domination. It is a zero-sum game between states, where one state’s rise is another state’s demise. To ensure their survival, states will wage war, or else band together in protective alliances against stronger aggressors. The theory garnered much support during the Cold War, when the USSR and US raced to build nuclear weapons, technological innovations, and spheres of influence around the world. However, it has ceded some relevance since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Today, Realism fails to explain the potency of international organizations like the United Nations or World Bank, and the cooperative environments they breed. It focuses its analysis on absolute security, downplaying a host of other motivations that may drive a state’s actions.
A similar critique may be levied against Liberalism. Liberalism contends that economic interdependence and institutionalized norms are sources and insurers of cooperation between states. Mutual benefits fostered in this collaborative environment will mean war is less likely for states that share similar democratic and free-market values. States that govern by different philosophies – like authoritarian regimes or illiberal democracies – are not guaranteed the same benefits since they threaten the system. The theory has been revived in recent decades, as international and regional organizations have grown in number and influence. However, there is a serious complication to Liberalism: like Realism, it relies too heavily on one factor to explain what drives a state’s actions. Whereas Realism undervalues cooperation, Liberalism undervalues the role of national security.
Both these theories make strong arguments. States certainly concern themselves with security threats, as realists emphasize; States also enjoy cooperative arrangements between friendly governments, as liberals like to note. However, there are scant writings that put Realism and Liberalism in harmonious dialogue with one another. Liberal theorist Michael Doyle explores the edges of this approach, arguing, “Given a world of diverse moral identities within and between human beings, we need an ethics of statesmanship capable of accommodating our diverse moralities. Each of our visions of morality has a legitimate sway on our identities, interests, and duties” (500).
In pointing out a state’s diverse needs (or, as he calls them, “moral identities”) Doyle sees the need and benefit of using both Realism and Liberalism as guiding philosophies for policymaking. He suggests policymakers alternate between Realist and Liberalist approaches as deemed necessary to achieve “rotating” policy priorities (501). His solution, however, implies that Realism and Liberalism have an “either/or” relationship: Either the policymaker uses Realism to achieve national security, or the policymaker uses Liberalism to promote human rights and development. While explaining that these can be mutually enforcing priorities, Doyle’s approach limits the possibility of policymakers using Realism and Liberalism simultaneously. Thus, the dynamic relationship between security, cooperation, and norms creation goes unaccounted for. So too does the role that transitional justice plays in helping states achieve each need as the state emerges from conflict settings.
Doyle’s interpretation of the relationship between Realism and Liberalism succeeds in one important regard: it accounts for the role played by individual citizens’ needs in state policy-making. What a person experiences on an individual level relates directly to what a state experiences at a societal level. States that ignore this reality do so at great risk – especially if they are newly emerged from conflict. Because individual needs translate into societal needs, transitional justice practitioners should evaluate their strategies’ effects on individuals. Realism and Liberalism do not afford much opportunity to do this. These limitations can be overcome by applying Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs to a state.
States – and the societies that comprise them – have both fundamental and abstract needs. Like man, a state’s needs can be arranged in order of their necessity. Sustainability is the foundation of the hierarchy, followed by Security, Prosperity, Nationality, and finally, Universality. Each need can be the primary motivating factor for a state depending where on the hierarchy the state sits. The dynamic relationship between these five needs is explored below.
State’s Hierarchy of Needs
Sustainability
Recall man’s most fundamental physiological needs – food, sleep, and air. When these needs are not met, his quality of life is greatly diminished at best, or at worst, he succumbs to his needs. The same need translates to a societal level. Is it not true that a drought- or famine-stricken country is also primarily concerned with feeding itself? Societies fail when a state cannot meet and sustain basic agricultural needs. People emigrate, retreat from their livelihoods, or die. Consider Ireland’s mass exodus in 1845 during the potato famine. Or the United States’ economic depression exacerbated by the dust bowl of the 1930s. Or the 1992 Somali drought that killed over 300,000 people. Without sustenance, societies cannot function.
Society’s most fundamental needs mirror an individual’s. After all, society is limited by the physiological needs of the individuals that comprise it. However, there is an unexpected consequence of this connection. One individual’s hunger – and in turn, a society’s famine – limits what the definitions of future happiness can be. In his theory on Man’s Needs, Maslow notes the psychological effects of hunger on the individual. He explains that when man “Is dominated by a certain need… [his] whole philosophy of the future tends also to change. He tends to think that, if only he is guaranteed food for the rest of his life, he will be perfectly happy and will never want anything more. Life itself tends to be defined in terms of eating. Anything else will be defined as unimportant” (37).
Similarly, a society suffering from drought or famine will likely reduce its definitions of satisfaction to terms that meet its most immediate need. In countries emerging from intense fighting or civil war, food shortages tend to be commonplace. Political scientist Jeremy Allouche cites FAO reports that confirm how “food shortages linked to conflict set the stage for years of long-term food emergencies, continuing well after fighting has ceased” (S5). It is therefore unsurprising that food needs dominate victim surveys in conflict or post-conflict zones. One survey conducted in 2005 of survivors of LRA attacks in northern Uganda showed that “Food” was the most common response among people when asked to identify their most immediate concern. It even surpassed “Peace,” in frequency (33 percent versus 31 percent, respectively. “Security” was the third most cited need, with 8 percent) (Pham 25).
Some transitional justice scholars argue that victims’ needs are fluid, and therefore difficult to predict or arrange. Rosalind Shaw terms this “‘pragmatic pluralism’ in which people select, in different contexts and historical conditions, which of several strategies will best allow them to survive and to rebuild their lives” (222). This argument is partially true; victims’ needs do change over time. However, there is an opportunity to arrange these needs without limiting opportunities for new ones to emerge. As Maslow points out, when one particular, fundamental need is unmet, all future happiness is defined in terms of meeting that immediate need. Therefore, victim surveys will likely highlight the one need on which society is most fixated. Once that need has been satisfied, new needs can emerge. Society moves along this hierarchy until one of two things happens. First, society can advance along the full hierarchy, satisfying all of its five needs. At this point, it is a fully functioning and modern state (most likely, a liberal democracy).
Alternatively, society can move along the hierarchy, satisfying its various needs, until one of its basic needs is threatened. In this case, society – and the individuals that comprise it – revert attention to the more basic need where it remains fixated until that need has once again been satisfied. In this way, needs are both predictable and fluid.
Maslow answered critiques levied against his ordering of man’s needs within a hierarchy in a similar way. He explained it was unnecessary, if not impossible, for man to absolutely satisfy all of his needs all of the time. He argued it was more about the “degrees of relative satisfaction” (53). In a helpful illustration, he suggests the average citizen has “satisfied perhaps 85 percent of his physiological needs, 70 percent of his safety needs, 50 percent of his love needs, 40 percent of his self-esteem needs, and 10 percent of his self-actualization needs” (53). Societies operate similarly – if not the same percentages, at least the same descending order of relative satisfaction needed to function and thrive.
Security
Once agricultural needs have been met, and society’s “belly chronically full,” new concerns arise: foremost, security. The security need has three dimensions: what are a state’s borders, what is contained within those borders, and who controls those borders. Regarding the first aspect, a state is fated to violence if neighboring countries do not agree on its definition. Modern history provides no shortage of examples, including Israel-Palestine, India-Pakistan, and China-Japan, to name a few. Second, the availability of natural resources within those borders also determines a state’s security. For example, blood diamonds and minerals have long plagued states’ security in western African. The same can be said for “resource-cursed” states holding large reserves of natural energy. Ironically, it also applies to states with limited access to natural energy reserves since those states are dependent on energy suppliers and vulnerable to fluctuating supplies and prices. Such dependence creates exploitable opportunities for energy-supplying states. Russia’s intermittent interruption of natural gas transport to EU-friendly Eastern European states is one recent example. Last, a state’s security depends on effective governance – does the government maintain a monopoly on the use of force, effectively provide social services, and diminish external threats?
This aspect of effective governance draws a strong parallel between an individual’s needs and society’s needs. On an individual level, man needs to know he is secure in his being – that unexpected threats will not rob him of his possessions, his family, or his life. Society has a similar need. A state should not freely dispossess a man of his property, disappear his loved ones, or summarily execute him. In Western democracies, an individual’s rights are often protected by rule of law and local security forces. These traditions are oftentimes not well founded in transitioning democracies or post-conflict societies, and therefore jeopardize a society’s maturation. Maslow draws the connection between individual and societal needs, explaining,
The safety needs can become very urgent on the social scene whenever there are real threats to law, to order, to the authority of society. The threat of chaos or of nihilism can be expected in most human beings to produce a regression from any higher needs to the more prepotent safety needs. A common, almost an expectable reaction, is the easier acceptance of dictatorship… It seems to be most true of people who are living near the safety line (43).
Individual and societal needs are interrelated since democratic governments provide the social and legal structures necessary to maintain order. Normatively, democratic governments facilitate everyday activities – from traffic control and administrative duties, to national security and financial regulation. They offer channels of recourse when an injustice has occurred, and provide means of enforcement to ensure laws are honored. This social order enables individuals – and societies – to move beyond their primal and existential fears. They can then concern themselves with other, and newer, needs.
However, instances where the security structure fails a society, fears of anarchy are sparked. Instead of sliding back into chaos, it is possible for societies to abandon certain values and submit to stronger displays of executive rule. US Congress’ near-unanimous and expedient passage of the sweeping USA PATRIOT ACT following the September 11th attacks is an illustrative example. Societies realize that without security, a state cannot attempt to meet other needs. However, it is those other needs that give meaning to a state’s existence. Without them, a state’s security seems a hollow accomplishment.
Prosperity
Once a society has satisfied its security needs, a new need emerges: economic prosperity. This need assumes a laissez-faire approach to macroeconomics, whereby what is good for society is good for the individual, and vice versa. It also assumes a low degree of income inequality. To understand why economic prosperity marks the third need on a State’s Hierarchy, it is useful to look at its historic role in state formation.
When the Treaty of Westphalia was signed in 1648, it brought an end to Europe’s Thirty Years War (and thus arguably satisfied each actor’s Security need). The Treaty codified the concepts of international borders and state sovereignty in international law (Croxton 561). It also established the nation-state as the foundation of our modern international system. But the Treaty was historic in another regard. It marked the end of feudalism and the beginning of an international political economy. Economic historian Robert Heilbroner beautifully articulates this evolution in his book, The Worldly Philosophers. He writes,
The arrangement was called the “market system,” and the rule was deceptively simple: each should do what was to his best monetary advantage. In the market system the lure of gain, not the pull of tradition or the whip of authority, steered the great majority to his (or her) task. And yet, although each was free to go wherever his acquisitive nose directed him, the interplay of one person against another resulted in the necessary tasks of society getting done (20).
Individuals could now freely explore new livelihoods, meeting the evolving demands of a modernizing society. Critically, this included the shift from agriculture to industrialization. The industrial revolution enabled mass-production, and mass-production meant excess products for export. This spawned a new governing philosophy: mercantilism. Capitalist governments – seeking to make their societies richer, and therefore more stable – quickly adopted the theory. Economic policies like trade quotas and tariffs were enacted to protect companies located within territorial borders. This helped assure social development, technological advancement, and political continuity. European states recognized that greater wealth promoted an advanced level of development, and their societies benefited as a result.
Today, violence is far greater among states where economic prosperity does not exist, or rates of income inequality are great. Conspicuous consumption among elites is largely cited as a cause for many of the Arab Spring uprisings, and can be attributed to many historic conflicts from around the world. Examining the economic roots of Sierra Leone’s civil war, Rosalind Shaw cites research done by Steven Archibald and Paul Richards. They explain how,
[Regional] chiefs continued ‘eating their chiefdoms’ throughout the twentieth century, imposing arbitrary and excessive fines on young men in particular…Not only did chiefs and senior men in general monopolize land and wives, but because of chiefs’ control of customary law, young men also feared losing the product of their labor through fines…Many young ex-combatants cited this lack of opportunity, and the unjust system of customary law that sustains it, as having given them an incentive to improve their situation by fighting with an armed group (215).
Therefore, when individuals or large segments of society are economically marginalized, peace is threatened. A state needs to provide an environment where economic opportunities are available to everyone in society. Without such an environment, society grows unsatisfied and a state loses its authority.
Economic prosperity as a need within the State’s Hierarchy is dissimilar to a state’s other needs. Whereas Sustainability, Security, Nationality and Universality closely mirror their corresponding needs in Man’s Hierarchy, Economic Prosperity does not. This break in approximation does not disqualify the parallels drawn between individual and societal needs, however. The relationship between the two remains intact for two reasons. First, there is no interstate equivalent of “Belonging.” Indeed, states may form alliances or treaties with other states, but this is more a luxury than a necessity. Pariah states like North Korea or Iran demonstrate that states can and do exist without expansive networks of external support. Because this need is not translatable from an individual to a state, the level must be occupied by some other need. Thus, the second reason why the relationship between individual needs and societal needs survives: Economic prosperity is as much a fundamental need to individuals as it is a state. In discussing man’s safety needs, Maslow notes that man will usually prefer “a job with tenure and protection, the desire for a savings account, and for insurance of various kinds (medical, dental, unemployment, disability, old age)” (41). Financial security is an essential part to a man feeling safe, much as it is essential to forming a stable state.
Nationality
A sense of nationhood – expressed by a single “nationality” – is a state’s penultimate need. The concept of “nationality” has varying, and at times contradictory connotations – some positive, some negative. As will be discussed, it is the positive aspects of nationality that are included in the state’s hierarchy. Negative aspects of nationality that distort social unity, like racism, apartheid, or ethnic cleansing, are detrimental to society’s development and therefore are not considered aspirations within its hierarchy of needs.
Libraries have been written on the definition and implications of national identity. Over time, there has emerged a general consensus about what elements together constitute national identity. Political scientist Montserrat Guibernau captures them well in her book The Identity of Nations. She calls out the five following elements as key components: Psychological (interpersonal assessments between members of a group that allow their conscious clustering); Cultural (similarities in values, beliefs, languages and practices); Historical (shared pride in a nation’s ancient roots and a belief that these roots are a source of resilience, strength or even superiority); Territorial (existence within defined borders); and, Political (systems of governance used to balance – or promote – linguistic and cultural homogenization among a diverse population) (11). Together, these elements give individuals within a particular society an “understanding of the nation’s identity, his or her sense of what the nation naturally stands for, and of how high it naturally stands in comparison to others in the international arena” (Hymans 13). If done well, such classification can carry significant advantages – both for the state and the individuals within its society.
Before examining these benefits, it is worth exploring when and why “nationalism” as a concept took root. The exact reason for its invention and application may prove critical in understanding why the concept has endured, and why states will likely rely on it for survival in the future.
As previously discussed, the 1648 Treaty of Westphalia marked the beginning of the nation-state, with legal demarcations, centralized government, and an international market-based economy. Prior to, European kingdoms were more fluid, as were the people within them. Paradoxically, this fluidity helped rather than hampered the king’s rule over his people (Anderson 19). There was no reason or incentive for people to subscribe to one specific identity; they simply could exist without. Westphalia changed that. States were named, and identities were chosen for the people within those states. The idea of a nation-state emerged, where common languages and unified political goals vis-à-vis the international system defined a person’s existence. Over centuries, the international system grew more complex and interrelated. Nation-states became global empires. This shift created a new and more sophisticated use of national identity.
Ruling European powers – affected by the proliferation of popular uprisings in their colonies around the world – sought ways to build cohesion and stem unrest. Military intervention was both undesirable and logistically impossible. Instead, ruling elites set out on the path of community building. Historian Hugh Seton-Watson first captured these manipulations in his book, Nations and States, but it is Benedict Anderson’s evocative interpretation that brings the concept to life. Anderson notes, nationalism can best be understood as an attempt to stretch the “short, tight skin of the nation over the gigantic body of the empire… A certain inventive legerdemain required to permit the empire to appear attractive in national drag” (86). This tactic was used with varying degrees of success well into the 20th Century.
Ironically, the end of colonialism did not mark the end of nationalism. On the contrary, postcolonial ruling elites perpetuated the national identities imposed by their European powers. They realized that to function well, a developing state needed to maintain peace and order among potentially-belligerent communities located within. Nationalism was the adhesive that helped them hold it all together. Harvard professor Joseph Nye notes the power nationalism can wield in state-formation when used strategically. Describing the phenomenon in the postcolonial context, he writes,
Local leaders argued that they needed to use the state machinery the colonists had established – the budget, the police, and civil service – to shape a nation out of smaller tribal groups. The same ideology of nationalism came to be used to justify two things that are almost the opposite of each other – nation makes state and state makes nation (188).
Now in the 21st Century, nationalism remains a potent concept and tool. Surely the effects of globalization have slightly blurred the lines between who is considered “American,” “Turkish,” or “Argentinian,” but the benefits of nationalism for the state and individual remain clear. By facilitating and promoting peaceful internal coexistence, states maintain a monopoly on the use of force, the rule of law, and economic development. These achievements translate directly into benefits for the individual who is assured of his physical safety, secure in his possessions, and satisfied with a comfortable quality of life. All that is required is a mechanism for devising and instilling a metanarrative that celebrates nationhood over self. As French philosopher Ernest Renan put it, “The essential element of a nation is that all its individuals must have many things in common, but they must also have forgotten many things” (Nye 186).
Within a state’s hierarchy of needs, Nationalism falls immediately above Prosperity. This placement comes after heavy consideration. As explained above, a state needs financial security to maintain social stability and progress. How best a developing state achieves financial security is a debate that has raged for decades within the halls of academia and multilateral financial institutions. That debate is beyond the scope of this essay. What is relevant, however, is how market liberalization – and the free exchange of ideas associated with it – contributes to the development of a national identity. In Imagined Communities, Benedict Anderson posits that the successful implementation of nationalism across European states came largely as a result of what he calls “print capitalism.” He writes, “The convergence of capitalism and print technology on the fatal diversity of human language created the possibility of a new form of imagined community, which in its basic morphology set the stage for the modern nation” (Anderson 46). While laissez-faire economics did not exist at the time, the system that would spawn it was in its own nascent stages. Print capitalism gave way to market capitalism, which in turn quickened the development of notions about national identity.
There is another reason why Nationalism follows Prosperity in a State’s Hierarchy. Consider the various ways of approaching the issue of ordering. Must a state achieve economic prosperity before it can build a national identity? Not necessarily. Conversely, must a state have a national identity in order to be economically prosperous? Again, not necessarily. However, see what happens when asked in the negative: Can a state’s national identity remain intact if it no longer is economically prosperous? Here, history suggests no. A brief look at the Weimar Republic offers an illustrative example.
Interwar Germany struggled to define a national identity. The Republic was only 34 years old when World War One broke out, and many unresolved ethnic conflicts were put on hold during wartime. As the Entente Powers imposed retributive policies on Germany, these tensions flared – especially among Poles in Eastern Germany. Instead of ushering these groups out of the German state, the Weimar Republic fought to keep them within (Tooley 3). The fact that the Polish regions were highly-developed centers of commerce is not inconsequential. The German struggle to maintain these regions suggests that the Weimar Republic was willing to sacrifice a clearer concept of national identity in order to maintain economic prosperity. That same logic produced the opposite reality only a decade later.
Stripped of production beltways like Upper Silesia in the east and Alsace-Lorraine in the west, Germany failed to make reparations to the Entente Powers. The German economy contracted until soon, it was subsumed within the global depression. The rise of Nazism in the early 1930s is perhaps thus unsurprising. The party vowed to alleviate economic hardships, promising “work and bread” to every deserving German. Critically absent from this community were ethnic minorities – including the Poles from Upper Silesia and of course, Jews. Hitler’s vision ironically sacrificed the inchoate national identity begun in the Weimar era for the same reason it was originally created: to advance society’s economic prosperity.
Weimar Germany doubly demonstrates how Prosperity is a relatively more necessary need than Nationalism in a state’s hierarchy of needs. Prosperity is a tangible necessity needed for both individuals and states to function. Nationality, on the other hand, is similar to its counterpart within Man’s Hierarchy (Esteem) in that it satisfies the more sophisticated psychological rewards of mastery and reputation. What else can explain why Germans embrace the accolades offered by the international community for stereotypical “national” accomplishments like “precise manufacturing,” “diligent work,” and “graceful reconciliation?” These benefits are not critical to a state’s survival, but they bestow meaning and importance on its existence.
Universality
The fifth and final level in a state’s hierarchy of needs is Universality. Universality is the process of reflecting, and contributing to, the body of norms and standards enshrined in international law. States satisfy the Universality need by participating in regional or global institutions whose membership requires the approximation of state laws with international laws. Membership within these institutions provides states with three benefits. First, it signals an advanced degree of development to the international community. Second, it gives meaning to a state’s progress. For what purpose does a state seek stability and prosperity if it must enjoy those benefits in solitude? Last, and perhaps most critically, membership within these institutions can insulate a state from arbitrary external intervention. The Universality need is the only need that relates a sovereign state’s actions with the international community. Therefore, it offers unique and important benefits for any state operating in a globalized world.
States can strengthen their international standing by affiliating themselves with various international institutions. The matrix below provides examples of the four types: Regional or global, financial or political.
There are key differences between regional and global institutions. Regional organizations exist to promote common interests among a select membership whereas global organizations have more expansive mandates. Global political organizations establish norms, like the Responsibility to Protect, and set international standards, like the Kyoto Protocol. For this reason, the role and benefits of global political organizations – specifically the UN and the ICC – will be examined here.
It is worth noting that membership in a global political organization does not imply unanimous agreement among members about what norms and standards should reign. On the contrary, the UN and ICC are forums of intense internal competition. States join because they recognize the unique role such organizations play in facilitating interstate relations and the benefits afforded to their members. Renowned liberalist Robert Keohane identifies the following benefits:
Global governance institutions are valuable because they create norms and information that enable member states and other actors to coordinate their behavior in mutually beneficial ways. They can reduce transaction costs, create opportunities for states and other actors to demonstrate credibility, thereby overcoming commitment problems, and provide public goods, including rule-based peaceful resolutions of conflicts (Buchanan 157).
The International Criminal Court, operating in close relation with the United Nations, is a prime example of a global institution offering such benefits. The ICC came into existence under the Rome Statue in 1998. Today is remains the only permanent, treaty-based international criminal court in existence. Its remit is therefore uniquely powerful, as is its ability to codify international human rights norms and transitional justice practices.
However, it is not without constraints. The ICC was envisioned as a court of last resort, investigating or prosecuting cases only when a state was “unwilling or unable” (ICC, 13). The latter scenario speaks to a state’s capacity – with regard to infrastructure, human resources, and functioning institutions – to handle large, complex cases. This aspect can be gauged more easily, and without as much debate, than the former aspect. Demonstrating a state’s “unwillingness” to investigate is a far thornier issue. States emerging from conflict may have great incentive to delay or forgo prosecutions against alleged war criminals. Decisions to not prosecute, however, may be overridden by the ICC, whose mandate is to uphold international law on the explicit crimes of genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes, and the crime of aggression. States can better secure their autonomy through complementarity of international laws than through wholesale rejection of them.
A state’s Universality need benefits society in much the same way that the Self-Actualization need benefits man. Universality introduces morality to the state and its society. It makes them aware of their political and economic surroundings and injects meaning into that status. States that exist beyond themselves – aspiring to reflect and influence international norms – do so because it benefits the lives of individuals living within.
A State’s Hierarchy of Needs and Transitional Justice
The usefulness of a hierarchy of needs for the field of transitional justice depends largely on what the stated aim of transitional justice is. Since its modern-day debut at the Nuremberg Trials, the overarching aim of transitional justice has evolved. In her article “Transitional Justice Genealogy,” legal scholar Ruti Teitel explains the field’s three phases. She notes its punitive nature against individual perpetrators following World War Two, its emphasis on nation-building in the post-Cold War era, and finally its association with international humanitarian law in the present day (70). This final evolution – for better or worse – suggests that transitional justice is no longer a process existing within a finite period, but rather a tool used as a constant standard for evaluating the democratic health of a state. This interpretation extends the scope of transitional justice beyond individual and governmental needs to include societies’ needs.
Much as the same way war is politics by other means, so too is transitional justice. Societies emerging from periods of conflict signal – either explicitly or implicitly – what their goals are based on what policies they adopt. They usually take the form of one of three approaches to transitional justice: retributive justice, restorative justice, or distributive justice. Each approach focuses on a different need facing transitioning societies, while all serve as means by which society can cope with past grievances. Retributive justice targets individual perpetrators through prosecution. Restorative justice attempts to make victims whole through reparations. Distributive justice seeks to rectify root causes and consequences of conflict. It is this last approach – distributive justice – that is most in line with the field’s contemporary philosophy focused on the societal level.
As the transitional justice field comes to rely on the approach of distributive justice, there is value in devising a framework that identifies and anticipates a society’s needs as it emerges from conflict. Public policy scholar David A. Crocker comes close to this in posing his normative framework on the eight goals of transitional justice, which he identifies as: 1) Truth, 2) Public platform for victims, 3) Accountability and punishment, 4) Rule of law, 5) Compensation to victims, 6) Institutional reform and long-term development, 7) Reconciliation, and 8) Public deliberation (47). His framework, however, does not offer an explanation for how the fundamental needs of a society can be arranged, or how the moral goals of transitional justice relate to those needs. He acknowledges the danger of a society arbitrarily choosing which tools of transitional justice to apply, but stops short of offering a workable framework. This is the benefit of the State’s Hierarchy of Needs. It supports the notion that societies do not have the luxury to be selective in their transitional justice efforts while outlining which efforts may be of most use at the various levels of conflict resolution.
Practitioners who use the hierarchy of needs stand a greater chance of building positive peace in states emerging from conflict. The graphic below demonstrates how, as each need is met, society grows stronger and more sophisticated in the ways it resolves conflict.
As illustrated above, fragile states stricken by extended periods of drought or famine will slip back into conflict in short order. Similarly, if armed non-state actors threaten a state’s security, violence will erupt regardless of whatever cease-fire or peace agreement may have been penned. A society can also lapse back into conflict if large segments of the population feel economically marginalized or disempowered. However, as states become more economically developed, the occurrence of gratuitous violence demonstrably decreases. Society becomes more stable. This stability is bolstered as the threat of sectarian violence is reduced by the internalization of a national identity. The complete transformation of negative to positive peace is realized when society uses democratic tools, rather than violence, to achieve change.
Mediators and transitional justice practitioners can use the hierarchy of needs to satisfy urgent needs while planning for the emergence of longer-term needs. Recalling Teitel’s genealogy of transitional justice, the field has produced some innovative tools to facilitate states’ departure from conflict. As shown below, these tools are well suited to meet specific needs. Together, they amount to a positive peace far greater than the sum of its parts.
Sustainability is a state’s most fundamental need – does its citizens have access to basic life-sustaining resources like food and water. If a state fails to meet this need, there is little transitional justice can do; this falls more within the mandate of international development and humanitarian relief. However, transitional justice quickly becomes an integral part in creating positive peace once the state turns to its second need, security.
There are three transitional justice tools useful for helping a state satisfy its Security need. First, consider the peacemaking process. Transitional justice experts argue that certain best practices – such as including women and minorities in negotiations – help build fairness into the process, resulting in greater trust and contributing to a more stable outcome. Gender specialist Sanam Naraghi Anderlini observes several important benefits of an inclusive process, noting,
Women influence and expand the agenda and issues up for discussion. They bring the voices and experiences of victims. They tend to maintain closer ties to the grassroots and a popular base, communicating their concerns at the negotiations and relaying decisions made back to them. Finally, they bring distinctive approaches and skills that affect the tone and dynamics of the process (75).
Transitional justice practitioners have grown increasingly aware of these benefits – which impact not only women and minority groups, but all of society. The latest effort to institutionalize this approach came in 2010 with the UN Secretary-General’s Seven-Point Action Plan on Women’s Participation in Peacebuilding. The Plan outlines metrics for promoting the inclusivity of women in peace processes sponsored by the UN and demonstrates how one transitional justice mechanism contributes to a more stable peace.
Institutional reform, lustration, and vetting are another set of tools that help a state meet its Security need. These are discrete mechanisms all relevant to reconstituting the moral authority and functionality of the state following its abuse of power. Such a revival in the state’s image is necessary for meeting the “good governance” aspect of Security outlined in the previous section. In examining how official apologies – a component of institutional reform – can help build trust between citizens and institutions, Pablo de Greiff cites Claus Offe’s explanation:
‘Trusting institutions’ means something entirely different from ‘trusting my neighbor:’ it means knowing and recognizing as valid the values and the form of life incorporated in an institution and deriving from this recognition the assumption that this idea makes sufficient sense to a sufficient number of people to motivate their ongoing active support for the institution and the compliance with its rules. Successful institutions generate a negative feedback loop: they make sense to actors so that actors will support them and comply with what the institutionally defined order prescribes (126).
In their own ways, institutional reform, lustration, and vetting change peoples’ perceptions of the state over time – reducing tensions and bolstering the stability of a government and its domain. While the benefits are not immediate, the need for action is. Imagine each tool of transitional justice as a brick – building a wall, layer upon layer, to protect a society from the threat of gratuitous violence. Using transitional justice tools, like inclusive approaches to peace negotiations and institutional reform, serve as this wall’s foundational bricks.
Transitional Justice also has a role to play in helping a state meet its Prosperity need. As noted earlier, a state seeks economic stability and growth over time. In states emerging from protracted conflict, where societies traditionally are heavily reliant on agribusiness, economic growth happens at the micro level. This is the logic driving the successful microfinance initiatives taking place across much of the developing world. Therefore, transitional justice tools that focus on the financial needs of individuals and families will promote economic wellbeing and contribute to a more stable society. As used today by transitional justice practitioners, the various forms of reparation are the most well-suited tools for this task.
There are five forms of reparations: Restitution, compensation, rehabilitation, satisfaction, and guarantees of non-repetition. Given the economic lens through which this essay sees reparations, an analysis of restitution and compensation is most valuable. These aspects are comparatively more substantive than some of the others, offering tangible and measurable benefits to recipient individuals.
As outlined by the UN General Assembly’s resolution on reparations, restitution aimed at “victims of gross human rights violations” can include “restoration of liberty, enjoyment of human rights, identity, family life and citizenship, return to one’s place of residence, restoration of employment and return of property” (UNGA 1). Similarly, compensation aims to make whole victims who lost employment, education, or social benefits, along with job earnings and earning potential.
The feasibility of some of these aims can prove challenging. Wartime economies shift the nature of industry so that pre-war jobs may no longer exist; families forced out of their homes may return to find other displaced families now living there. While these technical challenges question the practicality of restitution, they do not delegitimize its aim of helping individuals regain economic footing.
As the field of transitional justice has developed, more nuanced interpretations about the goals of reparations have emerged. No longer are victims the sole focus of reparative efforts. As used in Colombia, for example, disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration programs focused on helping perpetrators of violence return to civilian life have been used with relative success. Some critics argue these programs “reward bad behavior,” but Pablo de Greiff challenges the notion. He points to the UN’s standards for DDR programs that suggest “reintegration support for ex-combatants is not…regarded as special treatment of ex-combatants, but rather as an investment in security for the population as a whole” (150).
Practitioners have come to recognize the importance of economic wellbeing for all individuals in society, and the role it plays in contributing to positive peace. The various aspects of restitution and compensation represent another layer of bricks in the protective wall.
Transitional justice tools – namely truth (and reconciliation) commissions and memorialization efforts – help gratify a state’s Nationality need. As previously explained, “nationality” connotes both positive and negative forms of self-identification. However, if transitional justice tools are successful, the positive forms of collective national identity will override the residual negative forms conjured during conflict.
Truth commissions can serve many purposes: to “discover, clarify, and acknowledge past abuses; to address the needs of victims; to ‘counter impunity’ and advance individual accountability; to outline institutional responsibility and recommend reforms; and to promote reconciliation and reduce conflicts over the past” (Hayner 20). States that employ commissions can choose to use one or all of these as its goals, depending on what their unique objectives are, and how they are best served. This is not an inconsequential task. In answering the question, “What should be done about a difficult past,” David A. Crocker points out that, “Countries must make decisions that carry “intrinsic moral significance” (45). The collective mentality and identity resulting over time from truth commissions sets the tone for the state’s future.
Stephen Van Evera’s research on the power of national identity underscores this point. He notes that national identity formation – when done incorrectly or with sinister intent – can be used to breed future conflict. “In certain situations,” he explains, “hegemonic nationalist ideologies, which are often based on historical distortions and denials of past crimes, can be used by political entrepreneurs to incite violence” (Mendeloff 369). This was the case in Wilhelmine Germany, where virulent anti-Semitism was fomented, and the Second World War ensued. Societies that do not come to terms with their own historic prejudices can all too easily create revisionist narratives that at best ignore victims or at worst, perpetuate animosity towards them. Truth commissions are as official and neutral as any existing tool within the field of conflict resolution, and offer a unique benefit in helping reconcile national identity needs.
Many scholars contest the effectiveness of truth commissions in bringing about social reconciliation. Withstanding the critique that there may be no such thing as an “absolute truth,” these critics argue an official narrative of events cannot bridge historic social divisions. Legal scholar Erin Daly argues, “Where the population is deeply divided on even the most basic questions, as in the Balkans, between Israel and Palestine, and perhaps in Iraq, the unvarnished truth is unlikely to reconcile the competing points of view and the people who hold them” (Daly 39). In countries like these, history, politics, and emotion are potent variables that can arguably overpower the benefits resulting from any truth commission’s findings. However, it is unfair to see any transitional justice tool as a panacea.
Truth commissions and memorialization efforts have been successful, albeit imperfect, transitional justice tools used in Peru, Timor-Leste, Morocco, Guatemala, and most famously, South Africa. These cases offer anecdotal support for the valuable role played by truth commissions in post-conflict societies. However, it is also worth considering quantitative studies that look at the general usefulness of commissions. While these studies have produce mixed results, transitional justice scholar Priscilla Hayner still finds value. Citing one study by Tricia Olsen, Leigh Payne, and Andrew Reiter, Hayner notes, “Truth commissions that are employed alone, with no other transitional justice initiatives, have a negative impact on human rights and on democracy…but truth commissions ‘contribute positively when combined with trials and amnesty’” (26).
When paired with other transitional justice tools, truth commissions can help facilitate national reconciliation. The “truth” – or whatever metanarrative is established through these hearings – provides a societal baseline that individuals can build on or subtract from as personal accounts dictate. Establishing an official account of the types of crimes committed, and why, creates an opportunity for social solidarity – allowing victims to connect their own experiences with others’ and move beyond the simple label of “individual victim.” International relations professors William Long and Peter Brecke explain, “It allows the injured to transcend the role of victim and assume a more complete identity as citizen, and it punctures the aura of impunity of aggressors, thus beginning a process of redefining their role” (149).
Truth commissions also offer a long-term benefit. When done effectively, national narratives reduce tensions among future generations. Noting the potential threat to peace posed by children raised in war-time settings, UN Under-Secretary General for Political Affairs Jeffrey Feltman laments, “It is often said that youth are the hope for overcoming past hatred. However, reality shows that young people brought up just after war tend to be more extreme than their parents. By often being deprived of the chance to meet ‘the other,’ they are also deprived of the chance to experience what they have in common.” A national narrative can help reconcile competing interpretations of conflict by facilitating inter-cultural dialogue. This helps reduce the threat of imminent violence. Additionally, truth commissions – and the resultant national narratives – formally recognize injustices, preventing them from becoming recycled fodder for recurring factional debates. Citing renowned ethicist Ton Van den Beld’s work, Michael Freeman explains the psychology behind these debates:
It is difficult to see how innocent individuals can be responsible for injustices committed before they were born. If, however, we accept that our personal identity is socially constituted as a narrative continuity, an individual might bear responsibility for collective injustices in the absence of individual guilt, because of an association with the collective that is responsible for the injustice (Freeman 48).
If we accept that national narratives promote positive feelings between people, we can see a connection then to Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. Explaining man’s Esteem need, Maslow suggests that people have a desire for a “stable, firmly based, usually high evaluation of themselves, for self-respect, or self-esteem, and for the esteem of others” (45). An individual’s esteem is threatened when accusations of guilt-by-association are constantly levied against him. Therefore, healing at the national level has the potential to facilitate healing on the individual level.
As Priscilla Hayner’s argument above points out, truth commissions work best when used alongside other transitional justice tools. Depending on their mandates, truth commissions can promote rule of law by informing criminal investigations. They are also useful in reparation efforts – documenting who and how someone suffered economic hardship due to the conflict. Finally, commissions can contribute to more effective governance and security by determining what government institutions – and who working within them – was responsible for crimes committed. Thus, recalling the protective wall that transitional justice efforts help erect around post-conflict societies, truth commissions might be considered the mortar holding it all together. At first glance the highly-visible bricks – vetting, reparations, and prosecutions – seem like the most important aspects of conflict resolution. Closer inspection, however, reveals that truth commissions bind them all together. Truth commissions give strength and resilience to a structure that would otherwise tumble under pressure.
A state’s ultimate need, Universality, can help to be achieved by prosecuting perpetrators of international crimes. Universality, again, is a state’s ability to participate in global governing institutions in order to promote and enshrine norms that complement its own political, financial, or social values. Applied to post-conflict societies, this can be achieved in two ways. First, a state can bring charges against individuals using its own legal code that generally reflects international standards for specific crimes. If a state is “unwilling or unable” to bring forth charges, the International Criminal Court emerges as the second option. Institutions like the ICC can hold significant leverage over states and be either an impetus or tool for establishing democratic practices.
As with many powerful, global institutions, aspects of the ICC’s work come under great scrutiny. Mahamood Mamdani has famously argued that the ICC is a neo-colonialist tool used by Western capitals to depose unfriendly leaders in African countries (655). Others have complained that the heavily EU-funded organization is biased in which cases it pursues (Kimenyi). Most importantly, scholars argue whether or not the court helps or hurts reconciliation efforts in post-conflict states. It is the eternal debate: “peace versus justice,” or “peace through justice?”
One of the arguments made by ICC detractors is that the court destabilizes societies by using the constraining language of “criminal law.” In civil wars, Mamdani argues, both sides eventually wind up using reprehensible behavior to achieve political aims. Thus, the ICC’s objective of identifying perpetrators is ill-suited for the task. He explains, “It cannot be victim’s justice because there are no real victims in civil wars. This also means there are no real perpetrators” (658). In forcing large-scale, political violence into a legal framework premised on individual guilt, the ICC risks reigniting violence. Those aligned with the prosecuted individuals feel unfairly targeted in a conflict where both sides suffered grievances. Additionally, victims may even feel slighted by the court’s rulings if they perceive the punishment as insufficient for the crimes committed.
Conversely, supporters of the ICC argue that from a normative perspective, ICC involvement signals a “break with the immoral order of the past,” offering not only victims, but whole societies, a rare chance to formally close an ugly chapter in history (Lie 5). Another argument posits that ICC-issued convictions reduce the threat of renewed violence and vigilante justice because it deters would-be fighters (Lie 5).
While both sides offer well-founded arguments either questioning or championing the ICC, they do so to answer a shared concern: What kind of peace does the ICC help create – positive or negative, enduring or ephemeral? Looking at the State’s Hierarchy of Needs, it appears that prosecutions – carried out either locally or internationally, help create positive peace. However, they have to be done at the right time. The hierarchy shows that societies have more urgent, life-dependent needs than seeing war criminals brought to justice. Once those more basic needs are satisfied, though, retributive justice must be dolled out. This affirms a society’s values and at least symbolically offers a guarantee of non-repetition. Society’s achievement of Universality mirrors the effect of an individual achieving self-actualization. It gives meaning to its existence, and purpose to its actions.
Why a “Hierarchy?”
Arranging a state’s needs into a hierarchy can be a dangerous undertaking. In something as fluid and unpredictable as war, what use is a framework that purports to predict society’s needs? Is any such effort not a facile exercise? No, and the reason why is because a state’s hierarchy of needs is not a ranking of importance; it is a ranking of necessity. It is not audacious to suggest a state must meet the basic, life-preserving needs of its society in order for it to exist, and then to thrive. It would be audacious, however, to suggest the hierarchy outlined above is fixed.
Recalling Maslow’s concept of “relative satisfaction,” a state may move between adequately satisfied needs and inadequately satisfied needs as it emerges from conflict. A particular state may also transpose the order of certain needs, like prosperity and nationality. The value of this hierarchy comes not from its definitive ordering of needs, but from its demonstration of how these needs relate, and in turn, how transitional justice tools support the peacebuilding process.
In conclusion, a state’s hierarchy of needs provides a useful framework for policymakers and transitional justice practitioners concerned with both the immediate stabilization of a post-conflict state, and the promotion of long-lasting peace for its society. As explained, Man’s Hierarchy of Needs can reasonably be extrapolated to predict society’s needs, creating some new insights for the sequencing, timing, and justice versus peace debates. With new ideas for understanding what needs will emerge over time, perhaps practitioners can create a reality where states break their cyclical relationship with conflict and instead follow a hierarchical path to positive peace. After all, as Maslow might say, what a state can be, it must be.
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