Editors' IntroductionThis issue of Social Alternatives is devoted to ending war and other related forms of violence and to building structures and values that will strengthen peace. Its major theme embraces the notion of declaring Day, April 25th, 2015, the beginning of a 'Year of Peace'. The idea took root in the Day address delivered in 2014 by the late Governor Peter Underwood of Tasmania. His message was that 'until we find the truth (of what causes wars), we cannot begin to pay proper homage and respect to those who fought in that terrible conflict 100 years ago and to the many others who have subsequently fought in other wars.' Instead of glorifying war with the deeds of our soldiers 'enthusiastically and unflinchingly carrying the torch of freedom in the face of murderous enemy fire', we can best honour their sacrifices by embarking on studies to eliminate the custom of war and its practice of killing and being killed.The full address of the Governor, delivered from Hobart's cenotaph at last year's Day ceremony, appears as this issue's first article. It inspired a group of five former academics who have continued our long commitment to peace studies and action to respond to the Governor's call to be among those offering more than just 'remembrance and honour'. Two of us opted to focus on peace action at the community level. The other three turned to the Social Alternatives Collective with a proposal to edit a special peace issue in accordance with the spirit and process set out in the Governor's speech. Our proposal was supported enthusiastically by the Collective, so we contacted the Governor for his endorsement to publish the entire speech. He pointed out that his permission was not required since the address had become part of the public domain but he considered it thoughtful to have been asked. He said he was unfamiliar with the journal, so we told him it is widely available in university and government libraries. In a second exchange he indicated that he had found a copy and would now like to take out a yearly subscription.Sadly, that was the last time we had the opportunity to talk with this delightful and very approachable man. He died suddenly on 7 July, a month after surgery to remove a tumour. He had wanted the centenary year of the beginning of World War I in August 2014 to coincide with the launching of a Year of Peace. However, Social Alternatives was committed for the next two issues, so we prepared for a late January 2015 publication date. Supporting Governor Underwood's proposal for the Year of Peace we focused the publication of this issue towards the centenary of the landing at Cove on 25th April, 1915.Governor Underwood called for the establishment of an ANZAC 'centre for the study of peace, conflict and war'. Along the same lines, he declared that 'some of the millions of dollars that will be spent on the Anzac Festival should be diverted to support for the University of Sydney's Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies'. He clearly recognised the value of strengthening existing peace centres, establishing new ones, and introducing peace studies in universities and schools as well as peace methods in the communities. These comprise long-term and effective ways to create the peaceful society he envisaged as the true outcome of national sacrifice in World War I and subsequent wars.There are also a host of critical immediate issues to be dealt with. These include the impacts of fundamentalist-inspired terrorist acts such as the lone-wolf murders in Sydney's Martin Place on 16 December, 2014, the expansion of the arms trade, the rising of the mean world temperature toward the critical tipping point of a 3.6 degrees increase and the ongoing violence and discrimination against women around the world. It is sobering to bear in mind the imminent dangers of nuclear war that can end all human hopes of survival. The symbolic indicator of the Doomsday Clock was set by the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists on 14 January, 2014 at three minutes to midnight suggesting, according to the Board, that 'the risk of civilisation-threatening technological catastrophe remains high'. …

Editors' IntroductionThis issue of Social Alternatives is devoted to ending war and other related forms of violence and to building structures and values that will strengthen peace. Its major theme embraces the notion of declaring Day, April 25th, 2015, the beginning of a 'Year of Peace'. The idea took root in the Day address delivered in 2014 by the late Governor Peter Underwood of Tasmania. His message was that 'until we find the truth (of what causes wars), we cannot begin to pay proper homage and respect to those who fought in that terrible conflict 100 years ago and to the many others who have subsequently fought in other wars.' Instead of glorifying war with the deeds of our soldiers 'enthusiastically and unflinchingly carrying the torch of freedom in the face of murderous enemy fire', we can best honour their sacrifices by embarking on studies to eliminate the custom of war and its practice of killing and being killed.The full address of the Governor, delivered from Hobart's cenotaph at last year's Day ceremony, appears as this issue's first article. It inspired a group of five former academics who have continued our long commitment to peace studies and action to respond to the Governor's call to be among those offering more than just 'remembrance and honour'. Two of us opted to focus on peace action at the community level. The other three turned to the Social Alternatives Collective with a proposal to edit a special peace issue in accordance with the spirit and process set out in the Governor's speech. Our proposal was supported enthusiastically by the Collective, so we contacted the Governor for his endorsement to publish the entire speech. He pointed out that his permission was not required since the address had become part of the public domain but he considered it thoughtful to have been asked. He said he was unfamiliar with the journal, so we told him it is widely available in university and government libraries. In a second exchange he indicated that he had found a copy and would now like to take out a yearly subscription.Sadly, that was the last time we had the opportunity to talk with this delightful and very approachable man. He died suddenly on 7 July, a month after surgery to remove a tumour. He had wanted the centenary year of the beginning of World War I in August 2014 to coincide with the launching of a Year of Peace. However, Social Alternatives was committed for the next two issues, so we prepared for a late January 2015 publication date. Supporting Governor Underwood's proposal for the Year of Peace we focused the publication of this issue towards the centenary of the landing at Cove on 25th April, 1915.Governor Underwood called for the establishment of an ANZAC 'centre for the study of peace, conflict and war'. Along the same lines, he declared that 'some of the millions of dollars that will be spent on the Anzac Festival should be diverted to support for the University of Sydney's Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies'. He clearly recognised the value of strengthening existing peace centres, establishing new ones, and introducing peace studies in universities and schools as well as peace methods in the communities. These comprise long-term and effective ways to create the peaceful society he envisaged as the true outcome of national sacrifice in World War I and subsequent wars.There are also a host of critical immediate issues to be dealt with. These include the impacts of fundamentalist-inspired terrorist acts such as the lone-wolf murders in Sydney's Martin Place on 16 December, 2014, the expansion of the arms trade, the rising of the mean world temperature toward the critical tipping point of a 3.6 degrees increase and the ongoing violence and discrimination against women around the world. It is sobering to bear in mind the imminent dangers of nuclear war that can end all human hopes of survival. The symbolic indicator of the Doomsday Clock was set by the Science and Security Board of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists on 14 January, 2014 at three minutes to midnight suggesting, according to the Board, that 'the risk of civilisation-threatening technological catastrophe remains high'. …

In the contemporary world, the Australian peace movement should respond to the growing challenges of terrorism, crimes against humanity, genocidal conflict, massive human rights abuses and humanitarian disasters that characterise international politics today and analyse how well the contemporary movement is placed to present effective responses to these events and to our governments' response to them. The doctrine of responsibility to protect, emerging from some of the worst post-Cold War crimes against humanity and refined as it was scrutinised by the United Nations, will undoubtedly be a key standard against which 21st century conflicts are measured, but the peace movement is encumbered by its history and ideology from addressing the concept. Similarly, the Anzac legend has been regarded by the peace movement as a bulwark for militarism; however, given its deep roots in Australian culture, perhaps this is the time for the movement to engage with that legend more positively.The year 2014 saw a dolorous centenary: the opening shots of the Great War in August 1914. Since then, the rest of the twentieth and the first fourteen years of the twenty-first centuries have been marred by a string of big and small wars unprecedented in their levels of technology and scale. The peace movement has responded in every case to wars or threats of war sometimes effectively, as with the conscription referenda of 1916 and 1917, and sometimes with confusion as in the rise of fascism leading up to the Second World War. This essay will look at how the Australian peace movement should respond to the growing challenges of terrorism, crimes against humanity, genocidal conflict, massive human rights abuses and humanitarian disasters that characterise international politics today and analyse how well the contemporary movement is placed to present effective responses to these events and to our governments' response to them.The first point to note about the Australian peace movement is that it lacks coherence and is an amorphous entity at the best of times. In a crisis its numbers can swell to the hundreds of thousands, while at other times it consists of very small groups holding a watching brief on issues of peace and conflict, often in conjunction with other issues that are their concern (cf. Saunders and Summy 1986). Philosophically, those organisations tend to fall into two main streams - the left and pacifists. The left tends to mobilise if it perceives significant social justice issues associated with a conflict or if it sees Western imperialism playing a role, while pacifists condemn all violent responses by the state and the larger the conflict, the more they are likely to mobilise.The left-pacifist alliance is often tenuous and easily breaks down. During the inter-War period of the 1920s and 1930s, pacifists tended to place their faith in the peacekeeping efforts of the League of Nations while the left diverted from this course when the rise of fascism threatened either the Soviet Union or other left forces (as in the Spanish Civil War). The pro-Soviet left then had to do some quick about-turns when Stalin and Hitler signed their non-aggression pact in 1939 which further alienated them from the pacifists. With the pacifists unable to respond adequately to the rise of a super-militant fascism and the left hamstrung by the commitment of many to the Soviet Union, the peace movement in the 1930s folded with the outbreak of war in September 1939, a war which to most was a just and justifiable war.Asimilar dynamic prevailed with the left during the Cold War, with organisations like the World Peace Council blaming Western imperialism for aggression against the Soviet Union and pacifists tending to place blame on both sides for conducting an out-of-control nuclear arms race. The Vietnam War in the sixties and early seventies raised the same issues with the newly-energised Marxist left that advocated support for the National Liberation Front (NLF) of South Vietnam and the Communist North Vietnamese government, while non-Communists and pacifists kept their arguments firmly fixed on ending the war and conscription. …

I have been copping some flak lately from my Green or leftwing friends for being seen talking about coal and coal seam gas on public platforms with such well-known political conservatives as Alan Jones and Bob Katter. These people tell me they won't come to meetings or actions being organised by Lock the Gate while we mix with such people. My response to them is two-fold.

Social movements have been much analysed. These works describe how movements originate - usually because the social system has proven unable to deal in the normal way with an issue that is regarded as important by a significant number of people. A social movement will, then, often be born to confront, educate and mobilise public opinion. This movement then needs to mobilise resources, human and material, to carry its message. They might resort to forms of direct action to publicise the cause and challenge the behaviour they oppose. Ultimately, they have to connect with political power to enable their program to be implemented. If this is done effectively, the social movement either dies away, perhaps to be revived at a later date, or it goes on to wider challenges. If it fails to get its program implemented by government, it either dies or fades into relative insignificance.

The Six Degrees collective of Friends of the Earth, Brisbane has been campaigning against open cut coal mining on agricultural land and environmentally sensitive areas for over two years and, more recently, calling for a moratorium on coal seam gas development.

Direct action has been used in Australia by groups involved in social movements such as the labor, indigenous, peace, and environmental movements. Such actions are usually undertaken by small, often autonomous groups wanting to make strong statements about social practices they regard as morally wrong. Sometimes, these actions are illegal and so constitute civil disobedience. The messages they are attempting to communicate are directed at ordinary people, urging them to join or, at least adopt, the same moral positions, rather than to governments or other representative institutions to change their policies.

When a history of the Australian environment movement was published several years ago, the joke that went around the environment movement was that the first (and sometimes the only thing) purveyors of the book would read was the index to check whether their names were there. If some of the reports we have heard from around the bookshops of Brisbane are true, Radical Brisbane has received a similar response. We feel for Ray Evans and Carole Ferrier, the editors of Radical Brisbane, because everyone who has been around the activist scene in Brisbane over the last 40 years will want to see themselves, or at least their organisations, represented. Inevitably, given the limitations of such publications, many have been disappointed. The point of this review essay is not to critique the inclusions and omissions in order to assuage individual egos, but to further an understanding of the basis of radical politics and to interpret why Brisbane has been the seat of dissent as much as of development in this state.

Historic and theoretical differences between the Greens and the Left are significant. This paper outlines some of the tensions which the influence of the traditional Left inside the Greens could provoke. It does this by briefly outlining the Greens’ social movement origins in order to elucidate its characteristic differences with the Left's approach to social change and its end goals.

What can historians of the environment movement offer those interested in environmental law? The two fields are so disparate that we thought we should provide a brief outline of the nature of social movements before discussing interconnections and the common interest in aspects of law reform. Social movements are notoriously unstable and fluid phenomena and their history and influence can only be understood in the light of this temperament. Yet they aim to extend the limits of the social system, which brings them directly into the legal arena. This article briefly outlines the nature of the environment movement and its need to connect with political power. It then discusses some of the environment movement's recent struggles in Queensland in order to highlight the many obstacles that social movements face in their interactions with political power. Even when successful, environmental victories can be undermined by public servants who fail to enforce new environmental laws and standards. We conclude that the environment movement has to fight not only for environmental reform, but also for increased accountability measures.