The Russian quest for peace and democracy

摘要

In 1982, I was in Moscow with Metta Spencer, the author of a remarkable book on the transmission of ideas, in this case, ideas about peace. We and several other Canadian peace activists were on our way to participate in an international peace conference in Vienna. Spencer had a telephone number of a dissident peace organization in Moscow. We found our way to a small apartment and met with members of the Trustbuilders Group. This group aimed to counter Cold War mentality on both sides of the Iron Curtain by fostering people-to-people relationships and joint projects. The members were being persecuted, for example by being fired from their jobs, because they stood as independent thinkers outside the government system. Spencer established relationships with the people in this group that have lasted to this day and began pursuing a 28-year-long trail led by her curiosity about the impact of western peace researchers and activists on the tortuous development of Russian peace and democracy.