THE SEVILLE STATEMENT ON VIOLENCE

�The same species who invented war is capable of inventing peace."

Support Network c/o David Adams, Wesleyan Psychology Dept
Middletown, Connecticut, USA, 06457

NEWSLETTER � VOLUME 3; NUMBER 1, MAY, 1988

--- The Seville Statement is being used as a tool in the great
task of inventing peace. In the chambers of state, on the pages
of the mass media, in the classrooms of the next generation. this
is where the task is being carried on.

--- As the U.S. Senate debates the INF Treaty, the first step into
the Era of Disarmament, they have the Seville Statement as a resource
for their task. It was sent to them in April by the PSYCHOLOGISTS
FOR SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY along with the enclosed cover letter by
their President M. Brewster Smith. Similar mailings were sent to
all members of the U.S. House of Representatives.

--- The Seville Statement is increasingly featured in mass media
coverage of war and peace issues, The entire June issue of PSYCHOLOGY
TODAY is devoted to war and peace, a process which began as an outgrowth
of the endorsement of the Seville Statement by the AMERICAN PSYCHOLOGICAL
ASSOCIATION last August. One of the articles is devoted entirely to
the issues raised by the Seville Statement, and a copy is enclosed
with this mailing. We were also featured in the April 11 issue of
U.S. NEWS & WORLD REPORT. The article (enclosed) concludes that "the
view that war is not genetically programed in humans is perhaps the
one thing that most anthropologists do agree on," which, I suppose,
can be said on the basis of the mail ballot by the AMERICAN ANTHRO-
POLOGICAL ASSOCIATION last fall which overwhelmingly endorsed the
Seville Statement. The author of the article in U.S. News had first
encountered the Statement in the notice by Carol Tavris in VOGUE
MAGAZINE in January.

---  The enclosed letters from Bonnie Frank Carter (Seville signatory)
and Judith Kovacs-Long describe how they are introducing the Seville
Statement into the classroom. This kind of person-to-person, grass-
roots work with young people may not he as spectacular as the work
with opinion-makers and decision-makers, but in the long run, it is
the young people who are key to the inventing of peace. We will
follow with special interest the progress of Dr. Kovacs-Long and her
colleagues in the AMERICAN ASSOCIATION OF COUNSELING AND DEVELOPMENT
in their quest to use the Seville Statement at the level of school
counseling.

---  Continuing to believe in the United Nations as the best possible
sponsor for our work, we are introducing the Seville Statement to the
UN SPECIAL SESSION ON DISARMAMENT in June. The Statement is presented
by the non-governmental representatives of four psychological and
allied organizations: THE INTERNATIONAL COUNCIL OF PSYCHOLOGISTS:
THE SOCIETY FOR THE PSYCHOLOGICAL STUDY OF SOCIAL ISSUES; THE INTERNATIONAL
SOCIETY FOR RESEARCH ON AGGRESSION; and PSYCHOLOGISTS FOR
SOCIAL RESPONSIBILITY. A copy of the letter is enclosed. We also
continue to press For the full involvement of UNESCO, as expressed
in the enclosed letter by Seville signatory Santiago Genovés to the
Secretary General of UNESCO, Federico Mayor Zaragoza, himself also a
Seville signatory.