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Peace Journalism: What It Is, Why It Is Crucial in Times of War, and How It Counters Informational Hatred
In a context where the media can easily be turned into weapons, peace journalism—rooted in the ideas of Johan Galtung—emerges as an essential practice. It does not overlook conflict; rather, it examines its underlying causes and highlights non-violent responses as a path toward building lasting “positive peace”.
The saying “in war, truth is the first casualty” is often quoted, and we are well aware of the significant role the media play in conflicts—sometimes to the point of becoming weapons, or even ammunition, themselves. Yet there also exists a conception of the media that serves peace: a conscious understanding of information as a tool for dialogue and for fostering harmony among peoples and nations.
Take peace journalism, for instance. But what exactly is it, and why is it so important? The concept was defined by Norwegian scholar Johan Galtung in 1960. He argued that peace journalism does not rely on simplification; instead, it seeks depth. It does not avoid reporting on war but engages with it through precision and detail. It examines conflict meticulously, delves into layers of its causes, and reconstructs the broader picture with clarity and completeness, with the aim of identifying possible solutions.
Galtung also discussed these principles in a 2018 interview with Vatican News.
What Are Transcendence and Positive Peace?
Peace has always been at the core of Johan Galtung’s work. In 1959 he founded the International Peace Research Institute in Oslo; five years later, he launched the Journal of Peace Research, and on the eve of the new millennium, in 1998, he created Transcend: a global network dedicated to peace, development, and training on the notion of “transcendence” in relation to conflict resolution.
But what is transcendence? It is a process of change and evolution that unfolds gradually and goes beyond the mere resolution of a conflict, seeking broader, deeper, social and human solutions—solutions that are genuinely functional for both sides, and therefore widely accepted, even when they differ from the parties’ original positions.
This is what Galtung refers to as “positive peace”: a form of peace that, through transcendence, develops an authentic relationship between opposing sides, mutual understanding, empathy, knowledge, and respect. Here, constructive and forward-looking journalism plays a crucial role even using tensions as a resource, transforming them into drivers of bilateral development, in mutual synergy, for stronger relationships capable of withstanding potential future strains.
Simplification, therefore, is of no help to peace journalism—or to peace itself. Nor is superficial summarization. And certainly not propaganda or communicators’ submission to power. What is needed is layered, detailed courageous, costly, and persistent information—information capable of guiding a conflict away from violence, weapons, and bloodshed toward political and diplomatic engagement, grounded in dialogue: the true instrument of peace.
Peace Journalism Today
Today, peace journalism represents a source of hope; a direction and a practice that is not only possible, but necessary. On 6 November, a conference entitled “Peace Journalism: Reporting on War Without Fueling It” was held in Rome. It offered numerous insightful reflections, including those of Giampaolo Cadalanu, a journalist for the Italian daily La Repubblica.
Here are some key excerpts from his remarks: “In situations of tension, the media—newspaper, television, radio, websites, social networks, and everything digital technology places at our disposal —are undoubtedly capable of doing harm. They can incite hatred, encourage dehumanization, and even become instruments of genocide. The clearest example is Radio Mille Collines, the Rwandan broadcaster nicknamed ‘Radio Hate’ for taking an active role in the 1994 genocide of the Tutsi, issuing calls for mass killing of unimaginable ferocity. But a simple look at history is enough to understand: in the media, the mechanism that feeds resent and aversion, deepening the distance between groups of human beings, are constantly at work—often without journalists being fully aware of it.”
“Information, however, can also help to bring about peace: ‘good journalism’ is in itself a tool for pacification. Reporting accurately and impartially—as impartially as any journalist can be—while remaining transparent and avoiding excessive or sensationalist tones help us escape the mechanisms of fear, hatred, and demonization on which those who pursue conflict rely.”
A Reflection on Peace
Further on, Giampaolo Cadalanu explores the concept of peace: “Let’s begin with the awareness that peace is not a static phenomenon—i.e. a goal that remains once achieved—but rather a process in constant evolution, which must therefore be monitored and, if possible, cultivated. As a first interpretative model, let us try adopting a binary view: war journalism versus peace journalism.”
“The former is grounded in a zero-sum understanding of conflict, where one side wins and the other loses, and journalism serves only to narrate the outcomes of violence. The latter promotes analysis: it examines the causes of conflict, presents possible non-violent solutions, even at the cost of moving away from the traditional idea of journalism as detached and objective reporting.”
“War journalism often takes sides and risks seeing ‘the others’ only as a problem, ultimately accepting their dehumanization and contributing to the construction of antagonism—perhaps by focusing solely on the wrongs of the opposite side. It seeks solutions only on the battlefield, tracing conflicts back to the triggering act rather than their historical roots, and it reports exclusively from the viewpoint of elites.”
Peace journalism, by contrast, identifies the problem in war itself—not in the “the others.” Consequently, war reporting alone is not sufficient, because conflict is not necessarily synonymous with violent confrontation. It can more broadly be defined as “a relationship between two or more parties who have—or believe they have—mutually incompatible goals.” For this reason, possible non-violent responses to conflict must be considered and valued, even when doing so requires additional effort and a renounce to a superficially “cold” and equidistant approach to the positions of the parties involved.
The Importance of Peace Journalism
Giampaolo Cadalanu’s contribution offers further valuable insights, but even from these excerpts alone, the possibility of peace journalism—and its usefulness in fostering deep, authentic, and lasting peace—is already clear. It is the kind of peace Pope Francis refers to when he says: “Peace is not merely the absence of war; it is a general condition in which the human person is in harmony with themselves, in harmony with nature, and in harmony with others.”
Therefore, even writing, crafting a narrative through images , meeting someone for an interview—in short, every act of communication—must take into account the common good, the good of every human being, which always coincides with peace. Peace is a necessary condition for every form of development: human development and beyond.
