Peace through Constitutions. United Nations in Geneva side-event. 20th of November 2015

Speakers:

Marguerite Contat, former Co-President of the Constitutional Assembly, Geneva (2008-2012).

Raphaël Porteilla, Professor of political science, co-editor of the book “Peace and Constitutions” (Paix et Constitutions), Dijon 2015.

David Fernandez Puyana, Senior expert on human rights and peace.

Christophe Barbey, Lawyer, peace researcher and coordinator at APRED. Main representative of the Center for Global Nonkilling at the UN in Geneva.

Constitutions are locally universal. They express our ideals and are to a large extent binding. They are an excellent vector to promote effective peace. From setting peace high as a universal value to making violence prevention mechanisms mandatory; from promoting peaceful settlement of disputes at all levels of society to the strict control over the use of force; from civic education to peaceful maintenance of public order; from granting rights to peace and security to promoting full use of democracy peace and constitution are highly linked. Internationally, constitutions can also ban war or even the existence of an army and recall that friendly relations among nations are a universal principle.

Conference given as a side-event during the Geneva Peace Week