Toda Institute for Global Peace and Policy Research
CALL FOR PROPOSALS
Humanitarian Competition for Global Visioning
Deadline: September 1, 2009

In the course of its first decade (1996-2006), the Toda Institute took up several major research programs. HUGG1 (1996-1999) focused on problems of globalization, regionalization, and democratization. The P.E.A.C.E. project (2004-2006) dealt with issues concerning peace, education, art, culture, and the environment. The fruits of this collaboration among over 1000 peace scholars from all five continents have been as follows: over 20 international conferences, 26 volumes, and the yearly publication of Peace & Policy, the Institute’s journal.

During its second decade, the Toda Institute’s program will explore issues such as human security and human rights, dialogue and nonviolent conflict transformation, global governance and world citizenship, the abolition of nuclear weapons, sustainable peace through environmental integrity and social justice.

In his 2009 Peace Proposal, the founder of the Toda Institute, Dr. Daisaku Ikeda, has recommended “the creation of an office of global visioning within the UN secretariat in order to enable the international body to project and anticipate future trends and developments and focus its energies on these.” The goal of “global visioning” is to be able to foresee problems, anticipating the challenges humanity will face because of the effects of financial crises, climate change, protracted conflicts, and other issues.

The idea of “Humanitarian Competition,” also found in the 2009 Peace Proposal, was first proposed by Tsunesaburo Makiguchi in his 1903 work The Geography of Human Life. It sprang from Makiguchi’s observation that competition based on military, political or economic superiority was not serving the best interests of humankind. Instead, he envisioned a world in which groups and nations would vie with each other to find the most effective and humane solutions to our most urgent problems.

In this spirit, we would like to announce a call for project proposals that will bring together the best ideas for this kind of global visioning. Since relations between the UN, NGOs, transnational bodies and many other organizations are becoming more extensive, project proposals need not focus exclusively on the UN, but can freely concentrate on the main issues affecting our planet.

Humanitarian Competition for Global Visioning
Call for Project Proposals: Deadline September 1, 2009
Submission Guidelines

In order to achieve a multicultural dialogue and perspective, each research project will be directed by a Principal Investigator and composed of a team of scholars from different cultural backgrounds. Each proposed project must meet the following conditions:

• A Principal Investigator (PI) who can command the respect and confidence of project participants.
• The participation of 5 to 10 experts in the field, with good gender, regional, and civilizational balance.
• A project proposal, including a plan of study, list of participants, timetable, and potential beneficiaries.
• The commitment to produce a book from the team research work, with the possibility of using other media such as websites, videos, and others, in addition to the book
• A commitment to attend the Toda Conference in Sydney from 12-14 July 2010.
  

Proposal Outline (1,500 Words Maximum)

• Topic/Theme of the project proposal
• Name, title, affiliation, and full address of Principal Investigator
• Name, title, affiliation, and full address of the research team participants (Participants must come from a variety of countries representing the stakeholders in the problem under investigation. No more than 10 researchers per team.)
• Statement of the problem
• Review of the literature
• Proposed contributions and potential beneficiaries of the research project
• Project timetable

Project Budget

The Institute is able to offer the following budget*:
Seed funding: $1,000
P.I. Honorarium: $1,000 (upon publication)
Participant/author honorarium: $1,000 (upon publication)
Hotel accommodation for the Sydney 2010 Conference (some help with transportation might be offered in special circumstances).
*Project budgets which exceed these amounts should seek outside funding and make note of this in the project proposal.

Suggested Themes/Topics

The following are only meant to stimulate your imagination, many other topics are relevant:

• Human rights and human security
• Inter and intra-civilizational dialogue in conflict resolution
• UN reform and humanitarian competition
• Next steps towards a nuclear weapons free world
• Environmental consequences of nuclear proliferation
• Tensions between environmental and development policies
• Resources and international conflict
• The role of civil society in global governance
• Peace journalism in time of crisis
• Art as a channel for peace-building

Please send your proposals by email to chloe@toda.org by the September 1, 2009 deadline.

Further Information

We look forward to receiving many excellent proposals, and we will be happy to answer your questions in the meantime. For further information, you may write the Toda Institute for Global Peace and Policy Research at 1585 Kapiolani Blvd., Suite 1130, Honolulu, HI 96814. Tel: 808-955-8231. Fax: 808-955-6476. Email: chloe@toda.org.