There has been a paradigm shift in the balance of power at the global level post pandemic period as a result of which a new scenario seems to be evolving that could have dangerous implications for the humanity at large. The world witnessed US withdrawal from Afghanistan, the attempts by some nations like China being made for dominance in the region and last but not the least the Ukraine-Russia war escalating and refusing to end soon. It would not be wrong to say that the world today stands engulfed in a situation that many a times raises apprehensions about the globe having come at the brink of World War-III. In view of this it is high time to seri- ously realize the gravity of situation and that only a univer- sal world culture can vouch for peace in this world. It is really an irony that despite peaceful society being the ulti- mate aim of culture, the world today continues to be engulfed in hatred and violence with even the so called civilized and cultured nations across the globe busy in efforts to establish their supremacy to play the shots as per their whims and fancies. This clearly indicates that there has been a serious drift in the culture engineering across the globe during the past so many decades so much so that the world today seems to be on the brink of World War-III. It is an acknowledged fact that individuals, families, communities and societies have multiple options to adopt any of the ways or measures for being peaceful and that too through peaceful means, but it is quite unfor- tunate that some nations have been nurturing violence making it an inseparable component to deter the peaceful societies within and outside. This ultimately leads to a sit- uation whereby even peaceful nations have to adopt vio- lent means for deterrence though under compulsion. This makes one thing quite clear that there has been deviation from the established approach to peace that tilts the cul- tural balance in favour of peace, thereby peace cultures becoming the dominant cultures. In this context in 1995 UNESCO initiated ‘Culture of Peace Programme’ to assist war torn societies in the work of reconciliation and rebuild- ing. Despite having formulated the programme with six components aimed to help elucidate the goals and meth- ods for international development of peace culture, the current global scenario reflects that the programme has failed in achieving the set goals. It is pertinent to mention here that under the aforesaid programme Power was redefined not in terms of violence or force, but that of active nonviolence thus building upon the experience of active nonviolence as a means of social change and its proven success during the twentieth century. It also emphasized on mobilizing people not in order to defeat an enemy but in order to build understanding, tolerance, and solidarity. Thus these principles were in consonance with the basic tenets of nonviolence developed by Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi, Martin Luther King and Nelson Mandela and were aimed at liberating the oppressor as well as the oppressed through strategies for developing unity at the center of deliberation and action. According to these principles the culture of violence and war had to be replaced by a culture of peace, supported by a democrat- ic process with people participating in making decisions that affect their lives. Unfortunately, today exploitation characterizes the culture of violence and war and last but not the least economic exploitation being on the forefront.
The ground situation being quite contrary reveals that the programme launched by the UNO failed to achieve the set goals. As of today there is a need for conducting seri- ous introspection by the global leaders and use the world organization UNO that has the capacity to solve the prob- lem amid the hovering clouds of World War-III. It needs to be understood that the campaign in the direction of peace has to be joint venture of all the nations. Moreover, the United Nations Organization will have to intensify its cul- tural programmes to bring the member nations closer, but also to reverse the existing tilt in cultures today. This has become inevitable in view of the fact that the thought of war, hatred, fear and competition can be conveniently thwarted by diverting the attention of the nations towards the universal world culture that vouches only for peace.