Anatomy of Peace
Anatomy of Peace
Arbinger Institute, Berrett Koehler, 2006
reviewed by Miranda Bodfish - October 2006
I discovered this book on one of the Free Book shelves here at the center, and once I picked it up, I couldn't put it down. The Anatomy of Peace is a story of adults in challenging situations who are learning how to treat those around them like human beings instead of objects. While this sounds like a simple objective, The Anatomy of Peace reveals how reluctant we often are to treat people in our lives with the humanity they deserve. Because of this, simple thoughtless actions often lead to personal conflict, and then to group conflict, and, ultimately to large-scale political conflict.
The Anatomy of Peace is written from the perspective of parents who face many challenges with their troubled children. They enter a program run by Yusuf al-Falah, a Palestinian and Avi Rozen, a Jew, both of whom lost their fathers due to conflict in Israel. The book tells the stories of Yusuf and Avi in addition to those of the adult participants in the workshop. Through Yusuf and Avi's teaching, the participants are encouraged to humanize whoever their perceived “enemies” may be in any situation—their troubled children, their spouses, their colleagues and friends. Their struggle to achieve this drives the plot of the story.
Whether you face a particularly challenging situation or would like to change disruptive patterns of behavior or if you would just like to bring more peace into your life, this book provides valuable insight into conflict on all levels.