By Jim Luce
I first met Steve Killelea one year ago at the Harvard Club when the U.S. Peace Index (USPI) was launched. Last week, in the Japanese-themed Upper East Side home of Krishen and Geeta Mehta, I met him again — along with his lovely wife and daughter — far from his native Australia. Steve is a business-minded visionary who believes peace can be supported better if it is quantifiable. His life mission is to measure it.
Australian visionary Steve Killelea’s U.S. Peace Index is now in its second year. Photo: IEP.
Built upon its highly respected Global Peace Index, produced by the Australian NGO The Institute for Economics and Peace (IEP), the U.S. Peace Index was launched last year as the first in a series of national peace indices that IEP has begun to release. The aim is to further understand the types of environments that are associated with peace and its economic impacts at a more specific regional level.
“We really only study conflict, not peace,” Steve told his captivated audience. This is why humanity needs to quantify peace so we can more readily achieve it.
The Global Peace Index 2011 map shows that the U.S. has a “medium” state of peace. Image: GPI. Read the rest of this entry »
