Dieter Senghaas (born 27 August 1940 in Geislingen an der Steige) is a German social scientist and peace researcher.
After studying political science, social science, philosophy and history from 1960 to 1967, Senghaas received his doctorate in Frankfurt in 1967. His dissertation, Kritik der Abschreckung (Criticism of Deterrence), dealt with the field which has characterised his scientific activities since then: international relations, especially peace research, research on developing countries and conflict research. His studies were followed by work as an assistant at the Johann Wolfgang Goethe University in Frankfurt until 1968, and then a research residency in the USA with Karl W. Deutsch at Harvard University, among others, until 1970. From 1972 until 1978, Senghaas was leader of a research group at the Hessische Stiftung Friedens- und Konfliktforschung (Hessian Foundation for Peace and Conflict Research) and professor at the University of Frankfurt during that same period. Since 1978, he has been a professor at the University of Bremen and also active there at the Institut für interkulturelle und internationale Studien (Institute for Intercultural and International Studies). In 1986/1987 and 1992/1994, Dieter Senghaas was a research professor at the Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik (Foundation of Science and Politics). Since 1995, Senghaas has been a member of the advisory council of the Bundesakademie für Sicherheitspolitik (Federal Academy for Security Policies) in Bonn. In 1999, Senghaas was awarded the Göttinger Friedenspreis (Göttingen Peace Prize) of the Dr. Roland Röhl Foundation.
In the 1960s and the beginning of the 1970s, Senghaas took a close look at the armament dynamics and the system of deterrence in the East-West conflict. Senghaas recognised an autistic structure in the deterrence situation of the Cold War, which according to Senghaas, was mostly driven from the inside and less from the outside (international processes). Senghaas' criticism of deterrence and his analysis of armament dynamics and control contributed to the development of critical peace research.[1]
In his three compilations, "Imperialismus und strukturelle Gewalt (1972)" (Imperialism and Structural Power), "Peripherer Kapitalismus. Analysen über Abhängigkeit und Unterentwicklung (1974)" (Peripheral Capitalism. Analyses of Dependency and Underdevelopment) and "Kapitalistische Weltökonomie. Kontroversen über ihren Ursprung und ihre Entwicklungsdynamik (1979)" (Capitalistic World Economy. Controversies about its Origin and its Development Dynamics), as well as in his 1977 book, "Weltwirtschaftsordnung und Entwicklungspolitik. Plädoyer für Dissoziation" (World Economic Order and Development Policy. Plea for Dissociation), Senghaas attempts to make visible the structural dependency of the periphery on the metropolises, or stated more simply, the dependence of the developing countries (or areas) on the political and economic power centers in the age of world economy. Senghaas sees a solution to the impediments to development, created externally (pressure of the industrial countries) and internally (interests of the power elite in keeping the existing societal structures), in a decoupling (not severance!) at times from the world market. In this decoupling phase, the concentration should be upon the development of the economic form of the developing countries, which should be the satisfaction of the local population, if possible exploiting local resources (with which Senghaas does not mean striving for economic self-sufficiency). With this way of looking at things, Senghaas also simultaneously rejected the idea prevalent at that time that simply integrating the Third World into the existing world economic order could solve the development problems of the Third World. As of the middle of the 1970s, Senghaas attempted to strengthen his theory by analysing the developing socialist countries of Albania, the People's Republic of China, North Korea and Cuba. For Senghaas, socialism did not represent a post-capitalist production system. Much more (independently of the intentions of the respective leader or regime), socialism could accomplish an economic development, which would not have been possible in that way under capitalistic conditions. In his analysis, Senghaas came to the conclusion that the development of states proceeded positively in the beginning, but then came increasingly to a standstill due to the absence of reforms, a more and more complex system of business and society and an increasingly inflexible political order (results in the middle of the 1980s). From the results of the analysis, several country monographs and an article on the status of socialism regarding historical development were created in cooperations with Frankfurt graduate students. Dieter Senghaas decisively left his mark on the discussion of theoretical development within international relations in Germany with his works about the possibilities of independent development processes in dependency of the given international conditions (economic and political).
Dieter Senghaas' "civilizational hexagon" joins load-bearing building blocks together for a stable maintenance of peace. This peacekeeping and its supervision of itself is regarded as a civilising project. The hexagon consists of six building blocks, which are all linked to each other, since they all depend on each other. A fundamental building block is the monopoly on the use of force, which means the de-privatisation of force and its authorization, that is, "disarmament of the citizens". The next building block, the rule of law, comprises the control of the monopoly of force, which has as a precondition that the public monopoly of force is not despotically abused. Since without a check on the monopoly of force, it would be nothing less than a dictatorship. The third building block, democratic participation, means democratic involvement of the public in elections and other decision making, since without this right of the people to contribute, they would not obey the professed laws. The trust of the people must also be secured by equal rights, so that they comply with such regulations. This occurs, among other things, through the building block of social justice, which provides for a just verdict from a neutral court when there is a violation of the law, but also takes care of safeguarding the basic necessities of every person. The next building block falls under the heading of constructive conflict culture, which describes the capability for tolerance in a multi-cultural society and a willingness for compromise-oriented conflict solution. The last building block of the hexagon is interdependencies and control of emotion. The purpose of this building block is the mutual dependency among people and their control of themselves in conflict situations.[2]