A/HRC/39/31 building confidence. The transformative potential of disarmament would ultimately depend on its capacity to foster an understanding and a conviction that violence-free relations and peaceful conflict resolution were possible and sustainable. Furthermore, disarmament mechanisms contributed to the institutionalization of a cooperative security order. Disarmament institutions could promote multilateralism, uphold the rule of law and develop and maintain norms for the common good; however, they needed to address shortcomings in terms of diversity. 21. Ms. Brehm noted that arms control and disarmament had traditionally focused on preventing the outbreak of war, maintaining international stability and addressing other threats to the military security of the State. Disarmament was still articulated mainly in State-centric terms and in line with negative conceptions of peace. Yet new concepts of security that had been adopted into the disarmament vocabulary over the past two decades recognized that security could not be achieved by working against one another, but only through peaceful cooperation with one another. That had enabled humanitarian disarmament to contribute to the realization of the positive dimensions of peace by addressing threats to the health, safety, well-being and socioeconomic and human development of individuals and groups of people (human security) and by promoting the realization of their rights. Present-day disarmament discourse remained essentially security oriented and did not recognize peace as the goal and the basis for political action. Because security tended to be construed in political practice as the ability to defend one’s own interests against perceived threats, security primed the maintenance of peace and justified continued militarization and the development of weapons. 22. Ms. Brehm observed that in disarmament practice peace was either portrayed as a desirable yet illusive end goal that was subordinate to one’s own security needs, or as a process meant to civilize the conduct of conflicts through increasing regulation. Humanitarian disarmament, through its emphasis on mitigating the effects of the use of particular weapons, tacitly normalized and legitimized the use of weapons more generally. The security orientation of disarmament hampered its capacity to effectively address the structural causes of violence, foster more peaceful relations among actors and institutionalize a preventive, or even precautionary, orientation to weapons development. In order to promote the conditions of sustainable and positive peace and to break away from the continued cycle of developing new and more effective weapons, there was a need to overcome internalized attitudes, beliefs and behaviours that legitimated the use of force and militarization. Disarmament had to recognize peace as the goal and the basis for political action. 23. In the ensuing discussion, the representative of the Holy See noted that multilateral diplomacy was an important means of ensuring peace and preventing conflict, and that peace was not simply the absence of warfare based on a precarious balance of power, but instead required daily efforts towards achieving justice among all human beings and development that respected each person. 24. Stressing that the right to peace was the backbone for the enjoyment of all human rights, including the right to development, the representative of the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela stated that the United Nations system should prioritize the implementation of the right to peace and the right to development in view of the increased number of armed conflicts, the arms race, economic sanctions and unilateral coercive measures that hampered the development of entire peoples. 25. The representative of the International Fellowship of Reconciliation stressed the importance of building confidence through disarmament and non-violent communication, which should be taught in schools in order to implement the right to peace and allow future generations to enjoy that right and avoid mass killings. 26. The representative of the Spanish Society for International Human Rights Law reiterated the proposal that had been put forward by 692 civil society organizations in September 2017 to revise General Assembly resolution 71/189 and to include specific references to the right to disarmament; the right to human security; the right to resist and 6