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Researchers link Cambodia's relative prosperity and peace since 1993 with the Maharishi Effect
by Global Good News staff writer

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17 August 2013

In 2009, two researchers documented and published research on the social and environmental changes in Cambodia since 1993. This research is featured in a recently published book, along with other related research findings in the country from that era.

Why 1993?

That was the year Maharishi Vedic University in Cambodia was founded, and the year that large groups of students began to practise Transcendental Meditation and the advanced Transcendental Meditation Sidhi Programme together, thus creating the Maharishi Effect.

The Maharishi Effect is the name given by scientists* to the decreased crime, violence, and other negative social trends, and increased social coherence and harmony, in a city, province, or nation—created by large groups of people practising Maharishi Mahesh Yogi's peace-creating technologies of consciousness.

The researchers' findings were published in the Canadian Centres for Teaching Peace in 2009 and also in the new book, Maharishi Vedic University in Cambodia: Educational Reconstruction and Social Renewal.

Researchers Guy Hatchard and Ken Cavanaugh looked at a group of 70 nations, all of which changed their form of government to a multiparty democracy between 1990 and 1998.

Dr Hatchard and Dr Cavanaugh looked at the social and political conditions of each of these nations before and after the switch. Of these, 33 countries were peaceful before and after the transition, while 9 experienced civil war both before and after, thus suggesting that for these countries, the political transition did not enact major change in the peacefulness of the country.

The transition had a negative effect for 26 nations, all of which experienced an outbreak of civil conflict following the change of power.

The researchers found that only 3 nations of the original 70 experienced a positive, peaceful change as a result of the change in government, experiencing a shift from war to peace. Those countries were Mozambique, Namibia, and Cambodia.

What these countries have in common, said Dr Lee Fergusson, founding rector of Maharishi Vedic University in Cambodia, in a recent interview, is that all directly benefitted from peace programmes that Maharishi proposed and implemented in the early 1990s.

He added that Cambodia was also possibly the only country to restore a monarchy in addition to implementing a multiparty democracy. The country experienced a great shift toward peace and economic prosperity, the researchers pointed out.

Global Good News will continue to report on this research, including how Cambodia's prosperity is linked to Maharishi's programmes for world peace, in a forthcoming article.

* In honour of Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, who first predicted this effect in 1960.

See related articles:

∙ Study finds positive effects of Transcendental Meditation on education in Cambodia
∙ Nonverbal intelligence increases in Cambodian university students practising Transcendental Meditation
∙ Cambodian students' psychological health improves with Transcendental Meditation
∙ Maharishi Vedic University in Cambodia: New book gives history of education

Copyright © 2013 Global Good News Service

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