A Detour in the Local Turn: Roadblocks in Timor-Leste’s Post-Conflict Peacebuilding

Abstract

Liberal missteps have paved the way for the local turn in post-conflict peacebuilding. However, localized peacebuilding does not always produce peaceful outcomes. Several scholars have previously demonstrated that unresolved tensions from international-local encounters result in a negative hybrid peace in which political and social hierarchies are preserved and conflict and violence persist. To add to existing analyses on the local turn in peacebuilding, this article analyzes some of the causes and consequences of negative hybrid peace using the case of Timor-Leste. Exclusive and superficial local involvement, political cleavages within the local leadership, and unresolved tensions from international-local encounters were roadblocks in Timor-Leste’s post-conflict peacebuilding. These characteristics prelude a return to a status quo dominated by the local elite and plagued with governance and socio-economic issues.