Field Of Peace Studies Research Articles

Learning From the Global Experience in Conflict Prevention

This article identifies some of the central blind spots in the Western understanding of conflict prevention. On the one hand, this is achieved by referencing research that contrasts elements of Western conflict prevention approaches with more successful non-Western methods. On the other hand, the article summarizes research indicating which framings and social realities predict conflict onset and escalation, exposing intellectual approaches that are detrimental to conflict prevention. Throughout this exploration, the article also unveils my personal intellectual history and development in the field of peace studies.

Rescuing reconciliation: finding its role in peace research and practice

A rich and complex literature on reconciliation has emerged in response to political transitions since the 1990s, yet reconciliation’s value as a concept within peace studies is unclear. Definitions are contested, impressionistic or overlap with other concepts, while ‘reconciliation’ remains politically contested in many conflict-affected societies. This article considers the four leading understandings of reconciliation: reconciliation as peacebuilding, reconciliation as transitional justice, reconciliation as forgiveness, and reconciliation as identity change. Each is assessed according to whether it is (1) conceptually coherent, and (2) likely to be credible to people in conflict. The article argues that by restricting reconciliation’s meaning to a modified version of the fourth understanding – reconciliation as transformed social identity – the term can hold a distinct meaning in the peace studies field and direct a clear research agenda, as well as attract much less political criticism and misunderstanding.

Agonistic peace: advancing knowledge on institutional dynamics and relational transformation

This introductory article presents current conceptualisations in the field of agonistic peace and how they relate to studies of war-to-peace transitions in developing countries and post-colonial contexts. It argues for a need for analytical approaches to agonistic peace, which has thus far mainly been advanced in terms of theory and conceptual refinement in the field of peace research. This collection of case studies represents a first attempt at putting together a broad range of studies based on different analytical strategies for analysing agonistic peace. This introductory essay unpacks the main conceptual developments in the field, starting with Mouffe’s concept of agonistic democracy, which subsequently has been moved to the field of peace studies. We present the proliferation and application of the agonistic peace concept in recent years and show how agonistic peace links to and differs from broader developments in critical peace research. Moreover, we present the different themes and contributions examined by the articles: inclusion, dialogue and power as well as identity, recognition and reconciliation, which we cluster around the two overall themes of institutional dynamics and relational transformation. Lastly, we point to broader implications for the field and avenues open for future research.

THE INTENSIFYING INTERSECTION OF ETHICS, RELIGION, THEOLOGY, AND PEACE STUDIES

AbstractThe intersection of ethics, religion, theology, and peace studies is intensifying through increasingly multi‐disciplinary, contextual, explicitly normative scholarship. This book discussion demonstrates this claim through its profiles of an introduction to Christian ethics by Ellen Ott Marshall, a case study of the School of the Americas Watch by Kyle B. T. Lambelet, a case study of the American Jewish Palestine solidarity movement by Atalia Omer, and a global, historical study of Christian ethics by Cecilia Lynch. Though their methods and subjects vary, these authors are collectively renewing a history of mutual enrichment between religious ethics and peace studies, employing theories of lived, ambivalent religion. To begin, this essay provides introductory remarks about the field of peace studies, highlighting the evolving involvement of religious actors. To conclude, it makes a plea for greater use of conflict theory and peace practice in religious ethics.

Teaching Peace, Not War, to U.S. History Students

In a war-making society, teaching peace as a rejection of war requires boldness—a characteristic, in my experience, not typically found in history instructors at work. While the field of peace studies overtly rejects violence in all its forms (hopefully), historians tend to claim or aspire to academic detachment or objectivity. But “you can’t be neutral on a moving train,” historian Howard Zinn taught us, and the “train” of U.S. history, as engineered by the dominant opinion-pushers, celebrates and euphemizes war.

What’s So Funny ‘Bout, Peace, Love, and Shakespeare?: A Peace Studies Approach to As You Like It

ABSTRACTTaking As You Like It as its central case study, this essay explores how terms and ideas from the emergent field of Peace Studies might open new lines of inquiry into the work of Shakespeare. Previous scholarship on Shakespeare’s attitudes towards war and peace tend to assess his depictions of martial conflict. However, to focus solely on his attitudes toward war is to miss the possibilities he imagines for peace, not only in his time but also in our own. The present essay asks the question, “What happens if we go to Shakespeare for peace, not war?” In doing so, it considers a paradoxical phrase, “peace in action”, which assumes the perspective described by those in Peace Studies as “positive peace”. In order to offer an alternative to previous studies that have largely examined the histories, we examine a romantic comedy with its fair share of time wasting and frustrated plotting. As You Like It, we suggest, makes seemingly arbitrary movements towards peace into comedy and drama by indulging in their “pointlessness”. That is, Shakespeare presents a peaceful world through “pointless” or arbitrary changes in mindset in order to give an impression of a utopian peace, summarised by Touchstone: “Your ‘If’ is the only peace maker; much value in ‘If’” (5.4.91–92). He suggests that peace, love and understanding depend upon imagined alternatives, disparate plots and hypotheticals. Rosalind’s epilogue will underscore the point by suggesting new social alliances that are not in themselves permanent yet offer a temporary avenue towards peace-making.

A Joint Learning Process for Stakeholders and Insider Peacebuilders: A Case Study from Southern Thailand

In 2012, two well-established international nongovernmental organizations (INGOs) in the peacebuilding field, Conciliation Resources and Saferworld, published a joint report entitled “From Conflict Analysis to Peacebuilding Impact” (Hiscock and Dumasy 2012). This report was based on 18 conflict studies across a broad range of contexts, all focused on building the capacities of local actors to engage in participatory forms of conflict analysis as well as utilizing the insights gained for strategizing peacebuilding initiatives. The report’s main conclusion was that adequate conflict analysis is a key precondition for all types of effective peacebuilding initiatives. Two other notable conclusions were that the process and the ownership of the conflict analysis are as important as the results of the analysis. That study resonates with the current authors’ similar experiences in the context of the Insider Peacebuilders Platform (IPP) for the Deep South of Thailand. The IPP group was created at the beginning of 2011 as a joint initiative of a number of academic institutes in the Conflict and Peace Studies field, one state-based institution, and several academic and civil society organizations (CSOs). This platform was inspired by the observations of peace scholars and practitioners that, although civil society has been increasingly engaged in the region since 2007, few efforts have been put forward to bring the different actors together as a way to improve their joint strategizing and explore possibilities for more effective collaboration. Intensive discussions within the core IPP team initially focused on how best to develop such an approach in light of the earlier failures of several Asian Journal of Peacebuilding Vol. 2 No. 2 (2014): 277-296 Field Note

THINKING BEYOND DIRECT VIOLENCE

The thought-provoking roundtable on “theorizing violence” in the November 2013 issue ofIJMESpaid much attention to different manifestations of physical violence. This is the type of violence that as early as 1969 Johan Galtung, one of the founders of the field of peace studies, termed direct violence, distinguishing it from other forms of violence, to which I will refer below. Direct violence, Galtung noted, is related to “somaticincapacitation, or deprivation of health, alone (with killing as the extreme form), at the hands of anactorwhointendsthis to be the consequence.” According to Galtung, direct violence is physically manifested, it is related to a discernible event, and it has to involve a perpetrator and a purpose.

The Senesh Fellows

Dr Elise Boulding served for five years as the Director of the International Peace Research Association Foundation. During that time, she worked tirelessly to promote peace research. One of the projects she was most instrumental in starting was the Senesh Fellowship. The Senesh Fellowship Program was begun in 1990 with a generous donation from Dr Larry Senesh in honor of his wife, Dorothy Marchus Senesh, a life-long peace activist. This fund provides a biennial fellowship awarded to a woman from the developing world for studies in the fields of peace and development. Dr Boulding headed the selection committee for this Fellowship for many years. During her tenure on the committee, she had the opportunity to use this Fellowship to promote and highlight the role of women in peace research and to highlight their many academic accomplishments. In this issue honoring Dr Boulding, the continuation of the Senesh Fellowship is just one more way in which the mark that Dr Boulding left on the field of peace studies is evident. The author took over chairing the selection committee when Dr Boulding retired from the position and greatly benefited from her wisdom and advice. The scholars highlighted here reflect exactly the types of scholars that Dr Boulding chose to promote.

Elise Boulding and peace education: theory, practice, and Quaker faith

Elise Boulding wrote academically to help to create and influence the field of peace education, and lived a life that exemplified it. Her life integrated theory and practice and exemplified peace praxis as the ‘craft and skills of doing peace’ and ‘the integration of thought and action’. For Boulding, peace education occurred at all levels, across academic disciplines, across time, and across boundaries of cultures, states, class, race, age, and gender. As one of the founders of the field of peace studies, she became a sociologist to ‘do’ peace, and was especially oriented to peace education and activism and to futures studies and to studying women and children and cultures of peace. Her spiritual roots were in the values and testimonies of Quakers, especially simplicity, peace, integrity, community, and equality. She saw that of God in all, and lived the ‘inner light’ important to Quakers.

The Bradford Model and the Contribution of Conflict Resolution to the Field of International Peacekeeping and Peacebuilding

This article outlines the important contribution made by the Department of Peace Studies, particularly the Centre for Conflict Resolution (CCR), at the University of Bradford, the field of international peacekeeping and peacebuilding. It adds Woodhouse's examination of the crucial role of Adam Curle, the first chair of the department, in the field of peace studies (Woodhouse, 2010). In the spirit of Woodhouse, this article provides further investigation into how the department has developed research into one of Curle's main strands of activity relevant peacemaking, to nurture social and economic systems which engender cooperation rather than conflict (Woodhouse, 2010, p. 2). Woodhouse's article speaks of how Peace Studies at Bradford University explored this strand with a focus on research on institutions for international co-operation and interdependence (Woodhouse, 2010, p. 2). This article complements the approach by examining the impact the Centre for Conflict Resolution has had on the practice of peacekeeping over three generations, and how, in turn, the practice of peacekeeping has informed critical enquiry of peacekeeping and peacebuilding.

Adam Curle: Radical Peacemaker and Pioneer of Peace Studies

Normal 0 21 MicrosoftInternetExplorer4 /* Style Definitions */ table.MsoNormalTable {mso-style-name:Normale Tabelle; mso-tstyle-rowband-size:0; mso-tstyle-colband-size:0; mso-style-noshow:yes; mso-style-parent:; mso-padding-alt:0cm 5.4pt 0cm 5.4pt; mso-para-margin:0cm; mso-para-margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:10.0pt; font-family:Times New Roman;} This article presents a biographical account of Adam Curle, focusing especially on the development of his ideas on peace and peace studies and the impact these had on the evolution of the field at the level of theory and of practice. Curle was the founding Professor of the Department of Peace Studies at the University of Bradford in the UK. Appointed to the Chair in 1973, the department launched its teaching and research programmes in 1974. Curle's influence on the department and his development of a theory and practice of peace and peacemaking is traced and analysed in this article. His theory of peace was based on a synthesis of academic perspectives drawing on psychology, anthropology and development theory, and on the early peace theory of other innovators in the field of peace studies, including Johan Galtung and Kenneth Boulding. His peace practice was based on the experience of large scale conflict in the Nigerian Civil War and the India Pakistan conflict in the 1960s and 1970s, and was distinguished by his use of non-official or track two mediation as a complement to formal diplomacy in such conflicts. His use of mediation was modified later when, in the 1990s, in the context of the civil war in the Balkans, he helped to mobilise support for local people who wished to resist the civil war and to build peaceful communities and cultures of peace. In this way he also pioneered the idea of peace building from below, currently recognised as a leading mode of peacemaking amongst academics and practitioners.

SYMPOSIUM: Voices for Peace: Educators Respond to the Virginia Tech Shootings: Peace Education in a Violent Culture

The horror of the shootings on the campus of Virginia Tech challenges people to think about how to reduce levels of violence in the United States. Violence is a hallmark of American culture. A recent ranking of countries from peaceful to violent places the United States ninety-sixth in the world, out of 2 countries (Global Peace Index, 2007). Each day, eight children in the United States are murdered by gunfire (Children’s Defense Fund, 2004). Three million children each year are abused or neglected (Lamberg, 998). Young people in the United States typically watch tens of thousands of simulated murders by the time they reach adolescence (Lamberg, 998). In a society where the use of violence is viewed as legitimate — armed police provide security, parents use corporal punishment to discipline their children, popular culture praises violent heroes, and vast amounts of resources go to maintaining military superiority — children will learn to resort to violence to resolve their conflicts. Young people like Seung-Hui Cho, the shooter on the Virginia Tech campus, who act out violently in schools have learned well the lessons taught on the news and in the violent entertainment they watch. In response to the carnage of shootings that have taken place in U.S. schools during the past decade, educators are turning to a fresh approach, peace education, to quell incidents of school violence. Some have turned to the growing field of peace studies to gain insights into what they can do to empower students to resolve conflicts nonviolently. Peace theory teaches that there are three approaches to peace — peace through strength, peacemaking, and peace-building (Berlowitz, 994; Galtung & Jacobsen, 2000). Peace through strength relies on force and threats of force to deter violence or punish aggressors. Peacemaking uses communication skills to resolve conflicts,

Peace Studies as Experiential Education

This article argues that peace education and good peace studies at the university level must include peace action as well. Despite general agreement in the peace studies field that such inclusion of peace action is important, few colleges or universities have successfully incorporated an experiential component into their academic programs. Using the Peace and Global Studies Program at Earlham College as a model, this article attempts to show how peace action, in the form of on-campus cocurricular experiences, off-campus internships, and foreign study, gives new meaning to the study that precedes it but also is modified by further course work. When constructed on a developmental basis, good peace studies programs are able to offer students a way both to “think [their] way into... acting” and to “act [their] way into... thinking.”