Possibility Of Peace Research Articles

Struggles over memory?

AbstractIn this contribution, I introduce decolonial memory activism as struggle over meaning (Deutungskampf). Decolonial memory activism is understood as a specific form of memory activism that calls for the decolonization of both memory culture and politics, which necessitates a confrontation with dynamics of violence, power, and oppression. Unlike research that has primarily focused on the contents of collective memory, I argue that decolonial memory activism seeks to fundamentally challenge and transform the epistemological foundations of collective memory itself. Grounded in decolonial theories and drawing from a shared resolution of decolonial memory activists across Germany, I illustrate three interwoven elements of hegemonic knowledge that are being challenged by decolonial memory activism: nationalism, temporality, and the storage model of memory. Through this lens, the paper suggests that an understanding of struggles over memory gains more depth by considering the epistemic dimensions of these struggles. Such an approach opens up new possibilities for peace and conflict research as well as for social and political transformations.

Sufi Commentaries on a Quranic Peace Verse

Abstract Qur’ān 41:33–35 instructs that believers should return the greater or greatest good for acts of evil, and the commentators recognize that it is a counsel to nonviolence on the part of individuals. It is one of a series of peace verses in the Muslim scripture. The place of these ethical commandments in Muslim traditions has been little studied in the Western academy. This article focuses on prominent thinkers of Nishapur and Shiraz who laid the foundations for classical Sufism. The indigenous Muslim roots of Sufism and its tie to formal Islamic texts are increasingly underlined by scholars. All three of the figures on which we concentrate authored substantial commentaries on the Qur’ān, and all three found this passage important for their ethical frameworks. For medieval Sufi thinkers Qur’ān 41:33–35 opened up the possibility of peace and reconciliation after conflict in society, whether within Sufi study circles or in wider urban environments, including both elite strata and that of urban artisans and youth.

The Global South as a theoretical and methodological marker for scientific inquiry: researching and teaching decolonial peace

How do we know, theorize, and teach the possibilities of peace in the Global South? For most of Eurocentric literature on the topic, peace in the Global South seems like an impossible utopia. Building on Freire’s pedagogy, I argue for a decolonial approach to peace studies centered on the agency of Global South peoples and their power to transform the world. This means that the construction of knowledge around the possibilities for peace are situated in concrete and real struggles of marginalized groups that have been resisting the expansion of violent and oppressive systems, and whose existence and struggles for alternative worlds are an example of “building peace” beyond the neoliberal-Western constraints. The aim of theorizing and learning peace from such perspective is to rescue the liberatory power of the idea of peace away from an imperialist agenda of control and oppression, and towards a liberatory strategy for people and planet.

Evolution, culture, and the possibility of peace.

Glowacki's work meshes well with our view of human nature as having evolved to use culture to improve survival and reproduction. Peace is a cultural achievement, requiring advances in social organization and control, including leaders who can implement policies to benefit the group, third-party mediation, and intergroup cooperation. Cultural advances shift intergroup interactions from negative-sum (war) to positive-sum (trade).

In the Rubble of War, A Little Flower: How Thérèse Conquered the Oriental Heart of John C. H. Wu

Abstract This paper narrates the conversion story of the Chinese statesman and scholar John C. H. Wu at the beginning of the Second World War in Asia. Wu’s conversion to Catholicism was the culmination of a public intellectual’s struggle for peace and harmony in the violent and disturbing decades of the new Republic. Wu represented a Chinese humanist school of thought that desired some form of meaningful synthesis and integration between Chinese culture and western modernity for the salvation and reconstruction of their country. Though his political hopes were shattered by the war, he found inspiration through an encounter with Thérèse of Lisieux, who showed him the possibility of peace and reconciliation between East and West, between tradition and modernity, and between Chinese and Christian religions.

Contested heritage in Susya: Asymmetry and possibilities for peace

Discussions about the role of heritage sites and practices in provoking conflict – or conversely, as opportunities for building peace – have gained new impetus in recent years. In this context, we discuss a site of contested heritage in the occupied Palestinian territories, the Susya national heritage site. The article first highlights the way this contestation relates to wider conflict over territory (as well as political, economic and cultural resources). Using oral histories gathered by Palestinian youth researchers, it then considers how heritage narratives reinforce or challenge competing claims to ‘belong’ in Susya against a backdrop of protracted conflict. Finally, the article asks whether such contested heritage sites could play a role as resources for peace by adopting a conflict transformational paradigm, and what the barriers are to this approach.

Huxleyan utopia or Huxleyan dystopia? "Scientific humanism", Faure's legacy and the ascendancy of neuroliberalism in education.

In addition to the longstanding threat posed by narrow economism, faith in the possibility of peace and progress through democratic politics - central to the humanistic vision of the 1972 Faure report - today faces additional challenges. These challenges include the ascendancy of neurocentrism in the global policyscape. Whereas the effects of neoliberalism on education have been extensively critiqued, the implications of a newer, related ideological framework known as neuroliberalism remain under-theorised. Neuroliberalism combines neoliberal ideas concerning the role of markets in addressing social problems with beliefs about human nature ostensibly grounded in the behavioural, psychological and neurological sciences. This article critically examines a recent initiative of one of UNESCO's Category 1 Institutes - the Mahatma Gandhi Institute of Education for Peace and Sustainable Development (MGIEP) - that seeks to mainstream neuroscience and digital technology within global educational policy. Comparing the visions of the 1972 Faure, the 1996 Delors and the 2021 Futures of Education reports with MGIEP's International Science and Evidence Based Education Assessment (ISEEA), the authors analyse continuity and change in UNESCO's attempts to articulate a vision of "scientific humanism" which advocates the use of science for the betterment of humanity. They argue that ISEEA's overall recommendations - as represented in its Summary for Decision Makers (SDM) - reinforce a reductive, depoliticised vision of education which threatens to exacerbate educational inequality while enhancing the profits and power of Big Tech. These recommendations exemplify a neuroliberal turn in global education policy discourse, marking a stark departure from the central focus on ethics and democratic politics characteristic of UNESCO's landmark education reports. Reanimating, in cruder form, visions of a scientifically-organised utopia of the kind that attracted UNESCO's inaugural Director-General, Julian Huxley, ISEEA's recommendations actually point towards the sort of dystopian "brave new world" of which his brother, Aldous Huxley, warned.

Social Identity and Conflict Dynamics in Indian History Textbooks

Abstract History textbooks play a critical role in their connection to conflict. While they can play a role in dehumanizing the “other” by propagating the myths and narratives of dominant groups, they can also play a transformational role in challenging discourses and narratives at the root of conflict. This article explores the relationship between social identity and conflict dynamics in India by examining textbooks from three periods of Indian history (colonial, post-independence, and the rise of the Bharatiya Janata Party from 1999 to 2004), in order to explore how religion became a salient marker of identity informing social boundary creations and conflict dynamics. This article concludes by suggesting opportunities for future research and possibilities for peace.

The Possibility of Peace between Hamas and Israel

This paper investigates the possibility of establishing peace between Hamas and Israel, based on the politicisation model of armed groups that leads eventually to change the violent character of armed groups. The main question is: Can Israel and Hamas have a long-lasting peace to end the conflict in the Gaza Strip?The main pillars of politicisation are the willingness of warring parties to conclude peace, the existence of a ‘hurting stalemate’, the narrowness of objectives and the ability to guarantee public support. The primary conclusion of this paper is that comprehensive peace is difficult to achieve, but a unique long-term truce ‘Hudna’ is attainable.

The (Im)possibility of Achieving a Peaceful Solution to the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict

This paper has a two-fold objective: (a) It aims to provide a critical analysis of the constraints and obstacles that hindered possibilities for implementing the Oslo Accord, 1993-1994 signed by Israel and the Palestinians; and (b) examines the extent to which the U.S. administration was involved in mediating between the two parties with a view to removing such constraints and obstacles through drafting territorial and security arrangements for Israel, devoid of Palestinian input and voice. In analyzing the two most recent White House peace proposals associated with Presidents Obama and Trump, the paper shows that basic inalienable Palestinian rights entrenched in international law and in relevant UN Security Council resolutions were compromised. These peace proposals were not based on meeting Israel’s obligations as firmly grounded in the Oslo Accord Agreements. Hence, Palestinian leaders and negotiators remained uncompromising in refusing to surrender territory and acquiesce to the Israeli-Settler colonial policy and its demands backed by U.S. presidents at the time. Their request for self-determination was and remains simple and straightforward: Israel has to cease political maneuvering, embedded in unsubstantiated claims for security and exceptionalism. The (im)possibility for peace in Palestine/Israel continues.

Obstacles and Possibilities for Peace between Israel and Palestine

There have been various obstacles to resolution of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict since the United Nations resolved to partition Palestine into a Jewish state and an Arab state. Some of these obstacles have been psychological, with both sides contesting the identity and narrative of the other. More concrete barriers have been the many settlements built by Israel in the occupied West Bank, including East Jerusalem, since 1967, totaling today over 500,000 Israeli settlers. The article addresses these and other obstacles, but it also notes the important changes that have occurred, making resolution of the conflict possible. These include the pragmatic 1988 PLO decision to create a state next to the state of Israel in the West Bank and Gaza, with a capital in East Jerusalem; the exchange of letters of mutual recognition between Chairman Arafat and Prime Minister Rabin that preceded the 1993 Oslo Principles, and the Arab Peace Initiative of 2002.

Human Security and the Israel-Palestine Conflict: External vs. Internal Perspectives

The formation of the State of Israel in 1948 has led to bloody course of events, which continues to this day, as to who has the right to claim the land home; the Palestinian-Arabs (mostly Muslim) or the Jewish (mostly non-Arab residents). The Israel-Palestine conflict is one of the most violent and bloodiest protracted conflict in the post World War II era, which has resulted in massive human casualties and human rights abuses for decades. The numerous wars in conjunction with the rise of militant groups like Hezbollah and Hamas have led to the development of a human security dilemma in Palestine and Israel. Decades of violence and destruction have resulted in massive human casualties, political chaos and disruption to the way of life of the people in the region. The concept of human security began to enter mainstream human rights, security and international politics debate, more prominently, after the release of the 1994 report United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) report on Human Development. The report is essentially explicit manifestations of the human rights principles enshrined in the 1948 United Nations Declaration of Humans Rights (UNDHR). Human security pushes for intense promotion and greater respect for human life in all spheres of human endeavors. This article inspects the human security dimension present in the Israel-Palestine conflict. This article encompasses two major parts. The first part provides an external understanding of how human security principles can be applied to Israel- Palestine conflict and how it affects the possibility of peace. Secondly, the article addresses the question on how people ‘inside’ the conflict view human security and the possibility of peace.

A cat-and-Maus game: the politics of truth and reconciliation in post-conflict comics

AbstractSeveral scholars have raised concerns that the institutional mechanisms through which transitional justice is commonly promoted in post-conflict societies can alienate affected populations. Practitioners have looked to bridge this gap by developing ‘outreach’ programmes, in some instances commissioning comic books in order to communicate their findings to the people they seek to serve. In this article, we interrogate the ways in which post-conflict comics produce meaning about truth, reconciliation, and the possibilities of peace, focusing in particular on a comic strip published in 2005 as part of the Sierra Leone Truth and Reconciliation Commission Report into the causes and crimes of the 1991–2002 Civil War. Aimed at Sierra Leonean teenagers, the Report tells the story of ‘Sierrarat’, a peaceful nation of rats whose idyllic lifestyle is disrupted by an invasion of cats. Although the Report displays striking formal similarities with Art Spiegelman's Maus (a text also intimately concerned with reconciliation, in its own way), it does so to very different ends. The article brings these two texts into dialogue in order to explore the aesthetic politics of truth and reconciliation, and to ask what role popular visual media like comics can play in their practice and (re)conceptualisation.

Sadako’s Cranes Return

(Peace Garden, La Casa de Maria)In truth, they never left,these oldest living birds, constantin their possibility of peace. Wide-winged,they’ve migrated across centuriesjoining earth to sky, land...

Эволюционная, социальная и психологическая природа конфликта: Л. Гумплович и К. Лоренц

The paper examines the theoretical approaches of Ludwig Gumplowicz and Konrad Lorenz to analysis of social conflict. The comparison of their views elicits conceptual similarity of both theories: the resemblance becomes evident when the author places a special focus on such issues as the interpretation of war reason and the possibility of peace. The main thesis which is proved by Gumplowicz is that the appearance of humankind must be explained in connection with the latest inventions in different academic fields like biology, ethnology and sociology. It is the way that gives a possibility to avoid metaphysical interpretations and to approach to genuine roots of modern conflicts ― both group and national. Lorenz believes that aggression as a basic instinct follows to explanation of the genesis of human and animal ritualized behavior patterns. Blocking mechanisms of aggression had been formed during the evolution in purpose of avoiding consequences of intraspecific competition. In cultures of different nations there are also rituals which are dealing with inhibition and canalization of aggression. Due to this fact world of human culture also has evolutionary patterns of ritualized behavior in its origin. Besides this Lorenz considers that aggression must be taken into account when a conflict is analyzed as a psychological phenomenon. Both Lorenz and Gumplowicz stand on naturalistic positions of understanding of human nature and strongly believe in the inherent human belligerence. Thus, they explain the diversification of cultural and historical landscape and the nature of social institutions like morality, law and state.

The Pivotal Role of the Enemy in Inducing Hope for Peace

Protracted conflicts are also termed “intractable” in part because they are perceived as irresolvable by those mired in the prolonged dispute. The conflict’s perceived irreconcilability leaves little reason for citizens to strive for peace which, in turn, might further exacerbate the conflict. The central question posed in this study is whether hopelessness regarding the possibility for peace can be alleviated among citizens embroiled in protracted conflicts. Results from an experimental study administered in Israel show that hope can be instilled, even among those most skeptical, when an outgroup member claims that peace is possible but not when an ingroup member claims the same. A follow-up study revealed that hope induced by the experimental interventions withstood a period of conflict escalation and elicited active support for peacebuilding. The study demonstrates that hope inducement is a useful tool for carving a pathway out of detrimental structures of intractability.

Violent conditions: The injustices of being

Violent conditions burn in the background of daily life. Consider the slow wounds of ecological violence, the crumbling cityscapes of austerity, or the mental trauma inflicted by capitalism. In this paper, we provide an account for understanding violence in and through conditions, drawing on the work of Johan Galtung and Gilles Deleuze in particular. Violent conditions are not the property of individuals or monolithic structures: they are the existential climates by which localized subjects and worlds condense into being. In making this argument, we not only advance scholarship on the geographies of violence, but also make a sustained case for how and why condition is an important social, political, and ontological heuristic. Our examination is framed by unearthing the complex conditions and discontents of capitalism. Violent conditions forcefully constrain, traumatize, and poison the very resources of our becoming. Accordingly, we provide a map for exploring the geographies of violent conditions across four interrelated sections. (1) The Virtual, (2) Truncated Life, (3) Time, (4) Common Sense. Collectively, these explain how violence is embedded in the flesh and bones of our worlds. The paper finishes by discussing the injustices of being and the possibilities for peace.

Taekwondo diplomacy: new possibilities for peace on the Korean Peninsula

Taekwondo diplomacy: new possibilities for peace on the Korean Peninsula

It's Not about Race: Good Wars, Bad Wars, and the Origins of Kant's Anti-Colonialism

This article offers a new interpretation of Kant's cosmopolitanism and his anti-colonialism inToward Perpetual Peace. Kant's changing position has been the subject of extensive debates that have, however, not recognized the central place of colonialism in the political, economic, and military debates in Europe in Kant's writings. Based on historical evidence not previously considered alongsidePerpetual Peace, I suggest that Kant's leading concern at the time of writing is the negative effect of European expansionism and intra-European rivalry over colonial possessions on the possibility of peace in Europe. Because of the lack of affinity between colonial conflict and his philosophy of history, Kant must adjust his concept of antagonism to distinguish between war between particular dyads, in particular spaces, and with particular non-state actors. I examine the implications of this argument for Kant's system of Right and conclude that his anti-colonialism co-exists with hierarchical views of race.

Uncovering the Virtues of Peace within Visual Culture: The Case for Nonviolence and Imperfect Peace in the Western Tradition

Artworks are both artifacts and agents of history that offer their own proposals about the realities that surround them, including conflict and the possibilities for peace. In so doing, they present a framework for reflection that may reveal underexamined didactic texts on alternative ways of dealing with conflicts. Our academic fields are art history and ancient history, and in this essay, we argue that any attempt to locate the contributions of art to the history of peacemaking must begin by rethinking the questions we normally ask ourselves about visual culture (whether archaeological or artistic) and the values that we choose to emphasize. To this end, we first explain the connections between art and peace, and the benefit of the study of art history in researching historical perspectives on peace. We then focus on the analysis of one specific case: the images of the virtues in the ancient Greek and Roman world and their relationship to what we consider to be an enduring culture of peace within the Western tradition. Finally, we show how this classical heritage of peace and the virtues has been kept alive as a useful discourse that has provided an accessible guide to the habits and behaviors (or, as we call them, “virtues”) necessary to achieve the desired peace that artworks have long envisioned.