Post-conflict Societies Research Articles

Challenges and prospects of history education in divided and post-conflict societies

Challenges and prospects of history education in divided and post-conflict societies

Urban space as a democratic space: An analysis of the 2022 Pride Parade Media coverage in Belgrade and Sarajevo

In post-conflict societies internal demarcation is based on tradition, religion, and heterosexual family values and within this frame sexual citizenship is considered ?as ideology? and as a threat to society imposed from outside. At the same time the influence and importance of international norms and changes in the standard of international politics and the emerging culture of human rights cause conflict between inside and outside, national sovereignty and universal human rights. This conflict is not specific only to stabilocracy and hybrid systems, but the omnipresent illogicality of a closed system of citizen-ship. Following the Butler?s observation that ?conjuncture of street and media constitutes a very contemporary version of the public sphere? (2011: 9), media textual and visual reports about Pride Parade in Belgrade and Sarajevo were analysed. In the analysis focus is on the borders of citizenship within the patriarchal matrix of nation-state confronted with the present bodies on the streets. The analysed textual and visual media reports confirm a hierarchisation of urban public space formed by national history and its material structures.

Peculiarities of Interviewing Elites in Post-Conflict Societies

Those who engage in a task of conducting elite interviews in post-conflict societies must prepare for the context-specific challenges of this environment to mitigate the potentially distorting consequences of the process and the substance. This paper discusses the issues and challenges associated with interviewing elites in post-conflict societies. Examples are drawn from the author’s own experiences gained through conducting over seventy interviews while collecting data on peace processes in Cyprus and Kosovo. Particularly, the issues of sampling, gaining access, and the process of interviewing are discussed with a focus on the issues of the impact of terminology, the use of recording devices, the researcher’s positionality, and the subjective qualities of data.

What Women Politicians Could, Would, and Should, but Cannot Do

This paper analyses the main barriers to women’s political representation in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BH) from the perspective of female parliamentarians. The theoretical section presents the main obstacles to women’s political representation, followed by an overview of trends in the political representation of women and the controversies surrounding the presence of women in politics within the ethnocratic context of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Using the data from qualitative research, gathered through in-depth interviews with female MPs from BH elected to state and entity parliaments, this paper analyses and discusses the main obstacles to the political representation of women. They include challenges relating to family life and traditional gender roles, internal party processes and dynamics, especially informal relations among men, lack of support in election campaigns and various manoeuvres to circumvent quotas, shrunken space for women in parliaments, and distorted representation in the media. The experiences of the interlocutors are strongly gendered, and all the mentioned obstacles prove to be relevant, regardless of their varying impact on individual women MPs. Even interlocutors who have not personally encountered certain obstacles acknowledge their existence, noting that their female colleagues in politics have experienced them, sometimes in a brutal manner. There is agreement among the interlocutors that women are severely disadvantaged in politics. Therefore, serious additional positive measures should be taken to improve gender equality, given that the ethnocratic system favours ethnic representation and men maintain a firm grip on political power in post-conflict BH society.

Влияние военных конфликтов на психологическое состояние общества: перспективные направления исследований

<p style="text-align: justify;"><strong>Objective. </strong>Analysis of the psychological mechanisms of the influence of military conflicts on society and identification of promising directions for socio-psychological research in this area. <br><strong>Background. </strong>In the context of growing geopolitical tension and the number of military conflicts, forecasting the dynamics of the psychological state of society is becoming increasingly important. <br><strong>Conclusions. </strong>The psychological state of post-conflict societies is characterized by a combination of processes of social integration (various forms of intra-group solidarity and civic participation) and differentiation (decrease in social trust, radicalization and increased sensitivity to social inequality), as well as the influence of psychological traumatization on the phenomena of social cognition.</p>

From Conflict to Cohesion: Unveiling Ambon's Journey Through Collective Memory Analysis and Post-Conflict Reconciliation

This article delves into the religious conflict that transpired in Ambon from 1999 to 2004, with a specific focus on elucidating the formation of collective memory as a pivotal mechanism for fostering post-conflict reconciliation. Employing a methodology amalgamating literature review and in-depth interviews, this research scrutinizes the intricate dynamics of the conflict, delineating the roles played by both Muslim and Christian communities, not only as victims but also as perpetrators. The principal findings underscore the shared responsibility of both groups in instigating the conflict, resulting in egregious acts such as assaults, homicides, and property destruction. The article accentuates the imperative of mutual acknowledgment regarding each community's role in the conflict as an indispensable stride towards reconciliation. It posits that an accurate and all-encompassing collective memory of the conflict serves as a catalyst for communities to critically assess their religious practices and fosters a climate of receptivity to broader religious understandings. The research underscores the significance of cultivating a nuanced collective memory in upholding peace and harmony within a diverse post-conflict society.

How Ethnic Discrimination Shapes Political Reintegration After War: Insights From a Conjoint Experiment in Colombia

The reintegration of former armed group affiliates into formal politics is a fundamental challenge for post-conflict societies. Arguably, this challenge is even more difficult in settings where ethnic discrimination is pervasive, since discrimination implies comparatively higher barriers to political reintegration for racialized ex-combatants. In this paper, we explore how ethnicity and armed group affiliation interact to shape electoral prospects. Specifically, we investigate whether participants in a conjoint experiment in Colombia discriminate between political candidates of European and African descent and whether politicians of different ethnic identities are differentially punished for ties to armed groups. We find that participants display a strong aversion toward politicians with armed group affiliations and that they discriminate against Afro-Colombian candidates. Furthermore, we demonstrate that biases are additive, in the sense that Caucasian and Afro-Colombian candidates are equally punished for associating with armed groups. Finally, we explore heterogeneous treatment effects to shed light on sources of ethnic discrimination and aversion toward former armed group affiliates.

Front and centre? Northern Irish electoral behaviour in the age of Brexit

ABSTRACT In post-conflict societies, traumatic experiences can have a profound effect on electoral behaviour. In Northern Ireland, Westminster elections between 2001 and 2017 were marked by the rise of hardline parties, but the 2019 election saw a significant shift towards the centre. The centre ground vote soared, resulting in the lowest level of political polarisation since the early 2000s. What are the factors underlying this transition to a moderate vote? Drawing on public opinion surveys and electoral data, we find that Brexit played a crucial role in incentivising voters to support parties prioritising non-sectarian constitutional interests. The findings suggest that voters employ party competition as a balancing mechanism. Our article contributes to the understanding of how individuals in post-conflict societies navigate the complex relationship between violence, politics, and peacebuilding.

Protest jako forma ruchu obywatelskiego w społeczeństwie pokonfliktowym na przykładzie Republiki Serbii

PROTEST AS A FORM OF CIVIC MOVEMENT IN POST-CONFLICT SOCIETY WITH THE EXAMPLE OF THE REPUBLIC OF SERBIA Civic activity, the degree of development of this activity and its multifaceted relationship with the state has been one of the most expressive manifestations of mature democracy for several decades. Citizens’ trust in bottom-up initiatives is a long-term process built in the social space where systemic democracy is present. Serbs, as a society that directly or indirectly experienced armed conflicts, entered the path of democratisation after 2000 and remained on it for about 15 years, when during the rule of the Serbian Progressive Party of Aleksander Vučić, the populist character of the rule slowed down and then reversed the democratisation processes. The aim of the article is to look at the protest as one of the most common manifestations of civic movements and to analyse the subject matter of the protests, their intensity, the possibility of influencing the political and social reality, and finally the cases of its evolution, related to its transformation into other forms of activity.

Memory study as and through the socially responsive and meaningful design: A classroom experience

Using the case of an undergraduate graphic design course taught in a Colombian private university, this article focuses on ways of teaching memory – historical, collective, cultural and individual. The authors emphasize the importance of the critical and socially responsible approach in education. Drawn from critical pedagogies and affective memory studies, the authors discuss the journey of the students of rediscovering alternative realities of their city and country and learning to acknowledge the complexity of memory and multiple forms of its mediation in a socially fragmented post-conflict society.

The role of environmental professionals in post-conflict transboundary cooperation: The cases of Israel and Jordan

Given the environmental challenges many post-conflict societies face, researchers and policy-makers express growing interest in environmental cooperation and management in the aftermath of political agreements. To date, the literature focuses overwhelmingly on government policies, formal agreements, or international interventions. The role of local environmental experts in shaping the science-policy nexus of transboundary cooperation in post-conflict societies received little attention. We address this lacuna by studying influencing factors and interaction realms of such experts in Israel and Jordan following the 1994 peace agreement. Based on survey data, focus groups and participant observations gathered over a five-year period (2017–2022) we find that environmental experts interact with decisions makers in their own country in varying degrees, with the purpose to influence TEC policy. The experts play important roles as policy entrepreneurs in shaping and carrying out post-agreement transboundary environmental cooperation which is independent of their interaction with decision makers and policy. In addition, the experts report a positive transformation of their attitudes vis-à-vis the respective other side. However, contextual factors beyond the experts’ control shape transboundary conservation in important and asymmetrical ways. This is most evident by anti-normalisation pressures that Jordanian experts face.

Amnesties, Transitional Justice and the Rule of Law

The aim of this paper is to assess an objection to amnesties conferred in transitional justice contexts: that they violate the rule of law. The paper begins by setting out the objection and presenting three possible replies to it. Each is argued to be unsatisfactory. The central contention of the paper, namely that the success of the objection depends on amnesties’ terms and the reasons for which they are introduced, as well as on what conception of the rule of law is operative, is then presented. The argument that amnesties violate the rule of law on account of public international law, or national constitutions containing bills of rights, prohibiting their use without exception is then rebutted. Few amnesties violate the rule of law for this reason. Finally, the paper addresses a further rule of law-based objection to amnesties that is related to, yet distinct from, the objection that amnesties violate the rule of law. According to this second rule of law-based objection, amnesties prevent, or at least hinder, the restoration of the rule of law in post-conflict societies. This objection is countered by demonstrating that amnesties do not always promote the rule of law less effectively than trials and punishment and may even, in some cases, be essential for the restoration of the rule of law.

The ‘asean Way’ of Women, Peace and Security: Norm Rhetoric or Implementation?

Abstract Women, peace and security (wps) is a global normative agenda that seeks to address the vulnerability and victimization of women in armed conflict situation and recognize their agency to transform post-conflict societies. In over two decades, various international institutions, states, and transnational and domestic civil society groups have taken on various initiatives to advance wps through international policy frames, regional commitments, and national operationalization. In Southeast Asia, even though women’s human rights have gained traction in the region through cross-cutting issues on gender equality and violence against women, not much has been said in the context of these in armed conflict and peacebuilding situations. In fact, to date, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (asean) was the latest regional body to have adopted a framework for action on wps. This study uses the norm life cycle model to explain the emergence and cascade of wps in the asean and explains the challenges to the internalization of the norm in the region.

Minority Rights in Post-Conflict Peacebuilding: An Analysis of Legislative Perspectives and Contemporary Challenges

Post-conflict peacebuilding is a complex and multifaceted process that seeks to restore peace and stability in societies that have been ravaged by violent conflicts. Minority rights are an integral part of this process, as they play a crucial role in promoting social cohesion, reconciliation, and sustainable development in the post-conflict context. Unfortunately, minority rights are often marginalized and underrepresented in postconflict peacebuilding efforts, leaving minority groups at risk of continued discrimination and exclusion. The neglect of these rights hampers the prospects for lasting peace and hinders the contributions of minority populations to post-conflict societies. This paper examines or analyses the significance of minority rights in postconflict societies. It provides an in-depth examination of issues such as (a) the impact of religion on the formation of majority and minority dynamics in diverse societies, (b) the transformative potential of information technology and its role in fostering inclusive communication, (c) the interplay between primordialism and constructivism in understanding ethnic identities and their implications for the practice of consociational democracy; (d) the inclusivity of peacebuilding approaches and their integration of reconciliation across various facets of post-conflict development. To achieve this, the paper employs a multidisciplinary and non-empirical approach to desk research, including an extensive literature review, qualitative analysis of case studies from conflict-ridden regions, and a critical examination of consociational democracies. This methodological diversity enables a comprehensive exploration of minority rights' complex dynamics in peacebuilding contexts. Finally, the paper argues that achieving sustainable peace requires acknowledging the pivotal role of minority rights and fostering inclusive approaches that empower diverse community members to contribute actively. Despite its limitations, the consociational model offers an adaptable framework for balancing the preservation and reconstruction of ethnic identities in post-conflict settings. Moreover, involving historically marginalized groups, such as women and youth, is essential for building more equitable and peaceful societies.

Ideational Power and Institutional Change

Abstract Over the past three decades, truth commissions (tc s) have proliferated globally as an institutional practice for addressing past human rights violations in transitional and post-conflict societies. In light of discursive institutionalism, which emphasises the significance of ideas and discourse in institutional formation, continuity, and change, this study aims to offer an alternative explanation for the international proliferation of tc s by examining the role of ideational power and the dynamics of continuity and change in their institutional construction from the mid-1980s to the early 2000s. It analyses how particular agents, such as human rights movements, political leaders, and transnational discursive coalitions, construct, disseminate, and transform the idea of tc s in a historically and socially given context. Using process tracing to shed light on the institutional development of tc s, it identifies four phases in their discursive construction: i) discursive invention; ii) transnational recognition; iii) technical fine-tuning and intellectual consensus building, and iv) incorporation into new fields.

“Social workers by day and terrorists by night?” Wounded healers, restorative justice, and ex-prisoner reentry

Common to many post-conflict societies, former political prisoners and combatants in Northern Ireland are often portrayed as security threats rather than as potential contributors to societal peacebuilding processes. This distrust limits their ability to contribute to the transitional landscape and additionally hinders desistance processes during their reentry from prison. Drawing from the work of Maruna, LeBel, and others on “wounded healers,” this article critically examines the restorative justice work of ex-prisoners who have become involved in leadership roles within community based restorative justice. It is argued that such practitioner work can help former combatants overcome many of the challenges typically associated with reentry, contributing to a “strength-based” approach to desistance, impacting factors such as employment, social bonds, internal narratives, and agency. This work also enables individuals to showcase their desistance to others, highlighting their “earned redemption” and encouraging society to acknowledge that reentry is a two-way street.

Political Communication in (Post)Conflict Societies. The case of Kosovo

Political communication is important in the development of political, social and historical processes of a country. Communication is perhaps a powerful tool that politicians have in their hands. They use it to fight political opponents, and to persuade the masses. This article will address the importance of political communication in post-conflict societies, with a focus on Kosovo society. Political communication and media are crucial for peacebuilding, democracy, and conflict resolution, especially in Kosovo, where emotional and harsh nationalist communication hinders socio-political transformation of deep-rooted conflicts. In this article, authors try to examine the correlation of hate-speech and violence in Kosovo. The results conclude that there is a positive correlation between hate-speech and violence. Without free and independent media, political communication will not be able to free itself from the past that has plagued it for decades.

Sonoridades de posguerra en Baile con serpientes (1996) de Horacio Castellanos Moya

Abstract: Baile con serpientes (1996) by Salvadoran writer Horacio Castellanos Moya narrates a symptomatic violence due to the emerging economic order of neoliberalism during the official transition to peace. The present study attends to the novel's sonic register to show how silence, noise, and music reinscribe the memory of the civil war in a tumultuous present. Fueled by neoliberal rationality, the main character attunes to a hyper-masculine voice as a means of participating in Central America's emerging consumerist, post-conflict society. The following draws on Sayak Valencia's concept of the endriago subject—a masculine subjectivity rooted in the exercise of violence as necroempowerment—to signal the violent transformation of the main character into a celebrity due to media attention. Sound—whether unpleasant noise or melodious music—becomes a fulcrum upon which protagonist Eduardo Sosa's neoliberal subjectivity alternately emerges and is repressed by a reactionary state. The following will demonstrate how the sonorously gory scenes described in the novel resonate with the unresolved social corruption which facilitates the persistence of violence in the neoliberal present. The textual representation of silence, noise, and music recasts Sosa's violent disruption to incorporate himself into a masculine and violent postwar era.

‘Circles of Women’: Feminist Movements in the Choreography of Oona Doherty

The focus of this article is the range of feminisms which circulate through Belfast-based Oona Doherty's choreographies for groups of women, namely the second episode of Hard to Be Soft: A Belfast Prayer (2017), which is titled ‘Sugar Army', and Lady Magma: The Birth of a Cult (2019). This analysis is motivated by the need to expand discussion of feminisms in tandem with examination of more complex identities in Northern Ireland: to look beyond a Nationalist–Unionist binary within post-conflict society and examine the intersections of gender, class and race. Tracking the movement of feminisms through Doherty's choreographies will explore how they mobilize, and fail, these women, as well as revealing the potential for, and pitfalls of, community and solidarity. Doherty's work has the potential to mobilize a dynamic intergenerational and intersectional feminism which recognizes the experiences of ‘differently positioned women’.

War crimes and spirituality: to prosecute or to forgive and reconcile

Conducting investigations on war crimes has a clear goal of establishing facts on crimes, perpetrators, and victims. On the other hand, the question of forgiveness and reconciliation, as essential conditions for re-establishing the coexistence of former parties at war which continue to live together, in the same community, country, and society (or next to each other), is something completely different. Investigating crimes, establishing facts, and finding and prosecuting individuals for committing those crimes, is an exact, measurable category. Forgiveness and reconciliation are not. By questioning the real effects of war crimes trials in post-conflict societies, this article argues that, for a peaceful and lasting foundation for the future life in post-conflict societies, a legal approach to the atrocities committed is not sufficient. In addition, there is a need to find a way to forgiveness and reconciliation, without which societies can always return to the “dark past”. The New Testament says that only the truth will set us free, but is that immanent to the human being? Can a human being truly forgive, or is mercy only reserved for divine beings? Can and should the victims forgive their torturers, the ones who burned down their homes, killed their beloved ones, destroyed their lives and burdened them with memories that do not fade away? In countries where past conflict resulted in mass atrocities and where, following some peace agreement, the former parties at war did not go separate ways but continued to live in the same country, this inevitable reality is a burden, if not even a risk to the existence and rebuilding of the post-conflict society. To a great extent, the situation is the same for neighboring societies (countries). But no matter what, the question is whether war crimes trials and punishments for war criminals will eliminate the consequences of those crimes, allow the victims to free themselves from that victimhood, and societies at war to find peace and rebuild.