Presented are case studies of recent pandemic threats in our globalized world and how interests, institutions, and ideas can align to allow for interstate cooperations even in unfavorable environments. The author has a working proposition on what makes new forms of public-private governance effective and he creates analytical frameworks for practitioners grappling with transnational problems. Engaged here are core debates in the international relations theories of cooperation.
In this edited volume, experts on conflict resolution examine the impact of the crises triggered by the coronavirus and official responses to it. The pandemic has clearly exacerbated existing social and political conflicts, but, as the book argues, its longer-term effects open the door to both further conflict escalation and dramatic new opportunities for building peace. In a series of short essays combining social analysis with informed speculation, the contributors examine the impact of the coronavirus crisis on a wide variety of issues, including nationality, social class, race, gender, ethnicity, and religion. They conclude that the period of the pandemic may well constitute a historic turning point, since the overall impact of the crisis is to destabilize existing social and political systems. Not only does this systemic shakeup produce the possibility of more intense and violent conflicts, but also presents new opportunities for advancing the related causes of social justice and civic peace. This book will be of great interest to students of peace studies, conflict resolution, public policy and International Relations.
The Covid-19 pandemic is not only a health challenge. In the MENA region, against the backdrop of protracted conflicts, instability, and an overall deterioration in socio-economic conditions, the coronavirus crisis adds another layer of vulnerability and has already had long-lasting repercussions on human security across the region. Moreover, as hybrid actors take on an important role as security providers amid the pandemic in a context of limited or absent oversight, risks associated to a lack of accountability, ethno-religious discrimination, human rights abuses and gender-based violence grow. While classical approaches to security provision tend to portray non-state actors and the State as inherently at odds, the complexity of a rapidly evolving security landscape throughout the region should trigger a revision of the very concept of effective governance. Against this backdrop, how should Security Sector Reform (SSR) strategies and programmes adapt? What lessons can be drawn from selected case studies such as Iraq, Libya, and Yemen?
The Covid-19 pandemic is not only a health challenge. In the MENA region, against the backdrop of protracted conflicts, instability, and an overall deterioration in socio-economic conditions, the coronavirus crisis adds another layer of vulnerability and has already had long-lasting repercussions on human security across the region. Moreover, as hybrid actors take on an important role as security providers amid the pandemic in a context of limited or absent oversight, risks associated to a lack of accountability, ethno-religious discrimination, human rights abuses, and gender-based violence grow. While classical approaches to security provision tend to portray non-state actors and the State as inherently at odds, the complexity of a rapidly evolving security landscape throughout the region should trigger a revision of the very concept of effective governance. Against this backdrop, how should Security Sector Reform (SSR) strategies and programmes adapt? What lessons can be drawn from selected case studies such as Iraq, Libya, and Yemen?
This handbook offers a comprehensive analysis of peacebuilding in ethnic conflicts, with attention to theory, peacebuilder roles, making sense of the past and shaping the future, as well as case studies and approaches. Comprising 28 chapters that present key insights on peacebuilding in ethnic conflicts, the volume has implications for teaching and training, as well as for practice and policy. The handbook is divided into four thematic parts. Part 1 focuses on critical dimensions of ethnic conflicts, including root causes, gender, external involvements, emancipatory peacebuilding, hatred as a public health issue, environmental issues, American nationalism, and the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. Part 2 focuses on peacebuilders’ roles, including Indigenous peacemaking, nonviolent accompaniment, peace leadership in the military, interreligious peacebuilders, local women, and young people. Part 3 addresses the past and shaping of the future, including a discussion of public memory, heritage rights and monuments, refugees, trauma and memory, aggregated trauma in the African-American community, exhumations after genocide, and a healing-centered approach to conflict. Part 4 presents case studies on Sri Lanka’s postwar reconciliation process, peacebuilding in Mindanao, the transformative peace negotiation in Aceh and Bougainville, external economic aid for peacebuilding in Northern Ireland, Indigenous and local peacemaking, and a continuum of peacebuilding focal points. The handbook offers perspectives on the breadth and significance of peacebuilding work in ethnic conflicts throughout the world. This volume will be of much interest to students of peacebuilding, ethnic conflict, security studies, and international relations.
This open access book features various studies on democratization, transformation, socio-economic development, and security issues in the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) geographical region and beyond. Written by experts and scholars working in the field of human dimension, security, transformation and development in Europe and Asia, particularly in post-soviet and communist countries, it examines the connectivity that the OSCE provides between the East and the West. The 2021 edition of this Compilation Series of the OSCE Academy presents studies on peace and conflict as well as political regime development in various member states of the OSCE as well as their economic, security and human rights performance and the challenges countries and society face currently. The OSCE is working in promoting Human Rights and Democratization under the notion of Human Dimension of ODIHR and is enhancing securitization and development policies in Eurasia, Europe, Central Asia and North America since 1991. 2021 marks the 30th anniversary on the tremendous efforts in promoting democracy, security and development. This compilation reviews some of these efforts in light of this anniversary, the achievements and shortcomings.
Preventing violent conflicts and establishing comprehensive lasting peace in some of the world’s most turbulent regions has become the new global imperative. But to be effective, peacebuilding must be a multilateral, not a unilateral process. Even for the world’s sole surviving superpower, promoting and sustaining durable peace requires communication, co-ordination, co-operation, and collaboration between local, national and international actors, nongovernmental as well as governmental. In this book, Dennis Sandole explores the theory and practice of peacebuilding, discussing the differences and similarities between core aspects of peace processes, namely violent conflict prevention; conflict management; conflict settlement; conflict resolution and conflict transformation. Assuming no prior knowledge on the part of the student reader, the volume distinguishes between proactive and reactive peacebuilding as strategies to pre-empt or otherwise respond to global problems, such as identity conflicts, failing/failed states, terrorism, pandemics, poverty, forced migrations, climate change, ecological degradation, and their combined effects. Drawing on a wide range of conflicts such as Bosnia-Herzegovina, Cambodia, East Timor, Haiti, South Africa and Macedonia, the book debates the 'lessons learned' from past experiences of reactive as well as proactive peacebuilding, plus the challenges which lie ahead for those striving to bring about sustainable peace, security and stability to war-torn or otherwise fragile regions of the globe.
The everyday, circuitry, and scalability -- Sociality, reciprocity and reciprocity -- Power -- Parley, truce and ceasefire -- Everyday peace on the battlefield -- Gender and everyday peace -- Conflict disruption.
Violent conflicts today are complex and increasingly protracted, involving more nonstate groups and regional and international actors. It is estimated that by 2030—the horizon set by the international community for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals—more than half of the world’s poor will be living in countries affected by high levels of violence. Information and communication technology, population movements, and climate change are also creating shared risks that must be managed at both national and international levels. Pathways for Peace is a joint United Nations†“World Bank Group study that originates from the conviction that the international community’s attention must urgently be refocused on prevention. A scaled-up system for preventive action would save between US$5 billion and US$70 billion per year, which could be reinvested in reducing poverty and improving the well-being of populations. The study aims to improve the way in which domestic development processes interact with security, diplomacy, mediation, and other efforts to prevent conflicts from becoming violent. It stresses the importance of grievances related to exclusion—from access to power, natural resources, security and justice, for example—that are at the root of many violent conflicts today. Based on a review of cases in which prevention has been successful, the study makes recommendations for countries facing emerging risks of violent conflict as well as for the international community. Development policies and programs must be a core part of preventive efforts; when risks are high or building up, inclusive solutions through dialogue, adapted macroeconomic policies, institutional reform, and redistributive policies are required. Inclusion is key, and preventive action needs to adopt a more people-centered approach that includes mainstreaming citizen engagement. Enhancing the participation of women and youth in decision making is fundamental to sustaining peace, as well as long-term policies to address the aspirations of women and young people.
When an earthquake hits a war zone or cyclone aid is flown in by an enemy, many ask: Can catastrophe bring peace? Disaster prevention and mitigation provide similar questions. Could setting up a flood warning system bring enemy countries together? Could a regional earthquake building code set the groundwork for wider regional cooperation? This book examines how and why disaster-related activities do and do not create peace and reduce conflict. Disaster-related activities refer to actions before a disaster such as prevention and mitigation along with actions after a disaster such as emergency response, humanitarian relief, and reconstruction. This volume investigates disaster diplomacy case studies from around the world, in a variety of political and disaster circumstances, from earthquakes in Greece and Turkey affecting these neighbours’ bilateral relations to volcanoes and typhoons influencing intra-state conflict in the Philippines. Dictatorships are amongst the case studies, such as Cuba and Burma, along with democracies such as the USA and India. No evidence is found to suggest that disaster diplomacy is a prominent factor in conflict resolution. Instead, disaster-related activities often influence peace processes in the short-term—over weeks and months—provided that a non-disaster-related basis already existed for the reconciliation. That could be secret negotiations between the warring parties or strong trade or cultural links. Over the long-term, disaster-related influences disappear, succumbing to factors such as a leadership change, the usual patterns of political enmity, or belief that an historical grievance should take precedence over disaster-related bonds. This is the first book on disaster diplomacy. Disaster-politics interactions have been studied for decades, but usually from a specific political framing, covering a specific geographical area, or from a specific disaster framing. As well, plenty of quantitative work has been completed, yet the data limitations are rarely admitted openly or thoroughly analysed. Few publications bring together the topics of disasters and politics in terms of a disaster diplomacy framework, yielding a grounded, qualitative, scientific point of view on the topic.
