Countries emerging from civil war or protracted violence often face the daunting challenge of rebuilding their economy while simultaneously creating the political and social conditions for a stable peace. The implicit assumption in the international community that rapid political democratisation along with economic liberalisation holds the key to sustainable peace is belied by the experiences of countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan. Often, the challenges of post-conflict reconstruction revolve around the timing and sequencing of different reform that may have contradictory implications. Drawing on a range of thematic studies and empirical cases, this book examines how post-conflict reconstruction policies can be better sequenced in order to promote sustainable peace. The book provides evidence that many reforms that are often thought to be imperative in post-conflict societies may be better considered as long-term objectives, and that the immediate imperative for such societies should be 'people-centred' policies.

This book explores how competing worldviews impact on intergroup relations and building a sustainable peace in culturally diverse societies. It raises the question of what happens in a culturally diverse society when competing values and ways of interpreting reality collide and what this means for peace-building and the goal of reconciliation. Moreover, it provides a valuable and needed contribution to how peace-building interventions can become more sustainable if tied into local values and embedded in a society’s system of meaning-making. The book engages with questions relating to the extent transitional policies speak to universal values and individualist societies and the implications this might have for how they are implemented in collective societies with different values and forms of social organisation. It raises the question of cultural equality and transformation and whether or not this is something that needs to be addressed within peace-building theory. It argues that inculcating worldview into peace-building theory and practice is a vital part of restoring dignity and promoting healing among victims and formerly oppressed groups. This book, therefore, makes an important contribution to what is at best a partially researched topic by providing a deeper understanding of how identity and culture intersect with peace-building when seeking to build a sustainable peace.

Bringing together leading scholars and practitioners from the worlds of leadership, followership, transitional justice, and international law, this research provides a blueprint of how people-led, bottom-up, grassroots efforts can foster reconciliation and a more peaceful world.

The just peace movement offers a critical shift in focus and imagination. Recognizing that all life is sacred and seeking peace through violence is unsustainable, the just peace approach turns our attention to rehumanization, participatory processes, nonviolent resistance, restorative justice, reconciliation, racial justice, and creative strategies of active nonviolence to build sustainable peace, transform conflict, and end cycles of violence. A Just Peace Ethic Primer illuminates a moral framework behind this praxis and proves its versatility in global contexts. With essays by a diverse group of scholars, A Just Peace Ethic Primer outlines the ethical, theological, and activist underpinnings of a just peace ethic.These essays also demonstrate and revise the norms of a just peace ethic through conflict cases involving US immigration, racial and environmental justice, and the death penalty, as well as gang violence in El Salvador, civil war in South Sudan, ISIS in Iraq, gender-based violence in the Democratic Republic of Congo, women-led activism in the Philippines, and ethnic violence in Kenya. A Just Peace Ethic Primer exemplifies the ecumenical, interfaith, and multicultural aspects of a nonviolent approach to preventing and transforming violent conflict. Scholars, advocates, and activists working in politics, history, international law, philosophy, theology, and conflict resolution will find this resource vital for providing a fruitful framework and implementing a creative vision of sustainable peace.

When the September 11, 2001 attacks in the United States occurred—causing that nation to wage wars of revenge in Afghanistan and Iraq—the people of Burundi were recovering from nearly forty years of violence, genocide and civil wars that had killed nearly one million and produced another million refugees. Here in this small East African nation, one of the four poorest nations on earth, however, was a desire for reconciliation—not revenge—and it still runs deep today. The University of Ngozi in northern Burundi was created in 1999 and is now dedicated to peace, reconciliation and sustainable development. People in this region tell remarkable stories of tragedy and recovery amid these horrors. Their stories can inspire others to preserve their humanity and resist the urge to continue the violence, focusing instead on forgiveness, reconciliation and a better way forward. This volume presents case study analysis while pointing to the promise of a new kind of education that is committed to sustainable peace and development. The lessons here for the rest of the world are deep and inspiring.

All over the world, the practice of peacebuilding is beset with common dilemmas: peace versus justice, religious versus secular approaches, individual versus structural justice, reconciliation versus retribution, and the harmonization of the sheer number of practices involved in repairing past harms. Progress towards resolving these dilemmas requires reforming institutions and practices but also clear thinking about basic questions: What is justice? And how is it related to the building of peace? The twin concepts of reconciliation and restorative justice, both involving the holistic restoration of right relationship, contain not only a compelling logic of justice but also great promise for resolving peacebuilding's tensions and for constructing and assessing its institutions and practices. This book furthers this potential by developing not only the core content of these concepts but also their implications for accountability, forgiveness, reparations, traditional practices, human rights, and international law.