Handbook On Building Cultures Of Peace

Mediation and negotiation, personal transformation, non-violent struggle in the community and the world: these behaviors – and their underlying values – underpin the United Nations’ definition of a culture of peace, and are crucial to the creation of such a culture. The Handbook on Building Cultures of Peace addresses this complex and daunting task by presenting an accessible blueprint for this development. Its perspectives are international and interdisciplinary, involving the developing as well as the developed world, with illustrations of states and citizens using peace-based values to create progress on the individual, community, national, and global levels. The result is both realistic and visionary, a prescription for a secure future.

Since the early 1980s John Paul Lederach has traveled worldwide as a mediation trainer and conflict resolution consultant. Currently the director of the International Conciliation Committee, he has worked with governments, justice departments, youth programs, and other groups in Latin America, the Philippines, Cambodia, as well as Asia and Africa. Lederach blends a special training method in mediation with a tradition derived from his work in development. Throughout the book, he uses anecdote and pertinent experiences to demonstrate his resolution techniques. With an emphasis on the exchange involved in negotiation, Lederach conveys the key to successful conflict resolution: understanding how to guide disputants, transform their conflicts, and launch a process that empowers them.

This handbook encompasses a range of disciplines that underlie the field of peace education and provides the rationales for the ways it is actually carried out . The discipline is a composite of contributions from a variety of disciplines ranging from social psychology to philosophy and from communication to political science. That is, peace education is an applied subject which is practiced in differing ways, but must always be firmly based on a range of established empirical disciplines. The volume is structured around contributions from expert scholars in various fields that underpin peace education, plus contributions from experts in applying peace education in a range of settings, all complemented by chapters which deal with issues related to research and evaluation of peace education.

From violence and abuse within family units, to communities and regions torn apart by inter-group conflict and wars among nations, the human condition is rife with turmoil. The consequences of this seemingly perpetual strife weigh heavily on humanity, often creating feelings of powerlessness and hopelessness that only serve to breed more conflict and violence. In the face of these monumental challenges, initiatives for peace struggle to take root. Seeking effective ways to encourage these efforts, the United Nations adopted three declarations on the eve of the 21st century, including the “Declaration on a Culture of Peace” that broadly defines what the vision looks like and the actions necessary to build cultures of peace. Taking up this central challenge of our time, this volume of collected essays presents multiple perspectives on the critical issues of peace and conflict resolution that pervade the globe, addressing the UN’s charge to develop “values, attitudes, modes of behavior and ways of life conducive to the promotion of peace among individuals, groups, and nations.” Bringing together scholars and practitioners from fields including education, sociology, criminology, political science, and peace studies, this work constructively engages the task of creating peace and fostering hope in a conflict-ridden world.

The contemporary conflict scenarios are beyond the reach of standardized approaches to conflict resolution. Given the curious datum that culture is implicated in nearly every conflict in the world, culture can also be an important aspect of efforts to transform destructive conflicts into more constructive social processes. Yet, what culture is and how culture matters in conflict scenarios is contested and regrettably unexplored. The Handbook of Research on the Impact of Culture in Conflict Prevention and Peacebuilding is a critical publication that examines cultural differences in conflict resolution based on various aspects of culture such as morals, traditions, and laws. Highlighting a wide range of topics such as criminal justice, politics, and technological development, this book is essential for educators, social scientists, sociologists, political leaders, government officials, academicians, conflict resolution practitioners, world peace organizations, researchers, and students.

In an age where official and sponsored violence are becoming normalised and conceived of as legitimate tools of peace keeping, a number of leading academics and activists represented in Pedagogy, Politics and Philosophy of Peace interrogate and resist the intensification of the militarisation of civil life and of international relations. Coming from different areas of study, the contributors to this volume discuss peace and critical peace education from a range of perspectives. The nature of peace, myths related to peace, the logistics of peace and peacemaking as well as the relation of peace and pedagogy in the broadest meaning of the term constitute the main themes of the book. The common thread that binds the chapters together is the distinction between genuine/authentic and false peace and the importance of critical reflection on actions that contribute to genuine peace.