Local Ownership Of Peacebuilding In Afghanistan

The international community has followed up its 2001 invasion of Afghanistan with a complex, multi-faceted peacebuilding project. However, informed observers believe that this Western-led mission in Afghanistan has failed to address the inherent peacebuilding needs of Afghanistan and has hindered the formation of a locally experienced sustainable peace. In response, emerging peacebuilding theories and rhetoric have pointed to an urgent need for revised peacebuilding paradigms and strategies that hold local, Afghan ownership of peacebuilding activities as a central concern. This book responds to this need for revised peacebuilding paradigms and: (1) introduces the topic of local ownership of peacebuilding in Afghanistan; (2) surveys current shifts in peacebuilding theory and practice that are only starting to be realized on the ground; (3) sets the context for a discussion of local ownership of peacebuilding; (4) reports on the perceptions of foreign and Afghan peacebuilding leaders working in Afghanistan in regards to the journey towards local ownership of peacebuilding; and (5) suggests the creation of a locally designed and led conflict transformation system that might help restructure local-foreign relations and advance the journey towards Afghan ownership of peacebuilding.

This edited volume empirically examines key theoretical and practical issues relevant to the promotion of local ownership in contemporary international peacebuilding. This book attempts to provide comprehensive understanding of the issue of local ownership in international peacebuilding. By providing an empirical analysis of nine case studies, the volume aims to supplement contemporary academic discussions on local ownership, which have thus far mainly focused on its normative or theoretical dimensions. The case studies included here examine the peace operations in a wide range of countries - Afghanistan, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Cambodia, Cyprus, Kenya, Uganda, Sierra Leone, South Sudan, and Sri Lanka. The book seeks to address the weaknesses of conventional studies by:,empirical review of the achievements and limitations of previous attempts to promote local ownership; examination of the key concepts of local ownership; and analysis of structural and practical challenges. The volume concludes by presenting practical proposals for addressing the limitations of contemporary local ownership promotion. Through these means, the book aims to explore a key research question from both theoretical and empirical perspectives: How can international peacebuilding facilitate effective, active local community participation? This volume will be of much interest to students of peacebuilding, development studies, global governance, peace and conflict studies, security studies and IR.

This book explores the meaning of local ownership in peacebuilding and examines the ways in which it has been, and could be, operationalized in post-conflict environments. In the context of post-conflict peacebuilding, the idea of local ownership is based upon the premise that no peace process is sustainable in the absence of a meaningful degree of local involvement. Despite growing recognition of the importance of local ownership, however, relatively little attention has been paid to specifying what precisely the concept means or how it might be implemented. This volume contributes to the ongoing debate on the future of liberal peacebuilding through a critical investigation of the notion of local ownership, and challenges conventional assumptions about who the relevant locals are and what they are expected to own. Drawing on case studies from Bosnia, Afghanistan and Haiti, the text argues that local ownership can only be fostered through a long-term consensus-building process, which involves all levels of the conflict-affected society. This book will be of great interest to students of peacebuilding, peace and conflict studies, development studies, security studies and IR.

This book aims to understand the processes and outcomes that arise from frictional encounters in peacebuilding, when global and local forces meet. Building a sustainable peace after violent conflict is a process that entails competing ideas, political contestation and transformation of power relations. This volume develops the concept of ‘friction’ to better analyse the interplay between global ideas, actors, and practices, and their local counterparts. The chapters examine efforts undertaken to promote sustainable peace in a variety of locations, such as Cambodia, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan, and Sierra Leone. These case analyses provide a nuanced understanding not simply of local processes, or of the hybrid or mixed agencies, ideas, and processes that are generated, but of the complex interactions that unfold between all of these elements in the context of peacebuilding intervention. The analyses demonstrate how the ambivalent relationship between global and local actors leads to unintended and sometimes counterproductive results of peacebuilding interventions. The approach of this book, with its focus on friction as a conceptual tool, advances the peacebuilding research agenda and adds to two ongoing debates in the peacebuilding field; the debate on hybridity, and the debate on local agency and local ownership. In analysing frictional encounters this volume prepares the ground for a better understanding of the mixed impact peace initiatives have on post-conflict societies. This book will be of much interest to students of peacebuilding, conflict resolution, security studies, and international relations in general.

This book explores the meaning of local ownership in peacebuilding and examines the ways in which it has been, and could be, operationalized in post-conflict environments. In the context of post-conflict peacebuilding, the idea of local ownership is based upon the premise that no peace process is sustainable in the absence of a meaningful degree of local involvement. Despite growing recognition of the importance of local ownership, however, relatively little attention has been paid to specifying what precisely the concept means or how it might be implemented. This volume contributes to the ongoing debate on the future of liberal peacebuilding through a critical investigation of the notion of local ownership, and challenges conventional assumptions about who the relevant locals are and what they are expected to own. Drawing on case studies from Bosnia, Afghanistan and Haiti, the text argues that local ownership can only be fostered through a long-term consensus-building process, which involves all levels of the conflict-affected society. This book will be of great interest to students of peacebuilding, peace and conflict studies, development studies, security studies and IR.

This book is open access under a CC BY 4.0 license. This edited volume examines the policies and practices of rising powers on peacebuilding. It analyzes how and why their approaches differ from those of traditional donors and multilateral institutions. The policies of the rising powers towards peacebuilding may significantly influence how the UN and others undertake peacebuilding in the future. This book is an invaluable resource for practitioners, policy makers, researchers and students who want to understand how peacebuilding is likely to evolve over the next decades.

International Peacebuilding offers a concise, practical and accessible introduction to the growing field of peacebuilding for students and practitioners. This new textbook comprises three parts, each dealing with a key aspect of peacebuilding: Part I defines the core concepts and theoretical discussions that provide the philosophical grounds for contemporary peacebuilding activities. Part II divides the procedures of peacebuilding into three phases and examines some of the important features of each phase. Part III examines the key areas of the practice of peacebuilding. The volume approaches peacebuilding from the viewpoints of individual actors or institutions, introducing a range of theoretical discussions with which students can critically examine contemporary peacebuilding practice, as well as presenting detailed case studies for key issues highlighted in the text. In doing so, the book aims to provide more concrete ideas on how peacebuilding programmes are planned and implemented in the field and which major issues should be addressed by peacebuilding practitioners. This book will be essential reading for all students of peacebuilding, conflict transformation and post-conflict reconstruction, and recommended reading for students of international organisations, international security and IR in general.

This book serves as an important link between conflict resolution practice and education by providing research from the unique perspective and approach of the Arthur V. Mauro Centre for Peace and Justice, one of the world’s leading academic programs for PACS research: storytelling, peacebuilding, and conflict transformation. Each chapter presents original research in critical issues in the field of PACS, and provides recent research for the future development of the field and the education of its practitioners and academics. The book has a wide audience targeting students at the undergraduate, graduate, and post-graduate levels. It also extends to those working in and leading community conflict resolution efforts as well as humanitarian aid workers. Exploring the issues facing the field provides a means by which academics, students, and practitioners can develop theory, practice, pedagogy, and methodology to confront the complexity of contemporary conflicts while expanding opportunities for future research and practice. Contributors to the book are recognized scholars and practitioners in their respective fields. The authors’ take a holistic approach to the study, analysis, and resolution of conflict at the personal, interpersonal, societal and cultural levels. The book is a retrospective of the Mauro Centre and through its content, explores the roots of a major contributor to PACS scholarship. The scholarship represents those who come to the PACS field with a diversity of ideas, approaches, disciplinary roots, and topic areas, which speaks to the complexity, breadth, and depth needed to apply and take account of conflict dynamics and the goal of peace. This book reflects the unique model and approach of the Arthur V. Mauro Centre for Peace and Justice at the University of Manitoba in central Canada: conflict transformation, peacebuilding, and storytelling. Based in the doctoral theses and in celebration of the first decade of Canada’s only doctoral program in PACS, this volume, co-edited by three of the graduates of the program and written by colleagues, presents and explores a number of these issues while presenting new and leading research across the broad spectrum of Peace and Conflict Studies.