Not Your Father’s Peacebuilding: The Center for Global Studies Features Cutting-edge Research in Conflict Studies

Mason’s Center for Global Studies celebrated its 10th annual spring conference last week, welcoming students, faculty, academics, policy makers, and members of the public for two days of presentations of innovative research and discussion on the challenges of peacebuilding in the world today. The conference, titled “Not Your Father’s Peacebuilding: New Post-Conflict Realities,” kicked off on Thursday March 28 with a keynote address by internationally renowned peace studies scholar Roger Mac Ginty from the University of Manchester’s Humanitarian and Conflict Response Institute. The event was made possible by support from the U.S. Institute of Peace Public Education for Peacebuilding Support initiative, The School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, Latin American Studies, Global Interdisciplinary Programs, Global Affairs, the Human Rights & Global Justice Working Group, and University Life at George Mason University

Speaking on “everyday diplomacy,” Mac Ginty challenged conflict resolution “experts,” focusing on the actions and words of normal civilians rather than politicians or “men with guns.” Everyday diplomacy—in the form of “dissembling in actions and words,” saying nothing, or diligently discussing the weather to avoid contentious topics—is expertly practiced by individuals and families in all post-conflict settings, yet is frequently ignored by technocrats and experts. Mac Ginty’s presentation, attended by nearly 60 students, faculty, and staff, was followed by a breakout session mediated by the School of Conflict Analysis and Resolution’s student group Dialogue & Difference.

On the second day of the conference, attended by over 100 guests, including policy makers, practitioners, scholars and activists, CGS co-directors Jo-Marie Burt and Terrence Lyons moderated panels on the tensions between peacebuilding and accountability in post-conflict Latin America and on the linkages between global actors and local peacebuilding, respectively.

At the first panel, Georgetown University’s Marc Chernick spoke about the ongoing peace talks between the Colombian government and the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC) in the hemisphere’s longest running civil conflict, noting that recently released official numbers place the death toll at over 500,000 since 1985. Harvard University’s Kirsten Weld discussed the groundbreaking trial of former Guatemalan dictator Efrain Rios Montt on charges of genocide, observing that the peaceful legal protests of opponents to the trial may signal a departure from a traditional reliance on violence. Glenda Mezarobba, a scholar currently working for the newly formed Brazil Truth Commission, discussed the challenges of addressing the legacies of Brazil’s authoritarian regime nearly 30 years after its demise. The Center’s co-director Jo-Marie Burt discussed war crimes prosecutions in Latin America more broadly, noting that the region leads the world in domestic efforts to hold human rights violators accountable.

Paul Williams, from George Washington University, began the second panel on global actors and local peacebuilding with a discussion of external actors and local conflict in Somalia. Charles Call from the U.S. State Department’s Bureau of Conflict and Stabilization Operations then spoke on the U.S. government’s efforts to adapt to a “new peacebuilding,” working in diverse environments and relying more heavily on local partners. Agnieszka Paczynska and Terrence Lyons, both from George Mason University examined the changing relationships and roles among traditional and emerging development donors in Liberia and the diaspora politics surrounding Ethiopia’s conflict in the Ogaden, respectively.

The day’s proceedings concluded with a keynote speech by Roger Mac Ginty on “everyday peace indicators,” drawing on experiences and research from his native Northern Ireland, the Balkans, and beyond. These everyday peace indicators can be as simple as whether or not local business owners paint their shops or replace broken storefront windows, rather than boarding them up. As Mac Ginty suggests, everyday peacebuilding is messy; it is difficult to measure and requires close-to-the-ground analysis to get at intangibles such as the outlook among business owners in former war zones. Yet, as we see in cases from Colombia to Somalia, in Liberia and Guatemala, the art and science of peacebuilding is changing. This is not your father’s peacebuilding.