Launch at ICAR of Handbook of Conflict Analysis and Resolution

As part of its nearly 30-year effort to institutionalize conflict analysis and resolution as a multidisciplinary field for research, theory building, teaching, practice and outreach in the United States and abroad, the Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution (ICAR) launched, on November 11th, 2008, the Handbook of Conflict Analysis and Resolution (Routledge, 2009). The volume is coedited by Dennis Sandole of ICAR, Ingrid Sandole-Staroste of GMU's Department of Sociology and Anthropology and Woman's Studies Program, and Sean Byrne and Jessica Senehi of Canada's first and only Ph.D. Program in Peace and Conflict Studies at the University of Manitoba, in Winnipeg.

The genesis of the volume was a chat between co-editors Sandole and Byrne about a collaborative project between the US's and Canada's premier Ph.D. programs that would capture much of the diversity of cutting edge developments in the field. The result comprises more than 35 chapters from a wide range of North (including Native) American, European, Middle Eastern and other authors. It is structured in terms of
(a) core concepts and theories;
(b) core conceptual and methodological approaches;
(c) core practices and processes; and
(d) alternative voices and complex intervention designs.

The volume builds upon earlier ICAR efforts to capture, and advance the state of the field, such as
(a) ICAR's first book-length publication, Conflict Management and Problem Solving: Interpersonal to International Applications (1987; edited by Dennis Sandole and Ingrid Sandole-Staroste, with the Foreword by Kenneth E. Boulding) and
(b) Conflict Resolution Theory and Practice: Integration and Application (1993; edited by Dennis Sandole and Hugo van der Merwe, with the Foreword by Herbert
C. Kelman).

The volume also complements other recently published handbooks, such as:
(a) The Oxford International Encyclopedia of Peace: Global Conflict, Analysis, Transformation and Nonviolent Change (four volumes), editor-in-chief, Nigel Young (2009).
(b) The SAGE Handbook of Conflict Resolution, edited by Jacob Bercovitch, Victor Kremenyuk, and William Zartman (2009).
(c) Encyclopedia of Violence, Peace and Conflict (2nd Edition, three volumes), editor-in-chief, Lester Kurtz (2008) of GMU's Department of Sociology and Anthropology. (Prof. Kurtz attended the launch.)
(d) Handbook of Peace and Conflict Studies, edited by Charles Webel and Johan Galtung (2007).
(e) The Handbook of Conflict Resolution: Theory and Practice (2d Edition), edited by Morton Deutsch, Peter Coleman and E.C. Marcus (2006).

Together these (and other) volumes constitute an enhanced conflict analysis and resolution library that captures the complexity, diversity, and richness of our multidisciplinary field. This enhanced CAR library is of value not only to students, teachers, researchers, trainers and practitioners in the field, but also to policymakers, especially those associated with Barack Obama: the most conflict-resolution friendly president in American history.