Recognizing the Science of Peace to Build Positive Peace

2019 ◽  
pp. 19-42 ◽  
Author(s):  
David E.T. Prater ◽  
Patrick T. Hiller
Keyword(s):  
Public Discourse ◽  
Peace Movement ◽  
Academic Disciplines ◽  
Academic Publishing ◽  
Peace Research ◽  
Peace And Justice ◽  
Causes Of War ◽  
Peace And Conflict ◽  
Global Peace ◽  
Conflict Research

Different academic disciplines conceive of peace through their respective lenses. Often overlooked are the theories and guiding principles of the field of peace and conflict research itself. Peace science, the discipline examining the causes of war and conditions for peace, can help bridge the gap between peace movement moralism and pragmatism toward achieving peace on multiple levels. A research-practice communication gap is discussed as a strong impediment in making peace science relevant. Communication barriers, the requirements of academic publishing and the lack of public relevance for academia are examined. Examples of often under-recognized peace research contributions are presented within the framework of the Global Peace System. In doing so, the potential and actual relevance of those research contributions to real-world peace and justice issues is emphasized. The authors recommend that peace researchers make conscious efforts to contribute to peacebuilding practices, public discourse and attempt to reach audiences beyond academia in general.

scholarly journals Against All Odds: 2013 Richardson Award to Mats Hammarström and Peter Wallensteen

2014 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 235-243
Author(s):  
Margit Bussmann ◽  
Han Dorussen ◽  
Nils Petter Gleditsch
Keyword(s):  
Armed Conflict ◽  
World Wide ◽  
Scholarly Output ◽  
Peace Research ◽  
Peace And Conflict ◽  
Lifetime Achievement ◽  
Lifetime Achievement Award ◽  
Data Program ◽  
Conflict Research ◽  
Lewis Fry Richardson

AbstractThe institutionalization of peace research has been a tortuous process and it has proven particularly difficult to establish separate departments for peace research in the universities. The Department of Peace and Conflict Research at Uppsala University is a spectacular exception. This article honors two outstanding scholars who made it happen against all odds and who received the 2013 Lewis Fry Richardson Lifetime Achievement Award for their contribution to the scientific study of armed conflict. Peter Wallensteen and Mats Hammarström were awarded the prize for their individual scholarly output but above all for their joint achievement in establishing peace and conflict research at Uppsala University with its two pillars, the Uppsala Conflict Data Program and the training program for young scholars. They have made a lasting contribution to an institution of world-wide renown that pursues research in the scientific tradition of Richardson.

scholarly journals Critiquing and Joining Intersections of Disaster, Conflict, and Peace Research

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (5) ◽  
pp. 555-567
Author(s):  
Laura E. R. Peters ◽  
Ilan Kelman
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Research Policy ◽  
Conflict Transformation ◽  
Policy And Practice ◽  
Constructive Conflict ◽  
Cultural Violence ◽  
Peace Research ◽  
Peace And Conflict ◽  
Foundational Research ◽  
Conflict Research

Abstract Disaster research, conflict research, and peace research have rich and deep histories, yet they do not always fully intersect or learn from each other, even when they investigate if and how disasters lead to conflict or peace. Scholarship has tended to focus on investigating causal linkages between disaster (including those associated with climate change) and conflict, and disaster diplomacy emerged as a thread of explanatory research that investigates how and why disaster-related activities do and do not influence peace and conflict. However, definitive conclusions on the disaster-conflict-peace nexus have evaded scientific consensus, in part due to conceptual, methodological, and interpretive differences among studies. This article highlights that this nexus would benefit from a more robust engagement with each field’s foundational research that explores beyond binary and crude distinctions. Examples are concepts of destructive and constructive conflict; direct, structural, and cultural violence, and their relationships to vulnerability; negative and positive peace; and the ideals and realities of peacebuilding and conflict transformation. This article demonstrates how integrated scholarship could open up and advance new lines of questioning, with implications for developing coherent research, policy, and practice. The article concludes by offering recommendations for how to better connect disaster, conflict, and peace research.

scholarly journals Towards IT Peace Research: Challenges at the Intersection of Peace and Conflict Research and Computer Science

2020 ◽  
Vol 38 (1) ◽  
pp. 10-16 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christian Reuter
Keyword(s):  
Information Technology ◽  
Computer Science ◽  
Crucial Role ◽  
Research Challenges ◽  
Peace Research ◽  
Peace And Conflict ◽  
Peace And Security ◽  
Role Of It ◽  
Conflict Research

Advances in science and technology, including information technology (IT), play a crucial role in the context of peace and security. However, research on the intersection of peace and conflict research as well as computer science is not well established yet. This article highlights the need for further work in the area of research “IT peace research”, which includes both empirical research on the role of IT in peace and security, as well as technical research to design technologies and applications. Based on the elaboration of the disciplines, central challenges, such as insecurity, actors, attribution and laws, are outlined.

How far is it from Königsberg to Kandahar? Democratic peace and democratic violence in International Relations

2010 ◽  
Vol 37 (4) ◽  
pp. 1555-1577 ◽  
Author(s):  
ANNA GEIS ◽  
WOLFGANG WAGNER
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Research Programme ◽  
Critical Discussion ◽  
Democratic Peace ◽  
Security Issues ◽  
Peace And Conflict Studies ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Peace And Conflict ◽  
Forms Of Violence ◽  
Conflict Research

AbstractOver the last two decades, there has been a ‘democratic turn’ in peace and conflict research, that is, the peculiar impact of democratic politics on a wide range of security issues has attracted more and more attention. Many of these studies are inspired by Immanuel Kant's famous essay on ‘Perpetual Peace’. In this article, we present a critical discussion of the ‘democratic distinctiveness programme’ that emerged from the Democratic Peace debate and soon spread to cover a wider range of foreign policy issues. The bulk of this research has to date been based on an overly optimistic reading of a ‘Kantian peace’. In particular, the manifold forms of violence that democracies have exerted, have been treated either as a challenge to the Democratic Peace proposition or as an undemocratic contaminant and pre-democratic relict. In contrast, we argue that forms of ‘democratic violence’ should no longer be kept at arm's length from the democratic distinctiveness programme but instead should be elevated to a main field of study. While we acknowledge the benefits of this expanding research programme, we also address a number of normative pitfalls implied in this scholarship such as lending legitimacy to highly questionable foreign policy practices by Western democracies. We conclude with suggestions for a more self-reflexive and ‘critical’ research agenda of a ‘democratically turned’ peace and conflict studies, inspired by the Frankfurt school tradition.

Investing in the Peace: Economic Interdependence and International Conflict

2001 ◽  
Vol 55 (2) ◽  
pp. 391-438 ◽  
Author(s):  
Erik Gartzke ◽  
Quan Li ◽  
Charles Boehmer
Keyword(s):  
Policy Coordination ◽  
Conflict Behavior ◽  
Costly Signaling ◽  
Militarized Disputes ◽  
Economic Relationships ◽  
Goods And Services ◽  
Causes Of War ◽  
Monetary Policy Coordination ◽  
Quantitative Results ◽  
Global Peace

Research appears to substantiate the liberal conviction that trade fosters global peace. Still, existing understanding of linkages between conflict and international economics is limited in at least two ways. First, cross-border economic relationships are far broader than just trade. Global capital markets dwarf the exchange of goods and services, and states engage in varying degrees of monetary policy coordination. Second, the manner in which economics is said to inhibit conflict behavior is implausible in light of new analytical insights about the causes of war. We discuss, and then demonstrate formally, how interdependence can influence states' recourse to military violence. The risk of disrupting economic linkages—particularly access to capital—may occasionally deter minor contests between interdependent states, but such opportunity costs will typically fail to preclude militarized disputes. Instead, interdependence offers nonmilitarized avenues for communicating resolve through costly signaling. Our quantitative results show that capital interdependence contributes to peace independent of the effects of trade, democracy, interest, and other variables.

scholarly journals Peace as a composite indicator: the goals and future of the Global Peace Index

2021 ◽  
pp. 43-56
Author(s):  
T. Morgan
Keyword(s):  
National Level ◽  
Composite Index ◽  
Composite Indicator ◽  
Skewed Distribution ◽  
Continuous Measure ◽  
Conflict Studies ◽  
Multiple Indicators ◽  
Peace And Conflict Studies ◽  
Peace And Conflict ◽  
Global Peace

This article provides an overview of the purpose, development and future of the Global Peace Index (GPI), a composite indicator of peacefulness at the national level. It explains why the concept of negative peace is well suited to being captured by a composite index, for both theoretical and statistical reasons. It examines how the GPI fits within the field of peace and conflict studies and how its methodological soundness has been assessed. This is done by looking at the history and structure of the GPI and showing how it relates to other definitions and indicators of peacefulness. The article then analyzes how the index is constructed with respect to its weighting, aggregation, and robustness. Some of the criticisms of the index are also explored, as well as the main proposed directions for the GPI evolution over the coming decade. Three main advantages of the index are identified as the ones that best reflect its novel input in peace and conflict studies. First, a composite indicator of peace helps to provide a more compelling narrative around the dynamics of peace between countries, to generate more interest in the peace and conflict field and to promote the concept of peace as a crucial driver of development. Second, the aggregation of multiple indicators of violence allows for the construction of a continuous measure of peacefulness with a less skewed distribution that can serve as the baseline for seeing which factors in other areas are correlated with peacefulness. Third, this composite measure of peacefulness highlights areas where data on aspects of negative peace are missing, incomplete, or not comparable across countries and drives the creation of new and novel indicators to fill these data gaps.

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