Peacekeeping, Peace Culture and Conflict Resolution

Abstract

This article presents an overview of the relationships between peacekeeping, peacebuilding and conflict resolution with an emphasis on the way in which culture and cultural analysis might be used to develop more effective and sustainable peacekeeping interventions. The article comments on the conceptualization of the role of culture in conflict resolution theory and how this has been used in attempts to address cultural barriers to effective peacekeeping in so-called first-, second- and third-generation missions. While culture has generally been defined as important in theory and practice in terms of understanding differences between actors in conflict environments, the main new argument advanced in the article is that culture, redefined specifically as peace culture, can have a more proactive role in terms of mobilizing energies for sustainable peacebuilding at different stages of the conflict spectrum. More speculatively, the article explores the idea of culture as a contributory factor in the emergence of new forms of cosmopolitan peacekeeping.

Notes

See Oliver Ramsbotham, Tom Woodhouse and Betts Fetherston, ‘UNPROFOR: Some Observations from a Conflict Resolution Perspective’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.1, No.2, 1994, pp.179–203.

Tamara Duffey, ‘Cultural issues in Contemporary Peacekeeping’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.7, No.1, 2000, pp.142–68.

Charles Moskos, Peace Soldiers: The Sociology of a United Nations Military Force, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1976, p.1.

Betts Fetherston, ‘Peacekeeping, Conflict Resolution and Peacebuilding: A Reconsideration of Theoretical Frameworks', International Peacekeeping, Vol.7, No.1, 2000, pp.190–218.

Moskos (see n.3 above), p.1.

Marianne Heiberg and Johan Holst, ‘Keeping the Peace in Lebanon: Assessing International and Multinational Peacekeeping’, Working Paper No.357, Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, Oslo, 1986.

Sigrid van der Auwera, ‘Peace Operations and the Protection of Cultural Property during and after Armed Conflict’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.17, No.1, 2010, pp.3–16.

Robert Rubinstein, Peacekeeping under Fire: Culture and Intervention, Boulder, CO: Paradigm, 2008.

Robert Rubinstein, ‘Intervention and Culture: An Anthropological Approach to Peace Operations’, Security Dialogue, Vol.36, No.4, 2005, p.537.

Ibid., p.542.

On this, see Oliver Ramsbotham, Tom Woodhouse and Hugh Miall, Contemporary Conflict Resolution, Cambridge: Polity Press, 2005, pp.132–58.

Elise Boulding, Building a Global Civic Culture: Education for an Interdependent World, Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1990.

Ibid., p.95.

See Steven P. Kinloch, ‘Utopian or Pragmatic? A UN Permanent Military Volunteer Force’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.3, No.4, 1996, pp.166–90.

See Patrick A. MacCarthy, ‘Building a Reliable Rapid-Reaction Capability for the United Nations’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.7, No.2, 2000, pp.139–54.

Alexander Ramsbotham, Briefing Report: Enhancing the Rapid Reaction Capability of the United Nations: Exploring the Options, London: United Nations Association, 2004.

Oliver Ramsbotham, Tom Woodhouse and Hugh Miall, Contemporary Conflict Resolution, 2nd edn, Cambridge: Polity Press, 2005.

See, for example, Kabilan Krishnasamy, ‘“Recognition” for Third World Peacekeepers: India and Pakistan’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.8, No.4, 2001, pp.56–76.

Justin Morris, ‘United Nations Security Council Reform: A Counsel for the Twenty First Century’, Security Dialogue, Vol.31, No.3, 2000, pp.265–78.

Roland Paris, ‘Peacekeeping and the Constraints of Global Culture’, European Journal of International Relations, Vol.9, No.3, 2003, p.443.

See UNESCO Culture of Peace (at: www3.unesco.org/iycp/uk/uk_cp.htm).

Report of the General Assembly, UN doc., A/Res/53/13, 1998.

David Adams, ‘The Seville Statement on Violence, a Progress Report’, Journal of Peace Research, Vol.26, No.2, 1989, pp.113–21.

The websites are at: http://decade-culture-of-peace-org and www.fund.culturadepaz.org. Both have copies of the World Report and the Youth Report.

Rachel Briggs, Helen McCarthy and Alexis Zorbas, 16 Days: The Role of the Olympic Truce in the Toolkit for Peace, Athens: Demos, 2004.

For Jacques Rogge's statement and the Olympic Principles see International Olympic Committee (at: www.olympic.org/uk/organisation/missions/truce/truce_uk.asp).

See: www.olympictruce.org.

On the Olympic Truce, see Briggs et al. (n.25 above).

See UN Sport for Development and Peace, at: www.un.org/themes/sport/intro.htm.

For more details on these projects, see the UN Office for Sport Development and Peace (at: www.un.org/wcm/content/site/sport/dpko).

Varda Burstyn, The Rites of Men: Manhood, Politics and the Culture of Sport, Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1999, p.4.

For an account of this, see David Goldblatt, The Ball is Round: A Global History of Football, London: Penguin Books, 2007, pp 533–4.

Michael Shank and Lisa Schirch, ‘Strategic Arts-Based Peacebuilding’, Peace and Change, Vol.33, No.2, 2008, pp.217–42; John Paul Lederach, The Moral Imagination: The Art and Soul of Building Peace, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.