Report No. 1/2024
EMERGING APPROACHES TO INTERNATIONAL MEDIATION IN A FRAGMENTED WORLD
The growing number of conflicts - Ukraine, the Middle East, Sudan, etc. - is accompanied by a weakening of the international system and a stalemate in important peace processes. While traditional actors in mediation are increasingly positioning themselves in support of specific conflict parties and are becoming less attractive as "convening platforms", the mediation efforts of new hosting states are often linked to specific interests. The publication discusses how Austria could position itself as a neutral actor within these new approaches to mediation.
Report No. 1/2023
Dealing with justice and peace issues in times of war
Sustainable peace can only be found if human rights and international law are taken into account, but within wars and armed conflicts these principles of justice are violated. The report discusses this dilemma peacebuilders are facing in Ukraine, Sudan, or Israel and Palestine, and investigates if the call to end violence and the call to bring perpetrators to justice can be reconciled with human rights and justice issues while pursuing peace initiatives.
Report No. 7/2020
EMOTIONEN IM KONFLIKT - EMANZIPATION IN ZEITEN VON RESSENTIMENT
Dass Emotionen in der Politik und in sozialen und politischen Konflikten eine zentrale Rolle spielen, ist bekannt, wird aber trotzdem zu wenig berücksichtigt. Ist ein gewisses Ausmaß an persönlich empfundener Empörung notwendiger Bestandteil jedweden politischen Engagements und jedweder politischen Veränderung? Wann schlägt produktive Empörung in destruktive Gewalt um? Welche Ängste treiben den „Wutbürger“ wirklich um? Wann wird Empörung zum Selbstzweck? Was macht den neuen Autoritarismus und Nationalismus für viele Menschen so attraktiv? Warum wählen Menschen sich Regierungen, die die Ohnmachtserfahrungen dieser selben Menschen noch potenzieren? Warum kann so viel Hass so schnell als Mittel der Politik mobilisiert werden? Warum scheint die Festgefahrenheit so vieler gewaltförmiger und kriegerischer Konflikte weniger mit der Abwesenheit von Transformationspotentialen und Lösungsvorschlägen, sondern vielmehr mit starrsinnig verteidigten Gefühlsqualitäten und damit unterfütterten Vorurteilsstrukturen zu tun zu haben?
Report No. 6/2020
THE UNGOVERNANCE OF PEACE - TRANSITIONAL PROCESSES IN CONTEMPORARY CONFLICTSCAPES
The report rethinks peace, peace formation, but also peacebuilding as an ungoverned process. Liberal peace governance, resting on the pillars of settlement, resolution, and relation, is unlikely to deliver its promised outcomes. The irresolvable discrepancy between the promise of liberal peace and its inability to deliver is the background against which peace ungovernance emerges. It operates under the premise of non-closure in enduring transitions, where time, space, and relationality are not subject to an agreed common understanding, but elements of strategy and politics.
Report No. 5/2020
UNTANGLING CONFLICT: LOCAL PEACE AGREEMENTS IN CONTEMPORARY ARMED VIOLENCE
This research draws on discussions held at two Joint Analysis Workshops in October and November 2019 organised by the Political Settlements Research Programme (PSRP). The workshops were held in cooperation with The British Academy (BA) and the Rift Valley Institute (RVI). In total, over 100 participants from 25 countries involved with or researching on local peace agreements contributed to thematic discussions.
Report No. 4/2020
SUCCESSFUL PREVENTION OF WAR AND CIVIL WAR IN 16 EXAMPLES
In public debates successful prevention of war has low priority. As a rule inter- and intra-national tensions and crises are dealt with as long as their outcome is uncertain and the “writing of war is on the wall”. If, on the other hand, a war has been averted successfully, the case is no longer of interest to the general public and the media. Nevertheless, the statement by Lothar Brock, on 20 September 2015, “Prevention is the Alpha and Omega”, still stands. Lothar Brock, Prof. em. at Frankfurt Goethe University and former Director of a Research Group of the Peace Research Institute in Frankfurt, made this statement at the Biberach Symposium on the occasion of Dieter Senghaas’s 75th anniversary. Dieter Senghaas is one of the founding fathers of German peace and conflict research.
Report No. 3/2019
BEYOND PEACEBUILDING: CHALLENGING A CRITICAL MAINSTREAM
Peacebuilding has come of age. The field has reached a degree of ripeness that offers an immense diversification of approaches and topics. Many things have been said about peacebuilding, and many contemporary debates give the feeling that they have been heard before. Despite – or because – of the impressive volume of empirical studies done on peacebuilding issues, the field remains surprisingly weak on innovations. At the same time, the field also faces increased competition through the arrival of competing variants from outside of OECD countries, often resulting in a "shrinking space" for the Western-led, civil-society-focused approach. The present report compiles written contributions of eight young scholars addressing these challenges from different angles.
Report No. 2/2018
"INTERNATIONAL ORGANISATIONS IN PEACEBUILDING: CRITICAL ASSESSMENTS AND FUTURE IMPULSES"
Against this backdrop, the ASPR convened its annual „State of Peacebuilding“ (StoP) conference in November 2017, focusing on „the Practics, Politics and Paradigms of IO Peacebuilding“. This report represents a consolidation and continuation of the debates launched at the conference. To this end, we invited some of the participants to expand and consolidate their input into brief research papers, which form the chapters of this volume.
Report No. 1/2018
WELT IM UMBRUCH
Der vorliegende ASPR Report präsentiert die erarbeiteten Papiere und stellt sie dem interessierten Fachpublikum zur Diskussion. Die wesentliche und, im wahrsten Sinne des Wortes, übergreifende Gemeinsamkeit der hier versammelten Texte ist der über die konkreten politischen Fragen weit hinausgehende theoretische, historische und geographische Rahmen, der gespannt wird. Insbesondere ist es die Eigenschaft Europas als vormalige Kolonialmacht und die daraus resultierende postkoloniale Kontextualisierung jeder europäisch konnotierten Friedensordnung, die die Beiträge bewegt. Die nach wie vor bestehende Relevanz der postkolonialen Realität wird dementsprechend stark als konkreter Handlungsrahmen eingefordert.