Living in ‘post-colonial’ times does not mean that colonialism of the past has not left its footprints in the present. Its impacts, surviving overtly and covertly, can be found, both as ‘inside’ individual and collective mind-sets, as well as in ‘outside’ reality in and throughout many sectors of society such as socio-economics, science, education, health […]

Why does Peace and Conflict Studies need to be decolonised? What are the key theoretical moves that are needed? And what does decolonising academic work mean in practice?  In this lecture I argue that the emancipatory and humanist roots of peace and conflict studies are an important resource for the thought and practice of ‘decolonising’ […]

This year’s conference of the AFK (German Association for Peace and Conflict Studies) and the European Peace Research Association (EuPRA) is on „Peace and Conflict Studies from the Margins to the Centre; Rethinking Europe in an Unequal World“ (16 – 18 March 2017 in Schwerte (nearby Dortmund), Germany).

AFK-EuPRA – Panel 1: Ethnic Divided Societies Ethnicity is one of the main explanatory factors for violent conflicts according to recent research in the field. This panel provides new perspectives on ethnicity and violent conflict by bringing together papers with a focus at the individual, group and international level. At the individual level, Sebastian Schutte […]

AFK-EuPRA – Panel 2: Everyday Communal Peace and/or Everyday Hybrid Peace in the Fergana Valley The post-liberal debate on peace-building and reconciliation appears to have advanced in recent years. We can observe efforts at “bringing the local back in” (Debiel & Rink) by enhancing local ownership, relational sensitivity, contextualization, culturalization, hybridity and, last but not […]

AFK-EuPRA – Panel 3 (Part 1), Panel 6 (Part 2) and Panel 7 (Part 3): Forced Migration and Inequality: Current developments in Europe, such as the refugee crisis and European reactions to it, form an important backdrop of the joint AFK-EuPRA conference 2017. The Call for Papers mentions “securitization of borders, the selection and categorization […]

AFK-EuPRA – Panel 4: Intervention and Activism Contributions to this panel investigate the conditions under which interventions emerge in different settings of violent conflict as well as the factors impacting their outcomes. Building upon various empirical cases – France’s military interventions, inter-religious peace activism and UN peacekeeping missions – panelists explore the emergence and processes […]

AFK-EuPRA – Panel 5: Humanitarianism, ‘Emergency Imaginary’ and Alternative Imaginations of Inter-and Transnational Solidarity It seems that we live in a world of emergency where crises and exceptional suffering constantly demand urgent humanitarian action and compete for international attention and funding. Budgets for humanitarian aid have been growing. The European Commission recently announced that it, […]

AFK-EuPRA – Panel 8: Theorize Radicalization and Inequality During the last decade of research in social and political science and in public debate, radicalization became a key concept to explain why persons and groups turned towards views and policies directed against other groups that encompass violence or go beyond what seemed politically appropriate. However, the […]

AFK-EuPRA – Panel 9: Transitional Justice and Participation This panel addresses transitional justice and participation issues in post-civil war situations. The inclusiveness and participation in the cases of Cyprus and Northern Ireland – by the referendums of the Annan Plan and the Good Friday Agreement –, which focused on the state level, will be analyzed in the […]