Overview

Focusing on state-civil society interaction, this book lays bare the assumptions informing peacebuilding practices and demonstrates through empirical research how such practices have led to new dynamics of conflict. Despite some critical engagement with the concept, the study of peacebuilding is predominately technical in nature, seeking to assess past missions' successes and to determine how to best implement future operations. Drawing on an Cambodia's experiences, this book seeks to reinvest conversations about peacebuilding with the possibility for politics, so that local communities might assert their voice to claim some control over the processes that are directly affecting their lives. The book is structured around a core research question: has the promotion civil society resolved the sources of conflict in Cambodia? Rather than focusing on the initial formal phase of peacebuilding, the book explores the decade following the end of the UN mission, the phase which entails an increasing emphasis on the promotion of civil society, equated during peace operations with the NGO sector, as a source of conflict resolution and development. It explores one of peacebuilding's central tenets, that the promotion of civil society is crucial to the establishment of a peaceful democratic state, and argues that this obscures a history of contestation within the West over both the meanings of 'civil society' and of what its roles should be in relation to the state. Drawing on the process of immanent critique, the book concludes by arguing that the contradictions which arise because of the attempt to universalize from Northern experience contain within them the possibility for local communities to reassert some control over their engagement with peacebuilding. In this way we may see the return of a broader and more inclusive politics to processes of peacebuilding. This book will be of much interest to students of peacebuilding, conflict resolution, development studies, S.E. Asian politics, and IR in general.

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9780415693967

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One of the most interesting studies on civil society, the role of NGOs, and peacebuilding published recently, it has much to recommend it. - Oliver Richmond, University of Manchester, UK In approaching the logic of peacebuilding from the perspective of Critical Security Studies, this book bridges a gap in the literature... This book is recommended for all those studying and working in peacebuilding. - Courtney Hercus, Macquarie University, Australia

One of the most interesting studies on civil society, the role of NGOs, and peacebuilding published recently, it has much to recommend it. - Oliver Richmond, University of Manchester, UK In approaching the logic of peacebuilding from the perspective of Critical Security Studies, this book bridges a gap in the literature... This book is recommended for all those studying and working in peacebuilding. - Courtney Hercus, Macquarie University, Australia

One of the most interesting studies on civil society, the role of NGOs, and peacebuilding published recently, it has much to recommend it. - Oliver Richmond, University of Manchester, UK In approaching the logic of peacebuilding from the perspective of Critical Security Studies, this book bridges a gap in the literature... This book is recommended for all those studying and working in peacebuilding. - Courtney Hercus, Macquarie University, Australia

Author Information

Ryerson Christie is a Teaching Fellow at the University of Bristol, UK, He has a Phd in Politics, Politics from York University, Canada.

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