[Studies in Strategic Peacebuilding] Daniel Philpott, Gerard Powers - Strategies of Peace (2010, Oxford University Press) - libgen.lc (1)

AN OVERVIEW 23
institutions and the repair or creation of partnerships conducive to the common
good; and the increasing coordination and (where possible) integration
of resources, programs, practices, and processes. These hallmarks characterize
the reflexive practice of peacebuilders themselves who think and act strategically.
Elements of these definitions of strategic peacebuilding require unpacking
and elaboration.
Peacebuilding: Comprehensive and Sustainable
In this chapter we explore peacebuilding in its most capacious meaning by conceptualizing
it as an ideal type—which is to acknowledge that peacebuilding in
this “ultra” mode may exist only in our imaginations and on paper, rather than
in the real world of practice. We take this ideal-type approach for at least three
reasons.
First, many if not all elements in the definition and description of peacebuilding
that we present in this chapter do, in fact, appear in actual peacebuilding
activities and operations; all of them appear in peacebuilding activities and
operations, collectively considered; and all of them are central to the successful
building of peace. 1 In short, we add nothing to the array of activities and aspirations
already associated with the building of peace.
Second, a comprehensive definition and description of peacebuilding is
necessary if the peace being built is to be sustained over time. A sustainable
peace, the historical record shows, requires long-term, ongoing activities and
operations that may be initiated and supported for a time by outsiders but
must eventually become the ordinary practices of the citizens and institutions
of the society in question. We believe, furthermore, that peacebuilding occurs
in its fully realized mode when it addresses every stage of the conflict cycle and
involves all members of a society in the nonviolent transformation of conflict,
the pursuit of social justice, and the creation of cultures of sustainable peace.
Properly understood, the building and sustaining of a culture of peace and
its supporting institutions requires a range of relationship-building activities
encompassing the entire conflict cycle, rather than merely the postaccord,
coming-out-of-violence period. Accordingly, activities that constitute peacebuilding
run the gamut of conflict transformation, including violence prevention
and early warning, conflict management, mediation and resolution, social
reconstruction and healing in the aftermath of armed conflict, and the long,
complex work of reconciliation throughout the process. 2
In addition, peacebuilding theory articulates the end goal of these disparate
but interrelated phases of conflict transformation. The end goal is perhaps
best expressed by the idea of a justpeace, a dynamic state of affairs in which
the reduction and management of violence and the achievement of social
and economic justice are undertaken as mutual, reinforcing dimensions of
constructive change. 3 Sustainable transformation of conflict requires more
than the (necessary) problem solving associated with mediation, negotiated