Gender sensitivity: nicety or necessity in peace process management? , by Antonia Potter
24 June 2008
This paper offers examples of how issues in peace processes can be treated in a gender- sensitive manner, an exercise that is surprisingly simple yet can yield rich analytical results. The arguments in this paper are based principally on the practical experience of professionals currently or recently involved in the management of peace processes in Aceh, Kenya, Kosovo, Liberia, the Middle East, Nepal, Northern Ireland, the Sudan/Darfur and Uganda, together with some secondary academic research and analysis. This paper explores what peace-process actors, including mediators, have done to make peace processes more sensitive to gender, what else might be done, and the benefits (and costs, if any) of such strategies.

Power-sharing, transitional governments and the role of mediation , by Katia Papagianni
24 June 2008
Power-sharing transitional governments are common ingredients of peacemaking and peacebuilding efforts. This paper focuses on the sharing of power in the transitional executive and legislature, and argues that the international community has an important role to play in assisting power-sharing governments to manage their countries’ political transition.

A role for the private sector in peace processes? Examples and implications for third party mediation , by Salil Tripathi and Canan Gündüz
24 June 2008
The role of the private sector in different aspects of conflict resolution has received increasing attention in recent years. This paper discusses the diverse roles played by the private sector during Track 1 peace processes in particular, drawing on a variety of examples from different contexts. The examples illustrate that where the private sector enjoys credibility (sometimes higher than state parties), has access to conflict parties, and a strategic interest in the resolution of a conflict, it can become actively involved and have significant impact on the course of a peace process, for better or worse.

Against conventional wisdom: mediating the Arab-Israeli conflict , by Ezzedine Choukri-Fishere
24 June 2008
Usually described as the core conflict in the Middle East, and with obvious impact on international peace and security, the Arab–Israeli conflict seems to cry out for mediation. However, Israel has consistently maintained that the conflict is better dealt with directly and exclusively by the parties, with little or no external interference, and its view has become a conventional wisdom in the Arab–Israeli peacemaking community since the mid-1970s. This paper argues against this wisdom.

China's role in the mediation and resolution of conflict in Africa, by Dan Large
24 June 2008
The salience of China in relation to Darfur has generated a paradox in popular perceptions whereby China is seen as both the cause and the potential solution to an armed conflict. Such a black-and-white view may make effective ammunition for advocacy, but China’s role in Sudan and the African continent more generally is actually more complex. This paper offers a short assessment of China’s role in the mediation and resolution of conflict in Africa, with Darfur used as a key example – in many ways forming the exception to the wider rule.

It ain’t over ’til it’s over: what role for mediation in post-agreement contexts? , by Elizabeth Cousens
24 June 2008
International mediation is conventionally treated as the reserve of peace processes which, once culminating in a peace agreement, are expected to progress to implementation and various forms of post-conflict recovery in which mediation would have little or no part. Many have criticised the degree to which mediators focus on getting a deal and getting out, leaving the messy business of implementing those deals to others, at least until the deals fray or come apart, requiring new rounds of mediation.
This paper examines whether there may also be a role for mediation-like efforts in relation to post-agreement dialogue processes or similar efforts to broaden popular support for a settlement.

Non-Governmental Actors in Peace Processes - The Case of Aceh, by David Gorman and Timo Kivimäki
20 June 2008

Southeast Asian (neorealist and constructivist) scholarship on peace and conflicts often assume the natural monopoly of states as agents in the security game. Also regional political rhetoric emphasize the role of states as actors of security. Yet member-states of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations have never had militarized inter-state disputes1 that have lead to casualties, while all the main conflicts in the region have been fought between civil society movements and states (or two or several civil society movements). Thus challenges to Southeast Asian security clearly do not come from state actors, but from non-state actors.

Négociations de paix au Burundi - Une justice encombrante mais incontournable, by Caroline Sculier
30 May 2008

La présente étude aborde le processus de paix burundais, et plus particulièrement les débats et conclusions qui ont caractérisé l'Accord d'Arusha, en tentant de répondre à la question de savoir pourquoi et comment des préoccupations de justice ont fait partie des négociations.

Peace without justice? The Helsinki peace process in Aceh, by Edward Aspinall
15 May 2008

The peace process in Aceh has been lauded as a great success, both internationally and within Indonesia. And so it is. Coming in the wake of the cataclysmic Indian Ocean tsunami of December 2004, the mediators and the conflict parties pulled off what many observers had previously considered to be a virtual impossibility: a sustained end to armed hostilities. Within this justifiably celebrated success, however, there is one area that has attracted relatively little attention and where progress has been far less substantial: the human rights and justice agenda. 

This report seeks to explain the contextual factors and underlying political dynamics which gave rise to the outcome described above, as well as the details of negotiations and implementation which contributed to it. It also asks what more could have been done.

Puntos de Vista - Negociando el Desarme, by (Editado por) Cate Buchanan
30 March 2008

Reflexiones sobre Armas, Combatientes y Violencia Armada en Procesos de Paz representa un rica colección de voces y experiencias, y busca contribuir con el creciente debate sobre la respuesta integral a estos asuntos durante procesos de paz. Es el primero de una serie de dos partes que reúne relatos de primera mano y observaciones cuidadosas de personas con diversas conexiones con procesos de paz, ofreciendo espacio para sus perspectivas sobre cómo el control de armas, la reducción de la violencia y el desarme, la desmovilización y reintegración cuentan en el estira y encoje de las negociaciones de paz.