Peace Studies

Approaches to Peace provides a unique and interdisciplinary sampling of classic articles and short literary selections focusing on the diverse aspects of peace and conflict studies. Readings cover the causes of war and proposed means of preventing it and reflect upon the universal concern for positive peace.

The Laureates share their views about the importance of basic human rights, their concerns about conflicts that arise when these rights are denied, and their practical ideas for conceiving reconciliation.

I'd Rather Teach Peace is the story of one man's passion for peace education, as seen during one semester in six schools where risk-taking students found themselves challenged and inspired by an unconventional course and by a man who believes that if we don't teach our children peace someone else will teach them violence.

The inadequacies of pacifism and just war took a horrible toll on the world of the 20th century. While debate has focused on whether or not to wage war, we have witnessed two world wars, the specter of nuclear annihilation, and the wholesale extermination of peoples, as well as numerous other conflicts with tragic results. What have been overlooked are the positive, practical steps that human beings can take to make peace.

Peace: A World History is the first study to explore the full spectrum of peace and peacemaking from prehistoric to contemporary times in a single volume aimed at improving their prospects.

This book comprehensively introduces students to the relatively young interdisciplinary field of peace and conflict studies. A hallmark of the book is the effort it makes to encourage independent and critical thinking among student readers.

Johan Galtung, one of the founders of modern peace studies, provides a wide-ranging panorama of the ideas, theories and assumptions on which the study of peace is based.

The idea of studying peace - over studying war, genocide and political violence (hereafter violent conflict) and then inferring about peace - has gained considerable traction in the past few years after languishing in the shadows of conflict for decades but how should it be studied? The Peace Continuum offers a parallax view of how we think about peace and the complexities that surround the concept (i.e., the book explores the topic from different positions at the same time).

Tool that presents the goals and key issues of peace education, describes the difficulties and obstacles educators are likely to meet (and how to overcome them), and suggests approaches and programs for different age groups.

In an age where official and sponsored violence are becoming normalized and conceived of as legitimate tools of peace keeping, a number of leading academics and activists represented in Pedagogy, Politics and Philosophy of Peace interrogate and resist the intensification of the militarization of civil life and of international relations.

The Power of Nonviolence, the first anthology of alternatives to war with a historical perspective, with an introduction by Howard Zinn about September 11 and the U.S. response to the terrorist attacks, presents the most salient and persuasive arguments for peace in the last 2,500 years of human history.

Pursuing Just Peace: An Overview and Case Studies for Faith-Based Peacebuilders, understates the significance and relevance of the intertwining goals of peace and justice presented. It is a relatively short but dense book that requires concentration and is well worth the effort. Pursuing Just Peace is an important read for all interested in the power of grassroots peacebuilding.

Drawing on the Transcend approach to peace-making, this book provides a comprehensive guide to conflict resolution. Transcend is an international network of scholars and practitioners working for peace and development through action, training, dissemination and research.

Understanding Peace: A Comprehensive Introduction fills the need for an original, contemporary examination of peace that is challenging, informative, and empowering.

"This book provides an analytical framework for understanding how the concept of quality peace can be used to evaluate post-conflict peacebuilding, using social science, statistics, and case studies. Including contributions from more than 20 researchers and practitioners, it argues that the quality of the peace in a post-conflict state relates to the extent to which peace accords are implemented, the agreed-upon mechanism for the non-violent resolution of the conflict, and the available social space for civil and political actors."

A first-of-its-kind gathering of the essential texts of the American antiwar tradition, from the Revolution to the war on terror: over 150 eloquent, provocative voices for peace.

Yoder provides a variety of responses to this classic question: his own thorough ethical analysis along with the answers given by other writers such as Leo Tolstoy, Dale Brown, and Dale Aukerman and a variety of real-life stories of people who have discovered alternative responses to violence.

A major work from a seminal figure in the field of conflict resolution, "Building Peace" is John Paul Lederach's definitive statement on peacebuilding. "Building Peace" is a substantive reworking and expansion of a work developed for the United Nations University in 1994.

"Central to a transformational approach to conflict is the idea that conflicts must be viewed as embedded within broader relational patterns, and social and discursive structures—and must be addressed as such... This book makes a valuable contribution to the ongoing dialogue across and between disciplines and people on how to transform conflicts creatively, sustainably, and ethically."

The Community Leaders Workbook is designed to assist leadership who support nonviolent education programs in appreciating the full range of issues related to the philosophy of Martin Luther King, Jr. and his methodology of nonviolent conflict reconciliation.

Conflict Resolution in the Twenty-first Century is not only an essential introduction for students and scholars, it is a must-have guide for the men and women entrusted with creating stability and security in our changing world.

Seeking to expand the transformative aspect of conflict resolution, the contributors to this edited collection have focused on gathering scholarship from under-represented voices and viewpoints in the field, the emerging discipline.

The Ministry of Reconciliation of the Church of the Brethren has created this handbook for the purpose of assisting members of existing Discipleship and Reconciliation (D&R) Committees and district leadership in their efforts to help congregations deal with conflict.

This empowering guide goes beyond observable techniques to offer a close look at the creative internal processes--both cognitive and psychological--that successful mediators and other conflict resolvers draw upon.

In Getting Past No, William Ury of Harvard Law School's Program on Negotiation offers a proven breakthrough strategy for turning adversaries into negotiating partners.

Getting to Yes offers a proven, step-by-step strategy for coming to mutually acceptable agreements in every sort of conflict.

Human rights and conflict resolution have been traditionally perceived as two separate fields, sometimes in competition or in tension and occasionally with contradictory approaches towards achieving a lasting peace... The chapters in this volume navigate the relationship between human rights and conflict resolution by fleshing out practical, conceptual, and institutional encounters of the two agendas and engaging with lessons learned and windows of opportunities for mutual learning.

The Leaders Manual is a twenty-six module nonviolence education program organized by topics that collectively comprise an introduction to Dr. King's philosophy & the movements he led from 1955-1968.

Peacemaking Circles are used in neighborhoods to provide support for those harmed by crime and to decide sentences for those who commit crime, in schools to create positive classroom climates and resolve behavior problems, in the workplace to deal with conflict, and in social services to develop more organic support systems for people struggling to get their lives together.

This clearly articulated statement offers a hopeful and workable approach to conflict--that eternally beleaguering human situation. John Paul Lederach is internationally recognized for his breakthrough thinking and action related to conflict on all levels--person-to-person, factions within communities, warring nations. He explores why "conflict transformation" is more appropriate than "conflict resolution" or "management."

Most books on negotiation assume that the negotiators are in a stable setting. But what about those far thornier times when negotiation needs to happen while other fundamental factors are in uproarious change-- deciding which parent will have custody of their child while a divorce is underway; bargaining between workers and management during the course of a merger and downsizing; or establishing a new government as a civil war winds down.

A practical guide to understanding and transforming conflict based on biblical and Anabaptist principles.

This book provides a contemporary account of the linkages between the academic field of conflict resolution and the practice of military peacekeeping, through the lens of pre-deployment training for military personnel about to embark on UN peacekeeping operations.

This book is a training of trainers manual that uses and broadens the theories of conflict resolution and reconciliation provided in Working for Reconciliation: A Caritas Handbook. This manual uses a participatory and interactive training methodology which requires that training participants are actively involved.

Part of the Peace Skills Set, this Manual is designed as a take-home resource to support workshop participants as they return to their communities and both apply their mediation skills and share their insights with others. It covers conflict analysis, the role of mediation, the stages of mediation, communication skills, and working with group conflicts and in cross cultural settings.

Drawing on his experience, Lederach explains the process and key variables used in teaching conflict resolution. Lederach uses anecdotes and pertinent experiences to demonstrate his resolution techniques.

Early work in conflict resolution and peace research focused on why wars broke out, why they persisted, and why peace agreements failed to endure. Later research has focused on what actions and circumstances have actually averted destructive escalations, stopped the perpetuation of destructive conduct, produced a relatively good conflict transformation, or resulted in an enduring and relatively equitable relationship among former adversaries.

The essays in this volume ... explore the ways in which competing ’social’ or ’collective memories’ of the Northern Ireland ’Troubles’ continue to shape the post-conflict political landscape."

The toolkit emphasizes learning before, during and after the implementation of peacebuilding programs. It explores the connections between learning and effective peacebuilding practice, and suggest practices for reflection and learning as individuals and communities.

Practical resource for both church leaders and congregational members who are called upon to moderate and somehow bring resolution to conflicts.

How do Christians think about peacemaking in a new millennium? What can we do about ethnic and religious conflicts? How can we create peaceful communities and influence the world system? This book is a gift from Fellowship of Reconciliation and the historic peace churches (Mennonites, Brethren, Quakers) to the world church.

During the past decade, armed drones have entered the American military arsenal as a core tactic for countering terrorism. When coupled with access to reliable information, they make it possible to deploy lethal force accurately across borders while keeping one's own soldiers out of harm's way.

"Governance for Peace presents a comprehensive analysis of the dimensions of governance that are most likely to prevent armed conflict and foster sustainable peace. It is an accessible study written for the general reader that brings together the best empirical evidence across numerous disciplines showing how effective governance and inclusive, participatory, and accountable institutions help to reduce violence by addressing social needs and providing mechanisms for resolving disputes."

The main theme of the book is that the new types of sanctions constitute a challenge to the international system.

The definitive volume on the sources of contemporary conflict and the array of possible responses to it.

This volume describes the tools and skills for peacemaking that are currently available and critically assesses their usefulness and limitations. The field's preeminent researchers and practitioners present traditional approaches as well as newer, "nonofficial" approaches to peacemaking.

"Turbulent Peace" underlines the volatility and vulnerability of states and peoples in a world that is both increasingly interconnected and ever more differentiated and decentralized in its political and social structures.

This book provides a comprehensive guide to understanding conflict resolution in today's global world.

The United Nations and Changing World Politics, fifth edition, guides students through the complexity of politics and history of the UN. Students of all levels will learn what the UN is, how it operates, and what its relationships are with the universe of external actors and institutions, from sovereign states to the plethora of nongovernmental and intergovernmental organizations now playing important roles in world politics.

Uniting Against Terror argues that defeating the global terrorist threat requires engaging international financial, diplomatic, intelligence, and defense communities and law enforcement organizations in an atmosphere of cooperation. It examines cooperative diplomatic and economic policies to address the changing face of terrorism and the global Al Qaida threat, differentiates between protective measures and long-term preventive policies, and makes recommendations for effective cooperative nonmilitary strategies.

This book includes films that portray war and the experiences of those who have fought in them -- both the heroic and the horrific.

In theory war is a means to an end, a rational, if brutal, activity intended to serve the interests of one group of people by killing, wounding, or otherwise incapacitating those who oppose it. This volume provides a comprehensive account of the subject.

Drawing on conflict transformation in peace studies, recent American pragmatist thought, and models of agonistic democracy, Jason Springs argues that, in circumstances riven with conflict between strong religious identities and deep moral and political commitments, productive engagement may depend on thinking creatively about how to constructively utilize conflict and intolerance.

Hiroshima is the story of six human beings who lived through the greatest single manmade disaster in history. John Hersey tells what these six -- a clerk, a widowed seamstress, a physician, a Methodist minister, a young surgeon, and a German Catholic priest -- were doing at 8:15 a.m. on August 6, 1945, when Hiroshima was destroyed by the first atomic bomb ever dropped on a city. Then he follows the course of their lives hour by hour, day by day.

This classic work examines the issues surrounding military theory, war crimes, and the spoils of war from the Athenian attack on Melos to the My Lai massacre.

Mary Kaldor's New and Old Wars has fundamentally changed the way both scholars and policy-makers understand contemporary war and conflict.

The good news is that most soldiers are loath to kill. But armies have developed sophisticated ways of overcoming this instinctive aversion. And contemporary civilian society, particularly the media, replicates the army's conditioning techniques, and, according to Lt. Col. Dave Grossman's thesis, is responsible for our rising rate of murder among the young. Upon its initial publication, ON KILLING was hailed as a landmark study of the techniques the military uses to overcome the powerful reluctance to kill, of how killing affects soldiers, and of the societal implications of escalating violence. Now, Grossman has updated this classic work to include information on 21st-century military conflicts, recent trends in crime, suicide bombings, school shootings, and more. The result is a work certain to be relevant and important for decades to come.

Without denying our heritage of aggressive behavior, Frans de Waal describes powerful checks and balances in the makeup of our closest animal relatives, and in so doing he shows that to humans making peace is as natural as making war. In this meticulously researched and absorbing account, we learn in detail how different types of simians cope with aggression, and how they make peace after fights.

Violent criminals have been Gilligan's teachers, and he has been their student. Gilligan suggests treating violence as a public health problem. He advocates initiating radical social and economic change to attack the root causes of violence, focusing on those at increased risk of becoming violent, and dealing with those who are already violent as if they were in quarantine rather than in constraint for their punishment and for society's revenge.

A brilliant, clear-eyed new consideration of the visual representation of violence in our culture--its ubiquity, meanings, and effects. In her first full-scale investigation of the role of imagery in our culture since her now-classic book On Photography defined the terms of the debate twenty-five years ago, Susan Sontag cuts through circular arguments about how pictures can inspire dissent or foster violence as she takes a fresh look at the representation of atrocity.

This comprehensive new Handbook explores the significance and nature of armed intrastate conflict and civil war in the modern world.

"This Handbook links the growing body of media and conflict research with the field of security studies.... This handbook seeks to consolidate existing knowledge by linking the body of conflict and media studies with work in security studies ... providing a comprehensive mapping of the media-conflict field."

This completely updated and revised edition of "Warfare and Armed Conflicts" presents a record of casualties from the last five centuries. Additionally, ongoing conflicts that began before 2001 and that were covered in the second edition are now covered through 2007.

In War Is a Force That Gives Us Meaning, Hedges tackles the ugly truths about humanity's love affair with war, offering a sophisticated, nuanced, intelligent meditation on the subject that is also gritty, powerful, and unforgettable.

The Wretched of the Earth is a brilliant analysis of the psychology of the colonized and their path to liberation.

Gandhi's Way provides a primer of Mahatma Gandhi's principles of moral action and conflict resolution and offers a straightforward, step-by-step approach that can be used in any conflict---at home or in business; in local, national, or international arenas.

David Cortright is a life-long activist and respected scholar. In Gandhi and Beyond, he convincingly shows the power of nonviolence as a philosophy of life, not just a method of social action.

James C. Juhnke and Carol M. Hunter have written a ground-breaking book, challenging the routine application of the myth of redemptive violence to the history of the United States. Published just weeks prior to September 11, 2001, this second edition now concludes with an analysis of the events since that time. This work is a timely and eye-opening corrective that helps the reader see the history of the United States from an entirely new perspective. Available May 2004.

Few theologians have done as much as John Howard Yoder to articulate the case for Christian pacifism. The eleven lectures collected in Nonviolence--A Brief History were presented in 1983 in Warsaw, Poland, and this is their first publication together.

This book combats the notion that nonviolence is basically something new by stressing its Eastern origins and emphasizing the extent to which many of the recent manifestations of nonviolence are found in the Third World.

Nonviolent Social Movements is the first book to offer a truly global overview of the dramatic growth of popular nonviolent struggles in recent years.

In a companion volume to Pacifism in the United States, Peter Brock surveys the history of the pacifist movement in Europe from the beginning of the Christian era to the First World War. His detailed narrative is directed to the activities--and the beliefs that motivated them--of these sects in particular: the Czech Brethren of the late Middle Ages; the radical Anabaptists of the Protestant Reformation; their less militant offshoot, the Mennonites; the Quakers of Cromwell's England; and the Tolstoyans of nineteenth-century Russia.

For college students and general readers, surveys the various movements advocating personal nonparticipation in war of any kind as a first step in finding nonviolent means for resolving conflict. Considers the heritage of previous centuries, conscientious objection, Catholicism and Judaism between the world wars, the antinuclear movement, and the Vietnam War. An updated and illustrated edition of Brock's 1970 Twentieth-Century Pacifism published by Van Nostrand Reinhold. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

This book traces the history of pacifism in America from colonial times to the start of World War I.

From the pages of Fellowship magazine, this volume highlights the writings of some of the preeminent peacemakers of our century. These seventy original and classic essays offer a comprehensive reader in nonviolence while also chronicling the struggle for peace and justice in the twentieth century.

Is There No Other Way? is a provocative and emotionally powerful document that challenges readers' assumptions about the workings of power in their homes and communities, as well as the larger political arena.

A visionary work that explores the limits of violence and charts an unexpectedly hopeful course toward a nonviolent future.

The book covers pacifism, just war theory, and just peacemaking theory. It crystallizes Yoder's argument that his proposed Christian ethics was/is not sectarian and a matter of withdrawal.

In this volume, Peter Ackerman, an authority on non-violent strategy, and Jack DuVall, a veteran writer, show how popular movements used non-violent action to overthrow dictators, obstruct military invaders and secure human rights in country after country, over the past century.

This illuminating book presents a realistic analysis of the extent to which the war system has infiltrated all aspects of Western culture and how it works to perpetuate war rather than promote peace. Additionally, the text describes the historically recent and still evolving parallel system of peace institutions.

Mighty Be Our Powers is the gripping chronicle of a journey from hopelessness to empowerment that will touch all who dream of a better world.

In this timely, highly original, and controversial narrative, New York Times bestselling author Mark Kurlansky discusses nonviolence as a distinct entity, a course of action, rather than a mere state of mind.

Nonviolence in America is a comprehensive compilation of first-hand sources that document the history of nonviolence in the United States from colonial times to the present. Editors Staughton and Alice Lynd bring together materials from diverse sources that illuminate a movement in American history that is sometimes assumed to have begun and ended with the anti-nuclear and civil rights struggles of the '50s and '60s but which is, in fact, older than the Republic itself.

Veteran scholar and peace activist David Cortright offers a definitive history of the human striving for peace and an analysis of its religious and intellectual roots.

This three-volume anthology is a comprehensive overview of how the human yearning for peace has played out, and is playing out, on this planet.

Studies from around the world illuminate how peopel in communities torn by conflict--from Guatemala to Northern Ireland, the Philippines to Rwanda--struggle to empower, reconcile, and heal.

Sociologist Elise Boulding offers a collection of essays that emphasize her study of civil society during the second half of the 20th century. She revisits her theme of connection among family, community and government, offering perspectives and advice on how to fuel the process of peace.

In The Distinction of Peace, Catherine Goetze investigates the genesis of peacebuilding as a professional field of expertise since the 1960s, its increasing influence, and the ways it reflects global power structures.

"This volume explores one of the most critical issues of our time: whether heritage can contribute to a more peaceful society and future. It reflects a core belief that heritage can provide solutions to reconciling peoples and demonstrates the amount of significant work being carried out internationally."

So we'd all like a more peaceful world--no wars, no poverty, no more racism, no community disputes, no office tensions, no marital skirmishes. Lisa Schirch sets forth paths to such realities. In fact, she points a way to more than the absence of conflict.

John Paul Lederach explores the evolution of his understanding of peacebuilding by reflecting on his own experiences in the field. Peacebuilding, in his view, is both a learned skill and an art.

This volume provides a detailed book-length study of the period of the Protectorate Parliaments from September 1654 to April 1659. The study is very broad in its scope, covering topics as diverse as the British and Irish dimensions of the Protectorate Parliaments, the political and social nature of factions, problems of management, the legal and judicial aspects of Parliament's functions, foreign policy and the nature of the parliamentary franchise and elections in this period.

Volume I addresses the concepts, actors, and institutions of peacebuilding. Volume II, meanwhile, assembles key works to focus on the challenges of security, welfare, justice, and the rule of law. Volume III is devoted to democratization, the state, and civil society, while Volume IV brings together major works on the implementation of peacebuilding, in particular reconciling international standards and local dynamics.

Peace accords are often plagued by problems, including economic hardship, burgeoning crime, postwar trauma, and persistent fear and suspicion. The University of Notre Dame's Research Initiative on the Resolution of Ethnic Conflict (RIREC) explored three significant challenges of the postwar landscape: the effects of violence in internal conflicts after peace agreements have been signed; the contributions of truth-telling mechanisms; and the multidimensional roles played by youth as activists, soldiers, criminals, and community-builders.

This book analyses efforts to advance the rights of Indigenous People within peace-building frameworks.

"This book explores a critical question: in the wake of identity-based violence, what can internal and international peacebuilders do to help "deeply divided societies" rediscover a sense of living together?" ... case studies by leading international scholars paired with local researchers yield in-depth analyses of social cohesion and related peacebuilding efforts in seven countries: Guatemala, Kenya, Lebanon, Nepal, Nigeria, Myanmar, and Sri Lanka."

Individuals can make a difference working for peace worldwide. That is the message of People Building Peace II, an inspiring collection of stories of how ordinary men and women have played a crucial part in conflict prevention and peacebuilding.

The toolkit emphasizes learning before, during and after the implementation of peacebuilding programs. It explores the connections between learning and effective peacebuilding practice, and suggest practices for reflection and learning as individuals and communities.

In Strategies of Peace, fifteen leading scholars propose an imaginative and provocative approach to peacebuilding.

This book uses a series of case studies to examine the roles played by universities during situations of conflict, peacebuilding and resistance.

This is the first book to focus on the effects of violence in internal conflicts after peace agreements have been signed. Violence and Reconstruction adopts a four-part analysis, examining in turn violence emanating from the state, from militants, from destabilized societies, and from the challenge of implementing a range of issues including demobilization, disarmament, and policing.

This book explains what religious terrorists and religious peacemakers share in common, what causes them to take different paths in fighting injustice, and how a deeper understanding of religious extremism can and must be integrated more effectively into our thinking about tribal, regional, and international conflict.

The contributions in the volume focus in three areas: (1) Reconciling Religious Conflicts, (2) Reconciling Conflict through Religion, and (3) Religious Reconciliations.

In Bearing Witness, the author tells how and why he started the Zen Peacemaker Order and offers powerful teaching stories that illustrate ways of making peace one moment at a time. Each chapter focuses on an event or person and demonstrates how a particular peacemaker vow is put into practice.

A book for everyone concerned about the state of the world and the quality of our lives, it has lost none of its timeliness since it was first published in 1987. It is filled with practical suggestions how to create a more peaceful world "right in the moment we are alive."

Gopin considers ways to construct traditional paradigms that are committed to peacemaking on a deep level and offers such a paradigm for the case of Judaism. Throughout, Gopin emphasizes that developing the potential of the world's religions for coping with conflict demands a conscious process on the part of peacemakers and theologians.

This insightful book focuses on the multifaceted subject of sustainable religious peacebuilding. Katrien Hertog discusses the ways in which religious actors can utilize resources to prevent violent conflict from occurring, reduce conflict when it does happen, and rebuild bridges between sides in after conflict has ceased.

At a time when so many insist on countering violence with violence, this exploration of the life of Jesus and the (often misunderstood) teachings of Gandhi puts nonviolent action at the very heart of Christian salvation.

Building on his earlier book, Between Eden and Armageddon, Gopin provides a detailed blueprint of how the religious traditions in question can become a principal asset in the search for peace and justice.

The first part of the volume analyzes the concept and its varied application; the second focuses on its practice in specific zones of conflict; and the third assesses the experiences and approaches of particular organizations. When organized creatively, interfaith dialogue can nurture deep engagement at all levels of the religious hierarchy, including the community level.

Islamic Ethics of Life considers three of the most contentious ethical issues of our time-abortion, war, and euthanasia-from the Muslim perspective. Distinguished scholars of Islamic studies have collaborated to produce a volume that both integrates Muslim thinking into the field of applied ethics and introduces readers to an aspect of the religion long overlooked in the West.

Considers the level of power that sacred texts, including the Bible and Koran, have over their readers, paying particular attention to these texts' apparent justification of violence against enemies.

In this text, practitioners from different faiths relate and explore the many challenges they face in their peacebuilding work, which their secular partners may be unaware of.

Acknowledging that Judaism, Islam, and Christianity are all threatened by narrow-minded, violent extremists who put the particular interests of their own people above our common interests, Gish tells inspiring stories of open-minded Muslims, Jews, and Christians who struggle together for reconciliation and who confront injustices that spawn hostility. Gish looks not only at the disagreements but also at the unity of th

Most approaches to violence or its opposite in Islam try to establish that the religion of the Prophet is one or the other, and thus get nowhere. Avoiding this trap, Abu-Nimer has given us a wide-ranging and thoroughly researched study that will be of interest to scholars and of use to peace builders.

The progeny of a Muslim tribe steeped in a tradition of blood revenge, Badshah Khan raised history's first nonviolent army and joined Mahatma Gandhi in civil disobedience to British rule in India. His story of hard-won victory offers inspiration for nonviolent solutions to today's world struggles.

This volume provides a comprehensive and interdisciplinary account of the scholarship on religion, conflict, and peacebuilding.

Religion and Peacebuilding looks beyond headlines concerning violence perpetrated in the name of religion to examine how world religions have also inspired social welfare and peacemaking activism.

Discussions of the relationship between religion and violence have been on the rise since 9/11. Conversations have also focused on how religion can mediate conflict and help build peace. This volume offers a diversity of approaches to the subject, gathering essays from a cross-section of prominent scholars studying the role of religion in peacemaking.

The book is divided into two parts - the first includes sources, theories and methodologies of crossing boundaries of prejudice and distrust from the perspectives of theology and religious studies. The second includes case studies of theory and practice to challenge prejudice and distrust in a conflict or post-conflict situation.

Completely revised and updated, this new edition of Terror in the Mind of God incorporates the events of September 11, 2001 into Mark Juergensmeyer's landmark study of religious terrorism. Juergensmeyer explores the 1993 World Trade Center explosion, Hamas suicide bombings, the Tokyo subway nerve gas attack, and the killing of abortion clinic doctors in the United States.

Based on her vast research, Stern lucidly explains how terrorist organizations are formed by opportunistic leaders who -- using religion as both motivation and justification -- recruit the disenfranchised. She depicts how moral fervor is transformed into sophisticated organizations that strive for money, power, and attention.

Understanding World Religions studies major worldviews in relation to justice and peace: Hindu, Buddhist, Muslim, Jewish, Christian, Marxist, and Native American.

Studies from around the world illuminate how peopel in communities torn by conflict--from Guatemala to Northern Ireland, the Philippines to Rwanda--struggle to empower, reconcile, and heal.

This book offers a thorough and accessible analysis of Catholic teaching on war and warmaking from its earliest stages to the present.

John Howard Yoder was one of the most important thinkers on just war and pacifism in the late twentieth century. This newly compiled collection of Yoder's lectures and writings on these issues describes, analyzes, and evaluates various patterns of thought and practice in Western Christian history.

From the Sermon on the Mount to the twenty-first century, this comprehensive reader recounts the Christian message of peace and nonviolence. Christian Peace and Nonviolence is not only intellectually compelling but also inspirational. It is more than a reference work. It is a witness.

Wink explores the problem of evil today and how it relates to the New Testament concept of Principalities and Powers. He asks the question "How can we oppose evil without creating new evils and being made evil ourselves?"

The editors of The Hauerwas Reader have compiled and edited a volume that represents all the different periods and phases of Hauerwas's work. Highlighting both his constructive goals and penchant for polemic, the collection reflects the enormous variety of subjects he has engaged, the different genres in which he has written, and the diverse audiences he has addressed.

More than ever, Walter Wink believes, the Christian tradition of nonviolence is needed as an alternative to the dominant and death-dealing "powers" of our consumerist culture and fractured world.

For many years, Hauerwas has reflected on the lives of people with disability, the political significance of community, and how the experience of disability addresses the weaknesses and failures of liberal society. Together, Vanier and Hauerwas carefully explore the contours of a countercultural community that embodies a different way of being and witnesses to a new order--one marked by radical forms of gentleness, peacemaking and faithfulness.

The reader of this work will search in vain for a definition of power. It is one of those words that everyone understands perfectly well until asked to define it. Our use of the term 'power' is laden with assumptions drawn from the contemporary materialistic worldview. Whereas the ancients always understood power as the confluence of both spiritual and material factors, we tend to see it as primarily material.

The Bible has a reputation for being about violence in the Old Testament and about peace in the New Testament. David A. Leiter deconstructs that oversimplified notion as he explores passages in which God calls for the making of peace.

The author discusses the modern ethical problem of war as it relates to the Christian.

This collection of essays will challenge you to think seriously about your role as a peacemaker in today's world.

The essays in this book represent a contribution of the Historic Peace Churches (HPC) to the work of the World Council of Churches' Decade to Overcome Violence.

Angels, Spirits, principalities, powers, gods, Satan—these, along with all other spiritual realities, are the unmentionables of our culture. The dominant materialistic worldview has absolutely no place for them. … [But] materialism itself is terminably ill, and, let us hope, in process of replacement by a worldview capable of honoring the lasting values of modern science without succumbing to reductionism.

This primer on war and the Christian conscience, begins in an imaginary college classroom as students react to news that the draft has been reinstated.

Duane Cady views warism and pacifism as polar extremes on a continuum that embraces a full spectrum of ethical positions on the morality of war and peace.

More than 50 theologians, peace activists, military experts, public policy analysts, and media commentators gathered together to discuss what a just war really is and how the theory applies to the war in Iraq.

This provocative and timely primer on the just war tradition connects just war to the concrete practices and challenges of the Christian life. Daniel Bell explains that the point is not simply to know the just war tradition but to live it even in the face of the tremendous difficulties associated with war.

Questions of pacifism and just war, which have preoccupied Christian thinkers from time to time over the past 1700 years, are given distinctive treatment in this book as it discusses biblical sources for the questions, builds on historical examples both of just war theory and of pacifism, and shows how Christian pacifism is a live option in many contexts.

This book addresses the arguments of contemporary Muslim thinkers regarding war and peace.

Mirbagheri traces the revival of Islamic/ist movements, and embarks on a theoretical study of some of the fundamental concepts in Islam and International Relations such as the self, Jihad, peace and universalism.

Working the thought of feminist theologians and philosophers into an analysis of these women's writings, Cynthia R. Wallace crafts a literary ethics attentive to the paradoxes of critique and re-vision, universality and particularity, and reads in suffering a redemptive or redeemable reality.

"Violent conflicts today are complex and increasingly protracted, involving more non-state groups and regional and international actors... Enhancing the participation of women and youth in decision making is fundamental to sustaining peace, as well as long-term policies to address the aspirations of women and young people."

This volume brings together leading experts from Africa, Europe and North America to examine these critical social institutions and groups, and consider how they can either improve or impede peaceful conflict resolution.

"In applying concepts of power, hybridity and resistance, and providing different kinds of hybridity and resistance to explore post-conflict peacebuilding in Sierra Leone, the author makes an original contribution to existing literature by providing various ways in which power can be exercised not just between locals and internationals, but also among locals themselves and the nature of peace that is produced."

This book articulates a multilevel process that starts with local politics to explain how they can influence international negotiations and why President Obama's efforts in Copenhagen were doomed to fail. Understanding the role of local private interests can help form strategies for overcoming national resistance to climate change legislation and ultimately international agreements that could change the environmentally self-destructive course we are on.

"The past two decades have witnessed the emergence of a large body of research examining the linkage between environmental scarcity, violent conflict, and cooperation... Enabling the reader to find a concise expert review on topics that are most likely to arise in the course of conducting research or policy making, this volume presents a truly global overview of the key issues and debates in environmental conflict and peacebuilding."

A study of two of the most significant prophetic leaders in the twentieth century, J. Deotis Roberts's Bonhoeffer and King is an instructive work in theological ethics. This book considers and compares the theological reflections that guided Bonhoeffer's courageous stand against Nazism and King's quest for civil rights in America.

Freedom, Sen argues, is both the end and most efficient means of sustaining economic life and the key to securing the general welfare of the world's entire population.

Here, Mary Anderson cites the experiences of many aid providers in war-torn societies to show that international assistance can reinforce the divisions between groups. She also offers evidence of new approaches that could change the future of aid.

This book addresses the numerous national movements of ethnic groups around the world seeking independence, more self-rule, or autonomy-movements that have proliferated exponentially in the 21st century.

Focusing on the theme of visions seen by those who dreamed of what might be, Lauren explores the dramatic transformation of a world patterned by centuries of human rights abuses into a global community that now boldly proclaims that the way governments treat their own people is a matter of international concern--and sets the goal of human rights "for all peoples and all nations."

Activists and academics look back over ten years of 'politics from below', and ask whether it is merely the critical gaze upon the concept that has changed - or whether there is something genuinely new about the way in which civil society is now operating.

Our main goal in this handbook is to enhance individual and organisational negotiation skills. We hope that by reading, discussing and reflecting on the material that follows, individual humanitarian workers will become better negotiators and that humanitarian agencies
will become more strategic and effective in the way they negotiate in any given situation.

The relationship between human rights and conflict is dynamic, complex, and powerful, constantly shaping and reshaping the course of both peace and war. Yet, despite its importance, our understanding of this relationship has long been fragmentary, chiefly because three different schools of thought human rights, conflict resolution, and international law have offered three different and often contradictory perspectives.This much-needed volume brings these perspectives together to create a composite picture of the relationship between human rights and conflict.

This simple little book is designed to help those struggling with how to respond to conflict and violence in an ethical and transformative way. It offers practical examples of how analysis, intervention and evaluation of peacebuilding and restorative justice can be rooted in imagination of justpeace ethics.

Vengeance and bitter violence have had their turns -- without redemptive results. How should we as a society respond to wrongdoing?

In this hard-hitting volume two dozen scholars, activists, military officers, and religious leaders call for an immediate end to the practice of torture, paying particular attention to its use in the American war on terror.

In recent years, transitional justice has become increasingly international in its scope. This book examines how international assistance affects transitional justice, and where power truly lies in making decisions about justice for victims of massive human rights abuse.

The World Directory of Minorities is an authoritative, concise and up-to-date reference book on the contemporary situation of ethnic, linguistic and religious minorities worldwide.

Disdainful of America's booming commercialism and industrialism, Henry David Thoreau left Concord, Massachusetts, in 1845 to live in solitude in the woods near Walden Pond. Walden, the account of his stay, conveys at once a naturalist's wonder at the commonplace and a Transcendentalist's yearning for spiritual truth and self-reliance.

The only major one-volume collection of this seminal twentieth-century American prophet's writings, speeches, interviews, and autobiographical reflections.

In this collection of more than 100 excerpts chosen by his daughter Naomi from his most memorable speeches, sermons, and writings, archbishop Desmond Tutu discusses issues ranging from faith and social responsibility to nuclear disarmament, the Third World, and women in the church.

In No Future Without Forgiveness, Tutu argues that true reconciliation cannot be achieved by denying the past. But nor is it easy to reconcile when a nation "looks the beast in the eye." Rather than repeat platitudes about forgiveness, he presents a bold spirituality that recognizes the horrors people can inflict upon one another, and yet retains a sense of idealism about reconciliation.