MACMILLAN The Interaction Between Local and International Peacebuilding Actors: Partners for Peace (Rethinking Political Violence)

This book helps to better understand how the interaction between local and international peacebuilding actors influences the outcomes of their programs. Based on the case study of Ituri in the Democratic Republic of Congo, it analyses the relationships between local and international peacebuilding actors over the long term and assesses ways to overcome the obstacles to more cooperative partnerships. Focusing on perceptions, the book nuances existing definitions of war, peacebuilding and peace and allows for a more comprehensive understanding of conflict contexts. Thereby, it contributes to the literature on peacebuilding effectiveness and makes concrete suggestions for translating these findings into practice. Review “Sara Hellmüller’s new book, The Interaction between Local and International Peacebuilding Actors, offers rarely available empirical evidence to examine the local-international interaction in peacebuilding. … I believe this study is most suitable to researchers and postgraduate students in peace and conflict studies who aim to study local peacebuilding in conflict-affected societies. It will also be a useful information source for the people who want to be updated with the social dynamics in contemporary DRC.” (SungYong Lee, H-Net Reviews Humanities and Social Sciences, networks.h-net.org, August, 2018) From the Back Cover This volume helps to better understand how the interaction between local and international peacebuilding actors influences the outcomes of their programs. Based on the case study of Ituri in the Democratic Republic of Congo, this text analyses the inter-subjective relationship between local and international peacebuilding actors over the long term and assesses ways to overcome the obstacles to more cooperative partnerships between them. Focusing on perceptions, the book nuances the definitions of war, peacebuilding and peace and allows for a more comprehensive understanding of conflict contexts. Here, Hellmüller contributes to the literature on peacebuilding effectiveness and makes concrete suggestions for translating these findings into practice. About the Author Sara Hellmüller is a Senior Researcher at swisspeace, a peace research institute associated with the University of Basel, Switzerland, and a Post-Doctoral Fellow at the University of Montreal, Canada.