External Publications

Community-Based Peacebuilding

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Over the last two decades international peacemaking efforts have moved towards more participatory approaches that involve local communities and institutions. As a result, the ‘community-based approach’ to peacebuilding has gained currency in both policy and practice. This approach advocates a localized perspective on contributing to sustainable peace and involves creating or strengthening community-driven institutions for the resolution of conflict and the promotion of peace. In his paper Lukas van Trier from CARE Netherlands, presents the benefits but also criticism of community-based approach. The author argues that the community based approach, although promising in many regards, is faced with fundamental limitations. It follows that community-based intervention cannot replace alternative peacebuilding strategies. At the same time, it should not be dismissed altogether, as it offers a potentially very valuable complement to those strategies. If treated in this way - and fully recognizing its limitations - the community-based approach can serve to solidify peace within communities and realize the necessary grassroots support for, and active involvement in, wider peacebuilding processes.

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COPA is a networking organisation which facilitates linking and sharing among peace practitioners and stakeholders to ensure the building of sustainable peace in Africa. Through its External Publication it aims to facilitate debate on key Peacebuilding related issues. Therefore the views and opinions expressed in the external publications are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views or policy of COPA.

Working with Conflict: Skills & Strategies for Action

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By Simon Fisher, Dekha Ibrahim Abdi, Jawed Ludin, Richard Smith, Steve Williams, & Sue Williams.

Published by Zed books in Association with Responding to Conflict, 2000.

This book is a practical tool for people working in areas affected by conflict and violence. For all practitioners who are working in conflict-prone and unstable parts of the world in the fields of development, relief work, human rights, community relations, peace and reconciliation, this book should prove an invaluable support.
It is based on the insights of around 300 practitioners and communities from their first-hand experience in conflict situations in more than 70 countries. It is a practical tool, easy to use and well laid out, offering ideas, methods and techniques for understanding and working with conflict. By including helpful visual materials, it provides a range of practical tools - processes, ideas, visual aids and techniques - for tackling conflict.
The book highlights the options available to individuals and organizations; equips them with a basis on which they can plan what responses are possible; and strengthens their capacity to engage in useful interventions.

Working in Conflict is available also in French.

Transforming Conflict: Reflections of practitioners worldwide

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Published by ACTION for Conflict Transformation, 2003.

This book is intended to be a source book for people working on Conflict Transformation and Peace Building in many different countries and situations around the world. It is not a manual of how to do the work so much as a collection of real-life examples and experiences from which the reader can gain insights about what might be possible or appropriate in one's own context.

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