SIPRI Senior Researcher Jair van der Lijn has coedited the book Peacebuilding and Friction. The book aims to understand the processes and outcomes that arise from frictional encounters in peacebuilding, when global and local forces meet.
The book, released in hardback on 11 March 2016, will be part of the Routledge Studies in Peace and Conflict Resolution series. With a focus on friction as a conceptual tool, it advances the peacebuilding research agenda and adds to two ongoing debates in the peacebuilding field; the debate on hybridity, and the debate on local agency and local ownership. In analysing frictional encounters the book prepares the ground for a better understanding of the mixed impact peace initiatives have on post-conflict societies.
Several case analyses are studied, including in Cambodia, Sri Lanka, Afghanistan and Sierra Leone. They demonstrate how the ambivalent relationship between global and local actors leads to unintended and sometimes counterproductive results of peacebuilding interventions.
For more information, please visit the book's official Routlegde webpage.