The complexity of local and regional conflict dynamics in Afghanistan and Pakistan would be well served by the revivification of the Jirga system, the only convincing institutional base through which to build lasting peace.
Supporters of the Kony 2012 campaign have posed two questions to critics: 'what would you do?', and 'what's the problem with getting the issue more attention?'. But African and international efforts have already solved most of the problems associated with the LRA, let's keep up those efforts.
In the backlash against Kony 2012 a real discussion of what the international community can and should do has been lost. Despite the bias against intervention there is still a responsibility to protect.
Focused on the challenges of declining funds and public skepticism at home, development organisations tend to pay more attention to ´what works´ to convince donors and journalists, rather than finding out first what resonates with the people they mean to help. What kind of success is a film which
Ending the violence and insecurity perpetrated by the Lord's Resistance Army is more about empowering civil society and developing local solutions across many countries than about keeping US military advisers in Northern Uganda. The youthful, Western attention brought to the issue by Invisible Chi
Women in Burundi have won radical changes to the country's Penal Code, making rape punishable by life imprisonment. The taboo of speaking out against sexual violence has been broken and the lives of some women - and men - are beginning to change forever, says Lyduine Ruronona
Invisible Children's controversial campaign highlights the pressing question of international engagement in conflict, which openSecurity seeks to address through our debate 'Peacebuilding from a Southern Perspective'.
The term 'local reconciliation' may seem benign, but recent research amongst Tamils in the north of the country highlights the damaging silence hanging over the survivors of the conflict, and a determination to reach justice through transparency over past and present wrongs.
Peace in Pakistan and the entire region can only be achieved by the creation of genuine democracy in Pakistan, with its military institutions accountable to its elected bodies. Pakistan’s army consumes 38% of Pakistan’s budget without accounting for most of it.
The conflict in Kashmir has largely been seen through the prism of religious antagonism. New research on cross-border peacebuilding calls the classic conflict analysis into question.
There is nothing objectionable in arguing for greater and more meaningful participation of youth in the political process, so long as this is not a substitute for a proper post-war constitutional settlement.
International calls for justice in Sri Lanka which are insensitive to domestic public opinion further alienate a youth population suspicious of Western intervention and determined to develop their country.
