The new world disorder: The prospects for peace

In this speech I will discuss the problem of terrorism one year after September 11th 2001, the significantly changed global situation in which International Alert has had to work this year. I will then consider the roles for conflict transformation organisations such as International Alert and finally introduce some questions about how we measure our impact and effectiveness

A non-violent moment - response to "terrorism in America"

This article, like so many others, demonstrates that the "War on Terrorism", the "War in Iraq" and the United States tacit support for Israeli violation of Palestinian human rights are having exactly the opposite effects to those intended. Far from generating more security against terrorist politics and attack, these policies are delivering more insecurity for the West, (particularly the members of the Coalition of the Willing). Instead of "draining the pools within which terrorists swim", these pools have become very large lakes for the politically desperate. Far from delivering democracy, human rights and a bright economic future to a post-Saddam Iraq, the Interim Authority in Iraq has delivered higher levels of discontent, given cover to profound Western violations of Moslem human rights, and opened up some extremely deep and bitter internal fissures and divisions

Talk to Open the History Exhibition on 350 Years of Quakerism Commissariat, Brisbane, 18/05/04

In this talk the author discusses the place of Quakerism in modern society and its relevance to peace and conflict studies

Peace building and conflict transformation

The world clearly needs some new ways of thinking about old problems and new ways of acting if we are going to survive into the 21st century. It is vital, therefore, that students of peace and conflict work out ways of harnessing the creative imagination of everyone so that all peoples can envisage a positive future and ways of realizing that future. This imagining cannot be narrow. It has to be broad, inclusive, interdisciplinary and systemic but it has to begin if we are to have a viable future. In relation to this imaging, peace and conflict theorists need to learn from evolutionary theorists if they are to play a significant part in global survival. In the first place, this means endeavoring to gather the wisdom of many peoples and traditions since without this our understanding of the way the world works will always be partial and our normative prescriptions always biased

¿Qué es lo “fallido”? ¿Los Estados del Sur, o la investigación y las políticas de Occidente? Un estudio sobre órdenes Políticos híbridos y los Estados emergentes

This paper critically discusses the discourse on fragile and failing states and reviews current debates about state-building. The authors argue for an alternative conceptualization of states emerging from hybrid political orders. Hybrid political orders combine elements of the introduced Western models of governance and elements stemming from local indigenous traditions and practices. Shortcomings in a conventional example of state-building are identified in relation to East Timor, and are contrasted with successes flowing from more innovative approaches to peacebuilding and state formation in Somaliland and Bougainville. The authors conclude that approaches to conflict transformation, peacebuilding and state formation will only be successful in the long term if they engage with local sources of resilience and legitimacy within communities and non-state customary institutions, and if they seek to forge constructive relationships between communities and governments.Este documento de trabajo discute desde una perspectiva crítica el discurso sobre los Estados frágiles y fallidos y revisa los actuales debates sobre la construcción del Estado. Los autores argumentan a favor de una conceptualización alternativa de los Estados que emergen de órdenes políticos híbridos. Los órdenes políticos híbridos combinan elementos de modelos de gobernanza de Occidente, introducidos por éste, y elementos que provienen de las prácticas y tradiciones locales. Se identifican las limitaciones de ejemplos convencionales de construcción del Estado en Timor-Leste, y se contrastan con los éxitos que emanan de enfoques más innovadores de construcción de la paz y de formación del Estado en Somalilandia y Bouganville. Los autores concluyen que los enfoques de transformación del conflicto, construcción de la paz y de formación del Estado solo tendrán éxito a largo plazo si se vinculan con las fuentes de resiliencia y de legitimidad local en el seno de las comunidades y las instituciones consuetudinarias no estatales, y si se intenta forjar relaciones constructivas entre las comunidades y los gobiernos.Estados frágiles, construcción del Estado, construcción de la paz, órdenes políticos híbridos, Fragile states, state building, peacebuilding, hybrid political orders

Global security: confronting challenges to universal peace

The challenge of peace is complex and intractable. Much depends on the meaning of the concept and the definition of the term. And in that respect much depends on whether a diplomatic-legal or a sociopolitical approach is adopted. The diplomatic-legal approach is enshrined in the United Nations Charter of 1945. The primary goal of the United Nations is to protect future generations from the scourge of war. The charter bestows on the Security Council the primary responsibility for maintaining, or restoring, international peace and security.&nbsp

Understanding Infrared Galaxy Populations: the SWIRE Legacy Survey

We discuss spectral energy distributions, photometric redshifts, redshift distributions, luminosity functions, source-counts and the far infrared to optical luminosity ratio for sources in the SWIRE Legacy Survey. The spectral energy distributions of selected SWIRE sources are modelled in terms of a simple set of galaxy and quasar templates in the optical and near infrared, and with a set of dust emission templates (cirrus, M82 starburst, Arp 220 starburst, and AGN dust torus) in the mid infrared. The optical data, together with the IRAC 3.6 and 4.5 mu data, have been used to determine photometric redshifts. For galaxies with known spectroscopic redshifts there is a notable improvement in the photometric redshift when the IRAC data are used, with a reduction in the rms scatter from 10% in (1+z) to 5%. While further spectroscopic data are needed to confirm this result, the prospect of determining good photometric redshifts for the 2 million extragalactic objects in SWIRE is excellent. The distribution of the different infrared sed types in the L{ir}/L{opt} versus L{ir} plane, where L{ir} and L{opt} are the infrared and optical bolometric luminosities, is discussed. Source-counts at 24, 70 and 160 mu are discussed, and luminosity functions at 3.6 and 24 mu are presented.Comment: 8 pages, 14 figures, to appear in proceedings of 'Spitzer IR Diagnostics Conference, Nov 14-16, 2005

The Hard Science of Peace: An Interview with Kevin Clements

An interview with Kevin Clements, Director of the Australian Centre for Peace and Conflict at the University of Queensland. He discusses with SangSaeng the fine points of conflict resolution and the work his centre does towards that elusive end

COVID-19 Inequality and Inadequate Global Responses

Article【小特集：COVID-19と現代の課題／Feature: The Global Challenges in the time of the Covid-19 Pandemic】departmental bulletin pape