Articles

Should I Help the Empire with My Hand?

Confucian Resources for a Paradigm of Just Peacemaking

David Kratz Mathies

“Just Peacemaking” is the name given to a new paradigm advocated by Glen Stassen and an impressive collection of fellow scholars.

The Peacemaker in Jewish-Rabbinic and Arab-Islamic Traditions

Daniel Roth

Countering the “New Jerusalem”

Philosophical Jewish Positions for an End to the Israeli Occupation

Sarah L. MacMillen

Jewish philosophers Gillian Rose and Hannah Arendt believed that the phenomenon of an ethnic state was a contradiction to any society claiming to be a democracy and that Israel in particular was he

"Traces of Humanity" in Indo-Pak History

Tridivesh Singh Maini

History of the South Asian Subcontinent is largely the history of a traumatic partition.

Honoring Contracts as a Foundation of Peace

A Shi‘ah Articulation

Mohammad S. Homayounvash

S. Amir Mirtaheri

The Privilege Problematic in International Nonviolent Accompaniment’s Early Decades

Peace Brigades International Confronts the Use of Racism

Patrick G. Coy

Peace Brigades International is a human rights and nonviolent peacekeeping organization founded in 1981 by Gandhians and Quakers long active in international peace efforts.

Building a “City of Peace” through Intercommunal Association

Muslim-Christian Relations in Harar, Ethiopia, 1887-2009

Jan Bender Shetler and

Dawit Yehualashet

Within the current global context of rising Muslim-Christian conflict and warfare, it is increasingly important to study situations where Muslims and Christians have maintained peaceful relations, not just situations of violence. Harar, Ethiopia, an ancient city of Muslim learning incorporated into the Ethiopian Christian Empire in 1887, has remained relatively peaceful in spite of every indicator for violence. It thus offers a case study for testing Ashutosh Varshney’s theory that peace must be studied at the level of the city, where “peace-prone” cities rely on associations of civil society that bring people from different religious backgrounds into everyday contact to manage the inevitable tensions of a plural society. Our research in Harar found that peace is indeed due to robust intercommunal associations, particularly at the informal level, but it is also a result of divisions within Muslim and Christian religious communities, the strength of intracommunal social control, and finally the commitment of the Harari regional government to peace. Since the time of the conquest, tensions between Muslims and Christians have been high, but, because of their shared interests, people in Harar have managed to creatively build a strong set of civil society organizations and leadership. These were successfully put to the test in 2001 when a riot around a religious procession was effectively controlled through the joint effort of local networks and government intervention.

Post-War Guatemala

Justice, Forgiveness, and Reconciliation

Michael K. Duffey

In No Future without Forgiveness, Archbishop Desmond Tutu, chair of the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (SA TRC) argued that the post-conflict healing process in South Africa could not begin with criminal justice, but only with forgiveness, without which, he said, there is no future. Some victims did forgive the agents of Apartheid for their crimes. But how and whether forgiveness occurs is the issue. In the wake of 9/11 Pope John Paul II acknowledged in a message titled “No Peace without Justice, No Justice without Forgiveness” that criminal justice must be served but warned against broad retaliation. Failure to forgive and to work toward reconciliation only perpetuates deadly cycles of violence. The Pope declared that there is “no peace without justice, no justice without forgiveness.” Why must there be forgiveness if justice is to be served?

Engaging Girard

Is a Girardian Political Ethic Necessary?

Nathan Colborne

René Girard supplements his account of the origins of violence with a demand, emerging from the Gospels, for the renunciation of violence in imitation of Christ. This paper argues that the substance of this renunciation must be developed in conversation with an ethos of political engagement if it is to avoid abstraction. The thought of political theorist William Connolly provides a way to discuss a Girardian renunciation of violence that can be rooted in particular ethical habits and allow for genuine political engagement. Though critical of Girard, the essay concludes by highlighting possibilities for a genuine political but nonviolent engagement emerging from his work.

Whose Truth, Whose Justice?

Religious and Cultural Traditions in Transitional Justice

Landon E. Hancock and

Aysegul Keskin Zeren

Abstract: This paper seeks to explore the role of religious and cultural traditions in the form and function of transitional justice mechanisms. With the rise in the use of multiple methods of transitional justice, from international tribunals to hybrid courts, truth commissions, and local mechanisms, comes the question of whether these mechanisms serve the interests of the people in whose name they act, or if they instead serve the interests of the international community. Our argument is that those mechanisms that incorporate local religious and cultural traditions will have more acceptance from victims, survivors, and bystanders and may, thus, be seen as more successful than those that operate based on traditions embodied by the international legal community and Western nations.