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This report analyses the negotiation and codification process of a new political settlement in Aceh, based on the 2005 Memorandum of Understanding with the Indonesian Government and the Law on Governing Aceh passed the following year. It addresses various aspects related to inclusivity in the Acehnese political settlement, and is guided by the following questions: How did the Aceh peace process deal with the issues of participation and representation? What were the key substantive demands of the Acehnese people and how were they negotiated by the Free Aceh Movement (Gerakan Aceh Merdeka – GAM) on their behalf? What impact did the peace agreement have on constructing an inclusive Aceh and rectifying the imbalanced centre-periphery relationship between Jakarta and Aceh?

• Year 2015
• Author(s) Agus Wandi, Nezar Patria

Laporan ini menyoroti salah satu pelaku kunci dalam proses perdamaian: mediator orang dalam. Dasar laporan ini adalah pengalaman bahwa sebagian besar proses perdamaian resmi dimulai atau dilengkapi oleh proses informal, yang kerap difasilitasi oleh orang-orang dari daerah konflik, yang memiliki pengetahuan mendalam dan dedikasi besar untuk menyelesaikan konflik.

Untuk mengeksplorasi peran spesifik, potensi dan batasan mediator “orang dalam” lokal dan regional dalam proses perdamaian saat ini, Berghof Foundation for Peace Support (BPS) bekerja sama dengan Mediation Support Project dari Swisspeace/CSS-ETH Zurich mengundang belasan mediator orang dalam dari berbagai bagian dunia (Algeria, Burundi, Kongo, Jerman, Kenya, Kyrgyzstan, Makedonia, Mali, Meksiko, Nepal, Filipina, Sri Lanka, Swiss dan Uganda).

• Year 2016
• Author(s) Simon Mason

This report addresses findings generated from the Liberia case study on the coexistence of various conflict resolution systems in Liberia. Besides the traditional system of chiefs and elders, there are state-based mechanisms such as the formal justice system and the Peacebuilding Office, and various third-party initiatives, including the work of many different NGOs.

The study comes to the conclusion that the interaction and even cooperation of conflict resolution mechanisms in Liberia is happening on a massive scale, and provides recommendations on how this cooperation could be significantly improved.

• Year 2016
• Author(s) Janel B. Galvanek

Samer Araabi’s and Leila Hilal’s innovative report focuses on one prominent framework for local mediation and de-escalation in Syria: local ceasefire negotiations. Based on research conducted between mid-2014 and March 2016, their report presents four in-depth cases of ceasefire negotiations that have taken place inside Syria since 2012. It explains the environment in which these negotiations occurred and offers observations on the obstacles and shortcomings they faced.

• Year 2016
• Author(s) Samer Araabi, Leila Hilal

I cannot do justice to the rich and thoughtful comments on my essay “Dealing with Painful Memories and Violent Pasts: Towards a Framework for Contextual Understanding” in this short response. The respondents who so graciously shared their thoughts have provided much to consider; I can only touch on the implications. I will not dwell on the commonalities in the approaches put forward by the commentators and myself, but rather focus on the divergences or elaborations posed by their insightful comments.

• Year 2016
• Author(s) Brandon Hamber

This report is part of a wider comparative research project on “Peaceful Coexistence? ‘Traditional’ and ‘Non-traditional’ Conflict Resolution Mechanisms” to analyze the patterns of coexistence between ‘traditional’ (indigenous, local, community-based) and ‘non-traditional’ (imported, liberal, state-based, Western) approaches to conflict resolution. It addresses findings on the coexistence between the indigenous system of conflict resolution of Colombia’s most populous indigenous community, the Wayuu, and state-based intervention to solve conflicts over land within La Guajira department.

• Year 2016
• Author(s) Katrin Planta

Este informe es parte de un más amplio proyecto comparativo de investigación financiado generosamente por la Fundación Alemana para la Investigación sobre la Paz e implementado por la Fundación Berghof. El proyecto, titulado “¿Coexistencia pacífica? Mecanismos ‘tradicionales’ y ‘no-tradicionales’ de resolución de conflictos”, analiza los patrones de coexistencia de enfoques ‘tradicionales’ (indígenas, locales, basados en la comunidad) y ‘no-tradicionales’ (importados, liberales, basados en el estado, occidentales) de resolución de conflictos con base en el trabajo de campo realizado en Colombia, Liberia y el nordeste de la India.

• Year 2016
• Author(s) Katrin Planta

Our response explores the application of these participatory and community-informed approaches in the context of Guinea-Bissau, where a community-based policing model, the Model Police Stations (MPS), had its genesis in participatory research. Participatory research has also informed activities in other areas,such as the prevention of gender violence. In 2011, for example, a comprehensive portrayal of the violence against women in the country resulted from the combination of quantitative data with qualitative research on perceptions (see Roque 2011).

• Year 2016
• Author(s) Marco Carmignani, Fernando Cavalcante

Bernardo Arévalo de León and Ana Glenda Tager have written a succinct and substantive article, which adds to evidence of a shift from the centrality of war and conflict (armed and non-armed) in the study and practice of peace, towards a focus on violence, or rather that aspect of violence the authors call “armed social violence”. Violence, I argue, is the opposite of peace and this step towards recognising the wider expressions of violence is to be greatly welcomed. Violence is extensively studied, but in disciplinary silos. We lack a “converter” to enable us to interpret the learning from these various silos and to help us build new understandings of the varied mechanisms of violence reproduction and reduction. Despite nods to interdisciplinarity, academia reinforces the silos, while practice cannot easily embrace the complexity within and between each.

• Year 2016
• Author(s) Jenny Pearce

We respond to the lead article from the point of view of conflict transformation practitioners from the Centre for Peace and Conflict Studies (CPCS), a non-governmental organisation based in Siem Reap, Cambodia, which focuses on strengthening and supporting the peace processes in the Philippines and Myanmar and peacebuilding efforts in Sri Lanka. We thus operate within contexts involving state and non-state armed groups engaging or previously engaged in political conflict, and any exposure we have to armed social violence emerges from this context.

• Year 2016
• Author(s) Karen P. Simbulan, Laurens J. Visser