Abstract
This book is a study about the role of civil society in peace building. Mathijs van Leeuwen combines direct observation (taking part in the daily work of civil society organisations and visiting relevant regions) with interviews with civil society organisations in order to reach conclusions about the discourses and practices of local civil society peace building and its international support.
The book notes the transformation of the peacebuilding idea after the Cold War. Since the end of the Cold War, civil society has had a central role in peace-related work despite the increasing role of military intervention following 9/11. Based on the author's analysis of the work of the United Nations Development Programme, Cordaid, Norwegian Church Aid and Norwegian People's Aid in Southern Sudan, Guatemala and Afghanistan, the author argues that the changing idea of peace building has had an impact on international development organisations. These organisations have put peace building and local civil society on to their agenda. However, the transformation has happened in a slower and more varying way than the literature suggests.
The author discusses his findings from Southern Sudan, working with Sudanese Women's Voice for Peace and additional interviews, and concludes that women and NGOs have had a limited impact on public affairs and peace building. He adapts a regional approach to studying conflict in the Great Lakes Region (Burundi, Rwanda and Democratic Republic of Congo), and advocates the use of this type of analysis of the conflict based on interviews with local civil society organisations and international organisations and donors. Looking at land disputes in Burundi, van Leeuwen shows how reconsidering the way organisations view this issue can be a determining factor for solving the conflict. Observations and interviews in Guatemala led him to observe changes in the role and strategies of civil society in the post-conflict stage.
Van Leeuwen presents a very informative and detailed account of each case study he conducted and Discourses and Practices of Civil-Society Peacebuilding is invaluable for any researcher interested in the cases presented. However, it is hard to say that the generalisability and theory-building/improving function of the book is without flaws. Throughout, the reader may feel that the case studies might have been presented as separate journal articles with related but not necessarily the same research questions. Also, the author's research design may be responsible for the abundant but at times non-systematic and general theoretical and practical remarks in the concluding chapter.