March 2013 — The Kroc Institute recently assembled some of the world's leading experts on counterterrorism strategy, ethics and the use of force, international law, and civil and human rights for a conference on drone warfare.
February 2013 — The challenge of building peace and preventing violence demands new ways of seeing and thinking. In this issue of Peace Policy, an expert in peace processes, an anthropologist, and a political scientist offer unexpected insights for researchers and policymakers.
December 2012 — The nature of armed conflict has changed dramatically. Gone is the paradigm of industrial war between states. Instead, conflicts have risen sharply within and beyond states. Today’s combatants use hit-and-run attack or violence against civilians rather than formal combat. Such tactics cannot be defeated by conventional military means.
October 2012 — Religion is a key factor — for good and for ill — affecting security around the world, from Iraq and Iran to Pakistan and Israel-Palestine. It also plays a leading role in many other conflicts, including those in Congo, Sudan, and Colombia. Serious attention to religious actors and dynamics in world affairs is long overdue.
September 2012 — The U.S. will withdraw the bulk of its forces from Afghanistan by 2014. This transition is fraught with risk for Afghan women, many of whom have benefited for 10 years from greater access to education, health care, and political participation.
May 2012 — Peacebuilders often point to the importance of reaching sustainable peace accords. But few have attempted to examine the world's many comprehensive peace accords, and their myriad provisions, to see what works and what doesn’t. The Peace Accords Matrix (PAM) is a rich source of comparative information about peace agreements and a tool for mediators working to reactivate stalled peace processes.
March 2012 — Kim Jong Un has come to power in a fledgling nuclear state that has resisted intense pressure to denuclearize. The new North Korean leadership now has a lot more pieces on the chessboard to make moves and trade-offs. What are the next steps for dealing with North Korea’s nuclear ambitions?
January 2012 — The U.S. government’s list of “Foreign Terrorist Organizations” is a central part of a counter-terrorism strategy based on the isolation of individuals and groups who espouse violence defined as terrorism. Peacebuilding, on the other hand, proposes a strategy of engagement and deliberative dialogue, inclusive of all views.
December 2011 — President Obama has declared that the U.S. is committed to creating “the peace and security of a world without nuclear weapons." Some progress has been achieved in negotiated arms reduction, but many in Washington cling to old ways of thinking.
October 2011 — In March 2011, the UN Security Council authorized a no-fly zone over Libya. What began as a limited mission to prevent a massacre quickly morphed into a policy of armed regime change.