The Unexpected Impacts of Peace Interventions

Gearoid Millar

Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor) of Sociology, Institute for Conflict, Transition, and Peace Research (ICTPR), University of Aberdeen

Building on recent literature regarding friction in post-conflict interventions, Millar argues that the inherent complexity of transitional and post-conflict societies makes the actual impacts of peace interventions too difficult to predict or plan for. Using evidence from ethnographic peace research in Sierra Leone, he shows the manner in which local complexity derails the often benign or even well intentioned efforts of international interventions.