Building Sustainable Peace

Reviews / Votes

"...the well-versed duo [Tom Keating and W. Andy Knight] assembled an impressive roster of international experts to outline a wide-array of practical and theoretical bon mots about comprehensive and long-term peace building ranging from the on-the-ground experiences of David Beer (an RCMP officer who created the Canadian five year bilateral policing development assistance plan for Haiti) to an essay by former Edmonton Journal writer Satya Das, to papers penned by leading academics in the field." Gilbert A. Bouchard, Folio "Keating and Night (both professors of political science, U. of Alberta, Canada) present fifteen papers from a March 2000 symposium that explore issues of international intervention, techniques of peacebuilding, and the role of nongovernmental actors and regional organizations in the peacebuilding process. Mostly written by academics, but including contributions from some policy advisors and practitioners, the papers discuss such topics as the commodification and militarization of peacebuilding, judicial sector reforms in Haiti following the early 1990s intervention, peacebuilding experiences in Liberia and Sierra Leone, an assessment of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, financing of peacebuilding missions, the creation of a small arms control region, and the role of Africa's regional organization in the Horn of Africa." BOOK NEWS Inc. "Keating and Knight's impressive array of scholars, UN and NGO employees, and soldiers share their ideas on what it actually takes to make cliches like 'building civil society' and 'healing the wounds of war' realities..This is not an easy book--it's obviously aimed at an academic audience--but its essays provide a glimpse into the morally ambiguous decisions that must be made by those who seek to be peacebuilders." Alex Rettie, AlbertaViews "Building Sustainable Peace offers a variety of concise and informative discussion pieces for upper year classes on post-conflict policy issues. For courses involving a mixture of lectures and research presentations, the articles provide a very useful focus for students and teachers alike, with a good balance of case analysis and thematic critique. Canadian actors, programs and priorities are well covered so that the material will speak to the interests of Canadian students." Dr. Alistair Edgar, Wilfred Laurier University, (Political Science 311f course, Fall 2004)" "Building Sustainable Peace presents a timely and original overview of the field of peace studies and offers fresh analytical tools that promote a critical reconceptualization of peace and conflict, while also making specific reference to peacebuilding strategies employed in recent international conflicts." Prairie Books NOW, fall/winter 2004 "[Peace building] involves disarming the warring parties, restoring order, repatriating refugees, providing training for security personnel and technical assistance, de-mining and other forms of demilitarization, monitoring elections, and reforming and strengthening government institutions. Building presents a timely and original overview of peace building theories and strategies...." Bill Twatio, esprit de corps (Canadian Military magazine), Vol. 12, No. 7, July 2005 "A serious-minded compilation that blends philosophy with a coldly practical eye for twentieth and twenty-first century conflicts and acts of terrorism and genocide. Numerous specific peacebuilding strategies are exhaustively discussed in this heavily researched compendium particularly recommended for college libraries, activist organizations, and political science shelves." "Many of the authors in the book support a new concept of peace building that combines both problem solving and critical approaches. This new view recognises the need to do something about the immediacy of breakdown of societal structures. It stipulates that it is futile to pour resources and personnel into every problem associated with complex humanitarian emergencies and violent outbreaks, if the peace results cannot be sustained. Building Sustainable Peace captures both the experiences and the spirit of the challenges involved." V.R. Raghavan, The Hindu, February 14, 2006.