War and Reconciliation

This book is the first systematic examination of the impact of reconciliation on
restoring and maintaining peace following civil and international conflicts. Through eleven
comparative case studies of civil war and eight of international conflict, it constructs a
surprising explanation for when and why reconciliation restores social order.The civil war cases
reveal that successful reconciliation is associated with a process of national forgiveness, not
merely negotiated settlement. All successful cases followed a four-step pattern of public truth
telling, justice short of revenge, redefinition of the identities of former belligerents, and a call
for a new relationship. The book argues that success is not solely the result of rational choice
decision making. It proposes a hypothesis, grounded in evolutionary psychology, that to restore
social order we use emotional/cognitive techniques that have evolved to ensure human survival.On the
international level, however, successful reconciliation was not a part of a forgiveness process.
Reconciliation was successful in bringing about sustained peace when it was associated with a
signaling process -- an exchange of costly, novel, voluntary, and irrevocable concessions in a
negotiated bargain. This result is consistent with realist notions of the limits of international
society and illustrates the context in which a rational choice model is appropriate. The book's
approach, integrating emotion with reasoning and linking political science to scientific research in
other disciplines, particularly biology and neuroscience, has broad implications for social science
theory.