The Bradford Model and the Contribution of Conflict Resolution to the Field of International Peacekeeping and Peacebuilding

This article outlines the important contribution made by the Department of Peace Studies, particularly the Centre for Conflict Resolution (CCR), at the University of Bradford, to the field of international peacekeeping and peacebuilding. It adds to Woodhouse's examination of the crucial role of Adam Curle, the first chair of the department, in the field of peace studies (Woodhouse, 2010). In the spirit of Woodhouse, this article provides further investigation into how the department has developed research into one of Curle's main strands of activity relevant to peacemaking, "to nurture social and economic systems which engender cooperation rather than conflict" (Woodhouse, 2010, p. 2). Woodhouse's article speaks of how Peace Studies at Bradford University explored this strand with a focus on "critical research on institutions for international co-operation and interdependence" (Woodhouse, 2010, p. 2). This article complements the approach by examining the impact the Centre for Conflict Resolution has had on the practice of peacekeeping over three generations, and how, in turn, the practice of peacekeeping has informed critical enquiry of peacekeeping and peacebuilding.

between equals with no element of dominance (between two states).However in conflicts where both parties are not equal (i.e. a conflict between the centre and periphery within a state), peacekeeping runs the risk of preserving a status quo as a result of intervening.Through containing the conflict and maintaining the status quo the peacekeeping force is actually taking sides in the conflict (Galtung, 1976b, p. 284).
Galtung noted that doctrines of non-intervention in the affairs of a state must be rejected.Only by doing this, Galtung argued, would peacekeeping operations "unequivocally… break through these artificial walls called regions and states mankind has built around itself " (Galtung, 1976b, p. 286).To normalise intervention, Galtung examined three ways in which peacekeeping could react to vertical conflict (conflict between a strong centre and weaker periphery): 1) the formalistic stand (third party intervention which handles any war in the same way); 2) the let-it-work-itself-out stand (no third party intervention); 3) the use-peacekeeping-on-the-side-of-peace stand (third party intervention seeks to remove both direct and structural violence).
Galtung rejected the first two approaches outright, and chose to explore the third.Although he outlined problems in it, Galtung argued in favour of this approach, and stated that: "A peacekeeping operation in a vertical conflict should be more like a one-way wall, permitting the freedom fighters out to expand the liberated territory, but preventing the oppressors from getting in." (Galtung, 1976b, p. 288) Importantly, Galtung's work showed that peacekeeping could have a role in radical conflict transformation, and move beyond containment of overt violence.This was very much a case of incorporating peacekeeping into conflict resolution theory, and placed military forms of peacekeeping within the wider context of conflict transformation.
Following in this tradition, the CCR has examined how peacekeeping practice can move beyond negative peace and towards transformation and emancipation.This set of important theoretical insights have linked micro and macro-level processes, and helped to develop a reciprocal understanding between those who carry out the practicalities of peacekeep-ing, and those who engage in wider theoretical debates in the field of conflict resolution.

ccr engagemenT wiTh peacekeeping in The 1990s
The early 1990s heralded the first contributions from the CCR to the field of peacekeeping research.The end of the Cold War and the early 1990s was a period characterised by a sense of optimism at the UN, encapsulated in Secretary-General Boutros-Boutros Ghali's Agenda for Peace (UN, 1992).Moreover, there was a rapid expansion in peacekeeping deployments, with operations covering a much wider set of peacebuilding tasks.However, not all multidimensional operations worked as well as was hoped, with operations deployed in environments which had not reached the point of consent and agreement with the goals of the mission.This led to problematic engagements, most notably in Somalia, the former Yugoslavia, and Rwanda.
Although such problems were ongoing, the period heralded the engagement of the CCR with peacekeeping operations, with a burgeoning number of publications examining the role that peacekeeping can play in conflict resolution processes, and the specific conflict resolution skills which may be required for peacekeepers to carry out their roles effectively.
A major contribution made by the CCR in this period was Fetherston, Ramsbotham and Woodhouse's analysis of the UNPROFOR1 operation in 1994 (Fetherston et al., 1994).This analysis posed a number of areas where the field of conflict resolution could contribute to improving the operation,2 and outlined important contributions that conflict resolution could make in wider peacekeeping interventions.
The authors advocated the use of conflict resolution principles to help understand how peacekeeping personnel relate to the parties in a conflict.By doing so, they could greatly benefit from understanding the social dynamics of belligerent groups and those they were sent to protect.Preparing peacekeepers to understand this was seen as critical for them to provide security amongst the groups, and open up avenues for peacebuilding.It also raised the chances that operations would engage with groups who might not have had access to power structures during the conflict.Fetherston et al. also highlighted how conflict resolution theory and practice could facilitate relations between the military and non-military components of the peacekeeping operation.
In modern-day operations this is formalised through civilmilitary cooperation and coordination strategies, at the time it was written, 1994, the linkages between the civil and military actors were not formalised at all (Slim, 1996).Finally, through developing an understanding of the multinational and multicultural aspects within peacekeeping deployments, the authors firmly established conflict resolution as a tool which could develop understanding between the various nationalities within a peacekeeping deployment.Peacekeeping is still a global undertaking (more so than in 1994), and for peacekeeping operations to function effectively, there is a requirement for military peacekeepers to understand crosscultural communication within the operation, as well as towards external actors.
Fetherston's early work on training for peacekeeping advocated the strengthening of links between peacekeeping and conflict resolution, both at theoretical and tactical levels.Her 1994 study of training suggested that existing definitions of peacekeeping were "inadequate" because they "have not been placed within a larger framework".She offered a theoretical framework to "analyze the utility of peacekeeping as a third party intervention and as a tool of conflict management" (Fetherston, 1994, pp. 139-140).She further argued that: "It is not enough to send a force into the field with a vague notion that they should be impartial and help to facilitate settlement.To act as a third party in a protracted violent, polarized conflict is an extremely difficult and delicate task.Diplomats, academics and others who have acted in the capacity of a third party are generally well trained, highly experienced individuals with a good base of knowledge about the particular conflict.On the whole, peacekeepers have limited preparation and experience." (Fetherston, 1994, p. 140) Noting that peacekeeping operations represent a form of third-party intervention and that there exists no framework for understanding when to intervene, she linked peacekeeping to the contingency model outlined in Fisher and Keashly's 1990 research, arguing that it "seems to offer the best possibility for a more effective management of conflict" (Fetherston, 1994, p. 123).The model was devised to match third party intervention to certain characteristics of the conflict (Fisher and Keashly, 1991).
In order for peacekeeping to fit the model, Fetherston advocated that effective coordination must be made between the traditional security aspects and the civilian peacebuilding aspects of the operation.Without this, in Fetherston's view, operations faced "insurmountable odds" of moving beyond controlling violence and maintaining a status quo (Fetherston, 1994, p. 150).Within this framework, she also considered that peacekeeping could be visualised in a two-tiered approach.Firstly with peacekeeping personnel "working in the area of operation at the micro-level, facilitating a more positive atmosphere", and secondly with peacekeeping operations "cooperating and coordinated with peacemaking and peacebuilding efforts at the macro-level" (Fetherston, 1994, p. 150).Fetherston suggested that peacekeeping could play a valuable role in the successful resolution of conflicts by creating an environment conducive to further resolution of conflict (much like the important role of pre-negotiation).She found that: "Co-ordinating peacekeeping at the micro-level at least begins the groundwork of what might be called a pre-resolution or a pre-peacebuilding phase.This has taken the form of coordination of local level resolution processes, either at the initiative of local people or at the initiative of the peacekeepers." (Fetherston, 1994, pp. 151-152) So peacekeepers were seen as a critical interface between micro and macro approaches to conflict resolution.To facilitate this link, Fetherston emphasised the importance of peacekeepers possessing the two 'contact skills': skills in conflict resolution, such as mediation, negotiation, conciliation, and the skills required for effective cross-cultural interaction.She emphasised the importance of these skills for deployed peacekeepers, arguing that the "essence of peacekeeping as a third party intervention must be contact skills".She adds: "It is through the use of communication skills, methods of negotiation, facilitation, mediation, and conciliation that peacekeepers de-escalate potentially violent or manifestly violent situations and facilitate movement toward conflict resolution." (Fetherston, 1994, p. 219) Her findings also supported the view that it is important to provide "specific training to effect a shift from a military to a peacekeeping attitude and to learn and practice contact skills" (Fetherston, 1994, p. 217).
This work is supplemented by the 1994 article, Putting the peace back into peacekeeping (Fetherston, 1994a), which outlined the importance of training for peacekeepers.Here, she argued that a lack of training for peacekeepers means that the task peacekeepers undertake, representing the international community's message of non-violent consensual conflict management, becomes increasingly difficult.In a 1998 article, she warned that, without basic research on what peacekeepers do and why they do it, "training will continue to be inconsistent and inappropriate".She added "[...] if we only prepare people for war it is far more likely that is what we will get." (Fetherston, 1998, p.178) Alongside the development of Fetherston's work on training, Woodhouse and Ramsbotham both furthered research into peacekeeping and conflict resolution.Their 1996 paper, "Terra Incognita: Here be Dragons", applied Azar's Protracted Social Conflict theory to contemporary conflict.From this, Woodhouse and Ramsbotham suggested that peacekeeping operations be deployed in International Social Conflict (ISC): a conflict neither purely inter-state, nor intrastate, but somewhere between the two.Using this framework, their response to the failures of peacekeeping deployments was to advocate the use of the 'middle ground' between peacekeeping and peace enforcement (Woodhouse and Ramsbotham, 1996).Also in 1996, Humanitarian Intervention in Contemporary Conflict was published.This book examined approaches to, and attempted to widen understanding of, humanitarian intervention by drawing together existing analyses from the field of international relief organisations, and studies from the security field.It was also an early indication of the work that Woodhouse and Ramsbotham would later carry out on cosmopolitan approaches to peacekeeping (Ramsbotham and Woodhouse, 1996).Further contributions by Woodhouse were his analysis of the psychological aspects of peacekeeping, and the requirements for military personnel to understand conflict resolution concepts and techniques (Woodhouse, 1998), as well as an analysis of national policies, such as the development of UK doctrine and practice, (Woodhouse, 1999).
Woodhouse and Ramsbotham also formalised the links between peacekeeping and conflict resolution in two particularly important contributions to the field.The first, Encyclopaedia of International Peacekeeping Operations (published in 1999), offered a comprehensive approach to all facets of international peacekeeping, but also included entries from the conflict resolution field, incorporating the scholarly work that had been ongoing within the CCR and other institutions (Ramsbotham and Woodhouse, 1999).The second major publication was Ramsbotham, Woodhouse and Miall's Contemporary Conflict Resolution.Also published in 1999, it incorporated peacekeeping practice as part of international efforts to alleviate conflict and facilitate positive peacebuilding (Ramsbotham et al., 1999).The publications were aimed at different audiences: one was more specifically concerned with the intricacies of peacekeeping, and the other predominantly for conflict resolution scholars.However, through incorporating both fields into a common endeavour, the publications further solidified links.
Research at the CCR widened towards the end of the 1990s.Tamara Duffey's research advocated the incorporation of Betts Fetherston's contact skills into military training for peacekeeping operations (Duffey, 1998, p. 106) and argued that military peacekeepers preparing for Cold War operations received virtually no specialised peacekeeping training in mediation, negotiation and other conflict resolution skills.Because of this, they would often find themselves in "dangerous and stressful situations unprepared to effectively handle them" (Duffey, 1998, p. 129).To address this deficit in training, Duffey's analysis outlined the importance of cultural training which should have two components.Firstly culturegeneral training, which focuses on basic understandings of culture (including how culture influences one's own assumptions, values, actions and reactions, along with intercultural communication skills, and developing an awareness of other organisational cultures).Secondly, culture-specific training, which concentrates on developing an understanding of the specific culture in which the intervention takes place (Duffey, 1998, p. 270).Overarching this is the need for all involved in peacekeeping (including the military, civilian agencies and conflict resolution scholars) to carefully consider the "culturally appropriate ways of re-evaluating and reforming peacekeeping" (Duffey, 1998, p. 271).
Research in the late 1990s also reflected the dynamic changes that were occurring in the field of international peacekeeping.Langille's thesis on the development of training, role specialisation and rapid deployment of peacekeepers took the case study of his attempts to develop the idea of a specialised peacekeeping training establishment in Canada.Langille's research mapped the debates leading up to the development of a training centre, reporting on the considerable amount of opposition to the notion of turning a redundant military facility into a peacekeeping training centre.(Langille, 1999, p. 101).As the manifestation of these efforts resulted in the creation of the Pearson Peacekeeping Centre, it can be seen that the thesis and the CCR itself were at the forefront of developments in the field of peacekeeping.

The second generaTion: reflecTions on 1990s peacekeeping and The advenT of peace supporT
The end of the 1990s highlighted a shift in how peacekeeping practice was conceptualised.At the UN, Kofi Annan launched a period of reflection, through official reports into the failures in Rwanda and Srebrenica.This reflection culminated in the 2000 Report of the Panel on United Nations Peace Operations -a wide-reaching report into all aspects of peacekeeping and peacebuilding deployments (UN, 2000c).In the UK, a doctrine was developed to meet the wider operational demands of deployment in peacekeeping operations where robust peace enforcement needed to be linked with civilian expertise.Whilst uncertainty existed about exactly how operations could achieve the ambitious targets set out in the Security Council Resolutions, the turn of the century also heralded the third generation of peace operations, with multifunctional and robust deployments in Sierra Leone and the DRC.
Ramsbotham and Woodhouse's 2001 book Peacekeeping and Conflict Resolution, published during a time of transition and uncertainty, reflected on the current debates, underscoring peacekeeping operations by stating that: "[...] the future of UN peacekeeping will depend on the capability and willingness to reform and strengthen peacekeeping mechanisms, and to clarify its role in conflict resolution." (Woodhouse and Ramsbotham, 2001, p. 3) Thus, the authors argued, the purpose of the collection was to consider the contribution that conflict resolution can make in the development of future peacekeeping practices.The book offered the viewpoints of academics, who applied conflict resolution theory to peacekeeping practice, and "experienced military peacekeepers seeking to enrich peacekeeping by uses of conflict theory" (Woodhouse and Ramsbotham, 2000, p. 6).It included articles spanning the spectrum of international conflict resolution efforts, from prevention to peacekeeping and peacebuilding, providing a crucial contribution as it solidified links made between the two fields.Articles provided by practitioners included Philip Wilkinson (who wrote about the role of conflict resolution in the UK's Peace Support Operation doctrine), John Mackinlay (examining the role of warlords) and Peter Langille (who examined the development of standing capacities for UN peacekeeping).Articles by scholars in conflict resolution examined the role of culture in peacekeeping practice (Tamara Duffey's article highlighting the difficulties encountered in the UN operation in Somalia), how operations can best address the peacebuilding capability gap, and complementary approaches dealing with ethno-political conflict.Further articles linked peacekeeping and peacebuilding interventions to wider theoretical approaches from the conflict resolution field.Woodhouse provided a response to criticism of international conflict resolution processes, Ryan looked at integrating peacekeeping strategies into wider conflict resolution approaches, Ramsbotham examined the UN approaches to peacebuilding, and finally, Fetherston (in a radical change from her early work on peacekeeping) provided a critical assessment of peacekeeping and peacebuilding, and advocated that peace operations provide a wider transformative process to promote a post-hegemonic society.
PhD scholarships at the CCR continued throughout this period, and provided significant analyses to peace-keeping and conflict resolution practices.Solà i Martín analysed MINURSO to understand why the mission failed to provide space for transformative conflict resolution, after the successful reduction of violent conflict.He found constraints on the operation as a result of power politics (Solà i Martín, 2004, p. 22).The second part of his research examined the potential of new ideas in peacekeeping research, in particular, through the use of a Foucauldian analysis of power versus knowledge to assess peacekeeping operations in the context of power relations at a local and international level.He found that through the examination of the parties' production of power and knowledge, conflict resolution could have a larger impact on peacekeeping research (Solà i Martín, 2004, pp. 241-244).
Yuka Hasegawa focused on the UN operation in Afghanistan (UNAMA) and provided an analysis of the role of peace operations in the protection and empowerment of human security.His research also asserted the importance of UN peacekeeping forces as a third party intervener, with their impartiality derived from the UN's pursuit of basic human security (linked to Burton's Human Needs theory).This impartiality is the most important facet of peacekeeping operations.In the case of UNAMA, the pursuit of impartiality was key in its effectiveness.Hasegawa concluded that the significance of UN peacekeeping missions is that they represent a collective means to address issues of human security, as opposed to being "yet another tool with which to coordinate various interests both at the global and micro levels" (Hasegawa, 2005, pp. 332-337).
As well as advances in the field of peacekeeping, wider social and cultural developments were beginning to impact on peacekeeping and peacebuilding.One critical development was the spread of the Internet and other tools to increase global communication in the first decade of the 21st century.Laina Reynolds-Levy sought to document the real-world use of the Internet by organisations operating in the post-conflict context of Kosovo in the period 2000-2003, focusing on understanding how the Internet could contribute to post-conflict peacebuilding.She considered the potential impact of information and communication technologies (ICT) on peace and conflict issues, and offered practical examples of how the Internet was used as a vehicle of change in the working practices of peacebuilding organisations (Levy, 2004, pp. 61-97).Informing this is the importance Levy attached to the emergent uses of ICT in this post-conflict Kosovo, particularly, "in order to formulate ideas on how ICTs could be best used to build stable, peaceful and just societies in the aftermath of war" (Levy, 2004, pp. 1-2).In terms of peacekeeping, Levy links the role of ICT to recommendations in the UN Brahimi Report, which was explicit in making the case for ICT to be used to link peacekeeping operations (Levy, 2004, p. 108).

The Third generaTion: criTical appraisal and cosmopoliTan peacekeeping
The third generation of conflict resolution interaction with peacekeeping has come as a result of wider theoretical critiques over the type of peace that peacekeeping operations attempt to achieve.The backdrop to this is continued reflection and uncertainty over peacekeeping practice, with operations in Sierra Leone and Burundi successfully making the transition from peacekeeping to peacebuilding, operations in the DRC and Lebanon suffering setbacks on wider peace processes, and new operations in Darfur and Chad/CAR failing to deploy rapidly.This period is also informed by four main thematic debates.Firstly, within overarching peacekeeping and peacebuilding practice, there has been an evolution of normative values for protecting civilian populations, a responsibility to protect, and a wide and varied approach to the phenomenon of human security.Secondly, through the practice of robust peacekeeping, military peacekeepers have been more able to use force in deployments in a pre-emptive manner, and at times under the rubric of protecting civilians.Thirdly, there has been a rise in studies and assessments that ask questions about the liberal economic underpinnings of peacebuilding.Finally, this era is characterised by unilateral and, at times, non-UN sanctioned intervention under the rubric of the Global War on Terror.At the CCR, the arrival of Professor Mike Pugh meant that the journal International Peacekeeping was housed at the centre.It is a cornerstone for contemporary debates in the field and has succeeded in becoming an "important source of analysis and debate for academics, officials, NGO workers and military personnel" (Pugh, 1994), On a wider scale, challenges to the role of conflict resolution in peacekeeping practices came from the background of critical theory.There was increasing criticism of problem-solving approaches to peacekeeping in the literature on peace operations, arguing that it devoted "too much attention to policy relevance" (Paris, 2000, p. 27), and overlooked "larger critical questions that could be posed" (Whitworth, 2004, p. 24).Bellamy and Williams took the critiques a stage further in International Peacekeeping (Bellamy and Williams, 2005), examining peacekeeping from a critical theory standpoint and challenging many of the overarching conceptions of peacekeeping.They offered a substantial critique of problem-solving approaches to peacekeeping operations: "By failing to question the ideological preferences of interveners… problem-solving theories are unable to evaluate the extent to which dominant peacekeeping or peacemaking practices may actually help reproduce the social structures that cause violent conflict in the first place." (Bellamy, 2004, p. 19) The authors suggested that critical approaches to peace operations would open up a new stage in how they were theorised.This critical appraisal was reflected in the CCR, most pertinently spearheaded by Professor Mike Pugh, who elaborated on this by arguing that peacekeeping operations were not neutral, but served an existing global order within which problem solving adjustments could occur.In this framework, peacekeeping can be considered as "forms of riot control directed against the unruly parts of the world to uphold the liberal peace" (Pugh, 2004, p. 41).
Pugh furthered this work with Mandy Turner, and Neil Cooper, in Whose Peace?Critical Perspectives on the Political Economy of Peacebuilding.The collection provided an analysis of present peacebuilding strategies, separated into seven inter-related areas (liberal war and peace, trade, employment, diasporas, borderlands, civil society and governance), and argued that largely disregarded local bodies struggle against universal presumptions of a "particular liberal-capitalist order" (Pugh et al., 2008, p. 2).From the analysis, the authors found that concepts of human security had either not been followed through or had been "captured to work in the interests of global capitalism".Thus, the authors propose a less securitized life welfare approach to peacebuilding: "[…] there is a need, then, to develop a new, unsecuritised language and to contemplate a paradigm that takes local voices seriously, rejects universalism in favour of heterodoxy, reconceptualises the abstract individual as a social being and limits damage to planetary life -in short, a 'life welfare' perspective." (Pugh et al., 2008, p. 394) The authors make a strong case for the development of a life welfare perspective.The process would not so much be a prescription of resigned relativism, but more a prescription for a politics of emancipation in which the need for dialogue between heterodoxies is a core component.Whose Peace demonstrates the crucial role that the approaches of critical theory provide in deepening understanding about the role of peacekeeping and peacebuilding as a vehicle for conflict resolution.
Although these approaches have been criticised themselves for not elaborating on how suggestions for transformation can be operationalized, there are signs of policy considerations in wider transformation projects.Pugh finds a role for deployments akin to peace support operations (PSO) in a transformative framework.
He argued that PSO would be likely to be increasingly subtle and flexible in responding to crises, providing expert teams similar to disaster relief specialists, taking preventative action, and offering economic aid and civilian protection.Pugh's article contended that this may only happen if such expert teams are released from the state-centric control system, making them "answerable to a more transparent, democratic and accountable institutional arrangement" (Pugh, 2004, p. 53).Moreover, Pugh found that such a scheme would be based on a permanent military volunteer force "recruited directly among individuals predisposed to cosmopolitan rather than patriotic values"' (Pugh, 2004, p. 53).

Towards a cosmopoliTan framework
This links to Woodhouse and Ramsbotham's 2005 article, Cosmopolitan Peacekeeping and the Globalisation of Security, where the authors examined how future peacekeeping and peacebuilding operations could work within an emancipatory framework.It posits that the framework of cosmopolitan peacekeeping is situated in conflict resolution theory and practice, engaging with peacekeeping practice in a way in which the authors believe critical theory does not (Woodhouse and Ramsbotham, 2005, p. 141).
The article noted the revival of UN peacekeeping operations as a commitment by the international community to peacekeeping as a "vital instrument in pursuing conflict resolution goals internationally" (Woodhouse and Ramsbotham, 2005, p. 142).Looking at theoretical approaches to future interventions, the authors3 argued for a cosmopolitan approach, "for deeper reforms, an accountable permanent rapid reaction or a standing UN force and an enhanced resolution capacity, including gender and culture-aware policy and training" (Woodhouse and Ramsbotham, 2005, p. 152).Developing such an architecture could release the potential of peacekeeping operations "as a component of a broader and emancipatory theoretical framework centred on the idea of human security" (Ramsbotham et al., 2005, p. 147).
Woodhouse followed up on this in an article with Curran, (Curran and Woodhouse, 2007) which investigated the emergence of a cosmopolitan ethic in African peacekeeping through the emergence of the African Union standby brigades and conflict prevention network, as well as the response to the peace operation in Sierra Leone.The authors concluded that peacekeeping in general, and African peacekeeping in particular, is seen as a: "[…] force in the making for cosmopolitan governance, characterized by an impartial, universal, democratic, cosmopolitan community which promotes human security (positive peace) over national security and state-centric interest." (Curran andWoodhouse, 2007, p. 1070) The understanding of cosmopolitan peacekeeping developed at the CCR links to the cited works of Galtung, who argued strongly against peacekeeping operations being placed in positions where they are unassumingly supporting the status quo in vertical conflicts.For peacekeeping to be effective, he argued, it must protect those who are trying to alter the status quo and remove the violent structures that are creating conflict.This is an area where critical theorists have made an important contribution.Without a strong body of research into the role of peacekeeping in global politics and the global economy, it will most likely fail to alter the status quo.Woodhouse and Ramsbotham's work on cosmopolitan peacekeeping elaborates on Galtung's 'one-way wall' concept of peacekeeping operations, but instead of protecting what Galtung termed the freedom fighter, it protects the vulnerable groups within conflict zones, who may possess the capacity for emancipatory political transformation.

conclusions
In outlining the contribution of the Bradford School to peacekeeping research, this article has outlined the critical role played by the Centre for Conflict Resolution in approaching the micro-level debates over peacekeeping practice, and linked them to wider understandings of the process of conflict resolution in post-conflict environments.
Cosmopolitan approaches propose an avenue to engage in critical appraisals of peacekeeping, but they certainly do not propose an 'end of history' with regard to peacekeeping and peacebuilding.What this article demonstrates is that conflict resolution research (if the CCR is used as a case study for other centres of its type) is sufficiently robust to effect change in the field of peacekeeping practice, and foster developments in understanding and appraisal of the practice of peacekeeping and peacebuilding.
The question as to how conflict resolution will adapt in the future is, according to Ramsbotham, Miall and Woodhouse, dependent on the ability of the field to become truly global (Ramsbotham et al., 2011).This will be facilitated by the multiple effects of the expanding role of ICT in peacekeeping, peacebuilding and conflict resolution.Firstly, ICT will allow the dissemination of information and sharing of examples of good practice.The wide use and availability of peacekeeping training over the Internet is an example, where peacekeepers can learn about the skills necessary for peacekeeping (including many of Fetherston's contact skills) without the need to travel to a recognised training institute.Secondly, the spread of ICT and the 'shrinking' of the globe will allow information and critique to influence overarching theories of conflict resolution, by allowing greater theoretical input from practitioners, academics, and groups from areas previously untouched.Finally, the expansion of the Internet and social media has already made a wealth of information available for those engaged in the field of conflict research and encouraged transparency on the part of institutions, leading them to advocate transparency in other institutions and actors.Hopefully, the outlined processes will give the conflict resolution field greater depth and allow it to continue to engage with peacekeeping and peacebuilding.