Centre for Resolution of International Conflicts, CRIC
An abridged version of the final application from January 2013
1. Summary
The prevention and resolution of violent conflicts can be promoted by developing clear analytical tools and techniques for engagement, particularly targeted at two phases of conflict: the
role of the past in protracted conflicts and third party possibilities for breaking spirals of escalation. A defining mark for the CRIC project will be an ambition to develop a synthesised theoretical understanding of conflict, particularly through a distinct conceptualisation of the social
dynamics of emotions. The microsociology of emotions enables a renewed grasp of the threshold where conflicts turn violent. Contrary to common belief, violence is actually ‘difficult’, and
the limited number of pathways around the barrier of so-called ‘confrontational tension/fear’
allows targeted efforts to prevent a conflict from turning violent (or if not fully so, to channel it
through the situations known to produce the kind of violence that is least atrocious and escalatory). To make conflict expertise relevant in practice, the sociology of knowledge will be mobilised to understand why different bodies of expertise are followed or ignored by practitioners.
The evolving nature of authoritative knowledge creates new conditions for interaction between
scholarship, the public, decision makers and parties to a conflict. Thus CRIC will research four
aspects of conflict resolution: 1) development of conflict theory, 2) collective memory in protracted conflicts, 3) third party options during escalation of conflict and 4) sociology of expertise. Regionally, it will concentrate on the Levant and the Horn of Africa in order to systematically explore potential cross-fertilisation of lessons and comparative insights. Concrete organisational formats for joint development of solutions by scholars and practitioners will be tested.
Through research and innovation, CRIC will enable interested parties – governmental and nongovernmental - to better contribute to peaceful resolution of international conflicts.
2. Objective of the Project
The project aims to strengthen the basis from which Denmark can contribute with non-military
solutions to current international conflicts. Empirical research and theorising on conflict has
made significant progress in recent years. However, these insights have been difficult for practitioners to apply due to both academic fragmentation and insufficient specification of the relationship between practical and theoretical knowledge. Specialised research on third party
action can gain from integration with general theories of conflict. In the scientific community,
the project will contribute to general conflict theory within mainly Sociology, Anthropology and
Political Science and to specialties like conflict resolution, mediation, and third party intervention plus to regionally defined expertise. Society will benefit from improved tools and capacities
for conflict resolution, which take the dynamics of conflict into account and are based on a
systematic assessment of experiences with diverse instruments. Military interventions often
prove counterproductive and extremely expensive. Non-military forms of involvement currently
gain increased attention internationally. Danish actors can contribute by not just following the
trend of competing with other small states for the role as ‘mediation super power’, but by
concentrating on the less coveted fields of dealing with the past in protracted conflicts and
anti-escalatory early intervention on the basis of novel scientific insights.
3. The main results of the project1
Among the results expected from the project are these:
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A toolbox of possible instruments and strategies available for practitioners with
specification of past experiences and conditions of success.
Suggestions for organising conflict expertise in a useful format, which is actually utilised
by the relevant actors.
A deepened understanding of conflict in which different theoretical contributions are
contrasted, translated and partly integrated. Specialisation among methodologically
The structure and section titles of this proposal follow the instruction from the Danish Council for Strategic Research.
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divergent traditions as well as between general theory and theories on specific aspects
(mediation, peacekeeping, culture, prevention, etc.) has been necessary, but all strands
can be enriched by re-integration.
A distinct contribution to conflict theory will be made by drawing recent theoretical
contributions on emotional dynamics into the understanding of generation and
resolution of large-scale conflicts.
Insights from practitioners are integrated with research, and pertinent needs for
knowledge are identified in cooperation.
Cases from the Horn of Africa and the Levant are compared, providing novel insights for
regional specialists as well as for generalisations about conflict resolution and conflict
prevention.
Strategies for the re-drawing of maps of conflict based on an analysis of the role of
historical memories in protracted conflicts.
The particular roles of external actors (intended as well as unintended) during phases of
conflict escalation are isolated in order to optimise external impact in the most time
critical period.
An operational, analytical model is constructed (centred on collective emotive processes
and political identities) in order to facilitate strategic assessment of any given situation
containing escalatory pressures in order to evaluate different forms of third party
involvement.
4. Background and hypothesis of the project
The starting hypothesis of the project is that conflict is a distinct social phenomenon amenable
to general theorising drawing on a number of academic disciplines and methodological tradetions. The generic dynamics of conflict can be understood better by giving increased, but not
sole, attention to the previously under-theorised element of emotions, especially when this is
done sociologically and thereby can be united with strategic and cognitive dynamics of conflict.
When integrated with specific insights from more policy-oriented fields of research, like conflict
resolution and mediation, the resulting body of knowledge will be useful in practice. Not only
the content should be research-based; also the organisational format of this knowledge should
be designed on the basis of research and experiments into scholar-practitioner relations.
Better peaceful resolutions of conflicts require both improved understandings of dynamics of
conflict (incl. external involvement) and the development of new instruments and techniques.
Future peace-building must draw systematically on experience. This requires theory-building
ambitions as well as a thorough understanding of the particulars of both the cases from which
lessons are drawn and of those to which they are applied. Instead of piling up cases with only
one expert on each, a collaborative research effort will be organised around two complexes of
conflicts. They are among the most momentous conflict regions in today’s global politics and of
immediate policy relevance for Denmark as both sources of instability and areas of
involvement: the Levant and Horn of Africa. It is vital to draw from state-of the art research by
specialists on these conflicts. An inter-disciplinary research project drawing on strong
university departments can improve the empirical basis for knowledge in these fields, where
too often think tanks and policy institutes cultivate a form of expertise that is neither as
theoretically nor as empirically solid as what universities and academic disciplines can provide.
The research strategy consists of theoretical integration and comparison with a focused selection of cases within the two regions. While some other forms of social science accumulate and
‘count’ research from a wide selection of cases, a thorough cooperation between social
sciences and humanities becomes possible in the present project, because the social science
traditions drawn upon here share a commitment to context-sensitive analysis with the
humanities, and because we focus research within the two regions. Additional funding will be
sought elsewhere for a third regional cluster (eg. North Africa).
CRIC’s four work packages, each holding the promise of both analytical progress and policy
relevance, will be pursued across both regions. The subprojects are thus defined as cases that
fit into the overall structure, which is grounded both analytically and regionally (as captured in
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the table in section 7). By actively engaging the theory in each node, it is possible to develop
not only new insights, but also new instruments and practices. It is a guiding aim to consolidate results in practical tools and techniques for conflict resolution. CRIC will encourage this by
relating to international conflicts beyond our regional focus as they gain political prominence
during the grant period. CRIC aims to generate expertise and policy-relevant knowledge on
conflict in general, not only the studied cases. However, to produce quality research, the cases
are consolidated in two regional clusters, where a critical mass of scholars and competent
supervision will be available. Comparisons and theory development on this basis will produce
general ideas for understanding and engaging with conflicts. Thus, the Centre will be available
for advice to state and non-state actors in relation to conflicts beyond the focus areas.
Policy expertise has for decades been too uniformly dominated by security studies (anchored in
International Relations[IR]/Political Science), at best moderated by critical approaches. Rather
than deepening this Political Science/policy research track through further debate of ‘new
schools’, CRIC will take up basic questions from within the tradition of peace and conflict
research and make original contributions through a distinct conceptualisation of collective
dynamics of fear, anger, shame, resentment and other emotions/affects (Clarke et al. 2006).
‘State of the art’ in conflict theory and conflict resolution has become ever more fragmented,
as work on mediation and intervention has become increasingly ad hoc and under-theorised,
while general theory on conflict has evolved in other disciplines and fields without sufficient
attention to the practically oriented work in conflict studies/resolution. Top-down theoretical
synthesis would be presumptuous, but greater coherence and communication can be achieved
through the dual strategy of relating broadly to a variety of research traditions and pitching a
few specific organising ideas that make for an original contribution. Among the distinct CRIC
ideas are the possibility to integrate emotions centrally into a socio-political analysis - which
points, in the study of protracted conflicts, to the centrality of collective memory and a
renewed attention to the violence threshold within conflicts (more in section 6).
An emphasis on theory will allow CRIC to connect to and integrate insights from several research communities. CRIC can play a productive role in this push partly due to the so-called
‘Copenhagen School’ theory of securitisation. The idea is not that securitisation theory should
become the integrative framework for CRIC - the limitations of this particular theory are recognised. However, it will play three important roles for the CRIC project. First, one of the distinct
(and hitherto underdeveloped) ideas in the theory – that of ‘de-securitisation’ – actually contains a possible strategy for conflict resolution through targeted elimination of justifications for
extreme measures, and CRIC will explore the potential of this idea (Wæver 2009; Rumelili
2013). Second, the dynamic international scholarship on securitisation has worked out a
consistent relationship between dimensions similarly at stake for conflict theory: identity, fear,
politics and violence. Thus the experiences with theory building and integration of multiple
layers and explanatory formats will be useful in the CRIC context. Third, that CRIC is headed
by the founder of securitisation theory and is launched from the current main hub of
securitisation theory will increase international attraction, making it easier to network and
become a partner to valuable collaboration. In the different work packages, specific theoretical
strongholds will play a similar role.
The overarching theoretical framework will, however, be theory of conflict with particular
attention to the theoretical integration of micro and macro sociological dynamics and collective
categories including identities (see section 6 below). A key subproject will take stock of recent
innovations in the largely disconnected strands of conflict theory-building on rational choice
theory, constructivism, sociology of emotions, and quantitative data. These insights will be reworked based on theoretical and meta-theoretical progress in philosophy of social sciences, to
specify how different explanatory formats can be related. Thus CRIC will draw upon influential
forms of conflict analysis, like the quantitative data one, without itself engaging in this kind of
work. The resulting general understanding of conflict will be specified in more operational
format in WP2-4, engaging both specialised literatures in each field and cumulated insights
from own empirical analyses. These WPs will deepen our understanding of how to break
repetitive cycles in protracted conflicts especially through memory work (WP2), how third
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parties can help to prevent escalation in conflicts (WP3), and how conflict expertise partakes in
conflicts and their resolution (WP4). These specialised fields all need to interact with
generalised theorising of conflict as such as well as empirical research anchored in scholarly
communities with historical, socio-political and cultural insight.
5. Innovative value, impact and relevance of the project
Violent, international conflicts ruin human lives, resources and the ability of the international
community to cooperate on global concerns. In recent decades, the West has intervened militarily, often counter-productively and at great cost, in several conflicts. An impetus has been
the need to ‘do something’, while non-military options lacked clarity and hence appeared politically as ‘doing nothing’. Therefore it is key not only to improve knowledge about non-military
approaches, but to distil this knowledge with the clarity required to make it politically viable.
Denmark can strengthen its role in non-military conflict resolution by developing original
approaches; Danish research is in good standing internationally. With CRIC, central areas
within conflict analysis will be given a new thrust by combining strongholds of regional
expertise with dynamic theoretical groups.
The academic originality and distinct contributions are described in other sections. The policy
relevance of this originality will be to provide Danish practitioners with both the direct output
of CRIC research and access to wider research through the networks established. Furthermore,
a new generation of scholars will be trained in the resolution of violent conflicts and, together
with the networking of research communities in Denmark, they will provide capacity-building
beyond the funding period.
The name chosen for the centre is not simply a reflection of the terms given for this call. It is
also a conscious stance on debates in peace studies on e.g. ‘the four (or five) generations of
conflict resolution’ (Ramsbotham et al). Until recently, ‘conflict resolution’ was seen by many
as ‘old fashioned’ after valid criticisms (by e.g. John Paul Lederach) of the idea of ‘solving’
conflicts (conflict is energy and you rather transform it). Various other concepts, like peacebuilding, have taken centre stage - and then been criticised too. However, the classical concept
of conflict resolution is chosen here for two reasons. First, it remains the most meaningful in
the policy world, and the centre aims to interact fruitfully with practitioners. Second, scholarly
debates have shown that every label will in due time appear naïve and problematic, and thus,
rather than picking the next, transient slogan, we go back to basics and associate with
tradition and the original aspirations expressed in the term conflict resolution.
If reviewers and colleagues convince us that we will be unable to transform the connotations of
‘conflict resolution’ like this, we are open to a name like Centre for Avoidance of Violence in
International Conflicts resonating with our theoretical re-emphasising of the violence threshold.
6. Project’s methodology and results
The architecture of CRIC consists of four work packages (WP) that support each other systematically (see table in section 7). One WP develops general conflict theory, thus operating as a
unifying conceptual apparatus that researchers in all parts draw on and contribute to. WP2 and
WP3 are focused on specific phases of conflicts, in which distinct possibilities for violencereducing interventions are possible. Increased insight and knowledge do not necessarily lead to
better policies. To ensure that relevant knowledge is provided in forms that work for the users,
and that experiences by practitioners are integrated into research, the 4th WP explores conflict
knowledge as expertise. Thus WP4 draws on all the other projects as it explores its own research agenda in close cooperation with practitioners. Utilisation and relevance are not issues
external to the research agenda; they are dealt with as objects of knowledge. Ethical questions
relating to politics and research will be addressed as part of this WP. Systematic anchoring in
case studies in two regions produces a matrix structure, where WP2, WP3 and WP4 each
include a case study from each region plus a study that compares and generalises across
regions. Inter-disciplinarity is present within each sub-project, not only at the aggregate level.
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WP1. Conflict theory. At our peril, we often underestimate the value of understanding
conflicts as conflicts. I.e., when a situation gets tense and laden with violence, it is common to
approach it politically in terms of values and interests - what should be furthered or hindered but ignoring that the situation has emergent collective qualities understood best as conflict
(Simmel, Galtung). Similarly, the expertise drawn upon will often be specialised knowledge
about the ‘object’ at stake (water scarcity, security experts or at best area specialists), but the
distinct dynamics of conflict regularly upset expectations about the results to be obtained.
The status of conflict theory is paradoxical. Peace researchers often point out that policy
debates on international conflicts ignore basic insights from textbook conflict theory, formulated mostly in the 1960s by innovative individuals like Galtung, Burton, Boulding and Kelman.
However, while it is true that even quite rudimentary conflict theory could improve practice,
conflict theory has not evolved that productively. After a creative ‘founding phase’, conflict
research did little to deepen its core theories. Parts of research floated ‘upwards’ to global
structures, while work on conflict management and mediation drifted ‘downwards’ towards
operational accumulations of (‘how to’) experiences and advice. Whilst parallel bodies of theory
in e.g. Sociology and IR went through dynamic periods of theory development, less happened
at the heart of conflict theory. An unambitious and ultimately unsustainable eclecticism has
become fashionable within conflict research. General theory of conflict will be a useful
disciplining force, clarifying the conditions of validity of disjointed generalisations, thereby also
qualifying policy usages. Several promising signs have appeared recently in rationalist (game
theory-inspired), quantitative, constructivist and social-psychological conflict theory. The
moment seems right for a concerted push for re-theorising conflict as a distinct phenomenon.
Naturally, we are not alone in trying to reinvigorate classical conflict research drawing on
findings from more specialised literatures on mediation, third parties, escalation, fora, religion,
etc. Ongoing work on Edward Azar's Theory of Protracted Social Conflict, theories of conflict
transformation and Kriesberg’s conflictology will be important companions in this.
Our research programme can be summed up in three concepts: Conflict, Emotions, Violence.
The first principle is to focus on conflict not only as an empirical object to summarise insights
about, but also as a dynamic factor in itself, i.e. conflict is explanatory, because conflict situations have generic and emergent qualities that need to be understood. These are of several
kinds, and we will both take all into account and give privileged attention to one (previously
underestimated) form. Conflict has two kinds of internal dynamics that are relatively well
understood (but poorly integrated): Strategic-rational and cognitive; both the pursuit of
interests (absolute vs. relative gains) and categorisations (e.g. us-them) take distinct forms
under conflict. However, a third kind of internal dynamic should be included: Emotions.
Previous analyses of emotions tended to run into a micro-macro problem. To a large extent,
this followed from the unfounded but instinctive assumption that studying emotions necessarily
implied psychology, typically ascribing mechanisms to collective actors with dubious microfoundations, or studying specific groups with unclear links to the overarching dynamic of situations. Sociology of emotions – especially the theory of interaction rituals by Randall Collins –
advances, placing collective patterns at the centre of analysis. When emotions are studied
sociologically, their dynamics can be linked to and integrated with other factors. It becomes
possible to study specific groups and actors (neither individuals, nor the abstract unit as such)
in particular interaction sequences that generate the emotional dynamics of a given conflict.
Emotions are socially engendered and play a crucial role in mobilising conflict behavior. Particular emotions are responsible for distinct dispositions, inclinations and outcomes (Barbalet
2006:55). Articulation of political interest can be understood in terms of the emotional dynamics propelling it. Feelings of vengefulness and resentment are important emotions shaping
groups’ fight for what they see as their rights (Barbalet 1998). Anger as an emotion people
feel when experiencing injustice or transgression of their moral values may offer insights into
the nature of justice which conflicts are often focused around. Collective, political action can be
grasped by the way anger mobilises people for it (Thompson 2006:123-124). Anger and
shame operate as causal structuring agents in generation of destructive conflicts (Scheff and
Retzinger 1991). Conventionally, fear is seen as a paralysing emotion, but fear can actually
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lead to an actor realising its interests and stimulate social change. The object of fear is an
expectation of a negative outcome, anticipation of a threat or danger, and thus a negative
emotional perception of the present as a particular temporal place. Instead of fleeing from
what is creating fear or fighting it, actors can also try to contain it. In social contexts, this third
possibility is significant, as fleeing from socially induced threats is often not possible. Such
containment implies a social object of the fear and an intersubjective experience of it. An
example is the constitution of ‘elite fear’ which moves elite groups to collectively defend their
interests through containment actions (Barbalet 1998). ‘Fear’ as a collective political category
is at the centre of securitisation theory too, however, not as an emotion but as a justificatory
speech act constituting a particular social constellation of rights and obligations. Sociology of
emotions and political speech act theory should cooperate in exploring the politics of fear.
Other emotions than the above mentioned can also be involved in the generation and defusing
of (violent) conflict. Given the relatively limited amount of work done at the intersection of
micro-sociology of emotions and conflict theory, our research should be open to the possibility
of observing other significant emotional dynamics. The centre will take an empirically open and
contextual approach to both conflict and emotion.
Violence. A classical insight from conflict theory has been partly marginalised: The importance
of the threshold where conflict turns violent. Marginalisation is due to the widespread assumption that violence is ‘easy’, that if limits are removed conflict turns violent. However, microsociological studies of violence (Collins 2007) show the hard passage of this threshold and thus
the utility of focusing on (blocking) the specific mechanisms that can take people across this
boundary. Innovatively, Collins argues that a range of situational and structural conditions
have to be in place in order to transgress the fundamental barrier of ‘confrontational tension
and fear’ (Collins 2009). Particular emotional dynamics are involved when violence is realized.
Conflict escalates through a series of interactions that generate emotional feedback loops. On
the micro level, conflict generates conditions for group solidarity and feelings of righteous
anger and enthusiasm, which fuels external conflict (Collins 2012).
This issue of crossing the non-violent/violent boundary is crucial in relation to WPs 2, 3 and 4:
WP2 makes clear that the hardest part in the processing of history in protracted conflicts is the
memory of violence. For WP3, interventions during the escalation phase should be targeted at
the increasingly well-understood mechanisms that transgress the normality of non-violence.
Gene Sharp’s recently (due to the Arab Spring) revived theories of non-violent politics can be
clarified by integration into a theoretical model specifying the emotional and political dynamics
around the violence threshold for different groups and actors. WP4 deals with actors and
processes, producing conflict expertise with special attention to how they shape the profile and
placement of the violence threshold.
Taking situations and interactions as the starting point of analysis, we can avoid the pitfalls of
methodological individualism and holism. Emotions float in networks between individuals,
groups and things and should be understood as being located and transferred in such sociomaterial relations rather than arising from within ‘the individual’ (inside out) or ‘the society’
(outside in). Emotions, affects or feelings are part of ‘affect networks’ where emotions affect
other persons and things in innumerable ways. ‘Affective network’ could prove a powerful
concept with marked empirical applicability Social networks can be understood as conduits for
affect but also the reverse, as circulations of affect may also be constitutive of social networks
alongside other factors (Clarke et al 2006:174). Assuming that emotion configures conflict and
conflict configures emotion, we can speak of an emotion-conflict assemblage, which
acknowledges the contingent, constantly changing and inextricable aspects of the emotion and
conflict relationship. This concept of assemblage avoids assuming emotion as something
irrational, contending instead that it may better be viewed as a form of processing the world.
Whereas the other ‘own dynamics’ of conflict often operate at the aggregate level of collectives
in conflict (states, ethnic groups), dynamics of emotions most often operate at lower scales of
e.g. a leadership group, a local population, a specific rally or local police. However, macro
conflicts typically unfold through critical events in specific locales where situational dynamics
determine who gain the momentum through domination of the emotional space, and whether
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the conflict turns into (what kind of) violence (Collins 2008, 2009). A key methodological and
analytical task for the project is therefore to develop a model to study this crucial meso-macro
interface of conflict dynamics, something almost entirely absent in the existing literature.
The three core concepts conflict-emotions-violence are both distinct and closely connected. In
addition to these main ideas, the project will be marked by two additional ideas:
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Phases of conflicts – built into the structure of the centre (see WP 2 and 3)
Methodological pluralism. Important findings and insights have been generated from
research traditions that have ‘grown apart’, and one subproject will systematically compare
and relate general ‘conclusions’ about conflict that have emerged by the different routes of
quantitative data, rational choice modelling, fieldwork etc.
WP1 consists of four subprojects by core members:
a) Cross-fertilising Conflict sociology and Conflict theory (Poder & Wæver, SI & IFS, KU).
b) Comparing and integrating theoretical innovations from rational choice, constructivism and
quantitative analysis (PhD, IFS, KU).
c) Copenhagen School: Desecuritisation as Conflict Resolution (Wæver, IFS, KU).
d) Developing social theory of international conflicts focussing on emotional dynamics (Poder).
In addition, two projects are conducted by associated researchers: A project on diplomacy as
mediation (Adler-Nissen, IFS, KU) and “Theorising conflict from below” (Vigh, Anthro, KU)
WP2. Memory in protracted conflicts. Dramatic international conflicts are often recurring
ones. They raise particular challenges, as layers of historical memory, trauma and blame are
entrenched. Such conflicts demand specific understandings of the role of history and memory
and are thus to be studied both as a critical events and as critical continuity.
A pivotal part of protracted conflict is the emotive use of collective memory that can charge
processes of identity formation. Collective memories thus represent a crucial reservoir for
perceptions and identity dynamics in protracted conflicts. Different political and civil society
actors often manipulate violent events in the history of a conflict to suit their transient
interests (Ricoeur 2004), mobilise support and legitimise their ambitions or, conversely, to
delegitimise those of their opponents. Consequently, interpretations of the past are guarded
jealously as exclusive narratives can be played very effectively for identity politics. Commemorations (of heroes, victories, victims, injustices) play an important part in rallying sections of
the population, rehearsing the living visceral memory of violent conflict and re-establishing the
perceived ‘other’. In this vein, remembering becomes a mechanism for deepening divisions in
which conflict is quite literally ‘re-membered’. Understanding and managing this particular
dynamic of conflict is central to devising strategies for third party interventions (cf. WP 3).
Today the Levant and the Horn of Africa represent probably two of the most consequential
protracted conflict complexes in international politics. Future stabilisation needs analysis and
interruption of spirals of escalation, where successful third party intervention by international
actors also depends on sufficient knowledge about the internal logics of the collective
memories and interpretations of the past. Drawing on general conflict theory, the cases will be
studied comparatively to locate the most promising points of entry for transformation of
enduring conflict patterns, especially as they are anchored in political processes of identity
formation. The centre’s general approach to conflict analysis (cf. WP1) creates a strong
foundation for analysis of memory given the general model of emotional and political dynamics
at both micro and macro levels.
A concrete opportunity to study and practice ‘dealing with the past’ is opened by the relations
to key actors in Syria, making it possible to convey recent experiences from other countries in
the region and assist post-conflict memory politics from the beginning. The sub-project
Preparing future history in Syria (Skovgaard-Petersen, TORS, KU) zooms in on this particular
context. The civil uprising against the Assad regime may be coming to a close, but hostilities
might continue after the fall of the regime, and the country is certain to remain traumatised
and vulnerable for years to come. More than in any previous conflict, this uprising has been
thoroughly archived, as practically all communication has been digitalised, and the opposition
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is already marking anniversaries of events on a daily basis. The earlier uprising 1979-82, by
contrast, was so suppressed that little documentation was known until recently. Concentrating
on the city of Hama (700,000 inhabitants), the epicentre of the earlier uprising and one of the
flashpoints of the current one, this subproject will analyse the attempts to document the
history of Hama during the two uprisings and explore how to document survival and civil virtue
and not only belligerence and martial virtue. A long-term objective is to engage the museum of
Hama, which was recently erected with the help of Danish archaeologists and museologists, to
devote its 1st floor to a museum of its recent history of urban destruction and human survival.
Protracted conflicts in HoA: their remembrance, mutations and spill-overs (Christensen, PhD at
AAU, supervised by Møller). The Horn of Africa contains several protracted conflicts (including
the various ethnic conflicts in Ethiopia, the conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea, the conflict in
Somalia and Somalia’s territorial disputes with Kenya and Ethiopia), although these conflicts
often mutate into new forms. Diverse threats to the states and peoples of the region regularly
spill over to other parts of the world, e.g. through maritime piracy, fear of terrorism and
refugees. Denmark is active here as a ‘traditional’ donor, in state-building/good governance
promotion and in counterpiracy, facilitating our interaction with policy-makers and NGOs. The
project will 1) map the plethora of conflicts and their mutual links; 2) critically examine the
various mediation and conflict resolution efforts to date for their (lack of) attention to collective
memories and emotions; 3) drawing on experiences from other parts of the world devise
strategies to improve external conflict interventions, especially with non-military instruments.
Dealing with the Past: Memories and Modernities (Jung, SDU & McQuaid AU). The cross
regional theorising subproject will take up recent sociological theories of multiple and
successive modernities and how collective memories impact conflicts (Wagner 2010). Modern
collective identities revolve around hegemonic narratives of authenticity which establish
cognitive and emotional maps for conflict. This project will, therefore, identify avenues for
conflict resolution through re-drawing these cognitive and emotive maps.
Collective memories cannot be separated from basic structures of societies. The Levant has
been dominated by models of social order related to the idea of an authoritarian kind of
organised first modernity. The Arab spring, however, showed the transition of the region in
with forms of first modernity challenged by a pluralised second modernity associated with new
means of communication based on the digital revolution (Reckwitz 2006). Consequently, collective memories are less organised by political authorities, become more pluralistic and enter
a phase of mutual contestation. Scrutiny of the relationship among these different forms of
modernities produces an analytical framework for understanding the dynamics of foundational
collective memories, which connects our three key concepts of conflict, emotions and violence.
The subproject further examines contestations of the past in a political institutional frame. How
do political actors negotiate processes of dealing with history in protracted conflict situations?
Conflicting ways of remembering the past involve differing understandings of the current dynamics of conflict, but also, importantly, may speak to radically different visions for the future.
Understanding the binding functions provided by certain political and epistemological narratives (Brown 2001) is tantamount to transforming them. In the theoretical intersection between the ‘politics of identity’ and ‘politics of memory’, this part of the project focuses on drawing lessons from constitutional scripts and political interventions, where state or civil society
actors actively aim to reimagine the past in ways that can redraw the cognitive and emotive
maps for conflict and act as a restorative rather than a destructive force in political transitions.
WP3. Third party interventions during periods of escalation. Some of the most productive theories and analyses of third party interventions point towards the importance of ‘the ripe
moment’, often understood as involvement when violence has peaked (related to the theory of
‘mutually hurting stalemate’). This might be well-justified academically, but it is naturally an
unpleasant conclusion in human and political terms. Also, given the theme from WP2 about the
reconciliation burden of past violence, this lateness of involvement is unfortunate. It is therefore an important challenge (acknowledged by Ripeness Theory; Zartman/Faure) to develop
insight into modes of third party intervention, targeting phases where new or old conflicts
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escalate, preferably even before the threshold to violence has been crossed. Public policy in
the West has been particularly paralysed in such situations, often leading to military actions,
thus in several situations exacerbating the problems rather than solving them.
Preventing armed conflict requires knowledge about where, when and how it may break out.
Application of conflict theory to available qualitative and quantitative material provides such
‘early warnings’. But an analysis of the ‘time-dynamics’ (Collins 2012) of conflict processes,
attentive to the identity and emotional effects of third party engagements, is equally needed.
It is entirely possible that a particular course of action pursued by A may be helpful, whereas
the same action undertaken by B may not, e.g. because the underlying motivation seems
suspicious. Strategies might aim to incorporate moderate actors in polarised societies, who are
often ignored in the negotiated processes that tend to privilege political and (para)military
elites—and it may be essential to get such actors (e.g. clan elders or religious authorities) on
board, even when they are not seen as ‘kindred spirits’ by the West. It will both be essential
to identify ’spoilers’ (Stedman 1997) and to refrain from labelling groups with legitimate
demands as spoilers only because they appear to hinder one particular negotiated solution.
The political will to invest dramatically in non-military interventions during periods of
escalation has often been lacking. This might change if a strong case could be made that
prevention can work, offering great humanitarian and financial benefits over military
engagements. Absolute certainty that a course of action will achieve the sought-for results will
rarely be obtainable. Hence there is both a need to take risks, but also for preferring win-win
options. For instance, empowering women may or may not make a resort to violence less
likely, but even if it fails in this respect its effects will still be benign on other counts.
The general approach to conflict analysis presented above in WP1 contains instruments for
locating conditions for impact on escalatory dynamics. The Collins-inspired attention to pathways across the violence boundary points to specific sites of intervention (Collins 2008, 2012).
The more general sociology of emotions plus theories of political identity show how third parties will enter the constellation of collective categories in a way that re-channels the emotional
energies of communities (Block&Siegel; Kaufman). This process must be managed deftly if an
intervention is to prove anti-escalatory rather than just one more factor in the conflict. Understanding the difficulties of violence make it easier to bolster factors of restraint (cf. Strauss).
Narrating international relations in Islamic vernacular - Regional perceptions and third party
intervention (Jung, SDU). The success of third party interventions depends largely on their
reception by those involved in conflict. Since the late 19th century and the rise of PanIslamism, the reference to Islamic traditions has been central in the perception of international
politics by regional actors. The regional narrative of state formation has been Islamised, a tendency strongly reinforced during the past three decades. The history of world politics is often
narrated in an Islamic vernacular and religious actors play an important role in the negotiation
of regional politics. Third party interventions by Western states, therefore, need to understand
these perceptions and to synchronise policies with regional narratives which often contradict
the established narratives of intervening states. The subproject investigates this regional
narrative with respect to its potentials to securitise or de-securitise the relationship of local and
international actors. In contextualizing the conflicts of the Levant against the backdrop of the
larger Muslim world, the subproject also attains comparative and cross-regional dimensions.
Excess of External Actors: Coordinating Conflict Impact (post.doc at IFS, KU). This subproject
on Horn of Africa investigates third party conflict involvement by taking an inclusive approach
to third party (mostly Western, but also Arab and Chinese) impact on local and regional conflicts, including more than what the external actors themselves see as conflict related, i.e., the
impact of aid, investments, good governance, anti-terror, anti-piracy etc., in terms of the way
external actors impact and get drawn into the local conflict formations. The conditions for
explicitly conflict targeted activities are thereby explored more realistically by including other
actions and the mutual conditioning between these. Drawing on the general theories from WP1
(added by WP2 and WP4), we can map the dynamics of the conflict, the flows of emotional
energies and the constellation of identities, thus fathoming the local impact of involvement.
9
The generic cross-regional sub-project in WP3 (Møller, AAU with Leander, CBS) will, first of all,
identify the various intra-regional dynamics in the Horn of Africa (HoA) and the Levant and
compare them to other (sub)regions in the world, e.g. the Persian Gulf region, South and
South-east Asia. Secondly, it will identify the roles played by extra-regional states and international organisations such as the UN and the EU, reviewing their accomplishments and
failures in terms of conflict prevention, management and resolution. Thirdly, it will look at the
(in many cases more successful) roles played by non-state actors - including diaspora groups
and organisations, religious and ethnic authorities, institutions and groupings - on conflicts, not
least those with an intra-state (and sometimes quite local) core combined with a transnational
dimension. In all cases, the role of technologies will be taken into account, not primarily (but
also) military technologies, but rather the various cheap and portable technologies such as
mobile phones and internet-related technologies. These have the ability to impact what is, in
the final analysis, the most important ‘battleground’ - the ‘hearts and minds’ of the people
involved. Technologies may also prove useful in early warning (EW), which has the potential of
directing conflict intervention efforts to where they are most needed. However, one should not
expect to acquire reliable EW just by feeding statistics of dubious reliability into computers
equipped with sophisticated programmes. Several EW initiatives have been taken in the HoA
and will be reviewed for their potentials and possible weaknesses.
WP4. Conflict Expertise. Authoritative knowledge about conflicts (i.e. conflict expertise)
influences how conflicts evolve. It partially shapes the memories and emotions associated with
the conflict. Conflict expertise is therefore significant in shaping third party interventions (WP3)
and the extent to which conflicts become protracted or not (WP2). This is born out in conflict
theory where expert knowledge figures both as a culprit for failure and a source of success
(Chandler 2012; Oren 2003). Consequently, it is difficult to know what ‘the right’ conflict
expertise is and to make it bear on practice. Conflict expertise tends to be contested and
manipulated, and as other areas of expertise, it has been fragmented by the multiplication of
experts and forms of expertise in ‘reflexive’ modernity. Hence, while some bodies of expertise
– economics, medicine, law, traditional security studies – are more smoothly integrated into
the policy formation process, expertise framed in terms of ‘conflict’ is rarely consulted. Rather
than treating this state of affairs as a fatality, CRIC will build on existing research on expertise
in conflict research and engage with Social Studies of Science (STS) where the relation
between expertise and political processes figures prominently (Callon et al 20098; Irwin&
Michael 2003; Nowotny et al 2009; Rappert 2009). The aim is a systematic understanding of
how evolving conflict expertise can be drawn upon to promote non-violent forms of conflict
resolution. To this end, we organise research around three significant changes in the way that
expertise is produced (the increased role of social media, of information technologies and the
reorganisation of academic research). To ensure that this knowledge has relevance for
practice, the ideas will be developed in close collaboration with relevant practitioners.
New social media and TV (Skovgaard-Petersen, TORS, KU with Leander, CBS): This project
proposes to follow and analyse the Syrian debate on how to overcome the sectarian mindset,
focusing on major cultural productions and on the intellectual religious leaders who will be
struggling to convince the public of their sincerity. One part will therefore concentrate on the
treatment of sectarianism in Syrian media, whereas the other part will concentrate on efforts
to organise religious leaders and engage them in anti-sectarian community-building. Syria’s
long-term stability and social peace will depend on how well the new sectarianism can be held
at bay. The problem is that the Assad regime and its media and cultural production already
made significant efforts to discredit sectarianism, even if it discretely operated according to its
logic. Post-conflict Syria will likely make new efforts to overcome a sectarian mindset, but it
will be facing the challenge that anti-sectarian language and assurances are worn and
discredited, and that media practitioners and religious leaders will be known to have employed
it also during the former regime.
Involvement of Islamic religious actors (TORS, KU): In spite of a long history of antisectarianism in Syrian local and public life, tension and conflict between Syria’s various sects
10
has risen dramatically during the 2011-13 uprising. During the conflict, representatives of the
religious communities have been assembled in Beirut and Copenhagen, funded by the Danish
Foreign Ministry, and it is the ambition to gather these people again to discuss strategies for
anti-Sectarianism. In this action research project, CRIC will support and contribute to these
efforts and particularly focus on the role of the Sunni Muslim religious leaders who stand to
gain in the new Syria. Just how will they place themselves between a partly discredited secular
anti-sectarianism, and new equation based on the Sunni ascendancy, offering the prospect of a
Sunni dominated ‘millet-system’, with significant autonomy to the different religious
communities, but Sunni control over society as a whole?
Information Technologies (Leander, CBS with Møller, AAU): This project takes a closer look at
the role of information technologies in shaping expertise about the conflicts in the Horn of Africa. More specifically it looks at how the reliance on standardised categories used by IT systems
for observing, analysing and representing the conflict have come to occupy an increasingly
central place in the expertise about the region. It traces how governments, international organizations (the AU and the UN), armed forces but also non-state actors (including notably insurance and shipping companies and aid agencies) have come to rely on these as the presence of
direct observers has become increasingly scarce. Expertise is produced at a distance and from
above. The project analyses the implications of this for the way the conflicts are understood
and uses the insights to suggest guidelines for dealing with technological expertise in conflicts.
This last part is carried out in close connection with the action research project aiming at the
development of a CRIC early warning system for third party interventions (see WP3).
Sociology of Public Conflict Knowledge (Wæver, IFS, KU w Leander, CBS): Academic expertise
on conflict already exists with much policy-relevant insight. However, practice has routinely
ignored it, partly because academic research has never been but one of many competing forms
of expertise and not always the one considered most trustworthy. The current trends of
transforming conflict expertise dealt with in this WP have accentuated this as suggested by
sociologists of knowledge. Moreover, the emphasis on policy-relevance potentially undermines
the status of academic research as objective and politically neutral and hence ethically
superior. This increases the likelihood that it will be ignored. This subproject will work to
achieve a better understanding of the processes by which academic conflict research (in patchy
and partial fashion) becomes part of public knowledge. We will draw on this research to
facilitate the practitioners and academic engagement around the ‘peace-making toolbox’.
A peace-making toolbox (IFS, KU): Often large-scale international settlements have been
informed by intensive academic endeavours (e.g. President Wilson in 1918; democratic peace
theory at the end of the Cold War). Only more recently have studies explored how scholarly
concepts inform specific processes, while even fewer studies assess successes and seek to
forge this knowledge into specific guides. A subproject aims to generate such expertise by
engaging practitioners in the field in workshops to generate a ‘peace-making toolbox’.
Experimental workshops on the HoA case (some of it in cooperation with the Centre for Military
Studies that hold solid expertise on piracy and practitioners) will be used as basis for
generalisation. Particular attention will be paid to the question of what formats of knowledge
are both manageable politically and defensible academically. How can boundaries of
applicability be specified better than in the past?
Methodology and research strategy: The centre is multidisciplinary and optimal methods
vary between subprojects. However, the team’s focus on joint theory will ensure consistency
and coherence. In addition to the purely intellectual case for a strong theory component, there
are two organisational reasons.
1: A centre for conflict resolution easily disintegrates into specialists, experts in their own
cases, but without a common research culture. Ongoing work on theory can galvanise an infrastructure of shared concepts and ideas that make a research institute more productive.
2: Even if the funding now allocated to peace and conflict research is sizable by Danish standards, the research unit will be small in international comparison. Other research centres have
11
scores of researchers concentrated in one specialised area. If Denmark is to be an attractive
partner in global collaboration and make its mark, this is best achieved by theory, where
quantity less easily translates into superiority, and where we start from a strong position.
CRIC engages in ‘action research’, i.e., in research that directly involves researchers in the
practice researched. This raises distinct methodological (and ethical) concerns and the relevant
literature on this will be mobilised in the CRIC process.
One particularly uncertain element in the research design is the close integration aspired for,
which has become even more demanding in the three-year format (compared to the original
five-year format). It is important that key theoretical ideas are in general circulation from the
very start, and a major seminar on conflict theory will therefore form the starting event.
Another element that we will pay particular attention to is the mix of comparability and
difference between the two regions and individual cases within these. Our strategy to handle
this will be to embed discussions of comparative insights into collaboration with real area
specialists, rather than parcelling it out to abstract social science at a distance.
The specific multidisciplinarity of CRIC is driven by the main objective to understand conflict in
all its complexity, i.e. the task is not served by just any multidisciplinarity). Conflicts involve
historical preconditions, actual social life conditions, discursive and social formation of
identities and social processes of group formation and national and international alliances.
Consequently, the working together of researchers from especially sociology, international
relations and regional specialists from the humanities and social sciences is necessary to
satisfy the object of CRIC.
7. Project plan
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It is central to the ambitious research strategy of CRIC that theory performs an integrative and
inspiring function for all sub-projects; therefore several theory-focused activities will be placed
early in the programme. One will be an extensive cross-perspectival stocktaking of insights
from different traditions. This is already being prepared, and as it will take too long to get
these people together in time, we are doing it with our own funds. Another will focus on the
microsociological theory that informs CRIC’s distinct perspective. Here we are fortunate that
the eminent sociological theorist Randall Collins (author of the 1975 classic ‘Conflict
Sociology’), having recently published his ‘general theory’ in Interaction Ritual Chains (2004)
and its revolutionary implications for the study of violence in Violence (2008), now studies
macro patterns of violence such as contemporary high-tech war, comparative studies of
organized crime; and future crises of capitalist economies. Collins will be invited to present this
work in a larger working seminar for discussion and inspiration across disciplines. Also, both
the international advisory board and the Danish practitioners will meet very early in the
process in order to guide the precise design of the different projects.
As the figure above shows, CRIC is built as a matrix, and in order to achieve true integration it
has been crucial that a full column or row is not confined to one department. A WP or a region
should not become a local business for one partner only. The participating departments will be
‘forced’ to cooperate, ensuring that the centre as a physical locale will truly become a centre.
Nevertheless, some joint seminars will be located at other partner institutions to stimulate
local interest in peace and conflict research. The Centre for Contemporary Middle East Studies,
for instance, will appoint a guest professor in the field and organise a workshop at SDU
together with him/her on conflict dynamics in the Levant.
The project does not have separate phases, enabling the definition of milestones in the
classical sense. However, it is crucial to assess the project annually together with the two
advisory panels ensuring that it progresses along its parallel tracks and that sufficient
interaction keeps terminology and key ideas consistent. Two thoroughly co-authored works
(involving the core group) will have a particularly integrative role. Nothing brings scholars
closer together than actually writing joint text, and these projects will ensure a cumulative
core for the series of research seminars: The chapters for the joint book. The first product, a
programmatic article, will place the research agenda of CRIC and the WPs in the context of a
general presentation of state of the art in conflict research. The second, a book, will present
the findings across WPs and cases.
All partner institutes contribute significant resources and have committed to the project. All the
core team members have assigned 20-50% of their time to the project. For the phase two
application, the departments were willing to pay most, and receive only 10% of their salary
from DCSR/CRIC. However, the DSCR have convinced us of the utility of basing the project
more solidly on resources from the grant, so most core group members are now financed 25%.
On top of this, several other researchers – as listed below – deliver research time fully paid for
by their own departments. Similarly, the departments provide between 1/3 and ½ co-financing
of all post.doc.s and PhDs.Additional interested researchers have been mobilised who already
have their own research funded but see promising synergies and, therefore, are willing to
participate in the project. Some of these projects are mentioned in the description of the WPs,
but they are not included in the matrix, in order to demonstrate that we do not rely on these
‘complimentary’ researchers. Although we are confident that they are committed and
motivated to participate, we have now constructed the project in a manner where all necessary
components are paid by CRIC’s own budget.
Notable additional researchers are:
Prof. Martin Beck, SDU, is a renowned Middle East specialist with solid experience both from
the region and from interaction with practitioners. Newly arrived to Denmark, the CRIC context
will be of particular mutual benefit.
Henrik Vigh, Anthropology, KU, combines fieldwork experience in Africa and Northern Ireland
with relevant theoretical ambitions.
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SDU will hire a (yet to be named) visiting full professor for a year, combining the areas of
peace and conflict research with Middle East Studies, who will also be drawn into the project.
Rebecca Adler-Nissen, IFS, has published prominently in the emerging field at the interface of
micro-sociology and International Relations.
8. Project’s international dimension
Researchers in CRIC, and especially the core group, are well connected to the leading
international networks in their respective fields (cf. CVs), hence it is impossible within the
limited space here to list the general international dimension of work. On the basis of
established publication and citation records, it can fairly be expected that work from CRIC can
find its way to leading journals and conferences in the disciplines of political science,
international relations, security studies, sociology, anthropology, international political
economy, Middle East studies, Islam studies, African studies and STS. Specifically, in relation
to peace and conflict research and conflict resolution, the high-powered scientific advisory
board (sect. 11) will be important in spreading the news of the centre to relevant networks.
While CRIC researchers already have a high international profile and strong networks in their
‘home disciplines’, the fields of peace and conflict research and conflict resolution have been
less clearly present in Denmark for more than a decade since the closure of COPRI,
Copenhagen Peace Research Institute. While individual scholars (partly based on the COPRI
record) continued to have some claim to be card-carrying members of peace and conflict
research, and some work from Danish scholars was read and discussed in peace and conflict
research internationally, the field as such has not been very visible in Denmark. It has been
taught very little in Danish universities, rarely presented to the public and seldom gathered on
Danish ground. An important element in the international dimension of CRIC will therefore be
to bring leading scholars and representatives of different traditions of forms of scholarship to
Denmark to re-connect Danish academe to peace and conflict research internationally.
Special mention should be made of some partners in the regions studied, where CRIC can
contribute to capacity-building, while benefiting from collaboration with local specialists. The
Institute of Peace and Security Studies (IPSS) at the University of Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, is a
new regional institute, offering MA and PhD degrees in peace and security studies. Bjørn Møller
already has quite extensive collaboration with the IPSS, having taught courses for the MA
programme, and being affiliated as an external supervisor for PhD students. The Institute of
Peace and Strategic Studies in Gulu Uganda is another partner with potential for future
capacity-building. SDU has a collaborative project with Jordanian universities and close
contacts to Koc University in Istanbul and Middle East Technical University in Ankara. Jakob
Skovgaard-Petersen’s research centre has extensive research contacts in the region, e.g.
toIslamic Studies Institute at Qatar Foundation and several institutes in Cairo.
9. Legal and ethical aspects, etc.
The project is not expected to raise any distinctive legal issues beyond those commonly
confronted by researchers. (This in contrast to an earlier version of the project, where planned
experiments with ‘safe deposits’ for oral history from Northern Ireland was addressed in this
section regarding both legal and ethical aspects. However, this sub-project has been removed
from the research agenda of CRIC, following advice from both external reviewers and the
programme committee.)
Ethical issues relate to the responsibility and role of researchers when engaging with actors
with practical involvement in social issues that are by definition contested and potentially
impact the life and welfare of millions of people. These are timeless challenges with no final
solution, but the centre will ensure that all researchers are involved in sessions reflecting on
this. To ensure that this ambition is realised, ethical concerns are made an explicit focus in
WP4. The analysis of ‘conflict expertise’ involves clarifying how the limits of conflict expertise
are drawn and hence also what issues, topics, persons and concerns remain excluded.
14
This focus, therefore, ensures that the ethical choices, become part and parcel of CRIC’s
research agenda. This reflexive component is particularly important considering the emphasis
CRIC places on practitioner engagement and action research. This research methodology blurs
the boundaries between the researcher and the researched. Research expertise is therefore
prone to lose its fundamental critical function and become reduced to a policy legitimating
function that is harmful both for science and for practitioners (Haskell, 1998). This makes the
ethical aspects of WP4 particularly central to the research process itself.
10. Publication and promotional strategy and exploitation of results
Research and Policy Agendas: The CRIC programme is sufficiently ambitious and precisely
targeted to impact international research agendas and its results will offer new options for
policy.
Publications: In addition to individual monographs and journal articles targeted at disciplinary top outlets, the tight structure of CRIC allows for multi-authored volumes that integrate
insights across cases. These flagship publications will structure close cooperation. As mentioned above (7.), two of the co-authored works involve the core group. Other co-authored and
edited books follow the WP structure. An interdisciplinary effort like CRIC demands a conscious
strategy in relation to publications. All researchers will target some specialised articles to their
key disciplinary journals, whereas the field of conflict research will be engaged first through
conferences and edited volumes, and later through empirical results and, if possible, the most
pointed theoretical conclusions in specialised journals of peace and conflict research.
Education: Beginning with a summer school, joint courses are to be offered in already
existing programmes, exploring the possibility for a specialised master’s programme possibly
geared towards already established professionals. PhD training will be given priority.
Since the scholars in CRIC are based in a number of different universities and disciplines, they
will bring peace and conflict research issues to the education of a large number of students
and future researchers, stimulating thesis-writing and the recruitment of future talents to
peace and conflict research in Denmark in the long run.
Engagement with professionals: CRIC will organise workshops with relevant professional
groups, facilitating a two-way interaction between research and practice. Practitioners will be
included in the formulation of research questions, not just framed as recipients of answers.
The centre will work closely with relevant practitioners. The ultimate ‘users’ of the knowledge
from the centre will be ordinary people, who survive because a conflict is handled through
peaceful means. Therefore the centre will work closely with practically engaged organisations –
NGOs, IGOs and foundations – in the regions, while a user panel is composed of Danish
practitioners for regular meetings (all have accepted):





Anders Ladekarl, General Secretary, Red Cross in Denmark
Birgitte Qvist-Sørensen, International Director, DanChurchAid
Søren Friis, Chairman of the Board, RIKO (Council for International Conflict Resolution)
Ole Kværnø, Director, Institute for Strategy, The Royal Danish Defence College
Klaus Ljoerring Pedersen, Regional Director & Representative for Armed Violence
Reduction, Danish Demining Group
 Flemming Bech, Acting Head of Unit, International Assignments, Danish Police
 Stinne Lyager Bech, International Coordinator, Amnesty International
 Mogens Kjær, General Secretary, Danmission
 Aase Rieck Sørensen, Centre Leader, The Danish Centre for Conflict Resolution
 Jan Ole Haagensen, Director of International Department, Rehabilitation and Research
Centre for Torture Victims
 Lars Lose, Political Director, Undersecretary for Global Politics and Security, Foreign
Ministry
 Erik Bjerager, Editor in Chief Kristeligt Dagblad, Chairman of World Editors Forum, World
Association of Newspapers and News Media
In addition to direct engagement with practitioners, the wider public will be serviced both
through special seminars and through the media. Several CRIC researchers are experienced in
15
this regard, and the creation of CRIC will make journalists more aware of the importance of
obtaining comments from a conflict research angle in their coverage of current challenges.
11. The participating parties, project management and the centre function
The projects are directed by members of the core team who represent solid expertise on the
regional cases and the relevant theories: Dietrich Jung (SDU), Anna Leander (CBS), Sara
Dybris McQuaid (AU), Bjørn Møller (AAU), Jakob Skovgaard-Petersen (TORS, KU) and Ole
Wæver (IFS, KU). To ensure coherence, the sub-projects are entwined across institutions and
all projects are firmly anchored at the CRIC Centre in Copenhagen.
The management structure is built around a director with extensive experience of running
large, interdisciplinary research projects and a tight matrix, in which each project has a leader
from the core group, and each region also has one main coordinator. An experienced senior
researcher (Poul Poder) with a key role in the theory part, and thus working across regions,
hired full time for CRIC, will be deputy director at the centre. The core team of research
leaders covers five of Denmark’s main universities, yet all six live in Copenhagen and will
spend time at the new centre, ensuring that it becomes an actual centre, not a loose network.
CRIC can draw on outstanding research environments at the major Danish universities. This
includes the research on collective memory at Aarhus University, where the research
programme ’Globalisation, Migration and Memory’ has a strong focus on individual and
collective memory, understood as present usages and portrayals of the past not least in the
aftermath of political violence and terrorism.
It also includes the strong research environment on sociology of knowledge and the social
study of science at CBS. CBS houses major interdisciplinary research projects on new media as
well as a theoretically oriented research community with sufficient international standing to
host the joint convention of the Society for the Social Studies of Science and the European
Association for the Study of Science and Technology in 2012.
The Centre for Contemporary Middle East Studies at SDU disposes over a widespread network
with international institutions and scholars in the fields of Middle Eastern and Islamic studies.
Its research is multidisciplinary and its education (BA and MA courses) is conducted in English,
attracting a substantial number of international students. Moreover, the academic staff has a
long-standing engagement in consultancy work for Danish and international organisations.
University of Copenhagen has a very long history of international prominence in Middle Eastern
and Islamic Studies. In 2008 the Centre for The New Islamic Public Sphere was founded, with
Jakob Skovgaard-Petersen as director. It maps and analyses how new transnational media,
such as satellite TV and the Internet, are changing Islamic norms, politics and identity in the
contemporary Middle East. It has a strong international position, both in global research and in
terms of contacts to media, movements and researchers in the region. Generally, the
Department of Cross-Cultural and Regional Studies houses solid expertise in many regions of
relevance to CRIC and teaches many students who might connect different subjects to peace
and conflict research.
Aalborg University in general, and the Department of Political Science (DPS) in particular, is
home to several teaching and research programmes that are interested in contributing to the
work of CRIC. Global Refugee Studies (with Simon Turner as research coordinator) is a central
participant, focusing on the links between armed conflicts and forced displacement of people,
with geographical foci in Africa, Latin America and the Middle East. A research programme on
‘camps’ is being established. Under the auspices of DPS a couple of study programmes are
under accreditation, including one on Police Studies (in collaboration with the Danish Police)
and another one on the links between Climate Change, Development and the Environment.
The Department of Political Science in Copenhagen is widely recognised as an internationally
strong, theoretically inclusive department within the sub-discipline of International Relations.
This is due, not only, to the great interest in the so-called ‘Copenhagen School’, associated
particularly with Ole Wæver and securitisation theory. A longer tradition for theory has created
a strong and open-minded research community, used to stimulate and engage diverse
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research traditions. The Centre for Advanced Security Theory, directed by Ole Wæver, has
become an important base internationally for interdisciplinary research on risk, dangers and
threats, establishing strong relations to scholars within climate science, geography,
anthropology, law, history, etc., who will be highly relevant to the CRIC project. Poul Poder at
Sociology, KU, is a specialist in Sociology of Emotions and the theory of Randall Collins. He will
relocate to the department of Political Science and CRIC during the project period.
CRIC is a joint effort by these strong research communities that do not currently cooperate,
but would form a unique, interdisciplinary basis for research on conflict and conflict resolution
in Denmark. None of the participating universities have strong research communities on all the
regions to be researched, nor are all the relevant theoretical traditions represented in any one
place. Synergies from cooperation are striking, and a common understanding of the project
has been worked out through regular meetings during the long preparation of the present
application.
The individual case projects will be conducted by one of three kinds of personnel: 1) members
of the core group, with a buy-out from the CRIC budget and providing 20-50% of their
research time, 2) PhDs or post.docs financed by CRIC (in most cases with the departments
providing one to 1½ year of co-financing), 3) colleagues who already do research that fits into
the CRIC research agenda and are attracted by the emerging research community to adjust
their research. Type-3 projects are in no instance mandatory for the project but add-ons to a
basic set-up where type-1 and 2 cover the ground. Coherence will be ensured by an actual
physical centre with regular research seminars, visiting scholars and obligatory stays for those
PhDs or post.docs, who have their main base at other universities. The training of PhDs and
post.docs will be the joint responsibility of the ‘home department’ and the centre. Courses in
conflict research will be coordinated with PhD schools from several disciplines and taught in
English in order to attract students with diverse backgrounds.
Day-to-day leadership is with the director (Wæver), deputy director (Poder) and the
administrative leader of the secretariat; the director refers to the head of departmentThe
centre will be a physically coherent space with contiguous offices and a joint seminar room. It
will have several functions: It will be the daily workplace of many of the researchers;
researchers with their primary location elsewhere will spend shorter periods at the centre;
visiting scholars will work here for varying periods; research and work-in-progress seminars
will be held every 3 weeks and mini-seminars at appropriate intervals; special seminars aimed
at the wider public and at specific groups of practitioners will take place here to ensure general
familiarity with CRIC; and it will be the administrative base for organising larger conferences,
international projects etc.
As explained in section 8, an international scientific advisory board will play important roles. In
addition to those mentioned above, it will critically review the research plans and progress of
the centre, and make sure efforts are optimally coordinated with international state of the art
– not duplicating work done elsewhere, optimally drawing on and cooperating with other
centres, and results disseminated effectively. Sessions with the advisory board will not be
purely organisational but organised to be of substance and mutual scientific value. Open
sessions with selected members of the board will be organised in relation to each meeting.
The Scientific Advisory Board consists of nine highly regarded researchers (all have accepted):
William Zartman, PhD, Professor, Johns Hopkins University, Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced
International Studies, Washington DC.
Laurie Nathan, PhD, Professor, Director of the Centre for Mediation, University of Pretoria,
South Africa.
Mary Kaldor, PhD, Professor, Director of the Civil Society and Human Security Research Unit,
London School of Economics, UK.
Richard English, PhD, Professor, Director of the Centre for the Study of Terrorism and
Political Violence, St. Andrews University, Scotland.
Vivienne Jabri, PhD, Professor, Department of War Studies, King’s College, London.
17
Peter Mandaville, PhD, Associate Professor, PhD, Director, Ali Vural Ak Center for Global
Islamic Studies, George Mason University, Washington DC.
Arlene B. Tickner, PhD, Professor, Universidad de los Andes, Bogotá.
Siniša Malešević, PhD, Professor, Head of School of Sociology at the University College
Dublin, Ireland.
Roger Mac Ginty, Professor of Peace and Conflict Studies at the Humanitarian and Conflict
Response Institute, Department of Politics, University of Manchester, UK.
The scientific advisory board will meet three times during the project, timed with a meeting of
the user panel; a separate meeting for each is combined with a joint session to let the two
groups benefit from each other.
A key consideration in designing the structure of the centre, including the two advisory panels
– international academic and Danish practitioners – is to produce both innovation in research
and policy (during the grant period) and innovation capacity (thus contributing to continued
improvement in conflict resolution in the long run). CRIC is based on partnerships with key
private and public organisations, who are, in their daily work, contributing to conflict
resolution, as well as with recognised international researchers in the field. Cooperation
between practitioners and scholars –at CRIC, in the advisory panel, and other international
collaborators — will include experimental sessions aimed at the exploration and development
of relevant forms of involvement in conflict situations. Thus, all parties will gain practical skills,
working procedures and relevant networks that will strengthen their work independently of
CRIC. It is important to not only ‘transfer knowledge’ in a static sense of research conclusions
forming the premises for policies, but equally to train practitioners in different positions in
practicing themselves a conflict perspective on challenges and developing appropriate tools for
handling difficult situations. Similarly, the partnerships established should have a long term
impact on researchers who gain an ability to frame research questions in a policy relevant
manner.
It is expected that the centre will continue as a unit after the 3 years, although the exact
format will depend on the degree of success with fund raising. After re-creating and
consolidating a peace and conflict research community in DK, the larger network (not only this
exact core group) will constitute the basis from which future support should be sought from
the Nordic Council, the ESF, Horizon2020 and not least private research foundations
(MacArthur, Ford, Carnegie, Thyssen Stiftung and Asian foundations) who are currently
especially inclined to support research of an interdisciplinary kind.
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