Open AccessIntroduction to the Special Issue: Power and Conflict
Author(s) -
Daniel Rothbart
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
peace and conflict studies
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.116
H-Index - 6
ISSN - 1082-7307
DOI - 10.46743/1082-7307/2020.1828
Subject(s) - power (physics) , peacebuilding , political science , politics , state (computer science) , population , conflict transformation , sociology , criminology , social psychology , political economy , psychology , law , computer science , physics , demography , algorithm , quantum mechanics
This Special Issue of Peace and Conflict Studies focuses on the power dynamics that drive participants of protracted violent conflicts. Such dynamics undergird every act of brute force by militants of such conflicts, every state policy that diminishes the lives and life prospects of marginalized people, and every public speech by a political leader that degrades a segment of the population as inferior, dangerous or impure. Despite the ubiquity of power to violent conflicts generally, this subject matter lacks primacy as a central topic of prevailing conflict theories. Power is cast tacitly as secondary to the cardinal categories of violence, conflict and peacebuilding. This subordinate positioning is mistaken. A robust understanding of protracted violent conflicts requires attending to power’s complexity, its many forms, and its inseparability in the interactions and potential transformation of conflict actors.