Doctoral Dissertation Research: Understanding How Community-Led Efforts of Maintaining Peace Can be Effective in Areas of Long-Term Armed Conflict

这个博士论文研究项目调查了国家和非国家武装团体之间长期武装冲突期间平民社区建设和平所需的工作。它提供了四个重要贡献：（1）该项目提供的观点和想法将有助于世界各地受武装冲突影响的许多平民社区执行社区主导的建设和平战略;（2）对社区主导的建设和平的分析将有助于国际建设和平工作者、政府官员、在设计和实施自下而上的和平建设项目方面，帮助美国和全球的决策者;（3）关于在战争期间保护平民生命所需的当地进程的数据将有助于理解当地的和平建设，（4）该项目提供的研究方法和工具将有助于民间社区、民间社会组织和学者评估社区领导的建设和平项目。作为博士论文研究改进奖，该奖项还将提供支持，使有前途的学生建立一个强大的独立的研究生涯。鉴于国际建设和平干预措施在世界许多地方保持和平方面的局限性，和平学者和实践者在过去十五年中一直侧重于地方建设和平的做法。然而，虽然这种对地方建设和平努力的关注揭示了国际一级以外的做法和行为体的重要性，但大多数研究仍然侧重于国家行为体和进程，而不是基层建设和平做法。本项目调查基层建设和平的一种形式：社区领导的和平区现象。通过参与观察、半结构化深入访谈和档案研究等人种学方法，该项目审查了（1）平民社区在维持和平区方面所需的日常工作;（2）社区在维持和平区方面所借鉴的历史、价值观和规范;以及（3）平民、国家、非国家行为体和民间社会组织之间的战略关系和互动，使社区能够建设和保持和平。该项目的关键是重新定义和平，超越其对没有暴力的主要定义，并将建设和平作为一个国家领导、专家驱动和解决冲突的技术项目。虽然这个博士论文的研究项目将集中在菲律宾当地的和平建设，研究将提供新的见解和方法，在当地平民一级维持和平与长期武装冲突的地区，在许多地方，包括在美国的地方。

This doctoral dissertation research project investigates the work required from civilian communities in building peace during prolonged armed conflict between state and non-state armed groups. It offers four important contributions: (1) Perspectives and ideas provided by this project will be useful to many civilian communities affected by armed conflicts around the world in implementing community-led peacebuilding strategies; (2) Analysis on community-led peacebuilding will be useful to international peacebuilding practitioners, government officials, and policy-makers in the US and globally in designing and implementing bottom-up peacebuilding projects; (3) Data on indigenous processes required in protecting civilian lives during war will be useful toward understanding indigenous peacebuilding, an emerging theme at the United Nations (UN); (4) Research methodology and instruments provided by this project will be useful to civilian communities, civil society organizations, and scholars in evaluating community-led peacebuilding projects. As a Doctoral Dissertation Research Improvement award, this award also will provide support to enable a promising student to establish a strong independent research career.Given the limits of international peacebuilding interventions in sustaining peace in many places around the world, peace scholars and practitioners have focused on local peacebuilding practices in the last fifteen years. However, while this focus on local efforts in peacebuilding reveals the significance of practices and actors beyond the international level, most research remains focused on national actors and processes rather than grassroots peacebuilding practices. This project investigates one form of grassroots peacebuilding: the phenomenon of community-led peace zone. Through ethnographic methods of participant observation, semi-structured in-depth interviews, and archival research, this project examines (1) the daily work required from civilian communities in maintaining the peace zone; (2) the histories, values, and norms that the community draws upon to do so; and (3) the strategic relationships and interactions among civilians, state, non-state actors, and civil society organizations that allow communities to build and sustain peace. At stake in this project is a reconceptualization of peace beyond its dominant definition of the absence of violence, and peacebuilding as a state-led, expert-driven, and technical project of conflict resolution. Although this doctoral dissertation research project will focus on local peacebuilding in the Philippines, the research will provide new insights and approaches for maintaining peace at the local civilian level in areas with chronic armed conflict in many places, including localities in the United States.