The Local Dynamics of Violence in Post-Accord Guatemala: Historical legacies, community cleavages and grassroots agency.

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The conceptualisation of peace as a limiting negative epistemology -the absence of war, needs to be overcome. Central America's internal armed conflicts ended in the 90s. Today, violence continues to cripple lives, development and democracy. This research aims to explore the strategies that have emerged from the grassroots to tackle this violence epidemic. I seek to fathom their relationship to the varying types and levels of violence in Guatemala and El Salvador. Further, I intend to document manifestations of hybridity in the interaction between local efforts and international actors. This evidence will add to Peace Studies theoretical debates on hybridity in peacebuilding and will advance efforts driving towards contextual, positive conceptualisations of peace. The policy implications of the proposed research are wide, since the project grapples with questions of why ambitious peacebuilding efforts have failed to render peaceful societies. This knowledge will contribute to our understanding of conflict transformation processes and their impact on conflict-affected peoples.