Why local voices matter. Participation of local researchers in the liberal peace debate

Abstract

Most of the critical peace literature has put 'a local turn' as an important aspect of a paradigm shift in liberal peacebuilding, both in academic and practice-oriented terms. Although most of the made criticism is valid, it is still being disputed by Western academics with their epistemologies, ontologies and methodologies. The voice of researchers who live in post-conflict or conflict-affected societies is still very much restricted by structural, institutional or personal constraints. Consequently, by drawing mostly from the experience of local researchers in the Balkans, the paper analyses the main causes for the limited impact of local researchers in the liberal peace debates, and proposes several steps that could lead to their stronger involvement in this discussion.