Dissolving the conflict mesh: Opportunities and limits of local peace agreements

In recent years, the difficulties and failures of national level peace processes have prompted increased attention on ‘the local’ as a space of conflict resolution.

The papers presented here suggest both the existence of local peacemaking, and the impossibility of delimiting what is merely ‘local’ about it. This in turn points to a need for a new political imaginary for peace processes, which would go beyond the idea that it is about brokering elite pacts reached in a comprehensive peace agreement.

The contributions to this Collection all conclude that local agreements deserve greater attention as a peacemaking tool. They also demonstrate variation in how local agreements are used within and across contexts, and indicate significant involvement of international actors in many contexts.