Reconceptualizing Spoiling in Peace Processes
(2007)Department of Political Science
- Abstract
- Ending conflict and generating peace is an undertaking challenged by many
threats. This essay deals with one of those, spoiling, i.e. actions that aim to
destroy peace processes. The spoiling concept is a young phenomenon in political
science. The author argues that the concept nonetheless carries a number of flaws.
Those are the concept's definitional vagueness, normative underpinnings, and
under-emphasis of the ?structure and agency?-relationship. Thus, a
reconceptualization is proposed.
The reconceptualization is undertaken with focus on the denotative definition,
i.e. the boundaries- and membership definition, by engaging a behaviour-based
model for assessing acceptable and unacceptable behaviour in the spoiling realm.
... (More) - Ending conflict and generating peace is an undertaking challenged by many
threats. This essay deals with one of those, spoiling, i.e. actions that aim to
destroy peace processes. The spoiling concept is a young phenomenon in political
science. The author argues that the concept nonetheless carries a number of flaws.
Those are the concept's definitional vagueness, normative underpinnings, and
under-emphasis of the ?structure and agency?-relationship. Thus, a
reconceptualization is proposed.
The reconceptualization is undertaken with focus on the denotative definition,
i.e. the boundaries- and membership definition, by engaging a behaviour-based
model for assessing acceptable and unacceptable behaviour in the spoiling realm.
Special emphasis is accorded to the ?structure and agency?-relationship. The
model is applied to a case study of Hamas.
The essay concludes by defining acceptable behaviour as behaviour that does
not question peace as the goal, but aims at altering the nature of the peace.
Unacceptable behaviour is defined as behaviour that aims at obstructing peace, no
matter its nature. The border between acceptable and unacceptable behaviour is
set to where civilians are targeted as the only mean to alter an asymmetric peace
process. Such a situation should, argues the author, be reminiscent for scrutinizing
of the peace process. (Less)
Please use this url to cite or link to this publication:
http://lup.lub.lu.se/student-papers/record/1321558
- author
- Kolhammar, Tina
- supervisor
- organization
- year
- 2007
- type
- M2 - Bachelor Degree
- subject
- keywords
- Hamas, peace process, reconceptualization, spoiling, structure and agency, Political and administrative sciences, Statsvetenskap, förvaltningskunskap
- language
- English
- id
- 1321558
- date added to LUP
- 2007-06-12 00:00:00
- date last changed
- 2007-06-12 00:00:00
@misc{1321558,
abstract = {{Ending conflict and generating peace is an undertaking challenged by many
threats. This essay deals with one of those, spoiling, i.e. actions that aim to
destroy peace processes. The spoiling concept is a young phenomenon in political
science. The author argues that the concept nonetheless carries a number of flaws.
Those are the concept's definitional vagueness, normative underpinnings, and
under-emphasis of the ?structure and agency?-relationship. Thus, a
reconceptualization is proposed.
The reconceptualization is undertaken with focus on the denotative definition,
i.e. the boundaries- and membership definition, by engaging a behaviour-based
model for assessing acceptable and unacceptable behaviour in the spoiling realm.
Special emphasis is accorded to the ?structure and agency?-relationship. The
model is applied to a case study of Hamas.
The essay concludes by defining acceptable behaviour as behaviour that does
not question peace as the goal, but aims at altering the nature of the peace.
Unacceptable behaviour is defined as behaviour that aims at obstructing peace, no
matter its nature. The border between acceptable and unacceptable behaviour is
set to where civilians are targeted as the only mean to alter an asymmetric peace
process. Such a situation should, argues the author, be reminiscent for scrutinizing
of the peace process.}},
author = {{Kolhammar, Tina}},
language = {{eng}},
note = {{Student Paper}},
title = {{Reconceptualizing Spoiling in Peace Processes}},
year = {{2007}},
}