Mass-Violence and Struggle for Recognition in Identity Conflicts - Negotiating Memories and Justice in the Philippines
TO BLOCK THE SLIPPERY SLOPE: REDUCING IDENTITY CONFLICTS AND PREVENTING GENOCIDE, Mark Anstey, Paul Meerts and I. William Zartman, eds., University of Georgia Press, 2010
Posted: 22 Jun 2010 Last revised: 28 Oct 2010
Date Written: June 21, 2010
Abstract
The Southern Philippines provides an interesting example of how violence contributes to the development and maintenance of identity in a self-sustaining conflict cycle. It reflects a conflict whose complexity has been reduced simplistically to one of a Muslim minority in contest with the state. An intervention based on superficial analysis may however not simply fail to resolve the conflict and end the violence, but fuel new conflicts. This paper proposes a disaggregation of the levels of conflict and the design of interventions appropriate to each to raise prospects of success. Particular attention is given the role of civil society and NGO’s in peace processes.
Keywords: Philippines, Identity Conflicts, Religion, Ethnicity, Mindanao, Violence, Recognition
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