By Taylor O’Connor
One of the challenges in understanding peacebuilding, especially for those outside the field, is that there are often as many definitions as there are organizations or practitioners in the room.
In this piece, peacebuilder Taylor O’Connor takes a deep dive into these definitions and unpacks their relevance and implications across different contexts. He also proposes a more human-centered definition — one that resonates with us at The What If.
For him,
peacebuilding is essentially an approach adopted by individuals or groups who meaningfully engage with issues they care about in an effort to build a more peaceful and just world. It includes a wide range of actions, activities, and life choices aimed to transform conflict, delegitimize violence, deconstruct systems that produce inequality, heal suffering, or otherwise remove the causes of war and violence. Building peace should reduce the separation between people and lay the foundation for a more just society.
Read more about the different definitions of peacebuilding and O’Connor’s approach here:
