Building Peace in the Shadow of War : Women-to-Women Diplomacy as Alternative Peacebuilding Practice in Myanmar

• Conventional assumptions locating peacebuilding temporally after violence have largely prevented exploration of how peacebuilding is practiced amidst conditions of ongoing violence. This article addresses this gap by analysing how Myanmar women's activists have devised strategies in pursuit of peace, amidst ongoing armed conflict, from the 1990s and onwards. The findings demonstrate that women's inter-ethnic cooperation contributed to transform conflict divides long before the initiation of formal national peace negotiations in 2011. Further, theorizing these peacebuilding practices, the article provides new insights into the dynamics of women's peace activism of relevance beyond the case of Myanmar.

Subject headings

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Statsvetenskap (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Political Science (hsv//eng)

Keyword

Women's activism

gender equality

inter-ethnic dialogue

Women's League of Burma

Peacebuilding

freds- och konfliktforskning

Peace and Conflict Research

Publication and Content Type

ref (subject category)

art (subject category)