"The book ... successfully argues that the deep seated and binary moral judgments about the wrongdoing of ex-combatants not only revictimizes the ex-combatant but can also hold back peace processes. ... For academic readers, the book serves as a rich and valuable source of qualitative research, a top text for a university peace programme. Brewer and Wahidin have skilfully crafted the volume to ensure that in each chapter, the reader is grounded in the arguments being made." (Kisane Prutton, The Peace Psychologist, Vol. 30 (2), 2021)
Chapter 1 John D. Brewer and Azrini Wahidin
Introduction
Chapter 2 John D. Brewer
Listening to Ex-Combatants’ Voices
Chapter 3 Azrini Wahidin
Female Ex-Combatants in the Irish Republican Army and the Rocky Road to Peace
Chapter 4 Dave Magee
The Experiences of Loyalist Ex-Combatants on their Journey from Conflict to Peace
Chapter 5 John D. Brewer
‘Sin by silence’: The Claims to Moral Legitimacy Amongst Northern Irish Paramilitaries
Chapter 6 John D. Brewer and Stephen Herron
British Counter Insurgency Veterans in Afghanistan
Chapter 7 Malose Langa, Godfrey Maringira and Modiefe Merafe
Contested Voices of Former Combatants in Post-Apartheid South Africa
Chapter 8 Siphokazi Magadla
The Lives of Women Ex-Combatants in Post-Apartheid South Africa
Chapter 9 Wilhelm Verwoerd and Theresa Edlmann
‘Why Did I Die?’: South African Defence Force Conscripts Pre- and Post-1994
Chapter 10 Allen Kiconco
An African comparison: Girl Soldiers Returning from a Rebel Group in Northern Uganda
Chapter 11 Bhavani Fonseka
Reflections on the Role of Female Cadres in the LTTE
Chapter 12 Ashleigh McFeeters
Media Representations of Women Ex-Combatants in Sri Lanka
Chapter 13 Azrini Wahidin
Concluding reflections
Index
John D. Brewer is Professor of Post Conflict Studies sat Queen’s University Belfast, Northern Ireland, and Honorary Professor Extraordinary at Stellenbosch University, South Africa.
Azrini Wahidin isProfessor of Sociology and Criminology and Co-Director for the Centre for the Study of Women and Gender Studies at Warwick University, UK.
This book develops the discourse on the experiences of ex-combatants and their transition from war to peace, from the perspective of scholars across disciplines. Ex-combatants are often overlooked and ignored in the post-conflict search for memory and understanding, resulting in their voice being excluded or distorted. This collection seeks to disclose something of the lived experience of ex-combatants who have made the transition from war to peace to help to understand some of the difficulties they have encountered in social and emotional reintegration in the wake of combat. These include: motivations and mobilizations to participation in military struggle; the material difficulties experienced in social reintegration after the war; the emotional legacies of conflict; the discourses they utilize to reconcile their past in a society moving forward from conflict toward peace; and ex-combatants’ subsequent engagement – or not – in peacebuilding. It also examines the contributions that former combatants have made to post-conflict compromise, reconciliation and peacebuilding. It focusses on male non-state actors, women, child soldiers and, unusually, state veterans, and complements previous volumes which captured the voices of victims in Northern Ireland, South Africa and Sri Lanka. This volume speaks to those working in the areas of sociology, criminology, security studies, politics, and international relations, and professionals working in social justice and human rights NGOs.