After decades of striving to prevent international conflict, major armed conflicts in the 1990s have taken place within national boundaries. After the series of national independence wars in the 1950s and 1960s and frequent geopolitical wars in the 1970s and 1980s, a category of 'wars of the third kind' prevailed. The aim of this book is to consider the root causes of recent internal conflicts, and to develop long-term conflict prevention strategies from here. New insights suggest the central role of politico-economic inequalities in ethnic, religious and cultural conflict. The United Nations...

Central to the current development debate is the importance of human welfare in the context of group conflict. Hence, when considering ethnic, racial and religious conflict, this debate draws us towards a 'political economy' of conflict. Moreover, notions of an economic paradigm have become prominent when international organizations debate conflict prevention. In looking closer at the 'political economy' of conflict, this publication argues the need to assimilate into our thinking distinct social and ethical economies of conflict prevention. A social economy of conflict prevention considers...