This article reviews the
debate on broader and narrower conceptions of peace
and investigates empirical patterns in the first 49 volumes of Journal of Peace Research, with some comparisons with Journal of Conflict Resolution.
The concept of peace has been under discussion in peace research from
its start over 50 years ago. This article reviews the
debate on broader and narrower conceptions of peace
and investigates empirical patterns in the first 49 volumes of Journal of Peace Research, with some comparisons with Journal of Conflict Resolution.
Negative peace, in the sense of reducing war, was the main focus in
peace research from the inception. But positive peace,
in the sense of cooperation or integration, has
also always been on the peace research agenda, as reflected in the
contents
of both journals. Over time, a larger share of the
articles in JPR has ‘violence’ or related terms in the title,
while the incidence of the word ‘peace’ is fairly stable. Furthermore,
articles
on peace generally have fewer citations than those
with violence-related terms. A broad concept of peace, as encouraged by
the definition of positive peace as the reversal of
structural violence, was popular in peace research for a decade or so,
but has largely evaporated. To some extent, peace
research has returned to its original agenda, although the main
attention
has shifted from interstate war to civil war and to
some extent to one-sided and non-state violence. Articles dealing with
patterns of cooperation, the traditional meaning of
positive peace, now tend to address the liberal agenda and ask how they
can foster a reduced probability of violence.
Despite the ‘gender gap’, the increasing share of female authors in the
journal
appears to have had little influence on these
developments although it may well have had other effects.
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