This book is about two prominent issues: conflict prevention, and the media. Conflict prevention is a challenging concept for the media because journalists normally work on current affairs: reporting what is going on now, not trying to change the course of events in the medium or long term. However, the media can also play a determinant role in conflict prevention by providing swift and reliable information of emerging or potential conflicts to local and external actors. Governments, international organizations and public opinion alike need in-depth understanding of pre- and post-conflict social, economic, cultural and political environments in order to fully understand the benefits and feasibility of preventive policies.

Humanitarian crises caused by conflict or natural disasters have become a growing focus of multi-disciplinary studies. Research on response mechanisms to humanitarian crises have likewise undergone rapid developments. This volume addresses in particular urban crises. It is based on conclusions and case studies discussed by scholars and practitioners who gathered together for HumanitarianNet’s Annual Forum 2008 in Odense, Denmark.

The Research Handbook on Conflict Prevention is a cohesive and comparative analysis of the ways in which organised violence is combatted. Renowned experts dissect the complex problem of conflict prevention by investigating its three main aspects: agency, methods and timing.

This book analyses how humanitarian crises, conflicts, and peace processes in the Horn of Africa (HoA) were covered by two different media outlets, the Daily Nation (DN) and the Integrated Regional Information Network (IRIN), currently known as The New Humanitarian. The author develops a new framework called the Four-Part Framework, and examines the coverage of humanitarian crises, conflicts and peace processes, particularly conflicts and peace processes in Kenya, Sudan and South Sudan. Regional conflict and media situations are also discussed in the book, as well as important recommendations that could be applicable in similar situations in other locations.

In the light of a rapidly changing media industry with new technologies, actors and advertising models, and the critical role of media in society, this volume highlights the meaning of different values in media companies and media managers’ decisions. It discusses how economic as well as societal values can be equally integrated in media management processes and how such values affect the internal as well as external environment of media companies. The contributions analyze various issues in media management, such as the relationship between quality and audience demand, the role of branding in building values, changes in the value chain, and the impact of deregulation. Further important topics include hypercompetition, mediatization, challenges for media managers and the meaning of corporate social responsibility.

The book is about the peace implementation process in Bosnia-Herzegovina viewed, or interpreted reasonably, as a continuation of war by other means. Twenty years after the beginning of the Dayton peace accords, we need to summarize the results: the author shares the general agreement in public opinion, according to which the process is a failure. Pehar presents a broad, yet sufficiently detailed, view of the entire peace agreement implementation that preserves 'the state of war,' and thus encourages the war-prone attitudes in the parties to the agreement. He examines the political and narratological underpinnings to the process of the imposed international (predominantly USA) interpretation of the Dayton constitution and peace treaty as a whole. The key issue is the – perhaps only semi-consciously applied – divide ut imperes strategy. After nearly twenty years, the peace in document was not translated into a peace on the ground because, with regard to the key political and constitutional issues and attitudes, Bosnia remains a deeply divided society. The book concludes that the international supervision served a counter-purpose: instead of correcting the aberration and guarding the meaning that was originally accepted in the Dayton peace treaty, the supervision approved the aberration and imposed it as a new norm under the clout of 'the power of ultimate interpretation.'

This book provides a comprehensive, interdisciplinary study of the multiple legacies of Francoist violence in contemporary Spain, with a special focus on the exhumations of mass graves from the Civil War and post-war era. The various contributions frame their study within a broader reflection on the nature, function and legacies of state-sanctioned violence in its many forms. Offering perspectives from fields as varied as history, political science, literary and cultural studies, forensic and cultural anthropology, international human rights law, sociology, and art, this volume explores the multifaceted nature of a society’s reckoning with past violence. It speaks not only to those interested in contemporary Spain and Western Europe, but also to those studying issues of transitional and post-transitional justice in other national and regional contexts.

An investigation of recent developments and trends within the Yugoslav successor states since the signing of the Dayton Agreements in Autumn 1995. This book offers a distinctive and desirable perspective on the seven successor states, their cultures, politics and identities by providing an internal perspective on the region and its developments.

Contemporary Ethnographies is a call to use ethnography in imaginative ways, adjusting to rapidly evolving social circumstances. It is based on a reflexive and theoretically grounded exploration of the author’s two main research projects – the study of the spiritist possession cult of María Lionza in Venezuela, and the analysis of the contemporary exhumation of Civil War (1936–1939) mass graves in contemporary Spain. Ferrándiz critically reviews the labyrinthine and continuous transforming nature of ethnographic engagement. He defends both the need for methodological rigour and the astounding flexibility of ethnography to adjust in creative ways to shifting realities in a dynamic world – a world in which research scenarios multiply, social actors are on the move (physically or digitally), acts of violence proliferate, new technologies are transforming the experience and perception of human life, and the demand, production, circulation and consumption of knowledge is greatly diversified, overshadowing former well established and more hierarchical patterns of diffusion. The book is conceived of as a historically grounded open debate, providing as many certainties as moments of unpredictability and unresolved dilemmas. It is valuable reading for students and scholars interested in ethnographic methods and anthropological theory.

During ten days in July 2008, around fifty students and a dozen professors from twelve different European universities met at the University of Coimbra for the Fifth Intensive Seminar of the European Doctorate Enhancement Programme on Peace and Conflict (EDEN) and discussed the new dimensions of peace and security studies. Their contributions reflect the research agendas of a new generation, who continue to address enduring themes in peace and conflict studies, but whose formative influences are those of a complex post Cold War world.