Conflict Management in International Missions
A field guide
Routledge Studies in Security and Conflict Management Series

This book serves primarily as a field guide and curriculum for organisations training personnel for conflict management missions abroad.

Currently, a gap exists between practitioners and academia in the field of conflict management and peacebuilding. Few practitioners have studied conflict management, and few academics have experience as field workers. Conflict literature contains a range of important insights and analyses, but is useful only to a limited degree to practitioners. This book provides practitioners with a much needed guidebook which is easy to understand, academically solid and which identifies with their mission and helps them relate to real-time challenges in the field. The book focuses on a number of case studies, including peacebuilding efforts in East Timor, and offers a range of practical advice for persons about to embark on a mission, from the receipt of an appointment to establishment in the field and encountering the realities and practical challenges that handling conflicts may imply.

This book will be of much interest to students of conflict management, peacebuilding and conflict resolution, as well as practitioners in the field.

Introduction 1. What you should know about conflict 2. Preparing for mission 3. Establishing in the field 4. Mediation 5. Influence: Psychology versus traditional approaches 6. Peacebuilding 7. When you or your agency becomes party to a conflict Conclusion

Olav Ofstad is an independent researcher and consultant in the field of conflict management, humanitarian assistance and development.