Skip to main content

Bridging Elite and Grassroots Initiatives: The Road to Sustainable Peace in Syria

  • Chapter
  • First Online:
Post-Conflict Power-Sharing Agreements
  • 699 Accesses

Abstract

Khoury and Ghosn offer a much-needed analysis of reconciliation initiatives that are essential to ensuring a long, stable, and positive peace in Syria. After they explore two types of reconciliation strategies—elite and local levels—they propose that the only way to achieve a positive, stable peace and reconciliation rather than simply absence of violence in Syria is to bridge the gap between power sharing and peacebuilding efforts (i.e. between elite level efforts and local level initiatives).

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 84.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as EPUB and PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info
Hardcover Book
USD 109.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Durable hardcover edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  • Abo Naser, Metwaly, Sara Hellmuller, Leila Hila, Ryme Katkhouda, and Yosra Nagui. 2016. Inside Syria: What Local Actors Are Doing For Peace. swisspeace.

    Google Scholar 

  • Bar Tal, Daniel, and Gemma Bennink. 2004. The Nature of Reconciliation as an Outcome and as a Process. In From Conflict Resolution to Reconciliation, ed. Yaacov Bar-Siman-Tov, 11–38. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Bartlett, Eva. 2014. As Foreign Insurgents Continue to Terrorize Syria, the Reconciliation Trend Grows. Dissident Voice, August 22. http://dissidentvoice.org/2014/08/as-foreign-insurgents-continue-to-terrorize-syria-the-reconciliation-trend-grows/

  • Basedau, Matthias. 2011. Managing Ethnic Conflict: The Menu of Institutional Engineering. GIGA Working Papers 171, June. https://www.giga-hamburg.de/en/system/files/publications/wp171_basedau.pdf. Accessed 8 Sept 2016.

  • BBC. 2013. Guide to the Syrian Rebels. BBC Middle East (BBC News), December 13. http://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-24403003

  • Cafarella, Jennifer, and Genevieve Casagrande. 2015. Syrian Opposition Guide. Institute for the Study of War, October 7. http://understandingwar.org/sites/default/files/Syrian%20Opposition%20Guide_0.pdf. Accessed 8 Sept 2016.

  • Charney, Craig. 2015. Maybe We Can Reach a Solution: Syrian Perspectives on the Conflict and Local Initiatives for Peace, Justice, and Reconciliation. Transitional Justice Research Series, no. 2. The Hague: Syria Justice and Accountability Centre.

    Google Scholar 

  • Cunningham, David. 2006. Veto Players and Civil War Duration. American Journal of Political Science 50 (4): 875–892.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 2010. Blocking Resolution: How External States Can Prolong Civil Wars. Journal of Peace Research 47 (2): 115–127.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • David, Charles-Philippe. 2002. Does Peacebuilding Build Peace? In Approaches to Peacebuilding, ed. Ho-Won Jeong, 18–60. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Derouen, Karl, Jenna Lea, and Peter Wallensteen. 2009. The Duration of Civil War Peace Agreements. Conflict Management and Peace Science 26 (4): 367–387.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fakhoury, Tamirace. 2014. Debating Lebanon’s Power-Sharing Model: An Opportunity or an Impasse for Democratization Studies in the Middle East? Arab Studies Journal 22 (1): 230–255.

    Google Scholar 

  • Ghosn, Faten, and Amal Khoury. 2013. The Case of the 2006 War in Lebanon: Reparations? Reconstruction? Or Both? The International Journal of Human Rights 17 (1): 1–17.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Ghosn, Faten, and Christina Sciabarra. Forthcoming. Analyzing Identity in Peace Agreements, 1989–2005, Peace Research: The Canadian Journal of Peace and Conflict Studies.

    Google Scholar 

  • Haaß, Matthew, and Martin Ottmann. 2015. Buying Peace? The Political Economy of Power-Sharing. GIGA Focus, International Edition no. 9, 2015. https://www.giga-hamburg.de/en/system/files/publications/gf_international_1509.pdf

  • Hamber, Brandon, and Grainne Kelly. 2005. The Challenge of Reconciliation in Post-Conflict Societies: Definitions, Problems and Proposals. In New Challenges for Power-Sharing: Institutional and Social Reform in Divided Societies, ed. Ian O’Flynn and David Russell, 188–203. London: Pluto Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hartzell, Caroline A. 1999. Explaining the Stability of Negotiated Settlements to Intrastate Wars. Journal of Conflict Resolution 43 (1): 3–22.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hartzell, Caroline, and Matthew Hoddie. 2003. Institutionalizing Peace: Power Sharing and Post-Civil War Conflict Management. American Journal of Political Science 47 (2): 318–332.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hartzell, Caroline A., and Matthew Hoddie. 2015. The Art of the Possible: Power Sharing and Post—Civil War Democracy. World Politics 67 (1): 37–71.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hoddie, Matthew, and Caroline Hartzell. 2005. Power Sharing in Peace Settlements: Initiating the Transition from Civil War. In Sustainable Peace: Power and Democracy After Civil Wars, ed. Donald Rothschild and Philip Roeder, 83–106. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Horowitz, Donald L. 2014. Ethnic Power Sharing: Three Big Problems. Journal of Democracy 25 (2): 5–20.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • ———. 1985. Ethnic Groups in Conflict. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Jeong, Ho-Won. 2005. Peacebuilding in Postconflict Societies: Strategy and Processes. Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Kapstein, Ethan, and Amanda Mayoral. 2014. The Economics of the Syrian Crisis. United States Institute of Peace International Network for Economics and Conflict, February 26. http://inec.usip.org/blog/2014/feb/26/economics-syrian-crisis. Accessed 15 June 2016.

  • Khafaji, Isam. 2016. A Bicameral Parliament in Iraq and Syria. Policy Alternatives. Arab Reform Initiative, June. http://www.arab-reform.net/en/node/961. Accessed 8 Sept 2016,

  • Kritz, Neil. 2002. Where We Are and How We Got Here: An Overview of Developments in the Search for Justice and Reconciliation. In The Legacy of Abuse: Confronting the Past, Facing the Future, ed. Alice H. Henkin, 21–47. Washington, DC: The Aspen Institute.

    Google Scholar 

  • Laporte-Oshiro, Alison. 2011 From Militants to Policemen: Three Lessons from U.S. Experience with DDR and SSR. PeaceBrief 115, November 17. Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace. https://www.usip.org/sites/default/files/from%20militants%20to%20policemen.pdf

  • Lederach, John Paul. 1997. Building Peace: Sustainable Reconciliation in Divided Societies. Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Lijphart, Arend. 1977. Democracy in Plural Societies: A Comparative Exploration. 2nd ed. New Haven: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • McCulloch, Allison. 2013. Does Moderation Pay? Centripetalism in Deeply Divided Societies. Ethnopolitics 12 (2): 111–132.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Meernik, James D., Angela Nichols, and Kimi L. King. 2010. The Impact of International Tribunals and Domestic Trials on Peace and Human Rights after Civil War. International Studies Perspectives 11 (4): 309–334.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Mitchell, Christopher, and Landon Hancock, eds. 2012. Local Peacebuilding and National Peace: Interaction Between Grassroots and Elite Processes. New York: Continuum International Publishing Group.

    Google Scholar 

  • National Reconciliation and Negotiation: The Path Forward in Iraq and Syria. Initiative for Track II Dialogues, Middle East Institute, co-sponsored with the John Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS), December 15, 2014. http://www.mei.edu/sites/default/files/Final%20SAIS%20report.pdf

  • Pfiffner, James. 2010. US Blunders in Iraq: De-Baathification and Disbanding the Army. Intelligence and National Security 25 (1): 76–85.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Pugh, Michael, ed. 2000. Regeneration of War-Torn Societies. New York: St. Martin’s Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rosiny, Stephen. 2015. A Quarter Century of ‘Transitory Power-Sharing’. Lebanon’s Unfulfilled Ta’if Agreement of 1989 Revisited. Civil Wars 17 (4): 487–502.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Salamey, Imad. 2009. Failing Consociationalism in Lebanon and Integrative Options. International Journal of Peace Studies 14 (2): 83–105.

    Google Scholar 

  • Salem, Paul. 2011. Lebanon. In The Middle East, ed. Ellen Lust, 12th ed., 530–550. Washington DC: CQ Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Snyder, Jack, and Leslie Vinjamuri. 2003/2004. Trials and Errors: Principle and Pragmatism in Strategies of International Justice. International Security 28 (3): 5–44.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Syria Solidarity Movement. 2018. www.syriasolidaritymovement.org

  • The Editorial Board. 2014. A Risky Bet on Syrian Rebels. Sunday Review. The New York Times, September 18. https://www.nytimes.com/2014/09/14/opinion/sunday/a-risky-bet-on-syrian-rebels.html?_r=0

  • Turkmani, Rim, Mary Kaldor, Wisam Elhamwi, Joan Ayo, and Nael Hariri. 2014. Hungry for Peace: Positives and Pitfalls of Local Truces and Ceasefires in Syria. http://www.lse.ac.uk/internationalDevelopment/research/CSHS/pdfs/Home-Grown-Peace-in-Syria-report-final.pdf

  • United States Institute of Peace. 2004. Truth Commission: Morocco, December 1. http://www.usip.org/publications/truth-commission-morocco. Accessed 9 Sept 2016.

  • United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHCR). n.d. Report of the Independent International Commission of Inquiry on the Syrian Arab Republic. http://www.ohchr.org/Documents/HRBodies/HRCouncil/CoISyria/A-HRC-23-58_en.pdf

  • Vandeginste, Stef, and Chandra Lekha Sriram. 2011. Power Sharing and Transitional Justice: A Clash of Paradigms? Global Governance: A Review of Multilateralism and International Organizations 17 (4): 489–505.

    Google Scholar 

  • Walter, Barbra. 2013. The Four Things We Know About How Civil Wars End (and What This Tells Us About Syria). Political Violence @ a Glance, October 18. https://politicalviolenceataglance.org/2013/10/18/the-four-things-we-know-about-how-civil-wars-end-and-what-this-tells-us-about-syria/

  • Zraick, Karen. 2016. Syria Talks Are Complicated by Competing Opposition Groups. New York Times, February 4. http://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/30/world/middleeast/syria-talks-geneva-opposition.html?_r=1

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Faten Ghosn .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2018 The Author(s)

About this chapter

Cite this chapter

Khoury, A., Ghosn, F. (2018). Bridging Elite and Grassroots Initiatives: The Road to Sustainable Peace in Syria. In: Salamey, I., Abu-Nimer, M., Abouaoun, E. (eds) Post-Conflict Power-Sharing Agreements. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-60104-5_3

Download citation

Publish with us

Policies and ethics