Building Peace Through Knowledge

This groundbreaking volume documents a comprehensive peacebuilding initiative in addressing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and reviews the broad theoretical base underlying these efforts. Theory chapters discuss intrinsic peace-related concepts, including the nature of conflict, elements of individual and group identity, the long-term psychological effects of prolonged political hostilities, and the mechanisms of reconciliation and inclusiveness. Central to the coverage is the ambitious Building Peace through Knowledge Project, a four-year multidisciplinary program featuring a diverse palette of professional and community interventions to reduce the occurrence and trauma of political violence. The author reveals powerful insights connecting knowledge to peacebuilding by analyzing:  ·         The relationships between attitudes and ideology in intergroup conflict.·         The psychosocial impact of political violence among Israelis and Palestinians.·         The literature on people-to-people interventions (P2Ps) in conflict reduction.·         The roles of forgiveness, reconciliation, and fairness in conflict resolution.·         The methodology and findings of the Building Peace through Knowledge Project.·         The potential of knowledge-based interventions in building sustainable peace in other regions.  Practitioners, mental health professionals, and scholars with interests in multicultural mental health, cross-cultural psychology, political violence, and peace education will look to Building Peace through Knowledge as an ideabook, a mission statement, and a road map toward a more stable world.