This book?aims to contribute to?debates about the?concept of ‘quality peace’, and provides an analytical framework?to show?how this concept can be used to evaluate post-conflict peacebuilding through a number of case studies.

The editors and?contributors argue that the quality of the changes in a post-accord state is related to the extent to which peace accords are implemented, the agreed-upon mechanism for the non-violent resolution of the conflict, and the available social space for civil and political actors. To arrive at the concept of ‘quality peace’, they evaluate the existing literature and identify a lack of a satisfactory means of measuring outcomes, and consequently how these might be researched comparatively. Social, political and economic changes take time, and the authors suggest that the step towards that direction is critical to understand the trajectory towards ‘quality peace’ in the post-conflict period and this should be evaluated from multiple dimensions.

The book has three main objectives:

(a)?to demonstrate that the research and practice in the field of peacebuilding should move beyond the notion of absence of war, and one way to do so is by using the new concept of quality peace;

(b) all post-war cases are qualitatively different, and even the most commonly observed outcome is an absence of war;?the book aims to show how these qualitatively different aspects should be researched;

(c) aims to?demonstrate the five dimensions of quality peace; through extensive literature review and empirical evidence, the authors identify and explore five factors considered necessary to evaluate quality peace in a post-accord society, which are (1) post-war security; (2) governance; (3) economic reconstruction; (4) reconciliation and transitional justice; and (4) space for civil society to hold government accountable as well as provide goods and services to citizens when necessary.

This book will be of much interest to students of peace and conflict studies, civil wars, global governance, security studies and International Relations in general.

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Preface, Madhav Joshi & Peter Wallensteen

1. Understanding Quality Peace: Introducing the Five Dimensions, Madhav Joshi and Peter Wallensteen

PART I: Post-War Security

2. Peace Implementation and Quality Peace, Terence Lyons

3. Same Peace ? Different Quality? The Importance of Security Equality for Quality Peace, Louise Olsson

PART II: Governance

4. Governance and negotiations: Whose quality standards?, Roger Mac Ginty

5. Approaches to Negotiations in Post-Civil War Settings: The Role of Local Institutions, Jenny Guardado, Leonard Wantchekon, Sarah Weltman

PART III: Economic Reconstruction

6. Business on the Frontlines, Viva Ona Bartkus

7. Peace processes, economic recovery and development agencies, Achim Wennmann

PART IV: Reconciliation and Transitional Justice

8. Factoring Transitional Justice into the Quality Peace Equation, David Backer

9. The Challenges of Reconciling the Old and the New in Truth and Reconciliation Commission Processes: The Case of Solomon Islands, Karen Brouneus and Holly Guthrey

10. Reconciliation's Contributions to Quality Peace, Alexander Dukalskis, Laura K. Taylor, and John Darby

PART V: Civil Society

11. Is civil society needed for quality peace?, Thania Paffenholz

12. Civil Society and Quality Peace: What happened in El Salvador, Richard Jones

PART VI: Case Studies

13. Quality of Peace in Cambodia: 20 Years after the Paris Peace Agreement, Kheang Un

14: El Salvador Twenty Years Later: Successful Democratization but Questionable Peace, Dinorah Azpuru

15. Quality Peace Northern Ireland Case Study, Colin Knox

16. Mozambique: A Credible Commitment to Peace, Carrie Manning and Chipo Dendere

17. Conclusion: Developing Quality Peace: Moving Forward, Madhav Joshi and Peter Wallensteen