A Critical Approach to Youth Sector Peacebuilding
Dialogue, Politics, and Power
By Andy Hamilton, Mark Hammond and Eliz McArdle
Published
May 13, 2025Page count
208 pagesISBN
978-1447373438Dimensions
234 x 156 mmImprint
Policy PressPublished
May 13, 2025Page count
208 pagesISBN
978-1447373421Dimensions
234 x 156 mmImprint
Policy PressPublished
May 13, 2025Page count
208 pagesISBN
978-1447373445Dimensions
234 x 156 mmImprint
Policy PressPublished
May 13, 2025Page count
208 pagesISBN
978-1447373445Dimensions
234 x 156 mmImprint
Policy Press
A Critical Approach to Youth Sector Peacebuilding
Using Northern Ireland as a compelling case study, this book offers a critique of peacebuilding approaches with young people in contested societies. In the north of Ireland, the spectre of murderous violence is increasingly distant for peace-agreement generations. However, legacies stemming from the 30 years of protracted conflict are ever-present in young people’s segregated lives.
This book presents four distinctive viewpoints that inform contemporary peacebuilding work with young people, revealing divergent purposes and conflicting aspirations. Offering a new model to understand peacebuilding, the authors urge peacebuilding communities around the globe to embrace an increasingly politicising and participative youth peace praxis.
Andy Hamilton is Research Associate at Ulster University.
Mark Hammond is Senior Lecturer in Community Youth Work at Ulster University.
Eliz McArdle is Senior Lecturer in Community Youth Work at Ulster University.
Foreword by Candice Mama
1. Introduction: A critical approach to youth sector peacebuilding
2. Working with young people in a contested society
3. Power and legitimacy: entering the world of the peacebuilder
4. Prewrapped peacebuilding
5. A peacebuilding typology
6. Morphology: an analytical tool for peacebuilding
7. Four viewpoints on youth sector peacebuilding
8. A new model of youth sector peacebuilding
9. Radicalising youth sector peacebuilding
10. Peace activism with and by young people
11. Conclusion: reclaiming a political practice
Appendix
