Book Discussion: Building Peace After War

At a time when more peacekeepers are deployed around the world than at any other point in history, is the international will to rebuild war-ravaged societies beginning to wane? How capable are the systems that exist for planning and deploying ‘peacebuilding’ missions?

Mats Berdal is Professor of Security and Development in the Department of War Studies at King’s College London and a Senior Consulting Fellow at the International Institute for Strategic Studies (IISS). From 2000 to  2003 he was the Director of Studies at the IISS in London.Recent publications include Building Peace After War (Routledge, 2009), United Nations Interventionism,1991-2004, edited with Spyros Economides (Cambridge University Press, 2007), and “The UN Security Council and Peacekeeping” in The Security Council and War: The Evolution of Thought and Practice since 1945, edited by Vaughan Lowe, Adam Roberts, Jennifer Welsh and Dominik Zaum (Oxford University Press, 2008). Other notable publications include: “How ‘New’ are ‘New Wars’ ? - Global Economic Change and the Study of Civil wars” for Global Governance (2003), “The UN Security Council: Ineffective but Indispensable” for Survival (2003), and Greed and Grievance: Economic Agendas in Civil Wars, edited with David Malone (Lynne Rienner, 2000).