Peaceland Quotes

“Throughout Peaceland, inequality permeates the relationships between interveners and local stakeholders.”
― Severine Autesserre, Peaceland: Conflict Resolution and the Everyday Politics of International Intervention

“...international peacebuilders usually arrive in new theaters of deployment with a clear sense of belonging to a specific group – a group markedly different from local populations.”
― Severine Autesserre, Peaceland: Conflict Resolution and the Everyday Politics of International Intervention

“At first glance, one might assume that a peacekeeping soldier from Pakistan, a diplomat from the United States, and a human rights advocate from Senegal would approach their jobs quite differently. Yet, while in Congo for a previous research project, I observed striking similarities in the ways that international interveners understand the situations they face and in the strategies they adopt, despite their otherwise extremely different national, professional, social, and economic backgrounds.”
― Severine Autesserre, Peaceland: Conflict Resolution and the Everyday Politics of International Intervention

“[R]ight when it's at its hardest, right when you want to give up most, that's when your commitment to the long term is most important. Because unlike you, the people you want to help can't just leave.”
― Severine Autesserre, Peaceland: Conflict Resolution and the Everyday Politics of International Intervention

“I was so eager to make a difference in the lives of war-affected populations that I did not pause to reflect on the practices I followed while trying to accomplish this goal. It was not until I stepped outside of the expatriate bubble that I realized what an odd, self-contained community we interveners were.”
― Severine Autesserre, Peaceland: Conflict Resolution and the Everyday Politics of International Intervention

“They base their programs on local demands and ideas, put local staff in management positions, strive to be accountable to intended beneficiaries, rely on neighboring citizens to ensure their security; in brief, they escape the dominant modes of operation, suggest alternate ones, and in doing so undermine Peaceland’s structure of inequality.”
― Severine Autesserre, Peaceland: Conflict Resolution and the Everyday Politics of International Intervention