U.S. and Non-U.S. Scholars

Fulbright New Century Scholars Program
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John Darby

Professor
University of Ulster
Violence: Post-Accord Problems During Peace Processes
United Kingdom

John Darby is Professor Emeritus at the University of Ulster and lives in Northern Ireland. During the fall semester he works with the Kroc Institute in the University of Notre Dame, where he is Professor of Comparative Ethnic Studies. He was founding director of INCORE, a joint programme of the Tokyo-based United Nations University and the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland. He has held visiting positions in Harvard and Duke Universities, and has been a fellow of the Rockefeller Foundation in Bellagio (1990), the Woodrow Wilson Center in Washington (1992) and the United States Institute of Peace (1998). He currently holds two honorary positions: President of the Ethnic Studies Network, and adjunct Professor at the University of Sunderland.
Dr. Darby has written or edited eleven books, and more than 100 academic publications, mostly dealing with the conflict in Northern Ireland and ethnic conflict internationally. Three of the books were listed for international awards, one short-listed for the American Sociological Association Distinguished Scholarly Publication award in 1986.

Selected Publications:

Contemporary Peacemaking. London, Palgrave/Macmillan, 2003. (Ed. with Roger MacGinty.)
Guns and Government. London, Palgrave, 2002. (Ed. with Roger MacGinty.)
The Effects of Violence on Peace Processes. Washington, D.C., U.S. Institute of Peace, 2001.
The Management of Peace Processes. London, Macmillan, 2000. (Ed. with Roger MacGinty.)

Violence: Post-accord Problems during Peace Processes

This proposal aims to examine violence as a major threat to contemporary peace processes, especially after peace accords have been signed. It is argued that peace processes are threatened by violence in four principal forms: violence by the state, violence by militants, violence in the community and new security-related issues during negotiations. Each form presents different threats, and has different policy implications. The proposed research aims to develop the analysis through case studies, to focus on the effects of violence on post-accord peace building, and to examine the policy options for each form of threat.

The key questions driving this proposal are: Under what circumstances does violence become a serious threat to a peace process, especially after accords have been agreed? Why does post-accord violence take different forms in different settings? What policy approaches are best suited to address the different forms of violence? In order to answer these questions, it is proposed to conduct a comparative study of post-accord violence in Northern Ireland, South Africa and (possibly) El Salvador, including successful and failed policies.

This project meets the Fulbright aim 'to identify those settings that might provide cases for intensive study' by focusing of settings where peace accords have been agreed, but where problems of violence continue. It also appears to fit in well with the work of a number of other Fulbright Fellows who are conducting comparative projects.