The EU and the IsraeliPalestinian Conflict 19712013: In Pursuit of a Just Peace

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Just peace has been much talked about in everyday life, but it is less well researched by academics. The rationale of this book is therefore to probe what constitutes a just peace, both conceptually within the field of peacebuilding and empirically in the context of the EU as a peacebuilder in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The EU has used the term just peace in many of its most important declarations on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict throughout the years. Defining a just peace is about these declaratory efforts by the EU to articulate a common formula of a just peace in the conflict. Securing and building a just peace are about the EUs role in implementing this formula for a just peace in the conflict through the creation of a Palestinian state. As the EU enters its fifth decade of involvement in the conflict, there can be little doubt that in common with the rest of the international community it has failed in its efforts to establish a just peace between Israelis and Palestinians. While this is an inescapable overall conclusion from four decades of EC/EU peacebuilding in the conflict, it is, at the same time, possible to draw a number of other conclusions from this book. Most importantly, it argues that the EU is a major legitimizing power in the conflict and that it has kept the prospects of a two-state solution alive through its support for the Palestinian statebuilding process.

Reviews

Anders Persson raises critical questions about the notion of just peace in EU diplomacy. Though the notion just peace has been used consistently in the EUs declaratory diplomacy over decades, it received only sparse attention. Previous research predominantly focused on the cumbersome process of forging internal political compromise on the EUs conflict resolution policy. This book shifts focus by elaborating on the intersubjective nature of just peace and the way the EUs own notion of a just peace has evolved over time. While the book touches on several important issues and is empirically rich, it is its particular conceptual focus on the notion of just peace that makes it unique and will stimulate the readers thinking. It almost seems paradoxical, but at a time when the feasibility of establishing a Palestinian state alongside Israel is more and more questioned, the EUs own view of a just solution to the longstanding conflict has crystalized into an increasingly elaborated vision of a two-state settlement. -- Patrick Mller, Vienna University
This is an informed and informative work in which Anders Persson offers an original examination of Europe's frustrated and often frustrating attempt to turn her geographic proximity, historic links, and deep contemporary economic ties with the Middle East into a just and lasting peace deal between Israel and the Palestinians. Throughout it makes a valuable contribution to the literature on Europe and the Arab-Israeli conflict. -- Rory Miller, author, Meditations on Violence
In The EU and the IsraeliPalestinian Conflict 19712013: In Pursuit of a Just Peace, Anders Persson provides a highly analytical, multi-disciplinary, cutting-edge, theoretically informed, and insightful contribution to scholarship pertaining to the EUs attempts to establish a just peace in the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The thorough, comprehensive, and critical approach renders the book of great assistance to scholars dealing with conflict resolution, peace building, state building, and the dialectic relations between peace building and state building. As such it is highly recommended. -- Guy Harpaz, Hebrew University of Jerusalem

Author Bio

Anders Persson is lecturer of political scientist at Linnaeus University, Sweden.