Diaspora Engagement in Peacebuilding: Empirical and Theoretical Challenges

Abstract

This private exchange at a conference on ‘Diaspora and Peacebuilding’ in Toronto in October 2006 highlights the issues central to this chapter — the interconnections between power and methodology. In the study of the role of diasporas in peacebuilding it is increasingly recognised that the activities of subgroups within diaspora communities have contributed to both the continuation and the reduction of violent conflict in the land they call their original home (Fagen, 2006; Smith, 2007; see also Chapter 10, this volume). Current research on diasporas tend to be driven by case studies of specific groups: the Irish, Palestinians, Armenians, Kurds, Tamils, Ethiopians, Eritreans, Jews, Somalis and others. The challenge is to collect these rich, complex and unique stories into shared understandings of common or comparable structures and processes. It is necessary to move towards more systematic comparative case studies that are critical in their analytical stance, and that allow identification and examination of the similarities and differences in patterns of experience. In short, it is important to move from the idiographic (individualising, particularising and interpretive) to the nomothetic (generalising, rule-seeking and integrative). While several diaspora and peace/conflict projects have been initiated, there remains a substantial need for solid, empirically grounded comparative research.