This month’s US National Security Strategy underlines an ongoing shift away from liberal values into a new age of empire. In this new long read, Larry Attree discusses how – by rethinking alliances, defence posture, peace and conflict policies, and international cooperation – the UK can oppose these dangerous trends and promote a more peaceful … Continue reading Strategising for Peace in the New Age of Empire
How can we build on the ‘radical peace’ made in Northern Ireland?
Among the UK and Ireland’s greatest successes of the last century has been the achievement of peace in Northern Ireland. Almost three decades on, Larry Attree asked five key experts how peace and security was built in Northern Ireland, and what is now needed to sustain it in the face of unrest, social division and … Continue reading How can we build on the ‘radical peace’ made in Northern Ireland?
‘Organised irresponsibility’: How Britain’s defence strategy clings to a bygone world
The UK's new Strategic Defence Review is another example of the government talking tough while failing to make tough choices. Mary Kaldor and Luke Cooper argue that the SDR strategizes for a bygone age, in which the US was a dependable ally rather than a threat to European democracy. The German sociologist, Ulrich Beck, coined … Continue reading ‘Organised irresponsibility’: How Britain’s defence strategy clings to a bygone world
A ‘Peace Lens’ for the New UK National Security Strategy
For twenty years, violent conflicts and related deaths have been spiralling, while forced displacement has nearly doubled in ten years. Why is this happening? And could a ‘peace lens’ help the UK respond more effectively in its forthcoming National Security Strategy? In this short piece, Larry Attree, Hillary Briffa, Thomas Martin and Richard Reeve discuss the challenges and ways forward, drawing on a roundtable convened on 01 May 2025 to explore this question.
Making the case for de-escalation in the UK’s Strategic Defence Review
As a new UK Strategic Defence Review gets underway, a series of complex interconnected crises from the Middle East to the Horn of Africa must prompt a much greater emphasis on de-escalation. Charlie Linney and Lewis Brooks propose three areas where UK Defence can contribute to de-escalation and conflict prevention.
Finding Clues amid the Wreckage of Contemporary Wars
In their new book, Wreckonomics, David Keen and Ruben Andersson explore the Cold War, and the fights against terrorism, migration and drugs, analysing why disastrous policies live on even when it has become apparent that they do not work. In this written interview, Larry Attree asks the authors to share key insights from this new work.
Picking up the pieces of the UK’s conflict and development policy
Oliver Walton and Andrew Johnstone discuss how UK conflict and development policy since 2015 has become more fragmented and explore the wider implications of this case for the security-development nexus.
Joining the Dots: Lessons for peacebuilders navigating conflict, gender and climate change
Climate breakdown is accelerating and its interaction with conflict and gender relations is evolving in complex and destructive ways. Drawing on the experiences of conflict-affected communities in Kashmir, the Philippines and Uganda, Alastair Carr and Amy Dwyer propose several ways in which peacebuilding programmes can respond.
Weaponising Sheep: Israeli settler colonialism in the South Hebron Hills
While media attention has focused on devastating Israeli military raids on Jenin and Nablus and land expropriations in East Jerusalem, a slower burning form of violence is being perpetrated by settlers against Palestinian herders in the West Bank, seeking to gain control of their land and livelihoods. Andrew Rigby reports from the South Hebron Hills.
The MOD’s Accidental Roadmap to Peace: A radical reading of the Integrated Operating Framework
The UK’s Ministry of Defence (MOD) has been doing some rethinking about how it operates in peacetime, wartime and somewhere in-between. ‘Cassandra’ looks at the MOD’s Integrated Operating Concept and finds an unexpected roadmap for building peace in a world already at war, but only when read from back to front.