We went into this project asking how peace movements – broadly conceived – navigated decolonization. And more specifically, how international peace organizations navigated the inclusion of groups with different understandings of peace and peace work that might not be immediately legible to them?

We also want to know where friction occurs in those international interactions. And there’s a lot of it – it may relate to the location of decolonization in peace work, but also to different understandings of what “decolonization” means in this context. What are the necessary political, economic and social conditions for a “positive peace” to exist? Peace is more than the absence of violence, after all.

We started by reading key books on the history of peace movements, looking for representation of peace advocates and peace groups from the decolonizing worlds and their ideas around peace. This means we also read about violence and non-violence more broadly, and seek out primary texts on peace by authors from the decolonizing world.

Here are some of the books we have read so far. We’ll try to update occasionally. New suggestions welcome!

Pia Koivunen, Performing Peace and Friendship: the World Youth Festivals and Soviet Cultural Diplomacy (De Gruyter, 2022). Open Access via OAPEN.

Robert Kisala, Prophets of Peace: Pacifism and Cultural Identity in Japan’s New Religions (University of Hawai’i Press, 1999).

David Cortright, Peace: a History of Movements and Ideas (Cambridge University Press, 2008).

Krishnalal Shridharani, War Without Violence (Victor Gollancz Ltc, 1939). The full text is available on Internet Archive.

Kenneth Kaunda, Kaunda on Violence, ed. by Colin Morris (Sphere, 1982).

Lawrence Wittner, Confronting the Bomb: a Short History of the World Nuclear Disarmament Movement (Stanford University Press 2009).

Shruti Kapila, Violent Fraternity: Indian Political Thought in the Global Age (Princeton University Press 2024).

Petra Goedde, The Politics of Peace: a Global Cold War History (Oxford University Press 2019).

Rob Skinner, Peace, Decolonization and the Practice of Solidarity (Bloomsbury 2023).