Menu

United States Institute of Peace

Search

Home ▶ Events

Peace and Conflict Diplomacy in a Turbulent World

Date: Thursday, June 10, 2021 / Time: 9:00am - 10:30am EDT

Center: Policy, Learning and Strategy Center

Read the Event Coverage
Share This
Print the Page

The practice of peace and conflict diplomacy — or the activities that states, international organizations and civil society employ to make peace and manage conflict — is increasingly challenged. The emergence of China and resurgence of Russia have shifted the rules of the game, creating risks of major power confrontation and competition over accepted international norms such as respect for human rights, state sovereignty and principled international engagement. Meanwhile, transnational threats such as the proliferation of violent extremism, cyberwarfare and climate-induced mass migration have introduced conflicts far different from those diplomats have encountered in the past.

These forces — together with growing waves of populism and Western isolationism after a series of failed foreign interventions — have eroded faith in the efficacy of diplomatic engagement and broken down the consensus on the merits of peace and conflict diplomacy. Can peace and conflict diplomacy survive in this discordant international environment?

A newly released edited volume, “Diplomacy and the Future of World Order,” offers answers to this question. Featuring essays from 19 scholars, the book explores the prospects for discord or collaboration around major security issues and considers how diverse strains of diplomacy may impact the foundation for global peacemaking and conflict management in an uncertain future.

On June 10, USIP hosted a conversation with several of the book’s leading authors and other experts on the project’s findings and its implications for the practice of peace and conflict diplomacy. Panelists debated how to adapt our diplomatic strategies to shape a more effective, agile and inclusive system of international cooperation, as well as considered how to make room for diverse voices — including regional organizations and civil society — while maintaining a sense of unity and common purpose.

Continue the conversation on Twitter with #Diplomacy4Tomorrow.

Speakers

Lise Grande, welcoming remarks
President and CEO, U.S. Institute of Peace

Dr. Chester Crocker, introductory remarks
James R. Schlesinger Professor of Strategic Studies, Georgetown University

Ambassador George Moose, moderator
Vice Chair, Board of Directors, U.S. Institute of Peace

Ambassador Barbara Bodine
Director, Institute for the Study of Diplomacy; Distinguished Professor in the Practice of Diplomacy, Georgetown University

Ambassador Jean-Marie Guéhenno
Distinguished Fellow, Foreign Policy, Brookings Institution

Dr. Fen Hampson
Chancellor’s Professor, Carleton University; President, World Refugee and Migration Council

Dr. See Seng Tan
Professor of International Relations, S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies

Dr. Solomon Dersso
Founding Director, Amani Africa; Chairperson, African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights

Pamela Aall, closing remarks
Senior Advisor, Conflict Prevention and Management, U.S. Institute of Peace

Related Publications

U.S.-China Rivalry: The Dangers of Compelling Countries to Take Sides

U.S.-China Rivalry: The Dangers of Compelling Countries to Take Sides

Thursday, March 30, 2023

By: Gregg A. Brazinsky

As the U.S.-China rivalry intensifies — with some speculating a new Cold War is in the offing — many Asian countries are looking on with concern. If Washington seeks to maintain its role as a global leader, it should be judicious in how it contests Chinese influence in Asia, which seems likely to be the key battleground of the new Sino-American rivalry. The United States must understand that Asian countries do not want to be forced to constantly manage competing pressures from superpowers. Cold War-era Sino-American competition demonstrates that forcing Asian countries to choose sides can ultimately be counterproductive and undermines one of the United States’ chief attributes in this global competition.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Global Policy

Positivism for Peace: Reforming the International System

Positivism for Peace: Reforming the International System

Wednesday, March 29, 2023

By: Andrew Cheatham

Among many insightful and concerning points raised by the U.S. intelligence community’s 2023 threat assessment, it notes that "great powers, rising regional powers, as well as an evolving array of non-state actors, will vie for dominance in the global order … [and] compete to set the emerging conditions and the rules that will shape that order for decades to come.” China’s efforts to supplant U.S. dominance of global governance, along with divisions in the international community over the war in Ukraine have brought to the fore questions over the utility and viability of today’s international order.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Global Policy

Taiwan and the United States Share Key Interests in the North Pacific

Taiwan and the United States Share Key Interests in the North Pacific

Monday, March 27, 2023

By: Camilla Pohle-Anderson

In September 2022, USIP published a report on “China’s Influence on the Freely Associated States of the Northern Pacific,” which consist of the Federated States of Micronesia, the Republic of the Marshall Islands and the Republic of Palau. “China’s engagement in these countries threatens [U.S.] interests both locally and in the broader Pacific region,” said the preface to the report, which makes the case that strengthening U.S. relations with the Freely Associated States (FAS) is essential to secure U.S. interests and prevent China from increasing its influence in the region. This Senior Study Group report largely focuses on the interests of the United States, China and the FAS, but also has significant implications for Taiwan.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Global Policy

Xi and Putin Flaunt Deepening Ties, Flout the U.S.-led Order

Xi and Putin Flaunt Deepening Ties, Flout the U.S.-led Order

Friday, March 24, 2023

By: Heather Ashby, Ph.D.;  Mary Glantz, Ph.D.;  Jennifer Staats, Ph.D.;  Andrew Scobell, Ph.D.

Thirteen months after Russia’s illegal invasion of Ukraine, Moscow and Beijing are continuing to deepen their ties even as China has sought to portray itself as a neutral player in the war. This week’s summit between Chinese Communist Party leader Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin comes on the heels of the International Criminal Court’s warrant for Putin for war crimes. For Putin, the summit demonstrated that despite Western sanction and opprobrium, Russia is not an isolated pariah state. Meanwhile, Xi used the summit to further the image he has tried to burnish of Beijing as a peacemaker and advance his vision of an alternative multilateral order, breaking away from the U.S.-led system.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Global Policy

View All Publications