TY - JOUR

T1 - Divergent Perceptions of Peace in Post-Conflict Societies:

T2 - Insights from Sri Lanka

AU - Carey, Sabine C.

AU - González, Belén

AU - Glaessel, Christian

N1 - Funding Information: The author(s) disclosed receipt of the following financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article: This work was supported by the European Research Council under the European Union’s Seventh Framework Programme (FP7/2007–2013)/ERC Grant Agreement no 336019 and the German Research Foundation (DFG) via the Collaborative Research Center 884 ‘Political Economy of Reforms’ at the University of Mannheim. Publisher Copyright: © The Author(s) 2022.

PY - 2022/10

Y1 - 2022/10

N2 - Research on postwar peace focuses primarily on how elites and institutions can prevent relapse into civil war. In line with this special issue’s focus on citizens’ experiences, we take a micro-level approach to explore peace beyond the absence of war. We investigate how members of opposing sides experience peace a decade after a decisive victory of the majority. Using original survey data from a representative sample of 2000 respondents in 2018 Sri Lanka, we find that even one decade after the conflict members of the Sinhalese winning majority are consistently more likely to report improvements in peace than Tamils, who were represented by the defeated minority. But the benefit of a “victor’s peace” does not seem to translate into an optimistic outlook of the victorious group, nor does it increase people’s endorsement for repressive state measures. Despite the drastically improved physical security for the defeated ethnic minority since the war, they experience a deterioration in other dimensions of peace. Our findings have important implications for a deeper understanding of variations in peace and reconciliation processes.

AB - Research on postwar peace focuses primarily on how elites and institutions can prevent relapse into civil war. In line with this special issue’s focus on citizens’ experiences, we take a micro-level approach to explore peace beyond the absence of war. We investigate how members of opposing sides experience peace a decade after a decisive victory of the majority. Using original survey data from a representative sample of 2000 respondents in 2018 Sri Lanka, we find that even one decade after the conflict members of the Sinhalese winning majority are consistently more likely to report improvements in peace than Tamils, who were represented by the defeated minority. But the benefit of a “victor’s peace” does not seem to translate into an optimistic outlook of the victorious group, nor does it increase people’s endorsement for repressive state measures. Despite the drastically improved physical security for the defeated ethnic minority since the war, they experience a deterioration in other dimensions of peace. Our findings have important implications for a deeper understanding of variations in peace and reconciliation processes.

KW - reconciliation

KW - civil society

KW - post-conflict peace

KW - perceptions

KW - stability

KW - Sustainability Governance

KW - Politics

UR - https://www.mendeley.com/catalogue/80dfc414-b320-3a5f-b0a4-2991e97dab1d/

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85131510227&partnerID=8YFLogxK

U2 - 10.1177/00220027221104719

DO - 10.1177/00220027221104719

M3 - Journal articles

VL - 66

SP - 1589

EP - 1618

JO - Journal of Conflict Resolution

JF - Journal of Conflict Resolution

SN - 0022-0027

IS - 9

ER -