Interpretations of Peace in History and Culture

Spanning continents as well as disciplines, the first volume of the miniseries 'Many Peaces' presents a panorama of diverse interpretations of peace in world history and culture. Dietrich takes the reader on a fascinating journey through time and space, exploring the so-called five families of peace - energetic, moral, modern, post-modern and trans-rational. He stresses the importance of combining rationality and reason with human properties such as emotion and spirituality in applied peace work. This innovative book indicates a paradigm shift and proposes a new epistemological understanding of peace with enormous consequences for conflict work.

WOLFGANG DIETRICH holds the UNESCO Chair for Peace Studies at the University of Innsbruck, Austria, and is the program director of the MA Program for Peace, Development and Security and International Conflict Transformation at the same University.He is Visiting Professor at the Institute for Political Science at the University of Vienna, Austria, at the Centre for Peace and Development Studies at the University of Castellon, Spain, the University College of Oslo, Norway, and at the United Nation's Peace University in Ciudad Colon, Costa Rica. He has written almost 200 books and articles, and his work has been published in five languages.