How can sustainable peace be achieved? This question surely stands as one of humankind’s most pressing imperatives, as a glance at today’s headlines will reveal. The answer, likely a bouquet of interconnected insights, is in high demand. Historically, the Versailles Peace Treaty, which left Germany humiliated and vindictive, taught statesmen and diplomats that peace cannot be forged solely through the pursuit of retribution for past wrongs, however grievous. The future must also be considered, with an eye to the collective sentiments that may arise in both the defeated and the victorious nations.
H-Diplo | Robert Jervis International Security Studies Forum
Review Essay 121
Johanna Mannergren, Annika Björkdahl, Susanne Buckey-Zistel, Stefanie Kappler, and Timothy Williams. Peace and the Politics of Memory. Manchester University Press, 2024. ISBN: 9781526178312.
Review by Li Bennich-Björkman, Uppsala University
8 May 2025 | PDF: http://issforum.org/to/RE121 | Website: rjissf.org | X: @HDiplo
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How can sustainable peace be achieved? This question surely stands as one of humankind’s most pressing imperatives, as a glance at today’s headlines will reveal. The answer, likely a bouquet of interconnected insights, is in high demand. Historically, the Versailles Peace Treaty, which left Germany humiliated and vindictive, taught statesmen and diplomats that peace cannot be forged solely through the pursuit of retribution for past wrongs, however grievous. The future must also be considered, with an eye to the collective sentiments that may arise in both the defeated and the victorious nations.
Charles Kupchan, an adviser to former US President Barack Obama, made significant strides in the understanding of peace between states in his work How Enemies Become Friends: The Sources of Stable Peace.[1] Yet, despite the emergence of far more constructive peace agreements than the infamous one of 1919,[2] and despite the fact that former enemies, such as France and Germany,[3] or Norway and Sweden following the latter’s secession in 1905,[4] have managed to forge lasting peace after centuries of conflict, new wars continue to erupt. In Europe, Russia’s 2022 full-scale invasion of Ukraine brought devastating consequences,[5] while the Middle East is again embroiled in war, with the ongoing violence between Israel, Hamas, and Hezbollah, alongside attacks between Iran and Israel, threatening the prospect of full-scale war.[6] Civil wars persist in Latin America and Africa, where government forces and guerrillas continue to battle in what have been decades-long struggles. Against this backdrop, the introduction of fresh perspectives on how to approach peace remains both necessary and commendable. A recent example is Joseph S. Robinson’s dissertation on reconciliation in Northern Ireland, in which he strongly underlines the need to not insulate the present from the past, and to acknowledge the continuity that weaves together life then and now rather than simply moving on.[7]
Memory studies focus on what, why, and how societies remember collectively. Maurice Halbwachs is generally considered the field’s founder through his influential On Collective Memory, published in 1925.[8] Nationally significant memories form the bedrock of collective identities, shaping the hearts and minds of future generations, as well as of those who currently wield power. The classic study by Benedict Anderson on how nationalism binds us together with strangers [9] paved the way for an avalanche of identity studies that has not abated, and brought about studies of the relationships between collective identity and collective memory.[10] The examination of collective memories of states and nations as reflected in their history textbooks, museums, monuments, memorials, and both oral and written testimonies has flourished as a field of study within the humanities and social sciences since the 1990s.
For example, in countries where memories are divided and contested, such as the Baltic States, scholars have studied disputes over monuments,[11] or approached the topic of remembrance by looking at how cultural trauma has the potential to rupture lives and is being mitigated through memory-work.[12] Tension over the contested memories of nationalism during the Second World War has left its mark on present-day Ukraine.[13] Textbooks used in secondary schools and universities, where the official version of history is transmitted to younger generations, are another source for scholars who study the construction of collective memory.[14] Following the collapse of the Communist regimes in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union, the end of apartheid in South Africa, and the devastating Balkan Wars, questions of what should be remembered, where, and how—indeed, what should be forgotten, too—have come to the fore in social discourse on truth and reconciliation, and on transitional justice.[15] These inquiries are driven by the need to manage bitterness, anger, sorrow, hatred, and desires for revenge.
While memory studies have attracted interest from scholars in various disciplines, there have also been critical voices, specifically those that find the field to have encompassed all and nothing, i.e., that it is ill defined.[16] Nevertheless, the field has grown, and studies on peacebuilding have blurred the lines between painful pasts of war or conflict and the forgetfulness of the present.[17]
The five authors of this book combine the discipline of peace research with the field of memory studies. They focus on five societies that were previously torn apart by war or conflict: Cyprus, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Rwanda, South Africa, and Cambodia. These case studies, which are united by the experience of internal conflict, whether in the form of civil war or ethnically driven violence, serve as the core of their analysis. Two of these nations, Cambodia and Rwanda, experienced genocides of appalling scale, while Cyprus and Bosnia and Herzegovina saw brutal ethnic and national conflicts over contested territories. South Africa’s decades-long system of white supremacy and racial oppression was a paradigmatic example of social domination, the division of society into hierarchical groups,[18] and the echoing of the ideology of Nazi leader Adolf Hitler and his regime.
The primary aim of the book is to explore what the authors term “the quality of peace” or a “just peace” (2), and how this desired outcome relates to memory politics. They argue that a quality peace consists of five elements: security, governance reforms, economic opportunities for marginalized groups, the promotion of reconciliation, and a strong civil society (12). Achieving a ceasefire and ending active warfare is, of course, a laudable achievement, but the authors aspire to reach an understanding of something more ambitious: a peace that goes beyond the mere absence of violence, one that embodies fairness, justice, and mutual recognition among all parties involved. The authors argue that collective memory plays a critical role in this process. In the opening chapter, they pose the central question: “how do the politics of memory affect the quality of peace in societies transitioning from violent conflict?” (2)
Methodologically, the authors analyze the “mnemonic formation” (4) of each society, unpacking its memory politics through a framework they call SANE, integrating four elements: Sites, Agents, Narratives, and Events, which previous literature tends to treat separately (21-32). SANE links geographical spots and places (sites), which are often powerfully important to remembrance, with active actors and persons (agents). The stories woven around particular sites, atrocities, or occasions form stories (narratives); and specific events define memories or their formation (events). In the empirical chapters, the SANE framework offers a coherent structure throughout the texts, rather than providing an analytical model. The methods and materials the authors use for the five empirical chapters are observational. They do not, however, observe social interactions; instead, they focus on memorial sites in the five countries and what they reveal in terms of contestation, antagonism, acceptance, and inclusion. The study of the five cases is interpretative, and hence subjective, and the quality of the analyses is dependent on the researchers’ sensitivity and deep understanding of the respective social, political, and cultural contexts.
While the mnemonic formations differ across the five case studies, the SANE framework brings much-needed coherence to the analysis. In Cyprus, the central memory core is the competing nationalisms of Greek and Turkish Cypriots; in Bosnia and Herzegovina, it is the four-year siege of Sarajevo; in Rwanda, it is the role of the international community; in South Africa, it is colonialism; and in Cambodia, it is the power of the dead. Through the lens of the SANE framework, these mnemonic formations are unpacked and analyzed, providing a basis for what the authors term a “soft comparison” (19). Drawing from Geertzian anthropology,[19] they aim to provide “thick descriptions” of life and suffering during violence, genocide, and war. One significant conclusion from the thick description of the country chapters is that memory politics are deeply embedded in the politics of the present. This is hardly a novel observation. Current memory struggles in Ukraine, for instance, between those who venerate the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (OUN) leader Stepan Bandera and his brand of nationalism and those who criticize him as a collaborator with the Nazis, or between Estonians and Russian-speaking communities in Estonia over Soviet-era war monuments, illustrate how collective memory continues to shape political identity and perceptions of the conflict long after active hostilities have ended.[20]
As to whether the analytical approach works, and whether the method of identifying specific symbolic or contested aspects of collective memory and then examining them through the four dimensions of the SANE framework brings us closer to understanding how memory politics affect the quality of peace in these five societies, the answer is both yes and no. Yes, since the authors conclude that in order for memory politics to foster a qualitative peace, it must be pluralistic, inclusive, and dignified. By pluralistic, they mean that multiple collective memories must coexist, and should be interwoven rather than isolated. Additionally, recognizing the dignity of victims and establishing inclusive narratives is essential. Inclusivity captures the active support for allowing diverse memories to surface and coexist.
And yet one may suspect that for memory politics to be pluralistic, inclusive, and dignified, the peace processes must have come quite far along to affect memory politics in such a positive way; however, the authors cannot demonstrate a clear causality from memory politics to peace; the sequence might as well be from peace to consequences for memory politics. This possible mutual interaction should have been discussed in more depth to offer a convincing explanation, which may of course include interlocking processes not easy to disentangle. Among the five country studies, Bosnia and Herzegovina stands out for its relatively successful memory politics, while Cyprus and South Africa fall into the opposite category. In these latter two, competing memory communities exist side by side but remain unacknowledged by one another, unable to recognize the suffering of the respective other side. Memories are thus multiple, but not pluralist or inclusive, which might invigorate future conflict. These findings seem reasonable, yet they make me think of a counter-example, namely Ukraine, where the collective memory of the Second World War and the postwar era was profoundly upended after independence in 1991, yet without leading to internal conflict.[21] The ongoing war is not a civil one, but a war fought from Ukraine’s side against an aggressor. The same is true for Estonia and Latvia, where the collective memory of the decades of Soviet occupation is completely different for Estonians and Latvians on the one hand, and the Russian minorities on the other.[22] This suggests that the quality of peace is not necessarily predicated upon inclusive memories, as the authors argue.
On a critical note, therefore, the study would have benefited from a more clearly defined research design and greater precision in articulating its theoretical underpinnings. For example, the selection of countries is not sufficiently explained: why, for instance, were only countries with intra-state wars chosen for analysis, and why were these specific ones chosen rather than others? The “soft comparison” approach also remains somewhat unclear. It is not apparent what exactly “soft” means in this context and why the process is not more robustly discussed. The comparability of the cases, even in a soft way, could have been made more explicit. It may have been more useful to choose countries with varying degrees of qualitative and just peace and to study how their memory politics correspond to their levels of post-conflict peace? Moreover, the concept of “quality of peace” is left somewhat vague. While the five countries under review are all post-conflict, with peace accords in place, the book does not fully explore whether these accords have led to a stronger, more enduring peace; and if so, whether memory politics have played a causal role in this. Numerous other factors—internal, international, ideological, economic, and diasporic ones—which also contribute to the establishment of peace, are not discussed. What the authors do show, however, is the value of connecting memory politics with post-conflict coexistence and how closely the rebuilding of societies after violence is connected to collective memory into efforts that cannot be ignored.
Li Bennich-Björkman is Johan Skytte Professor of Eloquence and Politics at Uppsala University, Sweden. She is a member of the Royal Academy of Sciences in Sweden, honorary doctor at the University of Tartu, Estonia, and the Academy of Pedagogical Sciences in Ukraine. She is the author of numerous books and articles, most recently “Imperial or Colonial: The War is Fought over the Soviet Past and a Broken Relationship,” Turkish Policy Quarterly 21:4 (2022), and Moscow and the Non-Russian Republics in the Soviet Union: Nomenklatura, Intelligentsia and Centre-Periphery Relations, edited with Saulius Grybkauskas (Routledge 2022), and has worked on popularizing research and science. Among her fields of research are politics and history in Eastern Europe and the Caucasus region, including political culture, memory politics, and analyses of dictatorship and transitions to political and societal pluralism.
[1] Charles Kupchan, How Enemies Become Friends: The Sources of Stable Peace (Princeton University Press, 2012).
[2] John Maynard Keynes, The Economic Consequences of the Peace (Brace and Howe, 2020); Norman A. Graebner and Edward M. Bennett, The Versailles Treaty and Its Legacy: The Failure of the Wilsonian Vision (Cambridge University Press, 2014); David A. Andelman, A Shattered Peace: Versailles 1919 and the Price We Pay Today (Wiley, 2008); Margaret Macmillan, Peacemakers (John Murray, 2001).
[3] Harvey Clark Greisman, “The enemy concept in Franco-German relations, 1870–1914,” History of European Ideas 19:1-3 (2012): 41-46; John Pinder, The European Union: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford University Press, 2007); William Friedmann, “The European Coal and Steel Community,” International Journal: Canada’s Journal of Global Policy Analysis 10:1 (March 1955): 12-25.
[4] Evert Vedung, “Varför ledde Norges seccession 1905 inte till krig?” [Why did Norway’s secession in 1905 not cause war?], Scandia: Tidskrift för Historik Forskning 66:2 (2000): 251-268.
[5] Serhii Plohky, The Russian-Ukrainian War: The Return of History (W. W. Norton, 2024); Christopher Miller, The War Came to Us: Life and Death in Ukraine (Bloomsbury, 2023); Adrian Karatnycky, From Independence to the War with Russia: Battleground Ukraine (Yale University Press, 2024).
[6] Netanel Flamer, The Hamas Intelligence War against Israel (Cambridge University Press, 2024); Bud W. Hunton, Israel and Hamas at War: The World Reacts (Author’s Tranquility Press, 2024).
[7] Joseph S. Robinson, Digging Underneath the Reconciliation Paradigm in Northern Ireland: Survival, Temporal Resistance, Rebellious Mourning (PhD diss., Maynooth University, 2022).
[8] Maurice Halbwachs, Les Cadres Sociaux de la Mémoire (Presses Universitaires de France, 1925), and in English, On Collective Memory (University of Chicago Press, 1992).
[9] Benedict Anderson, Imagined Communities (Verso, 1983).
[10] Jan Assman and John Czaplicka, “Collective Memory and Cultural Identity,” Cultural History/Cultural Studies 65 (Spring–Summer 1995): 125-133.
[11] Karsten Brüggemann and Andres Kasekamp, “The Politics of History and the ‘War of Monuments’ in Estonia,” Nationalities Papers 36:3 (July 2008): 425-448.
[12] Aili Aarelaid-Tart, Cultural Trauma and Life Stories (Kikimora Publications, 2006).
[13] Yuliya Yurchuk, Reordering of Meaningful Worlds: Memory of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists and the Ukrainian Insurgent Army in Post-Soviet Ukraine (PhD diss., Stockholm University, 2014).
[14] Li Bennich-Björkman and Sergiy Kurbatov, eds., When the Future Came: The Collapse of the USSR and the Emergence of National Memory in Post-Soviet History Textbooks (Ibidem Press and Columbia University Press, 2019).
[15] See, for example, Naomi Roht-Arriaza and Javier Mariezcurrena, eds., Transitional Justice in the Twenty-First Century: Beyond Truth versus Justice (Cambridge University Press, 2006); David Bloomfield, Teresa Barnes, and Luc Huyse, eds., Reconciliation after Violent Conflict: A Handbook (International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA), 2003).
[16] For an early critique, see Jeffrey K. Olick and Joyce Robbins, “Social Memory Studies: From ‘Collective Memory’ to the Historical Sociology of Mnemonic Practices,” Annual Review of Sociology 24 (1998): 105-140.
[17] See, for example, Marc Howard Ross, “The Politics of Memory and Peacebuilding,” in Roger MacGinty, ed., Routledge Handbook of Peacebuilding (Routledge, 2013), and in the second edition of the book (Routledge, 2025), David Mwambari and Andrea Purdeková, “Memory, Politics and Peace.”
[18] Felicia Pratto, Jim Sidanius, Lisa M. Stallworth, and Bertram F. Malle, “Social Dominance Orientation: A Personality Variable Predicting Social and Political Attitudes,” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology 67:4 (1994): 741-763; James Sidanius, “The Psychology of Group Conflict and the Dynamics of Oppression: A Social Dominance Perspective,” in William J. McGuire and Shanto Iyengar, eds., Explorations in Political Psychology (Duke University Press, 1993); Jim Sidanius and Felicia Pratto, Social Dominance: An Intergroup Theory of Social Hierarchy and Oppression (Cambridge University Press, 1999).
[19] Clifford Geertz, The Interpretation of Cultures: Selected Essays (Basic Books, 1973).
[20] Yurchuk, Reordering of Meaningful Worlds; Brüggemann and Kasekamp, “The Politics of History and the ‘War of Monuments’ in Estonia.”
[21] Yurchuk, Reordering of Meaningful Worlds.
[22] Brüggemann and Kasekamp, “The Politics of History and the ‘War of Monuments’ in Estonia.”