Understanding Violence and Political Markets in Africa and the Middle East

After four years of researching violence and conflict across Africa and the Middle East, what have we learned? Catch up on the concluding event of the Conflict Research Programme.

The Conflict Research Programme has been investigating the logics of war and peace across five countries in the Middle East and Africa over the last four years. Findings cover the link between extremist identity politics and political marketplaces, the countervailing role of civicness, and ‘what works’ external interventions in such areas as security, humanitarian need or localised conflict resolution. Producing high-quality research published in academic journals alongside policy analysis to the UK government, the programme boasts a range of outputs that has the potential to shape academic debate and the development landscape.

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This event was recorded on Monday 15 March 2021.

Charlotte Morris (@FCDOREDGCSD) is a Senior Conflict Adviser in FCDOs Research Department where she overseas funding for the department’s conflict focussed research portfolio. She has spent 20 years working on conflict across the Middle East, East Africa and Asia. Morris worked with Sudanese refugees in Cairo and later on varying peace and dialogue initiatives in the Sudans. She was in Iraq and Afghanistan in the early 2000s and led part of the UK government’s response to the Arab Uprisings after 2011.

Minouche Shafik is Director of LSE. Prior to this she was Deputy Governor of the Bank of England. An economist by training, Baroness Shafik has spent most of her career straddling the worlds of public policy and academia. After completing her BSc in economics and politics at the University of Massachusetts in Amherst, she took an MSc in economics at LSE before completing a DPhil in economics at St Antony’s College at the University of Oxford. In 2020 the UK Government announced that she would be made a Life Peer in the House of Lords.

Alex de Waal is Executive Director of the World Peace Foundation and Research Programme Director with the Conflict Research Programme at LSE.

Christine Bell is Professor of Constitutional Law and Assistant Principal (Global Justice). She is a co-director of the Global Justice Academy and a member of the British Academy.

Mary Kaldor (@KaldorM) an Emeritus Professor of Global Governance and Director of the Conflict Research Programme at the London School of Economics. She has pioneered the concepts of new wars and global civil society. Her elaboration of the real world implementation of human security has directly influenced European and national governments.