Settling Softly: Support for Ending War and Building Peace in Divided Societies

• In Event: Popular Support for Peace

Abstract

This paper investigates possible reconciliatory mechanisms to garner support for peace drawing on the Kurdish Question in Turkey, a four-decade-long armed conflict that has spilled over into neighboring Syria and Iraq. It answers what reconciliatory policies and framing are more effective in attracting support for peacemaking in a society challenged by sustained violence, how unresolved past events relate to the existing conflict issues, and how the hopes of minorities and the fears of majorities are negotiated in a violent context. Results from an original survey confirm that ethnonationalist conflicts are intractable but also show the possibility of peacemaking even in the most challenging situations. Our results demonstrate that ethnonationalist demands can initially be addressed by a ‘soft settlement,’ which lies between individual and collective rights, without formally signing a comprehensive peace agreement that has come to be a modal category to end internal armed conflicts in the post-Cold War era.

Authors

• Mehmet Gurses, University of Central Florida

• A. Betul Celik, Sabanci University