Abstract
This book is about how individuals and groups managed the dynamics of conflict escalation in Baghdad neighborhoods. This chapter introduces the concept of community resilience to violence and provides the background, context, and overview of this book. It introduces and explains key concepts including sectarian violence, resilience, conflict prevention, and “resilience thinking,” and describes the research partnership and methodology used to conduct this research. This chapter describes the ten neighborhoods that served as research sites, six of which suffered the sustained presence of a militia (Amiriyya, Adhamiyya, Dura, Sadr City, Zafaraniyya, and Bayaa) and four of which prevented sectarian militias from setting up local operations (Al-Dhubat, Palestine Street, Karada, and Kuraiaat). This chapter concludes with an overview of the rest of the book.
The oak fought the wind and was broken, the willow bent when it must and survived.
Robert Jordan
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Notes
- 1.
Michael Lund’s broad definition of conflict prevention has been widely accepted for over a decade: Any structural or intercessory means to keep intrastate or interstate tension and disputes from escalating into significant violence and use of armed forces, to strengthen the capabilities of potential parties to violent conflict for resolving such disputes peacefully, and to progressively reduce the underlying problems that produce these issues and disputes. Michael Lund, “Preventing Violent Intrastate Conflicts: Learning lessons from experience,” in Searching for Peace in Europe and Eurasia, p. 117.
- 2.
The intent of analysis was to identify regime characteristics and coping strategies as described by the respondents. Open coding of interview transcripts, informed by the literature review, generated five categories of variables—governance, social capital, socioeconomic opportunities, leader behavior, geospatial infrastructure—with between one and ten indicators for each category (see Box I). In the second round of coding, I grouped indicators into two themes: “Stories about Conflict Escalation” and “Resilience Management & Regimes.” I used a hybrid method of frequency analysis to highlight key indicators, coupled with my interpretive reading of the “thick narrative accounts” in the Geertzian tradition, of people’s perceptions, of key events, conflict dynamics, and lived experiences.
- 3.
See Ref. [19]. Iraqis tended to reside in the same neighborhoods where their families had first settled when they arrived in Baghdad during Ottoman times.
- 4.
Secular” or “civilian” and “religious” were terms used by Iraqi respondents to describe neighborhoods’ character. These differences will be discussed at length further on.
- 5.
The Abbasid Caliphate was the third Islamic caliphate following the Umayyad caliphate. It was founded in 750 CE by the descendants of Muhammed’s youngest uncle in Harran, an ancient city located in now modern-day Turkey. In 762, the Caliphate shifted its capital in 762 to Baghdad where it flourished for two centuries.
- 6.
The four traditional sub-Sunni sects are Al-Hanafi, Al-Shafii, Al-Hanbali, and Al-Maliki.
- 7.
According to local research team.
- 8.
Ibn Al-Haytham college, the Economy and Administration College & the Islamic University, Saddam’s Islamic College.
- 9.
Interview, Baghdad 2010.
- 10.
Researcher feedback.
- 11.
Iraq Body Count Database. Retrieved from http://www.iraqbodycount.org/database/incidents/k2791.
- 12.
Email correspondence, YouGov researcher.
- 13.
Al Qaida in Iraq (AQI) and Mahdi Army (JAM) were the two primary armed non-state actors (ANSAs) in Iraq during the period of study. Multiple other militias existed, including offshoots of AQI and Mahdi Army and other autonomous groups.
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Carpenter, A.C. (2014). Introduction. In: Community Resilience to Sectarian Violence in Baghdad. Peace Psychology Book Series. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4614-8812-5_1
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