Description
The past years have seen an increasing interest in aspects of methods and ethics in peace and conflict studies, as well as IR and social sciences more generally. A number of volumes, special issues and other formats have covered various topics and thus formed a more solid basis for dealing with issues of access, safety, transparency, (contested) epistemic authority and effects and impacts of research in complex and difficult research contexts. This panel asks what are the precise take-aways from this new wave of publications and which aspects require further discussion, attention and action on part of scholars and the academy more generally. Specifically, contributors will address tensions and dilemmas that persist in peace and conflict research despite all reflection and awareness, and will discuss possible approaches to deal with these more effectively. Relatedly, a second main theme of the panel concerns the question as to how institutional practices and frameworks need to (and can) be adapted to reflect the realities of contemporary field research. A third theme will serve to place this discussion into the wider debate on knowledge production, pedagogy and epistemological diversification of social sciences, which has prompted scholars to rethink the premises of academic research in light of the lifeworlds and ontologies of the places they set out to research.
