Who are the peacemakers?

Lior Lehrs, Unofficial Peace Diplomacy: Private peace entrepreneurs in conflict resolution processes, Manchester University Press, Manchester, 2022, pp. vix and 294.

Reviewed by Mike Makin-Waite

The central chapters of Unofficial Peace Diplomacy provide substantial descriptions and extended considerations of the peace-building efforts of four remarkable individuals: Norman Cousins, a United States citizen who helped encourage the US, the Soviet Union and Britain towards agreeing a Nuclear Test Ban Treaty in the early 1960s; another American, Suzanne Massie, who won the trust of President Ronald Reagan and was able to influence him to counter pressure from hawkish advisors during the ‘Second Cold War’ in the 1980s; the businessman Brendan Duddy, who at different points across twenty years played a key role in enabling consequential contact and negotiations between the Irish Republican Army (IRA) and the British government during ‘the troubles’ in Northern Ireland; and the Israeli journalist Uri Avnery, who opened up space for dialogue with the Palestine Liberation Organisation (PLO) between the mid-1970s and the mid-1980s. Avnery’s life story included emigration from Nazi Germany as a young boy: serving as an Israeli commando unit in 1948; editing the magazine Halolam Hazeh (‘This World’) for several decades; and being an elected member of the Knesset for eight years. In 1982, during the ‘Siege of Beirut’, Avnery crossed the battle lines to meet Palestinian leaders: this is said to have been the first time that Yasser Arafat personally met an Israeli citizen.

This reviewer initially reacted against Lior Lehrs’ characterisation of his subjects as ‘private peace entrepreneurs’ (PPEs) as yet another example of the neo-liberal practice of applying business-derived terminology to forms of activity which generously promote social good. As Lehrs points out, though, the term entrepreneur should not be limited to the world of business and profiteering, but has a more general application. It ‘comes from the French word entreprendre, meaning “to undertake”’, and it is therefore entirely appropriate to apply it to Cousins, Massie, Duddy, Avnery and others whose initiatives are characterised by ‘innovation, proactiveness … risk-taking’ and great skill in identifying and taking advantage of opportunities.

Lehrs’ clearly-written book, which is based on his doctoral dissertation, starts from a recognition that our understanding of conflict resolution processes tends to be focussed on politicians and high-profile figures who take part in ‘well-known official negotiations’. This obscures the significance of many ‘less-known and less-researched unofficial dialogue channels that were initiated by private actors, some of whom even played critical roles’. As he scanned ‘the histories of conflicted situations around the world’, Lehrs identified dozens of such figures, ‘excluded from the history textbooks’, and he resolved to shed light on their practice and contributions.

His ‘PPEs’ are ‘individual private citizens who … initiate channels of communication with official representatives (not private citizens) from the opposing side during a conflict, in order to promote a conflict resolution process’. They often develop ‘a form of unofficial diplomacy, which might be with leaders, or mid- or low-ranking representatives’, or with other actors who have a ‘direct channel to officials on the other side of the conflict’. Even though they ‘often act under conditions of tension and in a manner that clashes with official policy’, their aim can be ‘to influence the official sphere as well as relations between the leaderships of different sides’.

A substantial and systematic first chapter provides ‘a theoretical framework … a toolkit to discuss and analyse PPEs’ characteristics, activities and impact’. Lehrs sets out a range of detailed observations and considered distinctions which he has distilled from his studies.

Given that they have ‘no official authority or legal status based on appointment or election’, where does the PPEs’ scope and ability to influence people come from? Lehrs highlights forms of ‘non-material power and legitimacy’ which result from the way that they ‘are perceived by other actors’. These resources ‘are tied to dynamic and flexible terms like trust, reputation, appreciation and approval’. Other forms of ‘moral and spiritual’ resource can come from the perceptions people may have of the PPEs through such roles they may have as religious leaders, or as well-informed intellectuals, or as ‘actors motivated by values and moral commitment, acting above private interests’.

Their unofficial character means that PPE’s can draw on ‘instrumental and tactical power resources’ which elected politicians or appointed officials may have much less scope to use. These include the option of acting secretly; holding meetings or developing lines of communication which those who have engaged in them can later deny having been party to without compromising their relationships to ‘official’ actors; facilitating open and creative dialogue in which options can be aired that official actors would not have the leeway to discuss; and the ability to work continuously over the long-term, or during periods of rapid governmental change, given that PPEs’ role does not depend on the outcome of elections or bureaucratic decisions about how and where to deploy officials.

Lehrs differentiates between different ‘action patterns’ which PPEs may pursue. The first is direct, ‘working secretly to influence decision makers on both sides and promote diplomatic moves in the official policy sphere’. Other ‘action patterns’ are less direct, such as interventions which aim to influence ‘public opinion in order to pressure decision makers to change official policy or to promote a change in leadership’, or putting energy into developing relationships with third parties, external actors who may themselves have influence on the disputing parties.

Each of these action patterns involves a specific combination of some of the particular roles which Lehrs delineates, including mediator, negotiator, activist, and ‘shaper of public discourse’. His analysis is vividly illustrated in the conclusions of each of the case-studies, when he links fine-grained descriptions of his subjects’ activities back to the theoretical chapter.

For example, Cousins’s ‘ability to influence the official sphere’ was underpinned by ‘the network of contacts and the trust he … built among decision makers in the US, the Soviet Union, and the Vatican’, and his background ‘as a prominent journalist and expert in foreign policy’. These made him ‘a respected figure both among the public and in government circles’.

His activity prior to the early 1960s had included drawing on concepts promoted by Erich Fromm in order to co-found SANE, The Committee for a SANE Nuclear Policy (its successor organisation today is Peace Action). Popular support for SANE, which signed up 25,000 members in its first year, helped tilt public opinion against Eisenhower – one of the reasons that President Kennedy felt that he stood on ‘common ground’ ideologically with Cousins, whilst key Soviet figures around Nikita Khrushchev saw Cousins as ‘independently minded … objective … non-partisan’.

Suzanne Massie’s commitment to peace-building grew from her reaction to blocks she experienced as a writer. She had first visited the Soviet Union in 1967 whilst working on a book on the last Russian czar, and built a network of friends there. She held to a fundamental distinction between the communist government and the people who lived in the Soviet republics: her relatable personal story and her disavowal of ideological positions appealed to Reagan, who she met after spending several years appealing against repeated visa refusals by the US government. Massie was able to develop her influence by focussing on relatively small steps, of which the first was ‘the specific goal of renewing cultural exchanges’ between the US and the Soviet Union, an issue which was ‘not extremely sensitive relative to others’, though one on which positive moves contributed to ‘the broader aim of improving the relationship and dialogue between the parties’.

Brendan Duddy is the only one of Lehrs’ subjects whose work did not involve a concurrent public dimension (all of the other PPEs were combining discreet and sometimes secret work with ongoing public advocacy for steps they hoped governments and other actors would take). Duddy was a Catholic who lived in the city he would have called Derry, but nevertheless had a direct understanding and appreciation of the Protestant community there. His supportive attitude to the civil rights campaign against anti-Catholic discrimination in the late 1960s was based on the belief that ‘it should be a joint struggle for social equality rather than an inter-community struggle’. The quality of his networking with the IRA was based, amongst other things, on close personal relationships: Martin McGuinness had ‘worked as a young man in a company that delivered hamburgers to Duddy’s restaurant … McGuinness’s daughters worked in Duddy’s businesses, and he was invited to their weddings’. Another of Duddy’s close connections was with the Social Democratic and Labour Party leader John Hume: they had studied at the same school.

Duddy’s work for peace in Northern Ireland included his efforts as a ‘communicator, exchanging written and oral messages, information, drafts of speeches, clarifications … and updates’. He organised, co-ordinated and facilitated ‘direct meetings between the parties, using his house as a secret, neutral space and maintaining special secrecy arrangements’. Duddy also helped formulate possibilities, ‘presenting ideas, plans and proposals’, sometimes taking significant risks as he did so. Lehrs notes that Duddy’s story shows how PPEs can help generate changes in the outlook and working arrangements of one or more of the parties to a conflict. His activity contributed to ‘changes in institutional procedures’ on the part of the IRA, ‘impelling them to organise accordingly, to formulate positions and proposals, and to create relevant bodies for the negotiation process’.

The extent to which PPEs’ efforts contribute to conflict resolution depends, of course, on the way that the various parties respond. Lehrs explains that official establishment reactions can range from ‘resistance’ to ‘indifference’ to ‘endorsement’ – and that these reactions can shift depending on how a number of dynamic factors shape the situation. He considers key variables in relation to each of his case studies: the ‘characteristics of the conflict’; ‘ripeness’ (i.e., whether the varied and conflicting interests and outlooks of the parties are aligned in such a way at a particular moment in time so as to open up the possibility of process); ‘the position of leaders and the domestic conditions’; the extent to which there are ‘parallel channels of communication’ to those which the PPE is using; and the attitude of ‘internal agents’ within each of the parties.

Such determinants are extremely important elements in Lehrs’ account of the dialogue which Uri Avnery and the Israeli Council for Israeli-Palestinian Peace conducted with the PLO. (In respect of this case study, of course, the conflicted and disputed issues continue to generate terrible violence, whereas the Cold War was won by one of the competing sides, and the conflict resulting from different views on the constitutional position of Northern Ireland has, for the most part, now been transformed into a complex and ongoing peace process). On the issue of ‘ripeness’, Lehrs notes that, for most of the period he covers, ‘amongst Israelis, the Palestinians were not considered an independent actor, and the consensus was that any solution to the Palestinian problem would be with Egypt or Jordan’. The positions taken by different figures during internal debates within the PLO meant that some Palestinian activists were ready at different points to meet Israeli PPEs – a preparedness which could carry the perilous danger of being seen as ‘collaborating with the enemy’ and ‘betraying Palestinian interests’. Said Hammami (in 1978) and Issam Sartawi (in 1983) were amongst the PLO leaders who were assassinated by other Palestinians in the course of activities which had included working with Avnery (who was also, himself, subject to risks, threats and attacks on a number of occasions).

One of the most interesting questions raised by Unofficial Peace Diplomacy is that of who or what gives people such as Avnery and Duddy ‘the right’ to act as they do, given that they ‘have no formal or moral authority or mandate to negotiate’. Who are they accountable to, and how? If they are successful in efforts to influence public opinion or policy, then what makes this legitimate?

For some critics of PPEs, their activities are highly problematic, including the risk of legitimising ‘the enemy’, and cutting across the democratically-mandated work of government. These issues apply particularly to the self-determined and independent activities of the category of peacebuilders who Lehrs is studying: there are other approaches and forms of practice which are ‘beyond the scope’ of his study, all of which raise different questions and considerations. These include initiatives by PPEs who are ’private citizens who do not belong to either of the disputing sides’; people who promote unofficial and informal interactions between ‘ordinary people’ from ‘both sides’ of a conflict, but who do not engage people at an official level (sometimes but not always taking the form of ‘track two diplomacy’ which is intended to complement official diplomatic negotiations); and peacebuilders who seek to break the cycle of violence by the general promotion of conflict resolution skills through educational inputs to children and young people in schools and colleges, and by delivering training programmes for professionals, as well as through direct conflict resolution work and support to victims of terrorism and political violence (such as the work of the Tim Parry Johnathan Ball Peace Foundation, a UK charity headed by Colin and Wendy Parry, whose son was killed in the IRA bombing of Warrington in 1993 – an event briefly covered by Lehrs in terms of how it threatened to stall the emergent peace process, and the way in which Duddy helped address this threat).

Lehrs’ book is very valuable in itself: it is to be hoped that his careful approach of sifting and considering the specific skills, approaches and choices of his subjects will be developed further and more widely applied (both by Lehrs himself, and by others) so as to construct a systematic taxonomy of the many diverse forms of peace-activism and efforts to manage, resolve and transform conflicts.

Review published January 2023.

Illustration: A young boy plays against a wall in north Belfast on the eve of the 1994 IRA ceasefire. The photograph, used here with his permission, is by the multi-award-winning Crispin Rodwell (click here for website).