Conflicts.Meanings.Transitions – Bavarian Center for Peace and Conflict Research

The network Conflicts.Meanings.Transitions (“Deutungskämpfe im Übergang”) aims at better understanding how people contest meanings in times of transition. The guiding question is, under which circumstances do struggles over meaning contribute to peace?

In the research network we examine these conflicts from an interdisciplinary perspective. In particular, we focus on meaning struggles over peace strategies by non-state actors, over violence, and over universal rights and diversity. The project hence focuses on pressing societal challenges of our times (locally, inter-, and transnationally), as they crystallize in debates about (colonial) history, memory, violence, universal rights, and diversity.

The overarching goal is to establish a Bavarian Center for Peace and Conflict Research. The center will promote interdisciplinary exchange and connect peace and conflict researchers in Bavaria. Thereby, the network aims at increasing the social and political impact of peace and conflict research in the region and beyond.

Conflicts.Meanings.Transitions is a joint project of scholars from the Universities of Augsburg, Bayreuth and Erlangen-Nuremberg, and the Leibniz Institute for Contemporary History (Munich-Berlin), coordinated at the University of Bayreuth.