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Abstract This paper investigates four questions related to ethical issues associated with the involvement of engineers and scientists in 'military work', including the influence of ethical values and beliefs, the role of gendered perspectives and moves beyond the purely technical. It fits strongly into a human (and planet)-centred systems perspective and extends my previous AI and Society papers on othering and narrative ethics, and ethics and social responsibility. It has two main contributions. The first involves an analysis of the literature through the application of different ethical theories and the application of gendered analysis to discussion of masculinities in engineering and the military. The second is a survey of scientists and engineers to investigate their opinions and experiences. The conclusions draw together the results of these two contributions to provide preliminary responses to the four questions and include a series of recommendations covering education and training, ethical approval of work not involving human participants or animals, the need for organisational support, approaches covering wider perspectives and the encouragement of individual ethical commitment.

AbstractEx-combatant youth originated the commercial motorcycling sector in Liberia and have played a dominant role in its development. This article collates key insights narrated by one of Liberia's young ex-combatants-turned-commercial motorcyclists, Edwin Nyankoon, to build narrative accounts of peacebuilding around conceptualisation of youth livelihood, identity, and politics after war. The article contributes to diverse literatures on youth agency by emphasising the need for narrative and subject-led methodologies that anchor research questions and data analysis to research participants' own language and narrated experiences of post war. It applies insights about everyday peace to interpret hustling as bottom-up peacebuilding, in opposition to dominant top-down peacebuilding accounts of ex-combatants. These latter accounts largely fail to see youth actors as peacebuilding agents, constructing them instead as troublemakers and interpreting their livelihood activities in terms of criminality and threat. Additionally, it argues that hustling also constitutes a peacebuilding style. More than a coping strategy or an indicator of peace, hustling-as-peacebuilding-style is performative: relational, embodied, contradictory, and recognisable to its adherents as peace-promoting even if (and arguably because) outsiders construct it as peace-negating. This analysis problematises agency, social relations, gendered identity, and collective security as they relate to ex-combatant and conflict-affected youth during peace processes.

The inclusion of women in conflict resolution and peacebuilding is an important notion that has been well documented. Despite a widespread call for inclusive peacebuilding and progress in some African countries, in Nigeria, women are yet to achieve direct representation in formal peace and policy decision-making processes. The complex nature of conflict in Nigeria makes it imperative to explore all possible solutions to peacebuilding, including women's potential, which remains largely untapped. This article examined, through a review of the literature, the strategies that women employed to achieve direct representation at the table in formal peace talks in Kenya and South Africa. The conflict situations in the two countries resonate to some extent, with some of the current insurgencies in Nigeria. The strategies of both the Kenyan and South African women were similar. High-profile women in the two countries brought their skillset and competencies to work across women's groups regardless of social, religious, or political affiliation. They formed strong coalitions and were able to unite to the lobby, dialogue, and push for representation in formal peace talks. They engaged with the government to be included as negotiators and mediators. In Nigeria, there is a need to change patriarchal norms and traditional mindsets that prevent women from representation at the peace table through sensitization. It is also essential to enlighten relevant stakeholders, especially the government, on the importance of leveraging women's skillset in peacebuilding initiatives.

The purpose of this study is to diffuse knowledge about the limited roles women still play in Nigeria, as opposed to the roles they could be playing if they were to be empowered, especially in terms of local and national security. The research questions examined the different ways in which women in Nigeria are suffering the omnipresence of patriarchal beliefs and the norms they entail, which interviews with a sample of nine Nigerian women have testified for. It further analyzed the possible interdependence between patriarchy and insecurity levels, and how empowering women could help building peace in the region. Three experts on the topic were interviewed, and testified for this correlation between women and security, while also pointing out the need for governmental support in terms of financing and policing this inclusion of women. The paper finally proposes a set of recommendations to the different stakeholders of Nigeria, from the civil society and Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) to the Government itself, on how to reach empowerment and peacebuilding in a sustainable way. Structured mainly on the social and cultural determinants of women's roles in Nigeria, the study revealed that such determinants need political and legislative will if they are to improve. There is an urgent need for the Nigerian Government to take responsibility for the insecurity the country is facing and acknowledge how this insecurity is curbing any improvement towards both women empowerment and peacebuilding at the national and regional levels. Some of the recommendations include the promotion of dialogue among stakeholders, the implementation of sport programs to diffuse values of tolerance and empowerment, and the alteration of discourse around women and girls to change the conceptualization of power and therefore the roles they play in the society.

The paper analyses peacebuilding and state building in post-conflict Africa. The article examine two conception of peacebuilding and state building. These are popular progressive and neoliberal peacebuilding and state building.

The article examines peacebuilding and state building in post-conflict situation in Africa.

Wer sind die wichtigsten Akteure im Prozess der Friedenskonsolidierung im Nachkriegsliberia? Wie interagieren sie vor Ort und welche Faktoren sind für das langsame Tempo des Reformprozesses in der Nachkriegszeit verantwortlich? Die qualitative Fallstudie gibt Antworten auf diese Fragen. Die Autorin unterstreicht die Bedeutung der innenpolitischen Landschaft für das Schicksal der Reformen und die Rolle einflussreicher Personen in diesem Prozess. Die Ergebnisse zeigen, dass die derzeitige Praxis der Friedenskonsolidierung trotz einer umfassenden, kritischen akademischen Debatte nach wie vor vom neoliberalen Paradigma geprägt ist und von den Realitäten nach dem Konflikt und den Menschen vor Ort abgekoppelt bleibt.

The role of diaspora for a long time now has been seen from a negative perspective. They are usually seen as sponsors of conflict and terrorist activities in their homeland. However, there is a growing recognition that sees diaspora groups in a more positive light, that is playing a vital role in national development, integration, and peacebuilding. The paper aims to examine the role of the Nigerian diaspora in peacebuilding processes in Nigeria. Basing itself within the theoretical framework of transnationalism, the paper finds that they play certain roles of lobbying and advocacy, network and partnership, discussion and awareness, conflict mediation and negotiation, remittances, investment, and social development. However, playing these roles have become very daunting due to challenges such as lack of adequate fund, poor communication, lack of voting rights, fragmentation inter alia. The paper concludes that diaspora can contribute effectively to the peacebuilding of the nation so long as they maintain constant contact with their home country and recommended that peacebuilding of any nation is a national responsibility for all its citizens, home and abroad. The government must create a safe, peaceful, and conducive environment for an effective and diaspora involvement in all peacebuilding processes of the nation.

This paper investigates four questions related to ethical issues associated with the involvement of engineers and scientists in 'military work', including the influence of ethical values and beliefs, the role of gendered perspectives and moves beyond the purely technical. It fits strongly into a human (and planet)-centred systems perspective and extends my previous AI and Society papers on othering and narrative ethics, and ethics and social responsibility. It has two main contributions. The first involves an analysis of the literature through the application of different ethical theories and the application of gendered analysis to discussion of masculinities in engineering and the military. The second is a survey of scientists and engineers to investigate their opinions and experiences. The conclusions draw together the results of these two contributions to provide preliminary responses to the four questions and include a series of recommendations covering education and training, ethical approval of work not involving human participants or animals, the need for organisational support, approaches covering wider perspectives and the encouragement of individual ethical commitment.