Peace studies in China has had meaningful initial developments, but the sustainability of the field’s development has been constrained by an authoritarian political atmosphere. rights and justice are core issues in peace studies, but these remain unaddressed in China. Thus, this article highlights studies on rights movements as de facto peace studies in an authoritarian setting and compares the movement among the middle class and that of peasants/workers, which can help us understand current contradictions and disharmony in Chinese society. Maintaining the stability of a turbulent society is becoming a crucial agenda for the Chinese state. Accordingly, studies on rights movements will become increasingly important.

The purpose of this article is to study the characteristics and patterns of the field of peace and conflict studies in South Korea by tracing its history. A reflection on peace and conflict studies in Korea shows that the 1987 democratization was a critical moment, and that the subsequent end of the global Cold War initiated the full-blown development of the field. The Korean case shows that the advancement of peace and conflict studies is linked to real-world changes. The recent inclusion of human rights and transitional justice issues is meaningful since rights and justice were core but unaddressed issues in Korea. It is time for peace and conflict studies in Korea to leap forward, and this new attention to human rights and transitional justice can be a way to lead this development.

In light of recent efforts by the UN to more firmly embed SSC and TrC in all its institutions, this paper examines the challenges that lie ahead by first tracing the emergence of the terms SSC and TrC on a discursive level in the UN system. Second, it reflects theoretically on the concepts of solidarity and development to show that voices from the Global South are suggesting alternative understandings that may do more justice to the poor and disadvantaged. Third, it explores what can be learned from various interlinked health crises and the recent COVID-19 pandemic regarding the flaws of SSC and TrC. Fourth, it sketches a way forward by looking at ways in  which a more human rights based democratization of global health can be achieved.

What is missing from the ongoing Afghan peace talks is public opinion: whether the Afghan people are in broad agreement with the peace process and its potential outcomes. The current study is based on the opinions of 704 people from across twenty-five provinces of Afghanistan. The study uses a quantitative and qualitative approach to delve into public opinion on the process. The general finding of this study is that while almost all Afghans want peace, most are unwilling to accept a peace deal that would cost them their constitutional gains, including human rights, minority rights, gender equality, and an Islamic republic. Besides this, most Afghans would be unwilling to vote for the Taliban in any elections.

Post-war reconstruction in Sri Lanka, which is aided by many countries, is aimed at consolidating the unitary state structure as part of a geo-strategic security complex in the Indian Ocean Region. In this process, discourses of democratization and human rights have been reconfigured to contain or totally remove any threat to the unitary state emerging from the Tamils in the North and East whose claim to self-determination is seen as a major challenge to the geo-strategic complex in South Asia. In such a context, the bio-politics of the development-security nexus and neo-liberal governmentality operates by strengthening the hegemony of the Sinhala state against the Tamils and weakening or destroying the essential foundations of Tamil nationhood. Without recognizing these local and global dynamics every peacebuilding attempt will fail.

The concept of human security gained prominence in Southeast Asia in the aftermath of the Asian financial crisis of 1997-1998. In a rapidly changing ASEAN, the list of human insecurities covers issues of both development and security, and fall within the ambit of both freedom from want and freedom from fear. But while human security has gained traction 20 years since the 1994 UNDP Human Development Report, more needs to be done to translate discourse into action. This article argues that in order to advance human security ASEAN states must be imbued with the political will to act decisively in addressing human insecurities and to work with other actors in promoting protection and empowerment of people and communities.

Distinguished colleagues from government, university, NGOs, and students; The Republic of Korea (South Korea) is a fitting host for this meeting on refugee rights, given the example it has shown by ratifying the 1951 United Nations Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (the 1951 Refugee Convention) in 1992 and for enacting its amended Refugee Act just last month. In today’s global village, people are constantly leaving their homes in search of new opportunities. In public debates, however, the distinction between refugees and other people on the move is often blurred. It is important to remember that refugees have a distinct legal status. Refugees are people who have been forced to leave their country because their lives are in danger. Migrants and other groups on the move make a conscious decision for economic and other reasons. Refugees do not have this choice. Refugees are forced to leave and need international protection. This is why 147 countries across the world have signed the 1951 Refugee Convention and thus have granted refugees a unique legal status. It is shameful that Asia remains the largest refugee hosting region with the fewest signatories; large populations of refugees are hosted by neighbouring states that have not even ratified the Refugee Convention. The extent to which Korea’s asylum policy is an example of good practice will no doubt be among the subjects for extensive analysis, dialogue, and debate throughout this week. There are an estimated sixteen million refugees in the world today and 80% of them are hosted by states in the Global South, where the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita of most countries is below 3,000 US dollars. South Korea’s GDP per capita is 32,000 US dollars!

This research note outlines a series of questions about conducting research on state violence and human rights in Thailand. Taking as a central problem the recurrence of state violence across regimes both dictatorial and democratic in the 80 years since the end of the absolute monarchy, I argue that the failure to secure accountability for state violence can productively be placed at the center of researching and writing about modern Thai history. Unevenness is common both to the attempts to secure state accountability for state violence and to the available archival and other sources for writing histories of such violence. This research note examines the particular methodological and analytical difficulties and productive possibilities presented by the partial attempts and failures to secure state accountability and the equally partial available documentation of state violence.