**8. Conclusions**

There has been a demonstrable "turn" to both religion and the local in recent years. This article investigates actors in both of these domains of conflict prevention, who in this case overlap, in order to question some of the conventional assumptions about prevention that emerge from its roots in liberal peace.

Having documented faith-based conflict prevention initiatives in three countries, this article has argued that in some cases they appear to make a meaningful impact in reducing violence. However, to what extent can the successes of local faith-based organisations be attributed to their localness, their faith-basis or both? Clearly, there are instances where localness is key, as this enables organisations to "read" situations and respond appropriately. However, there are also instances where an organisations' religious character can play a decisive role—for instance, in persuading former combatants to give up

their weapons and be spiritually cleansed. Ultimately, the organisations in the study had both local capital and spiritual and religious capital and used them both.

In some ways, the faith-based approaches studied here conform with "liberal peace" wisdom, as they a ffirm the fundamental soundness of investing in conflict prevention through peacebuilding initiatives and the practical gains that can be made. This is unsurprising, as they exist within a wider liberal framework and use many of the same models and approaches. Faith-based approaches also provide some useful counterpoints, highlighting liberal peace's susceptibility to quick wins, formulas and technological solutionism. These are serious weaknesses within the liberal peace framework, identified through existing critiques, but none are insurmountable. Indeed, they could all be addressed through reform of the liberal peace agenda, or failing this, could be partially o ffset by adaptations in current programming. Faith-based approaches o ffer glimpses of such adaptations, many of which could be replicated by others. Firstly, they foreground values such as justice, compassion and human flourishing. For faith-based actors these values are religiously inspired, but they are also universal values that the wider peacebuilding sector can seek to engender. Secondly, faith-based approaches emphasise the importance of relationships, recognising their significance in explaining people's behaviour and motivation for change. This is habitual for many faith traditions, which stress relationality and the common good, but contrasts with the liberal peace view of the individual as self-governing. Thirdly, faith-based approaches allow participants to engage deeply, bringing in di fferent dimensions of their experience, including spirituality and emotion.

Expanding our view of conflict prevention to include faith-based actors also addresses a methodological blind spot. Generalisations about conflict prevention are becoming more commonplace as the field develops, but they cannot hold true unless they capture the entirety of the endeavour, including initiatives that are faith-based, secular and hybrid. Faith-based initiatives require us to think about peacebuilding vernacular and how far it does and does not travel, and in so doing, it reminds us to scrutinise how accurately and strategically actors use the term "conflict prevention" in general.

The case study approach used in this article was adopted as a first step to exploring a largely unresearched topic. Based on its findings, several pathways for future research have emerged. A theological exploration of the underpinnings and expressions of conflict prevention norms in di fferent faith traditions would add another dimension to existing insights. The current research has also focused on faith-based actors at the leadership level, but what about ordinary religious people? As one respondent would have it, "Many people have no sympathy for dialogue or prevention, they are not theologically convinced. We see the same faces in dialogues, they are interfaith practitioners. What about ordinary people, what theological basis do they have?" (Muslim faith leader, Zanzibar). Is this true, and if it is, does it matter? Finally, another dimension to explore lies in the di fferences between faith-based conflict prevention and countering violent extremism initiatives, which also involve religious groups in preventative actions. Would the two concepts provide similar insights into the liberal and the local, and if not, how would they di ffer?

**Funding:** This research was funded by the UK's Economic and Social Research Council through the *Faith-based conflict prevention and early warning scoping project*, gran<sup>t</sup> number ES/L002116/1. The APC was funded by RCUK through a block gran<sup>t</sup> to Coventry University. The Zanzibar Case Study was funded through Making All Voices Count, an initiative supported by the UK Department for International Development (DFID), the US Agency for International Development (USAID), the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA) and the Omidyar Network, and implemented by a consortium consisting of Hivos, IDS and Ushahidi.

**Acknowledgments:** Organisations that have contributed to the projects underpinning this research include the Anglican Alliance (UK), the Archbishop of Canterbury's Reconciliation Ministry (UK), the Action Support Centre (South Africa), Local Peace Committees in Gauteng Province (South Africa), People's Voice for Peace (Uganda) and the Zanzibar Interfaith Centre (Tanzania).

**Conflicts of Interest:** The author declares no conflict of interest. The funders had no role in the design of the study; in the collection, analyses, or interpretation of data; in the writing of the manuscript; or in the decision to publish the results.
