Dr. Brendan Ciaran Browne

Summary

Against the backdrop of the Israeli-Palestinian setting and the protracted occupation of Palestine, the Bedouin community of the West Bank face unique humanitarian vulnerabilities, including the risk of (repeated) forced displacement, considered a violation of International Humanitarian Law (IHL) as well as of International Criminal Law (ICL) and human rights (IHRL). So far, there has been a general reluctance in the international community to establish responsibility under international law and address these violations as drivers of humanitarian risk for the Bedouin. However, in 2018 the International Criminal Court (ICC) Prosecutor's Annual Report on Preliminary Examination Activities - Situation in Palestine included in their analysis demolitions and evictions in "Bedouin and other herder communities present in and around the so-called E1 area" on its list of alleged potential war crimes. The current ICC focus on demolitions and forced displacement in E1, and the subsequent call for individuals and groups to send information on the alleged crimes, offers a crucial opportunity for Bedouin communities to engage with the ICC.This project is a direct response to the ICC invitation. For researchers and civil society organisations working with the Bedouin on issues around forced displacement, this is a watershed moment, which offers the chance to contribute to the ICC preliminary examination activities, with a view to seeking accountability for past IHL violations and improving future humanitarian protection outcomes for these communities at risk. Building on the experienced, international, interdisciplinary team's previous work, the project will achieve these aims through a combination of desk-based research, fieldwork and community-based activities (including human rights workshops and advocacy capacity building for Bedouin women, teens and children).

Funding Agency

Arts Humanities Research Council (UK)

Programme

DfID Collaborative Humanitarian Protection Research Programme

Project Type

International, multi-disciplinary, socio-legal

Summary

This project, funded by the AHRC Follow-on Funding (FoF) for Impact and Engagement Scheme / Highlight Notice for the UN International Year of the Creative Economy for Sustainable Development, builds on existing research on the humanitarian vulnerabilities of the Palestinian Bedouin at risk of forced displacement in the Jerusalem periphery. The project develops a collaboration between the academic team and a Palestinian media production company subcontracted to produce creative content addressing SDG 16 (peace and justice) and creates voluntary opportunities for content cocreation with members of the Bedouin community. The non-academic users targeted in this project are worldwide global digital audiences who access creative visual content online, and human rights festivals (digital and physical), to become informed of human rights and international law issues in Palestine. This proposal builds on the AHRC-FCDO-funded project 'Palestinian Bedouin at risk of forced displacement: IHL vulnerabilities, ICC possibilities' (Ref AH/T007540/1) ('the parent project') running between 1 September 2020 and 31 August 2022, with a no-cost extension granted until 31 January 2023. The core aim of this follow-on project is to complement the existing suite of academic and policy-facing activities underway in the 'parent project', with a third pathway: creative media content targeting general audiences worldwide through digital means

Funding Agency

Arts & Humanities Research Council/FCDO

Summary

Sitting at the intersection between STEM and a range of social science disciplines, (including sociology, politics and anthropology), this research funded by the Wellcome Trust, critiques understandings of 'Resilience' and 'Risk' from a Palestinian youth perspective. Those growing up in Palestine must transition from adolescence to adulthood whilst negotiating the everyday difficulties associated with an entrenched and expanding apparatus of occupation. By moving beyond the favoured quantitative analysis of 'resilience', the work seeks to gain a deeper and more critical understanding of the usefulness of the terminology, 'risk', 'resilience' and 'resistance' from the perspective of Palestinian youth. Availing of firsthand qualitative research with Palestinian youth as active research participants, the work will shed light on strategies of 'coping' that are often sanitised in more rigid quantitative research frameworks.

Funding Agency

Wellcome Trust

Programme

Institutional Strategic Support Fund (Seed Funding)

Summary

The conflict in and around Northern Ireland spanned a period of 30 years (1968 - 1998) and claimed the lives of over 3,500 people across the sectarian divide. The impact of the conflict was far reaching with some suggesting that almost 1 in 3 people were affected indirectly. Since the onset of a peace process, one that remains unfinished, issues pertaining to the legacy of the conflict and how best to address the needs of victims and survivors, have dominated academic and practitioner discourse. Despite much by way of blue sky thinking, there has been an inability to implement a programme that addresses the diverse needs of those who were impacted. Within the myriad options for dealing with the past there is little to no mention of those who were violently displaced as a result of the onset of the conflict itself. In fact, the issue is almost completely absent from scholarly analysis of the 'troubles'. This project, ongoing since 2016, seeks to recover the narratives of these forgotten victims who were displaced, giving them a platform in the debates around dealing with Northern Ireland's past. It is a direct response to existing academic projects that overlook this aspect of victimhood in favour of more procedural based, fiscal responses to conflict transformation. Through a mix of creative methodologies (including semi-structured interviews, artistic representations of displacement, and documentary film) the research engages with both those who were victims and those who were victim makers, when it comes to better understanding the longterm impact of violent displacement.

Funding Agency

ISRF Flexible Grants for Small Groups (ISF4)

Summary

As a term with interdisciplinary appeal, 'resilience' has found prominence in the fields of ecology, sociology, and psychology (Manyena, 2006; Zhou et. al., 2009). Theoretically speaking, the commonly understood notion of resilience; being positive in the face of adversity (Fleming & Ledogar, 2008) reflects the latin lineage of the term, and the notion of 'bouncing back'. In the field of conflict management, an area dominated by 'shocks, vulnerability and risk' (Evans & Reid, 2013; Béné et. al., 2012: 8), resilience has been used to describe those who are seemingly capable of managing to cope with the scourges of sustained conflict. In Palestine, a growing number of vulnerable and 'at risk' youth are attempting to navigate uncertain transitions; from adolescent dependency to adult autonomy, against the backdrop of an entrenched conflict. Their capacity for doing so is often heralded by international NGOs and foreign observers as reflective of their 'resilience'. Such a labelling is not un-problematic in that it masks the deep seeded physical and emotional impact of consistent exposure to such violence. This project problematises the concept of 'resilience' when analysing youth transitions in conflict zones from a social sciences perspective and turns a critical eye to the entrenched conflict in Palestine.

Funding Agency

Arts and Social Sciences Benefactions Fund