After remembrance: What is peacebuilding?

The end of conflict is not the automatic beginning of peace

A conflict can end at a precise hour of a precise day.

At 11 a.m. on November 11, 1918, the guns on the Western Front went quiet. Under foggy skies near Mons, where Canadian troops had fought to capture the city, the shelling stopped. On mud-soaked fields, soldiers lowered their weapons and held their positions.

Silence. Stillness.

The larks, still bravely singing, could finally be heard.

After more than 1,500 days of war, it was over.

But peace had not arrived.

The Armistice had set the hour and terms. Signed at about 5 a.m. in a railway carriage in a French forest, it reached Canadian units as a short telegram that morning. It was unmistakable:

Troops were to stand fast on the line they had reached, keep up their defences and have no contact with the enemy.

Stop fighting. Stay put.

The Armistice was a welcome ceasefire. It was not a peace treaty.

Forced peace is not lasting peace

The peace treaty that formally ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied powers, the Treaty of Versailles, did not build or secure a lasting peace.

Rather, it sought to impose peace by force and blame.

Germany was excluded from the main negotiations. It and its allies were made to accept responsibility for the loss and damage the war caused. The treaty also set the legal basis for reparations to be paid.

German representatives were handed the terms of the treaty and given two options:

1. Sign it.
2. Be invaded.

Many Germans called the Treaty of Versailles a diktat —a dictated peace. A peace the German people had no part in making. No voice in shaping. It lacked legitimacy and left many causes of the war unresolved. It fuelled resentment among Germans.

It would ultimately fail to prevent another major war in Europe.

Peace agreements are necessary. But peace cannot simply be imposed. It must be built.

That work has a name.

What is peacebuilding?

An armistice stops the fighting. A treaty settles the terms. Those are instruments of paper and signatures. Peacekeepers can help maintain security as agreements are put in place.

Peacebuilding is the work of making peace last. World Vision International defines it as: “…the process of restoring broken relationships between people engaged in destructive social conflict as well as preventing the escalation of conflict.”

When it happens after the fighting stops, that is called post-conflict peacebuilding.

It means addressing the underlying causes of conflict, including:

• Grievances and injustices that were never resolved.
• Cyclical poverty and inequality.
• Governments that people don’t trust to protect or serve them.
• Exclusion and discrimination.
• Climate change shocks that strain limited resources.

The fighting may stop. Yet the embers of tension remain. Still hot. Still capable of reigniting.

Post-conflict peacebuilding is the work of putting them out.

It is not simply about rebuilding roads, homes and schools. It is also about rebuilding trust, restoring relationships and helping communities find ways to live together.

Who are the peacebuilders?

History remembers Mahatma Gandhi and Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. for their nonviolent actions.

It remembers Lester Pearson, whose diplomacy helped establish the first large-scale United Nations peacekeeping force during the Suez Crisis. When making his case, he said, “Peace is far more than ceasing to fire.”

And it should remember Eglantyne Jebb and Dorothy Buxton, who spoke out for starving children in the aftermath of the First World War.

But instead of asking “who is a peacebuilder?”, the question should be, “who isn’t?”

Because peacebuilding can happen quietly, in everyday moments led by everyday people:

• Community leaders in Venezuela who developed a character named Respetina to teach children respect.
• Teenagers like Ludmila in Mozambique, who speak out against violence and early marriage.
• Teachers like Isa, who fled war in Sudan and opened a school for refugee children in South Sudan.

Or someone who makes a promise to a child and keeps it.

No titles. No awards. No treaties to sign. Just people who choose to listen and stand up for others.

How does peacebuilding happen?

There is no set formula. There is no definitive starting line. Peacebuilding can happen before the conflict, during the conflict and afterwards.

But two principles hold wherever and whenever it happens:

The people affected must have a hand in building it

This is one of the lessons from 1919. The Treaty of Versailles was written without Germany at the table. It was developed and handed over without meaningful debate or compromise. The peace it meant to secure did not last.

Peacebuilding begins with questions, not answers

In Venezuela, for example, World Vision staff and community members asked what was preventing children and families from living peacefully together. The answers included:

• Bullying
• Disrespectful language
• Lack of empathy

Rather than importing, or imposing, a ready-made solution, they built peace with the community.

The methods may change from place to place. The approach does not: involve the people affected and ask questions.

Canadians and the work of peace

In the First World War, Canadians fought at Ypres, the Somme, Vimy Ridge and Passchendaele. On the day of the Armistice, they liberated the city of Mons.

More than 620,000 Canadians enlisted or were conscripted. Some 61,000 never came home.

They saw the need. They answered the call.

In the decades since, Canadians have answered a different one: to keep the peace and to build it.

Canada’s modern peacekeeping legacy took shape during the 1956 Suez Crisis. Since then, more than 125,000 members of the Canadian Armed Forces and over 4,500 police officers have served in peacekeeping missions around the world.

Some have served in places where World Vision Canada works today, such as Rwanda, Mali and the Central African Republic.

And approximately 130 Canadians have died in the service of peace.

On Remembrance Day, we remember them too.

We remember soldiers who fight to end a war. Peacekeepers who protect the peace. And we honour peacebuilders who help make peace last.

After the silence

Every November 11 at 11 a.m., Canadians fall silent to mark the moment the Armistice took effect in 1918.

We stand still. We remember.

Then the silence ends, and the work of peacebuilding resumes.

Today, over 473 million children live in areas affected by war or armed conflict. A ceasefire, when it comes, will end the fighting.

But not the work.

Because that is how peace is built: with the people who live in it, not for them.

Lest we forget the important work of peacebuilding.