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Summary

Keating, Tom (2002). What Can Others Do? Foreign Governments and the Politics of Peacebuilding. In Carol A.L. Prager and Trudy Govier, Dilemmas of Reconciliation: Cases and Concepts. Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press. Pp. 169-195.

This essay sets out, among other objectives, to review the factors that have encouraged foreign governments, and the international institutions they operate, to intervene in an effort to contribute to the process of resolving civil wars and reconciling divided societies. It also seeks to examine critically the role of outside agents in this process and to reflect on the ethical and practical considerations involved in intervention. The essay provides a skeptical view of the role outsiders can play and offers a strong caution to advocates of intervention based principally on a concern for the inability of outsiders to avoid exacerbating these politically volatile situations. (Excerpt)

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