CONCLUSION
This chapter has examined how justice relates to peace and peace-making, in different stages of the conflict resolution process. Theresearch literature to date mostly examines the peace vs.
justice dilemma within a single stage, and often frames the problem as being one monolithic value standing against the other. Much of the literature is specifically on postconflict (transitional) societies faced with past injustices while attempting to build a durable peace. It has been argued here that the contextual details are decisive for how the two values relate to each other, and that it is impossible to say categorically that justice either undermines or promotes peace. It can do and does both, depending on the circumstances. Among the major factors are the phase of peace-making involved, the timeframe (short- or long-term), the particular concepts of justice at play and whether these are shared by parties, and the prevailing balance of forces between parties.In many situations, particularly in a longer- term perspective, the issue is not whether peace or justice is to be chosen or prioritized for both are clearly needed in some sense. The core questions are instead: what kind of justice and what kind of peace should be promoted (what steps should be taken)? How are the pursuits of these two values (the steps) best timed, sequenced and combined over time— that is, what kind of justice is to (can) be furthered in what stage of the process of conflict resolution and peace-building?
Behind the “peace vs. justice” label thus lurks a web of different relationships and interactions between the two values. Many of these are still little researched and poorly understood. How far conflict resolvers should seek to achieve justice depends partly on what is politically wise and possible, but also on what is beneficial for long-term peace. The roles of justice in bringing parties into dialogue, and in peace processes and the terms of agreements, have been examined here. Yet we still possess relatively little systematic knowledge about, for instance, the importance of justice for durable peace in the long term.
Other questions concern in what sense and how both justice and peace are best promoted over time, rather than whether both are needed or which is to be prioritized. For example, there are many instruments of transitional justice. What makes a leader choose one instrument over another, and what instrument should she choose if stable peace is a prime concern? The actual effects and consequences in the field of the use of different mechanisms need to be better examined. These and other questions point perhaps foremost to the need for more empirical investigations, to fill the gaps and put to test propositions and assumptions found in both scholarship and policy.