“I’m less concerned with villains and heroes than I am with how the next 50 years can be more peaceful than the last,” says Richard English, professor of politics at Queen’s University Belfast and director of the Senator George J Mitchell Institute for Global Peace, Security and Justice. It’s a refreshing perspective in a world where peace often seems impossible, and the complexities of conflict are readily reduced to narratives of good versus evil.
Queen’s is a Russell Group university at the forefront of global peacebuilding and reconciliation research. It’s a research institution that influences academic thought, shapes policy, and transforms lives in conflict communities worldwide. Its location in Belfast – a city shaped by decades of sectarian violence – means those engaged in the university’s peacebuilding work have a deeply personal awareness of the reality beyond research papers and reports. “The practicalities of the lived experience of conflict and post-conflict have been unavoidable for Queen’s – they affect everyone at the university, staff and students,” says English.
