Local agency, adaptation, and vertical integration of bottom-up peacebuilding: reflecting on systemic action research in Myanmar

This paper presents findings from a peacebuilding programme in a highly conflict-affected area in northern Myanmar. The programme utilised a novel peacebuilding methodology, Systemic Action Research, which draws upon participatory action research, complexity theory, and systems thinking. The programme engendered high rates of participation among populations that were otherwise excluded from Myanmar’s peace process, democratic process, and international development assistance.

Notable successes were achieved on conflict-related issues such as landmine contamination and drug abuse, whose incidence rates are among the worst in the world. Various characteristics of the programme are explored for their contributions to greater peacebuilding effectiveness, including sufficient localisation, the role of agency, the utility of learning and adaptation, and various types of strategic connections between actors and processes which allow for vertical integration of bottom-up peacebuilding programmes and offer a richer set of relational dynamics that are of interest to ‘peace writ large’.

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