A group psychoanalytic approach to the analysis of peacemakers' practice

Peacemakers dealing with violent conflicts are often exposed to stressors that are detrimental to the peacemaking process. Such stressors hinder performance and challenge the peacemakers' professional identity and identifications, both consciously and unconsciously. Moreover, peacemakers may risk contamination by the “radioactive,” traumatic elements of the violence inherent in the bellicose situations they deal with at the peace table. They may become “crypt carriers” of expulsed mourning and denied lost objects. In this study, I elaborate on whether a group psychoanalytic approach to analyzing peacemakers' practice can offer mediators the space to explore, elaborate on, and symbolize the unconscious dynamics underlying their practice. Having such a space can help them perform the psychic “work of trauma,” and shield or decontaminate them and their practice from the “radioactive” effect of the potentially traumatic elements of their profession. Such an approach can provide peacemakers with a complementary tool for developing their practice.

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