Peace, Complexity, Visuality Ambiguities in Peace and Conflict

This book argues that we can capitalize on the tolerance of ambiguity-enhancing potentialities inherent in visual images – their non-coherence – and thus increase our capability of tolerating ambiguities. Studying international relations equals studying ambiguity. The international system is complex, and where there is complexity, there is also ambiguity. Crucially, in a world saturated not only with ambiguities but also with visual images, it is mandatory to think ambiguity and visuality together. The authors analyze the constructive and peaceful potentialities of ambiguities through an exploration of journalistic imagery in the context of post-war Bosnia and post-siege Sarajevo.

Chapter 1: Introduction: Ambiguities in Local and Global Contexts.- Part I: Complexity and Ambiguity.- Chapter 2: Approaching Complexity in Peace and Conflict.- Chapter 3: Tolerance of Ambiguity.- Part II: New Photographies and Visual Ambiguities.- Chapter 4: The Crisis of Photojournalism and the Emergence of New Photographies.- Chapter 5: Visual Ambiguities: Controlling the Meaning of Images in a Digital and Interactive World.- Part III: Bosnia: Uncertain Paths to Peace.- Chapter 6: Introducing Bosnia: Uncertain Paths to Peace.- Chapter 7: Navigating Bosnia: Uncertain Paths to Peace.- Chapter 8: The Grids: Architectural Space and Panel-to-Panel Transitions.- Chapter 9: Interactivity and the Author-Audience Relationship.- Part IV: Leveraging Ambiguity for Peace.- Chapter 10: Embracing Difference: Learning from Bosnia?.- Chapter 11: Exploring the Surround, Appreciating Complexity.- Chapter 12: Active Looking: Images in Peace Mediation.- Chapter 13: Concluding Reflections: Tolerance of Ambiguity and the Ambiguity of Tolerance.

Rasmus Bellmer is based in Berlin and currently works for the Berghof Foundation. He holds a master’s degree in Peace, Mediation and Conflict Research. From 2020 to 2022, he worked as a project researcher in the research project Peace Videography, funded by Kone Foundation, and was affiliated with the Tampere Peace Research Institute, Tampere University, Finland. His research was published in journals such as International Political Sociology, Peacebuilding and Journal of Peace Education.