Local Religious Leaders and Peacebuilding in Fragile Context: Empirical Evidence from Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan

Abstract

The influence of religion on human behavior is an undeniable fact. Faith deeply influences citizens’ behavior regarding violence, peace and conflict in society. Faith can be a source of both violence and peace. However, the role of religion in violence is often discussed in literature while its functions in promotion of peace are mostly ignored. Similarly, in the conflict context of Khbyer Pakhtunkhwa Pakistan where militants used religion for the legitimization of control and violence. While local religious actors also played a vital role in prevention of conflict and promotion of peace but that rarely surfaced in media and literature. In this vein, this study attempts to explore the religious actors’ role in peacebuilding in communities affected by terrorism in Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. The study adopted a quantitative approach and purposively selected four fragile communities of District Dir Upper and Lower of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. Multiple linear regression was applied to assess the effect of various aspects (variables) of faith base peacebuilding on the level of peace. The results showed that four aspect of faith base peacebuilding, namely, peace mobilization, prevention of violence and conflict, reconciliation and trust building are the strong predictors of the level of peace while the single variable, namely, spiritual and emotional support was noted as a non-significant predictor of the level of peace. The study concluded that religious actors played a vital role in mobilizing local people towards peace, prevention of violence and conflict, reconciliation and trust building.  Keeping in mind the significant role of religious base actors’ role in peace it is suggested that the peacebuilding organization needs to recognize their vital role and include them for realizing sustainable peace in post-conflict settings in order to avoid relapse.