Nathan Funk
Associate Professor and Chair, Peace and Conflict Studies
For several years, Nathan Funk’s principal research focus has been the Peace Professionalism Project (PPP), a SSHRC-funded, transnational, partnership-development research project. The PPP fosters interaction between scholars and practitioners to generate insights and mobilize knowledge. Together with a research team in Canada and several other countries, the project explores two broad research questions: 1) How do peace professionals know whether they possess the skills, competencies and values necessary to be effective in their work? 2) What makes an effective peace worker?
Along with Philip Onguny, Gord Breedyk, and Evelyn Voigt, Nathan is working with a wide team of partners and collaborators in Canada and abroad. He finds several aspects of the collaboration to be especially meaningful. Part of the project’s purpose is to forge genuine collaboration between academicians and practitioners. “The research is academic, but the research design and focus have been informed not just by scholarly literature but also by insights from experienced practitioners,” Nathan explained.
He also appreciates the transnational nature of the project, with team members who live and work in Africa and Latin America as well as Asia and Europe. “We have heard so many interesting perspectives on how to define peace, on models for building peace, on gaps and challenges facing practitioners, on pedagogy and training, and on what are deemed to be the most important values and competencies for effective practice,” Nathan noted. “We have encountered not only a wide range of views but also common themes that can be surprising in their frequent recurrence — for example, affirmation not just of empathy, humility, respect, and active listening, but also of the importance of trying to understand the complexity of unique local contexts.”
Through this project, Nathan has made many new connections and revived older connections, including with PACS and MPACS alumni. “I have found that many people enjoy reflecting on the questions we are asking, and I consider it a privilege to hear them talk about what they consider important in peace work.”
Three years into this project, the team is still analyzing and weighing the data from 111 interview transcripts, 193 survey responses, and 19 focus group reports. There is much work still to do on this project, but the team has already given many presentations and published an initial journal article on the project.
“We find that a large proportion of people who have committed to the field believe it makes sense to reflect on skills and disciplines that enable peacebuilding, and to speak of values or ethical principles that can inform an ethos for the field,” Nathan said. While there are distinctive vocabularies, methods, and cultural traditions of peacemaking in many different parts of the world, Nathan noted that the people they have engaged with “seem to intuitively resonate with the idea that peacemakers in different places have much in common with one another.” He added, “above all we hope that our work helps to amplify the voices of people in the global peacebuilding community -- people who have wisdom to share with us, and whose practical knowledge calls for greater recognition.”
“I genuinely enjoy research collaborations and am a strong proponent of their value for peace and conflict studies,” shared Nathan. “Making peace, after all, always seems to require broadening one's point of view and taking into account other people's experiences and insights.”
“In my experience, partnership in research helps to align the knowledge production process with the sorts of processes that are so essential for making peace,” he added. “Research itself becomes more dialogical. The process can be very enriching, and what I learn informs my teaching.”
