Belfast International Conference

Urban Conflicts: Ethno-National Divisions, States and Cities

The Urban Conflicts conference was held at Queen’s University Belfast on 19 – 21 May 2011. It was organised by the Conflict in Cities and the Contested State ESRC Research Project (2007 – 2012) and partly sponsored by the World Bank's World Development Report 2011 - Conflict, Security and Development. This multi-disciplinary conference focused on the nature and dynamics of ethno-national conflicts as manifested in contested cities. It aimed to enhance dialogue between academics and non-academic urban policy practitioners and community activists working in such contested cities. CinC also produced an exhibition entitled Capturing Urban Conflicts (see below).

CinC team members made the following presentations at the conference: Anderson ‘Conceptualising Divided Cities’; Baillie ‘Staking Claim: Monuments and the Making (and Breaking?) of a Border Matrix in Vukovar’; Carabelli & Zuljevic ‘(Re)collecting Mostar: Could Artistic Strategies Foster a Discussion about Public Space and Memory in a Polarised Urban Environment?’; Dumper ‘Ideology and Religion in a Divided City: Zionism, Christianity and the Politics of Exclusivity in contemporary Jerusalem’; Gwiazda & Kyricaou 'Visualising Policy? The Case of Dividing Jerusalem'; Hayward & Komarova ‘Performing Conflict Management’;  Larkin ‘Resistance, Resilience or Resignation? Palestinian Jerusalemite responses to the Separation Barrier’ ; O’Dowd ‘Cities at Frontiers, as Frontiers’; Pullan ‘Sacred space’ as paradox: the situation in Jerusalem today’; Leonard & McKnight 'Permanent or Temporary Barriers? Young People’s Perceptions of Peace Walls in Belfast'; Smyth & McKnight ‘Normative Conflict and Creative Action: Juggling Cultural and Political Identities in Belfast’s Inner City’; Wallach‘Shared Space’ in Divided Cities: Does it Exist? What Does it Mean?’; and Yacobi ‘Symbolic De-colonisation or Survival Mechanism: Re-visiting a Colonial Neighbourhood in East Jerusalem’.

Individual abstracts and the conference programme can be found in the conference reader below:

Urban Conflicts Conference Reader

More information about the conference can be found at: http://www.qub.ac.uk/sites/UrbanConflictsConference/

Capturing Urban Conflicts exhibition
The CinC Capturing Urban Conflicts exhibition was shown at the CinC Urban Conflicts conference (Queen’s University Belfast, 19 – 21 May 2011). The exhibition consisted of maps of contested cities which were accompanied by a series of photo-essays which provided a glimpse into an aspect of everyday life in these cities. The exhibition provided an opportunity for the project to showcase some of its visual reseach--a key element in the work of CinC.