Toward an Emancipatory Methodology for Peace Research

Peace research is meant to help those working to develop a more peaceful and just world, but it falls short of its potential in this respect. Most peace research is research for dominant groups (taking the nation‐state as primary actor) or about subordinate groups (utilizing them as objects in the research process). Instead, an emancipatory methodology is one that involves in the research process as coinvestigators subordinate groups struggling for change. Standpoint theory, which posits that in a stratified society the perspectives on social reality of those at the bottom are less partial and perverse than those at the top, is used to justify this methodology. The implications of standpoint theory for some issues in peace research and some obstacles to the adoption by peace researchers of an emancipatory methodology are discussed.