Where will the AARCON Summer Conference be held?

The conference will take place in Aarhus, DNK.

What is the primary focus of the AARCON Summer Conference?

The conference focuses on 'Transitions: The Aftermath of War and Conflict', exploring societal recovery and peacebuilding.

When does the conference begin?

The conference is scheduled to begin in late June.

AARCON Summer Conference 2026: "Transitions: The Aftermath of War and Conflict"

Name: AARCON Summer Conference 2026: "Transitions: The Aftermath of War and Conflict"
Start: 2026-06-26T00:00:00Z
End: 2026-06-26T00:00:00Z
Location: Aarhus

Jun 26, 2026Aarhus, DenmarkIn-person

Registration open

The AARCON Summer Conference, hosted in Aarhus, DNK, will convene experts to explore the multifaceted challenges and opportunities arising in the aftermath of war and conflict. This event focuses on the 'Transitions' that societies undergo, encompassing political, social, economic, and psychological dimensions of recovery and peacebuilding. Participants will delve into the complexities of moving from conflict to stability, examining various approaches to reconciliation, reconstruction, and the establishment of sustainable peace.

Committees & topics

Topics
Post-Conflict Reconciliation: Rebuilding Societies After War · Transitional Justice in Post-Conflict States · Moral Injury: Recognising the Ethical Wounds of War · The Situation of Veterans After War · Building and Sustaining Peace After Conflict · Navigating Uncertainty in Post-Conflict Transitions · War Veterans and Metal-Detecting Archaeology: Heritage, Therapy, and Regulation

Why it matters

Understanding the aftermath of war and conflict is paramount for fostering global stability and preventing cycles of violence. The conference's theme, 'Transitions,' highlights the critical period where peace can either take root or falter. This involves not only addressing immediate humanitarian concerns but also laying the groundwork for long-term societal healing and development. The insights generated from such discussions are vital for policymakers, humanitarian organizations, and academic institutions working to support post-conflict regions worldwide.

The discussions will likely touch upon the intricate processes of transitional justice, economic revitalization, and the rebuilding of social cohesion. Effective strategies in these areas are crucial for countries emerging from conflict to avoid relapse and to build resilient, inclusive societies. The conference provides a platform for sharing best practices and innovative solutions, drawing on diverse experiences to inform future interventions and policies.

How to prepare

Delegates preparing for this conference should focus on developing a robust understanding of post-conflict recovery frameworks and the challenges inherent in their implementation. A strong foundation in topics such as "Engagement Strategies" and "Dynamic Analysis" will be particularly beneficial for contributing meaningfully to discussions on peacebuilding and societal reconstruction. Consider how various stakeholders, including those often overlooked, contribute to or impede transitional processes, aligning with concepts explored in "Hidden Stakeholders" and "What Is Stakeholder Mapping?".

Attendees should be prepared to engage with diverse perspectives on justice, reconciliation, and governance in post-conflict settings. Reviewing case studies from different regions, even if not explicitly mentioned in the event details, can provide a broader context for understanding the universal and unique aspects of transitions. Furthermore, an appreciation for "Gender Dynamics Across Cultures" will be crucial, as the impact of conflict and the process of recovery often disproportionately affect different demographic groups.

Country perspectives

Where the most-relevant 1 countries stand on the core issues in play. Click through for the full country profile.

Denmark

As the host nation, DNK provides a neutral and academically rigorous environment for discussing post-conflict transitions.

Role in topic

DNK has a history of contributing to international peace efforts and humanitarian aid, offering a perspective rooted in supporting global stability and development. Its academic institutions are often at the forefront of peace and conflict research.

Topics & background

The background behind each topic and the actors that shape it.

Post-Conflict Reconciliation: Rebuilding Societies After War

Reconciliation as a structured post-conflict process emerged most visibly in the second half of the twentieth century, as states confronted the question of how divided societies could coexist after mass violence. The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission (1995-2002), chaired by Archbishop Desmond Tutu under the Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act, became the global template, prioritising truth-telling and conditional amnesty over criminal prosecution. Earlier and parallel models — denazification in occupied Germany, the Nuremberg Principles, and later Rwanda's gacaca courts established in 2001 — illustrated the spectrum from retributive to restorative approaches. The core dispute centres on the trade-off between justice and stability. Reconciliation efforts must balance victims' demands for accountability and reparations with the political reality that perpetrators often retain power, weapons, or social networks. Critics argue that amnesty-heavy models entrench impunity, while purely prosecutorial approaches can collapse fragile peace settlements, as seen in debates over the Colombian Special Jurisdiction for Peace created under the 2016 Havana Accords with the FARC. Today, reconciliation frameworks are active or contested in Colombia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Northern Ireland, Sri Lanka, Ethiopia following the 2022 Pretoria Agreement, and increasingly in discussions about a post-war Ukraine. The UN's 2010 Guidance Note on Transitional Justice and the work of the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights continue to shape international norms, though implementation remains deeply national and uneven.

Key players

Transitional Justice in Post-Conflict States

Transitional justice refers to the judicial and non-judicial measures societies use to redress legacies of large-scale human rights abuses. The concept crystallised after the Cold War, when waves of democratisation in Latin America, Eastern Europe, and South Africa forced new governments to confront the crimes of their predecessors. The Nuremberg and Tokyo tribunals of 1945-48 set early precedents, but the field's modern architecture was built through the International Criminal Tribunals for the former Yugoslavia (1993) and Rwanda (1994), the hybrid Special Court for Sierra Leone (2002), and the establishment of the International Criminal Court under the 1998 Rome Statute. The UN Secretary-General's 2004 report 'The Rule of Law and Transitional Justice in Conflict and Post-Conflict Societies' codified four pillars: criminal prosecutions, truth-seeking, reparations, and institutional reform including vetting. Disputes persist over sequencing (peace first or justice first), the legitimacy of international versus domestic prosecutions, and the application of universal jurisdiction. The ICC's indictments against sitting leaders — including Sudan's Omar al-Bashir and, in 2023, Russia's Vladimir Putin — have intensified debates about selectivity and Western bias, particularly given African Union criticism and the non-participation of major powers in the Rome Statute. Current flashpoints include accountability mechanisms for Syria (the IIIM), Myanmar (the IIMM), Ukraine (the Register of Damage and proposed special tribunal on aggression), and Gaza-related proceedings at the ICC and ICJ. Domestic transitional justice processes are also unfolding or stalled in Tunisia, The Gambia, Ethiopia, and Sri Lanka.

Key players

Moral Injury: Recognising the Ethical Wounds of War

Moral injury describes the lasting psychological, social, and spiritual harm caused by perpetrating, witnessing, or failing to prevent acts that transgress deeply held moral beliefs. The term was introduced by psychiatrist Jonathan Shay in his 1994 study 'Achilles in Vietnam,' drawing on his clinical work with American veterans, and was later operationalised in research by Brett Litz and colleagues at the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs. Unlike post-traumatic stress disorder, which is rooted in fear-based responses to threat, moral injury centres on guilt, shame, and a loss of trust in oneself or legitimate authority. The concept has gained traction because conventional PTSD frameworks did not fully capture the experiences of service members involved in counter-insurgency, drone operations, detention, or witnessing civilian harm in Iraq, Afghanistan, and elsewhere. It has since been extended to humanitarian workers, healthcare staff during the COVID-19 pandemic, refugees, and child soldiers undergoing demobilisation. Debates continue over whether moral injury should be classified as a distinct clinical diagnosis, how it interacts with PTSD, and whether faith-based, narrative, or community-based interventions are more effective than standard psychotherapy. Policy attention is growing in states with large veteran populations and active deployments. The U.S. VA, the U.K. Ministry of Defence, the Canadian Armed Forces, and Israeli mental health services have all funded research, while NATO's Science and Technology Organization has explored moral injury within multinational operations. The concept is increasingly relevant to post-conflict transitions, where ex-combatants' unaddressed moral wounds can complicate reintegration and reconciliation.

Key players

The Situation of Veterans After War

The treatment of veterans has shaped state-society relations since antiquity, but the modern veterans' welfare regime is largely a product of the twentieth century. Mass conscription in the First and Second World Wars produced unprecedented numbers of disabled and traumatised survivors, prompting landmark legislation such as the U.S. Servicemen's Readjustment Act of 1944 (the 'GI Bill') and the establishment of dedicated ministries and agencies across Europe and the Commonwealth. The Vietnam War later forced the formal recognition of PTSD in the DSM-III in 1980 and exposed gaps in mental health and reintegration services. Contemporary veterans' issues span physical disability, mental health (including PTSD, traumatic brain injury, and suicide), homelessness, unemployment, substance abuse, and family breakdown. The post-2001 wars in Afghanistan and Iraq generated a generation of veterans in NATO states with high survival rates from severe injuries thanks to improved battlefield medicine, but correspondingly complex long-term care needs. Russia's war in Ukraine is producing very large veteran cohorts on both sides, with Ukraine alone projecting several million veterans and family members eligible for support, and Russia confronting reintegration of mobilised personnel and pardoned convict-soldiers. Key disputes concern entitlement scope, the burden-sharing between state and private provision, recognition of irregular or contract fighters, and parity of treatment for women veterans and those from minority backgrounds. International cooperation is limited but growing through NATO's Committee on Gender Perspectives, the Commonwealth War Graves Commission, and bilateral exchanges on best practice.

Key players

Building and Sustaining Peace After Conflict

The international peace architecture took shape in 1945 with the UN Charter, whose Chapter VI (pacific settlement) and Chapter VII (enforcement) underpin contemporary peace operations. The end of the Cold War unlocked a major expansion in UN peacekeeping and the development of 'peacebuilding' as a distinct activity, articulated in Boutros Boutros-Ghali's 1992 'An Agenda for Peace' and refined through the 2000 Brahimi Report, the 2005 establishment of the UN Peacebuilding Commission, and the 2015 HIPPO and AGE reviews that produced the 'sustaining peace' agenda jointly adopted by the General Assembly and Security Council in 2016. The core challenge is that roughly half of post-conflict states relapse into violence within a decade, according to World Bank and UN data. Debates centre on the sequencing of security, political, and economic transitions; the role of external actors versus local ownership; the integration of women under UNSCR 1325 and youth under UNSCR 2250; and how to finance prevention when donor attention is short. The 'liberal peacebuilding' paradigm, which links peace to democratisation and market reform, has been challenged by alternative models, including China's emphasis on development-led stability. Current peace processes face severe headwinds. UN peacekeeping has contracted with the closure of missions in Mali (MINUSMA, 2023) and the drawdown in the DRC (MONUSCO). Active negotiation tracks or stalled processes include Sudan, Yemen, Syria, Myanmar, Colombia's 'Total Peace' policy, Ethiopia, and prospective frameworks for Ukraine and Gaza. The 2024 Pact for the Future reaffirmed sustaining peace as a UN priority but did not resolve Security Council deadlock.

Key players

Navigating Uncertainty in Post-Conflict Transitions

Uncertainty is an intrinsic feature of war termination and post-conflict transition. Political scientists from Thomas Schelling onwards have shown that incomplete information, credible commitment problems, and shifting power balances make peace settlements fragile. James Fearon's 1995 'Rationalist Explanations for War' framed bargaining failures around uncertainty, while Barbara Walter's work on civil war settlements demonstrated that third-party guarantees significantly reduce the risk of relapse. The 1990s saw repeated examples — Angola's Bicesse Accords, Rwanda's Arusha Accords — where uncertainty about adversaries' intentions contributed to catastrophic breakdowns. In contemporary practice, uncertainty manifests across multiple domains: military (will ceasefires hold?), political (will elections be accepted?), legal (which transitional justice path will be chosen?), economic (will sanctions be lifted, reconstruction funded?), and humanitarian (will displaced populations return?). The post-2020 era has added new layers: climate shocks compounding fragility in the Sahel and Horn of Africa, cyber and information operations blurring the line between war and peace, and great-power competition reducing the predictability of international guarantees. The collapse of arms-control regimes, including the INF Treaty in 2019 and New START's suspension in 2023, has heightened strategic uncertainty. For delegates, the policy question is how institutions — UN missions, regional organisations, donor consortia — can reduce uncertainty enough to make peace self-enforcing. Tools include monitoring and verification regimes, conditional financing, security guarantees, demobilisation programmes, and confidence-building measures. The current debates around security assurances for Ukraine, monitoring of the Ethiopia-Tigray Pretoria Agreement, and the future of UN special political missions all turn on managing uncertainty during transition.

Key players

War Veterans and Metal-Detecting Archaeology: Heritage, Therapy, and Regulation

The use of metal detectors for conflict archaeology emerged after the Second World War as battlefields across Europe, North Africa, and the Pacific became sites of both salvage and remembrance. From the 1990s, the field professionalised through 'battlefield archaeology,' associated with scholars such as Tony Pollard and Iain Banks at the University of Glasgow, and through systematic surveys of sites including the Somme, Verdun, the Eastern Front, and the American Civil War battlefields. In parallel, veteran-focused programmes began to harness archaeology as therapy. The U.K.-based charity Waterloo Uncovered, founded in 2015 by veterans of the British Army, has become the most prominent example, combining academic excavation at the 1815 battlefield with structured recovery support for serving personnel and veterans, often those affected by PTSD or moral injury. Similar initiatives exist through the American Veterans Archaeological Recovery and Operation Nightingale, a U.K. Ministry of Defence-supported programme founded in 2011. The core issues are threefold. First, heritage protection: unregulated metal detecting — sometimes called 'nighthawking' — damages stratigraphy and removes context, and is regulated very differently across states (liberal under the U.K.'s Portable Antiquities Scheme and Treasure Act 1996, restrictive in France under the 1989 law, and tightly controlled in Greece, Poland, and most post-Soviet states). Second, the recovery of human remains and unexploded ordnance on former battlefields raises legal and ethical duties under international humanitarian law and domestic war-graves legislation. Third, the therapeutic dimension raises questions of clinical evidence, safeguarding, and the appropriate integration of veterans into research teams. Current debates focus on the war in Ukraine, where active and recent battlefields overlap with sites from the Second World War, complicating both heritage protection and humanitarian demining. UNESCO, the International Committee of the Blue Shield, and national heritage agencies are increasingly engaged with how veterans, archaeologists, and the military can cooperate without incentivising looting or endangering participants.

Key players