The Hidden Peacebuilders Network

The Hidden Peacebuilders Network was established in 2018 to improve understanding of the role of local faith actors in building peace and resilience. We have partners in the UK, Sri Lanka, the Philippines, Burundi, Kenya, Brazil, and Mozambique.

We are comprised of an international collaboration of academics, faith actors, practitioners, and policy makers working to bridge the gap between local and international approaches to peacebuilding, as well as between policy, practice and research. We work towards this by pursuing the following objectives: Identifying and sharing existing evidence about the role of local faith actors (LFAs) in peacebuilding, including attention to both the 'tangible/visible’ and 'intangible/invisible’ dimensions of their contribution; carrying out new research to fill evidence gaps; and finally, translating research into policy and practice.

We received £100k of funding for this project from the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC, 2019-2021) (The hidden peace-builders: from ambivalence to engagement, strengthening the role of local faith actors in peace-building and reconciliation); £200k from the British Academy (2023-2024) (Building Community Resilience, Peace and Reconciliation as a Response to Global (Dis)Order: the ‘Tangible’ and ‘Intangible’ Aspects of Local Faith Actors’ Contributions) and the University of Leeds (2023-2024).