Decolonizing Religion and Peacebuilding: Author Meets Critics

This panel brings together a diverse group of scholars to discuss Atalia Omer’s Decolonizing Religion and Peacebuilding (Oxford University Press, 2023). Based on an extensive empirical study of inter and intra-religious peacebuilding practices in the postcolonial contexts of Kenya and the Philippines, Omer identifies two paradoxical findings: first, religious peacebuilding praxes are both empowering and depoliticizing, and second, more doing of religion does not necessarily denote deeper or more religious literacy. The book deploys decolonial and intersectional prisms to illuminate the entrenched colonial dynamics operative in religion and peace and development praxis in the global South. Still, the many stories of transformation and survival emerging from spaces of programmatic interreligious peacebuilding praxis, generate decolonial openings that speak back to decolonial theory. The panelists will reflect on how the book’s findings and theoretical interventions contribute to contemporary conversations in the study of religion, coloniality, and justice-oriented peacebuilding.