Digital peacebuilding in post‐conflict Colombia – A conceptual framework

Abstract

This article proposes a preliminary conceptual framework that integrates digitality, or the condition of being digital, with existing frameworks of peacebuilding and post‐conflict reconstruction. It builds on existing literature about how the Internet impacts social capital, polarization, participation, and conflict as well as traditional conflict research that examines stability post‐conflict. The framework is designed to evaluate the impact of digitality, which I treat as the independent variable, on six societal factors relevant to post‐conflict civil society, which I treat as dependent variables. I hypothesize that these effects are meaningful for outcomes of social capital, reintegration, and justice in post‐conflict civil society and find that digitality meaningfully changes post‐conflict civil society. Finally, I recommend that policymakers tailor a peacebuilding approach to a digital world.