Introduction to Peace and Conflict, Volume 20, Issue 3.

Abstract

I first became aware of the work of the Jesuit scholar Ignacio Martin-Baró in the 1980s, after I had become involved in the movement to try to develop more "appropriate psychology" for third-world societies. Research and practicing psychologists who engage in efforts to bring about constructive change in third-world societies often realize that traditional Western psychology has other priorities and does not address many of the major questions and concerns that should have top priority in non-Western contexts. Ignacio Martin-Baró was already well regarded among those concerned with developing a more appropriate psychology for third-world societies by the end of the 1980s for his contributions to a community psychology that better meets the needs of the masses in Latin America. I had a more direct connection with his work in 1990, when we both contributed to a special issue of the Journal of Social Issues, edited by Tod Sloan, on the theme of psychology in the developing world. Ignacio Martin-Baró's contribution explored the ways in which certain religious ideologies were serving to keep the common people oppressed in the Salvadoran Civil War (Martin- Baró & Sloan, 1990). In 1990, I developed another connection with Ignacio Martin-Baró when I joined the faculty of Georgetown University, established by Jesuits in 1789. November 16, 2014, is the 25th anniversary of the assassination of Ignacio Martin-Baró by the Salvadoran military, and I am proud that we begin this issue of the journal with a paper (Lykes & Sibley, 2014) on Ignacio Martin-Baró and work made possible through the Ignacio Martin-Baró Fund.The Lykes and Sibley (2014) paper is followed by seven major articles exploring different psychological aspects of war and its consequences. The first, by Myriam Denov and Ines Marchard (2014), examines the experiences of former child soldiers as they struggle to reintegrate into mainstream society in Colombia. Many lethal modern weapons are "user friendly" enough to be used by young children; bullets from a semiautomatic weapon fired by a 10-year-old child are just as lethal as from a semiautomatic weapon fired by a 30-year-old adult. This unfortunate fact has made child soldiers a common ingredient of warfare in many conflicts, particularly in Asia and Africa. Denov and Marchard's study reveals the stigma and rejection former child soldiers face when they escape from the war zone and attempt to reintegrate into mainstream society.Children and women are the first victims in violent conflicts, and the next paper, by Dossa, Hatem, Zunzunegui, and Fraser (2014), explores the experiences of rape victims and their relationships with their rape-conceived children, in the context of the Democratic Republic of Congo. Like the child soldiers