In recent times traditional justice processes have become increasingly adapted to serve as transitional justice tools in post-conflict societies. The healing potential of traditional justice is becoming more recognized, nevertheless there is still little known about its impact on collective trauma and especially about the causal mechanisms behind it. To contribute to this research field, this study is guided by the following research question: Why do some traditional justice processes generate the healing of collective trauma after conflict more than others?The developed theoretical framework argues that bottom-up, locally-led traditional justice processes foster voluntary community engagement which enhances collective trauma healing. Top-down, institutionalized processes, on the other hand, are theorized to produce involuntary contact which leads to lower levels of collective healing. It is thus hypothesized that locally-led traditional justice processes are more likely to generate healing of collective trauma than institutionalized traditional justice processes. An in-depth comparative case study which uses Structured Focused Comparison, analyzes the Rwandan Gacaca trials and the traditional justice processes in Acholiland. The empirical findings lend support to the hypothesis and provide modest support to the proposed causal mechanism.

Post-liberal, hybrid peace, a new model of peacebuilding, aims to step away from the top-down imposition of liberal peace. In order to recognise the local, the new model considers the interaction between the international and the local as a dynamic power interaction, through which the means and ends of peace can be mediated. Yet, it has already been criticised for its theoretical underpinnings which would, ultimately, impede it to achieve its objectives. This thesis aims to determine the concrete impacts of the elements pinpointed by the critiques. It adopts an alternative focus on both the programme itself and the affected population’s perspectives. Through an instrumental case study of the EU Peace III Fund’s peacebuilding in Northern Ireland and the Border Region, the thesis highlights that these critiques can take different, practical forms. It enables to unveil the importance of exploring the affected population’s perspectives, of the initial context as well as the external peacebuilder’s belief that it knows, still, what is best over the affected populations.