ABSTRACT
The peace studies approach to international relations and conflict was founded by a group of scholars with backgrounds in economics and the social sciences, including Kenneth Boulding, Howard Raiffa, and Anatol Rapaport. The field of peace studies and conflict resolution developed in the context of a highly politicized environment. This background has helped to create a situation in which the programmes, publications and research in this area reflect a dominant ideology that is rooted in postcolonialism. In the field of peace studies, postcolonial ideology is often accompanied by the pretence that criteria exist by which to distinguish between aggressor and oppressor, or victim of injustice and perpetrator. Disciplines such as alchemy and astrology that do not produce useful or reliable results are eventually dropped from the curriculum. And the dominant ideologically saturated version of peace studies and conflict resolution programmes is the modern equivalent of alchemy and astrology.
