ABSTRACT
This chapter analyses the local-level dynamics of peacebuilding. Of the widely differentiated Bosnian localities, it focuses on a successful case — the post-Dayton intervention in Prijedor, a municipality in northwest Bosnia which had been under Serb control since the beginning of the 1992–95 war, and was formally granted to Republika Srpska under the Dayton peace settlement of November 1995. Prijedor is also a daunting case for international peace building. The chapter begins with a brief background on Prijedor and reviews the final vicissitudes of the war which left the town under Serb control. It shows how post-settlement international policy risked undermining the peace process. The chapter highlights the crucial role in diffusing ethnic division played by returning DPs, who returned home after the war even against the advice of international agencies.
