World Peace Foundation

World Peace Foundation The WPF is an operating foundation affiliated with the Fletcher School. It aims to provide research for non-violent futures.

The World Peace Foundation was established by Edwin Ginn, a Boston-based publisher of educational texts and an advocate for international peace. Created initially as the International School of Peace on July 12, 1910, the WPF was tasked with educating a global audience about the ills of war and promoting international peace. In 2011, the World Peace Foundation established a program at The Fletcher

School at Tufts University, the first graduate-only school of international affairs in the United States, under Executive Director Alex de Waal. In line with the educational and practical vision of its founder, today the Foundation aims to provide intellectual leadership on issues of peace, justice and security. We believe that innovative research and teaching are critical to the challenges of making peace around the world, and should go hand in hand with advocacy and practical engagement with the toughest issues. As the Foundation enters its second century, our underlying theme is reinventing peace for the globalizing world. The WPF does not make grants to outside organizations and individuals.

Is the Pentagon’s munitions shortage really a production problem, or is it a foreign policy problem in disguise? Hartung...
08/31/2026

Is the Pentagon’s munitions shortage really a production problem, or is it a foreign policy problem in disguise? Hartung argues that the real driver isn’t underfunding, but a foreign policy built on continuous arms transfers and military intervention, from Ukraine to Gaza to Iran.

Read the full piece at link in bio.

Kosti Manibe Ngai represented the best of a political tradition: disciplined, ethical, hardworking, meticulous and excep...
08/24/2026

Kosti Manibe Ngai represented the best of a political tradition: disciplined, ethical, hardworking, meticulous and exceptionally competent. Kosti was, quite simply, a public servant when public service was becoming unfashionable.

His loss represents the loss of a promise that came with the of . He is evidence that South Sudan’s failure was not inevitable. But, as with many other African heroes, he was neglected in his fight during his life and recognized more in death. His death serves as an invitation to South Sudan’s younger generation to recover the better tradition that Kosti represented.

08/20/2026

Trailer for the Season 5 of Disrupting Peace is out!

We ask how private companies and powerful individuals make their fortune from killing…and why no one stops them.

This season builds on a new book, Making a Killing: How the West Profits from Slaughter in Yemen and Gaza by , Ruth Rohde and .cinamon  from

Listen & subscribe at the link in our bio.

[Book link: https://www.versobooks.com/products/3335-making-a-killing?srsltid=AfmBOoqztSySu0queZBBzlQ_NAQVNi1jb6hMSLJ9CIqSlvoJZc5A5973]



“Peace is a word of so many meanings that one hesitates to use it for fear of being misunderstood.” –Kenneth BouldingWha...
08/19/2026

“Peace is a word of so many meanings that one hesitates to use it for fear of being misunderstood.” –Kenneth Boulding

What do we actually mean when we talk about peace? It’s a question that sits at the core of WPF’s Future of Peace program, and one that resists easy answers.
In a new paper, “A Working Orientation for the Future of Peace,” Program Director Michelle Anderson traces how has been understood across scholarship and practice, as the absence of , as , as a condition, a process, or something continually shaped through relationships. Rather than settling on one definition, the paper asks what we can learn from this itself.

Because how we define peace isn’t just academic. It shapes what gets measured, funded, prioritized, and recognized as progress.

Read more: link in bio

08/18/2026

In a recent episode of History As It Happens podcast, Executive Director Alex de Waal explains how Sudan’s current war is fueled by past conflict and is prolonged by rival armed groups and external powers.

But, in the meantime, civilians of are bearing the costs of , displacement, hunger, , and the threat of future atrocities. The end of will require regional cooperation and a credible process.

Link in bio.

08/13/2026

How can relationships across contexts help us unlearn imposed divisions, see our own realities differently, and find ways to remain human with one another?

In our latest interview, D**g Jin Kim reflects on what translocal peacebuilding can offer, drawing on his own experience of division on the Korean Peninsula and his work across conflict-affected contexts. He discusses how learning from other contexts can also help us unlearn assumptions about division, conflict, and what is possible; argues that institutions should serve people rather than the other way around; and emphasizes the importance of “acupuncture points”– spaces where people can build relationships across division, expand their imagination, and open possibilities for more futures.

Link in bio.

08/07/2026

In a recent conversation with Fronts on their podcast Due South, Executive Director Alex de Waal reflected on the difficult, often invisible work of and the urgent need for a regional solution to Sudan’s war. Despite the devastation and atrocities committed in the current , he argues that must be ready to seize its next opportunity for peace when it comes.

Link in bio

Political economist Yuen Yuen Ang’s essay on polytunity— her reframing of today’s global disruptions as a generational o...
08/06/2026

Political economist Yuen Yuen Ang’s essay on polytunity— her reframing of today’s global disruptions as a generational opening for transformation— ran on our blog earlier this year. In our latest interview, she builds on that idea by exploring what it takes to exercise in moments of disruption.

Ang suggests that people generally respond to disruption in one of three ways: ignore it, maladapt in ways that make things worse, or adapt and actively shape what comes next. But choosing agency also means accepting responsibility. It requires acting despite uncertainty and recognizing that meaningful change often comes with costs.

This conversation explores what it means to hold onto agency when the future feels uncertain— not only as an intellectual challenge, but as a deeply personal one.

Read more at link in bio.

The Great Chinese Famine (1958–62) was the deadliest in recorded history—an estimated 36 million people died directly ...
08/04/2026

The Great Chinese Famine (1958–62) was the deadliest in recorded history—an estimated 36 million people died directly because of the policy decisions under the Great Leap Forward.

In our latest blog, Executive Director Alex de Waal and Kaitlyn Bell explore how this catastrophe is especially striking not only because of its sheer scale, but its invisibility. There are almost no photographs—only propaganda images. At its peak, entire provinces experienced mortality on a scale that surpasses many global crises combined. Yet, for years, the truth was hidden, both within and from the world.

Why does this matter now? Because memory is an important tool for shaping and .

Link in bio.

07/30/2026

“Hope and peace are both actions. It’s weird that they’re nouns, because they really are acts of doing.”

In our latest interview, we speak with Dr. Kristin Alford, futurist and Co-Executive Director of The Ubuntu Lab, about what it takes to imagine and build toward better .
Kristin draws on Hope Theory to explain what makes hope actionable rather than passive: having a positive image of the future, a sense of agency, multiple pathways forward, and alignment with your own values.

She also shares how The Ubuntu Lab is building civic infrastructure, including a global network of spaces designed to help people navigate difference and strengthen our shared humanity.

Her throughline: building human capacities for dialogue, hope, and cooperation isn’t secondary to peace work. It’s essential to it.

Read the full interview, link in bio.

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