What does it mean to live well in a world of conflict?

I have spent more than twenty-five years asking that question as a scholar, educator, practitioner, and activist. The longer I do this work, the more convinced I become that the quality of our questions shapes the quality of our responses.

I started this Substack because some questions need more space and freedom than what academic writing often permits. This is a place to think out loud about conflict, justice, leadership, higher education, decolonization, and the everyday choices that shape our relationships, communities, and institutions.

Much of that work happens through the Center for Conflict Studies, which I founded in 2011 to bring theory, research, and practice together. At the Center, we teach conflict resolution, train practitioners and educators, facilitate dialogue, consult with organizations and institutions, and develop resources for navigating conflict in everyday life. This Substack grows out of that work, but it is also more personal. Here, I want to explore ideas as they are forming, write about the questions I cannot let go of, and invite others into the conversation.

My work has been shaped by many experiences: growing up in India, living and working in the United States, teaching students from around the world, and working with communities divided by conflict. It has also been shaped by the experience of being privileged in some spaces, marginalized in others, and sometimes both in the very same room. Those experiences have taught me to be suspicious of simple categories and easy answers. They have led me to question not only how we understand conflict, but also whose knowledge counts, whose stories are heard, and how our identities shape the way we see the world.

Over the years, I have come to believe that compassion and courage are inseparable values. Compassion without courage rarely changes anything. Courage without compassion often creates new harm. I have also come to believe that conflict is rarely about finding the right answer. More often, it is about learning to ask better questions, staying curious when certainty feels more comfortable, and resisting the temptation to reduce people to a single story.

I don’t expect us to agree on everything. In fact, I hope we won’t. I hope this becomes a place where we remain curious, ask audacious questions with compassion, challenge one another without dehumanizing one another, and remain open to changing our minds. My hope is that we leave each conversation understanding ourselves, one another, and the world a little better than when we began.

Thank you for being here. I look forward to learning with you.

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