Conflict, Peace and Mental Health - by David Bolton

About the Book

What are the human consequences of conflict and what are the appropriate service responses? This book provides answers to these important questions, drawing on over twenty-five years of work by the author in Northern Ireland and elsewhere.

Book Synopsis

A powerful guide for dealing with traumatised communities in the wake of conflict and disaster.

What are the human consequences of conflict, and how should healthcare and social services respond? In this book, David Bolton provides an answer to these urgent questions, drawing on more than twenty-five years of service experience in Northern Ireland and elsewhere.

Focusing on the work he undertook with colleagues following the devastating Omagh bombing in 1998, Bolton reveals how needs were assessed and how evidence-based services were put in place. He describes the training and education programmes that were developed to assist first those communities directly affected by the bombing and later the wider population traumatised by the years of conflict. Crucially, he places the mental-health needs of affected communities at the heart of the political and peace processes that follow.

The second edition of this clear and practical book includes new chapters on the challenges of promoting justice and reconciliation in a post-conflict situation. It is essential reading for those planning for and responding to conflict-related disasters, policy makers, service commissioners and providers, politicians, civil servants and peace makers.

From the Back Cover

What are the human consequences of conflict, and how should healthcare and social services respond? In this book, David Bolton provides an answer to these urgent questions, drawing on more than twenty-five years of service experience in Northern Ireland and elsewhere.

Focusing on the work he undertook with colleagues following the devastating Omagh bombing in 1998, Bolton reveals how needs were assessed and how evidence-based services were put in place. He describes the training and education programmes that were developed to assist first those communities directly affected by the bombing and later the wider population traumatised by the years of conflict. Crucially, he places the mental-health needs of affected communities at the heart of the political and peace processes that follow.

The second edition of this clear and practical book includes a new chapter on the challenges of promoting justice and reconciliation in a post-conflict situation. It is essential reading for those planning for and responding to conflict-related disasters, policy makers, service commissioners and providers, politicians, civil servants and peace makers.

About the Author

David Bolton is a trauma researcher, writer and practitioner. He trained as a social worker in Belfast from 1974 to 1978, during some of the worst years of the civil conflict. At the time of the Omagh bombing of 1998 he coordinated the immediate and longer-term responses of community services, including establishing the Omagh Community Trauma and Recovery Team. In 2002 he became the founding director of the Northern Ireland Centre for Trauma and Transformation, which closed in 2011. He lives in County Fermanagh in Northern Ireland.