Laurie Vogel reflects on Michael Ignatieff's recent book on ethnic conflict.

Analysing the war in the Balkans, as well as the student massacre in Colombine High School and racist attacks in Britain, William Rees-Mogg wrote in The Times of London recently about 'the racism that threatens the world's future'.

Fifteen years ago in a ground-breaking article in Foreign Policy magazine in the United States, Joseph V Montville described the relatively new concept of citizen diplomacy. By this he meant the unofficial initiatives of private citizens and groups to help open lines of communication and build trust between those involved in international conflicts.

It's not just the ethereal scenery that brings people from conflict areas to Caux in Switzerland. Mary Lean takes part in a remarkable meeting of hearts.

New Zealand's Race Relations Conciliator, Rajen Prasad, has thrived amid cultural diversity from an early age. Joanna Grigg discovers that he is

As violence rocked the peace process in Northern Ireland in February, an inter-communal group from another conflict zone, Sri Lanka, addressed a forum arranged by For a Change in London. The scale of carnage in Sri Lanka's civil war between Tamil separatists and the Sinhalese majority is far higher than that in Northern Ireland.

Everyone needs to know where they belong, maintains Rabbi Marc Gopin - but this doesn't mean hating outsiders.

Dr Premen Addy is editor of 'India Weekly', London, and Visiting Fellow in Modern Asian History at Rewley House, Oxford.

The people of a former red light area have run the pimps and drug dealers out of town. Now they have launched a plan to regenerate their district. Mary Lean investigates.

Anthony Duigan from Johannesburg gives his impressions of a conference that aimed to bring healing in South Africa.