Available open access digitally under CC-BY-NC-ND licence.This book reveals how communities protect themselves when external support is absent. Drawing on participatory research from Cameroon's conflict zones, the authors document the remarkable agency and creativity of conflict-affected civilians employing non-violent methods to protect one another from violence. With international and national NGOs under strict government controls in the Anglophone regions, local communities have developed their own innovative self-protection strategies that offer sustainable pathways through conflict. This important study shifts unarmed civilian protection discourse away from externally-led interventions towards genuinely civilian-centred approaches, offering crucial insights for practitioners, policy makers and scholars working in conflict-affected contexts worldwide.
