From the Hills to the Streets to the Table

From 1996 until 2006, Nepal experienced a civil war that resulted in over 16,000 casualties. Remarkably, the conflict transitioned from an armed insurgency to a civil resistance campaign that overthrew the monarchy and brought about a transition to democracy. Leveraging a framework developed by Véronique Dudouet in her 2017 ICNC Special Report, Powering to Peace: Integrated Civil Resistance and Peacebuilding Strategies, this case study analyzes how a combination of civil resistance and peacebuilding strategies made the transition from civil war to civil resistance in Nepal possible and how it led to a successful conflict settlement. However, it also reveals how failures in post-conflict peacebuilding and some shortcomings of civil resistance strategies during that time have produced a turbulent aftermath, falling short of the goals of reconciliation, transitional justice, and sustainable peace.