Peace History Society

Elise M. Boulding Prize in Peace History

The Peace History Society awards the Elise M. Boulding Prize biannually for an outstanding English-language nonfiction book by a single author that has a substantial bearing on the field of peace history. First books and dissertations are not eligible.

Honorable mention for 2021-2022 is granted to Tracy K’Meyer, To Live Peacefully Together: The AFSC’s Campaign for Open Housing (University of Chicago Press, 2022).

To Live Peaceably Together is an impressive study of how the Americans Friends Service Committee (AFSC) challenged housing discrimination in the United States and in so-doing, worked to promote “positive peace” rooted in non-violent action and racial justice. Drawing on extensive archival research, particularly in the AFSC archives in Philadelphia, K’Meyer traces how a small group of Quaker activists in the AFSC worked with others to desegregate U.S. housing, especially in the suburbs, before the passage of the 1968 U.S Fair Housing Act. She does a superb job of explaining how the goals and tactics of the AFSC evolved over time in response to the stiff resistance of white homeowners and politicians, as well as deeper historical changes. K’Meyer documents numerous tactics employed by AFSC activists, including promoting housing opportunity programs, fair housing councils, race relations committees, and equal housing laws. With allies that included Jewish social activists, CORE, FOR, SCLC, SNCC, SDS, the AFSC built a grassroots, community-based movement: one that emphasized nonviolent direct action to empower local people and their communities.