Since 2001, the prevention of violent conflicts has been a priority of the European Union's external policy. In addition to new operational competences developed under the Common Foreign and Security Policy, the European Union is particularly suited to combat root-causes of conflicts throughout the world. The current draft Constitution for Europe proposes to insert the prevention of conflicts within the text of the Treaty. This volume explores and scrutinizes the progress achieved by the European Union in the definition of a concrete conflict prevention strategy, as well as the challenges it still faces. The contributors focus on the following issues: definition of and indicators for conflict prevention; institutional and constitutional dimension of conflict prevention; EU's instruments for the prevention of violent conflicts; structural conflict prevention and mainstreaming conflict prevention into EU's policies; and cooperation with other international organisations and civil society.