This volume is based on selected papers from two conferences on Bangladesh at Harvard University in 2008 and 2009. It covers a variety of challenging topics, ranging from linkages between democracy and security to effects of a given electoral system on political stability, micro-national autonomy for subregional peace, terrorism and its counter-forces. It also covers the role of NGOs in development and social change, intra-regional cooperation in conflict mitigation and refugee related violence in South Asia.

A common theme that runs through the eight chapters of this volume is the felt need for multidimensional interactions in the continuous search for a common ground on which negotiations could take place for the resolutions of issues, problems and conflicts at different socio-political and economic levels. Papers selected for the present volume were edited to form chapters and the contributors comprise academics, policy implementers researchers and consultants. The commonality tying them together is their quest for understanding the complex process of democratization for sustainable, multifaceted political development of Bangladesh .