The last few decades (especially since the end of the Cold War), has seen a shift from traditional warfare to an increasing number of intrastate violent conflicts. With this shift, a new term has entered the dictionary of supranational organisations to join such institutions as the UN and the EU. The term I am referring to is “Peacebuilding.”
The process of peacebuilding is aimed at the restoring of positive peace on all levels (thus including the local, grassroots level), to ensure that the causes of the conflict are addressed and that the state in question can function peacefully and stable again. This trend has recently been embraced by NGOs, who are increasingly spending their time and resources on various elements of peacebuilding, such as the initiation of processes aimed at facilitating reconciliation.
However, it seems that the larger international community is not practicing what they preach when intervening in a conflict. The attainment of negative peace (the mere absence of overt conflict) seems to have become sufficient for proclaiming that an intervention has been successful. Add to that the imposition of progressive institutions such as a democratically elected government (which is often too weak to function properly) and a tribunal to try the perpetrators of war crimes, and we have been extremely successful in our peacebuilding efforts. Or so the international community shamefully seems to believe, with the US as its main advocator.
This viewpoint, which is rather simplistic even in theory, is all the more a smorgasbord of failure in practice. Peacebuilding has become an institutionalised process, in which it almost seems to be forgotten that institutions do not work without creating a situation in which the successful functioning of these institutions can be safeguarded. The international community – especially the state-actors – is taking a deductive approach to peacebuilding, focusing on what they can offer in short-term transitional measures, thereby disregarding their long-term capacity in the process of conflict resolution. The focus should rather be on an inductive approach, which is more problem-driven and works at addressing the underlying causes of a conflict to ensure the violence does not recur. As John Paul Lederach, one of the leading authors on post-conflict reconciliation, argues, peacebuilding is a structure-process, which involves the necessity of change in attitudes on all levels of society to stop violent behaviour.
The growing institutionalised approach to peacebuilding is detrimental for the attainment of positive peace; a situation in which not only the fighting has stopped, but also the root causes of the former conflict have been dealt with. By focusing too little on the inductive approach, the international community is and has been missing the opportunity to build a sustainable peace and, in fact, is often making things worse for the stability of the international political community in the long run. Take the example of the global rush for democratisation. This is producing many illiberal democracies, where popularly elected leaders disregard civil- and political rights because they act without constraint of functioning institutions or a history of law-based liberalism.
This institutionalisation of peacebuilding has partially been caused by the characteristics of the prevailing conflicts that we nowadays face. The attainment of positive peace has become far more difficult due to the intrastate- and often ethnic nature of these conflicts, which are frequently referred to as the ‘new wars.’ Also, the fact that civilians are often both the victims and the perpetrators of atrocities has made the threshold to reconciliation and the addressing of the root causes of a conflict much higher. Lastly, after these ‘new wars,’ the former conflicting parties often still share the same state or lands, which increases the chances of violence erupting yet again. Due to the fact that the attainment of a positive peace has become so much more difficult than after traditional wars, the focus of peace researchers and other people involved in the process of peacebuilding has simply shifted to focusing merely on the first step of the attainment of a positive peace: the absence of overt conflict. In doing so, the international community (with the exception perhaps of NGOs) seems to have almost forgotten that the absence of overt conflict – negative peace – should only be the first step towards attaining a situation of positive peace.
Fortunately, the situation seems to be improving. The growing attention paid by NGOs to facilitate initiatives at the grassroots level and take a bottom-up instead of a top-down approach, combined with the increasing importance that these organisations are beginning to play in peacebuilding nowadays (compare, for example, NGO involvement in the breakdown of Yugoslavia with the current war in Iraq), is a positive development in the process of peacebuilding. For a truly successful intervention in a conflict, peacebuilding needs to become highly prioritised in the decision making process. The failure of the Iraq invasion is the prefect testimony to this proposition.
- This article was written for and provided to the Weekend Economist by Leon Emmen
The process of peacebuilding is aimed at the restoring of positive peace on all levels (thus including the local, grassroots level), to ensure that the causes of the conflict are addressed and that the state in question can function peacefully and stable again. This trend has recently been embraced by NGOs, who are increasingly spending their time and resources on various elements of peacebuilding, such as the initiation of processes aimed at facilitating reconciliation.
However, it seems that the larger international community is not practicing what they preach when intervening in a conflict. The attainment of negative peace (the mere absence of overt conflict) seems to have become sufficient for proclaiming that an intervention has been successful. Add to that the imposition of progressive institutions such as a democratically elected government (which is often too weak to function properly) and a tribunal to try the perpetrators of war crimes, and we have been extremely successful in our peacebuilding efforts. Or so the international community shamefully seems to believe, with the US as its main advocator.
This viewpoint, which is rather simplistic even in theory, is all the more a smorgasbord of failure in practice. Peacebuilding has become an institutionalised process, in which it almost seems to be forgotten that institutions do not work without creating a situation in which the successful functioning of these institutions can be safeguarded. The international community – especially the state-actors – is taking a deductive approach to peacebuilding, focusing on what they can offer in short-term transitional measures, thereby disregarding their long-term capacity in the process of conflict resolution. The focus should rather be on an inductive approach, which is more problem-driven and works at addressing the underlying causes of a conflict to ensure the violence does not recur. As John Paul Lederach, one of the leading authors on post-conflict reconciliation, argues, peacebuilding is a structure-process, which involves the necessity of change in attitudes on all levels of society to stop violent behaviour.
The growing institutionalised approach to peacebuilding is detrimental for the attainment of positive peace; a situation in which not only the fighting has stopped, but also the root causes of the former conflict have been dealt with. By focusing too little on the inductive approach, the international community is and has been missing the opportunity to build a sustainable peace and, in fact, is often making things worse for the stability of the international political community in the long run. Take the example of the global rush for democratisation. This is producing many illiberal democracies, where popularly elected leaders disregard civil- and political rights because they act without constraint of functioning institutions or a history of law-based liberalism.
This institutionalisation of peacebuilding has partially been caused by the characteristics of the prevailing conflicts that we nowadays face. The attainment of positive peace has become far more difficult due to the intrastate- and often ethnic nature of these conflicts, which are frequently referred to as the ‘new wars.’ Also, the fact that civilians are often both the victims and the perpetrators of atrocities has made the threshold to reconciliation and the addressing of the root causes of a conflict much higher. Lastly, after these ‘new wars,’ the former conflicting parties often still share the same state or lands, which increases the chances of violence erupting yet again. Due to the fact that the attainment of a positive peace has become so much more difficult than after traditional wars, the focus of peace researchers and other people involved in the process of peacebuilding has simply shifted to focusing merely on the first step of the attainment of a positive peace: the absence of overt conflict. In doing so, the international community (with the exception perhaps of NGOs) seems to have almost forgotten that the absence of overt conflict – negative peace – should only be the first step towards attaining a situation of positive peace.
Fortunately, the situation seems to be improving. The growing attention paid by NGOs to facilitate initiatives at the grassroots level and take a bottom-up instead of a top-down approach, combined with the increasing importance that these organisations are beginning to play in peacebuilding nowadays (compare, for example, NGO involvement in the breakdown of Yugoslavia with the current war in Iraq), is a positive development in the process of peacebuilding. For a truly successful intervention in a conflict, peacebuilding needs to become highly prioritised in the decision making process. The failure of the Iraq invasion is the prefect testimony to this proposition.
- This article was written for and provided to the Weekend Economist by Leon Emmen
2 comments:
Leon:
interesting analysis of peacebuilding albeit somewhat daunting to the average reader. Looking at limitations of institutional peacebuilding: i would argue that institutions (governments civil groups hamas etc) have to create pre-requiste stability and dialogue in order to give grasroots innitiatives a chance.
vice versa when hatred and hostility permiates in both institutional and civil/social levels i would argue institutional and grassroots are almost equally futile.
What would you suggest in a "real" world scenario in the case of israel palestine questions?
is there good news? is there a future? how do u look at it?
Francois, let me start by apologising if you found my article to be somewhat daunting. It wasn't easy to transform a quite long piece of work into an opinion article this short. About your comments:
I am not saying that the initiatives taken in the institutionalised approach are not necessary, I'm saying that they are not enough, while they often seem to be perceived as enough. Obviously, implementing functioning institutions in a war-ridden society is absolutely necessary to ensure the minimal amount of stability needed to start working at the grassroots level. However, the international community's work is not done when violence is absent and progressive institutions are in place.
I agree with you that hostility on the grassroots level is equally futile as on an institutional level, however, what I argue is that there should be more attention paid to (individual) reconciliation on the grassroots level, to take away hatred and anger between people.
Thans for asking me to describe what I consider to be the most complicated scenario in the real world, the Israel-Palestine question. What makes this case so incredibly complicated is its history. In recent times up until 1948, Israelis and Palestinians were not sharing a single land, the same villages, etc. until a conflict broke out. The Israelis were given the state of Israel in Palestinian territory after the WWII atrocities (this is no value judgment in favor or against either side of the conflict). This makes the Palestinians see the Israelis as invaders. Also, the amount of displaced persons and refugees is extremely high on the Palestinian side, which doesn't exactly make things less complicated. I do see a future with a two-state solution, but this is where the second big problem with this conflict enters the discussion: what to do with Jerusalem? For both the Israelis and the Palestinians this is a sacred place, which they both claim as theirs and are not willing to give up or share. We came close to seeing a solution with the Oslo Peace Process and the Clinton Parameters, however this plan did not succeed due to various reasons. The fact that there was almost a solution gives me hope for the future, although the rise in Arab anti-Americanism may have negatively affected this process, since the US has always been the most important facilitator in this peace process. To conclude: I do see hope, but to more accurately explain why without making this entry too long is not possible. If you wish to discuss any of these topics further with me, I would be delighted. Send me an email on l.emmen@gmail.com.
Thank you!
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