scholarly journals Political and Military Fronts in Resolving Asymmetrical Conflicts

2020 ◽  
Vol 55 (4) ◽  
Author(s):  
Bama Andika Putra
Keyword(s):  
Conflict Resolution ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Central Africa ◽  
Intergovernmental Organizations ◽  
Collective Security ◽  
Child Abduction ◽  
Lord's Resistance Army ◽  
State Actors ◽  
The Military ◽  
Lord’S Resistance Army

The growing terror inflicted by the Lord’s Resistance Army has devastated communities in four countries in central Africa. Since the 1980s, mass human rights violations such as kidnapping, murder, rape, and child abduction have been part of a systematic attempt by the Lord’s Resistance Army to undermine state actors in the region. This article attempts to highlight the contributions of Intergovernmental Organizations as part of the United Nations work to eradicate the group using both political and military fronts of action. We will be employing Rourke and Bouyer’s concept of collective security and parameters to measure the success of collective action undertaken by state and non-state actors in conflict resolution. We illustrate the proposed utilization of collective security parameters, a method Intergovernmental Organizations use to exert both political and military-based influence towards resolving asymmetrical conflicts, to provide insight into the major research gap in the discourse of conflict resolution. Utilizing empirical data from 2008-2012, this article identifies the political front as the mobilization of mass resources and the reallocation of African Union peacekeepers; meanwhile, the military front is identified as the extension of existing United Nations mandates in the region to include the current issue of the Lord’s Resistance Army in Africa.

scholarly journals Peace Management and Conflict Resolution: A Practitioner’s Perspective

2020 ◽  
pp. 277-292
Author(s):  
Ibrahim A. Gambari
Keyword(s):  
Cold War ◽  
Conflict Resolution ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Special Reference ◽  
Best Practice ◽  
Secretary General ◽  
Post Cold War ◽  
Global View ◽  
State Actors ◽  
The United Nations

Abstract This chapter provides a firsthand perspective on the broad issues of prevention and mediation of conflicts, with special reference to two conflict environments outside Africa—Cyprus, Myanmar—and one at its heart (Darfur), where the author was deployed as a senior envoy of the United Nations Secretary General. The aim is to provide a global view on best practice for peacebuilding in Africa against the backdrop of three fundamental shifts in conflict in the post-Cold War era: from inter- to intra-state war; from primarily state-based to non-state actors; and from largely mono- to multi-causal understandings of why wars begin and end. It provides key recommendations on improving mediation, strengthening relations between the UN and NGOs, and dealing with spoilers

How the World Sees Uganda

2019 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
David A. Hoekema
Keyword(s):  
East Africa ◽  
19Th Century ◽  
Late 19Th Century ◽  
Distorted Image ◽  
Lord's Resistance Army ◽  
Activist Group ◽  
The World ◽  
In Captivity ◽  
The Military ◽  
Lord’S Resistance Army

In the late 19th century explorers and missionaries brought home accounts of the interior regions of East Africa that fed the curiosity—and exploited the credulity—of audiences in Europe. Some saw a continent of cruel tyrants exploiting their people and enslaving, if not cooking and eating, their adversaries. Others found an Eden of harmonious living in happy isolation from the corruptions of the outside world. In 2012 another similarly distorted image of Uganda was viewed a hundred million times around the world when it was posted online by an activist group seeking the military defeat of Joseph Kony’s Lord’s Resistance Army. As a foil to such exaggerated pictures, the author recounts the testimony of an LRA survivor concerning her years in captivity and her life after escaping.

Conflict Prevention and Conflict Resolution in the African Context: Peacekeeping in Liberia

1993 ◽  
Vol 21 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 70-73
Author(s):  
Tafsir Malick N’Diaye
Keyword(s):  
Conflict Resolution ◽  
United Nations ◽  
West African ◽  
Regional Security ◽  
Conflict Prevention ◽  
Collective Security ◽  
Economic Community ◽  
The West ◽  
African Context ◽  
Monitoring Group

The West African force known as the ECOWAS Monitoring Group (ECOMOG) was sent to Liberia by ECOWAS (Economic Community of West African States). A closer look at the Force shows that it is an adaptation of the peacekeeping system used by the United Nations. What started as a system of collective security based on the regional security mechanism of ECOWAS turned into a standard peacekeeping operation as a result of “the Yamoussoukro process.”

scholarly journals Hindrances to Third-Party Interventions in Conflict Resolution: United Nations and Patterns of Constraints in Resolving the Lord’s Resistance Army Conflict Between 2008-2012

2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 231
Author(s):  
Bama Andika Putra
Keyword(s):  
United Nations ◽  
Democratic Republic Of Congo ◽  
Task Force ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
United Nations Security Council ◽  
Third Party ◽  
African Region ◽  
Lord's Resistance Army ◽  
Un Peacekeeping ◽  
Lord’S Resistance Army

Since 1987, the Lord’s Resistance Army has continued systematic human rights violations in the Central African region. Cases of kidnapping, village raids, mass rapes, and murders, have become defining factors to the urgency of resolving the crisis. In an attempt to respond to the conflict, the United Nations Security Council has initiated a number of political and military-based resolutions to control the conflict since 2008, which includes extending UN peacekeeping mandates in Uganda, Democratic Republic of Congo, and South Sudan, as well as coordinate efforts with relevant African Union bodies. However, its success is far-reached, urging the need to contextualize the forms of hindrances that the UN faced in responding to the crisis. Employing Rourke and Bouyer’s (1996) concept of collective security and measures of response success, with a research limitation set to 2008-2012, a qualitative research utilizing secondary data is implemented, concluding the following hindrances that can be categorized into the following; (1) Implementation of the additional mandate of the UN Peace Forces, (2) Application of the AU Regional Task Force, and (3) Implementation of the Disarmament, Demobilization, Repatriation, Resettlement, and Reintegration program.   Received: 16 December 2020 / Accepted: 11 March 2021 / Published: 10 May 2021

Dilemmas of Justice and Reconciliation: Rwandans and the Gacaca Courts

2010 ◽  
Vol 18 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Amaka Megwalu ◽  
Neophytos Loizides
Keyword(s):  
Conflict Resolution ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Due Process ◽  
National Court ◽  
Demographic Characteristics ◽  
Widening Participation ◽  
Court System ◽  
Trained Personnel ◽  
The United Nations

Following the 1994 genocide, several justice initiatives were implemented in Rwanda, including a tribunal established by the United Nations, Rwanda's national court system and Gacaca, a ‘traditional’ community-run conflict resolution mechanism adapted to prosecute genocide perpetrators. Since their inception in 2001, the Gacaca courts have been praised for their efficiency and for widening participation, but criticised for lack of due process, trained personnel and attention to atrocities committed by the Rwandan Patriotic Front (RPF). To evaluate these criticisms, we present preliminary findings from a survey of 227 Rwandans and analyse their attitudes towards Gacaca in relation to demographic characteristics such as education, residence and loss of relatives during the genocide.

Stepping back from the brink: Why multilateral regulation of autonomy in weapons systems is difficult, yet imperative and feasible

2020 ◽  
Vol 102 (913) ◽  
pp. 235-259
Author(s):  
Frank Sauer
Keyword(s):  
United Nations ◽  
Arms Control ◽  
Use Of Force ◽  
Human Control ◽  
Conventional Weapons ◽  
United Nations Convention ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
The Military ◽  
Weapons Systems

AbstractThis article explains why regulating autonomy in weapons systems, entailing the codification of a legally binding obligation to retain meaningful human control over the use of force, is such a challenging task within the framework of the United Nations Convention on Certain Conventional Weapons. It is difficult because it requires new diplomatic language, and because the military value of weapon autonomy is hard to forego in the current arms control winter. The article argues that regulation is nevertheless imperative, because the strategic as well as ethical risks outweigh the military benefits of unshackled weapon autonomy. To this end, it offers some thoughts on how the implementation of regulation can be expedited.

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