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Volume 4, No. 1

Regulating Group-Related Rivalries in Highly
Polarized Communities

Johan D. van der Vyver, PhD

Sharpening Our Plowshares

Applying the Lessons of Counterinsurgency to Development
and Humanitarian Aid

Solomon Major, PhD

Human Security as Analytical Contexts of Humanitarian
Intervention in Application and Practice
War for Justice, War for State, or War for People

Yu-tai Ts’ai, PhD
Szu-Hsien Lee

C\l

0 )

4 J

The Tuareg Revolt and the Mali Coup

Lt Col Rudolph Atallah, USAF, Retired

Establishing a Marketplace of Women in Peacekeeping
An Analysis of Gender Mainstreaming and Its Viability in United
Nations Peacekeeping Operations

Kerry Crawford
Julia Macdonald

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Gen John A. Shaud, USAF, Retired

Editor

Remy M. Mauduit

Megan N. Ollendyke, Editorial Assistant
Marvin Bassett, PhD, Contributing Editor
Nedra O. Looney, Prepress Production Manager
Daniel M. Armstrong, Illustrator
L. Susan Fair, Illustrator

The Air and Space Power Journal (ISSN 1931-728X), published
quarterly, is the professional journal of the United States
Air Force. It is designed to serve as an open forum for the
presentation and stimulation of innovative thinking on
military doctrine, strategy, force structure, readiness, and
other matters of national defense. The views and opinions
expressed or implied in the Journal are those of the authors
and should not be construed as carrying the official sanction
of the Department of Defense, Air Force, Air Education and
Training Command, Air University, or other agencies or
departments of the US government.

Articles in this edition may be reproduced in whole or in part
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Power Journal requests a courtesy line.

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Editorial

❖-

Eight Years of ASPJ-A&F

Air and Space Power Journal—Africa and Francophonie ( ASPJ-A&F) has reached
another major milestone. In its eighth year of publication, your Journal is read
in 185 countries/territories; 1,015 academic institutions; 292 think tanks in 42
countries; 667 institutes (African and Francophone studies); government agencies;
armed and security forces; and so forth. Budgetary constraints and increased
demands, however, may force us to discontinue the printed edition of ASPJ-
A&F. In such an event, we will continue to publish the electronic version, which
already attracts as many readers as its hard-copy counterpart. Furthermore, our
website—now undergoing a complete transformation—will feature more dyna¬
mic, interactive content. It will allow you, our readers, to discuss articles with
other subscribers from around the world and view updated content. Free from
the constraints of conventional printing, we will be able to publish more articles,
add new sections, and quickly adapt the Journal to your needs. (You can sub¬
scribe via ASPJ-A&Fs, website at http://www.airpower.au.af.mil/apjinternational
/aspj_a_f.asp or contact me directly at remy.mauduit@us.af.mil. We will safeguard
your e-mail address and send you quarterly messages announcing the posting of
the new issue.)

ASPJ-A&F intends to remain a forum for the dissemination of original, refe¬
reed research articles and review articles in numerous areas, published in both
English and French. It will continue to explore significant issues and serve as a
vehicle for your intellectual enrichment. We welcome submissions from researchers,
scholars, policy makers, practitioners, and informed observers on such topics as
international relations, regional security issues, civil-military relations, leader¬
ship, ethics/morality, women in society, economics, democracy, terrorism, human
rights, and so forth. Articles should take existing theories and concepts in a new
direction or bring a novel perspective to current literature.

Rest assured that the Journal will retain both its founding editor and its original
principles, which embody the spirit of democratic ideals; intellectual rigor; critical
analysis; vigorous, scholarly research; proven methodologies; and the primacy of

clarity and quality in its articles. Thus, ASPJ-A&F continues the Air Force tradi¬
tion of ensuring the intellectual and editorial independence of its publications.

Remy M. Mauduit, Editor

Air and Space Power Journal—Africa and Francophonie
Maxwell AFB, Alabama

Regulating Group-Related Rivalries in
Highly Polarized Communities

Johan D. van derVyver, PhD*

I n May 2011,1 and 10 other so-called international experts accepted
an invitation to Kathmandu to address problems encountered by the
Constitutional Assembly of Nepal in the drafting of a new constitu¬
tion for that country Since its creation in 1768 as a unified state and
until not so long ago, Nepal was proclaimed a Hindu state, constitutionally
structured as a monarchy The country’s very first meaningful constitution,
adopted in 1990, formally endorsed this state of affairs. Dissatisfaction with
the constitution prompted a Maoist insurgency which plunged the country
into a decade-long civil war that brought about approximately 17,500 casu¬
alties. The adversaries concluded a 12-point peace agreement in 2005, an
interim constitution took effect, and the king abdicated in 2008 (he now
lives in the country as an ordinary citizen, and his palace has become a
museum). The first president, Dr. Ram Baran Yadav, took office on 23 July
2008 under the current interim constitution. A Constitutional Assembly
was established to draft a final constitution that would address—and seek
to overcome—the causes of unrest in the country.

"The author is the I.T. Cohen Professor of International Law and Human Rights at the School of Law,
Emory University. His current teaching obligations include Public International Law, International Human
Rights, International Criminal Law, International Humanitarian Law, and Comparative Constitutional Law.
He also serves as an Extraordinary Professor in the Department of Private Law at the University of Pretoria,
South Africa. Before joining the faculty of law at Emory in 1995, he was a professor of law at the University
of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa. His academic qualifications include a Doctor of Laws
(PhD) from the University of Pretoria (1974); Doctor of Laws (honoris causa ) from both the University of
Zululand (1993) and Potchefstroom University for Christian Higher Education (2003) in South Africa; and
the Diploma of the International and Comparative Law of Human Rights, International Institute of Human
Rights in Strasbourg, France (1986). Professor van der Vyver has authored eight books and more than 200
law review articles, chapters in books, and book reviews.

This article is an updated version of the author’s special public lecture delivered in 2011 at North-West
University in Potchefstroom, South Africa, published in PER/PEJL, that university’s electronic journal
(see http://www.nwu.ac.za/webfm_send4737).

REGULATING GROUP-RELATED RIVALRIES IN HIGHLY POLARIZED COMMUNITIES 5

A major cause of concern in Nepal involves the polarization of its di¬
verse ethnic and religious population. Although the vast majority of the
country is Hindu, influential Buddhist and Muslim minorities exist, and
the ethnic composition of the population reflects no fewer than 91 different
language groups. One of the issues that the assembly asked the “inter¬
national experts” to address was a proposal—one with wide support among
politicians—to apply a federal system of government, based on the ethnic
composition of the Nepalese population, as a means of securing internal
peace in the years to come. It might be noted that the Maoists most recently
proposed 10 federal states for the country while others favor 12 or 14. We
cautioned against ethnically defined federal states as a proposed “solution”
for the country’s group-related tensions. Complete territorial segregation of
ethnic varieties in any political community is almost impossible to orches¬
trate, and consigning regional powers of government to cultural, religious,
or linguistic factions could become a recipe for disaster. We know from the
gruesome experiences in the former Yugoslavia that attempts to create reli¬
giously or ethnically homogeneous states could lead to profound animosity
toward others in one’s midst and might culminate in a policy of “ethnic
cleansing” that could include brutal acts of genocide.

The territorial seclusion and political empowerment of rival ethnic
groups are not confined to Nepal. Orthodox Judaism, for example, also favors
the segregation of conflicting groups within a particular political domain.
Orthodox Judaism does not believe in turning the other cheek—a decree to
do that comes from the New Testament. Instead, the Talmud makes the
maintenance of peace and security conditional upon the construction of a
fence that would separate those who belong from their enemies.

Of course, other constitutional devices have been proposed to maintain
peace and security in highly polarized plural communities. Attempts to
avoid group-related conflicts in group-conscious communities include a
political strategy for the promotion of homogeneity within the body politic.
As far as member states of the European community are concerned, one
can single out France, Greece, and Turkey (an associate member of the
European Union) as countries not favorably disposed to accommodating
ethnic, religious, or linguistic diversity within their respective borders. On
15 March 2004, French president Jacques Chirac signed into law an amend¬
ment to the French Code of Education that now prohibits, as a principle of
the separation of church and state, “the wearing of symbols or garb which
shows religious affiliation in public primary and secondary schools.” 1 A
French law entered into force on 11 April 2011 banning the covering of

6 ASPJ AFRICA & FRANC OPHONIE

ones face in public, clearly intended to outlaw the wearing of a burqa by
Muslim women. Greece is particularly unaccommodating of the claim to a
distinct identity by people of Macedonian extraction in Fiorina (northern
Greece). A Turkish law banned the wearing of a (Muslim) head scarf in all
universities and official government buildings, basing the proscription on
the fact that Turkey is a secular state. The Grand Chamber of the European
Court of Human Rights—the court of final instance in the European system
of human rights protection—upheld the legality of the Turkish law since, in
its opinion, the head scarf ban was based on the constitutional principles of
secularism and equality; consequently, it did not constitute a violation of
the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Funda¬
mental Freedoms. 2

Article I5(3)(c) of the Nigerian constitution reflects a trend toward
promoting homogeneity, placing an obligation on the state to encourage
intermarriages between members of different religious and tribal commu¬
nities for the purpose of “promoting national integration. ” J The truth of the
matter, though, is that the Nigerian people are as divided today as they ever
were—perhaps even more so.

In 2002 several predominantly Muslim states in northern Nigeria for¬
mally adopted Islamic law, including Islamic criminal law, as part of their
legal system. As of 2012, nine states have instituted Sharia law (Zamfara,
Kano, Sokoto, Katsina, Bauchi, Borno, Jigawa, Kebbi, and Yobe).The imposi¬
tion of Sharia penalties, which by international standards include cruel and
inhuman punishments, attracted media attention (and condemnation) from
many parts of the world when in March 2002, a Sharia court sentenced a
30-year-old woman, Amina Lawal, to death by stoning because she was
expecting a child out of wedlock. Indeed, in 2004 the Sharia Court of Appeal
set aside the sentence, based on the rule against retroactive criminal sanc¬
tions because the law incorporating Islamic law was enacted after she be¬
came pregnant. However, the case generated wide publicity as a reminder of
both unbecoming (and in Nigeria, in fact, unconstitutional) penalties and
the sharp divide between the northern Islamic communities and the pre¬
dominantly Christian population of Nigeria. Religious violence orchestrated
by a radical Muslim group, the Boko Haram, has disrupted the country for
several months, costing several hundreds of Nigerians their lives and leaving
more than 10,000 people displaced. The violence has also caused severe
damage to (Christian) places of worship and government buildings.

The postapartheid dispensation of South Africa represents a further
constitutional strategy for coping with group-related tensions within a

REGULATING GROUP-RELATED RIVALRIES IN HIGHLY POLARIZED COMMUNITIES 7

single state. The “new South Africa” abandoned territorial segregation as a
supposed recipe for the peaceful coexistence of racial and ethnic groups and
did not attempt to promote the homogeneity of its nation. It opted instead
for a system designed to promote national unity on the basis of the inter¬
nationally acclaimed right to self-determination of peoples.

Accordingly, the South African constitution of 1996 encourages main¬
tenance of and pride in the ethnic, religious, and linguistic group identities
of the country’s diverse population. The constitutional preamble thus expresses
the belief that all who live in South Africa are “united by our diversity.” 4 In
its substantive provisions, the constitution proclaims 11 official languages,
calls on the state “to take practical and positive measures to elevate the
status and advance the use of... [the indigenous languages of our people,]”
and affords to everyone “the right to use the language and to participate in
the cultural life of their choice.” 5 The constitution expressly guarantees the
right to self-determination of cultural, religious, and linguistic communities
in accordance with international directives that apply in this regard. 6

The Right to Self-Determination: Historical Perspective

In the early twentieth century, proponents of socialism confronted a
challenging problem. According to the teachings of Karl Marx and Friedrich
Engels, the entire world would in due course be subjected, through a revolu¬
tion of the proletariat, to a particular economic dispensation known as com¬
munism. The subjection of the entire world community to this economic
dispensation would not be negotiable, but what status would nation-states
have within the overarching and universal structures of communism? In 1913
Joseph Stalin published a treatise on Marxism arid the National Question , fol¬
lowed in 1916 by Vladimir Lenin’s more elaborate theses on The Socialist
Revolution and the Right of Nations to Self-Determination. Both authors pro¬
claimed that nation-states will retain the right to self-determination. Accord¬
ing to Antonio Cassese, Lenin’s Socialist Revolution constituted “the first
compelling enunciation of the principle” of self-determination of peoples at
the international level. 7

The special prominence of the right to self-determination in inter¬
national law has been attributed to the American president Woodrow Wilson.
Robert Friedlander thus accredited President Wilson’s “Fourteen Points
Address” of 8 January 1918 as “transforming self-determination into a uni¬
versal right.” 8 Wilson included in those 14 points one that proclaimed a
“free, open-minded, and absolutely impartial adjustment of all colonial

8 ASPJ AFRICA & FRANC OPHONIE

claims, based upon a strict observance of the principle that in determining
all such questions of sovereignty the interests of the population concerned
must have equal weight with the equitable claims of government whose
title is to be determined.” 9 In the “Fourteen Points Address,” President
Wilson never really used the word self-determination. It became part of his
vocabulary only in an address to a joint session of the two houses of Con¬
gress delivered on 11 February 1918, when he proclaimed that “national
aspirations must be respected; peoples may now be dominated and governed
only by their own consent. ‘Self-determination is not a mere phrase. It is an
imperative principle of action, which statesmen will henceforth ignore at
their peril.” 10

The above citation from the “Fourteen Points Address” has come to be
regarded as the basis of the League of Nations policy for dealing with the
future dispensation of nation-states that were part of the world empires de¬
feated and dissolved through World War I. 11 The right to self-determination
of those nation-states was conditioned by the so-called mandate system of
the League of Nations, in terms of which a designated mandatory state would
prepare the conquered nations for political independence—or in the case of
Southwest Africa (Namibia), for eventual incorporation into the Union of
South Africa as a fifth province of that country. 12

In its infancy, when World War I was drawing to a close, the idea of
self-determination emerged to legitimize the disintegration of the Ottoman,
German, Russian, and Austro-Hungarian empires. 13 Within that context,
self-determination vested in “ethnic communities, nations or nationalities
primarily defined by language or culture” and afforded justification to such
communities to disrupt existing states. 14 Self-determination here denoted
the right of “peoples” in the sense of (territorially defined) nations to political
independence. 13 But it did not end here. Over time, the concept acquired
different shades of meaning, depending in each instance on the nature and
disposition of the peoples claiming that right. 16

Following World War II, the emphasis of the concept of self-determination
shifted to the principle “of bringing all colonial situations to a speedy end.” 17
The repositories of the concerned right in this sense were colonized peoples,
and the substance of their right denoted the political independence “of
peoples that do not govern themselves, particularly peoples dominated by
geographically distant colonial powers.” 18

In the 1960s, yet another category of “peoples” came to be identified as
repositories of a right to self-determination—namely those subject to racist
regimes. Here the concept substantively signified the right of such peoples

REGULATING GROUP-RELATED RIVALRIES IN HIGHLY POLARIZED COMMUNITIES 9

to participate in the structures of government within the countries to which
they belong. 19 The “self” in self-determination was no longer perceived as
territorially defined sections of the population in multinational empires. It
not only comprised peoples under colonial rule or foreign domination but
also became identified with the entire community of a territory where the
social, economic, and constitutional system was structured on institution¬
ally sanctioned racial discrimination. 20

Finally, the right to self-determination has been extended to a political
community’s national or ethnic, religious, and linguistic minorities whose
particular entitlements center upon a right to regulate their lives according
to the traditions and customs of the concerned group. South Africa has
come to accept this final meaning of a right to self-determination as a
means for addressing sectional interests within the body politic.

The Right to Self-Determination of
Ethnic, Religious, and Linguistic Communities Defined

One must not confuse the right to self-determination of ethnic, religious,
and linguistic communities with the comparable right of colonized countries
or of peoples subject to a racist regime. In terms of the International Covenant
on Civil and Political Rights, the self-determination of ethnic, religious, and
linguistic communities entails the following basic directive: “In those States
in which ethnic, religious or linguistic minorities exist, persons belonging to
such minorities shall not be denied the right, in community with the other
members of their group, to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practice
their own religion, or to use their own language.” 21 Similarly, the Declaration
on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic
Minorities speaks of “the right [of national or ethnic, religious, and linguistic
minorities] to enjoy their own culture, to profess and practice their own reli¬
gion, and to use their own language, in private and in public, freely and with¬
out interference or any form of discrimination.” 22

But there is more to the self-determination of such communities. In
giving practical effect to the right to self-determination, governments,
through their respective constitutional and legal systems, must secure the
interests of distinct sections of the population that constitute minorities in
the above sense. The Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National
or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities clearly spells out that obliga¬
tion: protect and encourage the creation of conditions for the promotion of
the group identities of minorities under the jurisdiction of the duty-bound

10 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

state; afford to minorities the special competence to participate effectively
in decisions pertinent to the group to which they belong; do not discrimi¬
nate in any way against any person on the basis of his/her group identity;
and in fact take action to secure their equal treatment by and before the
law. 23 The declaration further provides that “states shall take measures to
create favourable conditions to enable persons belonging to minorities to
express their characteristics and to develop their culture, language, religion,
traditions and customs, except where specific practices are in violation of
national law and contrary to international standards.” 24

The Council of Europe’s Framework Convention for the Protection of
National Minorities specifies minority rights in much the same vein. It
guarantees equality before the law and equal protection of the laws. 25 States
parties promise to provide “the conditions necessary for persons belonging
to national minorities to maintain and develop their culture, and to preserve
the essential elements of their identity, namely their religion, language, tradi¬
tions and cultural heritage.” 26 States parties recognize the right of a person
belonging to a national minority “to manifest his or her religion or belief
and to establish religious institutions, organisations and associations.” 27
Finally, the framework convention guarantees the use of “minority
language[s], in private and in public, orally and in writing.” 28

The South African constitution is quite explicit in upholding these
directives of international law. Section 31 provides that

(1) Persons belonging to a cultural, religious or linguistic com¬
munity may not be denied the right, with other members of
that community

(a) to enjoy their culture, practise their religion and use their
language; and

(b) to form, join and maintain cultural, religious and linguistic
associations and other organs of civil society.

(2) The rights in subsection (1) may not be exercised in a man¬
ner inconsistent with any provision of the Bill of Rights. 29

The drafters of the constitution were also sensitive to the duty of the
state to promote cultural, religious, and linguistic diversity in South Africa.
The constitution thus makes provision for a Commission for the Promotion
and Protection of the Rights of Cultural, Religious, and Linguistic Com¬
munities. 30 It also envisions the establishment, by means of national legisla¬
tion, of a Pan South African Language Board charged inter alia with promot-

REGULATING GROUP- RE LATED RIVALRIES IN HIGHLY POLARIZED COMMUNITIES 11

ing and ensuring respect for “Arabic, Hebrew, Sanskrit and other languages
used for religious purposes in South Africa.” 31 One must note that the right
of self-determination of ethnic, religious, and linguistic groups (a) is not an
unlimited right and (b) does not include a right to political independence.

Limitations of the Right to Self-Determination

The Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Reli¬
gious and Linguistic Minorities excluded from the right to self-determination
specific practices of an ethnic, religious, or linguistic community that violate
the national laws of a country and run contrary to international standards. 32
The international-standards criterion conditions the national-law limitation,
presupposing municipal regulation that remains within the confines of inter¬
national standards and does not place undue restrictions upon the group
interests of minorities.

Current state practice does not uphold to the letter the limitations in¬
herent in the right to self-determination of ethnic, religious, or linguistic
communities dictated by the international-standards criterion. For example,
almost all of the international human rights conventions and covenants
condemn gender discrimination, yet religious institutions that discriminate
against women on gender grounds have—thus far, successfully—claimed a
sovereign right to conduct their affairs within the sphere of their internal
household according to the dictates of their faith. And perhaps rightly so!
Does one really want the state to compel the Roman Catholic Church,
Greek Orthodox Church, Orthodox Judaism, and others to ordain women
as priests or as part of their clergy?

However, one cannot justify practices such as female genital mutilation
on the basis of the right to self-determination of peoples. Such a practice
amounts to sexually defined physical mutilation of extreme severity and
with irreversible consequences. Almost exclusively inspired by male interests
(the prolonged sexual pleasure of the male partner), it constitutes sex- and
gender-based discrimination of the worst kind. Since this mutilation usually
occurs while the victim is an infant, it also implicates the rights of the child.
The United Nations Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women
(1993) describes female genital mutilation as an instance of “violence
against women.” 33

This raises the question as to an appropriate criterion for separating
those violations of “international standards” that do—and those that do
not—exceed the limits of the right to self-determination of ethnic, reli-

12 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

gious, or linguistic communities. There are no clear answers to this question.
It would seem, though, that those customs and traditions that threaten the
life or violate the physical integrity of members of an ethnic, religious, or
linguistic group clearly exceed the permissible confines of the right to self-
determination of the group. Applying these norms in a South African set¬
ting is particularly problematic since cultural or ethnic traditions in many
African communities include practices incompatible with the human rights
ideology of our time and are therefore intolerable.

From a certain perspective, one can divide the systems of human rights
protection in the world today into two main categories: those that have
grown from the bottom up and those imposed from the top down. In coun¬
tries belonging to the former category, the values embodied in a Bill of
Rights were based upon and kept track with an existing and evolving public
ethos. Drafters and law-creating agencies simply endorsed moral percep¬
tions entertained by a cross section of the peoples comprising the nation.
The American system of human rights protection offers an example of this
state of affairs.

South Africa, though, belongs to that category of political communi¬
ties that have imposed Bill of Rights decrees from the top down. That is to
say, the rights and freedoms protected by the constitution have been dic¬
tated by internationally recognized norms of right and wrong, which in
many instances do not conform with the moral perceptions and customary
practices of large sections of the South African population. From time to
time, some of the laws drafted to implement the principles of human rights
provoke strong voices of protest from groups within the country whose
age-old customs may fall prey to the particular legal-reform measures. In
many instances, the lives they live and the customs they observe are far re¬
moved from the nice-sounding ideologies written into the constitution and
specificities reflected in judgments of the courts. In one of the early judg¬
ments of the Constitutional Court, Justice Yvonne Mokgoro referred to the
“delicate and complex” task of accommodating African customary law to
the values embodied in the Bill of Rights, noting that “this harmonisation
will demand a great deal of judicious care and sensitivity.” 34

Effective implementation of the human-rights-based laws and judg¬
ments within the entire country will in the final analysis be conditioned by
cultivation of a human-rights ethos as the stronghold of all of the peoples
and in all of the tribal communities of South Africa. In this respect, that
nation still has many more miles to run.

REGULATING GROUP- RE LATED RIVALRIES IN HIGHLY POLARIZED COMMUNITIES 13

Self-Determination and a Right to Secession

The failure of national systems to provide protection to the sectional interests
of the peoples within their area of jurisdiction—or merely the perception of
being marginalized—represents an important contributing cause of the
tireless aspirations toward the establishment of homogeneous states for
sections of the political community with a strong group consciousness.
These include the Muslim community of Kashmir and in Kosovo, the
Basques in Northern Spain, the Hindu factions in Sri Lanka, the Catholic
minority in Northern Ireland, the Kurds in Iraq and Turkey, people of
Macedonian extraction in Fiorina (northern Greece), the peoples of So¬
maliland in Somalia, the northern provinces of Georgia, the Maoists in
Nepal, and many others.

One must emphasize, though, that the right of ethnic, religious, and
linguistic communities to self-determination does not include a right to
secession—not even in instances where the powers that be act in breach of
a minority’s legitimate expectations/ 5 Three compelling arguments prove
decisive in this regard:

• The right to self-determination is almost invariably mentioned in conjunc¬
tion with the territorial integrity of states. 36 Reconciling the two principles
in question necessarily means that one must take self-determination to
denote something less than secession.

• The right to self-determination vests in a people; essentially, a new state
created through secession is territorially defined/ 7 A defined territory,
not a people, secedes from an existing state. 38

• The right to self-determination is the right of a collective group (members
of the concerned group, either individually or collectively, can exercise
entitlements included in that right), but a right to secede is a right of an
institutional group (where permissible, a representative organ of the ter¬
ritorially defined group, acting on behalf of the group as a whole, must
make a decision to secede).

Therefore, one should not view general definitions of the right to self-
determination as a general sanction of a right to political independence
(one finds such a general definition in the Declaration on the Granting of
Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples proclaiming the right of
peoples to “freely determine their political status” and the right to “freely
pursue their economic, social, and cultural development”). 39 Rather, they
must be limited and understood in the context of the subject matter of the

14 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

document from which they derive. Peoples subject to colonial rule or foreign
domination do have a right to political independence—ethnic, religious,
and linguistic minorities in an existing state do not. Similarly, the definition
of self-determination in international instruments, including in that con¬
cept the right of peoples “freely [to] determine their political status and
freely [to] pursue their economic, social and cultural development,” did not
intend to undermine the rule of international law proclaiming the territo¬
rial integrity of states. 40

The United Nations’ (UN) Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belong¬
ing to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities reiterated that
one must not take its provisions to contradict the principles of the UN
pertaining inter alia to “sovereign equality, territorial integrity and political
independence of States.” 41 In the Framework Convention for the Protection
of National Minorities , the Council of Europe also proclaimed that “nothing
in the present framework Convention shall be interpreted as implying any
right to engage in any activity or perform any act contrary to the funda¬
mental principles of international law and in particular of the sovereign
equality, territorial integrity and political independence of States.” 42

The UN’s Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples of 2007 also
proclaims, somewhat inadvertently, that indigenous peoples are entitled to
“freely determine their political status and freely pursue their economic,
social and cultural development.” 43 Lest someone construe this as a right to
political independence, the declaration goes on to emphasise that it must
not be interpreted as “authorising or encouraging any action that would
dismember or impair, totally or in part, the territorial integrity or political
unity of sovereign and independent States.” 44

International law has quite adamantly proclaimed the sanctity of post-
World War II national borders and has censured attempts at secession in
instances such as Katanga, Biafra, and the Turkish Republic of Northern
Cyprus. 45 As explained by Vernon van Dyke, “The United Nations would
be in an extremely difficult position if it were to interpret the right to self-
determination in such a way as to invite or justify attacks on the territorial
integrity of its own members.” 46 The Organization of African Unity (now
the African Union), sensitive to the chaotic situation that might emerge
from any effort to redraw the (quite irrational) national borders established
by colonial powers in Africa, played a leading role in emphasizing the
salience of the existing frontiers. Its charter of 1963 prompted member
states to “solemnly affirm and declare” their “respect for the sovereignty and
territorial integrity of each State and for its inalienable right to independent

REGULATING GROUP- RE LATED RIVALRIES IN HIGHLY POLARIZED COMMUNITIES IS

existence.” 47 A resolution of the Assembly of Heads of State and Govern¬
ment adopted at its first ordinary session held in Cairo in 1964 called on all
member states “to respect the borders existing on their achievement of
national independence.” 48

The Supreme Court of Canada issued a judgment pertaining to the
legality of the province of Quebec’s seceding from Canada (should a majority
of the residents of that province through a referendum seek to effect the
severance of that territory from Canada?). It summarized as follows the
distinction between self-determination (referred to in the judgment as
“internal self-determination”) and secession (referred to in the judgment
as “external self-determination”):

The recognized sources of international law establish that the right to self-determination of
a people is normally fulfilled through internal self-determination—a people’s pursuit of its
political, economic, social and cultural development within the framework of an existing
state. A right to external self-determination (which in this case potentially takes the form of
a right to unilateral secession) arises in only the most extreme of cases and, even then, under
carefully defined circumstances . 49 (emphases in original)

Secession is indeed sanctioned by international law—not under the rubric
of a right to self-determination but as a permissible political strategy in its
own right. The restructuring of national borders is sanctioned by international
law in two instances only:

(a) If a decision to secede is “freely determined by a people”—that
is, a cross section of the entire population of the state to be divided
and not only inhabitants of the region wishing to secede. 50

(b) If, following an armed conflict, national boundaries are
redrawn as part of a peace treaty. 51

The reunification of Germany, the breakup of the Soviet Union, the parting
of the constitutional ways of the Czech Republic and Slovakia, and the re¬
cent secession of southern Sudan were in that sense “freely determined by
the people.” 52 The secession of Eritrea from Ethiopia, though, was sanc¬
tioned by a peace accord. The disintegration of the former Yugoslavia rep¬
resents a complicated conglomeration of both principles. 53

On 17 February 2008, a substantial majority of the Assembly of Kosovo
adopted a unilateral declaration of independence from Serbia. The General
Assembly responded by requesting an advisory opinion of the International
Court of Justice. The court noted that the request did not call upon the
court “to take a position on whether international law conferred a positive
entitlement on Kosovo unilaterally to declare its independence or, a fortiori,

16 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

on whether international law generally confers an entitlement on entities
situated within a State unilaterally to break away from it.” 54 Instead, the
court concluded that this declaration of independence was not precluded by
the Security Council resolution that authorized the secretary-general to
establish an interim administration for Kosovo with a view, inter alia, to
oversee “the development of provisional self-governing institutions.” 55 It
also concluded, somewhat obscurely, that the declaration of independence
did not violate general international law. 56

One body of opinion suggests that “remedial secession” might be per¬
missible under the rules of international law in instances where an ethnic,
religious, or linguistic community within an existing state is subjected to
unbecoming human rights violations. 57 Some years ago, the African Com¬
mission on Human and People’s Rights suggested by way of obiter dictum
that Katanga would have been entitled to secede from Zaire if “concrete
evidence [existed] of violations of human rights to the point that the ter¬
ritorial integrity of Zaire should be called to question and . . . that the
people of Katanga are denied the right to participate in government as
guaranteed by article 13(1) of the African Charter.” 58 In its declaration on
self-determination, the UN World Conference on Human Rights of 1993
reiterated that this right “shall not be construed as authorizing or encourag¬
ing any action which would dismember or impair, totally or in part, the
territorial integrity or political unity of sovereign and independent States.”
Seemingly it made this assertion applicable only to states “conducting
themselves in compliance with the principles of equal rights and self-
determination of peoples and thus possessed of a Government representing
the whole people belonging to the territory without distinction of any
kind.” 59 The fallacy of this reasoning is that the right to self-determination
belongs to a people while statehood is based on a territory foundation. In
the final analysis, secession must be sanctioned by general agreement or a
peace treaty. Of course it is quite possible that gross violations of human
rights could culminate in a referendum or an armed conflict that would
eventually constitute the basis for secession. However, the legality of seces¬
sion of a defined territory will depend on the referendum or peace treaty
and not on the human rights violations per se—at least not within the
current confines of international law and state sovereignty.

For many compelling reasons, one should avoid at all costs the destruc¬
tion of existing political communities harboring a plural society:

REGULATING GROUP- RE LATED RIVALRIES IN HIGHLY POLARIZED COMMUNITIES 17

• A multiplicity of economically nonviable states will further contribute
to a decline of living standards in the world community

• The perception that people sharing a common culture, religion, or language
would necessarily also enjoy political compatibility is clearly a myth,
and disillusionment after the event might provoke profound resentment
and further conflict.

• The movement of people within plural societies across territorial di¬
vides has greatly destroyed ethnic, cultural, or religious homogeneity in
regions where it might have existed in earlier times. Consequently the
demarcation of borders that would include the sectional demography
that secessionists seek to establish is in most cases quite impossible.

• Affording political relevance to ethnic, cultural, or religious affiliation
carries within itself the potential of the repression of minority groups
within the nation. Moreover, it affords no political standing whatsoever
to persons who, on account of mixed parentage or marriage, cannot be
identified with any particular faction of the group-conscious commu¬
nity or to those who—for whatever reason—do not wish to be identi¬
fied under any particular ethnic, cultural, or religious label.

• In consequence of the above, an ethnically, culturally, or religiously de¬
fined state will more often than not create its own “minorities problem.”
Because of the ethnical, cultural, or religious incentive for the estab¬
lishment of the secession state, this “problem” would almost invariably
result in profound discrimination against those who do not belong or,
worse still, a strategy of ethnic cleansing.

Concluding Observations

South Africa comprises perhaps the most diverse plural composition
in the entire world; furthermore, it is known for the polarization of factions
of the population. 60 Group rivalries are still rife in South Africa as a feature
of the country’s demographic divides. Dealing with such rivalries and or¬
chestrating reconciliation are central to social engineering within that
troubled land.

The drafters of the South African constitution rejected the segregation of
rival ethnic, religious, and linguistic communities as well as the promotion of
cultural, religious, or linguistic homogeneity within the nation as a means of
counteracting group-related tensions in the country’s social construct. Instead,

18 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

they opted for creating—in the celebrated words of Archbishop Desmond
Tutu—“a rainbow nation.” Accordingly, the new constitutional dispensation
seeks to promote pride in one’s group identities: Be proud of being an Afrikaner
or being a member of any of the rich variety of “peoples” within the African,
Indian, and colored communities. Be faithful to your membership in the Catholic,
Methodist, Dutch Reformed, or Zion Christian Church—or to your member¬
ship in the Muslim, Hindu, or Buddhist communities. Find comfort in speak¬
ing the language of your cultural extraction, whether Afrikaans, English, Greek,
Portuguese, Tswana, Xhosa, or Zulu. The European Court of Human Rights
has also singled out tolerance and broad-mindedness as indispensable compo¬
nents of a democratic society. 61

Pride in one’s particular ethnic, religious, or linguistic identity does not
elevate one to a superior status in the community. The respect of others for
one’s cultural values, religious persuasions, or linguistic preferences demands
full respect for the culture, religion, and language of others. The constitu¬
tional principle that applies in this regard has been reduced to perhaps the
most basic moral directive for a “new South Africa,” one that finds expres¬
sion in the concept of ubuntu or botho (“an idea based on deep respect for
the [inner] humanity of another”). 62 Ubuntu translates into “humaneness”
and constitutes “part of our rainbow heritage.” 63 It stands in sharp contrast
to “dehumanising and degrading the individual.” 64 Justice Albie Sachs on
occasion referred to ubunthu-batho in the sense of “civility” as “a precondition
for the good functioning of contemporary democratic societies.” He noted
that “civility in a constitutional sense involves more than just courtesy and
good manners. ... It presupposes tolerance for those with whom one dis¬
agrees and respect for the dignity of those with whom one is in dispute.” 65

The constitution therefore subjects the freedom of expression to limi¬
tations, which include a prohibition of the “advocacy of hatred that is based
on race, ethnicity, gender or religion, and that constitutes incitement to
cause harm.” 66 Under the Promotion of Equality and Prevention of Unfair
Discrimination Act, “no person may publish, propagate, advocate or com¬
municate words . .. against any person, that could reasonably be construed
to demonstrate a clear intention to (a) be hurtful; (b) be harmful or to incite
harm; (c) promote or propagate hatred.” 67 One must note that South African
law does not uphold the almost incontestable sanctity of freedom of speech,
as does the American constitutional system. In South African law, “certain
expressions do not deserve constitutional protection because they have the
potential to impinge adversely on the dignity of others and cause harm.” 68
In South Africa, “the right to freedom of expression is not a pre-eminent

REGULATING GROUP- RE LATED RIVALRIES IN HIGHLY POLARIZED COMMUNITIES 19

freedom ranking above all others.” 69 In this respect, it “differs fundamen¬
tally from the balance struck in the United States,’’where freedom of speech
constitutes the basic norm—a Grundnorm —of the entire rights regime. 70

Instead, the “new South Africa” is founded on zero tolerance for words
and conduct offensive to others. Depicting members of particular population
groups as “hotnot,” “kaffir,” “rooinek,” “boer,” or “coolie” is therefore strictly
forbidden since such names “have for decades been used to bring people of
different races into contempt.” 71 Refusing to serve a Muslim client wearing a
fez in a business enterprise open to the public constitutes unbecoming dis¬
crimination based on religion. 72 The media are under legal constraint not to
publish cartoons depicting the Prophet Mohammed as a terrorist (as did
those that first appeared in a Danish newspaper) because they “advocate hatred
and stereotyping of Muslims.” 73 A newspaper report that likens homosexuality
to bestiality cannot be tolerated under freedom of the press because it pro¬
motes hatred against the gay and lesbian communities. The chanting of a
“freedom song” that includes the phrase dibulu iBhunu (shoot the Boer) is
offensive to the Afrikaans-speaking section of the South African nation and
as such violates the proscription of offensive language. 75

As noted by Chief Justice Pius Lange in 2009, “The process of recon¬
ciliation is an ongoing one which requires give and take from all sides.” 76
“Our democracy is still fragile,” said Judge Eberhard Bertelsmann, adding
that “participants in the political and socio-political discourse must remain
sensitive to the feelings and perceptions of other South Africans when
words were used that were common during the struggle days, but may be
experienced as harmful by fellow inhabitants of South Africa today.” 77

Notes

1. Loi no. 2004-228 du IS mars 2004 (encadrant, en application du principe de lai'cite, le port de signes ou de
tenues manifestant une appartenance religieuse dans les ecoles, colleges et lycees publics) [formulating, in application
of the principle of secularism, the wearing of signs or dress manifesting a religious affiliation in schools and public
primary and high schools].

2. Leyla §ahin v. Turkey (Application no. 44774/98), European Court ofHuman Rights (Judgments and Decisions)
2005-XI (11 October 2005): 173. See also Kurtulmu^v. Turkey (Application no. 65500/01), European Court of Human
Rights (Judgments and Decisions) 2006-11 (24 January 2006): 297; and Kose and Others v. Turkey (Application no.
26625/02), European Court of Human Rights (Judgments and Decisions) 2006-11 (24January 2006): 339.

3. Art. 15(3)(c), Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, 1999.

4. Preamble, Constitution of the Republic of South Africa, Act 108,1996 (hereafter “1996 S. A. Const.”).

5. Ibid., secs. 8(1), 8(2), and 30.

6. Ibid., sec. 31; see also sec. 235.

7. Antonio Cassese, Self-Determination of Peoples: A Legal Appraisal (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University
Press, 1995), 15.

20 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

8. Robert Friedlander, “Self-Determination: A Legal-Political Inquiry,” Detroit College of Law Review 1
(1975): 71,73.

9. “Fourteen Points Address Delivered on 8 January 1918 to a Joint Session of Congress by President
Woodrow Wilson,” point 5, in R. S. Baker and W. E. Dodd, eds., Public Papers of Woodrow Wilson, vol. 1, War
and Peace (New York: Harper and Brothers, 1927), 155-59.

10. Woodrow Wilson, “Address to Congress,” 11 February 1918, in A Compilation of Messages and Papers of the
President, vol. 18 (New \ork: Bureau of National Literature, 1921), 8450. See also the address of President Wilson
delivered in Baltimore,MD, on 6 April 1918 on the occasion of the first anniversary of America’s participation in the
European War and the third inauguration of the Third Liberty Loan, in which he referred to “our ideals, the ideals of
justice and humanity and liberty, the principle of the free self-determination of nations, upon which all the modern
world insists.” Ibid., 8483.

11. Vernon Van Dyke, Human Rights, the United States, and World Community (New York: Oxford University
Press, 1970), 86.

12. The mandate system was the brainchild of Jan Christian Smuts (1870-1950) of South Africa, a general in
the Anglo-Boer War (1899-1902) and a Cambridge graduate, invited by Great Britain to be part of its delegation
to the Paris Peace Conference where the Peace Treaty of Versailles (1919) was drafted. In December 1918, Smuts
outlined the mandate system in a League of Nations plan under the heading “A Practical Suggestion,” which
President Woodrow Wilson included in his second draft of the League of Nations Covenant.

13. See Antonio Cassese, International Law in a Divided World (Oxford, UK: Clarendon Press, 1986), 131-34,
par. 80; Rupert Emerson, “Self-Determination,” American Journal of International Law 66 (1971): 459, 463; and
Friedlander, “Self-Determination,” 71.

14. Nathaniel Berman, “Sovereignty in Abeyance: Self-Determination in International Law,” Wisconsin
International Law Journal 7 (1988): 51, 86-87.

15. One should note, though, that even then, secession from existing empires was not a right in itself. The
advisory opinion of the International Committee of Jurists in the Aaland Islands Case pointed out that “the right
of disposing of national territory is essentially an attribute of the sovereignty of every State. Positive International
Law does not recognise the right of national groups, as such, to separate themselves from the State of which they
form part by the simple expression of a wish, any more than it recognises the right of other States to claim such a
separation.” “Report of the International Committee of Jurists Entrusted by the Council of the League of Nations
with the Task of Giving an Advisory Opinion upon the Legal Aspects of the Aaland Islands Question,” League of
Nations OfficialJournal, supp.3 (October 1920): [3],http://www.ilsa.org/jessup/jessuplO/basicmats/aalandl.pdf. It
was only when “the formation, transformation and dismemberment of States as a result of revolutions and wars
create situations of fact which, to a large extent, cannot be met by the application of the normal rules of positive
law” that “peoples” may either decide to form an independent state or choose between two existing ones (ibid., [4]).
In such circumstances, when sovereignty has been disrupted, “the principle of self-determination of peoples may
be called into play. New aspirations of certain sections of a nation, which are sometimes based on old traditions or
on a common language and civilisation, may come to the surface and produce effects which must be taken into
account in the interests of the internal and external peace of nations” (ibid.).

16. See Johan D. van der Vyver, “Sovereignty and Human Rights in Constitutional and International Law,”
Emory International Law Review 5 (1991): 321, 395-416; van der Vyver, “Self-Determination and the Peoples of
Quebec under International Caw,” Journal of Transnational Law and Policy 10, no. 1 (2000): 14-19; van der Vyver,
“Self-Determination and the Right to Secession of Religious Minorities under International Law,” in Protecting the
Human Rights of Religious Minorities in Eastern Europe, ed. Peter G. Danchin and Elizabeth A. Cole (New Ytrk:
Columbia University Press, 2002), 251,258-61; and van der Vyver, ‘Cultural Identity as a Constitutional Right in
South Africa,” Stellenbosch Law Review 14 (2003): 51,53-56,58.

17. Western Sahara (Advisory Opinion of 22 May 1975), International Court of Justice (1975), 1,31. See also
Legal Consequences for States of the Continued Presence of South Africa in N amibia (South West Africa) N otwith-
standing Security Council Resolution 276 (1970) (Advisory Opinion of 21 June 1971) International Court of Justice
(1971), 16,31. (The court held that the right to self-determination was applicable to “territories under colonial rule”
and that it “embraces all peoples and territories which ‘have not yet attained independence.’”)

REGULATING GROUP- RE LATED RIVALRIES IN HIGHLY POLARIZED COMMUNITIES 21

18. Berman, “Sovereignty in Abeyance,” 54. See also Cassese, International Law in a Divided World, lb, par. 43;
Van Dyke, Human Rights, 87; L. Berat, “The Evolution of Self-Determination in International Law: South Africa
and Namibia, and the Case of Walvis Bay,” Emory International Law Review 4 (1990): 251,283 (referring to self-
determination and the equal right of peoples as “twin aspects of decolonization”); Emerson, “Self-Determination,”
463; O. Schachter, “The United Nations and Internal Conflict,” in Law and Civil War in the Modem World, z d.John
Norton Moore (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 1974), 401, 406-7; and Gebre Tesfagiorgis, “Self-
Determination: Its Evolution and Practice by the United Nations and Its Application in the Case of Eritrea,”
Wisconsin International Law Journal 6 (1987): 75,78-80.

19. The link within the confines of the right to self-determination of systems of institutionalized racism and
colonialism or foreign domination may be traced to the United Nations (UN) General Assembly’s Declaration on
the Inadmissibility of Intervention in the Domestic Affairs ofStates and the Protection of Their Independence and Sovereignty
of 1965, in which the UN demanded that all states respect “the right to self-determination and independence of
peoples and nations, to be freely exercised without any foreign pressure, and with absolute respect for human rights
and fundamental freedoms.”To this end, it proclaimed that “all States shall contribute to the complete elimination
of racial discrimination and colonialism in all its forms and manifestations” (par. 6).

20. This development was probably prompted by the claim of South Africa that the establishment of independent
tribal homelands as part of the apartheid policy constituted a manifestation of the right to self-determination of
the different ethnic groups within the country’s African population. Not so, responded the international com¬
munity. The tribal homelands were a creation of the minority (white) regime and did not emerge from the wishes
or political self-determination of the denationalized peoples themselves.

21. International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, art. 1, General Assembly Resolution 2200 (XXI), 16
December 1966,21 UN GAOR Supp. (no. 16), 27, UN Doc. A/6316, 999 UN Treaty Series 171. See in general
Felix Ermacora, “The Protection of Minorities before the United Nations,” Recueil des Cours 4 (1983): 246.

22. Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities, art.
2.1, General Assembly Resolution 47/136, 18 December 1992, 47 UN General Assembly Official Records
Supp. (no. 49), 210, UN Doc. A/Res/47/135,1992.

23. Ibid., arts. 1.1 and 4.2,2.3, 3, and 4.1.

24. Ibid., art. 4.2.

25. European Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities, art. 4.1., European Treaty
Series 1995,157 (reprinted in International Legal Materials 34 [1995]: 35).

26. Ibid., art. 5.1.

27. Ibid., art. 8.

28. Ibid., art. 10.1. See also the European Charter for Regional Minority Languages, Strasbourg, 1992,
http://conventions.coe.int/Treaty/en/Treaties/Html/148.htm.

29. 1996 S. A. Const., sec. 31.

30. Ibid., secs. 181(l)(c) and 185-86. See also the Commission for the Promotion and Protection of the Rights
of Cultural, Religious, and Linguistic Communities, Act 19,2002.

31. 1996 S. A. Const., sec. 6(5)(b)(ii).

32. See the text associated with note 24.

33. Declaration on the Elimination of Violence against Women, art. 2(a), General Assembly Resolution 48/104,
20 December 1993, UN General Assembly Official Records, 48th sess., Supp. (no. 49), vol. 1, 217, UN Doc.
A/48/49,1994.

34. Du Plessis v. De Klerk, 1996 (5) S.A. 658 (CC) (South Africa).

35. See Van Dyke, Human Rights, 88; Berman, “Sovereignty in Abeyance,” 87; and Emerson, “Self-
Determination,” 464-65.

36. See FinalAct ofthe Conference on Security and Co-operation inEurope, for example, par. IV (territorial integrity)
and par. VIII (equal rights and self-determination of peoples), International Legal Materials 14 (1975): 1292.

37. According to Hermann Mosler, “States are constituted by a people, living in a territory and organized
by a government which exercises territorial and personal jurisdiction.” Mosler, “Subjects of International
Law,” in Encyclopedia of Public International Law, vol. 7, ed. Rudolph Bernhardt (Amsterdam: North-Holland,

22 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

1984), 442,449. Karl Doehring defines a state in international law as “an entity having exclusive jurisdiction
with regard to its territory and personal jurisdiction in view of its nationals.” Doehring, “State,” in Bernhardt,
Encyclopedia of Public International Law, vol. 10 (1987), 423. Herman Dooyeweerd defined the foundational
function of a state in terms of “an internal monopolistic organization of the power of the sword over a particular
cultural area within territorial boundaries.” Dooyeweerd, A New Critique of Theoretical Thought, vol. 3, trans.
David H. Freeman (Ontario: Paideia Press, 1969), 414. He further maintained that the leading or qualifying
function of the state finds expression in a public, legal relationship that unifies the government, the people,
and the territory constituting the political community into a politico-juridical whole (ibid., 433ff).

38. See\oram Dinstein, “Collective Human Rights ofPeoples and Minorities f International and Comparative
Law Quarterly 25, no. 1 (January 1976): 102,109. He notes that peoples seeking secession must be located in a
well-defined territorial area in which they form a majority.

39. Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples, General Assembly Resolution
1514,14 December 1960,15 UN General Assembly Official Records Supp. (no. 16) 66, UN Doc. A/4684,1960.

40. See International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, art. 1(1), General Assembly Resolution
2200A (XXI), 16 December 1966, 21 UN General Assembly Official Records Supp. (no. 16), 49, UN Doc.
A/6316 (1966), 993 UN Treaty Series 3; International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, art. 1(1); and Declara¬
tion on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples, art. 2. See also the first paragraph under the
heading “The Principle of Equal Rights and Self-Determination of Peoples,” in the Declaration on Principles of
International Law Concerning Friendly Relations and Co-operation among States in Accordance with the Charter of the
United Nations, General Assembly Resolution 2625,24 October 1970,25 UN General Assembly Official Records
Supp. (no. 28), 121, UN Doc. A/8028 (1970); Declaration on the Inadmissibility of Intervention into the Domestic
Affairs of States and the Protection of Their Independence and Sovereignty,par. 5, General Assembly Resolution 2131,21
December 1965,20 UN General Assembly Official Records Supp. (no. 14), 11-12, UN Doc. A/6014 (1965); and
Final Act ofthe Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe, par. VIII.

41. Declaration on the Rights of Persons Belonging to National or Ethnic, Religious and Linguistic Minorities, art 8.4.

42. European Framework Convention, art. 21.

43. General Assembly Resolution 61/295, 13 September 2007. The declaration was adopted with only
Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United States opposing.

44. Ibid., art. 46(1).

45. Regarding the sanctity of national borders, see Rosalyn Higgins, The Development of Inter¬
national Law through the Political Organs of the United Nations (London: Oxford University Press, 1963), 104-5;
and, for example, Final Act of the Conference on Security and Co-operation in Europe, par. III. Regarding attempts
at secession, see van der Vyver, “Sovereignty and Human Rights,” 403-7; and in greater detail, James Crawford,
The Creation of States in International Law (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1979), 235-36 (Katanga) and 265 (Biafra);
John Dugard, Recognition and the United Nations (Cambridge: Grotius, 1987), 86-90 (Katanga), 84-85 (Biafra),
and 108-11 (Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus); and Johan D. van der Vyver, “Statehood in International
Law,” Emory International Law Review 5, no. 9 (1991): 35-37 (Katanga) and 42-44 (Turkish Republic of
Northern Cyprus).

46. Van Dyke, Human Rights, 102.

47. Charter ofthe Organization of African Unity, 1963, art. III.3, reprinted in International Legal Materials
2 (1963): 766.

48. AHG/Res. 16(1), par. 2, Organization of African Unity, Resolutions Adopted by the First Ordinary Ses¬
sion of the Assembly of Heads of State and Government Held in Cairo, United Arab Republic, 17-21 July 1964.

49. Reference Re Secession of Quebec, 1998, 2 S.C.R. 217, par. 126, http://www.canlii.org/en/ca/scc
/doc/1998/1998canlii793/1998canlii793.pdf. See also van der Vyver, “Peoples of Quebec,” 14-19.

50. Declaration on Principles of International Law Concerning Friendly Relations and Co-operation among States.
Under the heading “The Principle of Equal Rights and Self-Determination of Peoples,” the declaration provides
“the establishment of a sovereign and independent State, the free association or integration with an independent
State or the emergence into any other political status freely determined by a people constitute modes of imple¬
menting the right to self-determination by that people.”

REGULATING GROUP- RE LATED RIVALRIES IN HIGHLY POLARIZED COMMUNITIES 23

51. See Cassese, International Law in a Divided World, 359-63.

52. One should specially note that Article 72 of the Konstitutsiya SSSR (USSR constitution) expressly guaran¬
teed the right of each republic to secede from the union. Accordance with International Law ofthe Unilateral Decla¬
ration of Independence in Respect of Kosovo, International Court of Justice General List no. 141,22 July 2010. The
referendum that sanctioned the secession of southern Sudan was confined to residents of that region but sanc¬
tioned by legislation of Sudan that authorized the referendum. Regarding elements for legitimizing secession in
any given case, Lee Buchheit specifies that the section of a community seeking partition should possess a distinct
group identity with reference, for example, to cultural, racial, linguistic, historical, or religious considerations. Those
making a separatist claim must be capable of an independent existence, including economic viability (but bearing
in mind international aid programs that might help a newly established political entity over its teething problems).
Further, the secession must serve to promote general international harmony or at least not be disruptive of inter¬
national harmony or disrupt it more than the status quo is likely to do. Buchheit, Secession: The Legitimacy of Self-
Determination (New Haven, CT: Yale University Press, 1978), 228-38.

53. Art. 1 of the Constitution of the Federal People’s Republic ofYugoslavia (1946) authorized secession of
its constituent republics. See also the Constitution of the Federal People’s Republic ofYugoslavia (1963), par. I
of the Introductory Part (Basic Principles) (depicting Yugoslavia as “a federal republic of free and equal peoples
and nationalities” united “on the basis of the right to self-determination, including the right of secession”), as
well as art. 1; and the Constitution of the Socialist Federal Republic ofYugoslavia (1974), par. I of the Introductory
Part (Basic Principles) (referring to “the right of every nation to self-determination” and “the brotherhood and
unity of nations and nationalities”). However, the disintegration of the federation did not occur in accordance
with the procedures prescribed for the exercise of the constitutional right to secession and furthermore included
territorial gains through conquest and ethnic cleansing.

54. Accordance with International Law ofthe Unilateral Declaration oflndependence in Respect ofKosovo, Inter¬
national Court of Justice General List no. 141, par. 56,22 July 2010 (hereafter “Kosovo Case”).

55. Ibid., pars. 114,119. Security Council Resolution 1244 (1999), 10 June 1999, par. 10.

56. Kosovo Case, par. 122.

57. See Ernest Duga Titanji, “The Right of Indigenous Peoples to Self-Determination versus Secession: One
Coin,Two Faces 1" African Human Rights Law Journal 9, no. 1 (2009): 52,68-72,73-74.

58. Katangese People’s Congress v. Zaire, 2000, African Human Rights Law Report 72, par. 6 (African
Commission on Human and People’s Rights, 1995).

59. “This [definition of self-determination] shall not be construed as authorising or encouraging any action
which would dismember or impair, totally or in part, the territorial integrity or political unity of sovereign and
independent States conducting themselves in compliance with the principles of equal rights and self-determination
of peoples and thus possessed of a Government representing the whole people belonging to the territory without
distinction of any kind.” World Conference on Human Rights, Vienna Declaration and Programme of Action, 25
June 1993, art. 1.2, UN Doc. A/Conf. 157/24,25 June 1993, reprinted in International Legal Materials 32 (1993):
1661,1665.

60. See S v. Makwanyane and Another, 1995 (3) SA 391, par. 308 (CC) (South Africa) (Justice Mokgoro
referring to South Africans having “a history of deep division characterised by strife and conflict”); and Du Toit
v. Minister for Safety and Security and Another, 2009 (6) SA 128, 2009 12 Butterworths Constitutional Law
Reports 1171, par. 17 (CC) (South Africa) (Chief Justice Lange stating that “the South African nation was for
decades a deeply divided society characterised by gross violations of fundamental human rights”).

61. Handyside v. the United Kingdom [1976] 1 European Court of Human Rights 737,754. See Islamic Unity
Convention v. Independent Broadcasting Authority and Others, 2002 (4) SA 295, par. 28 (CC) (South Africa).

62. Dikoko v. Mokhatla, 2006 (6) SA 235, 2007 1 Butterworths Constitutional Law Reports 1, par. 68
(CC) (South Africa). See also ibid., par. 69.

63. S v. Makwanyane, 1995 (3) SA 391, par. 308 (CC) (South Africa) (per Justice Mokgoro).

64. Ibid., par. 250 (per Justice Lange).

65. Masetlha v. President of the RSA and Another, 2008 (1) SA 566,2008 1 Butterworths Constitutional Law
Reports 1, par. 238 (CC) (South Africa).

24 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

66. 1996 S. A. Const, sec. 16(2)(c).

67. Promotion of Equality and Prevention of Unfair Discrimination Act 4,2000, sec. 10(1).

68. Du Toit v. Minister for Safety and Security, 2009 (6) SA 128, par. 32 (CC) (South Africa).

69. S v. Mamabolo (E TV Seven Others Intervening), 2001 (3) SA 409,2001 5 Butterworths Constitutional
Law Reports 449, par. 41 (CC) (South Africa).

70. Ibid., par. 40; Johan D. van der Vyver, “Constitutional Protection of Children and \oung Persons,” in The
Law of Children andYoung Persons in South Africa, ed.J. A. Robinson (Durban, South Africa: Butterworths, 1997),
265, 282; and van der Vyver, “Limitations of Freedom of Religion or Belief: International Law Perspectives,”
Emory International Law Review 19 (2005): 499,508.

71. Decision of the Broadcasting Complaints Commission in P Johnson v. 94.7 Highveld Stereo, case no.
07/2002,14 February 2002 (South Africa).

72. Woodways CC v. Moosa Vallie, case no. A251/05 (H. C. Western Cape), 31 August 2009 (South Africa).

73. Jamait-Ul-Ulama of Transvaal v. Johncom Media Investment Ltd. and Others, case no. 1127/06
(W.L.D.), 3 February 2006 (South Africa).

74. In South African Human Rights Commission v. Jon Qwulane, case no. 44/EQJHB (31 May 2011)
(South Africa), the Equality Court at the Johannesburg Magistrate’s Court demanded an unqualified public
apology to the gay and lesbian community from—and imposed a fine of R 100,000 to be paid by—Jon
Qwulane (currently the South African ambassador in Uganda) for a newspaper article he wrote under the
heading “Call Me Names, but Gay Is NOT OK,” in which he compared homosexuality with bestiality.

75. Agriforum and Another v. Malema and Another, 2011 (6) SA240 (EqC) (South Africa). The matter was
taken on appeal by Malema and the African National Conference but was settled on the basis of the appellants
agreeing “that certain words in certain freedom songs may be experienced as hurtful by members of minority
communities” and “to act with restraint to avoid the experience of such hurt.”The settlement was made an order of
court. Malema JS and Another v. Agriforum and Others, Case no. 20968/10 (2 November 2012).

76. Du Toit v. Minister of Safety and Security, 2009 (6) SA 128, par. 28 (CC) (South Africa). See also
Agriforum and Another v. Malema and Another, par. 11.

77. Agriforum v. Malema, 2010 (5) SA 235 (GNP) (South Africa).

Sharpening Our Plowshares

Applying the Lessons of Counterinsurgency
to Development and Humanitarian Aid

Solomon Major, PhD*

S ince the 1980s, encouraging social, political, and economic develop¬
ment and dispensing humanitarian assistance have become high-
priority missions for both national policy makers and international
and nongovernmental organizations (NGO). During the Cold
War, donor nations often competed among themselves for influence and
reputational rewards or from a simple desire to do good in the developing
world. This focus on dispensing developmental and humanitarian aid has
only accelerated since the fall of the Berlin Wall. 1

In 2005 President George W. Bush promulgated National Security
Presidential Directive 44, Management of Interagency Efforts Concerning
Reconstruction and Stabilization, which underscored America’s commit¬
ment to providing humanitarian assistance and reconstruction aid to popu¬
lations in need. 2 Later, during the Obama administration, Secretary of
Defense Robert Gates argued that “where possible, U.S. strategy is to employ
indirect approaches—primarily through building the capacity of partner
governments and their security forces—to prevent festering problems from
turning into crises that require costly and controversial direct military
intervention.” 3 More recently, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton argued that
the United States must “elevate development as a core pillar of American
power” as part of a strategy of exercising “smart power” internationally. 4

*The author is a research analyst in the Strategic Research Department of the US Naval War College. He
completed a master’s degree in national security studies from Georgetown University and a PhD in inter¬
national relations from Stanford University. Dr. Major has published several articles on humanitarian non¬
governmental organizations, international economic sanctions, and ethnic conflict. He continues to conduct
research on economic sanctions, counterinsurgency, humanitarianism, and development.

The author especially thanks COL R. J. Lillibridge, USA, for his invaluable insights from the field; this
article would not have been possible without his input and collaboration. Prof. Richard Norton and CAPT
Mike Haunter, USN, read earlier versions of the article and provided excellent feedback. Any oversights,
misstatements, or mistakes that remain, of course, are the fault of the author.

26 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

Humanitarian relief and successful development, however, are not the
sole preserve of international organizations and American foreign policy
organizations. National militaries, particularly America’s, have become
more directly involved in “engagement” and humanitarian assistance. 5 Al¬
though the US Army, which will likely take the lead in future humanitarian
operations, has been most proactive in integrating humanitarian assistance /
disaster relief missions into its tactical tasks, the other forces have followed
suit. 6 For example, A Cooperative Strategy for 21st Century Seapower —the
principal joint strategic document of the Navy, Marine Corps, and Coast
Guard—has broken with tradition by designating humanitarian assistance
and disaster relief as a core maritime competency. 7

Similarly, the nongovernmental sector—long engaged on these issues—
has redoubled its humanitarian and developmental efforts. 8 Although less
concerned with the ties that bind humanitarian assistance and defense,
NGOs unsurprisingly hold many concerns in common with those articu¬
lated by official aid givers. For example, World Vision—the largest American
humanitarian NGO—claims that it is “dedicated to working with children,
families and communities to overcome poverty and injustice . . . [and to]
working with the poor and oppressed to promote human transformation,
seek justice, and bear witness to the good news of the Kingdom of God.” 9

In spite of this renewed commitment to development and stability,
whether multilateral intergovernmental organizations (IGO) (e.g., the
United Nations), humanitarian NGOs (e.g., Oxfam) or organs of the
United States or other governments (e.g., the US Agency for International
Development [USAID] or the military) have distributed the aid, the results
have been disappointing. 10 Individual projects have sometimes flourished
and some “colors” or types of aid monies have proved relatively less ineffec¬
tive than others, but the overall development program has generally foun¬
dered. 11 In light of development aid’s inability to realize its promise for
whatever reasons, many IGOs and NGOs have recently and aggressively
expanded their portfolios to include operations in humanitarian aid. 12

Unfortunately, humanitarian operations have experienced similarly
disappointing results. Although humanitarian organizations have often
shifted much of the responsibility for these failures onto the fecklessness of
their donors (primarily nation-states and IGOs), some of the blame must
still rest with the humanitarians themselves. lj In most of these cases of

SHARPENING OUR PLO WSHARES 27

failure, a certain lack of proficiency on behalf of the aid givers often lies at
or near the center of these problems. As argued by Peter Hoffman and
Thomas Weiss,

for too long humanitarians have talked about becoming more professional but have
been unwilling to accept the discipline and costs that necessarily would accompany such
changes. Far too much [stabilization and development] work is still driven by anecdote
and angst, not evidence and strategy. Although humanitarians will undoubtedly bristle
at the comparison , professional militaries—unlike professional humanitarians—have a cul¬
ture that values learning ; and they invest substantial sums in the institutional infrastructure
to assemble and act on lessons. Military academies epitomize how this works; previous and
ongoing operations are analyzed, new procedures are tried and tested, and student sol¬
diers are educated about best practices and adapting tactics to field specifics . 14 (em¬
phasis added)

This article follows on a small but growing literature that seeks to take
up Hoffman and Weiss’s challenge: to begin to lay the intellectual founda¬
tion for a better “human-capital infrastructure” for proactive civilian, NGO,
and IGO development, peacekeeping, peace building, and stabilization. 15
Given the increasing stabilization and peace consolidation role undertaken
by American combatant commands, these lessons may be equally applied to
militaries fighting the wars of the new century.

Beyond emphasizing the process of “learning” writ large, we might
further mine military doctrine and practice to conceptualize how aid givers
can confront an amorphous enemy as well as incapacitated host-country
clients and partners in conditions of great strategic and tactical ambiguity.
In fact the US Army has confronted similar problems (and opportunities)
in a counterinsurgency (COIN) environment in Iraq and Afghanistan for
the past several years—experiences and lessons learned now codified in
Army Field Manual 3-24 / Marine Corps Warfighting Publication 3-33.5,
Counterinsurgency (FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5). 16 This article thus takes a
novel approach to aid giving, whether by civilians or their military counter¬
parts, by explicitly considering the parallels between COIN and civilian-
and military-led stability operations—and the lessons that the former
might take from the latter.

One must appreciate that asking humanitarians to draw lessons from
their military opposites will prove controversial, a point addressed below.
Consequently, one must note at the onset that this article does not advocate
the militarization of aid or aid givers—an ongoing strategic concern for

28 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

many members of the aid community. 17 Rather, it seeks to encourage aid
givers to draw upon those military lessons learned when—and to the extent
to which—they assist humanitarians and development specialists in most
effectively and efficiently dispensing with the tactical and operational aspects
of their important work.

Toward that end, the article first considers why humanitarian and
stabilization efforts are so central to America’s and the developed world’s
foreign policies that they merit our considering a “war” against instability. It
then addresses the challenges of foreign development and humanitarian aid
as well as the poor record of success that they have experienced thus far.
Next, it turns to developing a COIN-inspired strategy for development
assistance and stabilization operations, explicitly drawing, again, on FM
3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 in doing so. The article concludes by considering the
lessons that we thus might learn and avenues for future research and practice.

A New Kind ofWar:Why Development,Why Now?

We have fought wars against drugs, poverty, cancer, and terror. In those
actions, in which military force remained secondary to social, financial, in¬
formational, and diplomatic instruments, the term war conveyed the gravity
of the challenge and the totality of power and resources employed in the
pursuit of victory. 18 The war metaphor unintentionally illuminates one ad¬
ditional aspect of these contests—they can be lost. Indeed, the history of
warfare instructs us that even great powers’ efforts may falter when employed
without a comprehensive strategy for victory. The war metaphor serves as a
reminder that wars are won (and lost) not only by the quantity and quality
of the forces deployed but also by the skill with which they are employed.

Although America’s military and civilian leadership has principally
directed its attention to the prosecution of the two kinetic wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan, as those conflicts wind down, forward-thinking leaders have
begun to consider a new, metaphorical war that entails shaping the global¬
ized environment in ways that will avoid future shooting wars before they
start. 19 This strategy is predicated on the idea that preempting and avoiding
prospective crises will prove less costly than resolving them by force of arms
or dint of diplomacy after they have become manifest.

The principal axes of conflict in this new war on global instability are
the fronts of economic and social development, democratization, and the

SHARPENING OUR PLO WSHARES 29

development of civil society. Development strategy has been informed by
the belief that poverty and the disintegration of traditional social, cultural,
and familial networks are real and daunting adversaries. A dawning con¬
sensus among students of development aid, however, holds that some of the
greatest impediments to the delivery of humanitarian aid, stability, and
long-term peace often reside in the very governments of the recipient coun¬
tries themselves. 20

Although partner governments’ failings often concern an inability to
perform their obligations to their constituents, such weakness enables others
to undermine the peace or legitimacy of those governments, even without
the commission of violent or disruptive acts. Rather, corruption, simple in¬
competence, or a lack of administrative capacity proves that, like a cancer,
an “enemy” need not be malicious to be malignant. Against such a foe, we
must bring to bear new and unconventional tools with which to fight an
unconventional war—one in which effective local partnerships, proactive
diplomacy, and, most importantly, capacity building stand in for ever-greater
aid budgets, larger peacekeeping forces, or more military advisers.

Development and Humanitarian Aid Thus Far: Promises Unfulfilled

The United States, other wealthy nations, IGOs, and private actors like
NGOs and “superempowered” individuals such as Bill and Melinda Gates
have long sought to redress the extreme poverty and other depredations
believed to contribute to instability in the developing world. 21 Unfortu¬
nately, in spite of this commitment to development and relief, the record for
economic assistance has been disappointing. A number of empirical studies
have shown that higher gross quantities of aid have failed to improve the
performance of recipient countries. 22 As David Rieff notes, “bureaucratic
ineptitude, poor planning, paternalism, financial mismanagement, a lack of
any system of accountability, and a smug, self-regarding, and self-perpetuating
culture [have] . . . become the hallmarks of the development enterprise in
the poor world.” 23

Yet, even though greater quantities of aid giving may not be a panacea,
a better quality of aid, given to well-governed countries or capable and
robust local development organizations, may improve the prospects for
economic development and humanitarian relief. 24 One humanitarian aid
giver, for instance, has advocated an overtly “social or political contract

30 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

dedicated to famine prevention [that] constitutes an attempt to infuse
social and economic rights into civil liberties,” an approach to aid that
stresses the bond between a competent and democratic government and
those it seeks to represent. 25

These insights have directed more attention to the importance of the
quality of the recipient (and donor) governments as opposed to ever-larger
aid budgets or ambitious humanitarianism. 26 Governments and international-
development NGOs have articulated an increased willingness to shape
their aid policies to better reflect more efficient and safer practice as well as
the recipient countries’ actual needs (even if, unfortunately, donors’ practice
has often lagged their public commitments). 27 Furthermore, as shown by
the charter of the US Millennium Challenge Corporation, for example,
donors too are showing a parallel interest in partnering with well-run and
well-governed recipients. 28 This new political perspective is consistent
with (some) members of the NGO community who have, in effect, argued
that “there are no humanitarian [or development] solutions to humani¬
tarian problems.” 29

Two Communities, Common Lessons

The development community has not been alone in learning the very
costly lesson about the importance of effective local partnerships to stabili¬
zation and development. Since 2006 the US military has also experienced a
sea change in its operational and tactical doctrine: the foundation of the
Army’s COIN doctrine, applied with success in Iraq in 2007, and the more
recent “surge” in Afghanistan both emphasize the central importance of
setting up and working with effective local partners.

Indeed, the importance of local politics and partners has as yet failed
to fully gain purchase with the development community, but military “buy-in”
for the new COIN strategies has proved significant—particularly given the
difficulty of reorienting large bureaucracies like the US Department of
Defense and the military services. 30 Perhaps this has proceeded from the
modern American military’s demonstrated willingness to institutionalize
lessons-learned processes.

SHARPENING OUR PLOWSHARES 31

Lessons of Domestic Partnerships from Army Counterinsurgency

It is true that COIN operations in the distant past may have relied on
overwhelming force and civilian reprisals, perhaps best exemplified by the
British Army’s long and difficult—but ultimately successful—campaign in
South Africa during the Boer War. However, in the 24-hour news cycle,
one of the lessons that one must take from more recent COIN operations
is that even though outside powers cannot ultimately win such operations
(without Boer-like civilian depredations), they can establish and support
local partners and proxies that will. As noted in a perceptive paper by Nori
Katagiri, the “gold standard” of COIN operations to date—Great Britain’s
successful suppression of the communist insurgency during the Malayan
Emergency (1948-60)—held a hidden cost. That is, although the British
“won” the war, they did so only after they established a credible local
Malaysian government partner domestically strong enough that, after the
emergency had passed, the Malaysians successfully wrested control of the
country from their former colonial masters. 31

Although the United States did not hold similar colonial aspirations in
Iraq, it is notable that in spite of its great material advantages, America’s
COIN strategy and surge bore fruit only after it produced a reasonably
competent set of local partners and only after they had become sufficiently
committed to denying safe haven to and, ultimately, defeating the insur¬
gency. Without the Sunni Awakening and that population’s direct action
against al-Qaeda and the maturation of Iraqi governance from the nahiya
(city), to province, to national level, the surge may have failed. It is a most
significant but often overlooked fact that the Mahdi army and Shiite mili¬
tias were cleared from Basra and other southern strongholds by the Iraqi
army, as ordered by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki—not by the more
materially capable US armed forces.

Lessons Learned: FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency

One finds many of these lessons on successful COIN, civil-military, and
military/host-nation (HN) partnerships codified in FM 3-24/M CWP 3-33.5.
Many of the lessons learned by Gen David Petraeus and the other authors
of this document should have great resonance with the humanitarian and
development communities. By drawing upon FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5
and the collective lessons of Army and Marine units, NGOs, IGOs, and

32 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

national organizations (civilian and military) will be better able to realize
their worthy goals and to develop, shape, and stabilize heretofore restive
developing regions. The following examines and expands upon a number of
such lessons.

Of necessity, stabilization efforts must stress “unity of effort” and
interagency operations. Many organizations involved in the development
and distribution of aid—particularly humanitarian NGOs—are inimical to
working with governmental organizations generally and the military in
particular, for several reasons. 32 On the one hand, humanitarian organiza¬
tions assert that associating with ongoing military organizations reduces
their perceived neutrality in these conflicts, thus increasing the likelihood
that combatants will target them, which reduces their capacity to reach
people who need assistance. For example, one of the most outspokenly in¬
dependent humanitarian organizations—Doctors without Borders / Medecins
Sans Frontieres—has argued that “the US government’s strategy of com¬
bining relief and military operations increased the vulnerability of humani¬
tarian aid workers, whose work was perceived as a component of the mili¬
tary effort,” while the director of CARE “deplores the increasing trend . . .
to ‘use and co-opt humanitarian assistance as an integral part of warfighting.’” 33

On the other hand, the military has had less of a problem with the
“nexus” between military adventurism and humanitarianism. FM 3-24/
MCWP 3-33.5 stresses that

NGOs often play an important role at the local level. Many such agencies resist being
overtly involved with military forces; however, efforts to establish some kind of liaison
are needed. The most important connections are those with joint, interagency, multi¬
national, and [HN] organizations. The goal of these connections is to ensure that, as
much as possible, objectives are shared and actions and messages synchronized.
Achieving this synergy is essential.

Almost everything in COIN is interagency. Everything from policing to intelligence
to civil-military operations ... to trash collection involves working with interagency
and host-nation ... partners. These agencies are not under military control, but their
success is essential to accomplishing the mission . 34

The US government’s perspective is echoed in a recent study on the
intersection of humanitarianism and military operations: “Neutrality is an
ideal, not a reality. When aid workers operate in close proximity to Western
military forces, all sides will inevitably view the aid workers as political
actors.” 45 Similarly, a recent World Bank study urges us to “use a conflict

SHARPENING OUR PLO WSHARES 33

lens” since “all choices in governance affect power relationships.” 36 Each
case underscores an appreciation for the necessity of whole-of-government
and whole-o£-nation approaches, as reflected in National Security Presi¬
dential Directive 44 and more recent US government documents.

This stands in stark contrast to the perspectives of aid givers—particularly
NGOs, which are quick to reassert their independence and impartiality, in
keeping with the principles of humanitarianism. 37 Yet, as long as certain
subject populations remain of interest to US government organs, as well as
humanitarian and development NGOs, this overlap is inevitable. Thus, al¬
though arguing in favor of a perfectly neutral “humanitarian space” and a
purity of purpose may suit the NGOs’ and development agencies’ desire to
emphasize the “intrinsic worth” and “dignity” of those they serve, it is
unrealistic in practice. In fact, developing frontiers remain dangerous places
for aid workers, no matter their neutrality or provenance. 38 Idealism dictates
further separation from entangling military operations, but events on the
ground argue in favor of greater cooperation and integration between the
two. 39 As argued by Sarah Lischer, development cannot stand in for security;
rather, security, which militaries and nation-states have a comparative advan¬
tage in providing, is essential for development to succeed. 40 This element of
security, as outlined in FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 and as practiced in Iraq and
Afghanistan, is the first element necessary for the successful prosecution of
COIN and the resulting opportunities for sustained development.

On the one hand, as long as developmental and humanitarian organi¬
zations wish to fulfill their mission of bringing assistance and development
to those in need, they will be best served by working with governments,
professionalizing and recognizing the inevitability of military interaction.
Indeed, whether they approve or not, this has been an ongoing process
within the humanitarian field for the past decade. 41 On the other hand,
military and government organizations must become more fully aware of
the additional stresses and dangers that the “securitization” of humanitarian
and development relief brings to those who have long operated in this field.
FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 recognizes these realities, asserting that

there is no such thing as impartial humanitarian assistance. . .. Whenever someone is
helped, someone else is hurt, not least the insurgents. So civil and humanitarian assis¬
tance personnel often become targets. Protecting them is a matter not only of providing
a close-in defense, but also of creating a secure environment by co-opting local benefi¬
ciaries of aid and their leaders . 42

34 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

Do more than deliver (security or humanitarian) goods: Build capacity.

It is crucial that providers of development assistance not become overly
concerned with the narrow, technical aspects of aid (although technical com¬
petence, clearly, is also important). 43 FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 argues that
a stabilization “effort cannot achieve lasting success without the HN govern¬
ment achieving legitimacy. . .. [Therefore,] the primary objective of any . ..
[stabilization/development] operation is to foster development of effective
governance by a legitimate government.... [International custodians must]
achieve this objective by the balanced application of both military and non¬
military means.” 44

Indeed, in the end, host government capacity , rather than the availability of
large quantities of aid material, is crucial for long-term stability and develop¬
ment. Thus, although substantial aid budgets are surely important for win¬
ning wars against underdevelopment, just as adequate surge forces are for
winning COINs, neither is as important as the means by which they are
employed. Flooding aid into recipient countries without proper consider¬
ation of the ends it should achieve is the development equivalent of the
military’s previous unhealthy focus on body counts and destruction of the
enemy’s force during COIN operations. 45

To this end, attempting to do too much can impede HN capacity build¬
ing. This can take place in a number of ways. The aid literature, for example,
has argued that in their rush to acquire high-quality local workers, aid organi¬
zations have often “bought up” the best local talent for their own field offices
at wages against which local institutions cannot compete. In so doing, these
organizations leave the HN government with a shallow talent pool with
which to undertake the very difficult task of building up its own operations—
often from scratch.

Beyond personnel issues, another problem outlined in FM 3-24/
MCWP 3-33.5 deals with the conduct of operations that may be of con¬
cern to aid givers. It maintains that in order for development and stabiliza¬
tion efforts to not just succeed but take hold for the long term,

the host nation has to win on its own... . U.S. forces and agencies can help, but HN
elements must accept responsibilities to achieve real victory. While it maybe easier for
U.S. military units to conduct operations themselves, it is better to work to strengthen
local forces and institutions and then assist them....

SHARPENING OUR PLO WSHARES 35

. . . T. E. Lawrence [observed] while leading the Arab Revolt against the Ottoman
Empire in 1917: “Do not try to do too much with your own hands. Better the Arabs
do it tolerably than that you do it perfectly.” 46

FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 notes, however, that building capacity is not the
same thing as having a capacity built. Until a genuine HN capacity exists, a
premature turnover of responsibility in the name of forging that capacity
may prove highly counterproductive. The manual thus continues by arguing
that “a keyword in Lawrence’s advice is ‘tolerably.’If the host nation cannot
perform tolerably, counterinsurgents supporting it may have to act. Experi¬
ence, knowledge of the AO [area of operations], and cultural sensitivity are
essential to deciding when such action is necessary.” 47

As noted above, it is therefore crucial for custodians (governmental,
military, IGO, and NGO alike) to remember that it is not enough to simply
ensure that local institutions have the competent talent necessary to “win
on their own”—they must have the opportunity to do so. Again, though,
this occurs only after prior institution building by foreign partners has
facilitated their success.

A focus on institutions. Relatedly, FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 argues
in favor of standing up and building capacity in the institutions having the
potential for lasting stability and development: “U.S. forces committed to ...
[development and stabilization] effort[s] are there to assist an HN govern¬
ment. The long-term goal is to leave a government able to stand by itself.”
To that end, “Soldiers and Marines help establish HN institutions that
sustain ... [a] legal regime, including police forces, court systems, and penal
facilities.” 48 In a separate article on COIN operations, General Petraeus
emphasizes this point, writing that custodians must ultimately “help to
build institutions, not just units.” 49

Likewise, one can best realize development goals with a similar com¬
mitment to institution building. Too often, humanitarian and development
organizations see the giving of aid or the individual project upon which
they are working as the end toward which their efforts draw. In so doing,
they fail to appreciate the fundamentally social and political aspects of
successful aid and development strategies. 50 Worse, a desire for expediency—
getting things done with the easiest partners at hand rather than the best —
can have counterproductive effects if it ultimately undermines critical HN
institutions. Although ad hoc and informal partners can sometimes be

36 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

effective, as was the case with the Sons of Iraq / Sunni militias in Iraq, one
must be particularly cautious when allying with such actors. Thus, some
argue that “helping to build the capacity of the informal/non-state gover¬
nance institutions to complement formal/state functions” can be an effec¬
tive shortcut when state institutions are incapacitated, corrupt, or nonex¬
istent. 51 However, one must take care not to undermine nascent national
institutions and should act only with considerable understanding of the
local context.

Fortunately, interest in capacity building has increased, at least in the
military and security dimensions. 52 One hopes that civilian and civil society
programs will follow this good example. Perhaps the largely successful de¬
mocratization programs undertaken in Eastern Europe after the end of the
Cold War might prove a further, helpful template for these sorts of pro¬
grams. Ultimately, military and civilian organizations alike will likely be
best served by making self-sustaining local organizational capacity a key
aspect of future aid efforts. In the end, a successful exit strategy for both aid
and COIN operations will depend upon the ability of these organizations
to succeed in building local institutions up to the point at which they can
stand on their own.

Attain buy-in from the HN and, most importantly, its people. Ac¬
cording to FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, “Killing insurgents—while necessary,
especially with respect to extremists—by itself cannot defeat an insur¬
gency. ” 5j Similarly, as noted by Clark Gibson, Krister Anderson, Elinor
Ostrom, and Sujai Shivakumar, the distribution of aid, while necessary, can¬
not catalyze development by itself. 54 In both cases, it is fundamentally im¬
portant that one build peace, stability, and development upon the solid
foundation of the local populace—and not on the efforts of foreign aid or
military personnel who, ultimately, will depart.

Buy-in has two aspects: the populace must support the operations of
custodians in the immediate term and then must grant legitimacy to the
HN s civil, legal, and security institutions over the long term. Unsurprisingly,
FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 considers how custodians might realize these
goals from a purely military perspective:

Gaining and retaining the initiative requires counterinsurgents to address the insur¬
gency’s causes through stability operations as well. This initially involves securing and
controlling the local populace and providing for essential services. As security im¬
proves, military resources contribute to supporting government reforms and recon-

SHARPENING OUR PLO WSHARES 37

struction projects. As counterinsurgents gain the initiative, offensive operations focus
on eliminating the insurgent cadre, while defensive operations focus on protecting the
populace and infrastructure from direct attacks. As counterinsurgents establish mili¬
tary ascendancy, stability operations expand across the area of operations (AO) and
eventually predominate. 55

Notwithstanding the focus on the martial aspect of security, such observa¬
tions still offer a useful guide for aid givers, particularly the comment that
“victory is achieved when the populace consents to the governments legitimacy
and stops actively and passively supporting” spoilers of any type that con¬
tinue to sow instability and pursue rent seeking for their own narrow ends. 56

This goal is consistent with the argument—prevalent in the aid and
stabilization literatures—that international actors must be accountable to
those they serve. 57 Yet, even when one undertakes to be held locally ac¬
countable, the assumption is that it represents “an opportunity to widen the
conversation about the politics, power, and ethics that define humanitarian
space.” 58 However, accountability has received far too little consideration to
the degree that one sees it as a vehicle for building the sort of local buy-in
that ultimately makes these programs self-sustaining and, if successful, be¬
stow valuable legitimacy on the HN government.

Again, the guidance from counterinsurgents, who explicitly seek to
empower local agents as part of their war-fighting and exit strategies,
might serve as a model for governmental aid givers in their own aid strate¬
gies. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 observes that

as the HN government increases its legitimacy, the populace begins to assist it more
actively. Eventually, the people marginalize and stigmatize insurgents [e.g., man-made
and circumstantial threats to peace, stability and development in the case of aid].. ..
However, victory is gained not when this isolation is achieved, but when the victory is
permanently maintained by and with the people’s active support. 59

To the extent that aid givers’ goals coincide with the counterinsurgents’ on
these points, these observations on success will serve them in good stead as
they seek to design more effective stabilization and development programs.

When developing these programs, both the counterinsurgent and the
aid giver want to shoot for the moon—to design, in the words of former
secretary of defense Gates, “exquisite” programs. 60 Although clearly desir¬
able, such programs are difficult to see through to success in the face of
donors’ limited resources. They are harder still for even more resource-
constrained local governments in desperate need of quick legitimacy-building

38 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

successes. Exquisiteness demands that ever more of the onus be put on
foreign custodians, forgetting T. E. Lawrence’s advice that it is better that
the locals “do it tolerably than that you do it perfectly”

Thus, when designing programs with local input , FM 3-24/MCWP
3-33.5 notes that custodians “do not try to crack the hardest nut first. . . .
Instead, start from secure areas and work gradually outwards. Extend influ¬
ence through the local people’s networks. Go with, not against, the grain of
the local populace.” 61 Army units in Iraq during the summer of 2003 had
significant early successes with their local Iraqi populations, often through
the simple repair of mechanical wells or irrigation pumps or canal-cleaning
projects, all of which had suffered through over a decade of sanctions fol¬
lowing Operation Desert Storm. Later, efforts during and after the Iraqi
surge of 2007 were more ambitiously tied to the improved efficiency and
effectiveness of Iraqi government institutions. For example, during 2007-8,
local farmers’ co-ops were nested in the Iraqi Ministry of Agriculture, and
medical efforts were synchronized with the Ministry of Health and usually
focused on inoculations.

Local knowledge is key. If counterinsurgents wish to battle guerilla
forces effectively, then they must have local knowledge—and of all that
knowledge to master, intelligence about the people, among whom both the
insurgent and counterinsurgent must move, remains the most fundamental.
Indeed, “cultural awareness is a force multiplier.... The people are, in many
respects, the decisive terrain, and we must study that terrain in the same
way that we have always studied the geographic terrain.” 62 Further, if the
aid giver wishes to promote stability safely and successfully or even distribute
triage humanitarian aid effectively, similar local knowledge is of the highest
possible importance. 63 With this simple but often overlooked reality in
mind, FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 maintains that “an effective counterinsur¬
gent force is a learning organization.” 64 General Petraeus writes that “my
own pen and notebook were always handy when soldiering in Iraq.” 65

The proximate objectives of COIN as well as development and stabili¬
zation programs are not the same, but their long-term goals are much in
parallel. It may thus be instructive for the aid giver to consider FM 3-24/
MCWP 3-33.5’s advice to the company commander (the effective equiva¬
lent of an NGO/IGO program manager): “Intelligence and operations are
always complementary, especially in COIN operations. COIN operations

SHARPENING OUR PLO WSHARES 39

are intelligence driven, and units often develop much of their own intelligence.
Commanders must organize their assets to do that. Each company may
require an intelligence section, including analysts and an individual desig¬
nated as the ‘S-2’ [intelligence officer].” 66

This local area knowledge, essential for both COIN s and aid programs’
success, can be as simple as talking with local civilians or as detailed as
conducting polling efforts in metropolitan areas. In either case, it can facili¬
tate early successes/victories for the Soldier or aid giver. For example, expe¬
rience from Afghanistan and Iraq has led US COIN forces to seek to avoid
the trap of dictating civil affairs projects to local groups—a trap that, unfor¬
tunately, affects Western militaries and aid workers alike. Coalition COIN
forces in Iraq found that their greatest successes came only after they sought
local Iraqis’ perspectives—such as asking them where children went to
school or what sort of medical care had been available in 2003, before the
invasion. This intelligence gave counterinsurgents a crucial benchmark to¬
ward which they could strive—as well as local insights into expectations
and how they might best be met. Only after having achieved preconflict
levels of development and stability did the COIN forces attempt further
development efforts, in accordance with local Iraqi priorities and in concert
with the Iraqi ministries’ efforts. 67

Although the last example comes from the perspective of the counter¬
insurgent, the extent to which it applies to the aid giver is clear. Indeed, as
noted by Oxfam’s Tony Vaux, “one of the main lessons from the 1980s ha[s]
been that Oxfam’s best emergency work transpired when it acted in a devel¬
opmental way, consulting local people and concentrating on the longer-
term issue of rehabilitation.” 68

One should also note that although local knowledge is important to the
individual operator, it is invaluable to the organization and to the projects/
operations it runs. Compiling a collective pool of this knowledge is almost
as essential as its initial collection. Indeed, FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 advises
that “it is unlikely the insurgency [aid program] will end during a troop’s
tour ... and the relieving unit will need as much knowledge as can be passed
to them.” 69 One of the benefits of corporate organizations—whether the
military, Department of State, IGOs or NGOs—is that they need not limit
their local knowledge to a particular individual. “Corporate knowledge,” a

40 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

reserve of lessons learned and best practices, is among the benefits of oper¬
ating large organizations.

Although members of the Department of State or NGO project managers
may have the luxury of longer tour lengths than Soldiers in a COIN theater,
their terms in-country are similarly time-constrained. Like their COIN
counterpart, they should realize that the benefits of corporate knowledge
are neither inevitable nor automatic and that they must begin getting ready
for their handover from day one. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 advises that
field units start

handover folders ... immediately upon arrival, if they are not available from the unit
being relieved ... [and that these] folders should include lessons learned, details about
the populace, village and patrol reports, updated maps, and photographs—anything
that will help newcomers master the environment.... Keeping this information cur¬
rent is boring, tedious work. But it is essential to both short- and long-term success. 70

Strategic communication is key. Ultimately, all aid organizations must
have access to the resources that allow them to carry out their mandates.
American governmental organizations like the Department of State and
USAID must maintain the support of Congress, which controls their purse
strings. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 points out that “gaining and maintaining
U.S. public support for a protracted deployment is critical. Only the most
senior military officers are involved in this process at all ... [because this] is
properly a political activity. However, military leaders typically take care to
ensure ... that the conduct of operations neither makes it harder for elected
leaders to maintain public support nor undermines public confidence.” 71

Moreover, aid givers must keep the support of their constituent and
donor countries. NGO fund raising is sometimes controversial; cynics
often claim that these organizations raise funds on behalf of the needy and
media-friendly for their own selfish purposes. 72 They too have no option
other than raising funds aggressively (whether from private parties and
foundations or, increasingly, governments) in order to continue their work
abroad. 73 In addition to currying favor with home-country and global
audiences, however, it is at least as important that aid givers manage their
message to the recipients of this aid. They must do so to create the buy-in
necessary for the success of their own programs as well as to enhance the
legitimacy of their HN and local partners—essential to the long-term
prospects for stability and development.

SHARPENING OUR PLO WSHARES 41

To appeal to these diverse audiences, one must master the information
environment. Unfortunately, it is often difficult to overcome biases against
Western intervention (although, clearly, the problems faced by the military
in this regard are significantly greater than those for civilian NGOs). As
noted by FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, which relays the experiences of a par¬
ticular unit in Iraq, “decades of Arab media mischaracterization of U.S. ac¬
tions had instilled distrust of American motives. The magnitude of that
cynicism and distrust highlighted the critical importance of using informa¬
tion operations to influence every situation.” 74

Just as these informational aspects of humanitarian and development
assistance as well as stabilization and capacity-building operations must
draw from and remain sensitive to local communities, so can they shape
those communities. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 notes that a highly beneficial
aspect of strategic communications, both for foreign custodians and the
local government institutions to which they will ultimately have to hand
off, involves managing expectations: “To limit discontent and build support,
the HN government and any counterinsurgents assisting it create and
maintain a realistic set of expectations among the populace, friendly mili¬
tary forces, and the international community.” 75 For example, the American
military’s humanitarian efforts in Iraq in 2003-4 often highlighted the sin¬
gular efforts of US units, but any ground-breaking or opening ceremonies
after 2007 have emphasized the importance and significance of Iraqi leader¬
ship and participation, reinforcing the sovereignty of the young government.

This is not to propose a manipulative or propagandistic campaign on
behalf of aid givers but to urge that they manage the message for their
activities. As their interactions and cooperation with state governments
and even militaries grow, this essential task likely will become increas¬
ingly important.

NGOs in particular have proved (controversially) adept at managing
their brand and image for the consumption of their donors at home, a les¬
son that the US military would do well to learn. Indeed, as noted by one
observer, “better branding and commercial skill bee[o]me essential for in¬
stitutional survival and renewal.... The parameters to brand recognition—
ethically acceptable partners and practices—are just as crucial for firms such
as Borders or Apple or Nike” as they are to aid organizations. 76 However,
strategic communications with the target government, institutions, and

42 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

people must be foremost in mind as this represents both a threat and an
opportunity for aid givers. Managing expectations, building buy-in by local
partners and people, and limiting push-back by local and foreign forces that
might seek to undermine development and stabilization operations make
this aspect of development assistance and humanitarian relief essential.
But in the end, actions (aid) speak louder than words or web pages to
local constituents.

Realize that, like counterinsurgency, development is for the long
term. State building is a long-term vocation that can cause at least two sorts
of problems for the aid giver. Firstly, it means that valuable individual and
corporate knowledge may be lost due to the passage of time. Additionally,
valuable forward momentum enjoyed by successful projects may disappear,
or prospectively successful projects will not live long enough to get a chance
to get off the ground.

For these reasons, FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 stresses the importance of
knowledge diffusion and long-term planning by headquarters echelons.
Secondly, individuals’ or organizations’ desire to realize “wins” during their
relatively short term of service in the field on a particular project may over¬
shadow longer-term goals sought by the organizations’leaders. This temporal
mismatch and the lack of persistence that underlies it infect both civilian
and military stabilization operations. We consider each of these problems
in turn.

The emphasis that the military places on passing on and diffusing cor¬
porate knowledge is driven, in part, by the high pace at which COIN op¬
erators rotate through their area of operations (the average length of a
combat tour in Iraq was 12-15 months for Army personnel and seven
months for Marines). In principle, personnel with the Department of State
and USAID are not limited by fixed rotations and tours, but in practice in
Iraq and Afghanistan, they have served tours similar in duration to those of
their Marine and Army counterparts—indeed, “hardship” assignments for
State employees (e.g., those in unstable countries are limited to about two
years). NGO personnel, however, can stay as long as necessary. That said,
given the length of both COIN and state-building operations—many last¬
ing decades—even the most persistent humanitarians may lose focus (either
their own or that of their donors). This is unfortunate because many pro-

SHARPENING OUR PLO WSHARES 43

grams may pay off if one manages expectations and makes preparations for
the long haul.

FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 again underscores duration and persistence
operations. Although the manual emphasizes COIN operations, its obser¬
vations once again offer great insights for aid-giving operations as well:

Insurgencies are protracted by nature. Thus, COIN operations always demand consider¬
able expenditures of time and resources.... People do not actively support a government
unless they are convinced that the counterinsurgents have the means, ability, stamina,

and will to win_U.S. support [and that of other foreign custodians] can be crucial to

building public faith in that government’s viability. The populace must have confidence
in the staying power of both the counterinsurgents and the HN government.... Constant
reaffirmations of commitment, backed by deeds, can overcome ... [suspicion] and bolster
faith in the steadfastness of U.S. support. But even the strongest U.S. commitment will not
succeed if the populace does not perceive the HN government as having similar will and
stamina. U.S. forces must help create that capacity and sustain that impression. 77

This process, which can take a substantial amount of time, must be planned
and budgeted at the onset of an operation, rather than after the aid-giving
agencies’ resources and/or will begins to flag under the unforeseen weight
of a long and ambitious deployment.

Operationally, FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5 carries this theme forward as
it advises detailers and budget planners to prepare

for a protracted COIN effort [which] requires establishing headquarters and support
structures designed for long-term operations. Planning and commitments should be
based on sustainable operating tempo and personnel tempo limits for the various
components of the force. . . . Even in situations where the U.S. goal is reducing its
military force levels as quickly as possible, some support for HN institutions usually
remains for a long time. 78

These observations on the importance of persistence strongly serve to under¬
score that aid givers and international custodians, like their military counter¬
parts, must be committed to their respective development and stabilization
programs for the long term. Although the triage function played by emer¬
gency operations does, in some special cases, dictate a certain benign myopia,
it remains important to recognize that addressing the fundamental political
problems which create these crises can take a very long time.

Individual aid-givers’ desire for tangible wins with which to burnish
their resume; lobby for more and future donations, contracts, and budgets;
and validate their self-sacrifice can have a deleterious effect on development
and stabilization projects—particularly those designed to last into the dis-

44 ASP]AFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

tant term. Unfortunately, these organizations and programs are often judged
by measures of performance such as tons of food delivered, wells dug, refu¬
gees housed, and the like—none of which address the less pressing but more
fundamental problems that are engaged by measures of effectiveness, such as
those that concern the building of self-sufficiency into recipient populations. 79

Conclusion

This article does not advocate making aid “go military”—indeed, it
advocates sharpening one’s plowshares rather than turning them back into
swords. Aid givers, whether from the nongovernmental, intergovernmental,
or military services, play a vital role in shaping a more equitable and stable
world—a role that the force of arms cannot play. That said, as argued above,
aid givers can learn certain lessons and draw upon a pool of experience from
those who conduct military actions—especially COIN operations.

This is particularly true when the lessons concern standing up and
working with local partners (e.g., capacity building) and when corporate
knowledge is at a premium. The author hopes that this article is a first step
in a process toward a useful cross-fertilization of lessons, ideas, and experi¬
ences between two groups that rarely speak but that, ironically, increasingly
face overlapping problems within each of their traditional areas of expertise
and operations. One hopes that as these groups gain more experience in the
difficult environments in which they function—and as the two communities
have more opportunities to work with and talk to one another while they
are there—there will be more opportunities for an exchange of ideas for best
practices, useful measures and metrics of success, and effective means by which
the aid giver and the war fighter can share the burden more efficiently.

Notes

1. On the proliferation of official aid, see Michael Barnett and Jack Snyder, “The Grand Strategies of
Humanitarianism,” in Flumanitarianism in Question: Politics, Power, Ethics, ed. Michael Barnett and Thomas
G. Weiss (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 2008), 143-71; Michael Barnett, “Humanitarianism Trans¬
formed,” Perspectives on Politics, December 2005, 723-40; Peter J. Schraeder, Steven W. Hook, and Bruce
Taylor, “Clarifying the Foreign Aid Puzzle: A Comparison of American, Japanese, French, and Swedish Aid
Flows,” World Politics, January 1998,294-323; and David H. Lumsdaine, Moral Vision in International Politics:
The Foreign Aid Regime, 1949-1989 (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993). On the grand strategy
of American aid, see, for example, US Department of State and the US Agency for International Develop¬
ment, Strategic Plan, Fiscal Years 2007—2012 (Washington, DC: Department of State, 7 May 2007), http://

SHARPENING OUR PLO WSHARES 45

www.state.gov/documents/organization/86291.pdf, which seeks to ensure “a more democratic, secure, and
prosperous world composed of well-governed states that respond to the needs of their people, reduce wide¬
spread poverty, and act responsibly within the international system” (9). In terms of intergovernmental orga¬
nizations’ commitment to aid, see the mission statement of the United Nations Development Programme,
which maintains that its broad and ambitious goals encompass “helping countries build and share solutions
to the challenges of: Poverty Reduction and Achievement of the [Millennium Development Goals], Demo¬
cratic Governance, Crisis Prevention and Recovery, [and] Environment and Energy for Sustainable Develop-
ment.”“A World of Development Experience,’’United Nations Development Programme, accessed 27 November
2012, http://www.undp.org/content/undp/en/home/operations/about_us.html.

2. George W. Bush, “National Security Presidential Directive / NSPD-44: Management of Interagency
Efforts Concerning Reconstruction and Stabilization” (Washington, DC: White House, 7 December 2005),
http://www.fas.org/irp/offdocs/nspd/nspd-44.pdf See also Department of Defense, Military Support to In¬
direct Security and Stability Surge Operations (MISSS): A Study (Washington, DC: Department of Defense,
October 2007), http://www.dtic.mil/futurejointwarfare/concepts/misss_study.pdf.

3. Robert M. Gates, “A Balanced Strategy: Reprogramming the Pentagon for a New Ag e.," Foreign Affairs
88, no. 1 (January/February 2009): 29-30.

4. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, “Foreign Policy Address at the Council on Foreign Relations,”
Washington, DC, 15 July 2009, http://www.state.gov/secretary/rm/2009a/july/126071.htm.

5. On American military efforts for political and developmental engagement, see Anthony Zinni and
Tom Clancy, “CENTCOM,” in Tom Clancy with Anthony Zinni and Tony Koltz, Battle Ready (New York:
G. P. Putnam’s Sons, 2004). See also US Africa Command, United States Africa Command2009 Posture State¬
ment (Stuttgart, Germany: US Africa Command Staff and US Africa Command Public Affairs Office,
March 2009), 4, http://www.africom.mil/pdfFiles/USAFRICOM2009PostureStatement.pdf

6. Thomas S. Szayna, Derek Eaton, and Amy Richardson, Preparing the Army for Stability Operations:
Doctrinal and Interagency Issues (Santa Monica, CA: RAND Corporation, 2007), 3ff, http://www.rand.org
/content/dam/rand/pubs/monographs/2007/RAND_MG646.pdf.

7. GEN James T. Conway, ADM Gary Roughead, and ADM Thad W. Allen, A Cooperative Strategy for
21st Century Seapower (Washington, DC: Office of the Chief of Naval Operations, Office of the Commandant
of the US Marine Corps, Office of the Commandant of the United States Coast Guard, October 2007),
http://www.navy.mil/maritime/Maritimestrategy.pdf.

8. James D. Fearon, “The Rise of Emergency Relief Aid,” in Barnett and Weiss, Humanitarianism in
Question, 67-68; and William Easterly, “Foreign Aid Goes Military!, "New York Review of Books, 4 December
2008, http://www.nybooks.com/articles/archives/2008/dec/04/foreign-aid-goes-military/?pagination=false.

9. “Our Mission,” World Vision, accessed 4 December 2009, http://www.worldvision.org/content.nsf
/about/our-mission?Open&lpos=lft_txt_Our-Mission.

10. Clark C. Gibson et al., 7he Samaritans Dilemma: The Political Economy of Development Aid (London:
Oxford University Press, 2005); and William Easterly, The Elusive Quest for Growth: Economists' Adventures
and Misadventures in the Tropics (Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 2001).

11. Within the context of official aid, multilateral aid is considered more effective—and less politicized—
than bilateral aid; there is still a great deal of uncertainty with respect to the relative effectiveness of NGOs
against government-to-government aid. On the virtues of multilateral aid, see Lumsdaine, Moral Vision in
International Politics.

12. See Michael Barnett and Thomas G. Weiss, “Humanitarianism: A Brief History of the Present,” in
Barnett and Weiss, Humanitarianism in Question, 1-48.

13. See, for example, Michael Barnett, Empire of Humanity: A History of Humanitarianism (Ithaca, NY:
Cornell University Press, 2011); and Sarah Kenyon Lischer, “Collateral Damage: Humanitarian Assistance
as a Cause of Conflict,” International Security 28, no. 1 (Summer 2003): 79-109.

14. Peter J. Hoffman and Thomas G. Weiss, “Humanitarianism and Practitioners: Social Science Matters,”
in Barnett and Weiss, Humanitarianism in Question, 285. Although the general argument is true, some pre¬
liminary efforts at comprehensive lessons learned have occurred within the aid community, particularly in

46 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

terms of humanitarian security. See, for example, the InterAction-Based Security Advisory Group and the
Minimum Operating Security Standards protocols promulgated by the United Nations Security Coordinator.

15. See the United States Institute for Peace, Guiding Principles for Stabilization and Reconstruction , ed.
Beth Cole and Emily Hsu (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2009). See also Mary
B. Anderson, Do No Harm: How Aid Can Support Peace—or War (Boulder, CO: Lynne-Rienner Publishers,
1999); and Alex de Waal, Famine Crimes: Politics & the Disaster Relief Industry in Africa (Oxford, UK, and
Bloomington, IN: James Currey and Indiana University Press, 1997).

16. Field Manual (FM) 3-24 / Marine Corps Warfighting Publication (MCWP) 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency,
December 2006, http://armypubs.army.mil/doctrine/DR_pubs/dr_a/pdf/fm3_24.pdf.

17. Nicolas de Torrente, “Humanitarian NGOs Must Not Ally with Military,” European Affairs, Spring/
Summer 2006, 2; Easterly, “Foreign Aid Goes Military!”; and Hugo Slim, “A Call to Arms: Humanitarian
Action and the Art of War,” Opinion, February 2004,1-17.

18. Some argue that the war metaphor is overused to the point that its significance has diminished. It can
be useful in the ways described here: as a marshaling of resources against a known objective or enemy. For the
opposed view, however, see Ralph Peters, “Wishful Thinking and Indecisive ^Ntecs’’ Journal of International
Security Affairs, no. 16 (Spring 2009), http://www.securityaffairs.org/issues/2009/16/peters.php.

19. See, for example, Cole and Hsu, Guiding Principles', The Growth Report: Strategies for Sustained Growth
and Inclusive Development (Washington, DC: World Bank on Behalf of the Commission on Growth and
Development, 2008); and Conway, Roughead, and Allen, Cooperative Strategy.

20. Sarah L. Henderson, “Selling Civil Society: Western Aid and the Nongovernmental Organization
Sector in Russia,” Comparative Political Studies 35, no. 2 (2002): 139-67; Steven Knack, “Aid Dependence
and Quality of Governance: A Cross-Country Empirical Analysis,” Southern Economic Journal, October
2001,310-29; Jakob Svensson, “Foreign Aid and Rent Seeking JJournal ofInternational Economics 51 (2000):
437-61; Craig Burnside and David Dollar, “Aid, the Incentive Regime, and Poverty Reduction,” Policy Re¬
search Working Paper no. WPS 1937 (Washington, DC: World Bank, 1998); Tarhan Feyzioglu, Vinaya
Swaroop, and Min Zhu, “A Panel Data Analysis of the Fungibility of Foreign Aid,” World Bank Economic
Review 12, no. 1 (1998): 29-58; and Michael Maren, The Road to Hell: The Ravaging Effects of Foreign Aid and
International Charity (New York: Free Press, 1997).

21. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) includes the world’s 30
richest countries, which collectively delivered about $12.5 billion in gross official, government-to-government
development assistance in 2008. Total gross overseas development assistance (ODA) from all countries
amounted to just under $120 billion in 2004. Total private aid distributed by NGOs came to about $4 billion
in 2004, discounting the activities of organizations such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. For data
on the OECD, see Development Co-operation Directorate, Gross Official Development Assistance 2008, ac¬
cessed 28 November 2012, http://www.oecd.org/dataoecd/47/55/42458670.pdf. For data for ODA and
private aid, see Fearon, “Rise of Emergency Relief Aid.” On the historical commitment to global wealth
distribution, see Lumsdaine, Moral Vision in International Politics. For an interesting discussion on the role of
the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation in development aid, see Barnett and Weiss, “Humanitarianism: A
Brief History,” 14.

22. See, for example, David Dollar and Paul Collier, Allocation and Poverty Reduction (Washington,
DC: World Bank, 1998); and Peter Boone, Politics and the Effectiveness of Foreign Aid, NBER Working Paper
no. 5308 (Cambridge, MA: National Bureau of Economic Research, October 1995), http://www.nber.org
/papers/w5308 .pdf ?new_windo w= 1.

23. David Rieff, A Bedfor the Night: Humanitarianism in Crisis (New York: Simon & Schuster, 2002), 102.

24. Craig Burnside and David Dollar, “Aid, Policies, and Growth,” American Economic Review, September
2000, 847-68; and Jakob Svensson, “Aid, Growth, and Democracy,” Economics and Politics, November 1999,
275-97. See, however, Boone, Effectiveness of Foreign Aid', and William Easterly, Ross Levine, and David
Roodman, “Aid, Policies, and Growth: Comment, "American Economic Review, June 2004, 774-80.

SHARPENING OUR PLO WSHARES 47

25. De Waal, Famine Crimes, 11. De Waal differs in his perspective from more mainstream analysts who
advocate political solutions to aid problems, arguing that “a ‘right’ [not to starve] ... is less real than one that
is won through popular struggle” (ibid., 44).

26. For better targeted development aid, see Cole and Hsu, Guiding Principles', and Growth Report. On
the promise and pitfalls of remote management for humanitarian operations, see Abby Stoddard, Adele
Harmer, and Katherine Haver, Providing Aid in Insecure Environments: Trends in Policy and Operations, Hu¬
manitarian Policy Group Report 23 (London: Humanitarian Policy Group, Overseas Development Institute,
2006), http://www.odi.org.uk/sites/odi.org.uk/files/odi-assets/publications-opinion-files/269.pdf.

27. See, for example, Sphere Project, Humanitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Disaster Response
(Geneva, Switzerland: Sphere Project, 2004), 18, http://ocw.jhsph.edu/courses/refugeehealthcare/PDFs
/SphereProjectHandbook.pdf.

28. “Selection Indicators,” Millennium Challenge Corporation, accessed 28 November 2012, http://
www.mcc.gov/pages/selection/indicators.

29. Sadako Ogata, The Turbulent Decade: Confronting the Refugee Crises of the 1990s (New York: W. W.
Norton, 2005), 25.

30. Alex de Waal admonishes that “the humanitarian international appears to have an extraordinary capacity
to absorb criticism, not reform itself, and yet emerge strengthened.” De Waal, Famine Crimes, xvi. See also
Barry Posen, The Sources of Military Doctrine: France, Britain, and Germany between the World Wars (Ithaca,
NY: Cornell University Press, 1984); Stephen Van Evera, “The Cult of the Offensive and the Origins of the
First World War,” International Security, Summer 1984, 58-107; and Jack Snyder, “Civil-Military Relations
and the Cult of the Offensive, 1914 and 1984,” International Security, Summer 1984,108-46.

31. Nori Katagiri, “Winning Hearts and Minds to Lose Control: Exploring Various Consequences of
Popular Support in Counterinsurgency Missions,” Small Wars & Insurgencies 22,no. 1 (March 2011): 170-95.

32. See, for example, Easterly, “Foreign Aid Goes Military!”; Jeffrey Sachs, The End of Poverty (New York:
Penguin Press, 2005); and de Torrente, “Humanitarian NGOs.”

33. “MSF in Afghanistan,” Doctors without Borders / Medecins Sans Frontieres, 2012, http://doctor
swithoutborders.org/events/exhibits/thephotographer/msf-afghanistan.cfm; and Sarah Kenyon Lischer, “Mili¬
tary Intervention and the Humanitarian ‘Force Multiplier,”’ Global Governance: A Review of Multilateralism
and International Organizations 13, no. 1 (January-March 2007): 100.

34. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, 1-22, A-2.

35. Overseas Development Institute, quoted in Lischer, “Military Intervention,” 99.

36. Growth Report, 101.

37. The principles of humanitarianism, as articulated by the International Committee of the Red Cross,
are humanity, impartiality, neutrality, independence, voluntary service, unity, and universality. See Barnett and
Weiss, “Humanitarianism: A Brief History,” 3.

38. Stoddard, Harmer, and Haver {Providing Aid in Insecure Environments, llff) show a sharp and secular
increase in attacks against aid workers with incidents increasing by a factor of 10 from 1997 to 2005. Al¬
though on a per capita basis, the increase has been far less severe (as the number of aid personnel in the field
has also grown significantly during that period), NGO workers and other civilians have borne a larger share
of these attacks.

39. On the existential dangers to aid workers in marginal areas of responsibility, see Laura Hammond,
“The Power of Holding Humanitarianism Hostage and the Myth of Protective Principles,” in Barnett and
Weiss, Humanitarianism in Question, 172-95.

40. Lischer, “Military Intervention,” 99.

41. Barnett and Weiss, “Humanitarianism: A Brief History.”

42. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, A-7. Further, we urge the interested reader to closely
read Stoddard, Harmer, and Haver, ProvidingAid in Insecure Environments, for a thoroughgoing review of the
past and present efforts undertaken by aid givers to see to their own protection in unstable environments as
well as the compromises and difficulties that these strategies have inevitably entailed.

43. See de Waal, Famine Crimes.

48 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

44. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, 1-22,1-21.

45. Ibid., A-8; and Lewis < c>or\ey,A Better War: The Unexamined Victories and Final Tragedy of America’s
Last Years in Vietnam (Boston: Mariner Books, 2007). On the dangers of too much aid, see Thomas W.
Dichter, Despite Good Intentions: Why Development Assistance to the Third World Has Failed (Amherst: University
of Massachusetts Press, 2003); Maren, Road to Hell, and Bruce Wallace, “The Trouble with Aid,” Macleans, 16
December 1996,34-37.

46. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, 1-26,1-28.

47. Ibid., 1-28.

48. Ibid., 1-26,1-24.

49. Lt Gen David H. Petraeus, “Learning Counterinsurgency: Observations from Soldiering in Iraq,”
Military Review, January-February 2006, 50, http://usacac.army.mil/CAC2/MilitaryReview/Archives/English
/MilitaryRe vie w_2006C R103 l_art010. pdf.

50. See de Waal, Famine Crimes, 4; and Gibson et al., Samaritan’s Dilemma, 14.

51. Growth Report, 99.

52. For example, in military-to-military exchanges in US Africa Command’s area of responsibility and in
successful counterdrug programs, such as Plan Colombia.

53. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, 1-3.

54. Gibson et al., Samaritans Dilemma, 4.

55. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, 1-3.

56. Ibid. On “spoilers,” see Steven J. Stedman, “Spoiler Problems in the Peace Process,’’International
Security, Spring 1997, 5-53; and Kelly Greenhill and Solomon Major, “The Perils of Profiling: Civil War
Spoilers and the Collapse of Intrastate Peace Accords,” International Security, Winter 2006/2007, 7-40.

57. Janice Gross Stein, “Humanitarian Organizations: Accountable—Why, to Whom, for What, and
How?,” in Barnett and Weiss, Humanitarianism in Question, 124-42; Sphere Project, The Sphere Project: Hu¬
manitarian Charter and Minimum Standards in Disaster Response, Growth Report, Devesh Kapur, “The IMF:
A Cure or a Curse?,” Foreign Policy, Summer 1998,114-29; Zanny Minton-Beddoes, “Why the IMF Needs
Reform,” Foreign Affairs, May/June 1995, 123-33; Strom C. Thacker, “The High Politics of IMF Lending,”
World Politics, October 1999, 38-75; and Michael Ziirn, “Global Governance and Legitimacy Problems,”
Government and Opposition, March 2004, 260-87. Note, however, that even when aid givers seek to make
their projects more closely related to the concerns of the locals whom they wish to help, in practice their ef¬
forts on the ground have fallen short. Barnett and Weiss note that “most relief agencies now sheepishly
confess that they have largely proceeded without much input from those who are supposed to benefit from
their concern.” Barnett and Weiss, “Humanitarianism: A Brief History,” 47.

58. Stein, “Humanitarian Organizations,” 142.

59. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, 1-23.

60. Jim Garamone, “Gates Says People Take Top Priority in Budget Decisions,” US Army, 7 April 2009,
http://www.army.mil/-news/2009/04/07/19334-gates-says-people-take-top-priority-in-budget-decisions/.

61. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, A-5. As with the Sons of Iraq case mentioned above,
this might have been a case in which the gamble to work with unofficial partners would have proved worth¬
while. Though of equal importance, after 2007 multinational efforts were aggressively pushed through official
Iraqi government institutions.

62. Petraeus, “Learning Counterinsurgency,” 51. See also the US Army’s Human Terrain System Project,
catalyzed by much the same appreciation for the decisive impact of the populace in a COIN environment.

63. Stoddard et al., Providing Aid in Insecure Environments, 38-39.

64. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, 1-26.

65. Petraeus, “Learning Counterinsurgency,” 45.

66. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, A-2.

67. These accounts draw extensively on the experience of COL R. J. Lillibridge, who has had experience
in commanding COIN forces at both the company and battalion levels in the Iraq and Afghan theaters.

SHARPENING OUR PLO WSHARES 49

68. Tony Vaux, The Selfish Altruist: Relief Work in Famine and War (London: Earthscan Publications,
2001), 148.

69. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, A-8.

70. Ibid.

71. Ibid., 1-24.

72. See, for example, Maren, Road to Hell\ Margaret E. Keck and Kathryn Activists beyond Borders:

Advocacy Networks in International Politics (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1998), 2; Robyn Eversole,
ed., Here to Help: NGOs Combating Poverty in Latin America ( Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2003); and Graham
Hancock, Lords of Poverty: The Power, Prestige, and Corruption of the International Aid Business (New York:
Atlantic Monthly Press, 1989), 15ff.

73. Fearon, “Rise of Emergency Relief Aid,’’ 68. Blithe, Major, and Souza note that the goals of self¬
funding and altruism are not necessarily at odds, given that no overseas operations would be possible at all
without first meeting administrative costs. The degree to which administration should claim a share of the
organization’s budget remains a topic of hot debate, however. See Tim Blithe, Solomon Major, and Andre de
Mello e Souza, “The Politics of Private Development Aid” (paper presented at the Second Annual Meeting
of the International Political Economy Society, Stanford, CA, 9 November 2007), 2.

74. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, 4-8.

75. Ibid., 1-24.

76. Stephen Hopgood, “Saying ‘No’ to Wal-Mart?,” in Barnett and Weiss, Humanitarianism in Question,
106,107.

77. FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, Counterinsurgency, 1-24.

78. Ibid.

79. Stein, “Humanitarian Organizations,” 124-42

Human Security as Analytical
Contexts of Humanitarian
Intervention in Application and
Practice

War for Justice, War for State, or War for People

Yu-tai Ts’ai, PhD*

Szu-Hsien Lee

D uring the twentieth century, 35 million people died in all civil
and international wars, but 150 million were killed by their own
governments. 1 After 1945, inspired by the tragedy of the Holo¬
caust, international society greatly expanded its rules on human
rights, and the United Nations (UN) codified an increasing number of
norms on international society However, millions still perished at the hands
of their own governments, and actions taken to halt atrocities proved incon¬
sistent. In fact, in the late twentieth century, the emergence of international
humanitarian intervention reflected a new value in international society.
The traditional key criteria—including just cause, right authority, last resort,
and proportional means—have been challenged by both proponents and
opponents of intervention. 2

*Dr. Yu-tai Ts’ai is an associate professor at the Institute of Strategic and International Affairs, National
Chung Cheng University, Taiwan, where he teaches international relations and security studies to graduate
students. He has published several journal articles and books on human security, security studies, and the
theory of international relations. His current research focuses on human security, nontraditional security, and
international law. A Young Fellow at the Office of the President (Taiwan) in 2003 and a project assistant at
the Office of the President (Taiwan) in 2004-5, Prof. Yu-tai Ts’ai earned his PhD in 2008 from the Depart¬
ment of Diplomacy at National Cheng Chi University (Taiwan). In 2010 he received the Study of the United
States Institutes fellowship on US foreign policy from the US State Department and served as a visiting
professor in the Department of Political Science, University of Florida.

Szu-Hsien Lee is a PhD candidate in the Department of Diplomacy, National Cheng Chi University,
Taiwan. She has published several journal articles and book reviews on China studies, security studies, and
the theory of international relations. Her current research addresses Sino-US relations, relations between the
People’s Republic of China (PRC) and Taiwan, and foreign policy of the PRC.

HUMAN SECURITY AS ANALYTICAL CONTEXTS 51

The North Atlantic Treaty Organizations (NATO) intervention in
Kosovo in 1999 brought the controversy to its boiling point. 3 Humanitarian
intervention would not be considered a violation of the principle of noninter¬
vention but an act directed towards upholding the nonintervention norm of
civil society, which protects the freedom of individuals. Indeed, the contem¬
porary controversy surrounding humanitarian intervention (i.e., the question
of when the use of force is right or just) has become one of the more frequent,
divisive, and heated discussions in international relations. 4

To address this debate, the report of the International Commission on
Intervention and State Sovereignty, the latter formed in response to Kofi
Annans question of when the international community must intervene for
purposes of human protection, introduced the term responsibility to protect
(R2P) in December 2001. 5 R2P stresses that states have the primary obliga¬
tion to protect their populations. Further, it emphasizes the responsibility of
the international community to take timely, decisive action to prevent and
halt genocide, ethnic cleansing, war crimes, and crimes against humanity
when a state manifestly fails to protect its population. 6 Humanitarian inter¬
vention as advocated by R2P, however, has rightly threatened the traditional
rights of sovereigns. A conflict exists between R2P and other norms in the
institution of sovereignty, such as noninterference and sovereign equality. 7

Therefore, this article discusses the normative status of the concept of
human security in international law, examining R2P against the backdrop
of a wider discourse about the transformation of sovereignty, norms, and
the legality of using force. It explains that R2P has become an accepted
norm constitutive of the institution of sovereignty. To demonstrate the
justifiability of regarding R2P as an emerging norm of international law,
the article also examines whether one can regard the concept of human
security as analytical contexts of humanitarian intervention in application
and practice: war for justice, war for state, or war for people.

Human Security and International Law

The end of the Cold War and the accelerating pace of globalization
have given rise to fundamental changes in many of the paradigms employed
in the social sciences. Among the various new ideas that have emerged,
human security has become something of a buzzword. 8 In the mid-1990s,
the concept of human security began to visibly influence and challenge

52 ASP]AFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

global politics, institutions, and governance. 9 Security threats and the security
environment in this post-Cold War period of globalization and technological
advance have clearly changed. 10

Obviously, the current approach is quite flawed, reflecting the inade¬
quacy of traditional research tools employed in the field of international
relations in the post-Cold War era. The belief that power remains the sole
determinant of national interests, preferences, and actions is no longer a
tenable approach to international politics. 11 Therefore, unlike current poli¬
cies that emphasize the means of control, the human security approach
concentrates on the safety and protection of individuals and communities,
in addition to the traditional security concerns of the state. A comprehen¬
sive human security strategy would have to address competition over natural
resources and improve the capacity of communities and governments to
address the root causes of poverty and economic disparity by investing in
education, health care, and basic infrastructure. 12 In other words, rather
than a top-down approach, a bottom-up type of security becomes necessary—
that is, only by ensuring the security of the individual can the state guarantee its
own security.

As a matter of fact, in 1994 the United Nations Development Pro¬
gramme’s Human Development Report presented a new way of thinking
about the integration of security issues and globalization, defining human
security according to seven dimensions: personal, environmental, economic,
political, community, health, and food. 13 Moreover, it adopted a “people¬
centric” security concept as its focus instead of the traditional state-centered
concept. 14 This new emphasis on human security supplements the traditional
notion of security and represents the emergence of a new paradigm. Human
security accentuates the individuals rights and interests, often ignored by the
international community. Real security entails the protection of individuals
from such threats as disease, hunger, unemployment, political oppression,
and environmental degradation. 15 As a multilevel, wide-ranging concept, it
includes both the traditional and nontraditional elements of security, not
only serving as a blueprint for solving human problems but also offering
solutions that midlevel powers can put into practice. 16 Moreover, human
security has been used to define a foreign policy agenda promoted by Japan
as freedom from want and by Canada, Norway, and members of the Human
Security Network as freedom from fear. 17 Annan has pointed out the three

HUMAN SECURITY AS ANALYTICAL CONTEXTS 53

pillars of this wider concept of human security: freedom from want, free¬
dom from fear, and freedom to live in dignity. 18

The value of human security was adopted by the International Com¬
mission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, whose report noted the
context of this concept in international relations and international law. 19
The commission’s position on human security became part of the founda¬
tion of R2P and the new framework for debates on humanitarian inter¬
vention. 20 Even though humanitarian intervention prompts much debate,
international law plays an important and beneficial role as a means of
human security. 21 One way of approaching the relationship between human
security and international law involves examining the use of law as an
instrument to further this agenda—establishment of the International
Criminal Court, for example. Others can be discerned in several areas of
international law—most obviously refugee law, humanitarian law, and
human rights. 22

In terms of human security, the individual has gained greater promi¬
nence within the field of international law since the 1990s. Now encounter¬
ing challenges, the traditional state-centered model of international law is
giving way to a more people-centered orientation. In traditional studies,
international law has primarily concerned itself with regulating relation¬
ships among states and their rights and duties, seemingly to the exclusion
of the individual. 23 Only states (and possibly international organizations)
are subjects of the law. 24 Therefore, the individual is an “object,” not a “sub¬
ject.” International law operates on the individual indirectly, through the
state, which has international responsibility. Thus, any rights granted by or
obligations imposed by international law proceed through exercise of a
right held by the state of which the individual is a national. 25

With the end of the Cold War, though, international society recognized
that the individual should be adopted as a juristic entity. In the absence of
citizenship, the individual has no legal significance in the international
arena. For instance, both the Permanent Court of Justice and the Inter¬
national Court of Justice have adopted this position. 26 Obviously, the
cases of humanitarian intervention promote a direct link between indi¬
viduals and international law. 27 This article argues that although the
neorealist/statist view of security insists that “the idea of security is easier
to apply to things than to people,” ultimately the key argument holds that

54 ASP]AFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

state security is for individual security. 28 In the conception of human
security, the primary referent of security is the individual. 29 Similarly,
international law reflects acknowledgement of the worth of a person as
the essence of all law. 30

Although it seems that human security reflects the conflict between
state sovereignty and the principle of nonintervention, one can best ap¬
proach it as analytical contexts of humanitarian intervention in application
and in practice. Further, it provides us with a coherent framework to rethink
the impasse of the current state-centric strategies for preventive conflict
through its relevance to people, the state, and war.

The Evolution of Humanitarian Intervention

Since the sixteenth century, the international community has generally
practiced humanitarian intervention. In the first half of the twentieth cen¬
tury, human rights and state sovereignty collided, the latter usually winning
the confrontation. After the Cold War, however, a number of humanitarian
interventions occurred, including the war in Kosovo, ostensibly fought for
humanitarian reasons. Evidently, the contest between individual rights and
state sovereignty seems poised to take a new form. 31 UN peacekeeping op¬
erations have since occurred in such diverse places as Afghanistan, East
Timor, the former Yugoslavia, Liberia, Rwanda, and Somalia. On the one
hand, proponents of humanitarian intervention suggest that a new norm of
humanitatiran intervention is evolving, sometimes attributed to a change in
the general consciousness of individuals. On the other hand, opponents and
critics argue that humanitarian intervention is subject to political manipu¬
lation and that the use of force is always a poor way of promoting long-
lasting peace and justice. They assert that states must avoid overintervention
with the use of force against the territorial integrity or political indepen¬
dence of any state. 32

Over the past three centuries, these norms have become clearer and
have generated discussion in two areas of international law: a general and
consistent practice of states and states of similar international acts over
time. Table 1 depicts the evolution of humanitarian intervention.

HUMAN SECURITY AS ANALYTICAL CONTEXTS 55

Table 1. Key concepts in the evolution of humanitarian intervention

Evolution of
Humanitarian
Intervention

Just War

War for State

Humanitarian

Interventionism

War for People

Time

Medieval

17th-20th

Centuries

1990-94

1994-Present

Place

Europe

Colony

Balkans,

Africa

Global

Executor

Pope

Empire

Call for/Fight for

Justice

National Interests

Peacekeeping

Responsibility to
Prevent/React/ Re¬
build

Core Values

Morality

Power/Interests

Human Rights

Human Security

Purpose

Justice Punishing/
Prevention of
Atrocities

Balance of Power

Predatory/

Occupation

Peacekeeping

Against Genocide
and Ethnic

Cleansing

Theoretical

Framework

Catholicism

Realism

Humanitarianism/
Collective Security

Human Security

Way to Intervene

Coalition/Force

Depend on Powers

Authorizing All
Necessary Means
to Protect Civilians
and Civilian-
Populated Areas

Multilateralism

Referent Objects

Catholic Security

National Security

People's Security

Human Security

Right to

Intervene/

Right

Authority

In the Name of the
Lord

Depend on Powers

Authorization from
the Security Council

Source of
Normative Power

Moral Constraints

Powers

Media/Public

Opinion

International Legal
Norms

Cases

Crusades

Greek War of

Independence

(1829)

Northern Iraq
Operation (1991),
Somalia Operation
(1992)

NATO Air Strikes
against Yugoslavia
(1999), Libya
Operation (2011)

Humanitarian Intervention-War for Justice

One can trace the source of humanitarian intervention to the work of the
Roman statesman and philosopher Cicero (106-43 BC), who offered the
theory of just war, affirming that government is ordained by God to preserve
peace and maintain justice. 33 He, along with philosophers Saint Augustine,
Saint Thomas Aquinas, Franciscus de Victoria, and Hugo Grotius, insisted
that the just war tradition represented a moral and just instrument consisting

56 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

of two categories of criteria: jus ad helium and jus in bello? A Humanitarian
intervention serves as a way to prevent atrocities and punish unjust states.
Collective action is the most important feature of the traditional just war. 35
Only recognized public authorities have the right to authorize the use of
force. 36 Natural law and Catholic thought have strongly influenced the tradi¬
tion, which describes the collected consensus of Western Christian culture on
natural rights empowered in the name of the Lord/ 7

After the holy wars of the seventeenth century (1618-48), Grotius—
often referred to as the father of international law—sought to establish
secular natural law as a basis for the medieval codes of chivalry. He incor¬
porated jus in hello restrictions into just war criteria, believing that natural
law undergirded the law of a nation. 38 With the development of the modern
state system (1648), the nature of just war embedded a definite state bias,
and national interest became increasingly prominent in the concept of justice. 39

Humanitarian Intervention-War for State

John Mearsheimer argues that states do not act in accordance with moral
concerns, such as humanitarian violations abroad, and that inter¬
national institutions do not exert significant influence on state behavior. 40
In other words, states emphasize the influence of the international system
rather than human nature, claiming that this compels states to adopt a selfish
attitude which curtails altruistic action, such as humanitarian interven¬
tion. 41 Hence, Hans Morgenthau asserts that one cannot apply universal
moral principles to the actions of states because humanitarian operations
taken to halt or prevent violations against humans will create difficulties
with a state’s pursuit of national interests 42

Obviously, it follows that a state has the authority to wage war only in
pursuit of those interests. Former US secretary of defense Caspar Weinberger
stresses that interests, not ethics, should serve as the key motivation behind
Western intervention. 43 The cardinal tenets of US force employment are
the existence of specific national interests and Cori E. Dauber’s so-called
threshold test of vital interest or zero casualties. 44 Citizens usually expect
their state to act in the national interest and are reluctant to accept military
casualties when national interests are not involved. 45

HUMAN SECURITY AS ANALYTICAL CONTEXTS 57

Humanitarian Intervention-War for People

Of the 111 conflicts that occurred between the end of the Cold War and
the beginning of the twenty-first century, 104 were intrastate wars (95
purely civil wars and nine with foreign intervention); they involved more
than 80 states and 200 nongovernmental organizations, as well as two re¬
gional organizations. 46 Martha Finnemore insists that since the end of the
Cold War, states have felt pressure to intervene and protect their citizens
rather than their own interests. Humanitarian action could take place for a
variety of reasons. Compared to traditional just war, intervention could be
considered a moral factor, but with the abolition of slavery in the nineteenth
century and decolonization in the twentieth century, a new set of norms—
“humanism”—emerged as a universal value. 47

The end of the twentieth century marked a shift in the nature of con¬
flict. Large interstate wars were replaced by internal conflicts that produced
huge civilian casualties. For example, the genocides in Rwanda, Bosnia, and
Cambodia demonstrated colossal failures by the international community
to prevent mass atrocities. Thus, near the end of the 1990s, one perceived a
recognizable need to shift the debate to crisis prevention and response: the
security of the community and the individual, not just the state, must be¬
come a priority for national and international policies. 48

Case study of war for people: NATO air strikes against Yugoslavia
( 1999 ). The most controversial intervention to date involved NATO air
strikes against Yugoslavia in 1999. 49 UN Security Council Resolution 1160,
adopted on 31 March 1998 in reference to Kosovo and acting under chapter
7 of the UN Charter, imposed an arms embargo on the Federal Republic of
Yugoslavia (FRY). The Security Council deplored the violence that the
Serbian police force used against peaceful demonstrators in Kosovo as well
as terrorist acts of the Kosovo Liberation Army. 50 Six months later, Security
Council Resolution 1199, adopted on 23 September 1998 after the recall of
Resolution 1160, demanded that the Kosovar and Yugoslav parties end
hostilities in Kosovo and observe a cease-fire. In the meantime, the Security
Council decided that, should the parties not comply with the concrete measures
demanded by this resolution and its predecessor, it would consider further
action and additional measures to maintain or restore peace and stability in
the region. Additionally, Security Council Resolution 1203, adopted on 24
October 1998 after the recall of resolutions 1160 and 1199, demanded that

58 ASP]AFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

the FRY (Serbia and Montenegro) comply with previous resolutions and
cooperate with NATO’s and the Organization for Security and Co-operation
in Europe’s verification missions in Kosovo. Resolution 1203—affirming
the possibility of taking action in the event of an emergency to ensure safety
and freedom of movement—passed by a margin of 13 to one. 51 China and
Russia abstained, neither of them favoring the use of force. China also opposed
a resolution that would pressure the internal affairs of the FRY, and Russia
noted that the resolution had not taken into account favorable develop¬
ments in Belgrade.

Afterward, the United States, Canada, and France stressed that the
FRY was in violation of legal obligations imposed by Resolutions 1199 and
1203. From 24 March to 10 June 1999, NATO attacked Yugoslavia. In the
interim action, at the 3,989th meeting of the Security Council on 26 March
1999, the Russian Federation submitted a draft resolution, demanding that
the council reject any insistence on the immediate cessation of the use of
force against the FRY and called for the urgent resumption of negotiations.
Rather than adopt this draft resolution, the Security Council passed Resolu¬
tion 1244 on 10 June 1999, after recalling resolutions 1160,1199,1203, and
1239. In other words, the council authorized an international civil and
military presence in Kosovo (then part of the FRY) and established the UN
Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo. 52

Significantly, NATO’s use of force against Yugoslavia in March 1999
marked the first time since the founding of the UN that a group of states
had explicitly justified bombing another state in the name of protecting a
minority within that state (table 2). Moreover, the action lacked explicit
authorization from the Security Council and was condemned by some
council members as a legislative flaw and flagrant breach of international
law. 53 However, at that time, other members such as Malaysia and Bahrain
publicly supported NATO’s intervention. Evidently, NATO used the terms
morality and genocide to justify an illegal initiative because the illegal act
produced results more in keeping with the intent of the law and morality
than no action at all. 54 This view opens up the possibility that action might
be warranted but illegal, a position that has been directly invoked to describe
NATO’s action in Kosovo. 55 With regard to the case of Kosovo, Bruno
Simma observes that

HUMAN SECURITY AS ANALYTICAL CONTEXTS 59

“humanitarian interventions” involving the threat or use of armed force and undertaken
without the mandate of the authorization of the Security Council will, as a matter of principle,
remain in breach of international law. But such a general statement cannot be the last word.
Rather, in any instance of humanitarian intervention a careful assessment will have to be
made of how heavily such illegality weighs against all the circumstances of a particular
concrete case, and of the efforts, if any, undertaken by the parties involved to get “as close to
the law” as possible. Such analyses will influence not only the moral but also the legal judg¬
ment in such cases . 56

Table 2. A new norm of intervention authorized by the Security Council in the 1990s

Actions

NATO Air Strikes against Yugoslavia (1999)

UN Security Council Resolution

Resolution 1244 adopted on 10 June 1999 after recalling Resolutions
1160, 1199, 1203, and 1239. NATO used Resolution 1199 to advance
its internal planning for air strikes.

Debate of the Security Council

The United States, Canada, and France stressed that the FRY was in
violation of legal obligations imposed by Resolutions 1199 and 1203.

Outcome

The council did not adopt Russia’s draft resolution to end the use
of force against the FRY.

Significance for New Norm

The first time since the founding of the UN that a group of states
explicitly justified bombing another state in the name of protecting a
minority within that state.

Significance for Humanitarianism

The Kosovo event proves that if a country cannot make an effective
defense for its ill behavior—which will lessen its international legiti¬
macy, even in light of the principle of sovereignty—the international
community will find it difficult to avoid intervention.

With respect to NATO’s intervention in Kosovo, Simma argues that
the alliance made every effort to remain “close to the law” by scrupulously
following and linking its efforts to the resolutions of the Security Council
and by stating that the action taken was an urgent measure to prevent a
larger humanitarian crisis. 57 Therefore, humanitarian intervention was neither
a customary law nor legal norm at the time of NATO’s intervention in
Kosovo. Yet, the significant international support afforded to NATO in
1999 suggests that the operation was “a potential harbinger of future legality”
or that “norms had clearly changed.” 58

Case study ofwar for people: Libya operation (2011). Recent practice
reflects the international community’s success in preventing atrocities by
advocating R2P (table 3). On 26 February 2011, the Security Council put
its overwhelming power behind protecting the Libyan people from the
murderous regime of Muammar Gadhafi. Resolution 1970, adopted by a
15-0 vote, condemned the use of force against civilians; deplored the gross,

60 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

Table 3. A new norm of intervention authorized by the Security Council in 2011

Actions

Libya Operation (2011)

UN Security

Council Resolution

Resolution 1970, 26 February
2011

Resolution 1973, 17 March 2011

Outcome

The Security Council empha¬
sized the Libyan authorities'
responsibility to protect its pop¬
ulation.

The Security Council authorized member states
to take all necessary measures, notwithstand¬
ing paragraph 9 of Resolution 1970, to protect
civilians under threat of attack in Libya.

Significance for

New Norm

The first time that the Security
Council used the term R2P to
intervene by changing the lan¬
guage of intervention from right
authority.

The first time that the Security Council autho¬
rized member states to take all necessary
measures, notwithstanding paragraph 9 of
Resolution 1970, to protect civilians under
threat of attack in Libya.

Significance for
Humanitarianism

Again, the Libya event proves
that if a country cannot make
an effective defense for its ill
behavior—which will lessen its
international legitimacy, even in
light of the principle of sover¬
eignty—the international com¬
munity will find it difficult to
avoid intervention

A new interpretation for the relevance of sov¬
ereignty and human rights

systematic violations of human rights; and expressed deep concern at the
deaths of civilians and the incitement to hostility by the Libyan govern¬
ment. 59 Thus, for the first time the Security Council used the term R2P to
intervene by changing the language of intervention from right authority. 60
On 17 March 2011, the council adopted a new resolution—1973—this
time with a 10-0 vote and abstentions by Brazil, China, Germany, India,
and the Russian Federation, authorizing member states to take all necessary
measures (notwithstanding paragraph 9 of Resolution 1970) to protect
civilians under threat of attack in Libya. 61 This vote proved much more
problematic because the abstentions included two permanent council
members and three strong candidates for permanent membership. Again,
however, the Libya event reflects a new norm: a country’s failure to make an
effective defense for its ill behavior will lessen that nation’s international
legitimacy, even in light of the principle of sovereignty. 62

Conclusion

Thus, we see that states do not have an unqualified right to noninter¬
vention by other states; rather, the right is conditioned by the state’s meet¬
ing its own responsibility to protect its citizens. Failure to do so opens states

HUMAN SECURITY AS ANALYTICAL CONTEXTS 61

to the possibility of intervention; therefore, sovereignty is contingent upon
the promotion and protection of human rights and can be suspended. 63
R2P reveals that matters of human rights in the UN system have usually
been regarded as the concern of the UN Economic and Social Council,
specialized agencies, and subsidiary organs such as the Human Rights
Commission. The UN Charter affirms a principle of noninterference in the
domestic affairs of a sovereign state; it also offers international cooperation
in promoting human rights. 64 But the charter offers no guidance regarding
when sovereignty must yield to protection against violations, genocide, ethnic
cleansing, and massive abuses of human rights. However, current practice re¬
garding R2P suggests that the Security Council has begun to play an important
role in issues dealing with the international protection of human rights. 65

Considered a “bottom up” approach, human security is more applicable
to the security problems we face today. 66 It has become a well-used tool in
policy documentation and papers referring to the commitment of govern¬
ments and organizations to conflict zones and developing countries. 67
Consequently, our central claim runs contrary to the stereotype of human
security’s application and practice. This article has briefly charted the evolu¬
tion of humanitarian intervention from the causes of war: just war, war for
state, and war for people. It shows that although the state remains the fun¬
damental purveyor of security, it still fails to fulfill its security obligations—
and that is why the international community must shift the referent of
security from the state to the individual (human security). 68 Therefore, we
can regard the Kosovo and Libya interventions as cases of human security
winning out over sovereignty and traditional security. The article has also
hinted at a normative change that recognizes human beings as subjects of
international law. Further, it suggests that international relations, in some
measure, were a response to the changing quality of threats to individual
human beings and to the evolving quality of the relationship between the
state and the individual. 69

Notes

1. Catherine Lu, Just and Unjust Interventions in World Politics: Public and Private (Basingstoke,
England: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), 54.

2. Mervyn Frost, “The Ethics of Humanitarian Intervention: Protecting Civilians to Make
Democratic Citizenship Possible,”in Ethics and Foreign Policy, ed. Karen E. Smith and Margot Light

62 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

(Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001), 51; and Aidan Hehir, Humanitaria?i Interven¬
tion: An Introduction (Basingstoke, England: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010), 110—11.

3. Hehir, Humanitarian Intervention, 1.

4. S. Neil MacFarlane and Yuen Foong Khong, Human Security and the UN: A Critical History
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006), 165-68; and Yu-tai Ts’ai, “The Emergence of Human
Security: A Constructivist View,” International Journal of Peace Studies 14, no. 2 (Autumn/Winter
2009): 15, http ://www.gmu .edu/programs/icar/ij ps/voll 4_2/TS AI%20-%2014n2%20IJP S.pdf.

5. Kofi Annan, “Two Concepts of Sovereignty,” Eco?iomist 352, no. 8137 (1999): 49. One can
trace the development of the notion back to the Genocide Convention of 1948. In that same year,
the UN General Assembly adopted the Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the
Crime of Genocide. For more detailed information, see Luke Glanville, “The International Com¬
munity’s Responsibility to Protect,” Global Responsibility to Protect 2, no. 3 (June 2010): 287-306.

6. For a more extended discussion, see the International Coalition for the Responsibility to
Protect, http://www.responsibilitytoprotect.org/index.php/publications, or the R2P Coalition,
http://r2pcoalition.org/component/option, com_frontpage/Itemid.

7. Alex Chiang and Yu-tai Ts’ai, “A New Interpretation for the Relevance of Sovereignty and
Human Rights: The Case of Responsibility to Protect,” TamkangJournal of InternationalAff,airs 15,
no. 3 (2012): 42-43; and Glanville, “Responsibility to Protect,”287-306.

8. Yu-tai Ts’ai, “Emergence of Human Security,” 19-33.

9. Gerd Oberleitner, “Human Security: A Challenge to International Law?,” Global Governance
11, no. 2 (2005): 186, http://www.uni-graz.at/gerd.oberleitner/OberleitnerHumanSecurityGlobal
Governance.pdf.

10. Sabina Alkir e,A Conceptual Frameworkfor Human Security, Working Paper 2 (Oxford, UK:
Centre for Research on Inequality, Human Security and Ethnicity, Queen Elizabeth House, Uni¬
versity of Oxford, 2003), 10, http://economics.ouls.ox.ac.Uk/13003/l/workingpaper2.pdf.

11. Yu-tai Ts’ai, “Emergence of Human Security,” 19-33.

12. For more information, see 3P Human Security, “Policy Brief: Defining Human Security” (Wash¬
ington, DC: 3P Human Security, 2011), http://3phumansecurity.org/site/images/stories/PolicyBriefs
/human_security_overview.pdf.

13. United Nations Development Programme, Human Development Report 1994 (Oxford, UK:
Oxford University Press, 1994), 24-25, http://hdr.undp.org/en/reports/global/hdrl994/chapters/.

14. Ibid., 24-33.

15. See notes 7 and 8.

16. Roland Paris, “Human Security: Paradigm Shift or Hot Air?,” International Security 26, no.
2 (Fall 2001): 88, http://aixl.uottawa.ca/~rparis/Paris.2001.IS.Human%20Security.pdf.

17. The Human Security Network is a group of like-minded countries from all regions of the
world that, at the level of foreign ministers, maintains a dialogue on questions pertaining to human
security. It was founded in 1999 on the initiative of Canada and Norway. Members of the network
include Austria, Canada, Chile, Costa Rica, Greece, Ireland, Jordan, Mali, the Netherlands, Norway,
Switzerland, Slovenia, and Thailand, with South Africa as an observer. See Hideaki Shinoda, “Hu¬
man Security Initiatives of Japan,” in Facing Global Environmental Change: Environmental, Human,
Energy, Food, Health and Water Security Concepts, ed. Oswald Spring et al. (New York: Springer-
Verlag, 2007); and Jurgen Dedring, “Human Security and the UN Security Council,” in Globaliza¬
tion and Environmental Challenges: Reconceptualizing Security in the 21st Century, ed. Oswald Spring
et al. (New York: Springer-Verlag, 2008), 605-20.

HUMAN SECURITY AS ANALYTICAL CONTEXTS 63

18. Kofi Annan, In Larger Freedom: Towards Development, Security and Human Rights for All
(New York: United Nations, 2005), 5-6, http://daccess-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN
/N05/270/78/PDF/N0527078.pdf?OpenElement.

19. Barbara von Tigerstrom, Human Security and International Law (Portland, OR: Hart Publishing,
2007), 23.

20. Ibid., 97; and International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, The Responsi¬
bility to Protect (Ottawa: International Development Research Center of the International Commission
on Intervention and State Sovereignty, December 2001), 12-15, http://responsibilitytoprotect.org
/ICISS%20Report.pdf.

21. Von Tigerstrom, Human Security and International Law, 59.

22. Ibid., 60-65.

23. Chiang and Yu-tai Ts’ai, “New Interpretation,” 61-62.

24. P. O’Connell, International Law (London: Stevens, 1970), 106-7; and Malcolm N. Shaw,
International Law (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 222.

25. Julie Cassidy, “Emergence of the Individual as an International Juristic Entity: Enforce¬
ment of International Human Rights Deakin Law Review 9, no. 2 (2004): 539-40; and Chiang
and Yu-tai Ts’ai, “New Interpretation,” 62.

26. Some conventions regard the individual as a subject of international law: American Declara¬
tion of the Rights and Duties of Man (1948), Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and
Fundamental Freedoms (1950), Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimi¬
nation (1963), American Convention on Human Rights (1969), Convention on the Elimination of
All Forms of Discrimination against Women (1979), African Charter on Human and People’s
Rights (1981), Convention against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or
Punishment (1984), and United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989).

27. One can regard the Kosovo intervention as a case of human security winning out over sovereignty.

28. Barry Buzan, People, States and Fear: An Agenda for International Security Studies in the
Post—Cold War Era (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1991), 35.

29. Kanti Bajpai, Human Security: Concept and Measurement, Kroc Institute Occasional Paper,
no. 9 (South Bend, IN: Joan B. Kroc Institute for International Peace Studies, 2000), 37.

30. H. J. Steiner and P. Alston, International Human Rights in Context: Law, Politics, Morals (Ox¬
ford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2000), 147-48.

31. Chris Brown, Sovereignty, Rights, and Justice: International Political Theory Today (Cambridge,
UK: Polity Press, 2002), 135.

32. For more information, see Robert F. Gorman, “Introduction: Refugee Aid and Development in
a Global Context,” in Refugee Aid and Development: Theory and Practice, ed. Robert F. Gorman (West-
port, CT: Greenwood Press, 1993), 1-11; Peter Macalister-Smith, International Humanitarian Assis¬
tance: Disaster Relief Actions in International Law and Organization (Dordrecht, Netherlands: Martinus
Nijoft, 1985), 15—18; John Prendergast, Frontline Diplomacy: Humanitarian Aid and Conflict in Africa
(Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 1996), 4—5; John J. Merriam, “Kosovo and the Law of Humanitarian
Intervention,” Case Western Reserve Journal of International Law 33, no. 1 (2001): 111-54; and Steve G.
Simon, “The Contemporary Legality of Unilateral Humanitarian Intervention,” California Western
International Law Journal2A (1993): 117—53.

33. Paul Christopher, The Ethics of War and Peace: An Introduction to Legal and Moral Issues, 2nd
ed. (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education, 1999), 37.

64 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

34. V irgil Hawkins, The Silence of the UN Security Council: Conflict and Peace Enforcement in the
1990s (Firenze, Italy: European Press Academic Publishing, 2004), 98-99. Jus ad helium pertains
to governing the resort to force and jus in hello has to do with governing conduct during war.

35. Joseph Boyle, “Traditional Just War Theory and Humanitarian Intervention,” in Humani¬
tarian Intervention , ed. Terry Nardin and Melissa S. Williams (New York: New York University
Press, 2006), 31-38.

36. Michael Walzer, Just and Unjust Wars: A Moral Argument with Historical Illustrations (New
York: Basic Books, 1977), 90-100.

37. Anthony Coates, “Humanitarian Intervention: A Conflict of Traditions,” in Nardin and
Williams, Humanitarian Intervention , 62—71.

38. Grotius’s criteria for a just war were self-defense, the punishment of wrongdoers, the en¬
forcement of legal rights, reparation of injuries, and situations without any possibility of valid arbi¬
tration. Hehir, Humanitarian Intervention , 31. See also Eileen P. Flynn, How Just Is the War on
Terror? A Question of Morality (New York: Paulist Press, 2007), 12; and Larry May, Eric Rovie, and
Steve Vine, eds., The Morality of War (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson, 2005), 77.

39. Hehir, Humanitarian Intervention , 31—32; and M. Evans, Just War Theory: A Reappraisal
(Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 2005), 4.

40. JohnJ. Mearsheimer, “The False Promise of International Institutions,” International Secu¬
rity 19, no. 3 (1994/1995): 5-49.

41. Hehir, Humanitarian Intervention , 61.

42. Hans J. Morgenthau, Politics among Nations: The Struggle for Power and Peace, 6th ed. (New
York: McGraw-Hill, 1985), 9.

43. Nicholas J. Wheeler, “Introduction: The Political and Moral Limits of Western Military
Intervention to Protect Civilians in Danger,” in Dimensions of Western Military Intervention, ed.
Colin Mclnnes and Nicholas J. Wheeler (London: Frank Cass, 2002), 10.

44. Ibid., 11.

45. For example, regarding the US intervention in Somalia in 1992, people have demonstrated a
pronounced unwillingness to accept a military operation when national interests are not involved.
David Hendrickson, “In Defense of Realism: A Commentary on Just and Unjust Wars,” Ethics and
International Affairs 11 (1997): 19—55.

46. Joseph S. Nye, Understanding International Conflicts: An Introduction to Theory and History
(New York: Longman, 2007), 157-58.

47. Martha Finnemore, “Constructing Norms of Humanitarian Intervention,” in The Culture of
National Security: Norms and Identity in World Politics, ed. Peter Katzenstein (New York: Columbia
University Press), 153-85.

48. “An Introduction to the Responsibility to Protect,”International Coalition for the Respon¬
sibility to Protect, accessed 7 January 2013, http://www.responsibilitytoprotect.org/index.php
/about-rtop/learn-about-rtop.

49. Chiang and Yu-tai Ts’ai, “New Interpretation,” 49.

50. See Security Council Resolution 1160.

51. See Security Council Resolution 1203, par. 9.

52. See Security Council Resolution 1244.

53. Nicholas J. Wheeler, “The Humanitarian Responsibilities of Sovereignty: Explaining the
Development of a New Norm of Military Intervention for Humanitarian Purposes in Inter-

HUMAN SECURITY AS ANALYTICAL CONTEXTS 65

national Society,” in Humanitarian Intervention and International Relations , ed. Jennifer M. Welsh
(Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2003), 41-45.

54. Jun Matsukuma, “Emerging Norms of the Responsibility to Protect,” Seinan Law Review
38, no. 2 (2005): 106-18, http://www.seinan-gu.ac.jp/jura/home04/pdf/3802/3802matsukuma
.pdf; and Thomas M. Franck, “Interpretation and Change in the Law of Humanitarian Interven¬
tion,” in Humanitarian Intervention: Ethical, Legal, and Political Dilemmas, ed. J. L. Holzgrefe and
Robert O. Keohane (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2003), 226.

55. Wheeler, “Humanitarian Responsibilities of Sovereignty,” 41-47.

56. Bruno Simma, “NATO, the UN and the Use of Force: Legal Aspects,” European Journal of
International Law 10, no. 1 (1999): 6, http://ejil.oxfordjournals.Org/content/10/l/l.full.pdf.

57. Ibid. See also A. P. V. Rogers, “Humanitarian Intervention and International Law,” Har¬
vard Journal of Law and Public Policy 27 (2004): 725—36.

58. Hehir, Humanitarian Intervention, 93; N. Rodley and B. Cah, “Kosovo Revisited: Humani¬
tarian Intervention on the Fault Lines of International Law,” Human Rights Law Review 7, no. 2
(2007): 278; and Nicholas J. Wheeler, Saving Strangers: Humanitarian Intervention in Inter¬
national Society (Oxford, UK: Oxford University Press, 2000), 286.

59. See Security Council Resolution 1970.

60. Chiang and Yu-tai Ts’ai, “New Interpretation,” 59.

61. These measures include demanding an immediate cease-fire, ending violence and all attacks,
creating a no-fly zone over Libya, authorizing all necessary means to protect civilians and civilian-
populated areas, strengthening the arms embargo, imposing a freeze on assets owned by the Libyan
authorities, and establishing a panel of experts to monitor and promote the implementation of sanc¬
tions. See Security Council Resolutions 1970 and 1973.

62. Chiang and Yu-tai Ts’ai, “New Interpretation,” 58-59.

63. Aidan Hehir, Humanitarian Intervention after Kosovo: Iraq, Darfur and the Record of Global
Civil Society (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), 48-52.

64. See Charter of the United Nations, art. 2.7, preamble.

65. Matsukuma, “Emerging Norms,” 106-18.

66. This so-called bottom up (“people-centric”) approach implies a redirection of traditional secu¬
rity policies. Monica den Boer and Jaap de Wilde, eds., The Viability of Human Security (Amsterdam:
Amsterdam University Press, 2008), 11.

67. Oliver P. Richmond, “Western Intellectual Roots of Human Security,” in Huma?i Security
in East Asia, ed. Sorpong Peou (London: Routledge, 2009), 39.

68. Commission on Human Security, Human Security Now (New York: Commission on Human
Security, 2003), 2, http://reliefweb.int/sites/reliefweb.int/files/resources/91BAEEDBA50C6907Cl
256D19006A9353-chs-security-may03.pdf.

69. Yu-tai Ts’ai, “The Study of Diffusion and Practice of International Norms through the ‘Human
Security’: The Case of‘Responsibility to Protect,’ ” Asiaji Social Science 6, no. 2 (February 2010): 18,
http://ccsenet.org/journal/index.php/ass/article/view/5033/4172.

The Tuareg Revolt and the Mali Coup

Lt Col Rudolph Atallah, USAF, Retired*

Contextualizing the Current Tuareg Uprising

T he latest (2012) Tuareg uprising is not new. One should consider
this conflagration a continuation of a half century of conflict-promoting
dynamics that, historically, have sullied relations between Tuaregs
and various states which attempted to subjugate or delimit their
social, political, and economic practices. Understanding the current rebellion
necessitates coming to terms with this history, which started long before Mali’s
independence in 1960.

The following testimony—a snapshot of a rapidly evolving and complex
problem set—provides this historical context while shedding light on con¬
temporary Tuareg social, political, and economic dynamics that critically affect
security in the Saharan and Sahelian regions of Africa. Of particular interest
to US policy making is the complicated relationship between the Tuaregs and
al-Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb (AQIM), al-Qaeda’s North African
affiliate—a relationship driven by a convergence of interests, not ideology. In
the end, it will become evident that those seeking to promote stability in the
region and confront violent extremism, including AQIM, should not ignore the
Tuaregs, who play an integral role in regional security and economic growth.

"This article is based on the author’s congressional testimony in 2012 (see House, Prepared Statement of
LtCol (ret) Rudolph Atallah, Senior Fellow, Michael S. Ansari Center, Atlantic Council, and Chief Executive
Officer, White Mountain Research LLC, before the United State House of Representatives Committee on Foreign
Affairs, Subcommittee on Africa, Global Health, and Huma7i Rights on “The Tuareg Revolt and the Mali Coup, ”
Friday, June 29, 2012, 12th Cong., 2nd sess., http://foreignafFairs.house.gov/112/HHRG-112-FA16
-WState-AtallahR-20120629.pdf). Between 2001 and 2003, the author spent extensive time with the
Tuaregs in northern Mali, especially in Kidal, Tessalit, Timbuktu, Gao, and several other locations across
the Sahara. During this period, the first kidnapping of European tourists by an extremist named Abdel
Rezak A1 Para took place, and in Kidal, Pakistani activists—allegedly from Jamaat al Tabligh—attempted
to recruit young Tuaregs for activities abroad, possibly including militancy. A native Arabic speaker, the
author had several opportunities to interview Tuareg leaders and local imams about these issues and their
perspectives on the attacks of 11 September 2001, terrorism, and tribal beliefs. Subsequent work in the
region through the author’s company, White Mountain Research, afforded him many contemporary in¬
sights into the rapidly evolving security dynamics in this region.

THE TUAREG REVOLT AND THE MALI COUP 67

The Tuaregs and Decolonization

The Tuaregs, a seminomadic people who live in the Saharan and Sahelian
regions of southern Algeria, western Libya, northern Mali, northern Niger,
and northeast Burkina Faso, number approximately 1.5 million today al¬
though actual census data is unavailable. Their worldview is constructed
from a combination of Islam and traditional tribal practices inseparable
from their culture. They believe in both Allah and spirits, thus differing
from adherents of pure Islam, which teaches belief in a monotheistic God.
All Tuaregs belong to one of three classes: the nobles (camel herders), vassals
(goat herders), and black African slaves originally from southern ethnic
groups (the French outlawed slavery in the early part of the last century).

When decolonization took root across Africa in the 1950s, the people
of the Sahara (mainly the Tuaregs) pushed for political autonomy, often
sparking conflict. 1 During the colonial era, Tuareg regions were peripheral
to, and thus isolated from, influence within the capitals. Over time, colonial
powers imposed a series of conventions regulating and limiting nomadic
movements to specific territories for each federation, further restricting
Tuareg movements and increasing their isolation from centers of power. 2
Tuaregs clashed with French colonialists over these issues but were subdued
by French military superiority and tactics of divide and conquer, which
turned Tuareg tribes against each another.

The first Tuareg uprising began in 1962, in the postindependence period.
Initially, this conflict featured small hit-and-run raids, but these escalated
in subsequent years to include sophisticated attacks. However, the overall
Tuareg effort lacked unified leadership and a coherent strategy Neverthe¬
less, the Tuaregs’ grievances were poignant enough to encourage some to
take up arms. The sum of their concerns involved three main issues:

1. Discrimination from southern ethnic groups, which governed
Mali following independence.

2. Fear that land reform would threaten their privileged access to
agriculture.

3. Concern that national elites would destroy Tuareg culture
under the guise of “modernization.”

68 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

By 1964 Mali had crushed the rebellion, and the northeastern part of the
country became a no-go area ruled by martial law. The fledgling govern¬
ment’s heavy-handed approach alienated many Tuaregs who did not sup¬
port the insurgents. 3

The 1970s and 1980s, decades of extreme drought and suffering in the
region, saw many Tuaregs flee Mali and take refuge in Algeria, Libya, Niger,
Mauritania, and Burkina Faso. Overgrazing, combined with drought and a
lack of response by the Malian government, caused further, deepening re¬
sentment among many Tuaregs. Younger Tuaregs were also lured by jobs in
Algeria’s and Libya’s oil industries and moved there to earn a living. How¬
ever, the collapse of oil prices in the mid-1980s sent many Tuaregs back to
their homes in Mali. Algeria expelled over 10,000, and Libya, which had
created specialized military regiments composed of Tuareg recruits, dis¬
banded most of them. These events set the stage for the second Tuareg
rebellion, which started in June 1990 and lasted until 1992. Iyad Ag Ghaly,
current leader of Ansar Al-Din (“Defenders of the Faith,” a violent regional
Salafist group linked to AQIM), led the second rebellion. 4 As in the 1960s,
the Tuaregs were not united as one insurgent group; this time, however,
they enjoyed better organization and equipment.

To his credit, Moussa Traore, president of Mali at the time, recognized
very early after the rebellion began that a military solution was untenable
and accepted Algeria’s offer of mediation. In 1991, after serious discussions
between the government and Tuareg leaders, the principals signed the
Accords of Tamanrasset. Unfortunately, not all Tuaregs were represented at
the table—especially those from Gao and Timbuktu, who felt betrayed and
left out of the deal. The Traore regime refused to publicize the terms of the
accords, fearing that the south would interpret it as a surrender, and even
denied on national radio that there would be any “Statut particulier” for the
north. 5 This action reflected a chronic lack of trust that remains the impetus
behind today’s continuing conflict. Key provisions from the accord included
the following:

1. A cease-fire and exchange of prisoners.

2. Withdrawal of insurgent forces to cantonments.

3. Reduction of the army presence in the north, especially Kidal.

THE TUAREG REVOLT AND THE MALI COUP 69

4. Disengagement of the army from civil administration in the
north.

5. Elimination of selected military posts (considered threatening
by the Tuareg communities).

6. Integration of insurgent combatants into the Malian army at
ranks to be determined.

7. Acceleration of ongoing processes of administrative decentral¬
ization in Mali.

8. A guarantee that a fixed proportion of Mali’s national infra¬
structural investment funding (47.3 percent) would be devoted
to the north. 6

As a whole, Tuaregs felt that Mali never fully met most of these provisions,
giving them a reason for independence. Two months after the Tamanrasset
agreement, a coup abruptly ended President Traore’s 23-year rule. In 1992
national elections took place, and leaders from all of the communities signed
a national pact that addressed a wide range of issues, from integration of
former insurgents into the Mahan military to the allocation of resources for
national development.

Significantly, the Tamanrasset Accords prompted the formation of tem¬
porary security forces to garrison the north. These forces contained a mixed
percentage of Mahan army and rebel combatants—both a confidence-building
measure and a way to reduce the problem of unemployed, armed Tuareg youths. 7
The government also made promises of material benefits without having the
resources in place to fulfill them, resulting in a painfully slow application of the
national pact. 8

Ibrahim Ag Bahanga led the third Tuareg rebellion, which took place
in 2006 and lasted until 2009. Algeria once again stepped in to broker peace
by restating demands made in the national pact; however, the lack of trust
exhibited by all parties kept northeast Mali in a state of uneasy peace. In
2009 Mali dispatched troops to stop Bahanga and exiled him to Libya,
where he remained until his return in the summer of 2011. Bahanga’s Libyan
exile proved an important milestone in the recent Tuareg insurgency.

During his time in Libya, Bahanga contacted Tuaregs from his tribe
who served in Muammar Gadhafi’s military. One of these was Mohammed

70 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

Ag Najm, commander of Gadhafi’s elite desert units. In an interview with
the newspaper Al Watan in 2011, Bahanga said that “Al-Qadhafi’s disap¬
pearance is good news for all the region’s Tuareg. . . . His departure from
Libya opens the way to a better future and will make it possible to move
forward with our political demands.. . . Now that he is gone, we can forge
ahead with our struggle.” 9 Although Bahanga died in a mysterious car
accident that summer, his desire to spark another uprising and gain con¬
trol of northern Mali took root among many Tuaregs.

His vision unfolded later that autumn. In September 2011, when it be¬
came evident that Gadhafi’s regime would collapse, Tuareg fighters began to
cross into Mali after emptying several Libyan arms depots. 10 In October
2011, in the oasis settlement of Zakak, Mali, near the border of Algeria, Tuareg
youth, intellectuals, Malian army deserters, and Libyan-trained Tuareg soldiers
merged two movements—the Mouvement national de l’Azawad and the
Mouvement Touareg du Nord Mali—to form the Movement National Pour
La Liberation de l’Azawad (MNLA) (Azawad is the name of the Tuareg
homeland). The France-based spokesman for the new organization, Hama
Ag Sid’ Ahmed (Bahanga’s father-in-law), elaborated on the significance of
this new, more organized approach to Tuareg aspirations: “This year we have
all the generations together.” 11 He elaborated on this novel Tuareg approach
in a subsequent statement on the MNLA’s formation:

We talked about where things had gone wrong and tried to agree on a plan and on
some common objectives. We created a ruling council, a military etat majeur, com¬
manded and coordinated by Mohammed Ag Najm and other senior officers.There are
about 40 of them. And we also created a political bureau, which set about analysing
and considering all the political aspects including how to raise awareness among the
international community, especially the regional powers. 12

Although this new Tuareg approach strengthened military strategy, en¬
hanced tactical war-fighting capabilities, and generally augmented the Tuaregs’
political thought, disunity remained their biggest obstacle.

Recent Developments Contextualizing the Current Tuareg Uprising

From mid-January until early April 2012, the MNLA took control of
an area greater than the size of France, calling it Azawad, an Arabic corrup¬
tion of the Berber word Azawagh. n Geographically, this region straddles
Mali, Niger, and Algeria, but in the open press, MNLA carefully defines it

THE TUAREG REVOLT AND THE MALI COUP 71

as northern Mali to let neighboring states know that expansion was not in
the cards and thus prevent a unified backlash from those states. Unlike the
combatants in other tribal conflicts, the Tuaregs are not fighting for re¬
sources, fertile land, or geographical expansion of territory but for culture,
pride, and self-determination.

When Tuareg youth saw the world rally behind south Sudan’s struggle
for independence, they hoped the same would happen for their people.
However, history shows that the world did not react that way. To de-escalate
potential retaliation against its newly formed organization and galvanize
support, the MNLA publicly stated that it was not an extremist organiza¬
tion but a secular representation of northern ethnic groups. 14 The executive
committee of the MNLA then asked the international community to “rec¬
ognise, in a spirit of justice and peace, the independent state of Azawad.” 15
This plea for support was overshadowed by the coup in Bamako and a list
of plaguing questions, not the least of which were, Why now? and How did
this happen?

Despite recent successes, the MNLA faces many challenges, primarily
the threat of militant Islamist dominance. This threat, however, originates
perhaps more from the ultrapragmatic Tuareg desire to play for the “win¬
ning team” than it does from a worldview predisposed to violent extremism.
According to reports from Timbuktu, some Tuaregs have sons who joined
both Ansar Al-Din and the MNLA in hopes of having a family member on
a winning side. As one Tuareg said to a colleague, “They are two arms of the
same body,” a comment representative of wider confusion over these orga¬
nizational dynamics. However, without Ansar Al-Din putting a Tuareg face
on AQIM, there would be more Tuareg resistance to the Salafist presence
and broader support for MNLA.

Nevertheless,Tuaregs see flirtation with militant Islamism as temporary.
Tuareg society, for example, broadly resents Salafist conceptions of a Sharia
ban on soccer, smoking, and unveiled women. Further, even though Timbuktu
has a long tradition as a devout Muslim city, residents feel that no one
should tell them how to act or practice their faith. Regardless, the griev¬
ances that comprise the latest backbone of Tuareg insurgency push some
people into Tuareg Islamist factions, which share the same grievances and
hatred for regional governments, especially those in Niger and Mali, but tap
into a deeper Islamic frame to promote activism.

72 ASP]AFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

One contact who met with several Tuareg army officers last summer in
Timbuktu described these grievances, which sparked the flow of Tuareg
fighters coming in from Libya, and predicted a new rebellion. These officers
said that the lack of jobs, economic and infrastructure development, and
decent paved roads in northern Mali topped their list. All had family members
connected to trade and tourism, and according to most of them, the fact
that the only paved road to the north ends in Mopti embodies the govern¬
ment’s betrayal of the people. Whether secular pragmatists or Islamists,
Tuaregs do not trust the Malian government, which in their eyes has more
than once sent forces to “cleanse” them. Tuaregs are quick to point out that
since Mali’s independence, the outside world has never conducted a full,
independent investigation of the atrocities committed against them.

Despite these grievances, Tuaregs in general do not broadly support
the Salafists.They see them first as foreign interlopers and second as Arabs
or Moors, both of whom have long been their ethnic rivals for supremacy
in the Sahara.

lyad Ag Ghaly and Militant Islam

The uprising in 2012 saw the return of lyad Ag Ghaly, a Tuareg leader
who led the first rebellion in the early 1990s and started the second three-
year rebellion from 2006 to 2009. A seasoned 57-year-old warrior who
embraced militant Salafism, the unpredictable and manipulating Ag Ghaly
plays a key role in promoting conflict in the Sahel. His manipulative, radical
approach—not to mention his Rolodex and connectivity to AQIM—is
worthy of serious examination. Ag Ghaly’s biography as a militant reflects
a clear desire to play for the winners. In 2007, during the middle of the
second rebellion, he switched sides, leaving his cause (fighting for Tuareg
autonomy) to help negotiate settlements between the Tuaregs and the
government of Mali. This move still causes resentment among his tribesmen,
many of whom no longer trust him. In 2008 President Amadou Toumani
Toure appointed Ag Ghaly consul and sent him to Jeddah, Saudi Arabia,
but the Saudi government declared him persona non grata for his associa¬
tion with extremist elements tied to al-Qaeda. In October 2011, President
Toure asked him to head a delegation and bring Tuareg soldiers returning
from the conflict in Libya back into the fold of Malian society. 16 He re¬
turned to the north to resume his old role as leader of the Tuaregs, but the

THE TUAREG REVOLT AND THE MALI COUP 73

MNLA rejected him. He then formed his own group, Ansar Al-Din, and
fought alongside his people until they took the territory of Azawad.

Afterward, Ag Ghaly began to show his cards, agreeing to work with
the MNLA but on the condition that Azawad would follow strict Sharia.
On 16 June 2012, he rejected MNLA independence and publicly an¬
nounced that “Ansar Dine wants the unity of all brothers and sisters in Mali
around Islam, which is the foundation of our life.” 17 For now, he appears
resolute in his long-term goals to capture the Tuareg leadership and insti¬
tute rigid Salafism as the Tuaregs’ brand of Islam. The MNLA leadership
rejected Ag Ghaly’s pronouncement of 16 June and held its claim to secu¬
larism. Despite the impasse over the fate of Azawad, some members of the
MNLA favorably consider Ag Ghaly and his Ansar Al-Din members
Azawadis, a perception not shared about AQIM.

Ag Ghaly has a long history of successfully playing all sides of the Tuareg
conflicts. In previous years, he was easily influenced by Algeria and Libya,
which successfully “managed” him. However, his patrons, if any, are unknown
at this point. In this current stalemate over the fate of Azawad, Ag Ghaly
seems to be methodically undermining his MNLA tribesmen—but why?
Many unanswered questions remain, especially about the source(s) of his
funding. Further, did Ag Ghaly know about the rebellion and plan to under¬
mine it? Is a state, organization, or individual behind his success? Indeed, the
MNLA has no money or outside support, other than Tuaregs living abroad
who want an independent Azawad. Ansar Al-Din, on the other hand, has
funds and equipment, as well as the ethnic and tribal makeup necessary for
success. Ag Ghaly, no stranger to the Salafist Group for Preaching and Combat
(GSPC)/AQIM because of his initial involvement with the group in 2003,
also seems to have the full support of Abdelhamid Abou Zeid, one of AQIM’s
leaders in northern Mali. 18 Taken together, Ag Ghaly’s streamlined success
does not square.

In sum, against the backdrop of the current crisis, Ag Ghaly has posi¬
tioned himself very well. He managed to provoke bickering in MNLA and
now formally has AQIM’s southern fighters and resources under his com¬
mand. 19 His approach to undermining Tuareg leaders opposed to his rule
began in April, after MNLA declared the independence of Azawad. Loot¬
ing, rape, and abductions in Gao, Kidal, and Timbuktu broke out, and ac¬
cording to Human Rights Watch reports, MNLA rebels were responsible

74 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

for the crimes. However, the organization denied those accusations, blam¬
ing escaped prisoners and criminals. Eyewitnesses said that Ansar Al-Din
responded by taking protective measures to insulate the population and
curb crime. Since then, it has been proselytizing door-to-door and imple¬
menting Sharia on the population. Overall, Tuaregs are confused about
Ansar Al-Din, but are quickly learning the truth about the organization.
On 26 June, a friend conveyed a report from a Tuareg family in Timbuktu:

Ansar Al-Din is recruiting local boys as young as 11-12 years old with promises to
give them food and cash if they work in their camp at Fort Bekaye, the old Malian
base inside the city. The boys are being told to do odd jobs. One Tuareg man found out
that his 13-year-old son had gone to the camp to work, so he went there to talk to his
son at the base. He asked him why he had joined Ansar Al-Din, and the boy told his
father that he was only supposed to work for one month. So the man went to the
Ansar Al-Din leader in charge of the base and said respectfully that he would like his
son to leave with him, that he was needed at home. The head of the base told the father
that his boy couldn’t leave, that he was now permanently part of Ansar Al-Din and
that the family could have his body back after he had fulfilled his duty to Allah and
that he should be proud of him for bringing Muslim honor to his name.

Evidently this is not an isolated case. Two other families have relayed
similar stories. People without money rely on handouts from Ansar Al-Din,
which in return demands that they send their sons to newly militarized
madrasas (Islamic schools). One man described how his old mosque is now
home to one such madrasa where all the boys are forced to dress exactly
alike, learn to fire Kalashnikovs, and undergo indoctrination in a harsh in¬
terpretation of Islam. In sum, Ag Ghaly’s determination seems to be slowly
forcing the population to submit to his rule, leaving the future of northern
Mali in the hands of extremists and the fate of the Tuaregs in question.

AQIM in Northern Mali

AQIM remains active in northern Mali, despite a tenuous relationship
with the Tuaregs. Algerian nationals run the organization, but its fighter
composition includes Mauritanian, Moroccan, Libyan, Malian, and Nige¬
rian nationals. From 2003 until the present, AQIM gradually took advan¬
tage of Mali’s weak security infrastructure to establish itself in the northern
part of the country. This created an economic-development shift in which
tribal elements (particularly the Arab tribes and, to a lesser degree, the Tuareg)
had no alternative other than do business or join the organization since it is

THE TUAREG REVOLT AND THE MALI COUP 75

flush with cash (estimates vary from 70 to 150 million euros in total). This
money originates from ransoms paid for the release of kidnapped Westerners. 20
Over the years, the local Arab-Tuareg population has slowly learned to
tolerate its presence, in part due to AQIM’s ability to develop the local
economy and provide basic services in an impoverished region that felt
abandoned by its host government. Local leaders forged mutually beneficial
business relationships with the organization—relationships cemented
through marriages to local women. For example, Mokhtar Belmokhtar, an
influential AQIM leader from the southern zone katiba (battalion), took a
Tuareg wife from Timbuktu.

Although AQIM seems to affect the local population for the better
with respect to quality of life, over the long term it exerts a negative influ¬
ence on the economic development of the region and promotes the growth
of organized crime, especially among the Tuareg and Arab people. AQIM
is responsible for spreading violent extremism to countries like Nigeria,
where the radical organization Boko Haram dramatically stepped up its
attacks in 2011 against Christians and government targets. Over the years,
the government of Mali’s feeble response to AQIM’s attacks and kidnap¬
pings decimated even the smallest economic developments in the poorest
region of a country where 77 percent of the population lives on less than
two dollars per day. 21 Violence and insecurity deterred nongovernmental
organizations, outside investors, and tourism in critical areas plagued by
chronic underdevelopment, drought, and extreme poverty.

Despite AQIM’s gains, the Tuaregs remain traditionally moderate, not
lured by the Salafist brand of Islam. Their identity lies with their Tamashek
language rather than in religion. The autumn of 2006 saw multiple clashes
between Tuareg and AQIM fighters, resulting in distrust and animosity
between the two sides. Some MNLA members continue to discuss the idea
of driving AQIM out of the region because it is considered an outside in¬
fluence that corrupts the Tuaregs’traditions and way of life. For this reason,
Ag Ghaly took center stage and now has AQIM’s undivided attention and
support. His ethnic makeup as a Tuareg allows AQIM to operate while he
manages the negative Tuareg rhetoric. Despite significant differences and a
history of animosity towards radical Islam, Tuaregs are opportunists. The
allure of money, which would keep them relevant in the region, is their sole
attraction to AQIM.

76 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

Because of the Tuaregs’vehement opposition to Salafism and the desire
to win popular support, Abdelmalek Droukdal, the emir of AQIM, told his
followers to gradually impose Sharia on the people of northern Mali and
create the first Islamic state in the region. 22 Like Ag Ghaly, he does not
want to lose control of the situation. Maintaining a strong grip on northern
Mali provides AQIM the resources it needs to remain effective and expand.

Conclusion and Recommendations:

Implications for the United States

Although the international community likely would never entertain
the idea of Azawadian independence, it should make an effort to support
MNLA and Tuaregs who oppose militant Salafists in the region, including
AQIM. Tuaregs are masters of their environment; they can play a key role
in stabilizing the Sahel by driving out violent extremist groups. They have
the will to do so—but not without assistance.

Unfortunately, the present situation in the region is bleak. Time is not on
the Tuaregs’ side, and northern Mali is becoming a magnet for foreign Islamist
fighters who now help train recruits. Further, violent extremists have an ideal
environment in which to move weapons, bring in more foreign fighters, and
make money from drugs and other contraband, given the large quantities of
Gadhafi’s arsenal in their possession and control over airstrips near the towns
of Gao, Timbuktu, Tessalit, and Kidal. This region is becoming a strategic
nightmare for the United States and its European allies.

What is the end game for Ansar Al-Din and AQIM? According to
regional experts, Ag Ghaly wants to become the leader of the Tuaregs, and
he will use any means necessary to obtain this position. AQIM’s long-term
goals, though, are different and more in line with al-Qaeda’s plans for North
Africa. Analysis by West Point’s Combating Terrorism Center of the de¬
classified Abbottabad letters shows that al-Qaeda’s leadership desires to
take advantage of the “Arab Spring” to convert jihadi activities into mis¬
sionary activities, with the primary objective of regrouping and coming after
the United States. 23 To attain this goal, it has to rely on AQIM, its regional
affiliate. AQIM, however, has suffered significant setbacks over the last few
years and has seen its ability to recruit from North African countries disappear.
Internal ideological disagreements that started in 2006 when it swore allegiance
to al-Qaeda continue to vex the organization. Furthermore, effective counter-

THE TUAREG REVOLT AND THE MALI COUP 77

terrorism measures taken by the United States and its allies have proven very
damaging. To survive and remain effective, AQIM needs money and soldiers.
The Sahel has become an ideal ground for both, and the Tuaregs function as
collateral. In a way, AQIM has hijacked the heart of the great Sahara trade
routes—the indispensible lifeblood of economic growth in a vast 3,400-mile
region, where goods and commodities move between Europe, the Middle
East, and the subcontinent. Left unchallenged, terrorists and drug dealers
will exploit these routes for their long-term gains, using the only people who
know how to navigate the harsh terrain—the Tuaregs.

Until now, Mali’s military has been ineffective—unable to control the
north and drive out AQIM. The international community and Mali’s
neighbors should not support any plan by the current Bamako regime to
conduct a military intervention in the north, which would prove counter¬
productive and alienate local support against Ansar Al-Din and AQIM.
Instead, regional governments need to work together to address economic
and social needs across the Sahel, thereby protecting livelihoods and creating
opportunities that will keep Sahelian communities from falling victim to
Salafist groups—especially the Tuaregs.

The best approach to counter the present crisis in northern Mali in¬
volves creating a buffer zone around the areas where the Salafists operate.
This zone should restrict movement by air or ground of illegal goods entering
the area. On a larger scale, a systematic regional approach aimed at target¬
ing illegal drug trafficking, tobacco, and weapons should be addressed to
curb terrorists’ access to money. A diminishing cash flow will dry up funds
to recruit and expand.

Moreover, an effective information operations campaign is indispens¬
able to discrediting AQIM and Ansar Al-Din and to reinforcing local dis¬
trust of their motives. Such a campaign should include not only northern
Mali but also the Sahel as a whole, disparaging all militant Salafist groups
and activities. But direct intervention by Western states will only reinforce
the extremists’raison d’etre and exacerbate the crisis; consequently, regional
actors must broker a solution, and regional experts must guide it.

Border control and counterterrorism programs for Niger, Mauritania,
Libya,Tunisia, Morocco, and Algeria also require greater support.These states
still lack sustainable, effective coordination on these matters, and regional
intelligence collection and sharing need significant improvement. Further,

78 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

because Sahelian states cannot respond to security threats in remote areas
distant from the capitals, Mali’s efforts to maintain control of the north have
proven ineffective. Although AQIM s southern-zone katiba is no more than
300 strong, the absence of regional state collaboration makes it very difficult
to find and target individuals in the vast operational area.

The international community must also address poor governance, cor¬
ruption, and poverty issues, especially among the Tuaregs and people of the
Sahel. Initiatives that improve food and water security, health care, educa¬
tion, and employment will give the population incentive to resist militant
Salafist groups and refrain from working with them. In the case of the Tuaregs
in northern Mali, better infrastructure and effective security remain at the
heart of their grievances. If the international community wishes to support
their economy and preserve their way of life—a culture at odds with mili¬
tant Islam—it must deal with these issues directly. Finally, the community
must make a top priority of effective Western and local intelligence sharing
and regional coordination to root out Salafist activities and thereby reverse
the threat that plagues this region.

Notes

1. “Global Insider: Tuareg Rebel Groups,” World Politics Review, 31 October 2011, http://www
.worldpoliticsreview.com/trend-lines/10508/globalinsider-tuareg-rebel-groups.

2. “Prayer Profile: The Tuareg; a Cluster of 8 Distinct Groups in 5 Different Countries,”
Bethany World Prayer Center, 1997, http://kcm.co.kr/bethany_eng/clusters/tuareg.html.

3. Lt Col Kalifa Keita, Army of the Republic of Mali, Conflict and Conflict Resolution in the
Sahel: The Tuareg Insurgency in Mali (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, US Army War Col¬
lege, 1998), 10-11, http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/pub200.pdf

4. Andy Morgan, “The Causes of the Uprising in Northern Mali,” Think Africa Press, 6 February
2012, http://thinkafricapress.com/mali/causes-uprising-northern-mali-tuareg.

5. Attilio Gaudio, Le Mali (Paris: Karthala, 1992), 191.

6. Keita, Conflict and Conflict Resolution, 16.

7. Ibid., 18.

8. Macartan Humphreys and Habaye Ag Mohamed, “Senegal and Mali,” January 2003, 25,
http://www.columbia.edu/~mh2245/papersl/sen_mali.pdf.

9. BBC Monitoring International Reports, “Qadhafi’s Fall ‘Good News’ for Tuareg—Malian
Tuareg Leader Ag Bahanga,” Access My Library, 30 August 2011, http://www.accessmylibrary
xom/article-lGl-265659685/qadhafi-fall-good-news.html.

10. Rohan Gunaratna, “Instability Threatens the Sahel,” National Interest, 26 April 2012,
http://nationalinterest.org/commentary/instability-threatens-the-sahel-6850.

THE TUAREG REVOLT AND THE MALI COUP 79

11. David Lewis and Adama Diarra, “Insight: Arms and Men Out of Libya Fortify Mali Re¬
bellion,” Reuters, 10 February 2012, http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/02/10/us-mali-bbya
-idUSTRE8190UX20120210.

12. Morgan, “Uprising in Northern MaU.”

13. Robert Brown, ed Annotations to the History and Description of Africa of Leo Africanus, vol.
1 (London: Hakulyt Society, 1896).

14. Mossa Ag Attaher, “They Are Not Mercenaries,” Mouvement National de Fberation de
l’Azawad, 22 January 2012, http://www.mnlamov.net/english/101-they-are-not-mercenaries.html.

15. Michael Rundle, “MaH Unrest: British Embassy Staff Withdrawn by Foreign Office Amid
Violence,” Huffngton Post, 4 June 2012, http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/04/06/mab-unrest
-british-embassy-closed-foreignoffice_n_1407825.html.

16. Andy Morgan, “Stand-off in Northern Mali,” A1 Jazeera, 11 June 2012, http://www.al-
jazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/06/20126610723692872.html.

17. Adama Diarra, “Mali Islamist Leader Rejects Independence,” Reuters, 16 June 2012,
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/06/16/us-mali-crisis-ansardine-idUSBRE
85F0MD20120616.

18. Jeremy Keenan, “A New Crisis in the Sahel,” A1 Jazeera, 3 January 2012, http://www
.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2012/01/20121274447237703.html.

19. Peter Dorrie, “As Crisis Gathers, Northern Mali Needs More Than Just Military Inter¬
vention,” World Politics Review, 14 June 2012, http://www.worldpobticsreview.com/articles/12056
/as-crisis-gathers-northern-mali-needs-more-than-just-military-intervention.

20. Andrew McGregor, “Mali Pays the Price of al-Qaeda’s Asymmetrical Threat,” Terrorism Monitor 8,
no. 39 (28 October 2010), http://www.unhcr.org/refworkPpuhlisher,THEJF',,MLI,4cdl0ba72,0.html.

21. Caroline Pearce, Sebastien Fourmy, and Hetty Kovach, Delivering Education for All in
Mali, Oxfam International Research Report (Oxford, UK: Oxfam International, June 2009),
http://www.oxfam.org/sites/www.oxfam.org/files/delivering-education-for-all-mali
-report-07-06-09.pdf.

22. “Mali: rencontre entre groupes islamistes du nord aTombouctou,”Jeune Afrique, 28 May
2012, http://www.jeuneafrique.com/actu/20120528T200938Z20120528T200936Z/.

23. Nelly Lahoud et al., Letters from Abbottabad: Bin Ladin Sidelined ? (West Point, NY: Har¬
mony Program, Combating Terrorism Center at West Point, 3 May 2012), http://www.ctc.usma
.edu/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/CTC_LtrsFromAbottabad_WEB_v2.pdf.

Establishing a Marketplace ofWomen
in Peacekeeping

An Analysis of Gender Mainstreaming and Its Viability
in United Nations Peacekeeping Operations

Kerry Crawford*

Julia Macdonald

U nited Nations Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1325
took the unprecedented step of recognizing the profound im¬
pact of war on women and calling for their increased participa¬
tion in conflict prevention and resolution. It launched the UN’s
gender-mainstreaming initiative, and with it came the call to blue helmets
for women around the world. Yet, in light of the observation that the top
personnel contributors to UN peacekeeping are countries characterized by
high levels of gender inequality, the feasibility of gender mainstreaming in
peacekeeping remains questionable. This article uses the basic economic
principles of supply and demand to discuss the rationale for raising the
number of women in peacekeeping. Upon identifying the UN’s approach as
demand-driven, we turn to data from the UN Department of Peacekeeping
Operations (UNDPKO) and the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender
Gap Index to assess the feasibility of such a top-down approach. The data
from this comparison support our argument that the UN approach ignores
the gender realities of personnel-contributing countries. We conclude that

*Kerry Frances Crawford is a PhD candidate in political science and a predoctoral fellow with the Global
Gender Program at George Washington University. Her interests include gender dynamics in war, human
security, women in politics, women in the military, civilian casualties in war, and the formation of human
rights norms. She is writing a dissertation on variation in the responses of states, intergovernmental organi¬
zations, and nongovernmental organizations to sexual violence in war.

Julia Macdonald is a PhD candidate in political science and a research and teaching fellow in the Institute
for Security and Conflict Studies at George Washington University. Her current research focuses on signal¬
ing and threat credibility during international crises. Additional research interests include gender and peace¬
keeping, civil-military relations, and the role of experts in foreign policy decision making.

ESTABLISHING A MARKETPLACE OF WOMEN IN PEACEKEEPING 81

the UN must bolster its call for greater numbers of women in peacekeeping
with material incentives that foster greater gender integration within the
militaries of troop contributing countries (TCC).

The article first offers an overview of gender mainstreaming, the flawed
missions that led to recognition of the need to incorporate gender consider¬
ations in UN policies and operations, and the resolutions that constitute its
efforts to mainstream gender. It then outlines our theoretical framework
and the observable implications of supply- and demand-driven explanations.
The third section delves into the feasibility of the UN’s demand-driven
approach to gender mainstreaming, and the final section connects our as¬
sertions to UN policy and improvements for future research.

Bringing in Gender: Mainstreaming and UN Peacekeeping

UN peacekeeping operations are intended to stabilize postconflict regions
and monitor the enforcement of peace agreements. Sexual violence and
exploitation carried out by UN personnel (serving both military and civilian
roles) compromise the legitimacy of the mission, undermine the image of
UN peacekeepers as a benign and stabilizing force, present a serious moral
and ethical conflict for the UN, and perpetuate the cycle of violence against
women and girls in conflict zones. Entrenched assumptions of gender-
neutral effects of a UN presence as well as a consistent underestimation of
the unequal power dynamics between local civilians and peacekeepers in
planning for peacekeeping operations led to unintended consequences for
civilians—namely, exploitation of and sexual violence against women by
international peacekeepers during many UN missions.

The UN defines sexual exploitation as “any actual or attempted abuse
of a position of vulnerability, differential power, or trust, for sexual purposes,
including, but not limited to, profiting monetarily, socially or politically
from the sexual exploitation of another.” 1 It defines sexual abuse as “actual
or threatened physical intrusion of a sexual nature, whether by force or
under unequal or coercive conditions.” 2 The UN set out to address sexual
violence and exploitation of women in conflict zones, as well as other gender-
based concerns arising in war, through a process of gender mainstreaming—
the “process of assessing the implications for women and men of any
planned action, including legislation, policies or programmes, in all areas
and at all levels ... to achieve gender equality.” 3

82 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

UNSCR 1325, adopted on 31 October 2000, was the first major at¬
tempt to address the issue of sexual violence and exploitation of women and
girls in conflict zones and to call for the increased participation of women
in peacekeeping. The motivation was clear: women are disproportionately
affected by armed conflict, and when they are absent from the peacekeeping
process, the ultimate outcome overlooks gender-specific needs in the re¬
construction process and potentially contributes to continued instability
For instance, the UN Transitional Authority in Cambodia, launched in
1992 and active until 1993, did not include women peacekeepers. Through¬
out the operation, Cambodia experienced elevated rates of prostitution,
sexually transmitted disease, sexual assault, and (culturally stigmatized) extra¬
marital romantic relationships between civilians and peacekeepers. The
peacekeepers who perpetrated sexual violence or exploitation helped un¬
ravel the social and familial structures for some civilians, leaving many
Cambodians with the sense that the blue helmets had come only to trans¬
form Cambodian women into sex workers. 4 Logistically, the absence of
women peacekeepers made it difficult for civilians to report incidents of
sexual violence or exploitation perpetrated against them by peacekeepers or
combatants, which adversely affected the mission’s attempts to address the
effects of the conflict zone on women.

UNSCR 1325 takes into account the disproportionate effect of war on
women and girls and calls for more participation of women in peacekeep¬
ing, as well as a general effort to incorporate gender considerations during
the planning and implementation of UN missions. It places primary re¬
sponsibility for implementation on the Security Council, secretary-general,
member states supplying peacekeeping personnel, and parties to current
and future armed conflicts. The Security Council and secretary-general
consistently professed a commitment to addressing and preventing violence
against and exploitation of women in conflict zones. Nevertheless, after the
adoption of UNSCR 1325, allegations of exploitation and abuse of vulner¬
able civilian women by UN personnel began to surface as reporting mecha¬
nisms improved. 5 Although these were not the first instances of exploita¬
tion by peacekeeping forces, “the revelations in 2004 of sexual exploitation
and abuse by a significant number of United Nations peacekeeping personnel
in the Democratic Republic of the Congo” prompted an institutional re¬
view of prior reports received during other missions. 6 The review uncovered

ESTABLISHING A MARKETPLACE OF WOMEN IN PEACEKEEPING 83

sexual abuse and exploitation during operations in Bosnia and Herzegovina,
Kosovo, Cambodia, Timor-Leste, West Africa, and the Democratic Republic
of the Congo in the early 1990s through the mid-2000s. 7

The presence of peacekeeping forces has been linked to sharp increases
in the levels of sex trafficking and forced prostitution involving women and
children, rape, gender-based violence, and instances of civilian women and
girls hired by troops for domestic help and forced into sexual slavery. 8 The
missions in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Cambodia, Somalia,
and the Balkans all uncovered widespread instances of sexual assault against
and exploitation of girls and women. 9 By ignoring the gender construction
inherent in military training and the subsequent ramifications of placing
soldiers in situations that constrain the very identity of “soldier,” the UN
did not foresee the potential for sexual violence and exploitation of local
women by peacekeepers.

In the wake of damaging allegations of sexual violence and exploita¬
tion committed by civilian and military personnel deployed to postconflict
zones under UN auspices, the Security Council and secretary-general be¬
gan to take action through a comprehensive investigation and resolutions to
integrate gender considerations into peacekeeping operations and to im¬
prove peacekeepers’ legal accountability. A primary mechanism for success¬
ful UN peacekeeping missions is the perception of UN personnel as impar¬
tial, benign, and legitimate; abuse or exploitation of vulnerable civilians by
UN personnel does “great harm to the name of peacekeeping.” 10 The com¬
prehensive strategy to eliminate sexual exploitation during peacekeeping
missions, resulting from the investigation carried out by Jordan’s Prince
Zeid Ra’ad Zeid Al-Hussein and issued to the General Assembly in March
2005, outlines and recommends improvements to the UNDPKO’s stan¬
dards of conduct, investigative process, command responsibility, and indi¬
vidual accountability with regard to sexual exploitation and abuse. 11 This
investigation represented an important first step in addressing the UN’s role
in mitigating the devastating effects of armed conflict on women not only
through its recommendations as a moral authority but also through training
and appropriate disciplinary measures for its own deployed personnel.

Following the 2005 investigation, UNSCR 1820 was adopted on 19
June 2008 as a reaffirmation of UNSCR 1325, the Security Council’s com¬
mitment to integrating women into the peacekeeping process, and enforcement

84 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

of a zero-tolerance policy for UN personnel who sexually abuse or exploit
civilians. UNSCR 1820 was the first resolution to go beyond a general recog¬
nition of the adverse effects of war on women, to issue an injunction against
misconduct by peacekeeping staff", and to call on troop- and personnel-
contributing member states to train personnel on gender issues and respond
to instances of misconduct.

UNSCRs 1888 and 1889, adopted in 2009, built upon UNSCR 1820
with more specific measures fostering gender mainstreaming in postconflict
reconstruction. These measures involve creating special representatives and
special envoys of the secretary-general tasked with addressing sexual violence
in conflict, including womens protection advisers in peacekeeping missions.
They reiterated the need for states to deploy more women peacekeepers and
charged the secretary-general with the task of creating a full report of progress
made and remaining improvements after UNSCR 1325. 12

The Security Council has attempted to address and prevent incidents
of sexual violence and exploitation during peacekeeping missions planned
and implemented by the UNDPKO by adopting resolutions and formal
policies with limited change in practice. The Security Council and UNDPKO
have recognized the effects of a peacekeeping system comprised predomi¬
nantly of men deployed to unstable postconflict regions. Constraints posed
by the personnel supply structure, however, make formal attempts at change
difficult unless incentives for troop- and personnel-contributing states are
sufficient to offset the contributing states’ apparent hesitation to deploy
women peacekeepers.

Gender Mainstreaming: A Response to Supply or Demand?

Prior to addressing the feasibility of increasing the number of women
involved in peacekeeping missions, one must understand the UN’s rationale
for instituting a gender-mainstreaming policy. This article employs a theo¬
retical framework informed by basic economic principles to investigate the
motivation for UN attempts to realize gender equality in peacekeeping
operations. Approaching the puzzle in this way enables us to determine
where the catalyst for the gender-mainstreaming initiative originated. The
following sections apply the principles of supply and demand to the rationale
underpinning the UN’s efforts to mainstream gender in peacekeeping and

ESTABLISHING A MARKETPLACE OF WOMEN IN PEACEKEEPING 85

offer the observable implications of each explanation to determine which
has more support.

Supply-Driven Explanation

As discussed above, the UN’s gender-mainstreaming initiative, as it pertains
to peacekeeping, is embodied in UNSCRs 1325,1820,1888, and 1889.The
adoption of UNSCR 1325 in October 2000 marks the point at which the
UN began to grapple with the issue of gender equality within its own opera¬
tions. Within peacekeeping, gender mainstreaming has the goal of increasing
womens participation in missions at all levels of decision making—true for
both supply- and demand-driven explanations of gender mainstreaming.
The key difference between a supply-driven and a demand-driven explanation
lies in the catalyst or motivation for the policy.

A supply-driven explanation holds that the UN effort to increase the
participation of women in peacekeeping was motivated primarily by an
existing presence of women in the militaries of member states. Gender
mainstreaming, in this situation, amounts to a reaction to the gender com¬
position of national militaries rather than a response to mission failures or
top-down rhetorical statements about the need for gender equality in
peacekeeping. The UN’s gender-mainstreaming efforts would simply be a
codification in policy of a preexisting reality: the female troops are already
serving, and the policy emphasizing womens participation follows in an
effort to recognize this fact.

A supply-driven explanation finds support if data indicate an overall
trend toward gender equality at the state level. Data at that level, however,
show that willingness to send women into combat varies widely: “In almost
every country, the question of how and where women should be deployed
inspires strident debate.” 13 When national militaries are willing to recruit
and deploy women, they employ an egalitarian rationale—one that gained
traction with the advent of modern, more technologically advanced militaries.
The modern military requires less brute strength and more intellectual acu¬
men, discrediting the argument that women make less capable soldiers than
men. 14 In the modern military, men and women are theoretically equal; the
UN’s rationale for gender mainstreaming rests on the assumption that
women fulfill certain roles more successfully than men and that the presence
of women in peacekeeping has a neutralizing effect on male aggression.

86 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

Thus, even for integrated militaries, the UN’s gender-mainstreaming logic
conflicts with the national justification for recruiting women to serve. Gender
integration in the military varies widely, and it seems unlikely that the UN’s
gender-mainstreaming initiative derived its inspiration from a global surge
of women in the military

Demand-Driven Explanation

In contrast to supply-driven explanations, demand-driven accounts hold
that efforts to increase the participation of women in peacekeeping are
driven by the UN’s need for the greater involvement of women, regardless
of the existing gender composition of national militaries. In this case, the
UN would institute gender mainstreaming in response to peacekeeping
failures and the belief that improved gender equality would have a beneficial
effect on mission outcomes. A demand-driven explanation might also
reach beyond this narrow strategic calculation to include the UN’s broader
interest in promoting gender equality and reinforcing the perception of
the organization and its personnel as impartial, benign, and legitimate
representatives of international society. 15 One would find support for a
demand-driven account principally in the timing of and justification for
UN gender-mainstreaming resolutions. More specifically, a demand-
driven explanation finds support if UN resolutions were adopted in reaction
to peacekeeping missions thought to have failed because of the absence of
women peacekeepers.

The timing of the UNSCRs, combined with the organizational justifi¬
cation for the greater inclusion of women in peacekeeping operations, pro¬
vides strong evidence for a demand-driven account. The Security Council
and secretary-general had consistently professed a commitment to address¬
ing and preventing violence against women in conflict zones, but not until
a flurry of reports of crimes against women surfaced in the 1990s did the
UN adopt UNSCR 1325 and institutionalize gender mainstreaming in
peacekeeping operations. 16 Additional allegations of exploitation and abuse
of civilian women at the hands of UN personnel in the wake this resolution
prompted further institutional reviews of conduct across missions, revealing
the presence of sexual abuse and exploitation during operations in Bosnia
and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Cambodia, Timor-Leste, West Africa, and the
Democratic Republic of the Congo in the early 1990s through the mid-2000s. 17

ESTABLISHING A MARKETPLACE OF WOMEN IN PEACEKEEPING 87

To address reports of sexual violence and exploitation committed by
UN civilian and military personnel deployed to conflict zones, the Security
Council and secretary-general developed a comprehensive strategy to elim¬
inate exploitation during peacekeeping missions. It sought to improve the
UNDPKO’s standards of conduct, investigative processes, command re¬
sponsibility, and individual accountability with regard to sexual exploitation
and abuse. 18 The Security Council adopted UNSCR 1820 in June 2008 to
further cement UNSCR 1325 and the council’s overall commitment to
integrating women into the peacekeeping process as well as to enforce a
zero-tolerance policy for UN personnel who sexually abuse or exploit civilians.
UNSCRs 1888 and 1889, adopted in 2009, added more specific measures to
foster gender mainstreaming in postconflict reconstruction. 19

Not only the timing of resolutions but also the UN’s framing of gender
mainstreaming as a solution to prior mission failures bolsters a demand-
driven explanation. Enlarging the presence of women in peacekeeping mis¬
sions evidently reduces cases of exploitation, sexual abuse, and violence
against women in conflict and unstable postconflict zones for at least three
reasons. First, the UN considers women necessary participants in peace¬
keeping because of traits specific to their gender that allow them to com¬
plete and excel at tasks that men cannot perform. The predominant under¬
standing of female peacekeepers and their contributions to the mission is
that they, as women, are uniquely suited to work with victims of sexual vio¬
lence. Therefore, they can address instances that occurred during the armed
conflict or that were perpetrated by peacekeepers, fostering increased ac¬
countability in the cases of peacekeeper-perpetrated abuse. Civilians are
less likely to perceive women as invaders or conquerors, and they have a
civilizing effect, making the traditionally all-male deployment environment
seem more like everyday life in society. 20

Second, in addition to the specific tasks that women may perform better
than men, a peacekeeping force comprised of both women and men appears
less intimidating to civilians. Under the dominant logic of UN gender
mainstreaming, having more women in male-dominated missions improves
the image of the peacekeeping force on the ground and within the local
population. 21 Finally, female troops apparently have a pacifying or civilizing
effect on their male comrades in arms. The presence of women working in
deployed military and police units approximates “real life” and consequently

88 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

minimizes the aggressive tendencies of peacekeepers who may otherwise
find themselves swayed by the anarchic, overly masculine, and surreal nature
of postconflict instability. 22

In sum, both the timing of and justification for the greater inclusion of
women in peacekeeping operations support a demand-driven explanation
for the UN’s gender-mainstreaming initiative. The UN consistently took
action in response to mission failures on the assumption that the increased
presence of women would have a beneficial impact on peacekeeping out¬
comes. These policy changes have resulted in an increased demand for
women peacekeepers across all missions since the issuance of UNSCR 1325
in October 2000.

The Feasibility of Demand-Driven Gender Mainstreaming

In light of the evidence pointing to a demand-driven explanation for
gender mainstreaming, this article now addresses the feasibility of this
policy initiative. This is important for at least two reasons. First, and most
obviously, change in UN policies regarding the incorporation of women
peacekeepers into missions is a crucial step toward achieving gender equality
in peacekeeping operations. However, the initiative must also account for
gender realities on the ground and within the TCCs to realize any practical
success. Second, and following from this, by investigating whether a discon¬
nect exists between the gender-mainstreaming policy and the gender com¬
positions of troops from contributing countries, this article can evaluate the
future success of the UN gender-mainstreaming initiative.

UN Troop-Contribution Data as a Measure of Feasibility

To determine the feasibility of the gender-mainstreaming policy, we have
narrowed the focus of the investigation to include the top 10 TCCs as
identified by the UN. Table 1 includes the rankings of military and police
contributions by country for 2010, combining police and troop numbers for
all countries in order to increase the sample size.

Using figures published by the UN, we disaggregated these total figures
according to gender composition, presenting the average monthly male and
female peacekeepers contributed by each country in 2010. Table 2 presents

ESTABLISHING A MARKETPLACE OF WOMEN IN PEACEKEEPING 89

the results alongside the average annual percentage of female peacekeepers
contributed by country for this year of activity

Table 1. Ranking of military and police contributions by country (2010)

Ranking

Country

Average Total per Month

Pakistan

10,707

Bangladesh

10,614

India

8,805

Nigeria

5,815

Egypt

5,426

Nepal

5,044

Jordan

3,745

Rwanda

3,679

Ghana

3,663

Uruguay

2,521

Source-. UNDPKO, "Ranking of Military and Police Contributions [2010],” accessed 3 August
2011, http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/resources/statistics/contributors_archive.shtml.

Table 2. Gender composition of military and police contributions for the top 10 TCCs in 2010

Ranking

Country

Average Total
per Month

Average

Male

Average

Female

Percent

Female

Pakistan

10,707

10,663

0.4

Bangladesh

10,614

10,488

126

1.2

India

8,805

8,665

140

1.6

Nigeria

5,815

5,447

368

6.3

Egypt

5,426

5,411

0.3

Nepal

5,044

4,948

1.9

Jordan

3,745

3,739

0.2

Rwanda

3,679

3,586

2.5

Ghana

3,663

3,340

323

8.8

Uruguay

2,521

2,403

118

4.7

Source-. UNDPKO, “Ranking of Military and Police Contributions [2010],” accessed 3 August 2011, http://www.un.org/en/peace
keeping/resources/statistics/contributors_archive.shtml.

90 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

According to these results, the average annual female contribution of
the top 10 peacekeeping countries is 2.2 percent of their total. Of the top-
ranking military- and police-contributing countries, Jordan has the lowest
rating with a 0.2 percent annual contribution of women peacekeepers, while
Ghana tops the table with 8.8 percent. Unfortunately, the gender composi¬
tion of the top 10 military- and police-contributing countries is available
only for 2010. To account for this relative lack of data and to further bolster
these findings, we engaged in mission-specific research to determine
whether these macro annual figures reflected microlevel realities. Our
monthly analysis of troop contributions by the top 10 ranking countries to
UN peacekeeping missions in the Democratic Republic of the Congo
(MONUC), Western Sahara (MINURSO), Central African Republic and
Chad (MINURCAT), Darfur (UNAMID), and Timor-Leste (UNMIT)
supported our aggregate annual findings. Analysis of mission contributions
to operations in Liberia (UNMIL) and Haiti (MINUSTAH), however,
revealed Bangladesh and India as outliers, both contributing high percent¬
ages of women peacekeepers. Further research is necessary to determine the
cause of this variation.

Data from the Global Gender Gap Index as a Measure of Feasibility

The World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Index is a helpful tool
for researchers seeking to understand the magnitude of disparities between
men and women nationally, regionally, and globally. The index focuses on
inequality between men and women within countries, not unequal re¬
sources and opportunities across countries. 23 It does so by ranking
countries according to gaps in men’s and women’s access to and partici¬
pation in economics, politics, health, and education and by measuring
gaps in rather than levels of access to opportunities and resources. The
index examines gender disparities within four core categories: economic
participation and opportunity, educational attainment, health and sur¬
vival, and political empowerment. 24

We consulted the Global Gender Gap Index rankings for each of the
top 10 TCCs to assess the gender realities on the ground in each of these
countries. Because the index ranking is not affected by relative levels of
development, it offers a fair look at gender realities in these countries. Table
3 records the index ranking for each of the top-ranked TCCs.

ESTABLISHING A MARKETPLACE OF WOMEN IN PEACEKEEPING 91

Table 3. Gender Gap Index ranking of top lOTCCs

UN TCC Ranking

TCC

Gender Gap Index Ranking

Pakistan

132

Bangladesh

India

112

Nigeria

118

Egypt

125

Nepal

115

Jordan

120

Rwanda

n/a

Ghana

Uruguay

Source-. Ricardo Hausmann, Laura D. Tyson, and Saadia Zahidi, The Global Gender Gap
Report (Geneva: World Economic Forum, 2010), 8-9, http://www3.weforum.org/docs
/WEF_Gende rGap_Report_2010.pdf.

We are not attempting to delve into specific domestic gender policies/
issues or to indict countries for their gender disparities; rather, we are ad¬
dressing a macrolevel view of gender inequality in UN TCCs. Even a brief
examination of this overall score reveals that the UN gender-mainstreaming
policy urging greater participation for women in peacekeeping does not
effectively take gender realities into account. Table 4 pairs the top-ranked
UN TCCs with their Global Gender Gap Index ranking and troop contri¬
butions disaggregated by sex. In pairing the index ranking with the UN
data on troop contributions, we assert that a disconnect exists between top-
down UN gender-mainstreaming policy pertaining to peacekeeping opera¬
tions and the reality of the gender composition in TCCs.

Overall Summation of UN and Global Gender Gap Index Data

Given the troop-contribution data and the Gender Gap score for the top
TCCs, we argue that the demand-driven approach to gender mainstream¬
ing in UN peacekeeping fails to account for gender realities within TCCs.
Such a top-down approach to improving gender equality in peacekeeping
missions is likely to encounter only limited success since the TCCs’national
militaries must first work to integrate women in their ranks. Illustration of

92 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

Table 4. Ranking of military and police contributions paired with Gender Gap Index ranking (2011)

TCC

Gender

Gap

Index

Ranking

UN TCC
Ranking

Average
Male Troops
Contributed

Average

Female

Troops

Contributed

Average

Total

Troops

Contributed

Per¬

cent

Female

Troops

Pakistan

132

10,663

10,707

0.4

Bangladesh

10,488

126

10,614

1.2

India

112

8,665

140

8,805

1.6

Nigeria

118

5,447

368

5,815

6.3

Egypt

125

5,411

5,426

0.3

Nepal

115

4,948

5,044

1.9

Jordan

120

3,739

3,745

0.2

Rwanda

n/a

3,586

3,679

2.5

Ghana

3,340

323

3,663

8.8

Uruguay

2,403

118

2,521

4.7

the disconnect between UN policy and gender reality in the TCCs further
supports our argument that UN gender mainstreaming in peacekeeping is
a demand-driven and reactionary policy instituted in response to previous
mission failures.

Policy Implications for a
Mainstreaming Initiative That Misses the Mark

When gender dynamics come into play in armed conflicts and when
efforts to calm hostilities generate unintended consequences, the urgency of
incorporating gender into the peacekeeping and reconstruction efforts
increases. International actors are only starting to grasp the necessity of
recognizing and accounting for gender issues in war. When peacekeeping
and reconstruction efforts do not account for gender dynamics, they are
unable to provide appropriate guidance and services, given the gender bal¬
ance of the postconflict population and gender-based tactics utilized during
the conflict. A second consequence resulting from gender-blind stabilization
and reconstruction—the exacerbation of gender-based exploitation and
violence perpetrated by peacekeepers and other international actors in the
field—compromises the legitimacy of the mission, undermines the image

ESTABLISHING A MARKETPLACE OF WOMEN IN PEACEKEEPING 93

of peacekeepers, and perpetuates the cycle of gender-based violence in con¬
flict zones.

By ignoring the construction of the masculine soldier, the under¬
representation of women in militarized peacekeeping, and established or
shifting gender norms in the host country, peacekeeping missions have his¬
torically led to negative consequences for civilian women. Assumptions of
gender neutrality and underestimation of the unequal power dynamics
between civilians and peacekeepers in planning, training for, and executing
peace operations led to rape, social stigmatization, increased transmission
of sexually transmitted diseases, and higher demand for human trafficking
during the peacekeeping missions in the 1990s. 25 The combined impact of
wars that employed gender-based violence, reconstruction efforts that over¬
looked gender issues, and peacekeepers who abused their positions of power
in postconflict zones awoke the international community to the need to
consider the very real effects of gender in war and peacekeeping. UNSCR
1325 laid the groundwork for a solution to these problems in its call for
enhanced participation of women in peacekeeping and a greater effort to
incorporate gender considerations when planning and implementing
missions, but the groundbreaking resolution possesses an air of shortsight¬
edness in its call. As we have argued above, the UN’s attempt to mainstream
gender in peacekeeping ignores the gender realities ofTCCs; in so doing, it
runs the risk of remaining little more than lofty rhetoric.

Our assertion that the UN’s demand-driven approach to gender main-
streaming, one characterized by a reactionary stance to past mission failures
and embarrassments, raises a very simple but important question: What
should the UN do about it? We have established the existence of a disconnect
between UNSCR 1325’s call for women peacekeepers and the gender re¬
alities in the top TCCs (as illustrated by the 2010 Global Gender Gap
Index). What we propose is far from unheard of in UN peacekeeping
strategy. To correct the top-down nature of the UN’s current approach to
encouraging greater participation of women in peacekeeping, that organi¬
zation must offer incentives for state militaries to contribute female peace¬
keepers, just as it does for personnel contributions in general. One such
incentive may take the form of a larger stipend for TCCs whose personnel
contributions include a greater percentage of women in all ranks. The cur¬
rent stipend of approximately $1,000 (US) per individual per month might

94 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

rise incrementally for each percentage increase of female peacekeepers from
a given TCC, up to gender parity For instance, a 1 percent increase in the
number of female peacekeepers could merit a stipend of $1,010 (US) per
individual per month. To the top TCCs, this small boost in stipend would
generate a significant amount of financial support for national military in¬
stitutions. Although we recognize that financial incentives alone cannot
close gender gaps and that the process of achieving gender integration in
national militaries is a very gradual one, our point is simply that the gender¬
mainstreaming policy cannot have a substantial effect without offering in¬
centives to the countries asked to send their women into conflict zones.

Conclusions and Further Research

By employing a theoretical framework informed by the basic economic
principles of supply and demand, this article has investigated the motiva¬
tion for UN attempts to attain gender equality in peacekeeping operations.
Finding support for a demand-driven explanation of this policy change, it
utilized data from the UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations and
the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Index to assess the
feasibility of the gender-mainstreaming initiative. Analysis of the data
showed a clear disconnect between the UN gender-mainstreaming policy
and the gender composition of the top TCCs to peacekeeping missions. We
argue that this disconnect holds important implications for the future success
of the UN gender-mainstreaming policy and assert that the UN must bolster
its calls for the greater participation of women with targeted incentives.

This article represents one step in a broader research project on gender
mainstreaming in peacekeeping operations. The findings presented herein
are largely preliminary, due in part to the difficulty in ascertaining the gender
composition of personnel contributions by country to UN peacekeeping
missions prior to 2010. As peacekeeping gender-composition data become
more widely available, further studies might collect information on the
gender composition of the top 10 military- and police-contributing coun¬
tries over a longer period of time and expand the sample size beyond the top
10 TCCs to test the validity of these initial findings. In addition, aberrant
cases such as India and Bangladesh warrant further microlevel cross-sectional
analysis, investigating troop contributions by country and mission. More
extensive evaluation of these outliers will highlight differences among the

ESTABLISHING A MARKETPLACE OF WOMEN IN PEACEKEEPING 95

top TCCs that might help the UN better tailor its gender-mainstreaming
incentives to increase the number of women across all peacekeeping missions.

Notes

1. UN General Assembly, A Comprehensive Strategy to Eliminate Future Sexual Exploitation and
Abuse in United Nations Peacekeeping Operations , A/59/710 (New York: UN General Assembly, 24
March 2005), 7, http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.aspPsymboUA/59/710.

2. Ibid., 7-8.

3. UN Department of Peacekeeping Operations (DPKO), Gender Equality in UN Peacekeeping
Operations , DPKO Policy Directive (New York: UN DPKO, 3 November 2006), 8, http://www
.un.org/womenwatch/feature/wps/Policy%20directive%20gender%20equality%20FINAL%20
2006.pdf.

4. Sandra Whitworth, Men, Militarism & UN Peacekeeping: A Gendered Analysis (Boulder, CO:
Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2004), 68.

5. Following UNSCR1325, the General Assembly adopted Resolution 57/306 on 15 April 2003
urging the secretary-general to address sexual exploitation in peacekeeping operations. In 2005 the
General Assembly and Secretary-General Kofi Annan commissioned a comprehensive review of
sexual exploitation in peacekeeping missions. UN General Assembly, Comprehensive Strategy, 10.

6. Ibid., [1].

7. Ibid., 7.

8. Keith J. Allred, “Peacekeepers and Prostitutes: How Deployed Forces Fuel the Demand for Traf¬
ficked Women and New Hope for Stopping It,” Armed Forces a?id Society 33, no. 1 (October 2006): 5-23,
http://www.operationspaix.net/DATA/DOCUMENT/5507~v~Peacekeepers_and_Prostitutes
_How_Deployed_Forces_Fuel_the_Demand_for_Trafficked_Women_and_New_Hope_for
_Stopping_It.pdf.

9. When confronted with complaints about the UN’s omission of sexual assault charges against
peacekeepers from official peacekeeping documents and accounts, the United Nations Transitional
Authority in Cambodia expressed the sentiment that “boys will be boys” and that the peacekeeping
mission in Cambodia was “accomplished in part through the deployment of soldiers who assumed
that their prerogatives as militarized men included access to prostitutes, as well as a freedom to
pursue, harass, and assault local women.” Whitworth, Men, Militarism & UN Peacekeeping, 13. This
expectation of soldiers’ pursuit of female sexual partners in Cambodia grossly overlooks the local
social norms, which stigmatize and punish girls and women who engage in perceived sexual promis¬
cuity, regardless of whether the encounter is consensual or forced. For comprehensive accounts of
other missions, see Chiyuki Aoi, Cedric de Coning, and Ramesh Thakur, eds., Unintended Conse¬
quences of Peacekeeping Operations (Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 2007). For the UN’s take
on these missions, see UN General Assembly, Comprehensive Strategy.

10. UN General Assembly, Comprehensive Strategy, [1].

11. Ibid.

12. UN Security Council, S/Res/1888, 30 September 2009, http://www.un.org/ga/search
/view_doc.asp?symbol=S/RES/1888(2009); and UN Security Council, S/Res/1889, 5 October
2009, http://www.un.org/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=S/RES/1889(2009).

96 ASPJAFRICA & FRANCOPHONIE

13. Gerard J. DeGroot, “A Few Good Women: Gender Stereotypes, the Military and Peace¬
keeping,” in Women and International Peacekeeping , ed. Louise Olsson and Torunn L. Tryggestad
(London: Frank Cass Publishers, 2001), 28.

14. Ibid., 32.

15. UN General Assembly, Comprehensive Strategy, 1-2, 7.

16. UNDPKO, Gender Equality, 3.

17. UN General Assembly, Comprehensive Strategy, 7.

18. Ibid.

19. UN Security Council, S/Res/1888; and UN Security Council, S/Res/1889.

20. Louise Olsson and Torunn L. Tryggestad, “Introduction,” in Olsson and Tryggestad, Women
and International Peacekeeping, 2.

21. DeGroot, “Few Good Women,” 34.

22. Doreen Carvajal, “A Female Approach to Peacekeeping,” New York Times, 5 March 2010,
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/03/06/world/afri ca/06iht-ffpeace.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0.

23. Ricardo Hausmann, Laura D. Tyson, and Saadia Zahidi, The Global Gender Gap Report
(Geneva: World Economic Forum, 2010), 3, http://www3.weforum.org/docs/WEF_GenderGap
_Report_2010.pdf.

24. Ibid., 4.

25. Whitworth, Men, Militarism £sf UN Peacekeeping, 12-17.

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