1. Putting Nonviolent Peaceforce in
the picture
Christine Schweitzer
1.1.1 Nonviolence
Nonviolence is not a very exact term. It
not only describes a whole class of activities,
but also describes attitudes and life-style.
The debate among nonviolent activists is whether
the latter are preconditions to the first, or
whether nonviolence is
a principle or a technique. Both
approaches hold nonviolence as
an efficient instrument and an ethical means
for dealing with conflict and political strife
because it tries to minimise damages and casualties.
Both also agree that nonviolence might be used for reformist
or for revolutionary purposes,
and that it may be used to promote social change
(nonviolent action, nonviolent uprisings etc.)
and to prevent unwelcome changes (social defence
or civilian-based defense).
The biggest differences between the two approaches
lie in the nature of commitment,
the assumed relationship between means and ends,
the approach to conflict in general, the attitude
towards the opponent with the assumed way of
how nonviolence "works",
and the mentioned issue of nonviolence as a way of life.
It is certainly possible that
the difference between both approaches might
be an ideological rather than an empirical question.
On the one hand, elements of coercing the opponent
can be found in campaigns of principled nonviolent leaders
like Gandhi and Martin Luther King. Any
action has an impact on the opponent. The effect
of this action, whether coercive or persuasive,
may depend on the opponent’s perception and the
cost he is willing to incur. For example: Gandhi's
death fast in 1948 made
his opponents give in, not because they were
convinced, but because they felt that the political
costs of Gandhi's death would be too high. This
same action carried out by unknown and widely
despised Kurdish prisoners in Turkey led to more
than twenty deaths (May 2001). On the other
hand, many defenders of the pragmatic approach
might profess an ethical foundation for themselves,
but believe that they should not impose their
convictions on others, and that they might better
win support by using rational-pragmatic arguments. Certainly,
if the activists manage to convey to their opponent
that they do not hate him, that they are concerned
about his well being, and that they are ready
to consider his interests, this might produce
a positive dynamic in the conflict situation,
which could not have happened otherwise. However,
there might still be an element of coercion involved: "Clearly,
life is not a choice between violence and no
violence. It is a choice between violence and
less violence; the latter sometimes expressed
through the medium of nonviolence."
1.1.2.1
Some definitions
There are many definitions
of social conflict, and this study is not the
place to investigate the theory of conflict in
depth. Friedrich Glasl’s definition
has been chosen because it has the advantage
of being broad and neutral enough to allow an
all-encompassing view of social conflict. Friedrich Glasl’s (1994)
handbook on conflict resolution will play a role
again later on when talking about conflict stages.
He says:
"Social conflict
is an interaction between actors (individuals,
groups, organisations and so on), where at least
one actor sees incompatibilities in the thinking/
imagination/ perception, and/ or feeling, and/or
wanting with another actor (other actors) in
a way, that in the realisation there is impairment
by another actor (the other actors)."
Conflicts may be categorised according
to:
Different
objects (e.g. strategic conflicts, issue conflicts).
For the international field, Kumar Rupesinghe distinguishes
resource-based conflicts, conflicts over governance
and authority, ideological conflicts and identity
conflicts.
Visibility
(latent-manifest conflicts)
Characteristics
of the conflict parties, their position and relationship
to each other (e.g. individuals-groups, rulers-ruled),
Level
of escalation (see below)
Means
used to carry the conflict out.
1.1.2.2
Violent conflicts
Conflicts become a special
issue for attention when and if they are carried
out by violent means. Peace researchers have
reserved the term "war" for violent
conflicts that fulfil certain criteria. Usually
there has to be a minimum number of casualties
(1000 per year or per conflict), and some kind
of regular army and central organisation on one
side of the conflict at least .
Violent conflicts that do not fulfil these criteria
are called armed conflicts.
Since World War II there have
been about 200 wars. The number of wars taking
place each year has increased every year to a
total of 51 wars in 1992. The decline in the
following years to 29 wars in 1997 has again
been reversed, and the number of wars has risen
to 34 in 1999. Almost 75 % of them have taken
place in Africa (14) and Asia (11). Others were
in the Middle East (6), Latin America (2) and
Europe (1). In 1999 alone seven new wars started.
Today the majority of wars
are internal wars -
the number of international wars has been falling
drastically to almost zero in recent years. (In
1999 AKUF counted 3, with three more wars with
a strong international component.)
But while this is certainly reason enough to
concentrate on internal wars when dealing with
the issue of conflict intervention, it would
be too soon to conclude that the danger of new
major international wars has been eliminated.
There are many different ways
to categorise armed conflicts.
For the purpose of this study it is sufficient
to find categories that are meaningful for conflict
intervention. As a working conflict typology,
the one proposed by Miall et.
al. (1999) will
be freely combined with the one used by AKUF.
If in the course of the research, further distinction
will prove useful, the typology might be refined. It
is based on a combination of actors and issues:
1. International/interstate
conflicts
2. Internal
conflicts
2.1 anti-regime (Miall et
al: "revolution/ideology") conflicts/wars
2.2 autonomy and secession
(Miall et al: "identity/secession")
conflicts
2.3 factional conflicts (AKUF: "other
internal wars" or "unrests" depending
on if there is central organisation of the fighting
on both sides, regular forces at least on one
side involved, and some continuity of the fighting)
2.4 decolonising wars.
Further distinctive categories
are:
1. If
at least on one side the fighting is done by
regular forces (military, police, paramilitary
units) of the government or
not (distinction probably only relevant in internal
conflicts.
2. If
there is violence carried out only by one side,
and the other side is using only nonviolent means (distinction
at least theoretical both applicable for international
and internal conflicts),
3. If
there is direct military involvement by an external
party (military intervention)
The fact that civil wars are
the predominant kind of organised violence today
has had a significant impact on the problems
faced by those who deal with them. Often there
are many actors, and just as often across the
boundaries of one state - with very different
interests. Recently, the category of those who
profit from the continuation of a war has gained
special attention (the recent UN report on peacekeeping calls
them simply "spoilers"); Mary Anderson
distinguishes "thugs", "irreconcilables", "arms
merchants and other profiteers". The
wars are highly privatised, fought with small
weapons, and civilians easily might become part-time
warriors, extinguishing the clear distinction
between combatants and non-combatants. International
Humanitarian Law is heeded less and less. Civilians
and those trying to help have often been made
the target of violent attacks, as are civilian
installations such as hospitals, schools, refugee
centres and cultural sites.
1.1.2.3
Causes of (armed) conflict
The research on causes of
armed conflict so far has not produced a consistent
theory acceptable to most scholars working in
the field. However, It is very likely that there
is one consensus: that conflict cannot be reduced
to a single cause, or a single explanation. It
is obvious that there are "very few necessary
conditions" which need to be fulfilled in
order for a war to develop, and "very many
sufficient conditions, of which only a few of
these may apply, in any single conflict. War
is possible as soon as weapons are available
with which to fight it and as long as there is
a dispute between two or more parties. What makes
war probable, however, is a far more complicated
question."
There are different categories
of explanations: genetic and evolutionary/biologist
theories (aggression as a genetic function, maximisation
of survival chances), behaviourist theories (war
as learned behaviour), cost-benefit theories
(maximisation of benefit), ecological (war for
scarce resources), social/cultural theories (ethnicity
and/or religion as conflict causes), and cognitive
(attitudes) explanations.
Before the early 1990s most
scholars concentrated on international war. Only
recently have the causes for internal conflict
come into consideration. These are: the role
of power imbalances (a concept known since Roman
domination), of economic growth and free trade,
of relative deprivation (difference between expected
and real access to well-being and power), of
deterioration of the environment, of the state
as such and the ideology of nationalism, of specific
forms of political organisation (democracy, authoritarian
regimes, transitional regimes), of the existence
of a monopoly of power, and of the connection
between internal cohesion and external aggression.
Remarkably there are theories that say that an
existing monopoly of power and internal cohesion
are supportive for peace, and theories that say
the opposite.
Clearly the state of the research on conflict
causes is inconclusive.
The role of ethnic diversity
is controversial as well. In the eyes of many
researchers about conflict, it is not a cause
per se although parties in conflict do tend to
identify themselves ethnically. Ethnicity is
a powerful factor in mobilising people against
each other because ethnicity is easy to ascribe,
touches upon fundamental values, and seems to
be non negotiable. Still, it should be regarded
as an instrument, and an ideological base, rather
than as a cause.
The
different, and often popular, psychological and
biological theories try to explain why people
are willing to support and participate in war,
but they cannot give a sufficient explanation
of why there is modern war. Individual aggression
cannot explain armament, arms industry and the
modern military.
Agreement seems to exist on
these three important factors for the development
of war:
Bad
economic conditions seem to be a main cause for
internal conflicts.
Repressive
political systems, especially if they are in
a state of transition, are war-prone
Degradation
of renewable resources (erosion, deforestation,
scarcity of water) may contribute to the possibility
of armed conflict.
On the other hand, empirically,
it seems that democratic states do not go to
war against each other. This observation has
led to much comment, and is the rationale for
many conflict interventions, specifically the
democratisation programs undertaken by OSCE,
UN and others.
Proponents of nonviolent action
tend to emphasize individualistic theories of
conflict as well, probably because most of the
supporters are rooted in individualistic Western
culture. Special mention needs to be made of
the human needs approach which has been propagated
by John Burton and
others. It is the theoretical basis of many conflict
resolution projects, and specifically, so-called
conflict-solving workshops. Burton sees three
types of human motivation: needs, values and
interests. The basic needs are "universal
and primordial", and they are about avoiding
three primary emotions (fear, anger and depression)
in order to permit the fourth emotion, the positive
emotional state of satisfaction/happiness. Because
human beings are being driven by these emotions,
humans have a corresponding set of needs for
conditions of life that give them satisfaction.
There is no general agreement on what these secondary
needs might be; most often mentioned are identity,
freedom, recognition, stimulation, distributive
justice, participation, rationality, and control. Because
these basic needs absolutely must be fulfilled,
people are ready to go to war for them, or so
the argument goes. But this theory does not take
into account structural or cultural factors that
allow some groups to satisfy their secondary
needs at the expense of other groups, over a
long time, and without being challenged.
Perhaps much of the more fruitless
parts of the discussion could be avoided if there
was agreement on Smith's proposal to distinguish
four types of causes of
conflict:
Background
causes (basic elements of social and political
structure, e.g. that certain groups are excluded
from power, or that there are regional economic
differences);
Mobilisation
Strategies (objectives of key political actors
and the way they go about fulfilling these objectives;
Triggers
(factors that affect the timing of the onset
of the armed conflict);
Catalysts
(factors that influence the intensity and duration
of a conflict, including external factors like
an international intervention).
1.1.3.1
Conflict stages
Conflicts may be either latent
or manifest, and tend to escalate if not dealt
with in time. Usually escalation means that communication
between the parties breaks down, and the readiness
to use violence (first usually verbal, then physical)
grows. Many social scientists have attempted
to define this development by describing typical
stages of conflict escalation.
Friedrich Glasl deals
mainly with conflict in business, but his set
of nine stages can easily be used for political
large-scale conflicts.
Glasl shows how parties in conflict
loose the ability to co-operate in a constructive
manner as their successive and mutual experiences
are break down. He identifies several "points
of no return" which contribute decisively
to the escalation. In
stage 1,
there is a hardening of the positions. It is
the content of the conflict that is the centre
of attention, and the parties trust that it will
be possible to solve the problem. In the second
stage, polarisation and debate take place. The
conflicted parties unite within themselves (cohesion),
and stereotypes develop. When they reach the
point where they feel that talking to one another
is not productive, they "create facts" (stage
3: "deeds instead of words"). From
there the relationship to the opposing party
becomes a central part of the content of the
conflict itself. "There's no use in talking
to them," is the experience, "now we
have to act!" From now on behaviour towards
one another becomes more clearly negative, as
do the notions the opponents have of each other.
As the conflict constellation deteriorates, the
parties slide into a situation where each feels
threatened and endangered by the actions of the
other (stages 4-6). In stage 4 the relationship
becomes the problem. Stereotypes, and "win-lose" situations
arise. In stage 5 direct attacks on the position
of the opponent begin, and each party seeks to "expose" the "true
character" of its opponent causing him to
loose face. In stage 6 the threatening begins,
and isolated violent acts might happen.
The next decisive threshold
is crossed when threats and ultimatums are superseded
by (still limited) actions directed against the
power base of the organisation or group concerned
(stage 7). From this moment on the parties no
longer see each other in human terms but see
only objects that they want to be rid of (stages
7-9). From now on the violence directed toward
each other becomes the predominant issue of the
conflict. In stage 8 the basis of power and existence
of the opponent are targets, and mutual destruction
takes place. In the 9th and final stage there
is total confrontation even at the price of one's
own destruction. The only goal is to eliminate
the opponent.
Ronald J. Fisher has
transferred Glasl's model
from its original context of social conflicts,
mostly in or between organisations, to the context
of political conflicts. He simplifies Glasl's nine
stages to four: stage 1: communication, stage
2: polarisation, stage 3: segregation, stage
4: destruction.
All models of conflict that
describe stages are of course a gross simplification
of any given real-life conflict, as Leatherman et al. point
out. Conflict processes are usually multidimensional,
and unfold in a disjunctive manner. There are
usually multiple levels in each conflict (e.g.
the individual, the intra-societal, the international),
as well as multiple issues. Escalation may take
place, both vertically (behaviours, choice of
means) and horizontally (expansion of issues,
goals, actors, geographical scope).
1.1.3.2 Nonviolent conflict
escalation
The model developed by Glasl and
Fisher does not recognise the possibility of
a nonviolent conflict
escalation. In fact, this aspect is missing in
almost all studies on conflict and conflict resolution
except for a few which
deal specifically with nonviolent resistance
and/or nonviolent action.
One exception
is John Paul Lederach who
has created the term "conflict transformation".
Conflict transformation is the development from
a static situation with very unequal distribution
of political power, and a problem that hasn't
yet become a conflict issue, to a dynamic situation
with better balance of power and the possibility
of dealing with the problem. This includes the
conflict stages from the latency stage to the
articulation of protest. To end the static situation,
protest needs to be organised and articulated.
When this has happens, counter power may develop.
A new distribution of power is both a condition
for clarifying the conflict issues, and an expression
of a new relationship between the conflict parties
in conflict. Lederach emphasises
that conflict transformation is a long-term process
taking 20 years or more, and must not be confused
with short-term crisis intervention alone, which
is the most immediate activity in the process
of transformation.
The contribution of nonviolent action to this transformation
is obvious: it makes the conflict visible, and
tries to change the balance of power by using nonviolent means of protest and
resistance.
Theodor Ebert has defined
three stages of escalation in nonviolent action;
each stage has both subversive and constructive
elements:
1. Protest
as subversive action and 'functional demonstrations'
as constructive action;
2. Legal
non-cooperation and legal innovation of roles;
3. Civil
disobedience and civil usurpation;
Generally
speaking, escalation is achieved by:
Broadening the
scope of the activities (geographically or time-wise);
Growth of the number
of the activists;
Increased actions
of civil disobedience and other direct actions.
Hildegard
Goss-Mayr puts
the analysis of the conflict at the beginning
of her discussion. Then groups are formed and
trained in nonviolence.
As they come in contact with each other they
start to cooperate, chose tactics and begin their
activities to weaken and eventually neutralise
the pillars that support the injustice. The more
pillars of injustice are uprooted, and the more
institutions and other important actors change
sides, the closer the moment comes when the
status quo can no longer be maintained. This
is the moment to develop alternatives and to
create a new distribution of power. Everyone,
including the former opponents, is part of this
process.
1.1.3.3
Taking a closer look at conflict transformation
Conflict resolution, conflict
settlement, conflict handling, conflict management,
conflict regulation or conflict transformation
are terms which are often used indiscriminately
although there are certain nuances of meanings.
Conflict resolution implies that "the deep-routed
sources of conflict are addressed, and resolved".
Conflict settlement refers to the "reaching
of an agreement between the parties which enables
them to end an armed conflict. It puts to an
end the violent stage of conflict behaviour." Conflict
regulation and conflict management are "sometimes
used as a generic term to cover the whole gamut
of positive conflict handling".
Conflict transformation puts
an emphasis on the process of dealing with conflict,
and is therefore, in my eyes, preferable to the
other terms. It touches all three corners of
the famous conflict triangle that Johan Galtung has
defined. The process of dealing with the conflict
then moves around the triangle.
At this point it should be
very clearly pointed out that conflict transformation
is not synonymous with what external parties
do, nor is it synonymous with conflict intervention.
The importance of local peace builders, of peace
constituencies and of local zones of peace has
gained more and more recognition in the last
few years.
Müller/Büttner (1998) have proposed
making the triangle a pyramid in order to include
the dimension of conflict escalation. They argue
that in the first three stages of Glasl's conflict
escalation scheme the content is in the centre
of the conflict. Then the attitudes of the opponents
become the major factor, and as soon as the conflict
becomes violent, the behaviour itself is the
main problem.
A pyramid diagram
would look like this:
Table 1.4: Conflict pyramid
and escalation track
De-escalation of a conflict
then may be seen as the reversal of this process. First
the emphasis would be on the behaviour. That
is, stopping the violence through a cease-fire,
and then monitoring the cease-fire. Now work
on attitudes can begin. Only when attitudes
change for the better will it be possible to
deal with the original conflict and to attempt
to find a solution. (Then it would be time to
work on attitudes, and probably only when there
is a change for the better in these, there is
a chance to deal with the original conflict and
its content, and to attempt finding a solution
for it.)
While most experts would agree
with the first assumption, the order of the second
and the third might be questionable. In fact,
very often there is some peace agreement (conflict
settlement in the meaning defined above) before
any substantial work on the relationship of the
actors has been done. The chapter on Peace Strategies
will argue that all three dimensions need to
be tackled simultaneously.
The conflict intervention
discussion is a rather recent phenomenon,
which rapidly grew after the end of the East-West-confrontation
in 1989, though of course intervention in conflict
is something that has always taken place. Intervention
is "Any influencing of a system of rule
from the outside, no matter if the influencing
is done by nonviolent or
by violent means".
The term ‘conflict intervention’
will be used for such involvements that are undertaken
to influence a conflict in another ‘system of
rule’. This definition leaves the means (military,
diplomacy etc.), the type of conflict, the interveners
(states, international state organisations, NGOs
etc.) and the purpose/objectives of the intervention
open.
1.1.4.1
Objectives and motives of conflict intervention
There are at least 13 categories
of objectives or motives for conflict intervention. Often
more than one is at work in any given case at
any given time. With a few exceptions, most objectives
and motives can be found in both state and non-state
situations. The examples of objectives and motives
given here are arbitrarily chosen.
Change the attitude
and/or the behaviour of one or all of the conflict
parties (e.g. by conflict resolution workshops
or by sanctions against a government);
Change the distribution
of power within one conflict party (e.g. by sanctions
meant to build up so much pressure against the
government that it gets overthrown);
Support one conflict
party with the goal to help it win the conflict
(e.g. the Latin American solidarity movement);
Change the means
by which the conflict is carried out (e.g. by
giving training in nonviolent resistance
techniques);
Protect human rights
(e.g. by building international public pressure
like Amnesty International does);
Help the victims
of violence and war (shelter, medicine, clothing);
Guarantee agreements
made (e.g. by sending peacekeeping troops);
Support civil society
(many international NGOs concentrate on that
field while it is a rather recent discovery with
governments);
Influence powerful
external parties so that they change their behaviour,
and/or intervene in the conflict (social movements
and NGOs);
Protect one’s own
citizens (governments only, e.g. by evacuating
their own citizens when a violent conflict flares
up);
Defend own strategic
or economic interests;
Find supporters/members
for the own cause, promote own cause (e.g. missionaries);
Facilitate social
or economic change (e.g. development aid).
These
are only motives and objectives as they relate
to the conflict for the interveners usually have
many organisational motives of their own. For
example, to satisfy lobbyists and voters who
expect certain behaviour from a government, to
win public credibility by sponsoring a popular
project, and to get new funds from sponsors and
so on.
1.1.4.2
Actors
There
are a multitude of possible interveners. The
well-established differentiation between governments
on the one side and all the others (to be found
under track 2 diplomacy) does not give an adequate
picture of what is actually going on in conflict
transformation by external parties.
Louise Diamond and Ambassador John McDonald have
therefore introduced the concept of Multi-track
Diplomacy which distinguishes 9 tracks: governmental;
professional conflict resolution; business; private
citizen; research, training and education; activism;
religious; funding; and public opinion. Building
on their concept, I would like to propose that
there are two main types of actors with several
subtypes each:
a. States/governments
with two broad categories:
individual states
international organisations
and interest-based coalitions (UN and its bodies
and regional organisations, e.g. the OSCE or
the OAS, other regional governmental organisations;
World bank, NATO etc.
b. Non-state
actors with four broad categories:
NGOs,
social movements,
and
political parties
religious bodies.
corporate sector
(business)
media
This is an ideal picture;
in reality many non-state actors have very clear
connections and even dependencies to the state
in which they live and work. In the table below,
this relationship is only marked for two of them
(media and parties) because the relationship
is especially remarkable.
1.1.4.3
Tactics/means
It is
probably impossible to draw up a complete list
of means and tactics of conflict intervention (such
as attempted by Gene Sharp) for
the broad field of nonviolent action. Sharp
distinguishes psychological, physical, social,
economic and political tactics.
1.1.4.4
Civil Intervention and nonviolent intervention
If the main criteria which
distinguishes different forms of conflict intervention
is whether direct deadly violence is being used
or not, then the distinction between military
and civil interventions becomes meaningful.
Consequently civil
interventions are all those interventions which
are being carried out by civilians (in opposition
to military personnel), and which refrain from
the use of personal deadly violence.
But there is another way to
distinguish between conflict interventions: those
using coercive means and those that do not.
There are coercive means included
in the category of civil interventions, e.g.
economic sanctions or mediation with muscle.
Some of them might actually cause a high rate
of casualties - the economic sanctions against
Iraq have, according to official figures by the
UN, cost the lives of almost 600,000 children
alone between 1991 and 1996, which is an outcome
as bad or worse than those of many military actions.
Therefore I agree with those
authors who
find it necessary to distinguish between civil
interventions and nonviolent interventions, the latter
being a sub-category of the first. I would like
to propose the
following definition of nonviolent intervention:
Conflict
intervention can be called nonviolent,
when
1.
the objective is conflict transformation, and
the when the intervener, (either as a non-partisan
external party taking the interests of all
conflict parties into consideration, or as
a partisan party supporting one side in the
conflict), engages in conflict transformation
and/or human rights and justice, and when
2.
there is no use of direct or indirect deadly
violence.
This definition has two consequences
that might be controversial:
First, it is nonviolent intervention
may take place either at home of the interveners
or at the home of those people where the conflict
takes place.
Second, nonviolent intervention
may be partisan.
This topic has already been touched upon in the
paragraph on nonviolent conflict escalation
above. The argument goes like this: If there
is a strong imbalance of power between the parties
in conflict, (perhaps even to the degree that
structural violence is so high that the conflict
is latent and the underdog hasn't even started
to organise himself), then nonviolent intervention
must mean strengthening the underdog. This is
not a new argument. Johan Galtung made
it early in the 1980s.
But still in the bulk of the literature on conflict
intervention the non-partisan character is automatically,
and by definition, assumed.
Up to now, conflict interventions
have been categorised according to different
aspects: objectives, actors, methods and strategy.
Three more aspects that are very relevant when
either planning or evaluating a nonviolent intervention has yet
to be introduced: time, horizontal geographical
scope and the level of society the intervention
addresses.
1.1.5.1
Time
Everybody
distinguishes short, middle and long-term goals and activities. But it
should not be taken for granted that any two
persons mean the same thing when they use these
terms. Orienting ourselves to the time dimension
proposed by John Paul Lederach will be beneficial here. The
proposal has the advantage of not being guided
by funding directives that describe every project
that is longer than one year as long-term just
because funds are dispersed annually.
Lederach distinguishes
immediate
action (2-6 months) as crisis intervention;
short-range
planning (1-2 years) mainly used for preparation
and training (capacity building);
the
middle-range decade thinking (5-10 years) for
developing a design of social change; and
the
long-range generational vision (20+ years) for
developing a "vision of what we are trying
to achieve in order to build toward and reach
that vision".
1.1.5.2
Levels of society
John Paul Lederach's goes
on to distinguishes between three levels of
society (top, middle and grassroots), and attributes
certain approaches to peace building to
each of them.
Most authors dealing with
the levels of society in relationship to conflict
intervention agree that it is of paramount importance
for interveners to reach all three levels. This
does not mean that it is necessary for each intervener
to have contact with all levels, but intervention
needs to reach all of them. An agreement made
between top leaders is likely to fail if it does
not have the support of the masses - the grassroots
level. And vice versa, small grassroots initiatives
might find themselves run over by violence, outlawed
or simply pushed to the side if the top leaders
are not reached as well. Therefore, the middle-range
actors play a special role. They may co-ordinate
top-level decisions with grassroots realities.
Table 1.7 Actors and
approaches to peacebuilding
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Lederach 1997:39
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1.1.5.3
Geographical scope
It is known that some projects
will only reach one local community or even only
one part of that community, others will have
an impact on the whole country and/or on the
conflict as a whole.
In recent years more and more
notice has been given to the development of local
peace zones. These are single communities or
a number of communities where violence does not
take root, which remain peaceful in a violent
surrounding, sometimes against all odds. There
is little knowledge about what is needed in order
to have a local project impact on the conflict
as a whole.
Not all interventions involve
going to the place where the conflict is. As
has been mentioned before, influencing other
external parties to get involved, or working
on unjust structures might well take place far
away from the actual conflict (in the powerful
countries).
1.1.6.1
Some definitions
Terms
like "strategy" and "tactics" have
spilled over from the military jargon not only
to common language, but also to thinkers about nonviolence.
Because there are different, some times contradictory
usages of
these terms, it is necessary to define what they
mean. I will follow Burrowes’ (1996) example and first
go back to the military terminology as developed
by Clausewitz and Liddell
Hart (1967). Liddell Hart defined strategy as "the
art of distributing and applying military means
to fulfil the ends of policy",
policy being what "governs the object of
war". Military means can also be called tactics
- activities taken within the framework of a
strategy. Gene Sharp defines grand strategy,
strategy and tactics without referring to its
military origin:
"Grand strategy
is the broader conception which serves to co-ordinate
and direct all the resources of the struggle
group toward the attainment of the objectives
of the conflict. Strategy, a more narrow term,
is the broad plan of action for the overall struggle,
including the development of an advantageous
situation, the decision of when to fight, and
the broad plan for utilising various specific
actions in the general conflict. Tactics refers
to plans for more limited conflicts within the
selected strategic plan."
Jean-Marie Muller puts it more simply:
"Strategy concerns the
conception and execution which regulates and
co-ordinates the different activities of an intervention;
tactics concerns the conception and execution
of each of these activities."
In this
paper the terms ”strategy” and ”tactics” will
be used as Sharp and Muller defined them.
1.1.6.2
Strategies of conflict intervention
Since the Secretary General
of the United Nations, Boutros Boutros Ghali, published
the Agenda for Peace, the terms peacekeeping,
peacemaking and peacebuilding have become well
known. But it wasn't Boutros-Ghali who invented
them, nor were they originally meant to function
in a strict sequential order as Boutros-Ghali
puts them. Johan Galtung -
who called them ”approaches to peace” 20 years
before Boutros-Ghali, first described these three
peace strategies.Since
then these terms have been refined by other authors
such as the social anthropologist Stephen Ryan
(1995). When referred to in this study, they
are used within the broad civilian tradition,
and not in the tradition of reserved for the
UN. Together, these three strategies (or rather "grand
strategies") formulate a general theory
of maintaining peace: "keeping the opponents
apart, negotiating a political solution and finally,
tying the adversaries into something that one
could call a peace system."
Johan Galtung defines peacekeeping as
(to): "control the actors so that they
at least stop destroying things, others, and
themselves".
Peacemaking "is concerned with the
search for a negotiated resolution of the perceived
conflicts of interests between the parties". Activities shall
be called peacemaking activities if they bring
together groups or individuals in dialogue
about possible resolution of the conflict.
Contrary to Ryan’s notion, this can occur at
the diplomatic level or between ordinary citizens
that are caught in the conflict.
Peacebuilding "is the strategy
which most directly tries to reverse those
destructive processes that accompany violence".
These strategies must not
be confused with certain activities. For example: "dialogue" might
be used both to find a solution to the conflict
and to foster understanding between two groups
in conflict. The former usage puts it in the
realm of peacemaking, and the later in the realm
of peacebuilding. This
shows that many activities include aspects of
at least two, if not all three strategies. Nevertheless,
I believe that it makes sense to distinguish
between them because they highlight different
functions and problems.
The three strategies need
to be applied at the same time. Peacekeeping
without peacemaking and peacebuilding would be very difficult
because the violence might overwhelm the process,
and any group wishing to sabotage a peace initiative
would find it easy to provoke armed clashes.
If peacebuilding is
ineffective, the decision-makers might lose the
support of their communities, and if peacemaking
is ineffective, the perceived disagreement that
caused the conflict will remain unresolved, and
the probability that violence would start again
soon is high.
The three strategies are not
per se nonviolent strategies. As has been
shown before, they may include coercion - like
mediation with muscle or military peacekeeping.
But on the other side, all nonviolent tactics/methods
can easily be related to one, or sometimes to
more then one of the strategies.
The peace strategies are usually
presented as strategies to be used after a conflict
has escalated to violence. Ryan and Galtung as well as Butros-Gali seem
to assume this although the first two reject
the idea of a sequential order for their application.
It shall be argued here that
the same strategies are also used before the
violence takes place. They are usually covered
by the term prevention, but looking closely at
what activities (tactics) fall under prevention,
it is obvious that they are broadly the same.
Therefore, although prevention is an important
concept when looking at any given conflict, the
peace strategies used are the same no matter
if the conflict is pre-violent or post-violent,
only some of the tactics (means) used might differ.
The difference is that prevention deals with
the formation of the conflict while the three
peace strategies deal with violent conflict,
conflict transformation and social change. Prevention
includes what otherwise is called peacemaking
such as diplomacy and peacemaking efforts by
local actors. There has been preventive peacekeeping
(UN peacekeeping mission in Macedonia, for example). The
most sustainable tactics of prevention have to
do with socio-economic change, good governance
and the like.
1.1.6.3
Looking at the peace strategies in detail
Peacekeeping is a primarily dissociative approach. Galtung points
out that the idea of keeping the opponents apart
is also the underlying philosophy of the politics
of balance of power.
Peacekeeping, "is often the most urgent
and necessary of all peace strategies because
it is the only one which deals directly with
the warriors on all sides who are engaged in
mutual destruction." It
is traditionally considered a task of the military
and perhaps the police. The practice developed
by the UN of sending peacekeeping troops, so-called
blue helmets, gave the strategy of peacekeeping
a classical instrument; strategy and instrument
often are considered synonymous. There is no
logical reason why unarmed civilians could not
carry out the same task, and there have been
some cases of larger-scale civilian peacekeeping
actions (see 2.4).
Authors who are mainly
interested in nonviolent intervention
have broadened the concept of peacekeeping to
include other, smaller-scale activities like
(unarmed) accompaniment of activists threatened
by death squads. Since these activities are also
about control of violence by using a dissociative approach,
it makes sense to include them in the peacekeeping
strategy, only with a more limited scope than
the violence of a conflict as a whole. Lisa Schirch describes four approaches
of separating the parties involved in a conflict:
Buffer zones
("demilitarised and unpatrolled areas")
Peace zones ("civilian-occupied
spaces where no fighting takes place")
interposition
peacekeeping ("peacekeepers placing themselves
physically between groups engaged in violent
conflict in an impartial stance to all parties")
antirecessionary
peacekeeping (which "maintains unequal distance
between the parties” and is used when the parties
in conflict are not easily separated
Generally, two
main tactics of peacekeeping can be distinguished:
accompaniment of individuals and groups, and
monitoring of situations.
Ryan distinguishes three methods
of peacemaking as
the imposition of a solution through either:
- Violence
and power
- Law
3. Negotiation
(classical mediation or second-track diplomacy)
Much of the literature on
conflict resolution deals with negotiation and
related methods. In fact, often conflict resolution
is used interchangeably with peacemaking, because
peacemaking is the strategy that deals with the
contents of a conflict. Many different tactics
and methods have been proposed. Again, the terminology
varies widely among the different authors. I
would like to make mention of two issues in this
context:
First, there is usually a
continuum defined between third-party negotiators
who use considerable pressure to bring the parties
in conflict to an agreement (examples: the Dayton
agreement after the NATO bombing in Bosnia 1995,
and the Rambouillet negotiations
carried out under the threat of military intervention
in 1999), and third-party negotiators who act
as facilitators helping the parties in conflict
to find their own solution. How these different
negotiating techniques are named, differs. Perhaps
the major confusion stems from the fact that
in international politics mediation is often
used for the more coercive forms of negotiation,
while in the intra-societal projects (family
mediation, community mediation) mediation means
exactly the opposite viz. not making one’s own
proposals.
Kumar Rupesinghe proposes
some rather fundamental differences between state
versus non-state diplomacy. State-based
diplomacy is, he says, based on perceived self-interests,
state-to-s
