2-Strategies, Tactics&Activities

2.2 Peace Teams and Civil Peace Services

2.2.1 Introduction

Hope can only be kindled where there is solidarity. It is much easier to throw yourself into any commitment when you have someone with you, protecting you... I can throw myself from a high place, if I know that there is someone there to make sure I am not destroyed by the fall. You give us the force to be able to throw ourselves into our work. You have been expelled. You have suffered some of the same problems as those whom you have helped... Do not forget that it is precisely because you have suffered with the people that you have been able to support them in building their resistance.

Lutheran Bishop Medardo Gomez,
accompanied by Peace Brigades International in El Salvador[3]

Peace Teams and Civil Peace Services are both umbrella terms describing a wide range of activities carried out by civilians in conflict areas, which aim at broadening the scope of local activists by accompaniment and presence, resolving conflicts nonviolently, building peace and reconstructing society. They include training of peace workers, raising awareness of the importance of nonviolent conflict resolution, sending out peace teams and co-operating with the local populations in conflict areas.[4] That we have treated them separately in two subchapters is more due to division of work between the two researchers,[5] than it is well founded in conceptual differences.

If there is a difference, then it is a difference between those projects that concentrate on peacekeeping activities (accompaniment, presence, interpositioning), and those groups that concentrate on peacebuilding. But while there is presently no Civil Peace Service focussing solely on accompaniment (though there are other forms of peacekeeping practised), there are a few groups calling themselves Peace Teams that have been more focussed on peacebuilding than on peacekeeping tasks (BPT). That means that neither Civil Peace Service nor Peace Team is a clear-cut concept that separates the two clearly from each other on the one hand, or from other volunteer services on the other. If there is a proprium to the European CPS, then it may be that the term Civil Peace Service expresses a new political movement generally characterised by the following elements or goals:[6]

· Institutionalise peace services/peace teams and have corresponding legal provisions in place, or making use of already existing ones,[7]

· Access public funding for grass-roots work for conflict transformation and building up civil society,[8] and

· Strong emphasis on the necessity of preparatory training that in some cases (not all) goes hand in hand with the objective of professionalising peace services.

Lacking a more specific definition, for the purpose of this study, all those volunteer and training organisations that are members of the European Network for Civil Peace Services (see below) will be called Civil Peace Services (CPS) ,[9] all the others Peace Teams.[10]

In our survey, we have not aimed at covering the activities of all organisations active in that field. Rather, we have chosen a handful of these nongovernmental organisations, and examined them as being precedent in many aspects for the Nonviolent Peaceforce.[11]

2.2.2 Peace teams

Donna Howard

Lutheran Bishop Medardo Gomez,
accompanied by Peace Brigades International in El Salvador[12]

2.2.2.1 Introduction

Organisations that send peace teams into areas of conflict do so hoping to increase the odds that local peacemakers will be able to take greater risks in their work but not with their lives. Local individuals and organisations that report human rights abuse or expose injustice, for example, are usually ”working without a net.” Peace teams take risks themselves in order to be that net.

A handful of these nongovernmental organisations were examined as precedent for the Nonviolent Peaceforce. Those selected practice third party nonviolent intervention by placing teams in situations of conflict and instability for more than a short-term visit, march or demonstration. They have additionally analysed their own work and thus increased our understanding of nonviolent intervention. Included here, are Peace Brigades International, Christian Peacemaker Teams, Witness for Peace, Servicio Internacional para la Paz, Osijek Peace Teams and Balkan Peace Team.[13]

2.2.2.2 Character and goals

"The existence of a third party at the scene of events makes it easier for the conflict parties to take a more constructive approach to behaviour and problem-solving. A reversal of the escalation becomes possible because the conflict parties question their own conflict behaviour and are supported in their search for a different approach to the problem."[14]

The team-sending peace organisations examined here[15] differ in many ways, but all might be described as having a goal derived from the quote above: to reverse escalation in conflict and support parties in evaluating and altering behaviour that may have contributed to the escalation. Or as stated by Müller and Büttner, ”to influence the conflict parties using less and less threat and violence in order that they develop a productive treatment of their problems, that is, an increasingly civil peace strategy.”[16]

All the teams studied sprang from an urgent need to ”do something” about a particular conflict or crisis. For Peace Brigades International (PBI) it was Guatemala; for Witness for Peace (WfP), Nicaragua; for Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT), grassroots wars in Central America and North America in which U.S. was identified with elite groups; for Servicio Internacional Para La Paz (SIPAZ), Chiapas; and for both Balkan Peace Team (BPT) and Osijek Peace Teams, it was Croatia and Serbia/Kosovo/a.

PBI and WfP are the forerunners in this studied group, both founded in 1981 and created new peace team specialities from the precedents of Shanti Sena, World Peace Brigade, Peaceworkers and A Quaker Action Group. A look at the founding of each organisation will give us an idea of their character.

PBI was formed by activists who were international as a group, experienced in the field, and primarily former members of World Peace Brigade, International Fellowship of Reconciliation and War Resisters International. WfP was the response of outraged clergy and lay people in the U.S. to the Reagan Administration’s policy of ”low intensity warfare” directed toward Nicaragua’s civilian population. CPT (1986) was formed by Mennonite Churches, Church of the Brethren, Friends United Meeting and other Christians as a way for these churches to express their faith. BPT (1993) formed when organisations, including International Fellowship of Reconciliation, Peace Brigades International and War Resisters International, received requests from Croatia and Kosovo/a for an international presence. SIPAZ (1995) arose in response to an invitation from the Mexican church and human rights groups, who hoped an international presence in the state of Chiapas might benefit the peace process there. Osijek Peace Teams (1998) began as a project called "Building a Democratic Society based on a Culture of Nonviolence" as a joint effort of the Centre for Peace, Non-violence and Human Rights Osijek, and the Life and Peace Institute in Upsala, as well as their partner organisations The Face of Peace in Slavonski Brod and Austrian Peace Service.

There are strong relationships between some groups. PBI, in addition to developing its own structure and work in the field, went on to be a part of the coalitional founding of BPT and SIPAZ. War Resistors International and International Fellowship of Reconciliation were co-founders of PBI, SIPAZ and BPT. These three, plus Osijek, are the organisations that are founded and structured as coalitions: PBI with sections in 17 countries, BPT with 11 member organisations and SIPAZ with over 50 member groups.

The work of SIPAZ, WfP and CPT springs explicitly from the Christian faith; the mission of WfP and CPT is grounded in opposition to US policies that create injustice for citizens in other countries.

All claim some form of neutrality or non-partisanship, but there is quite a range to how the term is used and applied. Osijek, BPT and SIPAZ demonstrate the most easily defined form of non-partisanship. The peacebuilding done by BPT and Osijek is offered to all, Osijek teams always have both Serbian and Croatian members, and every effort is made to build communication between conflicting parties and to serve all populations. WfP claims non-partisanship in the field, choosing not to be involved in the internal struggles of any country or group. But their opposition to U.S. impact on that country might position them with one faction and not another. PBI has worked very hard, over the years, to define accompaniment as non-partisan, even if they accompany only persons of one group within the conflict. They do this by detachment from the work of that group (or person), but this position will always have to be defended. CPT’s partisanship or non-partisanship is even more confusing. They live with, train and defend the houses of Palestinians in Jewish Settlements, e.g., but claim that since they would defend anyone who was threatened in this way, the work is still not partisan.

The goals of these team-sending organisations range from peacekeeping through peacemaking to peacebuilding. PBI’s goal ”to create space for local activists to work for social justice and human rights”[17] emphasises the work of locals and involves violence reduction. CPT’s intent to ”get in the way”[18] implies the intervention of peacekeeping, but supporting peacemakers and affecting U.S. and world policies places their work also in the range of peacemaking. The emphasis of WfP is on peacemaking - to support peace, justice and sustainable economies in the Americas ”by changing U.S. policies and corporate practices which contribute to poverty and oppression. We stand with people who seek justice.”[19] This is peacemaking as it lobbies for change in the politics of war. What they describe as maintaining a presence in these countries has often been the work of peacekeeping, however, and their intent to assist in the building of stable societies is peacebuilding. SIPAZ began its work in Chiapas with a goal of keeping peace - to ”forestall or reduce violence and to protect and expand the precious political space in which dialogue [between the Zapatistas and the Mexican government] is possible”[20] - and has since pursued peacebuilding goals. BPT and Osijek, of the organisations represented here, are the ones whose goals and work fall most within peacebuilding. The Osijek project sought to assist ”reconstruction of a normal society with tolerance and acceptance of all people living peacefully together,” with the words ”empowerment, reconciliation, co-operation, democracy”[21] in their mission statement. The goal with which BPT identified itself was ”to work for the peaceful resolution of conflicts and to demonstrate an international commitment to peace.”

2.2.2.3 Activities of peace teams

I will use, here, the three overarching strategies of peacekeeping, peacemaking and peacebuilding, showing the activities of the peace teams in each.

Peacekeeping strategy aims to reduce violence in areas of conflict. Peace teams can effectively utilise tactics intended to keep individuals or groups safe by the ”creation of buffer zones or human chains; observation of cease-fires; observation of conflict events to reduce the incidence of violence; escorting of or presence near threatened persons or organisations; appeals.”[22] Some of the many nonviolent tactics used by civilian intervention teams are discussed below.

Interpositioning is the physical placement of peacekeepers between groups engaged in violent conflict in an impartial stance toward all parties. As conflicts do not necessarily have a separation of parties and often have more than two contending sides, interpositioning is not always even remotely possible. Interpositioners may do other peacekeeping activity while occupying the space between parties. WfP is the only team studied which has attempted large-scale interposition.

In 1983, after the Grenada invasion, Witness for Peace was founded by Christian activists in the U.S. to send teams of volunteers to Nicaragua to deter attacks on the Nicaraguan people by U.S.-sponsored Contras. In the event of an invasion, they committed themselves to "assemble as many North American Christians as we can to join us and go immediately to Nicaragua to stand unarmed as a loving barrier in the path of any attempted invasion, sharing the danger posed to the Nicaraguan people.”[23] Volunteers lived in villages along the northern border until their strategy had to be changed because fighting occurred more randomly across the Nicaraguan countryside rather than having a clear border between parties.[24] WfP volunteer Doug Spence says of their interposition: ”We perceived ourselves as a presence that would make the U.S. government think twice before attacking. If it didn’t stop them, they would at least have to take responsibility for whatever happened.”[25]

Interpositioning may at times refer to smaller groups of people.

In 1986, as Grupo de Apoyo Mutuo (GAM) women held a demonstration at Guatemala’s National Palace, the riot police began to beat the demonstrators. PBI quickly formed a human chain between the two groups. This act, effective as it was and non-partisan as we know interposition to be, was politically powerful enough to result in the threat of expulsion of PBI. PBI called for international support and published a public statement clarifying its nonparticipatory role.[26]

The most single-minded effort at interpositionary peacekeeping was known as the Gulf Peace Team. The idea was to send a team to the border between Iraq and Saudi Arabia as part of the struggle to prevent war in the Persian Gulf in 1991. Established well in advance of the UN Security Council deadline, there were 73 people from 15 different countries in the camp at the onset of war; ten days later they were evacuated and taken to Baghdad.[27]

The fact that this interposition effort happened at all has nonviolent historical significance. And because it has significance, the problems incurred in the project merit evaluation. One of those problems had to do with non-partisanship, which is essential to this kind of interpositioning. The group sought permission for their camp from both sides of the border, but got no response from Saudi Arabia and therefore established camp only on the Iraqi side. In addition, they depended on Iraqi tankers to supply water. The Gulf Peace Team Constitution stated, ”We as a team do not take sides in this dispute and we distance ourselves from all the parties involved, none of whom we consider blameless.”[28] But without a response from the Saudi Arabian government, with a camp only in Iraq and relying on Iraq for water, GPT’s non-partisanship was compromised.

Accompaniment of persons who are at risk is the physical counterpart of international advocacy. In order to deter or report violence, one must be physically there, in the right place at the right time. ”In most instances death squads and other human rights violators do not want their actions exposed to the outside world. Thus the physical presence of a... volunteer, backed by an emergency response network, deters violence directed against local activists.”[29]

Peace Brigades researchers and team veterans Liam Mahony and Enrique Eguren say that accompaniers need ”to be as obvious and visible as possible to the outside world, and yet as unobtrusive as possible in the lives and activities of those being accompanied.”[30] This accompaniment of activists, refugees and communities threatened with violence requires 24-hour a day presence, while the individual accompanier might be reading a book during a meeting, travelling with individuals or community, or being present at a demonstration.[31] Canadian volunteer, Sel Burroughs, puts it this way: ”Escorting is difficult. It involves being ready to move at someone else’s schedule, hours of waiting and intermittent exclusion and inclusion in the lives of the person you are responsible for.”[32]

PBI has done by far the most accompaniment work in the past two decades and has additionally analysed what does and does not make it effective. Their mission statement avows specifically: ”The aim of PBI’s international presence is to accompany both political and social processes through a joint strategy of deterring violence and promoting active nonviolence... PBI, where possible, initiates contacts with all the parties to a conflict in order to establish and inform of our presence.”[33]

The formulation of effective accompaniment work took place in the 80’s, as PBI experimented with tools for keeping civilian activists safe from military dictatorship and guerrilla resistance in Guatemala. As they began accompanying women of the Committee of Mothers of the Disappeared and Assassinated (COMADRES) and the Grupo de Apoyo Mutuo (GAM), they opened the PBI house for meetings and participated in the organising and strategy-planning of these organisations. It was later that PBI developed principles of non-involvement and non-partisanship as central to safe accompaniment practice. In Guatemala, El Salvador, Sri Lanka and Colombia, PBI teams have accompanied clergy, union leaders, campesino leaders, human rights activists and returning exiles. To increase effectiveness, PBI forges links with the diplomatic community locally and with media and human rights networks globally.[34]

PBI’s accompaniment takes these forms: escorting an individual 24 hours a day, being present at the office of a threatened organisation, accompanying refugees returning to their home communities, serving as international observers at elections and demonstrations.[35] They will not accompany anyone who is armed and they will not participate in the work of that activist or group no matter how needed or worthy. Because of this, they are able to claim that their accompaniment is non-partisan, even if they are protecting only parties who have a particular position in the conflict.

Presence is akin to accompaniment but expanded to an entire community. It is appropriate when violence is one-sided and/or parties are impossible to separate and it seeks to reduce the risk of violence rather than to protect the social change work of any particular individual or group.[36] All teams studied could be said to provide presence in the communities where they work.

Presence might include the following activities:[37]

a) patrol or occupy certain areas to prevent their falling into the hands of one party or the other in violation of law or stipulation

b) patrol a demarcation line

c) maintain a demarcation line free of violations and incidents

d) maintain open access to certain areas or routes

e) deny access to certain areas buildings or facilities.

Presence assumes that teams or team members may be spread out among the villages that need protection when it is not possible to interposition between conflicting sides, and that thus spread out they will still be a deterrent to violence. It does not rely on any particular activity but on certainty that one’s presence is known.

In fact, team members may be doing the unexpected. Asking one’s hostess, ”Show me how to make a tortilla” and allowing one’s ineptness to be a source of amusement is, according to Phyllis Taylor, a day well spent being present.[38] Other activities of WfP in Nicaragua included observing and listening to stories (particularly of victims), sending health delegations, writing materials to educate people in the U.S. ”The nonviolent presence came to include symbolic marches and vigils, accompaniment of individuals and communities in danger, fasting, work projects, peace flotillas, and a host of other actions.”[39] Short and long-term WfP delegations and teams lived and worked with the Nicaraguan people, met with religious, political and media leaders, stood with the grieving, documented atrocities, recorded stories, harvested coffee and perhaps most importantly did all they could to fulfil their goal of changing U.S. policy.[40]

The Cry For Justice coalition[41] in Haiti (1993 and 1994) provided the presence of foreigners where human rights abuses were most severe. Volunteers walked the streets of St. Helene getting to know people and writing reports for churches and the Haitian solidarity movement. Objectives of the project were to diminish violence; educate people in the U.S.; show solidarity and offer hope to Haitian activists; pressure and embarrass the UN, OAS, and the diplomatic community into taking stronger actions against de facto military government.[42]

Kathleen Kern describes what CPT members did during a typical day of being a presence in Haiti:[43]

We began every morning with devotions and a meeting, then separated to go visiting throughout the community of St. Helene. We accumulated a great deal of information about military and paramilitary activity in this way and would make a point of visiting the areas in which this activity occurred. When told about human rights abuses, we wrote reports and sent them to contacts in Port-au-Prince, who in turn disseminated them to various human rights agencies. Afternoons were spent on language study and naps. Rounds were made again in early evening. Meetings with the Democratic underground or friends in hiding took place at night.[44]

And the daily presence for CPT in Hebron, according to Ms. Kern, goes like this:

Morning devotions in the park in front of the mosque. Pick up trash, fix broken benches in park, or play with children. Separate and visit people - some journalist friends to pick up news, some friends or families near settlements. Twice a week, two members taught English classes to Palestinian highschool students, which became discussions on the theory and practice of nonviolence. Afternoon: writing, visiting in late afternoon and early evening, write more in the evening. Saturday: Afternoon and early evening on Dubboya Street (scene of many violent encounters between settlers and Palestinian residents and shopkeepers) to serve as violence deterring presence. [45]

SIPAZ has been placing teams in Chiapas, Mexico, since 1995 to ”forestall or reduce violence and to protect and expand the precious political space in which dialogue [between the Zapatistas and the Mexican government] is possible.”[46] SIPAZ makes persistent efforts to maintain communication with all the key actors in the conflict and seeks to deter human rights violations and promote tolerance and dialogue while monitoring the conflict.[47]

Observing/documenting/monitoring activities have potential for both reporting and deterrence. Team members can put into effect a string of consequences for an abuser of human rights by channelling information to the outside through emergency response networks with people ready to send messages to protest the violation. But the more immediate goal of observing is deterrence.

The teams studied all use the tactics of observation, documentation and monitoring. However, Witness for Peace is very distinct from the others by documenting and reporting only those policies and practices of the US government or US government-funded multilateral institutions insofar as these policies and practices lead to rights violations.[48]
A camera and notebook are the main human rights observation tools. CPT team members in Hebron report the effectiveness of making notes at an army check-point while telling the soldier that they are sure U.S. Congressmen will be interested in what they are doing while using money from their country.[49] And PBI team members posit that the act of taking a picture is perhaps more important than the picture itself. Upon seeing the camera, police or military become conscious of themselves. It is a distraction from their potential brutality and requires taking time to turn attention to the volunteer, make an arrest, seize the camera, or expose film. Meanwhile, they saved face and tension abated.[50]

Observation and reporting are an integral part of almost every other tactic or activity. Nonviolent peace team members who are interpositioning, accompanying or being a presence are at best utilising their ability to observe, document and report the violence and other human rights abuse they observe. Thus while being a presence in Nicaraguan villages, Witness for Peace volunteers interviewed survivors of Contra attacks to document the stories and report them in the U.S. to advocate for Nicaraguans, educate U.S. citizens, and lobby Congress to stop funding the Contras.[51]

”Armed only with a camera, PBI volunteers are a walking embodiment of the pressure the international human rights community is ready to apply in the event of abuse. As potential perpetrators know, our exposure of such abuse may adversely affect a regime's foreign aid allocation.”[52] The Balkan Peace Team in Croatia undertook considerable monitoring in the mid to late 1990’s: the return of the Serb population, the trial of Mr. Mirko Graorac, accused of war crimes, in the Split County (Zupanijski) Court, rental violations, etc.[53] Observation and reporting is undertaken by WfP specifically to document the results of U.S. and corporate injustice. They use collected evidence to change U.S. policies of economic violence.

Advocacy with the International Community involves alerting those in other places to the conflict violence, injustice and human rights abuse and is nearly inseparable from the other tactics of peace teams. Civilian peacekeepers are often very deliberate and energetic in seeking media attention in order to draw world attention to the conflict. The attention in and of itself has potential to decrease violence if parties in the conflict are concerned about their international image. Secondarily, well-directed advocacy engages those who can apply political pressure that increases safety and causes positive change in the nature of the conflict itself. The five teams studied all undertake advocacy, but again a distinction must be made about Witness for Peace, which advocates for change only in the U.S. and with multi-national corporations.

PBI has built and utilised an exemplary rapid-response network to mobilise international concern and pressure in response to emergencies. What began as a safety feature for both themselves and the Central American citizens they accompanied was developed over the years into a telephone tree of thousands of people around the world. Within a few hours, the PBI network had the capability to generate hundreds of phone calls and faxes protesting imminent or occurring danger. (And that was before electronic communication!)

Initially, the target of these messages would be the Guatemalan government or military. Later it was sometimes members of congress or parliament in the callers’ own countries, urging these politicians to put pressure on Guatemala. The goal was to multiply the protective power of the accompaniment while giving thousands of citizens around the world a way to learn about Guatemala and take effective action.[54]

In November of 1989, at least 60 foreign citizens were officially detained in El Salvador. The group included five PBI volunteers. Canadian team member Karen Ridd asked to make a telephone call and was able to reach the Canadian honorary consul and through them a U.S. PBI volunteer who activated the PBI international emergency response network before the captives could even be led away from the scene. Karen and Marcela Rodriguez (PBI Colombia) were mildly tortured, Karen was released but went back in to accompany Marcela, and both were released that same night and handed over to Canadian embassy officials.[55]

CPT uses their 2000-subscriber Urgent Response Network sparingly, in order not to decrease its effectiveness as a crisis intervention tool. Subscribers should feel compelled to take what measures they can upon receipt of the information.[56] BPT had a written policy on appropriate reasons to use their alert network:

1. Physical attacks on citizens or nonviolent activists in the country

2. Arrest/disappearance of citizens or nonviolent activists

3. Direct threats to citizens or nonviolent activists

4. A threatening public atmosphere short of direct threats

5. Other human rights violations announced

6. Other human rights violations occur

7. Physical attack on team members

8. Arrest/disappearance of team members

9. Direct threats to the team

10. Threatening public atmosphere concerning the team.[57]

The sending of delegations has been a successful activity of both WfP and CPT. ”CPT attempts to send several, short term delegations each year to project areas. These delegations are an important short-term encouragement to local people who are often overworked or face a crisis. In Haiti, the Middle East and Mexico, these delegations have led to long-term projects. Short-term delegations can sometimes engage in important dialogue or provide nonviolent witness, which might be difficult or impossible for a long-term team to do. Finally, delegates provide important advice for ongoing program activities because of the fresh eyes and ears that participants bring to the situation. When they tell their stories back home they augment the voices for justice.”[58]

Particularly for WfP, with its emphasis on giving witness in the U.S. against harmful U.S. policy, the sending of delegations is a high priority. Long term team members host the delegations, which are usually from 10 to 20 people who stay for two or three weeks. Since 1983, WfP has sent over 7,000 U.S. citizens to Central America, Cuba, Mexico, Haiti, and Colombia.[59]

Activism might be chosen as a tactic of either peacekeeping or peacemaking by peace team members who feel the strongest, most personal, and most immediate statement must be made. Nonviolent direct action can be used by intervenors to raise awareness of a particular manifestation of the destructiveness of a conflict. There is no doubt from the history of nonviolence that it may exponentially increase the bargaining power of the oppressed party. The question here, is whether that direct activism can be undertaken by a third party intervenor.

Of the teams studied, CPT is the only one that embraces nonviolent direct action, including civil disobedience, as a tactic in the field. Their mandate includes the statement, ”We believe a renewed commitment to the gospel of peace calls us to new forms of public witness which may include nonviolent direct action.”[60] They see it as essential to their civilian conflict interventions and faith based stance with the oppressed. Additionally, they provide training in nonviolent direct action as a means to address conflict.

In 1995, CPT team members used sledgehammers on a locked gate at Hebron University because it was an unjust barrier to students from Hebron. Three team members and one member of the Hebron Solidarity Committee were arrested and spent the night in jail before having bond posted by an Israeli friend.[61] In March of this year, team members Rick Polhamus and Pierre Shantz were arrested while attempting to clear the entrance to the town of Rantis, which had been blocked by the military with debris. In early April, Shantz climbed to the roof of a Palestinian home just as the Israeli military approached with a bulldozer to demolish it. He was kicked, slapped and pushed down the stairs. Also in April, Greg Rollins and Bob Holmes attempted another clearing of a road and sat down when the soldiers arrived; they were then dragged away. In these three cases, the individuals were released later without charges.[62]

CPT believes climbing to the roof of a house is effective. ”I don’t think many had heard about home demolitions on the West Bank until we went there,” says Claire Evans.[63]

Direct action may compromise legal status inside a country and will most likely violate a principle of impartiality. (Direct action undertaken by peace teams is often described as partisan third-party intervention.[64]) PBI ”will not plan, participate actively in, or carry out direct actions.”[65] Non-partisanship, a cornerstone of PBI work, is not something they will compromise. But PBI has a second reason for ruling out all direct action: they believe foreigners should not intervene in internal politics.[66]

WfP members are certainly not shy of direct action, but they keep it in the U.S., where they wish to make a passionate plea for change.

Peacemaking

For the purposes of this paper, peacemaking is defined as bringing together groups or individuals to dialogue about possible resolution of conflict. This can occur at the diplomatic level or between ordinary citizens who are caught up in conflict. This calls for ”mediation between the conflict parties through forms of dialogue: e.g. house to house visits, appeals, assemblies, delegations, fact finding, negotiation, creation of publicity between the parties and to the outside.”[67] Robert J. Burrowes calls it nonviolent reconciliation and development.[68] The intention is to facilitate conflict resolution, community reconciliation and/or community development by participating in projects that encourage conflicting parties to work together to achieve shared aims in defiance of the legal, political, economic and/or military constraints imposed by elites.[69]

CPT has tried to combine mediation and reconciliation efforts with intercessionary peacekeeping. Some, however, insist that the same organisation cannot do both reconciliation and peacekeeping work.[70]

BPT also was involved in both actively facilitating bringing parties together and being present in a conflict region. Their roles included: a) seeking to identify possibilities for dialogue between different groups, b) serving as channel of independent and non-partisan information from regions, c) contributing through contacts and networking to promote communication, d) dialogue and mutual understanding between different ethnic or peace groups and Croatian people and international community, and e) contributing team-members’ skills for benefit of all citizens (workshops in mediation, language classes, etc).

A June 1999 report from BPT team members in the field reads, ”In a recent exploratory trip to the region, the BPT-Yugoslavia team heard from some of the people they met that reconciliation between Serbs and Albanians will now be impossible. From many others, however, they heard that future dialogue and communication is not only possible, but absolutely essential. BPT was given strong encouragement to continue filling our unique role as networkers at the grassroots level, visiting and communicating with NGOs in both communities.”[71]

Sandra van den Bosse says that her objectives on the Balkan Peace Team were to support the people that were interested in a nonviolent solution to the Serb-Albanian conflict by helping to strengthen their organisations and to encourage dialogue with the other side.[72]

Though SIPAZ uses the word peacebuilding to describe its work, most of their activity falls under the definition of peacemaking used in this paper. They have coalition members who are experienced in international non-governmental conflict resolution. ”SIPAZ seeks to play a facilitative role, enhancing the context in which Mexicans are working to solve largely Mexican problems.” It encourages the international community to examine its relationship with Mexico and its role in creating greater political, economic and social justice.[73] As a faith-based organisation, they have put considerable effort into ecumenical reconciliation - reducing tension between evangelicals and Catholics. They offer peacebuilding workshops to strengthen local peacebuilding capacities for participants who are NGO, community and church workers.

Their list of activities in Mexico and in international witness between November 2000 and January 2001 shows a balance of peacemaking and peacebuilding:

Contacts and Visits:

· Participation in gathering of base communities in the northern region of Chiapas on the theme of community reconciliation.

· Meetings with a variety of political and religious contacts in the northern region to discuss the implications of the new state and federal governments.

· Meetings with several North American delegations to brief them on the political situation in Chiapas and the work of SIPAZ.

· Organisation of a visit to rural areas in Chiapas for the Under-secretary of the Foreign and Commonwealth Office of Great Britain.

Information:

· Continuation of the tour by a SIPAZ team member in Germany, Belgium and Switzerland, with ... speaking tour in Europe.

· Publication of article on indigenous women in conflict area.

· Publication of two articles in Dutch periodicals.

· Meetings with three international academics studying role of SIPAZ & other NGO in Chiapas.

Inter-religious

· Meetings w/ church contacts

· Participation in strategic planning

· Initiate series of meetings

Education

· Facilitation of workshops on Conflict Transformation

· Convene reflection process on processes of community reconciliation[74]

Most of WfP’s work falls directly under the strategy of peacemaking. One of the organisation’s greatest successes, according to Executive Director Steven Bennett, was ”participating in the process that ultimately resulted in the re-integration of CPRs[75] into Guatemalan society. We played an accompanying and facilitating role in this process, our presence providing a sense of security for the CPR population feeling directly threatened. The same went for the Guatemalan refugees in exile in Mexico.”[76] WfP’s lobby against the oppression of the U.S. and multi-national corporations is peacemaking as well. They act as channels of information from the victims to the policy-makers and from U.S. citizens who care back to the people who suffer.

Peacebuilding

Peacebuilding involves the work of relief and development. Lisa Schirch describes it as ”social, political, and economic development projects to address structural violence and prevent destructive conflicts from occurring or recurring.”[77]

The Balkan Peace Team made peacebuilding a major part of its work in Croatia and Kosovo/a. ”Facilitating peacebuilding is a process requiring a long-term commitment and a respect for the time that traumatised people need for healing. This is especially apparent in the war-torn society of Kosovo/a, where the memories of repression are still vivid, the wounds of recent atrocities still festering, and inter-ethnic violence still rampant... the BPT team in Kosovo/a hopes to continue to listen to and work with all communities in the region. In this way, they seek to contribute meaningfully and responsibly to the construction of peace and tolerance - so that no one will be made to feel that their home is no longer a place where they belong.”[78]

After the return of Albanian refugees into Kosovo/a, BPT staff together with local Albanian activists elicited and recorded stories of Albanians receiving unexpected assistance from Serbian people during their recent trauma. ”The goal of such a project is to counter what some local activists fear is becoming the homogenisation of the war experience.” [79] BPT members helped to establish a youth centre in the remote community of Dragash where both Albanian and Slavic Muslim youth could have access to locally identified services such as computer training and English language lessons. [80]

BPT-Yugoslavia, working in Serbia and Kosovo/a since 1994, described its primary focus there as building bridges between Serbs and Albanians. The team's daily work was predominately networking: visiting regularly with local NGOs; learning about their situations and needs; offering information on international resources. A highlight was a dialogue and discussion, which BPT helped to bring about in 1998 between Serbian and Albanian university students. Another example was BPT's work with a Serbian peace group who asked for help in building links with like-minded Albanians.[81]

The Osijek Peace Teams[82] pursue an impressive list of peacebuilding activities, all of which became possible after the war in Croatia. Their explicit peacebuilding goal is the ”slow reduction of prejudices.” They offer counselling through psychosocial workshops for children, women and war veterans, and education in the form of computer and language courses and seminars on democracy, election monitoring, de-mining, etc. They facilitate communication between people, communities and ethnic groups, specifically interreligious dialogue through ecumenical services attended by Catholics, Orthodox and Adventists with clerics from all denominations. They assist with the founding of associations, encouraging multi-ethnicity (e.g. the creation of youth clubs and a hiking association and the organisation of concerts and readings). They support and monitor the re-integration of returnees or disadvantaged groups, accompany citizens to the authorities and offering legal counselling. The Peace teams even pitch in on rehabilitation projects, notably the repair of libraries and sports centres and ecological co-operation on an idea for a peace park involving Croatia, Hungary and Yugoslavia.

Training in nonviolence is offered by all teams studied as some form of peace education in the field, except for WfP, whose teams offer educational events only for the WfP delegations they host.

CPT includes training others in nonviolent direct action and seeks to provide a nonviolent perspective to media, interested groups, congregations, or organisations through speaking and writing. PBI offers education and training in nonviolence and human rights, and nurtures indigenous versions of nonviolence.[83] In Haiti, PBI worked alongside local conflict resolution trainers to organise workshops about nonviolent methods of resolving conflicts. In Guatemala and El Salvador, they offered a broad range of workshops on conflict resolution, negotiation methods, group process and political analysis, as well as on specialised topics such as ”community responses to fear and torture.” Paolo Frere's techniques and methods became a regular feature of the teams’ work. BPT staff offered workshops and training in nonviolence, conflict in Kosovo/a, stereotyping, gender, etc. Skills of the team members determined what was offered.[84]

Humanitarian Assistance as a form of peacebuilding is not offered by any of the team-sending organisations studied except Witness for Peace. It is not a priority for the organisation, but they occasionally make it part of their work.[85] Christian Peacemaker Teams have a policy against giving monetary or material aid, which includes the following statement: ”CPT’s ability to work effectively within its mandate in local settings depends on developing healthy, honest relationships that are not based on gifts or financial assistance.”[86] Team members have reported finding this challenging when living in places of deep poverty. [87] PBI also stresses that they are not a development organisation, believing that ”communities need space and freedom to carry out their own development in ways that create self-empowerment rather than dependency. When we become aware of a development opportunity we try to pass it along to an organisation set up specifically for that work”.[88]

In the beginning, people expected humanitarian aid from Osijek Peace Teams: ”We sent them home with empty hands.”[89] The Osijek project does, however, direct aid to the region and people where it is needed. SIPAZ similarly assists by accompanying INGO caravans of humanitarian aid.

Visibility in the field

All teams find visibility desirable in the field, but to a greater or lesser extent depending on the activity undertaken and the security factors.

PBI found it necessary to go for the highest visibility when the situation in Guatemala was treacherous for both them and those to whom they offered protective accompaniment. After three volunteers were knifed in Guatemala City, PBI published an ad defending its work in every major Guatemalan newspaper. It was signed by dozens of members of the U.S. Congress, members of parliaments from Canada and Europe, international church leaders, and other well-known international figures. Simultaneous ads were placed by Guatemalan organisations condemning the attack on the volunteers. [90] After the team moved into a more secure house, they held another reception for the diplomatic and press corps. U.S. military aid to Guatemala had been directly threatened because of attacks on U.S. citizens. PBI frequented government offices, and ambassadors visited the team house. The violent attacks stopped.

CPT volunteers wear red armbands for visibility while monitoring checkpoints. They actively seek media attention by learning the names of local journalists and cultivating relationships. They write press releases and do high profile public actions. Learning how to talk to media is part of the training for new team members. In addition, their e-mail outreach goes to around 2,000 households and their newsletter to 7,000.[91] And of course public protest and direct action exercised by team members is meant to achieve the highest visibility.

WfP was the first international group to hold public witness in front of the U.S. embassy in Colombia, which resulted in headline news there. ”We seek this kind of news... We want Colombians to know that not all people in the US support US funding for Plan Colombia," explains Director Bennett.[92] WfP team members continue the witness in front of the embassy every Friday now, seeking visibility in asking forgiveness from Colombian people.

Additionally, WfP’s mission requires a great deal of visibility back in the U.S. A commissioning service was held in 1983 for the first short-term delegates going to Nicaragua. They held it in Washington, DC, with Vincent Harding as speaker, all as visible as possible. Carefully cultivating a profile of ”ordinary people” taking ”extraordinary risk,”[93] the press release stated: ”The aim of the witness is to provide...a protective shield between the Nicaraguan people and the U.S.-sponsored Contras... The group hopes that the constant presence of North American church people in the war zone will hamper the operations of the Contras.” The event and its advocacy were widely successful and ”drew media like flies to honey.”[94]

2.2.2.4 Outcomes and impact

Actually, I think things are just a mixed bag.[95]

How does one measure outcomes of nonviolent work? All who expend their effort to reduce violence struggle with this question. Did we succeed?

”A farmer couldn’t harvest his wheat [because of Israeli harassment]; so we went and worked in the fields with him. He was able to work with us there, but the harvest was burned later and we couldn’t save it. Did we help?.. Sadly, the houses in Hebron have been destroyed again. What did we accomplish?”[96] These questions are asked by the CPT team in Hebron. Outcomes are illusive.

Peacekeeping

Peacekeeping does little to create lasting peace. Its function is simply to stop the violence and open out the possibility of peacemaking. Presumably it will be possible to measure the outcome of large-scale nonviolent peacekeeping when it occurs, but it has not.

Interposition

The encampment of the Gulf Peace Team symbolised the idea that a peaceful solution to the Gulf crisis was possible. Was its outcome merely symbolic, or did it actually have potential for real intervention? Was the aim of the camp simple physical interposition or was it political, designed to help build a global consensus against war? The Gulf Peace Camp did manage, for the first time, to place a sizeable group of peace campaigners between belligerents in a time of war—a peace camp was in place on the border between Iraq and Saudi Arabia when the hostilities of Operation Desert Storm commenced.[97]

Müller and Büttner’s analysis of the Gulf Peace Camp outcome is that ”the willingness showed [sic] by the top-level to escalate the conflict does not face a serious challenge. For this there is a lack of numbers and too little visible neutrality. Because only one camp can be set up in Iraq it is not difficult for war propaganda to doubt the neutrality and moral legitimacy. Whether a larger number of people would actually be able to achieve a de-escalating effect remains an unanswered question.” [98]

Accompaniment

Without international accompaniment,
the people are like worms the army can just step on...”
- Guatemalan refugee in Mexico awaiting return to the Peten.[99]

Cry for Justice accompaniment did, in fact, result in the release of a man abducted by FRAPH (Front for Advancement of Haiti, paramilitary) through the influence of a prominent local pastor. ”It is one of the only instances in our case studies of an accompaniment intervention freeing someone from a paramilitary abduction” and illustrates the potential of accompaniment as moral-political persuasion rather than as direct deterrence.[100]

In some cases, the life-saving outcome of accompaniment is beyond question, like the intervention of two accompaniers in what would have been the abduction in 1997 of Mario Calixto, President of the Sabana de Torres Human Rights Committee in Colombia. As two armed men pointed a gun at Mr. Calixto’s head, the accompaniers stepped between and defused the situation; the gunmen left without doing harm.[101]

According to Bradman Weerakoon, Presidential Assistant in Sri Lanka, the ”government certainly paid attention to accompaniment... a local policeman or soldier would also pay attention, even if he had no grasp of international politics. This local official is most concerned about what his superiors might hear about his behaviour, and he naturally assumes that a foreigner has some power--or he wouldn’t be there. The presence will make him cautious.” Weerakoon suggested a moral angle as well: "These men who commit these acts, they know they are doing a bad thing, and they would prefer to do it in secret.”[102]

Müller and Büttner rate the PBI Guatemala project as demonstrating ”sustainable control of violence in civil society where PBI is active.”[103]

”In numerous cases PBI are able to protect persons from the grassroots and middle levels and organisations of civil society from the threat or use of violence. This is done through presence and escorting, by establishing relations to all sides, through an offer of dialogue to the government and through informing the international community about the oppression and violence in the country.... The international alert network mobilises in critical situations international publicity, which has de facto the power of sanctions at the top-level in Guatemala. The control of violence is supported in this case through the ability to sanction exercised by the intervening groups contacts.”[104]

One hoped-for outcome of accompaniment is the enabling of local activists to overcome fear. This requires solidarity with others in their organisations, but the very act of forming such organisations may be dangerous. Without them, fear must be confronted alone, but once they exist, they are inevitably delegitimised and demonised by the state, which further inhibits participation. ”Accompaniment can lower the fear threshold, enabling people to overcome the early hurdles of democratic political activity, thereby promoting the growth of the group.”[105]

Accompaniment expands the space of political action available to activists.

”If the activists can carry out significant political activities that they otherwise would have avoided, then that accompaniment has contributed to the strength and growth of a nonviolent civil society.”[106] Or as Randy Kohan of Project Accompaniment put it: ”The greatest impact made by international accompaniment is our contribution to the breathing space we provide Guatemalans who struggle to bring about justice in their own country.”[107]

Presence

CPT Corps member Claire Evans offers both evidence and questions about the project in Beit Jala. ”A team of two was in place in early December 2000 to respond to Israeli shelling of a Palestinian neighbourhood in Beit Jala (near Bethlehem). Shelling was occurring almost nightly. Our team got some press, some of it focusing on the team member who is a 70 year old Roman Catholic nun, and also kept U.S. and Canadian embassies aware of our presence.[108] By mid-January the shelling had discontinued. Was our team’s presence a factor?

”To quote from the concluding project report: ‘In conclusion, the question becomes did we help to stop the bombing. It seems that we will never know exactly how successful we were in actually stopping or reducing attacks. Certainly, our press work was a P.R. headache for the army. It doesn’t look good for them to bomb nuns during the Christmas season. But, the bombings in this neighbourhood increased briefly right after the first media accounts of our presence appeared. Was that the army trying to convince us to leave?’

”Another question is whether we emboldened Palestinian gunmen to shoot from this neighbourhood, thinking that our presence would protect them? On one occasion after a story about us appeared, the gunfire came from right next to our house. On both of these questions our local contacts give mixed opinions.

”However, the bombing has stopped (in Beit Jala, at least [as of the Jan 17, 2001 writing]). Were we directly related to the halt? The most realistic answer is that we were one factor among several. But we certainly were a factor.”[109]

This story is clear about one thing: the value of visibility through media work in a conflict area. Being there has little impact if people don’t know the team is there and feel concern about how their behaviour will look if it gets in print. It is not clear whether their presence caused: a) the cessation of firing by mid-January, b) the brief increase of shelling in their neighbourhood following media coverage, or c) the firing by Palestinian gunmen from the neighbourhood. The outcome seems only definable as a moral victory and the experiential certainty that CPT presence was "one factor among several" which ended the bombing.

Some participants thought the outcome of WfP presence in Nicaragua was symbolic only. ”Some of them came with the idea that their presence alone would be enough to stop the war,” mused soldier Francisco Machado, ”but they quickly learned.” Sixto Ulloa, a member of WfP’s Nicaraguan partner organisation, believed, ”Witness for Peace... made the counterrevolution move away [from Jalapa],” and by visiting the resettlement communities, Witness extended a certain amount of protection to those areas as well. On the chance that visitors from the United States might be in the community, he believes, the Contras had to avoid attacking.[110]

Displaced villagers in the highlands of Chiapas believe so strongly that an international presence is protective that they told CPT members, ”The Actual Massacre would not have happened if you had been here.”[111]

Emergency response network and international pressure

The effectiveness of accompaniment and presence is reliant on the use of a well-developed emergency response network and applied international pressure. PBI has developed this tactic extensively and uses it with demonstrable outcome. Two examples follow.

”With each arrest of a volunteer, PBI activated its international emergency response network, and in several cases, evidence shows that this external pressure helped bring about the release not only of the PBI volunteer but sometimes also of the Salvadorans arrested with them.”[112]

After avoiding an ambush set for them, a PBI team embarked immediately on a series of interviews with embassies and government officials. PBI chapters around the world called their own governments and their embassies in Colombia. Representatives of three European embassies came and met with regional civilian and military authorities in support for PBI’s work. Clearly there was a political consequence for any attack on PBI. This incident increased PBI’s safety as well as their locally perceived clout.[113]

Observation

Observation and monitoring of human rights is known to be an effective deterrent tactic, though only by anecdote. It seems conclusive, however, to the volunteer who speaks to the soldier at a checkpoint about reporting what is going on and the behaviour subsequently stops. Actual documentation and reporting, as is carried out by Amnesty International, has a quantifiable effect. But again, these activities can only be as effective as the international response network through which the information must be funnelled.

This work sometimes involves risk. CPT and PBI have many stories of seized cameras and exposed film, and in one case, the arrest of volunteers who tried to keep the cameras. PBI wonders if the taking of flash photographs might have endangered the civilians who demonstrated at the Lunifil factory in Guatemala.[114] As has been said of accompaniment, the risks do not negate but rather prove that the activity is effective.

Peacebuilding and combined strategy

The Müller and Büttner study rates BPT’s combined strategies as having had considerable effect on top leaders as dialogue partners and on middle and grassroots leaders in civil society, and some effect on the control of violence in the segments of civil society where the team was active. ”The team's ability to network between different groups was apparent. Each group they visited was eager for information about the others, and trusted BPT as the source. One activist put it directly to them: 'You are in a very unique position to do this because you have a history of working with both Serbs and Albanians at the grassroots.'[115] The BPTI [International] project plays a strongly supportive role in civil society’s development of articulation and conflict resolution abilities (peacebuilding: empowerment through seminars and networking). Presence in situations of direct conflict protects against political repression. Reporting on an (inter)-national level on violence and human rights abuses increases to a certain extent pressure on state authorities... During the military offensives the BPTI assumes the role of monitor, in individual cases also the protection of threatened persons...”[116]

Training and peace education

In addition to the formal training that peace teams offer, team members have ongoing opportunities to teach very personally, and perhaps very effectively, in their conversations with local people. There is a moving story about CPT presence in a Mexican Army civic action camp in Chiapas during Lent. They fasted, prayed, had conversations with the soldiers, and eventually converted a military helicopter landing pad into a giant peace symbol. On two separate occasions they later met individual young men who had been soldiers at that camp and were now civilians. Asking the men why they had stopped being soldiers, they received the same reply from both, ”You told us to.”[117]

2.2.2.5 Conditions for successful work in the field

Accompaniment

Mahony and Eguren provide a valuable examination of deterrence in general and of accompaniment as deterrence[118] specifically in Unarmed Bodyguards. Here, I include their ideas of the necessary conditions for successful accompaniment.[119]

”Accompaniment cannot directly threaten very much. Its presence is more of a hint - a suggestion that consequences may occur.” A series of conditions must be met:

1) The accompaniment and the activist have to communicate clearly to the aggressor what types of actions are unacceptable. If the message is complex or refers to documents, the accompaniment must know that the aggressor understands the content of the documents. Subtleties must be articulated. ”Deterrence cannot work if the aggressor does not know which actions will provoke a response.”

2) Deterrence commitment must be articulated: the aggressor must know in advance that an activist is accompanied and that there will be consequences to an attack. The problem here is that those giving the order may know but not inform the death squad carrying it out.

3) The aggressor must believe that an organisation is capable of carrying out its resolution. The chain of communication from the accompaniment to the international community to governmental pressure must be clear and effective. In practice, each link is uncertain and results cannot be guaranteed.

4) The aggressor must seriously consider an attack and then decide not to carry it out because its perceived costs are higher than its benefits. Usually it is impossible to find evidence of this.

One additional condition is that the accompaniment must know who the aggressor is. Death threats are often anonymous or the identity of an attacker must be deduced from little evidence. International reaction, in this case, may be mistargeted. Or an accused government may claim it has no control over a specific aggressor, which is difficult to disprove. Deterrence is demonstrably effective only if the potential attacker knows who the accompaniment group is, what it will do and what the consequences of an attack will be. Deterrence strategy requires access to information - clear analysis of who the attacker is and what political pressures will influence him or her.[120]

Some aggressors may not care about international pressure. There may even be a faction within the state apparatus, which politically opposes the ruling party and would attack human rights activists or international observers to discredit the seated government. [For example, PBI experienced that CERJ[121] members out in isolated villages were facing local thugs who seemed impervious to pressure, and that Civil Patrols which patrols, who attacked unarmed GAM members in front of the press and blatantly threatened even police and government representatives, were unaffected by foreign presence.[122]]

Deterrence fails when the aggressor decides that the attack is worth it, because other benefits outweigh the political costs. All that is left is to apply the threatened consequences as firmly as possible after the attack, in the hope of changing the calculation next time around."[123]

Additionally, the activist must not need to be in hiding for any reason. ”Semiclandestinity and accompaniment are both valid security strategies when used separately, but the combination is somewhat problematic. The mere presence of the foreigner makes hiding more difficult, and the protective function of the accompaniment is lost if the potential attacker is unaware of it.”[124]

Accompaniment cannot be used without a strong Emergency Response Network and/or other means of informing and swaying the international community. The stronger the international interest in a particular region, country, organisation, or individual, the more likely it is that accompaniment can deter an attack.

It is a condition for all teams that the accompanied person is an activist and is unarmed. PBI has set conditions on themselves too: ”PBI would not do political organising or form groups, would not initiate activities that Guatemalans themselves could initiate, would not attempt to cover the entire national territory, and would at all costs avoid any indiscretion or disclosure of information that might put others in jeopardy.”[125]

Accompaniment must continue uninterrupted as long as the threat exists to the person or group, provided that it is wanted. According to Labour organiser Sergio Guzman, Guatemala, ”It’s not that the threats necessarily stop when you have accompaniment. Accompaniment questions the threat... You call off the accompaniment when you feel you’ve reached a politically different situation. It doesn’t mean the systematic violence is over. It’s more subjective when the accompaniment has fulfilled its task of calling the violence into question.”[126]

PBI closed its accompaniment project in El Salvador in 1992 after five ”precarious years.” ”The war was over, and although violence and inequality continued in many forms, protective accompaniment was no longer the service Salvadorans wanted from foreign NGOs.”[127]

Each organisation must set conditions regarding safety and risks, knowing that accompaniment involves risks as described in the following examples. In El Salvador between 1987 and 1989, PBI members ”were inside movement offices while the army surrounded them... death squads set off bombs at night while accompaniment was inside. On 14 different occasions, PBI volunteers were detained, interrogated and invited to leave the country. In hundreds of other instances they were stopped by soldiers on the street, interrogated and intimidated. Yet the more the government harassed foreign volunteers, the more the Salvadoran civilian movement valued the accompaniment.”[128] Grenades were thrown into the Peace Brigades house in Guatemala, and three team members were knifed[129] by an unknown assailant.[130]

A last condition involves having other activities in place. ”Accompaniment is much more than an immediate tactic... It required substrategies for communicating with the army, building political clout, making diplomatic contacts, recruiting and training adequate volunteers, finding funding, and developing an emergency response network. These substrategies are conditioned by basic principles but are also designed to alleviate resource limitations and actively change the political context.”[131]

Presence

High visibility is not necessarily a condition for effective presence. The parties whom one deems potentially violent must absolutely be aware that peace team internationals are among the citizen population but they need not know where those individuals are at any particular time. The Michigan Peace Team in Chiapas used this factor quite uniquely.[132] Team members were asked to enter the country unobtrusively on a tourist visa. Further, they were required to travel at night as they entered the villages that invited them and thereafter to remain indoors during the daytime so as not to be seen. The Chiapan host villages believe that only if the internationals are not seen but known to be in the area can they protect more than a few.[133]

In most cases, however, teams have made their presence and position known to as many parties as possible, for example Cry for Justice participants strolling through the streets of Haiti.

Emergency response network

A list of 10 occurrences, which BPT felt necessitated the use of their Alert Network, is given in section 2.2.2.2. Questions developed by them regarding conditions for use are below:

1. Are other organisations/agencies working on case?

2. Is it possible to co-ordinate actions with them?

3. Is event in question a single case or repeat? Is it an exemplary case? Are people involved in the events known to you? Exemplary cases or cases indicating a worsening of the situation should have priority.

4. How serious is the case? Is there a danger for life or health? Threats to life or health have priority over other human rights violations.

5. Did you double-check the information? Did you witness the event yourself? Are there at least 2 independent sources? How reliable are sources?

6. Who wants the team to activate the network? Do persons or groups concerned want the team to take action? Do they want the case to be made public? Never act against the will of the people concerned. Co-ordinate with them which facts might be made known.

7. Would taking action on the case be an additional danger to the people concerned? To third parties? To the team? Never endanger people, even if it is only a slight possibility, without having asked them. If the safety of the team is concerned, consult with the co-ordinator.

8. How often has the alarm been triggered? Alarms cannot be triggered too often. Their effect and the willingness of people to take action wear off easily.[134]

Peacebuilding

BPT member Erik Torch itemised conditions for peacebuilding in Kosovo/a: ”In working on peacebuilding there are several points that we need to bear in mind. First and foremost, building peace needs to be focused on the relationship. To do this will require personal time spent with people as well as planning and implementing projects... It also means that when designing such projects a lot of listening must be done with interested community leaders, activists and NGO’s to make it something that they see as worthwhile and not simply imported and forced upon them. Secondly the work has to be looked at through the lens of sustainability... Thirdly it must be done within three contexts or spheres: locally (Kosovo/a), sub-regionally (the South Balkans) and regionally (Europe) since the war involved all three.”[135]

Strategy

In their empirical analysis, Müller and Büttner make the observation that nonviolent interventions ”do not automatically combine the peace strategies.” [Peacekeeping, peacemaking, peacebuilding.] Most are ”action-based” and use one of the strategies. The study shows interventions to have greater de-escalating effect if they are ”process-oriented,” aiming to affect the conflict dynamic while developing methods during the project itself, usually applying a combination of the three peace strategies.[136] All three strategies are necessary in severely escalated conflicts and must be parts of an integrated process of conflict resolution.

Higher-level goals such as prevention do not seem achievable through the sole approach of having teams of volunteers in crisis regions. If NGOs working for peace do not want to lose sight of these higher-level goals, team activities need to be integrated into a broad-based approach involving activities by a number of different actors.[137]

Clear goals

An internal condition for measurable or successful peace intervention is the presence of concrete and clear goals, which match the activities that are planned and possible. This was a painful issue in 1995 in Croatia and in 1997 in Serbia, when BPT experienced at first hand the run-up to surges in escalation. In Croatia, the volunteers thought it a defeat not to have secured a foothold from which they could exert some influence. By contrast, the organisers had never even expected this of the project. In the deliberations about how to react to a possible escalation in Kosovo/a, the question of the possibilities for achieving prevention was not even discussed—it was so far beyond perceived capacities.[138]

BPT’s peacebuilding work also suffered from the lack of a comprehensive plan that would have focused its work more systematically. Guiding notions such as human rights, non-violent conflict resolution, the channelling of information, and the provision of skills grew out of ideas about possible helpful roles and the subsequent practical realisation of these based on team experience.[139]

Other examples of poorly formulated goals would be the Gulf Peace Team and Mir Sada. GPT lacked refined goals, had not formulated their strategic objectives on a reasonable projection of the numbers they could mobilise, and had estimated the impact they could have on sheer optimism. Likewise, imprecision about the goals was one reason for the failure of the Mir Sada intervention. Christine Schweitzer suggests that the vagueness of goal formulation is obvious in the original appeals of Beati and Equilibre as well as the common Mir Sada appeal:

To stop the war, starting with a ”cease fire” during the Mir Sada period.

To be in solidarity with each person suffering from this war, regardless of his/her ideology, sex, religion or ethnic origin.

To represent civil interposition against violence.

To support and encourage a multi-ethnic population to live together in Bosnia.

To implement negotiations that will go beyond armed conquest and will impose both respect for, and the safeguard of, human rights under international law.

Nowhere was the aim of stopping the war elaborated.[140]

Without goal specificity, activities will be vague in focus and morale will suffer from uncertainty about even small successes and an undermining sense of failure.

Clarity of concepts and principles

Serious flaws in the Mir Sada plan are also found in a lack of agreement about neutrality, no agreement about the appropriateness of talking to Serbian and Croatian leaders, a vague understanding or agreement about the term nonviolent interposition, and even what to do when they arrived in Sarajevo. Lack of clarity about neutrality and how to achieve it usually means there will be none. In the case of Mir Sada, Schweitzer describes the results thus: ”During our stay in Prozor there was the lasting rumour that the Bosnian troops did not attack Prozor because of our camping there. But we did not actually do anything for the Bosnian side, which was shelled every day with grenades from a place about two miles from our camping site. A half interposition is not a successful example of interposition, but taking sides in a war!”[141]

Non-partisanship rests on good communication with both or all sides in a conflict and on a carefully selected physical position of the intervention. The Gulf Peace Team succeeded at neither.

Non-interference

Essential to conscionable intervention is the condition that locals welcome the team and have autonomy in creating their own solutions to problems. Galtung warns that intervention must not be left entirely to the outside: the broader the role defined for a third party the more it does to turn the local population into clients, taking away what might have served them in building a conflict resolution capacity, leaving them with solutions rather than challenges.[142]

”Colombians need to decide Colombian issues by themselves,”[143] says Bennett of WfP. ”We don’t advise Mexicans on what to do,”[144] says Poen of SIPAZ. ”We support them in working out their own problems.”

Communication with all parties

PBI has demonstrated again and again how absolutely essential it is that peacekeeping activities include communication with authorities involved in the conflict. ”An effective deterrence strategy can be hindered by an inability to communicate with the state. Salvadoran officials dismissed accompaniment groups as subversives; thus PBI and others were hesitant to identify themselves publicly. Likewise, it took years in Sri Lanka and Guatemala for PBI to build up a relationship with the government.”[145]

Director Robert Poen says of SIPAZ, ”We have what would be called collegial relations with local organisations. We try to connect with all groups: human rights, civic, Zapatistas, paradistas... We have contacts with the paramilitary... We try to reach out to all points of view without discrimination. It’s risky and complicated to talk to one group and then go to the next group and find that they won’t talk to you. The tendency is for people to assume that we’re pro-Zapatista. We’re trying to overcome that.”[146]

”The effectiveness of nonviolent peacekeeping is probably to a decisive extent dependent on how constructive the relations to the individual parties are, which further forms of pressure can be activated, and how far and how effectively pressure from civil society is exerted on the conflict parties.” These activities require ”reliable, long-term work and cannot be achieved though short... actions”[147] One difficulty in this is that beyond a certain stage of escalation, conflict parties view outsiders only as ”friend or foe.” Social relations are often what enable teams of nonviolent intervenors to monitor or go between mutually threatening groups to prevent renewed escalation.[148]

Attitude of aggressor

There are groups who impede work toward peace and may take direct action to prevent it. Individuals or groups perpetuate war even without obvious gain. ”Rejectionists” become so strongly identified with a cause and make such sacrifices for it that its end is a threat to their identity. ”Irreconcilables” are willing to suffer in order to inflict pain on others in return for pain experienced. An end to war represents their undoing; perhaps they’ll be tried for their actions. War is the only means by which they can survive.

”Too often... peacemakers appear surprised by rejectionists’ irreconcilable violence and allow it to interrupt steps that have been carefully constructed to bring the majority to agreement. When they do so, the actions succeed. When peacemakers signal rejectionists that their disruptions will undermine momentum toward peace, they reinforce rejectionists’ resolve to carry out such acts.”[149]

An aggressor might not fear international condemnation or repercussions of actions. Further, when a military group is threatened, it may become even less responsive to the need for a good relationship with the international community.[150]

”The processes of nonviolent conflict management, resolution, and transformation work best where state systems are democratic and/or have high levels of political, economic, and social legitimacy. Where regimes are controlled by military and paramilitary groups, they tend to believe that it is more efficient to rule by terror rather than persuasion. In these circumstances the opportunities for normal adversarial politics, played according to widely accepted rules of the game, are minimal. State-sponsored terror and political repression force individuals, interest groups, and political parties to either withdraw from the political system or to engage in violent or nonviolent resistance.

...The problem facing those seeking alternatives to the politics of terror is how to generate safe political action spaces while minimising the risk of arbitrary arrest, torture, disappearance, or death. The construction of such action spaces is a prerequisite to nonviolent problem solving. A number of problems are associated with generating creative resistance to terror:

- How to turn victims into protagonists

- How to overcome individual and collective fear

- How to develop deterrents to political and military threats

- How to promote a political system that enhances the positive consequences of political activity while minimising the negative.”[151]

"Relevant to all human rights pressure is the principle that it is about power as well as justice... in postwar or postterror transitions, there is a strong tendency for governments to respond to such pressure not by doing the right thing but by doing something. That something often involves throwing the least costly scapegoats to the wolves."[152]

Any role chosen by NP will fail if the conflict is not carefully evaluated by careful assessment of the attitude of the belligerents

Emergency response network

As has been said, the strength of other tactics depends upon the breadth, speed and reliability of an emergency response network, which ”mobilises in the shortest possible time relevant international publicity which cannot be ignored... Here use is made of repressive power, which third parties can exert on a particular conflict party. However, this power must first be activated and be prepared to let itself be mobilised to act for particular values, such as human rights against weapons export. The use of this power is hence not always available ...but rather somewhat precarious.”[153] The network and its reliability must be functional before entrance into a conflict area.

Timing

PBI has the following thoughts on timing for intervention:

1. Intervenors need credibility in order to gain access. This can be built through long-term relationships or through the reputation of intervenors via past work or position.

2. Is there hope of success given the resources of intervenors?

3. Is the conflict divisible to enable intervention in only one segment? Or is there a possibility of doing test intervention in one area?

4. Is peace desired by all parties? Are the parties motivated to resolve conflict? Are the parties hurting enough to welcome intervention?

5. Is doing nothing worse than the prospects for intervention?

6. Are domestic factors conducive to intervention?[154]

Visibility in the Field

There are multiple issues involved in deciding how much visibility is advantageous in the field. One is the practical matter of legal standing within the country. If team members have entered the country on tourist or religious visas, visibility of their peace work might give a non-welcoming government the opportunity to deport them. But if the government has agreed to the team’s presence, visibility has proved helpful.[155] Strategies of deterrence depend on high visibility of the accompanier or interpositioner.

Still other questions have to do with the effect of this spotlight on third party internationals. Does it detract from the credibility and confidence of local peacemakers or does it reinforce them?

The opinion of Michael Beer, Nonviolence International staff, is that third parties should strive for the minimum visibility necessary to get the job done. Over-exposure might bring on a political attack or a slide into dependency. Under-exposure nullifies the benefits of intervenors[156] and may decrease credibility.

2.2.3 Civil Peace Services

Christine Schweitzer

2.2.3.1 Character and goals

As mentioned in the introduction to 2.2, Civil Peace Services[157] is not a straightforward category that is clearly distinct from peace teams on the one hand, and other volunteer services on the other. Lacking a more specific definition, for the purpose of this study, all those volunteer and training organisations that are members of the European Network for Civil Peace Services (see below) will be called Civil Peace Services (CPS). Some of them are closely related to other, older versions of volunteer services that were founded after World War I or World War II.[158]

The 1990's saw a new wave of interest in nonviolent intervention by peace teams and peace services in conflict situations. Several volunteer projects, which used volunteers from abroad as well as recruited local volunteers, were created alone in the area of what was Yugoslavia until 1991. Many of the projects concentrated on refugee camps, offering social activities to the refugees and the displaced. Probably the largest of these initiatives was Sunflower (Suncokret) in Croatia, which became a Croatian humanitarian organisation that is still active today. Its founder, a Dutch activist, has meanwhile set up a follow-up project for refugees from Kosovo (Balkan Sunflower). Several projects engaged in what they called "social reconstruction work" (see below), combining physical reconstruction aid with social activities in divided towns. The first of these was a project in Pakrac in Western Slavonia that then was copied or adapted for several places both in Bosnia and Kosovo. Typically these projects work with short-term and middle-term volunteers who are usually young people, and who go with only little preparation (a weekend course or something comparable). Their goals are generally to give support to children, young people, elderly or other needy groups by offering them social activities, and thereby helping them overcome the traumas of war, and find a safe space for reconnecting with each other across conflict lines.[159]

The conceptualisation of what is called Civil Peace Services in (predominantly Western) Europe is a special development of the 1990s. The impetus was probably a reaction to the war in former Yugoslavia, plus in a renewed (related) interest in developing alternatives to the military. Conceptually, the projects vary widely between different countries, and also sometimes have seen different developmental stages within one country. Since 1997, there has been a European Network of Civil Peace Services (called EN.CPS) - a network of participants[160] and co-operating groups with which they are in contact.

The main countries where Civil Peace Services can be found today are Germany, Austria, France, the Netherlands, Britain and - as a somewhat special case - Italy. There are a few other initiatives in Europe that do not, or only partially, participate in Civil Peace Service efforts, especially in Sweden (Swedish Peace Team Forum) and Belgium (Field Diplomacy Initiative); also in Spain there are COs doing work abroad that has some similarity to the Italian White Helmet approach. In Germany there are at least two other organisations that provide training of several weeks and months as well as send people into projects, which do not count themselves among Civil Peace Services, but which are more comparable to them than to other volunteer projects.[161] And, to make things even more complicated, development services in Germany have started to send people abroad under a budget line in the Ministry of Development called Civil Peace Service. These latter projects are included in the following chapter on humanitarian aid and development organisations, and will not be considered in this chapter.

Some of the CPS projects concentrate solely on training, leaving the question of deployment aside (the Netherlands, Britain). In Austria and Italy the CPS is based primarily on Conscientious Objectors doing their alternative service in the CPS.[162] Others use paid staff called peace experts, or aim at training such experts (Germany, the Netherlands, Britain).[163] Some of the projects explicitly plan for conflict transformation work in their home country as well as abroad. In practical terms, almost all projects that have been implemented are cross-border projects, the majority of them in the European "near abroad", the countries of former Yugoslavia.[164]

At least some of the CPS groups started out as projects of large-scale intervention. This is specifically true of the German CPS, and to earlier discussions in the Netherlands. In the period between the first conceptualisations and their realisation, they all became small-scale, sending out teams or even individuals. (If not, they started to change their focus to education and training volunteers.)

The lists of goals of the different CPSs today greatly resemble each other. Generally, they aim at violence prevention, the search for possibilities for ending violent conflicts, and for sustainable solutions for all parties in conflict, (re)constitution of peaceful situations (material and social reconstruction, a functioning community and society, reconciliation), and support of civil society or for those groups which work toward these goals at the place of conflict.[165] Some also mention human rights protection as one of their goals.

In regard to principles to be found within the CPS organisations, many people in Europe nowadays prefer to use the term civil conflict transformation rather than nonviolent conflict transformation. As far as I know, none of the volunteer or CPS projects claims that its work constitutes an alternative to military missions. If the issue is raised at all, then the expectation is expressed that CPS and civil conflict transformation in general will become the dominant way of dealing with conflict in future, and by means of well timed preventive work, will make military conflict interventions unnecessary. Primarily, but not only, in the case of the Italian "White Helmets" there is usually[166] some co-operation on the practical level with international military forces in those countries where military interventions took place. The people in the field make use of their facilities and prerogatives (passes, communication services), put themselves on evacuation lists of the UN/NATO forces, and generally accept being part of the complex, multi-facetted reconstruction missions led by the UN in Bosnia and Kosovo (see 2.5 for a discussion of the role of civilians in complex missions). For example, one organisation working in Bosnia said clearly in the interview that they want to make a contribution to the implementation of the Dayton agreement.

With regard to non-partisanship and working with local partners, the picture is not very homogeneous. While the principle of non-partisanship is highly held by some organisations - specifically the more professional Civil Peace Services - others like Austrian Peace Services place their volunteers with local groups with the mandate to support their work. Ethnic tensions in the region was the reason given in two cases for the decision not to have a real local partner: In the absence of multiethnic local partners, choosing a local partner would mean aligning oneself with one side of the conflict (in Bosnia), the interview partner from Pax Christi Germany emphasised. One other project in Bosnia, the Centre for Antiwar Action, resolved the issue by choosing its staff from all three ethnic backgrounds, thereby maintaining an all-partisan stance.

In recent years, in some European countries a distinction has been made between learning services mainly for young people, with an emphasis on personal growth of the participants of the service, and expert services having their emphasis on the outcome of the service work for third parties.[167] The voluntary services mentioned above are such learning services. This is considered, at least in the German debate, as being also true for some long-term services in the South.[168] There is the category of "Learning Services in Solidarity"[169] as, for example, Eirene offers. Their goal is to further contacts between people and initiatives in the North and the South. The volunteers have to be supported by a local group at home, and work with a grassroots' organisation abroad, thereby creating ties between the two groups which continue after the service of the individual volunteers ends.[170]

Peace Expert Service[171] is used to describe the conflict transformation work of professionals (both in the meaning of being paid rather then being volunteers, and having specific qualifications) working with NGOs in conflict regions, be it in one’s own country or abroad.[172] In some countries, peace expert service is seen as the element typical of Civil Peace Services, and those countries - particularly the Germans - try to push this element. But it seems that this view is not shared by many of the other associations involved in Civil Peace Services today.

2.2.3.2 Activities of Civil Peace Services

There are not many Civil Peace Services that have already sent people to the field, and only a few of them have more than two years’ experience (Austria, Germany).

Depending on the character of the services, the number of people sent to the field varies when the volunteer project of the Swiss group and the Italian White Helmets are included, but most organisations (all German organisations and Austrian Peace Services) usually have only one to three people in one project at the same time.[173]

One remarkable speciality of the German CPS is that there are a few local peace experts trained, placed or financed in addition to international ones, or even as the only ones in a project. The Austrian Peace Services co-operate with the Centre for Nonviolence in Osijek, which provides them with international volunteers for their otherwise Croatian-staffed project.

On the basis of 15[174] projects that have people in the field, the following list of activities has emerged in regard to dealing with conflict. In addition, there were other activities reported, such as PR work and reporting back to their organisation or funders, but this was done only in an internal, organisational context. (None of the organisations interviewed uses public reporting as a tactic to influence the conflict, as some peace teams do.)

Peacekeeping activities

1. Monitoring, presence, and accompaniment:

Some activities in the realm of monitoring and presence, as well as the occasional accompaniment, can be found specifically in several projects both in Croatia and Bosnia:

§ Maintaining a presence: Having an international person in the office of a local (Croatian) human rights organisation, and going with the activists or alone to visit villagers are reported to have a protective function both for the Serbian minority and the activists.[175]

§ Monitoring is reportedly used mainly in the context of evacuating occupied houses that are in the process of being returned to their original (usually Serbian) owners. "When you are present, it is calmer", one bailiff reportedly said to a team member in Bosnia.

§ Accompaniment might occur occasionally in the context of support for returnees (for example, going with a refugee to her house that is to be evacuated), but has not been developed into a tactic as PBI or WFP have done.

2. Protesting with local or international authorities, or generally alerting international attention, also documentation and reporting:

These activities may have a protective function as well, depending on the issue of the protests. Several organisations working in Bosnia and Kosovo regularly or occasionally address local authorities as well as international organisations and authorities (UNHCR, OSCE, OHR, IPTF) in order to alert them to issues, mainly those concerning the return of refugees and the displaced. Pax Christi Banja Luka (Serbian Republic in Bosnia), for example, collected information on 600 homeless displaced persons, and gave that information to OSCE and IPTF with the request that they should act on it. Their sister team in Benkovac in Croatia alerted international organisations both in Croatia and internationally to threats and attacks committed by radical groups in that area.

Peacemaking activities:

Peacemaking activities, meaning bringing individuals or groups together in dialogue, usually occur, if at all, at the local level. Civil Peace Services generally profess the objective of working at the grassroots and middle level, and not attempting mediation etc. at the level of political leaders. In the examples studied, there have been few cases of such activities, and almost all of them could also be considered to fall into the category of peacebuilding without stretching either concept too far:

· Supporting dialogue: One of the Pax Christi teams (Benkovac) has been supporting dialogue between the Lutheran and Orthodox Churches.[176]

· Examples of mediation described were activities at the micro level, e.g. mediation between a returning displaced family and people currently living in their house,[177] or between two youth groups in a divided town.

§ Offering meeting space, be it the flat/house where the volunteers live or the Youth Centre they have helped to create, is a function that seems to be common to almost all projects.

§ Opening doors to authorities and international agencies:[178] Networking and linking functions between NGOs and internationals, accompanying activists or regular citizens to such bodies, and being an advocate for local groups are important functions played by many CPS projects. Specifically in those areas of former Yugoslavia where a large number of international actors are present, local NGOs often have found it difficult to be accepted as equal partners, or even to be listened to at all. International volunteers setting up meetings with such international organisations, or insisting in the participation of local NGOs in co-ordination forums (e.g. what the ForumCPS team did in Prizren), play an important role for these local groups. CPS volunteers have also served the same function from time to time in communication with local authorities. For example, Pax Christi Benkovac managed to get their local partner organisation in contact with their mayor who had previously chosen to ignore that group.

Peacebuilding activities:

Several categories of peacebuilding activities were found:

1. Multi-ethnic or multi-communal social work

This term is used in a thesis written by a German social worker, Ruben Kurschat,[179] who worked as a CPS volunteer in Jaice/Bosnia. He describes a multitude of activities that are typical activities of social workers but have the implicit function of bringing people together across ethnic or other perceived lines of conflict. This kind of social work creates a neutral space or protected area in which people, independent of their ethnic or religious identities, come together and do things together, such as attending a computer course or playing football. The objective of furthering reconciliation is rarely made explicit because of the fear that work concentrating on the ethnic lines of conflict might strengthen those lines and thereby deepen the conflict.[180] The social worker or peace expert might insist on participation from all sides and would try to stop all attempts to close one project or activity (e.g. language course) to members of the other groups. But rather then making "the conflict" the issue to meet about, the activities are used to reflect on group processes and one’s own behaviour, and thereby deal with the conflict indirectly.

In detail, such activities might be:

· Found and run youth centres

§ Organise social activities for different groups, for example courses and circles (knitting and senior groups) in refugee camps

§ Organise community-building projects: Pax Christi Benkovac (Croatia) has been interviewing citizens in order to find out their interests and special resources, thus encouraging the consequent formation of groups according to purpose, not ethnicity.

§ Organise youth camps: Several organisations have occasionally organised international youth camps in addition to their daily work, in order to give children and young people a chance to leave their daily life behind for a while.

§ Organise/facilitate cultural activities: Several local groups that are partners of Austrian Peace Service organise cultural activities, from theatre plays to rave parties, with the support of the Austrian volunteers.

§ Offer meeting space: This function sometimes develops almost without planning when the flat or house of the volunteers becomes a protected meeting space. Youth centres, of course, fulfil the same function.

§ Visit citizens: This is an activity reported by most CPS projects. It is both a by-product of other activities and a conscious effort to support isolated people in the countryside.

2. Support for local groups and civil society development

Supporting local groups and civil society development is one of the objectives of most CPSs, and one for which many related activities can be found:

§ Advising: The Austrian Peace Services placed volunteers with an Albanian Education Development Project where they gave advice on where to get materials, did some budget writing, edited a project newsletter, and generally were responsible for co-ordination and evaluation. Pax Christi Benkovac helped a humanitarian women’s association establish itself as an NGO, and also initiated biweekly meetings of village representatives to discuss upcoming issues and problems in village development.

§ Supporting local activists in their activities: Volunteers provide translations, facilitate meetings, serve in the office, take care of administrative and organisational tasks, drive people around, produce project newsletters and engage in other similar activities specifically in projects where volunteers were placed with local NGOs (as specifically the Austrians do). Of special importance here seems to be fund-raising support that the German ForumCPS team in Kosovo offered to a local group.

§ Networking activities: Most projects are involved in networking in one way or another, for example by furnishing international contacts and/or by bringing the partner organisation in contact with other local groups.

§ Co-organising public activities: Some CPSs have been doing this, for example Pax Christi Benkovac together with Balkan Peace Team helped several local humanitarian and human rights groups organise a Croatian-Bosnian Round Table on the return of refugees from Bosnia to Croatia.

3. Training and education in conflict-related skills

Although they belong to the realm of civil society building, training and education in areas such as conflict transformation, dealing with violence, and democratic decision-making skills should be considered in a category of their own because of their predominance in some projects. There is even one project supported under the German CPS scheme that concentrates solely on training: A Yugoslav expatriate who had worked with a German training organisation, together with (by now) six other trainers from all parts of former Yugoslavia set up a training centre (Centre for Nonviolent Action) in Sarajevo/Bosnia. There they offer training in conflict transformation and civil society building for all parts of Bosnia.

The research survey showed that NGOs, young people and women, teachers, police and OSCE staff are the primary target groups for workshops and training.

4. Psycho-social support

Psycho-social support for war victims and otherwise traumatised target groups has become an important activity in the realm of peacebuilding in many parts of the world, not only in former Yugoslavia.[181] The Civil Peace Services surveyed have displayed two kinds of activities in this field:

§ Active listening (Austrian Peace Services);

§ Trauma counselling with groups (ForumCPS and Pax Christi Benkovac), and self-help groups for those with chronic illnesses (ForumCPS in Vojvodina).

5. "Social Reconstruction" projects

Social Reconstruction describes a concept that is closely related to multi-communal social but combines physical reconstruction, rather than social work, with peace work in a broader sense. The first project of this type in the area of former Yugoslavia was a reconstruction project in a divided town (Pakrac) in Western Slavonia. The project was started by a Croatian organisation (Anti-war Campaign) in co-operation with the UN Office in Vienna (UNOV), and used short-term and middle-term volunteers from abroad. The international volunteers came to help with the physical reconstruction of houses, and on the side joined or organised social activities. While the Croatian and international volunteers could work only on the Croatian side of the town, UNOV together with Austrian Peace Services ran a parallel project for some time. Its Austrian members had UN passes and were therefore allowed to work on both sides of the border.

A project started recently by the group Switzerland Without an Army in Kosovo is based on the same concept.

6. Emergency and rehabilitation aid

Material aid of this sort has been more a by-product than a central purpose of the CPS projects in the survey (with the exception of the above-mentioned projects of social reconstruction). There has been both direct distribution of humanitarian aid and financing of projects (for building houses for needy families in Bosnia by Pax Christi), and indirect aid by linking needy persons to other humanitarian agencies that would then support them. In one case, volunteers took over advertising and selling products refugees had produced in their camps (Austrian Peace Services).

2.2.3.3 Outcomes and impact

The CPS projects are too young to have undergone an impact assessment.[182] It should also be remembered that peacebuilding - the peace strategy most commonly used by CPS so far - is the most under-researched aspect of conflict transformation, and that, as Large points out, "grass-roots peacebuilding will not have immediate dramatic effects on conflict situations".[183] An additional difficulty in judging impact is that most CPS projects are placed in the area of former Yugoslavia where a multitude of players has been working on the conflict since the beginning of the war in 1991: Starting with local and international grassroots groups, media support projects, mediation trainers, humanitarian and development organisations with their own conflict-related programs (Oxfam, for example, has been organising dialogue meetings, supporting women’s groups etc.), and ending with the different intergovernmental bodies, European Union, OSCE and United Nations. Attribution of outcomes and impact on the conflict to one specific intervenor would only be possible if all intervenors in one town, for example, were researched at the same time.

Therefore, lacking independent sources, the only indicators for positive outcomes and impact are what the projects themselves report on their activities. Judging from their reports and the interviews, it seems that especially the training work and the social work approach described above - an approach also used by other kinds of intervening agencies, specifically development organisations - find positive resonance with their clients. But it is an open question under which conditions this approach of "contact plus superordinate goal," which Ryan[184] already describes in his book on dealing with ethnic conflict, will have a positive impact in the long run. The same is of course true for the different kinds of training offered. Currently (May/June 2001) in Macedonia it has become obvious once more that even groups and organisations working for multi-ethnic understanding might be split apart along ethnic lines when the ethnic conflict escalates. However, experience in Croatia, Bosnia, Serbia and Kosovo has shown that links once formed between activists may be taken up later again in spite of the conflict. Although this is knowledge with which everyone conversant with this conflict would probably agree, there is a lack of quotable research data confirming these impressions of the validity of peacebuilding approaches under circumstances of war.

Concerning the two other categories, support of local groups and psycho-social work, it may be assumed that both are of immediate use to the groups and individuals with the privilege of having such international helpers around or being able to attend such group therapy sessions.[185] But again, the question of long-term impact remains open.

With regard to peacekeeping, it seems that presence and monitoring are considered to be useful and important by local groups and individual citizens that profit from the support of CPS volunteers. It has been reported that the number of attacks on ethnic minorities as well as threats against human rights activists (and the CPS team itself) in Benkovac, Croatia, was reduced due to the presence of the CPS team and its ability to mobilise international pressure through influential organisations in Germany and Croatia. Pax Christi in Banja Luka, in co-operation with local and international authorities (IPTF), has been successful in helping displaced persons and refugees return home.

It should be noted for future reference that in the area of former Yugoslavia these protective functions are carried out in a different way than PBI or Witness for Peace practice them in other parts of the world. Protection as a function of presence rather than of individual accompaniment is a tactic that has not been used much, if at all, and certainly has not become as refined a tactic as it has with PBI. It seems much more important that internationals are able to open doors and serve as intermediaries between local groups and citizens and the powerful international community.

With regard to peacemaking activities, it already has been mentioned that this is something Civil Peace Services have undertaken only at the very local level, often as the necessity arises during the course of their peacebuilding work. (For example, a CPS volunteer working in a youth club in West Mostar needs equipment for a party, and convinces the youth club on the other side of the town to lend that equipment to them, and then also drives a few young people from that youth club in her/his car over to attend the party.)

2.2.3.4 Conditions for successful work in the field

Generally it is difficult to judge whether the region (former Yugoslavia) in which CPS predominantly works or a particular approach used by the project organisations is responsible for the observed outcomes.

1. There are only very few projects that give the overall goals of conflict transformation and civil society building as reasons for their presence in the field. Rather, access to the field is sought and gained by means of more tangible projects, be it youth work, work with refugees, reconstruction, psycho-social help, or by stepping into the role of supporting members of local groups (like Austrian Peace Services usually do). In some conflict situations that approach might be necessary in order to obtain acceptance by local players.

2. Bringing people together in dialogue about the conflict requires clear-cut and professed identities, and the readiness of people to meet on the basis of these identities to talk about their conflict.[186] In the former Yugoslavia - perhaps with the exception of Kosovo - this approach seems to be rarely advisable, because it might strengthen rather than weaken the conflict lines. There, approaches like bringing people together regardless of their identity to pursue other common goals (what Korschat has called multi-communal social work, and which can also be found in training and other initiatives) seem to work better. The reason is probably that alignment along ethnic identities happened very recently and was very much connected to the experience of war itself, and many people, especially those more likely to participate in multi-ethnic enterprises, would much prefer to push these identities into the background once more.

3. While some CPSs place their volunteers with partner organisations, others prefer to set up independent teams with only a loose connection to a formal local partner if the funders required such a connection. There are no indicators that one approach is better or more likely to succeed. It seems to be more a question of the conflict situation in the particular area, of the presence of partners that aim at working over the conflict lines, and whether having a steady local partner organisation would make crossing the lines more difficult or impossible.

4. Building up good field relationships with both local authorities and international players already present seems to be very important in order to fulfil the functions of protection and opening doors to other agencies and authorities.

5. Questions concerning training, preparation, and the qualifications of people working in peace services will be dealt with in the chapters on personnel and training. The range of people in regard to both age and qualifications seems to be rather broad, and the length of training attended before going to the field varies between a few weeks and several months. There is no clear indication that field projects were more successful or had more impact because of certain kinds of training or skills, other than a general emphasis on personal maturity and the ability to communicate with and to adapt to another culture. Sometimes it seems to have been the other way around: The broad and open character of most CPS projects has allowed many volunteers to make use of their specific skills and knowledge (such as being a psychologist or suffering from a rare chronic sickness) in order to start matching projects in the field (trauma therapy or a self-help group for people with that sickness).

2.2.4 Consequences for Nonviolent Peaceforce

Donna Howard and Christine Schweitzer

1. Peacekeeping tactics: The examples of different peace team and civil peace service organisations have shown a rather wide range of peacekeeping tactics, including different varieties of accompaniment as well as presence and interpositioning. The lesson learned for NP might be that there are different approaches, and that depending on the conflict situation and the goals, different tactics might be chosen:

There are projects that concentrate on giving protection to local activists, acting as un-armed bodyguards with a strong international network behind them, and that derive their power from the threat of international pressure (accompaniment as deterrence, PBI as example).

Then there are projects that concentrate on giving protection to a larger group or even a ‘category’ (e.g. ethnic minority) of people. Here accompaniment might take the form of a few internationals being present with such a group (e.g. accompanying returning refugees), or accompanying individuals on critical missions (e.g. WfP accompaniment of banana workers to their trial in Guatemala, BPT and Pax Christi volunteers going with ethnic Serbs to Croatian authorities to apply for papers).

And thirdly there have been projects that direct their deterrence primarily not at one of the conflict parties on the ground, but at a third power threatening to intervene (Gulf Peace Team, Witness for Peace in Nicaragua). Here the deterrence is not a result of caring about international pressure but caring about pressure at home (killing ones own citizens as collateral damage is not received well with voters in many countries).

lnterpositioning to stop a war: The projects tried so far have all been rather spontaneous and small-scale, and have failed to reach their aims. We will come back to the question of how much that is due to the size of the projects (being too small), logistical shortcomings, and insufficient conflict analysis, after having looked at other kinds of missions in the conclusions of this chapter (2.8). In contrast to the spontaneous projects, peace teams and Civil Peace Services usually[187] have not been about stopping wars, though some of them might have started out with such a goal.[188]

2. The success of all these tactics depends on the perpetrator caring about pressure and not being self-sufficient. Accompaniment is not a tactic that works universally - careful conflict analysis is needed to determine if it has chances of succeeding or not.

3. There is one example in the survey of mixed local-international teams (Osijek Peace Teams, also PBI in Columbia has had local volunteers). It is an example in which the mandate goes beyond mere peacekeeping tasks. The function of internationals in these teams is to provide a link[189] to the outside world, sometimes to increase political clout with the local authorities, and sometimes also to bring in special skills useful to the project (like newsletter editing in the case of Osijek Peace Teams). An open question so far is whether mixed teams work also in projects where peacekeeping is the main objective. Some incidents in the history of PBI teams have shown that (white) Northern volunteers are not only safer themselves, but may be able to protect their Latin American team-mates as well. On the other hand, it has been pointed out that protection has many sources and being a foreigner from a powerful country of the Northern hemisphere is only one. For instance, the Indian Shanti Sena proved that peacekeeping by local activists is not only possible, but may be very effective. In our sample we found insufficient information on mixed local-international teams in which the international participants came from not-so-powerful countries of the Southern hemisphere.

4. All imaginable activities NP might decide to undertake - be they accompaniment, presence, observation and monitoring, interpositioning, or peacebuilding tasks - will be effective and safe depending upon the strength of its communication with both (or all) contending parties and with the international community. This aspect of the strategy must be in place before a team enters the field.

5. Most, if not all, peace teams have engaged in peacemaking on a local or sectoral level, which means that negotiation/mediation skills are important, as is the readiness to engage in such activities.

6. Peacebuilding: Here the survey has shown a very diverse picture of different approaches and views.

Some peace teams and most CPSs have peacebuilding as their main objective.

Some argue that development and relief activities provide an entree into situations and increase an intervenor’s credibility.[190]

There is, in contrast, the argument that relief and development work should be separate from peacebuilding. This view is held by four out of five[191] peace teams studied. The reasons given are that it: a) takes too much of team’s time, b) is being done by many other organisations, c) does not directly reduce violence or challenge the "powers that be,"[192] and c) is a form of colonialism - Western outsiders invade a region with their ideas of what local people should do in order to progress.[193]

Still, other peacebuilding tasks such as training in non-violence, setting up workshops and public events, activities of civil society building etc. are undertaken by most organisations - even those like PBI that concentrate on peacekeeping.

7. According to these findings, the decision whether to engage mainly in peacebuilding or in peacekeeping, or to combine both strategies, seems to be a policy decision to be made at the planning stage, and which depends on needs, conflict analysis, organisational interests and know-how (niches).

8. All the examples show how important it is for a project to define clear goals and strategies.

9. Another difficult issue is the question of non-partisanship. Not all peace team organisations are non-partisan in character and by claim. Some of them, like Christian Peacemaker Teams, are explicitly not, and found having a strong common link (i.e. a religious base to help communicate with devout Catholics of St Helene, and devout Muslims and Jews in Hebron)[194] to be a major help for their work.
In some other cases, the question whether the claim of non-partisanship can be confirmed by looking at the work of the organisations from a more independent point of view is still under discussion. This question specially has arisen again and again around accompaniment of local activists if that is the main activity of an organisation (like PBI).[195] The decision of some CPS projects to forego the requirement of having a local partner because any partner would position the project on one side or the other of the perceived conflict shows that there is a possible tension between having one local partner and non-partisanship. One solution might be to choose local partners that welcome the nonviolent intervention on both (or all) sides of the conflict.

10. Many of the CPS organisations have sought support from their governments, and all seek some kind of recognition by the state. Therefore, there are experiences and lessons learned which might be relevant for NP, specially the experience of how lobbying for state support influences the shape and contents of the projects. This can be observed both in Germany and the Netherlands where the CPS-projects looked very different in the beginning then what they are now. [196]

2.4 Larger-scale civilian missions

Christine Schweitzer

2.4.1 Introduction

In addition to the UN-led complex missions with a strong civilian element as described in the next section, there have been a few larger-scale international missions based on military force. I will present here five examples with different characteristics, leaving aside those UN Monitoring missions that were staffed mainly by military observers, as well as OSCE long-term missions consisting of only a small number of diplomats.[232] Three of the examples may be considered successes; two were not able to prevent the outbreak of violence.

In South Africa several election monitoring programs were organised by churches (Ecumenical Monitoring Program in South Africa), NGOs and intergovernmental bodies around the first free elections in 1994, and later in preparation for communal elections in KwaZulu/Natal. The various South African NGO monitoring programs are the only examples in this survey of larger-scale civilian missions, where the organisation of the missions lay in the hands of local organisations that co-operated with international sending organisations, and who deployed mixed local-international teams.

In Bougainville (South Pacific) the Truce Monitoring Group/Peace Monitoring Group (TMG/PMG) started working at the end of 1997 to monitor the peace agreements between Papua New Guinea and the warring parties in Bougainville. TMG/PMG are organised by the militaries of four neighbouring countries, but the teams do not carry weapons and include additionally civilians from these countries.

In Kosovo, the Kosovo Verification Mission of the OSCE 1998-99, was deployed to verify a cease-fire agreement between Yugoslavia and the insurgent Kosovo Liberation Army. The KVM was staffed by a mixture of internationals from all OSCE member states and included local staff mainly as interpreters, drivers and aides.

UN missions in El Salvador and East Timor were mandated with both preparation of elections /a referendum and monitoring violence. They were staffed by civilians, police and (unarmed) military observers provided by the United Nations.

2.4.2 Character and goals

2.4.2.1 Election monitoring in South Africa

The process of transition from the racist apartheid regime to a multiethnic and democratic South Africa led up to the first non-racist and free elections in 1994. The period before the elections was marked by much violence in different regions of the country. After the elections violence continued, specifically in KwaZulu/Natal where followers of the ANC and Inkatha were fighting each other, leading to the postponement of local elections in that province from November 1995 to the end of June 1996. This development provided the impetus for another monitoring project.

During the elections in 1994 both NGOs and intergovernmental organisations sent civilian monitors. The NGO mission with the largest number of monitors was the Ecumenical Monitoring Programme (EMPSA)[233] organised by the South African Catholic Bishops Conference and South African Council of Churches with the World Council of Churches. It ran from 1992 to 1994, with a total of 443 participants, about two thirds of them operating in the year of the elections. Three types of monitors were used: an Eminent Persons Group that was supposed to stay up to one week; a group of experts that stayed up to two weeks; and field monitors who served in small teams of two to four persons[234] for a period of six weeks. These time periods included preparation and debriefing at the beginning and the end of the mission. [235] The mandate of the EMPSA monitors included monitoring of politically motivated violence; investigating its causes and, if possible, preventing it from breaking out; monitoring and reporting on the negotiation process; and monitoring and reporting on the election process in its entirety.

Another larger monitoring program was set up by the Network of Independent Monitors (NIM), a South African umbrella organisation of some 40 NGOs. They deployed local and international monitors in teams who worked together an average of five months per monitor in 1994, the year of the elections. The mandate of the monitors took four main forms:

Basic monitoring, by presence at political meetings, funerals etc., and partly by short-term investigation (, collecting witness accounts);

Crisis intervention and, for example, when a train of demonstrators threatened to detour from the agreed route; and mediation between actors in conflict;

Investigative monitoring, e.g. investigation of the background of political murders, or mapping of illegal armed activities;

Long-term mediation to solve conflicts on a long-term basis.[236]

In addition, several other observation and monitoring programs and organisations were present before and at the time of the National Elections[237], including several intergovernmental missions:[238]

The United Nations sent an Observation Mission (UNOMSA) of about 500 observers who were deployed by the end of March 1994. Their number was strengthened in April by an additional 1,485 election observers.

The Organization of African Unity (OAU) sent 102 observers

The Commonwealth sent 118 observers

The European Union sent 322 observers.

The mandate of UNOMSA included monitoring and reporting on voter education; monitoring the distribution of temporary voter cards; and observing the Independent Electoral Commission in its selection of sites and establishment of balloting and counting stations. It also monitored compliance by the security forces with the requirements of the law relating to the electoral process, and equitable access to the media. UNOMSA also co-ordinated with South African and foreign NGOs on issues related to monitoring and observation.

The total number of observers deployed by intergovernmental observer missions and co-operating under the umbrella of the UN Mission was 2,527 persons:

In 1996, a coalition of local churches in KwaZulu/Natal (the KwaZulu Natal-Church Leaders Group- KCLG) organised a program called "Ecumenical Peacemakers Programme[239] in relation to the upcoming local elections in that province. The mandate of the peacemakers was not only to monitor and report, but to intervene actively and mediate between conflict parties. The volunteers–20 internationals and 80 South Africans--were deployed in five regions of KwaZulu/Natal for a period of three months per person. Each region was headed by a regional co-ordinator. The internationals received a one-week training in South Africa before beginning to work in teams of three internationals. One of their first tasks was to recruit 15 local peacemakers each, and train them with the help of experts.

2.4.2.2 Peace monitoring in Bougainville

Since 1988 Bougainville[240], an island that belonged to Papua New Guinea through colonial times, has gone through a serious civil war between the "Bougainville Revolutionary Army" fighting for independence of the island from Papua New Guinea (PNG), and the PNG defence forces. Papua New Guinea was supported by Australia through training, equipment, and for some time even through "military counsellors" allegedly spending their "holidays" flying four Australian army helicopters.[241] In the course of the war so-called “resistance forces” established themselves in Bougainville that fought on the side of PNG against the Revolutionary Army. The war had been triggered by intensive economic exploitation (copper mining) of the island by PNG. The 10 years of war cost the lives of about 20,000 people--more then 10 % of the population of 180,000. More than 50% became displaced. The infrastructure broke down completely; whole villages were burned to the ground. Massive human rights violations--murder, torture, rape, disappearances, etc.--became daily occurrences.[242]

The war was brought to an end by two agreements concluded in October 1997 (Burnham II Agreement), and the "Agreement on Peace, Security and Development on Bougainville" (Lincoln Agreement) in January 1998. The negotiations started when both sides realised that they could not win the war, and were made possible by the arrangement of a neutral location (Burnham, a New Zealand military base), covered travel and transport, and guaranteed security of the participants.[243] In the negotiations political and military leaders of Bougainville were joined by civil society leaders (clan chiefs, leaders of women’s organisations, etc.).[244]

An unarmed Truce Monitoring Group(TMG) was established in Bougainville as part of these cease-fire agreements. Under the leadership of the New Zealand military, in 1997 approximately 370[245] soldiers and civilians from New Zealand, Australia, Fiji and Vanuatu were sent to Bougainville to monitor the cease-fire and the implementation of the agreement. All members of the TMG had to be unarmed and wear civilian clothes, because an armed peacekeeping force would have been refused by the parties in conflict.[246] The operation was set up according to military standards and rules, using a military infrastructure and approach. Most of the staff today are based in one location, in a tent camp set up in a building in Loloho. Headquarters staff are quartered in a number of houses in another town (Arawa). From there they go out to patrols in the villages.

After a third round of negotiations--this time in Canberra in March 1998--and with the beginning of the permanent cease-fire at the end of April, the character of TMG changed. New Zealand stepped back from its role as co-ordinator of the peacekeeping force and reduced its staff from 220 to 30[247] in what was then called the "Peace Monitoring Group." Australia took over the leadership, with the agreement of all parties, in spite of the reservations against Australia that still existed because of its role in the war. In addition to monitoring the cease-fire, the mandate of PMG now includes facilitation of the peace process. The PMG still operates, although its numbers were reduced in the year 2000. [248]

In addition, the United Nations has sent a small Monitoring Mission consisting of five persons. Their mandate includes monitoring and verification of the agreement, but their real worth is seen in the symbolic inclusion of the United Nations in the peace process, a sign that the world cares about what happens in Bougainville. [249]

2.4.2.3 Kosovo Verification Mission

After almost nine years of non-violent resistance[250] against direct Serbian rule in Kosovo, a province that was inhabited by almost 90% ethnic Albanians[251], radical Albanian groups voted for armed struggle and founded the Kosovo Liberation Army (UCK). [252] The massive repression that followed on the part of the Serbian/Yugoslav police and military forces, especially in 1998, turned most parts of Kosovo into a war area, with hundreds of thousands of people becoming temporarily displaced. [253] Under the threat of NATO intervention in Kosovo in the autumn of 1998 (the activation order had even been given already) [254], the Yugoslav government under Milosevic agreed[255] at the last minute to the deployment of an unarmed "Kosovo Verification Mission" under the umbrella of OSCE. [256] In contrast to an armed mission, an OSCE mission was acceptable to both sides, although the Kosovo-Albanians would have preferred an armed NATO peacekeeping force.

The OSCE started to deploy about 2000 unarmed monitors in November 1998, but not having the personnel (or equipment) ready, the Mission never reached the agreed number before it was withdrawn on March 20, 1999. The KVM replaced the "Kosovo Diplomatic Observation Mission-KDOM" that preceded it, and whose personnel was integrated into the KVM.

The security of the OSCE verifiers--the term “verifier” instead of “monitor” was used to express their active role--was to be guaranteed by the Yugoslav/Serbian police. But a "NATO Extraction Force" was deployed to Macedonia to stand ready in case OSCE personnel were taken hostage (a scenario looming large in the imagination of the Europeans after the hostage-taking that occurred in Bosnia in 1995) or were otherwise endangered. NATO also took charge of monitoring all movements in the air.

The mandate of the KVM included:

Establishment of a permanent presence throughout Kosovo;

Monitoring of the cease-fire (UN resolution 1199) as agreed between OSCE and FRY on 16.10.1998;

Maintaining close liaison with the parties and other organisations in Kosovo;

Supervising later elections in Kosovo;

Reporting and making recommendations to the OSCE Permanent Council and to the United Nations.

They were also charged with accompanying Serbian police forces if they requested it; supporting UNHCR, ICRC and other international organisations in the return of displaced persons and delivering of humanitarian aid; monitoring the support given to the humanitarian organisations by the Yugoslav authorities; and supporting the implementation of an agreement on the self-administration of Kosovo as soon as that agreement was made.

The Mission headquarters was established in the capital of Kosovo, Prishtina. In addition, five regional centres were opened, plus field offices and co-ordination centres in smaller towns and communities. Teams of verifiers were to operate from the field offices. An OSCE training centre was also opened to prepare the verifiers for their tasks.

From the beginning[257] the Mission was faced with many problems, although for the first two months violence decreased as the Serbian forces returned to their barracks. But by the end of December fighting had already resumed, mainly at first from the side of the Kosovo Liberation Army which had filtered back into the areas abandoned by the Yugoslav forces. The OSCE mission held out until March although their work became more and more difficult, until it was withdrawn a few days before the NATO bombing started. It is difficult to assess the degree of risk for the verifiers. Most who are critical of the NATO military intervention maintain that the withdrawal was not really necessary, and the number of incidents involving KVM personnel was rather small compared to the total number of encounters experienced daily by the personnel. [258] The fact that the withdrawal was not impeded in any way, as OSCE and NATO feared it might, could be seen as an indicator that the Mission might still have had a chance.

Many questions have been asked about the role of NATO and specifically of the United States. It can be proven by KVM reports that the UCK, not the Serb side, was to blame for the breaking of the cease-fire in December and January 1998/99. However, a rather dubious incident, the so-called “Racak massacre,” [259] was used by the USA and other NATO leaders (Germany and Britain distinguished themselves here in particular) to build up a case for military intervention. That intervention[260]--a bombing campaign of Yugoslav forces in Kosovo, and infrastructure in Serbia and Montenegro--eventually took place from March to June 1999, after a new round of negotiations in Rambouillet (France) had failed. The war was not sanctioned by the Security Council of the United Nations but was a unilateral decision of the NATO-allied states. [261] The war ended when Yugoslavia capitulated in June 1999, and a transitional international rule (now based on UN Security Council resolutions) was established in Kosovo, with NATO taking care of peacekeeping, and the United Nations, OSCE and European Union sharing a multitude of civilian tasks.

2.4.2.4 UN missions in El Salvador and East Timor

UN Observer missions are generally small (at maximum, a few hundred), staffed predominantly by military personnel. They obey the same principles and rules regarding final approval of their constitution as for the conflict parties, including equitable geographic representation, and carrying arms only for self-defence (see next section 2.5) according to classical peacekeeping missions. [262] But a few observation missions have been staffed differently and with different tasks of these will be considered in this chapter:

ONUSAL in El Salvador (1991-1995) [263] was set up at a time when cease-fire negotiations between the Salvadorian government and the guerrilla army, FMLN, which were intended to end a civil war of more than 10 years’ duration, were well under way but were not yet concluded.[264]. Thus, ONUSAL was one of the first UN missions deployed prior to a cease-fire agreement. ONUSAL's mandate since its deployment in June 1991 has changed several times. At first, it was to verify compliance by the parties with the July 1990 Agreement on Human Rights. At this point Its mandate included monitoring of the human rights situation, investigating alleged human rights violations, promoting human rights, and making recommendations on eliminating violations. It had power to visit any place without notice, could receive communications from anyone, conduct direct investigations, and even use the media for the fulfilment of its mission.

After the signing of the Peace Accords in January 1992, ONUSAL had additionally to verify and monitor the agreement. After the demobilisation of the FMLN, the mandate was again enlarged to monitor the elections planned for 1994. ONUSAL was to verify that the provisions made by all electoral authorities were impartial and consistent with the holding of free and fair elections; that registration of voters would be inclusive; that effective mechanisms were established to prevent duplicate voting; that voters had unrestricted freedom of assembly, expression of movement and organisation; and that voters were educated so that they could effectively participate.

ONUSAL was originally comprised of 135 international staff but was later increased to 450, a number to which 900 election observers were added in 1993. In the course of enlargement of its mandate, ONUSAL had three divisions added to the original Human Rights Division: a Police Division with an authorised strength of 631 (a number it never reached), to assist in the formation of the National Civil Police; a Military Division consisting of 380 military liaison officers and observers; and an Electoral Division of 36 professionals, established in September 1993.

The longer-term conflict in East Timor, where the majority of the population sought independence from Indonesia[265] seemed to come to an end when, at the beginning of 1999, the President of Indonesia, Habibie, indicated that his government might be prepared to consider independence for East Timor. [266] Negotiations were taken up which included the former colonial power, Portugal, and ended in April 1999 with an agreement between the United Nations, Indonesia and Portugal to allow a referendum, (called “consultation”) in East Timor on the question of the future status of the island.[267] In the May 5 Agreements, the parties agreed to the security arrangements for the implementation of the consultation. Indonesia guaranteed that it would take care of law and order, and the protection of all civilians. This meant that the issue of security was left in the hands of the Indonesian police, although it was clear that their neutrality was anything but a given. At the beginning of June the Security Council established the observation mission, UNAMET, to cover the time period until the consultation slated for August 30, which was later extended until end of September. UNAMET consisted of 280 civilian police officers to advise the Indonesian Police, as well as 50 military liaison officers to maintain contact with the Indonesian Armed Forces. As well, a larger number of additional personnel from other UN organisations (e.g. UNHCR), including 460 UN Volunteers (50 of them as polling supervisors), and more then 1,700 other observers were present before the referendum day[268]. Supporters and opponents of the autonomy proposal signed a Code of Conduct for the campaigning period. [269] But in the last two weeks before the referendum violence escalated again after a period of relative quiet; militias tried to intimidate local people, and UNAMET staff were threatened again.

While voting on the referendum day took place with only a few incidents (one of them the fatal stabbing of a local UN staff member), on the night after the referendum, August 30, violence resumed, mainly on the part of pro-Indonesian militia that had not withdrawn from East Timor as had been stipulated in the Agreement. They attacked pro-independence supporters, burning homes and attacking residents of villages. The observers were unable to stop the violence, and all remonstration with Indonesia to provide adequate security failed. Only in the capital, Dili, a small group of 92 international staff with 163 local staff, 23 journalists, nine international observers and two UN medical volunteers remained in the UNAMET headquarters, in order to provide some protection to about 2,000 displaced East Timorese who had sought refuge in the compound. In the end the compound was not stormed by the rioting militias and, after two weeks, the beleaguered occupants eventually evacuated to Australia. On September 15, one day later, the UN Security Council decided to deploy an armed Chapter VII-peacekeeping mission,[270] the Transitional Administration of East Timor (UNTAET), which took place within a few days without meeting much armed resistance. This is the present state of affairs in East Timor.

2.4.3 Activities

2.4.3.1 Election monitoring in South Africa

The first and foremost activity of all NGO monitoring teams was to make their presence known by visits to political actors and authorities, and to build contact networks. [271] This was the background against which both their peacekeeping and their peacemaking efforts took place.

Peacekeeping Activities

1. Basic monitoring and presence :

Monitoring and presence at public meetings, demonstrations, occupations, strikes, compulsive transfers of illegal settlers, allocation of plots of land for homeless people, funerals, etc. [272]The mission in KwaZulu/Natal also offered accompaniment of participants in political meetings on their way to and from these events.

Monitoring the actions of the security forces was seen as a very important function.[273] NIM made sure (e.g. by phone calls ahead of time) that the police were present at public meetings, reminding them of the Code of Conduct agreed upon, and observing their behaviour.

Monitoring the elections: The EMPSA election team (that arrived only two weeks before the elections) monitored the preparations (registration and training of the monitors, the establishment of polling stations, and training of election monitors) as well as mounting a presence at polling stations on election day. The UN observers who came into the country for only a few weeks before and during the elections also concentrated their monitoring[274] efforts on activities related to the elections (such as the establishment of polling and counting stations).

2. Direct interpositioning played a larger part with NIM and the Ecumenical Peacemaker Programme than with EMPSA[275] NIM monitors intervened in possible crisis situations, e.g. when a train of demonstrators threatened to leave the agreed route and enter the area of its opponents; and contributed in creating links between the local population and the authorities/security forces. But EMPSA also reported interpositioning between different groups at public political meetings, demonstrations and funerals.

3. Investigative monitoring: NIM monitors especially investigated cases of violence, took witness statements, followed up on police investigations, investigated and refuted rumours, mapped areas of conflict, wrote reports, mapped illegal armed activities, etc. Also EMPSA monitors participated during police investigations and identification parades.

Peacemaking activities

Peacemaking activities mainly took place on a local/regional or sectional (work conflicts) basis. They included:

Creating contacts between rival political actors (EMPSA);

Supporting the local inhabitants' contacts with the authorities and with the security forces (EMPSA);

Mediation attempts such as in taxi wars and strikes (EMPSA);

NIM monitors actively took part in different types of confidence-creating measures, participated in meetings between disputing parties, organised meetings in areas affected by conflict, and implemented mediation in some individual cases. [276]

Peacebuilding activities

Peacebuilding was not an activity that loomed high in the descriptions of the South African missions, but there have been certain activities in this field:

1. Civil Society Building

The monitors working with NIM were involved in some organisational work such as the establishment of functioning offices, discussions with and training of recipient organisations on how to structure their work, etc.

Networking: The peace monitors contributed to improving information exchange between different organisations.

Support: The monitors supported different local initiatives to stop violence (EMPSA).

2. Humanitarian Aid

There were a few activities related to supporting victims of violence, visiting homes of the families of victims of violence (KwaZulu/Natal), and contributing to the contact between victims and the authorities or aid organisations (EMPSA);

Giving first aid, calling ambulances or transporting wounded people to hospitals which saved the lives of several people (EMPSA).

Also most missions engaged in report writing, but it is unclear what happened to these reports and how they were used (if at all).

The short length of stay of EMPSA monitors has been criticised. The monitors themselves felt the time was too short. The locals complained that the quick turn-over meant that, as soon as they got used to people they disappeared and new ones had to be introduced.

EMPSA started working before it had the infrastructure in place. Specifically, local support in South Africa was not a given. Other shortcomings related to administration and organisation were also reported--for example, that the program was too centralised, with the national office reserving all important decisions to itself. [277] Also, the report of a participant in the 1996 Ecumenical Peacemakers Programme states that internationals were a great help but their integration also caused many questions and problems for the locals. [278] NIM monitors faced many problems at the start because their local recipient groups did not have the infrastructure and equipment (housing, cars, fax, phones, radio communication) in place. This limited their work, and/or increased the risk (lack of radio communication). [279]

2.4.3.2 Peace monitoring in Bougainville

The basic task[280] of the Truce Monitoring Group and its successor, the Peace Monitoring Group, was to patrol the area and investigate breaches of the cease-fire agreement. In addition to peacekeeping several activities were combined with these patrols that may be considered as falling more into the realm of peacebuilding:

Monitors initially went out to the villages usually accompanied by an interpreter, distributed printed material on the peace process, and held so-called “peace awareness meetings” where they read the Peace Agreement and gave talks on peace-related issues.[281]

In addition they conducted village infrastructure assessments, and

set up sporting competitions (volleyball, soccer) in mixed teams, with members of TM/PPG participating as well.

Several other activities were carried out with the objective of breaking the ice and building up trust. The monitors organised and attended events which included music, singing and dancing; they learned to convene meetings around lunch or dinner times and shared food with villagers; and the Operations officer made attendance at church services compulsory for all team members, because he considered this to be an essential element in the success of the team considering the very religious setting of Bougainville.

TM/PPG supported a medical facility that also treats Bougainvilleans who are critically ill.

However, they did not fulfil requests for material aid although this was often requested and, according to the reports, they brought patrols into difficult situations.

There are not many indicators in the reports on peacemaking activities other than what is referred to as “facilitation.” Facilitation included providing ideas, information, communications and transport. At the start this occurred mainly at the grass-roots level, but as the peace process progressed, facilitation shifted to assisting the Bougainvillean leaders at all levels with attending meetings and the passage of information from these meetings back to the people. [282]

In terms of organisation and structure, it seems that at least initially the Mission faced many problems. Many things improved over time, especially when predeployment training was introduced (one-week training). [283] Breen reports that a real learning process had set in, and the concentration on military mechanics was reduced. Criticism includes:

Commanders feeling left alone with the problems once the Mission had started;

No real selection process of personnel;

Non-military staff having problems adapting to military culture; military having difficulty adjusting to the civilian monitors;

Cultural sensitivity conflicts between Fijians and Vanuatuans on the one side, and Australians/ New Zealanders on the other. Australians thought Vanuatuans badly prepared, while the latter found that some New Zealand and most ADF personnel treated them as interpreters, and seemed condescending about their lack of military experience and skills;

Partly as a result of concentration on force protection, and partly because the exact nature of monitoring operations was not well practised or understood, there was strong emphasis on military mechanics, but weak effort on political and cultural engagement with the factions and groups in Bougainville;

Gender awareness was obviously very low. One (female) monitor stated: "Many of the women's issues are considered to be only for the female PMG patrol members to be aware of... In fact, a directive that came out from the Headquarters was that patrols should not become "over burdened" by women's issues. I never quite understood that. Perhaps if I had known how not [to] become over burdened with men's issues and how they differed from those of women, I could have reached an appropriate balance." [284] Another adds: "As the only woman in our teamsite, I was sometimes mistaken as being the teamsite cook, or as being there to provide other services (I won't elaborate!) to the team." [285]

2.4.3.3 Kosovo Verification Mission

The objective was to spread the verifiers all over Kosovo but because of the low build-up of the Mission that objective was only partly reached. Instead, the verifiers often concentrated on those areas from which disturbances were reported. [286] The KVM concentrated on peacekeeping tasks, with some elements of peacemaking and also a few peacebuilding/emergency aid elements included.

Peacekeeping activities

1. Patrolling by car.

2. Intervening if possible if they came across violent incidents. Sometimes their presence was enough to stop violence--for example, on arrival in one place the Serbian police stopped harassing a group of Albanian young men. [287]

3. Monitoring a possible outbreak of violence before it occurred, in order to at least determine who had started the shooting if there was any. To do that, in at least one case the KVM established verifiers in command posts on opposite sides. [288]

4. Accompanying Serbian police and Serbian investigators to places controlled by the UCK[289], and/or in order to reassure the Albanian population who had reason to fear harassment by Serbian police. In one case, the escorts were cancelled when the UCK informed the KVM that they could not guarantee the safety of the verifiers. [290]

5. Establishing permanent outposts in crisis areas, e.g. in Malisevo, a small town originally controlled by the UCK, then taken over by the Yugoslav military, in order to encourage return to that town; [291]

6. Visiting sites of violence where fighting took place or dead bodies were found, or alleged mass grave sites. They usually documented the scene and reported on it.[292]

7. Monitoring several court trials. [293]

8. Their work also included weapons verification inspections in Yugoslav army barracks, and inspections of company positions. [294]

9. Reporting was another important part of the Mission’s tasks, including reports on the situation of refugees and displaced persons.

Peacemaking activities

Peacemaking activities were usually closely linked to the peacekeeping functions of the KVM--for example, when agreements were negotiated between the UCK and Yugoslav army and police to separate the parties in a place like Malisevo. [295]

Another activity in this field not included in the original mandate[296] was negotiation for the release of hostages and war prisoners. For example, the KVM negotiated the release of five civilians taken hostage by the UCK whom they then picked up and brought back into safety, [297] and the release of eight Yugoslav soldiers. [298]

Peacebuilding activities

At that point in time the KVM did not engage in peacebuilding in the sense of longer-term activities, but there were some KVM and KDOM activities related to the return of refugees and displaced persons, and reconstruction work:

Liaison with local and international NGOs on the situation of refugees and displaced persons; [299]

The KVM with the KDOM, USAID, UNHCR and NGOs undertook the rebuilding of facilities in Malisevo. [300] Similar activities also occurred in other places, e.g. repairing electricity in an area, or reconstruction of school buildings. [301]

2.4.3.4 UN missions in El Salvador and East Timor

ONUSAL, the UN mission in El Salvador, was engaged in all three peace strategies. The monitors spread throughout the country, established regional offices and creating a very wide range of contacts with all sides to the conflict. Their activities included peacekeeping tasks also found in other missions, such as:

Monitoring and verifying human rights violations by reporting on abuses (after they occurred);

Monitoring of reduction of armed forces (completed by end of January 1993);

After the conclusion of the Peace Accord, ONUSAL played an active role assisting in negotiations, e.g. on demobilization of the FMLN and more equitable distribution of land by the government, broad political participation, and wide recruitment into the new National Civil Police force.

In addition they engaged in a wide range of activities that would fall under the category of peacebuilding:

Offering human rights education to the military and the general public;

Monitoring the introduction of a new Armed Forces Reserve System;

Assisting the restructuring of the police;

Supervising the clearing of minefields;

Monitoring the situation affecting ex-combatants.

The observers of UNAMET in East Timor were also deployed throughout the country. [302] But apparently their main activity concentrated on preparations for the elections and not on controlling the violence, other than monitoring the registration and voting stations, and collecting weapons on a voluntary basis from militia members. Their main task was to educate the population on the referendum through the production and distribution of voter education material.

Registration for the referendum was postponed twice because of the security situation, but eventually commenced in the middle of July. The registration centres were managed and monitored by UNAMET, and turn-out was very good in spite of the still-unsecured situation (451,792 voters, whereas the UN originally expected only 400,000 eligible voters).

When UNAMET staff themselves became victims of violent attacks or threats, they reported on these threats and complained to the Indonesian security forces. [303]

2.4.4 Outcomes and impact

2.4.4.1 Election Monitoring in South Africa

Two of the NGO monitoring missions (EMPSA and NIM) have been evaluated by a Swedish team, looking at the missions from the Swedish sending organisation's viewpoint but containing a lot of general information on outcomes and impacts of those two missions, as well as comparing them to some extent with the UN mission. There is no information of that quality on the later program in KwaZulu/Natal, but from the report it appears that, regarding outcomes, there were no substantial differences from the earlier reports. The following immediate (positive) outcomes were listed[304]:

1. All monitoring missions managed to reduce the level of violence by their presence, monitoring and interpositioning at different events. This was associated with the fact that the various actors knew the peace monitors' presence meant a risk of sanctions.[305]

2. Providing encouragement and a link to the so-called wider world, both for citizens in general and for the churches with which the monitors worked.

3. The peace monitors contributed to improving the exchange of information between different organisations and, in the case of NIM, the monitors felt they had been able to contribute to strengthening NIM's capacity and its legitimacy (civil society building).

4. They also contributed to the formation of public opinion through their use of mass media both in their countries of origin (Sweden, but this could probably be generalised to include other countries as well), and the South African press.

The short-term success of the monitoring was dependent on the degree to which the monitors managed to make contacts with all sides, and a good knowledge of the local actors. Where this was missing, either because of the monitors’ short stay or because they had to cover too wide an area, their capacity to intervene was effectively reduced.

Because of this lack of anchorage, doubts have been raised about the longer-term impact of the monitoring missions on work for peace in general. Some church leaders interviewed by Ewald/Thörn believe they failed to build long-term competence in local societies. [306]

Nevertheless, the Swedish evaluators compare EMPSA monitors positively to the UN election monitors, and relate this to two aspects:

1. Time: the EMPSA monitors were present for at least five weeks, the UN for only two weeks. This gave the NGO monitors more time to make themselves known in a local context, and create continuity in the monitoring work.

2. Space: The UN election monitors lacked the local anchorage gained by the peace monitors through the recipient organisations and their co-ordinators. This criticism was echoed by interviewed Inkatha members who were very critical of the UN mission, saying that they came to "have nice vacation and to live a life of luxury at nice hotels."

2.4.4.2 Peace Monitoring Group in Bougainville

The monitoring mission in Bougainville seems generally to have been considered successful. Böge says that the TMG quickly managed to win the trust of all sides, specifically of populations in the villages, thereby contributing in a high degree to the development of a peace-friendly climate. The Commander of the Mission Osborn says the same: "In my view the TMG and the PMG have been outstanding successes whatever criteria you apply to measure their performances." [307]

2.4.4.3 Kosovo Verification Mission

The KVM is an example of very mixed outcomes. On the one hand, it undoubtedly managed to reduce violence by talking to both sides and convincing them to contain localised outbreaks of violence. In addition, their mere presence obviously played a role. [308] Specifically at the beginning of the mission the cease-fire was respected. Both the Serbs and the more moderate commanders of the UCK were willing to stop fighting, which gave a chance for stabilisation of the situation.Refugees and displaced persons returned in greater numbers as the fighting calmed down. [309] Loquai: "When looking from the present perspective back to the beginning of the KVM, one could imagine what could have been reached if the KVM had arrive quickly, spread densely and covered the whole of Kosovo."[310] Even in January/February 1999 when the situation became tense again, their arrival on the scene usually had a de-escalating effect. [311]

But the verifiers did not manage to contain all violence. There were attacks on police and civilians all the time in varying degrees. The cease-fire was also used by the UCK to move back into its strongholds as soon as the Yugoslavs withdrew. [312] At the beginning of February they controlled more or less the areas they had controlled before the Serbian offensive in the summer of 1998, but this time they were better organised and armed. There were warnings of a spring offensive by the UCK.[313]

In January and February the security situation also deteriorated for the verifiers themselves. In mid-January two verifiers were wounded when their vehicles came under small arms fire. [314] Their movements and activities became restricted. [315] At the end of February eight cars were refused permission to enter FRY from Macedonia, and a Russian verifier was shoved back into his vehicle[316]; two verifiers were stopped at gunpoint by Serbian police and hit by them. [317] There had already been attacks in January, e.g. on KDOM personnel eating in a restaurant. [318]

But did the KVM have any chance to succeed? The mission was agreed to by the Yugoslav side only under the threat of war, and that threat was kept up during the time of the Mission by the presence of NATO planes monitoring air movements, the NATO extraction force waiting in Macedonia, and the fact that the Activation Order was not cancelled. On the other hand, the Kosovo-Albanian side wanted a military intervention because they had always (in fact since 1991) [319] anticipated the internationalisation of the conflict, and especially an international military presence. They saw this as the way to reach their political goal of independence, so NATO’s continuing threat to intervene was just what they wanted. [320] Under these circumstances the KVM basically stood no chance, so it is rather surprising how successful they actually were in the field given this very negative framework in which they had to operate.

2.4.4.4 UN missions in El Salvador and East Timor

ONUSAL has been considered a success, despite many problems related to ongoing human rights violations[321] and hesitant disarmament–especially from the FMLN side, culminating in the discovery of an illegal arms cache in Nicaragua. The Peace Accords were ultimately implemented; FMLN was eventually disarmed and transformed into a political party; former combatants were re-integrated; and elections took place as planned. Participation in the elections was much lower then expected (only 55%) due to logistical and structural problems, and a number of irregularities were reported. Nevertheless the election results were accepted by all sides, and there was no relapse into war.

Although the Mission’s mandate did not include direct preventive action against human rights abuses, [322] its very visible presence alone seems to have represented an important symbol for all sides. It is also worth noting that the pursuit of a human rights agenda did not damage the neutrality of ONUSAL to the point where it would have become ineffective. [323] ONUSAL’s success in El Salvador is also attributed to the fact that the intense mutual suspicion and lack of trust between the two sides in conflict allowed the UN to play the role of arbiter and guarantor to both sides.

The disastrous failure of the mission in East Timor may be attributed at least partly to bad conflict analysis and misjudgement of the situation. It was not apparently recognised that the Indonesian side, especially the militias in East Timor, were not ready to accept the more likely outcome of the referendum, the decision for independence. [324]

Secondly, despite all the violent incidents, neither the UN nor NGO monitors were apparently really prepared to deal with the violence. Unlike the other examples in this survey, there was no real systematic attempt at dealing with it. Instead, everyone concentrated on the preparation and conduct of the referendum. The international monitors did not manage to invoke the threat of serious consequences in the case of a renewed outbreak of civil war--though the eventual deployment of a military mission (see Chapter VII) shows, in hindsight, that they would have had impressive sticks--if no carrots--at their disposal.

2.4.5 Conditions for successful larger-scale civilian missions, and for Nonviolent Peaceforce[325]

1. Success with these missions seems to rely on one condition: that both sides in the conflict really want peace, with a stake in international support and in retaining some minimum respectability[326] (as in El Salvador).[327] Only when this condition is present can the civilian intervenors use available incentives and threats. [328] In South Africa, there was the possibility of reports to the international world and of sanctions in the case of undue violence. [329] On the situation in Bougainville one Mission commander stated: "I was always confident that the Bougainvillean leaders were aware that contributing governments could be expected to withdraw their personnel if the security situation deteriorated." [330] It has been argued above that the lack of this element was one factor for the failure of the KVM, and of UNAMET in East Timor.

2. The character of a mission changes when it has to rely on the local people for security. All civilian missions had to rely on this protection to some degree; therefore it was important to establish good contact, and win trust and acceptance. Instead of just keeping people apart, civilian peacekeepers seem to have to bring them together, at least by making themselves the link between the parties. "Relying on the Bougainville people to ensure the safety of peace monitors reinforces the realisation that peace on Bougainville is the responsibility of the Bougainville people. They are only too aware that, should the safety of the PMG be placed at risk, there is a very real danger that the peace process will falter. This was emphasised on a number of occasions when Bougainvillians assisted patrols in difficult circumstances."[331] "The decision to go to Bougainville unarmed caused some angst ... at the time, but it was the right one--there were at least two occasions I encountered which may have gone differently if we had been armed"[332]
In the case of the KVM, there seems to have been a lack of understanding of the character of an unarmed mission. To contrast a quote from Mission head Walker with the quote of his colleague above: "It's a dangerous place; it's very risky. I think that people who are coming there, coming in unarmed under the agreement--and all of our people are unarmed--makes a very dangerous situation, as I've said. And the quote in the paper as recently as today, we're probably the only people in Kosovo who do not carry side arms of some sort, if not bigger weapons. So, we're hoping that is somehow going to protect us from those with weapons." [333]

3. Combining peace strategies: Civil peacekeeping always seems to imply a peacemaking component as well, both on the higher levels in order to create the framework and lead the peace process onward (El Salvador, Bougainville, South Africa), and on the ground to negotiate in the case of local/regional or sectoral occurrences. Ample examples of such activities have been given above. Both need to go hand in hand, although perhaps not carried out by the same persons. [334]
With regard to peacebuilding activities, the missions apparently engaged in them to varying degrees, depending on their mandate and the overall framework (e.g. partner organisations) of their situation. Some activities were obviously undertaken to win trust and acceptance, while others were part of the mandate (e.g. reconstruction work in the context of supporting returning refugees).

4. Knowledge of local background, and establishing a base in the community: The Swedish evaluation of the South African election monitoring, and that of Schmidt on the later mission in KwaZulu/Natal, both strongly emphasised this aspect: a comparable strength in contrast to the UN monitors in South Africa, but with impaired effectiveness due to insufficient local anchorage in some communities--the monitors being sent from some central office, leaving the local churches to deal with them. While the establishment of good contacts with all sides has been mentioned as an important factor in the success of ONUSAL in El Salvador, the TMG/PMG in Bougainville has been criticised by some Mission participants for not paying enough attention to this factor.

5. Non-partisanship or impartiality: it has been important for all the civilian missions to establish this position although some struggled with it, especially the South African NGO missions which, at least initially, were viewed as being close to the ANC--an image they managed overcome broadly but not completely. [335]
Another problem was combining investigations into the reasons for political violence with their image as an impartial observer or negotiator. [336]This tension could also be observed with the KVM. In Bougainville a problem arose with the participation of Australia which had been involved on one side of the war in the peacekeeping mission[337], although their leadership was eventually accepted since they could not be ignored as a regional power, and so had to be included a stakeholder in the peace process.

6. Length of stay of monitors: While simple monitoring seems possible for teams staying for only a few weeks, the evaluators of the Swedish contribution to EMPSA and NIM came to the conclusion that a minimum stay of six months is necessary to fulfil a broader mandate. [338] This was also the average length of stay of monitors in most other missions.

7. With regard to the constitution of the peace force, several aspects can be highlighted from the examples:

Language: In South Africa in the Ecumenical Peacemakers Programme a minority of internationals worked together with a majority of locals on a ratio of 1:5 (3 internationals to 15 locals). The report of one international participant emphasizes that, while the internationals could speak in English with most people, local team members working in their mother tongue were crucial.

Cultural affinity: The international monitors working with NIM felt it was important for them to show that not all whites are racists or persons who avoid the struggle against apartheid. [339] On the other side, the overall 'white' character of NIM and its observers was remarked upon negatively by others in South Africa. The inclusion of people from Fiji and Vanuatu was very important symbolically (Melanesians) as well as practically, since personnel from these countries shared a comparable cultural background. [340] People also reacted very positively to an Australian Aborigine woman with whom they felt a special affinity. [341]

Gender: In Bougainville one woman was included in each Mission patrol in recognition of the important role women play in Bougainvillean society (mostly matrilineal clans); men would not have been able to link effectively to the women. [342] This aspect is not mentioned in reports from the other missions although it is certain that women were included in all of them, and it may be assumed that their contacts varied from those of their male colleagues.

8. Organisation and Deployment: The importance of available infrastructure and equipment has been the especial experience of peace monitors with NIM in South Africa and the KVM in Kosovo. The ad hoc organisation of missions has always resulted in a slow initial response. Perhaps even more important is the need for quick deployment of monitors in sufficient numbers. As mentioned above, this deficiency caused serious personnel problems for the KVM in particular. At the time of their withdrawal they had just reached 65% of targeted capacity. Their inability to cover the whole province has been mentioned as one of the contributing factors to their eventual failure. [343]

2.5 Military-based interventions

Christine Schweitzer

2.5.1 Introduction

This chapter[344] will look at those missions carried out either by the United Nations or by members of the UN acting under a mandate from the UN, which involve some use of military personnel, and which are undertaken with the objective of "help[ing] maintain or restore international peace and security in areas of conflict"[345]. The character of these missions has changed drastically since 1989.

I will look first at what has come to be called classical peacekeeping or peacekeeping of the first generation, meaning those missions where lightly armed UN troops (blue helmets) are deployed to monitor a cease-fire.

After that, I will deal with the UN missions of the second and third generation[346], which are characterised by multiple tasks far beyond mere monitoring of a cease-fire ("2nd generation") and often by so-called "robust peacekeeping" ("3rd generation"). There are three important aspects of these missions: first, there are usually a greater number of civilians involved in these missions, being trusted with carrying out peacebuilding tasks. Secondly, there is the issue of division of labour between the armed forces and these civilians who are considered to be able to do their work because of the protection of the military. And thirdly, there is the issue of military forces assuming civilian tasks, such as the setting up of refugee camps and reconstruction work.

To end this chapter, a short glance shall be taken at the rather problematic term "peace enforcement."

Question related to the possibilities of replacing military personnel with civilian nonviolent forces will be discussed in an extra chapter, 2.5.

2.5.2 Classical peacekeeping and monitoring missions

2.5.2.1 Character and goals

Peacekeeping is usually considered to have emerged after World War II, although there were predecessors in the time of the League of Nations.[347] As it is not mentioned explicitly in the Charter of the United Nations, peacekeeping, understood as the monitoring of cease-fires and buffer zones, has been described as being in the middle between Chapter 6 and Chapter 7 missions (Dag Hammersköld termed it "Chapter Six and a Half") because it is said to have as much in common with peaceful settlement of disputes (Chapter 6) as with enforcement of UN decisions (Chapter 7). Peacekeeping troops were usually structured around light infantry battalions, not bringing heavy armour (e.g. usually no tanks or missiles), and consisted of up to a few thousand soldiers.[348]

Classical peacekeeping missions were governed by five principles[349]:

1. Consent of the parties to the dispute for the establishment of the mission;

2. Non-use of force except in self-defence;[350]

3. Voluntary contribution of troop contingents from smaller, neutral countries or middle powers[351];

4. Impartiality;

5. Day-to-day control of the operation by the Secretary-General.

The period of classical peace-keeping is considered to have lasted from 1948 or 1956[352] to 1987 with a gap between 1966 and 1973.[353]when no new missions were deployed. Usually 13[354] peacekeeping missions are counted in that time; five of these missions are still operational: UNFICYP (since 1964) in Cyprus, UNTSO (since 1948), UNDOF (since 1974) and UNIFIL (since 1978) in the Middle East, and UNMOGIP (since 1949) in India/Pakistan. There were also a few new missions created in the second half of the 1990s, including UNAMSIL in Sierra Leone and MONUC in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.

The overall objective of these missions has been to discourage a renewal of military conflict and promote an environment in which the dispute can be resolved.

In the 1990s there has been one preventive deployment of a peacekeeping mission - UNPROFOR III - which in March 1995 became UNPREDEP. Although in composition (presence of a US battalion) UNPREDEP belongs to later generations of peacekeeping, its mandate centred around monitoring the border between Yugoslavia and Macedonia, with the possibilities of Yugoslav troops attacking Macedonia and unrest within Macedonia in mind.[355]

2.5.2.2 Activities

The principal operational military objectives of traditional peacekeeping centred on the creation and occupation of a buffer zone to separate the parties in conflict (Israel - Egypt, Cyprus, Lebanon). The peacekeepers usually monitor the voluntary withdrawal of the armies out of this buffer zone, then occupy and monitor it. The monitoring involves patrolling, passive monitoring by technical equipment (radar, etc), and sometimes the use of planes and Marines. In regard to these activities, they are much akin to observation missions.[356]

But classical peacekeeping missions usually entail more than just watching military movements: they include also:

1. Investigating ceasefire violations and other incidents;

2. Stabilising measures, such as brokering local commanders' agreements over demarcation of boundaries.

3. Defusing incidents by means such as brokering a ceasefire when firing has broken out;

4. Making possible communication between parties with no diplomatic relations15 and

5. engaging in peacebuilding activities. UNFICYP, on Cyprus, facilitates meetings of different groups from both sides (trade unions, media, women, youth, professionals) by providing them with space and protection to meet in a hotel at Nicosia, and even sets up TV-discussions of representatives from both sides in the hotel. UNFICYP facilitates contacts within the communities by regularly visiting enclaves on both sides[357], and helps the population maintain contact with their relatives on the other side by organising visits (in Cyprus between 90 and 1 700 persons participated in each of these visits). In addition, most classical peacekeeping missions include humanitarian activities: UNFICYP has engaged in the distribution of books to Greek Cypriots in the Northern area, presses Turkish Cypriots to allow burials of Greek residents in a certain area, supports the resumption of agricultural activities in the buffer zone, provides emergency medical services, assists displaced persons, assists isolated communities in maintaining their supplies of water and electricity, and for a long time provided the only - and much used - phone connection between the sides.

6. In other peacekeeping mission UN peacekeepers have assisted in the exchange of prisoners of war, helped to repair local infrastructure and cleared minefields.[358]

2.5.2.3 Outcomes and impact

While the immediate outcomes (such as cases of violent demonstrations or other incidents in the Cyprus buffer zone which UNFICYP dissolved) are at least partly captured in the mission reports, the longer-term impact is more difficult to measure, and it seems that scientifically sound research on such missions is not overabundant.[359] Often assumptions seem to replace proof: In the literature on peacekeeping the fact that a war has not broken out again is often attributed to the peacekeeping mission's presence. But researchers dealing with political negotiations might attribute the same fact to other events, such as successful mediation or negotiations, or a change in the world political situation. A researcher with good knowledge of the situation on Cyprus told me when I asked him about his opinion on the peacekeeping mission there: "Well, you know, they are not really needed. The Cypriots are so divided, they would maintain the buffer zone by themselves." And there are conflicts where no peacekeeping troops are present but still a ceasefire agreement is being kept, as in the case of Nagorny Karabakh, a region disputed between Armenia and Azerbaijan, where a ceasefire has now held for almost 7 years with only a few Russian military observers present.

What must not be forgotten, however, is that the monitoring function of peacekeeping missions may have a de-escalating effect beyond the immediate situation on the ground. In the spring of 1995 the rumour started that Serb units were concentrated along the border with Macedonia. UNPREDEP was able to confirm, based on its observations, that this was not so, and thereby contributed to the de-escalation of the situation.[360]

Classical peacekeeping missions have never aimed at solving a conflict -- insofar as criticisms of classical peacekeeping argue that they "did not solve the conflict", such criticism is misleading because this has never been their intention. [361] The best that may be expected of them is that they preserve the cease-fire in order to give time to politicians to work out a sustainable solution to the conflict.[362].

Still, the lack of an exit strategy and of potential for conflict transformation is an issue taken more and more seriously by the UN itself.[363]

2.5.2.4 Conditions for successful peacekeeping

It seems that the four main conditions are

1. Both parties in a dispute agree (even if reluctantly) to accept a cease-fire,

2. Both parties consent to the presence of the peacekeepers, and

3. Are willing to cooperate with them.[364]

4. There is a clear physical separation of the parties in conflict (a condition difficult to meet in situations of internal war.)[365]

5. Laurence (1999) lists additional conditions for success of peacekeeping missions:

6. Broad agreement within the Security Council is essential. The operation should be clearly UN commanded or sanctioned to avoid objections that states might have to foreign troops being stationed on their soil;

7. The peacekeepers must be seen to be impartial, and must be prepared to bring pressure to bear when either party violates an agreement[366];

8. Any use of force must be based on principles of self-defence.[367]

If these conditions are not met, the peacekeepers have little chance to fulfil their mandate. UNIFIL in Lebanon has never been able to prevent Israeli attacks in Lebanon, nor has UNFICYP in Cyprus prevented the occupation of Northern Cyprus by Turkey in 1974, nor was UNPROFOR I in Croatia able to stop the Croatian Army from forcefully reoccupying the UN Protected Zones (UNPA) in the Eastern parts of Croatia which was held by Serbian separatists from 1992 to 1995.

Among the defining criteria of classical peacekeeping (see above 2.5.2.1) there is one element which might need further consideration - the identity of the troop-contributing states. The argument that middle states with the economic capacity to mount peacekeeping but without strong political or economical interests in the region are better suited to peacekeeping because they find it easier to maintain their neutrality in the conflict in question, is persuasive at first glance. On the other hand, in the case of UNPROFOR III/UNPREDEP in Macedonia many people think the presence of a US battalion was important exactly because it signalled an American military and political interest.[368] That means that there are contradictory experiences in regard to the identity of the peacekeepers: On the one hand the acceptance as non-partisan of classical peacekeeping missions seems to have derived at least partly from the fact that they came from countries which were not considered as having a stake in the conflict at hand. On the other hand, there are indications that the presence of powerful players may lend credibility to a peacekeeping mission, specifically when its function is more that of a symbolic deterrent than of an actual military power with a mandate of enforcement.

2.5.3 Complex missions

2.5.3.1 Character and goals

While classical peace-keeping missions are still being carried out, new types of peace-keeping missions have been developed since 1988. These newer types of mission are different in their function, in their application and in their composition,[369] and they usually operate in an environment very different from those of classical peacekeeping missions, an environment of intrastate conflict where one or both sides are often hostile to the peacekeepers.[370]

The main characteristics of these missions are:

1. Multidimensionality/complexity: In addition to control of violence (peacekeeping), peacebuilding tasks and sometimes even executive mandates to govern a country have been added to the missions.

2. Heavier armament of the peacekeeping force, and license to use these weapons not only in self-defence, but to make sure that the mission's mandate can be carried out (so-called robust peacekeeping).[371]

3. A new interpretation of impartiality as not meaning equi-distance between the parties in conflict[372].

4. Participation in peacekeeping missions by powerful states (including the USA and the nuclear powers of Western Europe and Russia -- the se countries formerly were not asked to play a role because of their real and perceived interests related to the Cold War.

5. Military take-over of more and more humanitarian aid and peace-building tasks on the ground.

The reasons for these changes are mainly the new kinds of conflict the missions have to deal with: internal wars with, rather than two sides in conflict, a multitude of unconnected interested actors involved, more people on the ground profiting from the continuation of war (so-called spoilers), cease-fire agreements not holding, and in consequence of these a higher level of risks for humanitarian personnel as well as for the peace-keepers themselves.[373]

It is further remarkable that two-thirds of UN peacekeeping missions have been established since 1991 (36 of 54). Accordingly, there is a much larger total number of peacekeeping personnel deployed to missions, both in regard to soldiers and to civilians. The number of soldiers involved in UN peacekeeping grew from 9 570 in 1988 to 73.393 in 1994. Over the same period, the number of civilian personnel increased from 1 516 to 2 260 and costs rose from 2 304 Million US$ to 3 610 Million US$.[374] Recent[375] missions include UNTAG in Namibia (1989-90), UNAVEM II and III and MONUA in Angola (1991 to date), ONUSAL in El Salvador (1991.-1995), UNTAC in Cambodia (1992-93), and UNPROFOR I and II in Croatia and Bosnia (1992-1995).[376]

The debacles of the missions in Rwanda, Somalia and, specifically, Bosnia in 1995 when two of the UN-protected enclaves were overrun by Serb forces, led to a quick waning of the enthusiasm[377] for UN peace missions which had been felt after the end of the Cold War. Since 1995 the numbers have declined sharply, but with four new larger missions beginning in 1999 and 2000 (UNMIK in Kosovo, UNTAET in East Timor, UNAMSIL in Sierra Leone and UNMEE in Ethiopia and Eritrea), these numbers are still much higher than the figures in the 1980s: as of March 2001 there are 15 operations in total, employing 38,905 military personnel and civilian police, 4048 international civilian personnel and 7587 local civilian personnel. The estimated cost of operations from July 1, 2000 to June 30, 2001 is between 2600 and 3000 Million US.

After a period of missions that were multidimensional and robust, there is now a different change of direction in peacekeeping missions. After the debacles of Somalia, Rwanda and UNPROFOR in Bosnia, the UN is now returning to its older maxim of never deploying peacekeeping missions without a prior ceasefire agreement in place, recognising that it "lacks the capacity for directing large-scale military enforcement operations"[378] This does not mean that the idea of peace enforcement (see below) has necessarily been given up. In the future, member states of the UN or forces under other member-state alliances (NATO, CIS, etc.), will likely be charged with the military enforcement of a ceasefire, as has been done already in Haiti 1994 and Bosnia in summer 1995. NATO has taken over the role of monitoring the ceasefire afterwards in lieu of a UN peacekeeping mission in Bosnia and Kosovo after the - unauthorised - bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999.[379]

2.5.3.2 Military activities

Because of the differences between peacekeeping missions since 1988, it is not so easy to generalise their activities as it is with classical missions. The former Secretary-General of the United Nations, Boutros Boutros-Ghali, in his Supplement to the Agenda for Peace, generalised the new tasks of peacekeeping as: "the supervision of cease-fires, the regroupment and demobilisation of forces, their reintegration into civilian life and the destruction of their weapons; the designing and implementation of de-mining programmes; the return of refugees and displaced persons; the provision of humanitarian assistance; the supervision of existing administrative structures; the establishment of new police forces; the verification of respect for human rights; the design and supervision of constitutional, judicial and electoral reforms; the observation, supervision and even organisation and conduct of elections; and the co-ordination of support for economic rehabilitation and reconstruction"[380]. This is the mandate with which UNTAC in Cambodia (1992-93) was charged.

Other missions concentrated on humanitarian activities (Somalia, Bosnia, Albania), whether delivering or protecting humanitarian aid.

For a more detailed description, see two examples in the appendix to this chapter: UNTAC in Cambodia (1992-93) and UNPROFOR in Croatia and Bosnia, to which I will refer in the following sections of this chapter.

The roles of civilians in these complex missions will be looked at in detail in the next subchapter. Here I summarise the roles the military takes in these kinds of missions as peacekeeping and enforcement measures:[381]. At least according to theory, the primary task of peace-keeping troops in complex operations is to "maintain a secure local environment for peace-building", while it is the task of the (civilian) peace-builders is to "support the political, social and economic changes that create a secure environment which is self-sustaining. Only such an environment offers a ready exit to peacekeeping forces, unless the international community is willing to have the peacekeepers stay for ever,[382] or tolerate recurrence of conflict when such forces depart. History has taught that peacekeepers and peacebuilders are inseparable partners in complex operations: while the peacebuilders may not be able to function without the peacekeepers' support, the peacekeepers have no exit without the peacebuilders' work." [383] In detail, these tasks are:

1. Establish a UN presence by patrolling disputed areas and monitoring activity.

2. Observe, monitor and manage cease-fires, by means such as defusing incidents and investigating violations.

3. Maintain buffer zones.

4. Disarm warring factions.[384]

5. Regulate the disposition of forces.

6. Prevent infiltration.

7. Prevent civil war.

8. Verify security agreements.

9. Supervise containment.

10. Establish stabilisation measures, by means such as brokering agreements over demarcation of boundaries.

11. Communicate between parties in conflict who have no diplomatic relations.

12. Clear mines and other unexploded ordnance.

13. Training/re-forming military units.

14. Restoration of law and order.

15. Forcible separation of belligerent parties.

16. Establishment of safe areas.

17. Guarantee or denial of movement, e.g. blockade or no-fly zone enforcement.

18. Enforcement of sanctions.[385]

19. Physical security of aid delivery and other humanitarian activity, e.g. by offering armed escorts, putting together escorted convoys, etc.

20. Physical security of refugee camps.

21. Carry out police functions, such as crowd control or arresting war criminals (examples: Bosnia, Kosovo).

Besides these more traditional military tasks, there are a number of activities and tasks centred around humanitarian support: UN forces provided humanitarian aid for Kurds in North Iraq, NATO soldiers built refugee camps in Macedonia, German UN soldiers dug wells in Somalia, and SFOR soldiers in Bosnia are involved in building schools. Typically, humanitarian tasks taken over by military include:

1. Provision of immediate humanitarian assistance, such as emergency food distribution, building of refugee accommodations, and provision of basic water and sanitation.[386]

2. Alerting humanitarian agencies to pockets of need encountered during routine patrol activities.

3. Assistance to humanitarian agencies in longer-term relief and development projects.

4. Negotiations with warring factions to create the conditions in which agencies can operate freely and effectively.

Some of these activities might originate in a spontaneous initiative by soldiers on the ground rather than being part of the mandate,[387] but in several cases humanitarian aid has been made part of the mandate.

The reasoning is that the military "often possess an abundance of precisely those resources that are in the shortest supply when disaster strikes: transport, fuel, communications, commodities, building equipment, medicines, and large stockpiles of off-the-shelf provisions".[388] It could be the case that the military is the only one to do it, relief agencies are "not present in sufficient strength to cope with sudden demand due to the sudden onset of a crisis, or they are unable to operate due to the volatility of the security environment."[389] Another, not negligible, aspect is the positive image that is created back home by the activities of the military sent abroad. Especially in countries where there is public debate on the role and costs of out-of-area deployments, politicians and military leaders have found it useful to publicise the humanitarian activities.[390] Hansen has observed that in Kosovo "bilateral funding is provided to favoured KFOR contingents for humanitarian or reconstruction activity ... an extraneous political agenda, not need, and not an appreciation for local conditions, determines allotments to KFOR humanitarian activity, sometimes with serious negative consequences."[391] Seiple points out that sometimes there are tactical reasons for the military to engage in humanitarian activities, in order to get acceptance from the local population.[392]

The growing importance of civil-military co-operation as result of the complex nature of these missions is reflected in so-called CIMIC plans and in the use of troops specifically responsible for enhancing co-operation between the military and humanitarian activities at the tactical level as well as military involvement in building consent.[393] In Bosnia, for example, the first focus of CIMIC was emergency humanitarian relief and prisoner release. Later it shifted to election and humanitarian support, reconstruction of infrastructure and longer-term programmes, and from there to a third phase of repatriation, reconstruction, capital investment, further election support and civil-institution buildings. CIMIC units have worked with NGOs, the World Bank, the United Nations mission in Bosnia, the OSCE and the Office of the High Representative.[394]

2.5.3.3 Outcomes and impact

Neither of the two missions I have investigated in detail was very successful in regard to their military mandates. Neither has UNTAC in Cambodia managed to carry through with its mandate of disarmament and cantonment of the armies of all fractions, nor has UNPROFOR in Bosnia been able to provide the safe havens it has promised.

Have there been overall successful missions at all? Some authors name at least three cases between 1989 and 1995 when civil wars were brought to an end with the help of UN missions: Namibia, El Salvador and Mozambique. In three other cases the middle-term success was doubtful or the mission an outright failure: Rwanda, Angola and Cambodia. And the failure at implementation led to catastrophic results: Many more people died in Angola and Rwanda after the peace agreements failed than during the years of war before. [395]

The humanitarian activities of the military deserve special discussion. While the logistical advantages of the military can hardly be doubted, it usually lacks specific knowledge about dealing with humanitarian crises. It can be inefficient (e.g. in Rwanda the US army set up a water purification system which was unable to provide the quantity of water needed), less effective (the German army dug wells in Somalia although Germany has a special state organisation (Technisches Hilfswerk) which not only has the equipment but the expertise to do so much more quickly and more efficiently), and it puts itself in direct competition with non-state actors which is contrary to the principle of subsidiarity upheld by many Western countries[396]. It often does not fulfil the minimum standards in humanitarian aid many organisations nowadays agree to[397], and the military authorities may potentially overlook the impact of the mission's actions on the wider population.[398]

Another question raised is if armed protection makes humanitarian aid transports really more secure, or if it rather increases the risk by turning the aid agencies into legitimate targets. Specifically in Chapter VII-missions this may well be an issue as the experience in Somalia has shown. Alternatives tried by aid agencies include reducing the threat by gaining widespread acceptance for one's work,[399] privately organised security procedures and bribing - as mentioned above, some of them being problematic themselves.[400]

2.5.3.4 Conditions for successful peacekeeping in complex missions

The question of conditions for successful complex peacekeeping missions, and lessons learned for nonviolent intervention will be dealt with more fully after I look into the civilian contribution to these missions. Still, both the UN itself and other experts on UN missions seem to agree on a number of lessons learned in regard to the military part of complex missions. These concern mainly issues of mandates ("clear, realistic and practicable and providing for the necessary means for implementation"), planning, co-ordination, training, logistics and so on.[401] These issues will be dealt with in Chapter 5 of this study. Notable here might be the perceived need for "robust" peacekeeping: "Once deployed, United Nations peacekeepers must be able to carry out their mandates professionally and successfully and be capable of defending themselves, other mission components and the mission's mandate, with robust rules of engagement, against those who renege on their commitments to a peace accord or otherwise seek to undermine it by violence".[402]

2.5.4 The role of civilian personnel in complex missions

2.5.4.1 Character and goals

While in first generation missions there were only a small number of civilians supporting the military component, number and tasks of civilians in complex missions have grown enormously. Civilians in the context of complex missions fall into two or three categories[403]: First, those working directly for intergovernmental organisations - be it UN agencies like UNHCR or UNDP or regional organisations of the UN (OAU, OAS and OSCE). Secondly, those working as members of an international civilian police force. Thirdly, there is usually a large number of NGOs working in the same area, sometimes co-operating with the UN mission, sometimes keeping their independence - usually to the distress of the UN representatives who tend to complain about a lack of co-ordination with the NGOs in the field. In this chapter they will only be considered as far as they cooperate explicitly in the complex mission, serving as implementing partners for an UN agency.[404]

As part of UN missions, civilians usually come in with a double task: to help to prevent a recurrence of armed confrontation (this is mainly the job of the military, but civilians contribute in many ways), and to consolidate peace.

Civilians are people coming from very different personal and professional background. Only a minority of them, usually only the directors, are permanently employed with the UN or one of its organisations. The others are either recruited by UN members who use different recruiting mechanisms, or are UN volunteers. Some countries choose their contingent of civilian personnel mainly from the standing resource of civil servants (sometimes including the military);, others have recruited more broadly.[405]

2.5.4.2 Civilian activities

The list of civilian tasks begins with disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration of soldiers, de-mining, return of refugees, organisation and carrying out of humanitarian aid, policing, preparation and monitoring of elections, monitoring of human rights, and in a few cases even carrying out an executive mandate to govern a country for a certain, limited time (UNTAC in Cambodia 1992-1993, UNMIB in Bosnia since December 1995, UNMIK in Kosovo from 1999 to date[406]). In example 1 (UNTAC in Cambodia) some of these activities are described more in detail. They do not vary so much from activities in other complex missions such as the post-war phases in both Bosnia-Herzegovina and Kosovo, although the number of state actors is in the latter cases much greater. Therefore, I will limit the description here to a summary of tasks usually undertaken.:[407]

1. A democratisation process which is usually meant to lead up to national elections: assistance in the rehabilitation of existing political institutions, promotion of national reconciliation, monitoring and verification of all aspects and stages of an electoral process, co-ordination of technical assistance of the process, education of the public about electoral processes, help to develop grassroots democratic institutions and NGOs, support of independent media.

2. Human rights: monitor human rights situation, investigate specific cases of alleged human rights violations, promote human rights/educate about human rights[408].

3. Humanitarian tasks may include the delivery of humanitarian aid (food and other emergency relief supplies), implementation of refugee repatriation programs, resettlement of displaced persons, reintegration of ex-combatants*.

4. Civilian Police: An important component[409] of complex missions is the Civilian Police (CIVPOL). Their task is not only to document or, ideally, to discourage by their presence, abusive or other unacceptable behaviour by local police officers, but to reform, train and restructure local police forces - a field of activities sometimes described with the acronym "SMART" for "support, monitor, advise, report, train". A sensitive issue is the perceived need for an international police with executive power in missions like Bosnia and Kosovo. Several solutions are being tried: trust the military with these tasks as KFOR in Kosovo does nolens volens, or set up something that in Bosnia is called the "Multinational Special Unit" - a force of 400 men with paramilitary training (mainly Italian Carabinieri, which is a paramilitary police force). In order to have the capacity to respond effectively to civil disorder and for self-defence (Brahimi-report)[410], the police in the future would generally be armed (today they are only armed in perceived high-risk situations, as in Kosovo), and specifically trained for dealing with what is called civil disorder. [411] At the moment, there are two missions consisting mainly of police: Civilian Police Support Group in Croatia and MIPONUH in Haiti.[412]

2.5.2.3 Outcomes and impact

Weiss (1999) has tried in an ambitious effort to develop a framework of estimating military costs for the troop-contributing countries and civilian benefits for targeted countries in complex missions. As criteria for military costs he defined: costs in US$, casualties/fatalities, and political impact. As civilian benefits he chose displacement, suffering and state of the State before and after each intervention.

Here follows his summary of UNPROFOR in Bosnia (unfortunately, Weiss did not include Cambodia in his study). It shows an ambiguous picture (as do most of the other cases Weiss looked into). While there is clearly a positive impact, in the tonnes of food delivered, it is difficult to judge how the picture would have changed if there had been another kind of mission, or no UN mission at all. Also the question of how much good is enough good? is not answered.

Table 2.1: Bosnia and Herzegovina: Military costs and civilian benefits from intervention, 1992-1995

Military costs of intervention for	$ Costs	Casualties/Fatalities	Political Impact
troop-contributing countries	UNPROFOR: 2/92-9/95: $2,82 Billion UN humanitarian: $ 1,355 Billion	1992-1994: 90 peacekeepers killed and 900 wounded by 3/95: 167 killed	Sarajevo airlift; no-fly zone; sanctions and embargo enforcement; air strikes; UN protection of humanitarian convoys. Led to crisis in UN system, EC/EU and NATO and doubts about Western leadership in the post-Cold War world
civilian benefits of intervention for targeted countries	Displacement	Suffering	State of the State
humanitarian challenge before intervention	Croatia: 250.000 Serbs, 100.000 Croats Bosnia: end of 1994: war victims and IDPs and refugees = 2,7 million	Hunger: Croatia: 1991 0,5 Million require assistance Yugoslavia early 1993: 4,359 Million in need Bosnia: Winter 1993-94: 2,7 Million in need Human Rights: Croatia 1991: 6-10.000 killed, 10.000 wounded; Bosnia: from 1992 on ethnic cleansing, expulsion, torture, rape. Early 1993: 230.000 killed or missing; 60.000 seriously wounded.; siege of Sarajevo (1992-94) killed 10.000 and wounded 60.000 Total: 250.000 killed, 35.000 wounded, 26.000 disappearances, 50.000 torture victims, 20-50.000 rape victims	State Structures: ill-suited to the dynamics of integration across ethnic lines and the complications of national self-determination taken to logical extremes
civilian benefits after intervention	Displacement/Repatriation: Even after IFOR, very little improvement. End of 1995: 1,3 million IDPs, 1,4 M war-affected people, 800.000 refugees	Hunger: winter 1992-93: UNPROFOR delivered 34.600 tons of relief to 800.000 beneficiaries, WFP 320.000 tons of food, UNICEF assisted 1,5 M; early 1993: between 26-50% of food needs met in enclaves... Human Rights: Periodic limited protection in certain areas. In the end, UNPROFOR did not prevent the massive atrocities. Health: Early 1993: ICRC operated 215 medical facilities.	The emergence of more ethnically homogeneous territory makes nation-state governance accurate for the near future

Source: Weiss 1999:131, extract of a longer chart

In discussing the impact of complex missions, the criteria developed in the do-no-harm-approach as well as other critiques of these missions need to be considered. There are multiple issues at stake:

1. What impact the invasion of thousands of internationals has on the economy of a country[413] and of its capacity to rebuild by its own strength:
- the presence of well-paid foreigners causing inflation,
- on the one hand many jobs are created which are desperately needed,
- but on the other hand there is brain-drain: skilled people get hired away to work for internationals rather then taking lower-paid jobs to build up their own country. In Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo medical doctors work as interpreters and judges as drivers - just because they have a family to keep and cannot afford not to take the at least five times better paid job the internationals offer her or him. The same is reported from Cambodia.[414]

2. Even if international missions are not called in after a war for a transitory government, they often cause a shift in the political balance in the country. While this often is intended and welcome, sometimes it might also mean groups are strengthened which would not have been chosen either by the intervenors or by the people in the country. For example, in Lebanon UNIFIL insisted on working through recognised traditional political leaders, which brought the Mouktars and village mayors new resources, including prestige. But when the situation changed economically, these traditional leaders maintained power mainly because of UNIFIL support, and became rather a hindrance to development of the area.[415]

Nonviolent Peaceforce

Feasibility Study

by Donna Howard, Christine Schweitzer, Carl Stieren

2.3 Humanitarian aid and development organisations

2.3.2 Character and goals

2.3.4 Outcomes and impact

2.3.5 Conditions for successfully dealing with conflict in humanitarian aid and development projects

2.3.6 Consequences for Nonviolent Peaceforce

2.4 Larger-scale civilian missions

2.4.2 Character and goals

2.4.2.1 Election monitoring in South Africa

2.4.2.2 Peace monitoring in Bougainville

2.4.2.3 Kosovo Verification Mission

2.4.2.4 UN missions in El Salvador and East Timor

2.4.3 Activities

2.4.3.1 Election monitoring in South Africa

2.4.3.2 Peace monitoring in Bougainville

2.4.3.3 Kosovo Verification Mission

2.4.3.4 UN missions in El Salvador and East Timor

2.4.4 Outcomes and impact

2.4.4.1 Election Monitoring in South Africa

2.4.4.2 Peace Monitoring Group in Bougainville

2.4.4.3 Kosovo Verification Mission

2.4.4.4 UN missions in El Salvador and East Timor

2.4.5 Conditions for successful larger-scale civilian missions, and for Nonviolent Peaceforce[325]

by Donna Howard, Christine Schweitzer,
Carl Stieren

2.3.5 Conditions for successfully dealing with conflict in humanitarian aid and
development projects