73
A “Sudden Outbreak
of Tranquility”: Assessing
the New Peace in Africa
Ken M enkhaus
Peace—or, more precisely, a notable abatement in active armed conflicts—
has quietly settled over much of war-torn Africa since 2002. In the Democratic
Republic of Congo (DRC), Sudan, Angola, Liberia, Burundi, Sierra Leone, and
the Republic of Congo, brutal and seemingly intractable civil wars have either
been resolved or are the subject of mediation. In a number of these conflicts—
along the disputed Ethiopian-Eritrean border, in Côte d’Ivoire, Sierra Leone,
Liberia, Burundi, and the DRC—external peacekeeping forces are helping to
maintain a fragile peace, and several pivotal African states have taken a step back
from the brink of widespread political violence that appeared inevitable only a
few years ago.
For a continent beset by civil wars and communal violence, this “sudden
outbreak of tranquility” is very welcome news.1 The nearly two dozen wars that
have erupted in Africa since the end of the Cold War have been disastrous on
every count. From a humanitarian perspective, the magnitude of human suffering caused by Africa’s wars defies comprehension. Somewhere around eight million Africans have died of war-related causes since 1991,2 while another 3.3
million are now refugees and 13.5 million are internally displaced.3 The vast
majority of egregious human rights abuses in Africa, including genocide, have
taken place in a context of war and accompanying collapse of rule of law.4 Civil
wars are also widely blamed for Africa’s continued economic underdevelopment,
Ken Menkhaus is Associate Professor of Political Science at Davidson College. He served as special political advisor in the UN Operation in Somalia in 1993-1994. The findings discussed
in this article are the result of his study of protracted conflicts in the Horn of Africa which was
supported by a grant from the United States Institute of Peace. Menkhaus is the author, most
recently, of Somalia: State Collapse and the Threat of Terrorism (Adelphi Paper 364,
Oxford University Press, 2004).
vol.28:2 summer 2004
74
the fletcher forum of world affairs
constituting what one study calls “development in reverse.”5 They frighten off
both local and international investment, redirect most foreign aid away from
development and toward emergency relief, damage or destroy critical infrastructure, and contribute to the collapse of rule of law, which is seen as vital to economic development. Finally, Africa’s civil wars have come to be viewed as a threat
to global security. The refugee crises and collapse of public health they produce
create a breeding ground for virulent and unchecked diseases; the anarchy and
lawlessness they generate provide attractive sites for transnational criminals and
terrorist networks.6
That a reduction in armed conflicts is a good thing for Africa is self-evident. What is not at all clear, however, is the significance and durability of this
cessation of hostilities in Africa. Is this new peace merely a lull in a much longer
era of warfare, state collapse, and post-colonial political transformation in Africa?
Or does it constitute a real departure from the recent past, a window of opportunity for the beleaguered continent to
escape from the cycle of conflict that seems
That a reduction in armed to be strangling it?
conflicts is a good thing for
This article assesses the new peace in
Africa—the
factors that appear to be proAfrica is self-evident. What
is not at all clear, however, moting peace or suppressing armed conflicts, the hurdles facing efforts to
is the significance and
consolidate the peace, and likely trends in
conflict and peace in Africa in coming years.
durability of this cessation
The conclusion drawn from this analysis is
of hostilities in Africa.
sobering, but not bleak. It predicts that setbacks and reversals are almost inevitable in at
least some, and perhaps most, of the African peace processes now underway; high
levels of criminal and communal violence will continue to produce warlike casualty levels in parts of Africa which are, at least on paper, at peace; and several simmering hotspots could conceivably explode. The outlook for sustained peace and
improved human security across the continent is thus not especially good. But the
forecast is not entirely bad either. Several waning conflicts stand a good chance of
achieving a consolidated peace with the right combination of astute external support and committed local leadership. Others appear to be mutating into a type of
low-intensity, low-casualty conflict—a hazy purgatory of neither war nor peace.
This latter scenario is hardly ideal, but for communities living in these shatter
zones, it is at least a marginal improvement over the horrors of the 1990s.
Measured assessments of the prospects for peace in Africa face the daunting task of navigating between the shoals of cynicism and naïve optimism, which
so often frame uninspired debates about Africa’s future. To be sure, the last time
a lull occurred in Africa’s catastrophic run of crises in the mid-1990s, Afro-opti-
vol.28:2 summer 2004
A “SUDDEN OUTBREAK OF TRANQUILITY”: ASSESSING THE NEW PEACE IN AFRICA
mists dramatically oversold the trend, coining the unfortunate term “African
renaissance” for what turned out to be a very short intermission before the continent was swept into a new wave of conflicts in the DRC, Angola, CongoBrazzaville, Sierra Leone, Zimbabwe, Côte d’Ivoire, and along the
Ethiopian-Eritrean border.7 Perhaps as a result of the African renaissance misstep,
even those advocates hungry for good news on Africa are generally adopting a
more cautious tone this time around. But the unrelenting bad news out of Africa
since the early 1990s—not only regarding wars and underdevelopment but also
the horrific toll AIDS has taken on the continent—has produced a corps of hardened
Unfortunately, one of
Afro-pessimists among journalists, analysts,
and policymakers, whose inclination is the recurring problems
simply to dismiss the continent as a basket hampering external
case and to view engagement in diplomatic interventions in Africa
or peacekeeping ventures in Africa as a fool’s
errand. That cynicism may be in part has been misdiagnoses
responsible for the surprisingly muted of the crises.
media coverage of Africa’s current abatement of armed violence, which has to date
earned far less press than the wars that preceded it.8 In their defense, the Afro-pessimists have a mountain of unhappy evidence from the 1990s to justify their
skepticism. However, the tendency to view past as prologue can obscure one’s
view of subtle but important changes in the African political and social landscape,
resulting in missed opportunities to end some of these wars.
MISREADING AFRICA’S CONFLICTS
Assessing prospects for peace in Africa requires accurate analysis of the conflicts themselves. Unfortunately, one of the recurring problems hampering external interventions in Africa has been misdiagnoses of the crises. These misreadings
are in no small measure responsible for the many failed diplomatic initiatives and
peace operations littering the continent since 1992. In addition to the high-visibility United Nations peacekeeping missions that failed in countries like Somalia,
the international community has expended considerable energy for both topdown shuttle diplomacy and grassroots mediation and conflict resolution
throughout Africa. This has generated a virtual cottage industry of peace-building in Africa. The UN, the African Union, the United States, the European
Union, South Africa, regional organizations such as the Inter-Governmental
Authority on Development (IGAD), and an army of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) are among the many players on the crowded field of peace-building in Africa. Until recently, this “peace-building sans frontiers” produced only a
vol.28:2 summer 2004
75
76
the fletcher forum of world affairs
long list of failed mediation efforts and unimplemented peace accords, and
tended to encourage “forum shopping” on the part of political leaders in these
disputes.
Frustrations encountered by mediators have been due, in part, to a tendency to presume that the conflicts themselves are the product of spiraling misperceptions and mistrust by both leaders and communities, and hence are
amenable to negotiated settlement and compromise reached with the help of
external mediation. Local misperceptions are seen to be fueled by ethnic, sectarian, or regional grievances about political access, and inflamed to dangerous levels
by myopic leadership and easy availability of lethal weaponry. Surveying the horrific losses sustained by all sides in these protracted conflicts, many external actors
understandably conclude that the “rational,” self-evident choice for local protagonists—one which promises a win-win outcome of improved security and prosperity for all concerned—is reconciliation, power sharing, the revival of working
systems of governance, and the rebuilding of the economy. Achieving peace, then,
is viewed essentially as a matter of astute but routine diplomacy aimed at reshaping local perceptions of individual and communal long-term interests; establishing confidence-building measures; offering opportunities for cooling off periods
through monitored ceasefires; providing good offices and mediation; and, at the
grassroots level, working on bridge-building, peace education, and mobilization
of civil society for peace.
When external peace-building efforts fail, as they so often have in Africa,
the temptation has been either to blame the external mediators for incompetence
(which has become a blood sport in parts of Africa) or to fall back on any one of
a number of more fatalistic interpretations of events associated with Afro-pessimism, including the following: that these conflicts are intractable and ancient
tribal clashes; that the violence and state collapse in these zones constitutes part
of the “coming anarchy” engulfing parts of the Third World about which little
can be done;9 or that efforts to intervene to stop such armed conflicts are naïve—
i.e., that civil wars cannot be ended until one side wins or both sides reach a
“hurting stalemate.”10 These competing interpretations generate a false choice,
pitting proponents of ill-equipped interventionist diplomacy against self-declared
realists in a debate that tends to obscure more than it reveals about Africa’s crises.
POLITICAL ECONOMY OF WAR IN AFRICA
Though each crisis is distinct, most of Africa’s post-Cold War conflicts possess a bundle of common features that defy the logic and assumptions of those
who mediate them and those who claim that the wars will only end when one
side wins. Specifically, most of Africa’s contemporary conflicts have had a political economy dimension that until recently was poorly understood. The political
vol.28:2 summer 2004
A “SUDDEN OUTBREAK OF TRANQUILITY”: ASSESSING THE NEW PEACE IN AFRICA
economy interpretation of the “news wars” in Africa can be summed up as follows.11 Though these conflicts may have initially been fueled by grievances and
defined by conventional military objectives, over time they have mutated partially or principally into wars waged not to win, but rather to create conditions
of “durable disorder” from which key actors benefit economically or politically.12
Far from being senseless or irrational, these wars have been perpetuated by conflict constituencies with vested interests in maintaining certain levels of armed
violence and in blocking efforts to promote reconciliation and effective government. These spoilers or veto coalitions may be relatively small in number and not
at all representative of the wishes of the majority of the population, but are wellpositioned to block efforts to end hostilities and reestablish rule of law. This
explains the otherwise puzzling phenomenon of protracted conflicts in Africa,
which, on the surface, appear “ripe” for resolution either via victory or negotiated
settlement, but which continue for years. Economic interests feature prominently
in these conflicts and can transform war into “an instrument of enterprise” via
pillaging, protection money, trade monopolies, labor exploitation, land expropriation, and diversion of relief aid.13 Fortunes made by warlords—and in the case
of the DRC, several neighboring states—in this “noxious cocktail of commerce
and violence” are generated mainly by the leaders’ capacity to monopolize both
legal and illicit trade of valuable primary
products into the global market,14 colluding
Because armed conflict
with international firms.15 Because armed
conflict produces profitable war economies produces profitable war
for both government army officers and economies for both
rebels, collusion between combatants is government army officers
commonplace.
War in this context is virtually unrec- and rebels, collusion
ognizable in the conventional (modern) between combatants is
sense. Parties to conflicts do not fight to commonplace.)
win; direct armed clashes are avoided, minimized, or simulated; strategic towns are not
taken; and armed violence is mainly directed at unarmed civilians, who constitute the vast majority of casualties.17 Looting of civilians is the primary form of
payment for both soldiers and rebels, leading to what in Sierra Leone was called
Operation Pay Yourself and producing the phenomenon of “sobels”—soldiers by
day and rebels or bandits by night.17 Militias often replenish their ranks by kidnapping young boys from villages and forcing them to commit atrocities, leading
to an epidemic of child soldiering in Liberia, Sierra Leone, Angola, and northern
Uganda. Militias in both government and rebel forces operate virtually independent of a command structure, pursuing their own interests locally, frequently
switching sides, and fighting against one another. This multiplies the number of
vol.28:2 summer 2004
77
78
the fletcher forum of world affairs
non-state actors on the scene, few of which have knowledge of or interest in the
Geneva Conventions and humanitarian law. Finally, humanitarian crises are in
some cases transformed from being a tragic consequence of the fighting to an
integral part of the war economy. Humanitarian crises are opportunities for
enrichment by warlords and their supporters; famine can be provoked and/or
exploited by parties to the conflict, as was seen in the 1991-1992 famine in
Somalia and in the current crisis in Darfur, Sudan. Relief aid is a prized commodity over which warring parties and militias fight; camps of internally displaced persons are controlled and used as bait to attract international relief; and
small fortunes are made via contracts for transportation, money changing, security, and other services provided to international aid organizations.18
This interpretation of Africa’s new wars has increasingly made its way into
mainstream analysis.19 Its attractiveness lies in the fact that it has been able to provide a compelling explanation for the most puzzling aspects of Africa’s civil
wars—why they have been so protracted in nature, and why they are so impervious to external mediation and peacekeeping. A recent World Bank study on civil
wars finds the political economy explanation persuasive:
The expected duration of conflict is now double that of conflicts that started
prior to 1980. One possible explanation is that sustaining a conflict is now
easier than it used to be…Another possibility is that rebellions have gradually changed their character, becoming less political and more commercial.
Violence entrepreneurs, whether primarily political or primarily economic,
may gain from war to such an extent that they cannot credibly be compensated sufficiently to accept peace…Asking a rebel leader to accept peace may
be a little like asking a champion swimmer to empty the pool.20
The explanation is also attractive for its capacity to move us past the presumption of irrationality or “Mad Max anarchy,” which informs so many analyses of Africa’s wars. Indeed, this rethink of the nature of contemporary civil wars
turns the table on Western-centric notions of what constitutes rational behavior
in wartime. As David Keen observes:
If contemporary civil wars have been widely labeled as mindless, mad, and
senseless, in some ways nineteenth and twentieth century Western notions
of war may be closer to madness. When war is seen as an occasion for risking death in the name of the nation-state and with little prospect of financial gain, it may take months of brainwashing and ritual humiliation to
convince new recruits of the notion. A war where one avoids battle, picks
on unarmed civilians, and makes money may make more sense.21
Finally, this explanation has the added merit of focusing our attention on
the interests of nonstate actors as key drivers of the conflicts. Interest-based analy-
vol.28:2 summer 2004
A “SUDDEN OUTBREAK OF TRANQUILITY”: ASSESSING THE NEW PEACE IN AFRICA
sis both goes some way toward explaining why the conflicts persist and provides
clues as to when and under what conditions the wars are likely to end. By highlighting the interests perpetuating conflicts and by tracking changes in these
interests over time, a political economy analysis of Africa’s wars has the potential
to identify opportunities for external strategies to shape those interests to promote peace.
The problem for analysts is that the very theory that appears best able to
deliver a reasonably persuasive, parsimonious, and cross-national explanation for
why Africa’s wars persist is less well-equipped to provide a compelling explanation
for why many of these wars suddenly appear to be ending. One possibility is that
the wars are in fact not ending; what we are now witnessing could merely be a
lull. The underlying interests driving these crises remain in place, according to
this view, and will soon reignite the wars. A more hopeful political economy
interpretation is that the interests of a number of key war entrepreneurs have
changed over time. As they accumulate fortunes from war and plunder, they
come to possess a greater appreciation of the benefits of rule of law and wish to
protect their new wealth in a way that allows them to shift into quasi-legitimate
business and political activities. This notion of warlords mutating into landlords
is an intriguing possibility, and draws on an impressive body of historical research
about state formation in Europe and elsewhere.22 A third interpretation is that the
war entrepreneurs are simply adapting to new circumstances—mainly changes in
the international environment—which are placing penalties on those who openly
wage war. In this case, we could be witnessing a shift in tactics as warlords seek
to create the appearance of peace, reconciliation, and governance, even to the
point of accepting positions in a government of national unity, while quietly
working to ensure that underlying conditions of lawlessness and violence continue to provide them with opportunities to engage in illicit war economies—
what William Reno calls a “shadow state.”23 Charles Taylor’s behavior, when he
switched hats from warlord to president in Liberia but continued to foment violence and predation, is one piece of evidence to support this interpretation.
THE “LULL” HYPOTHESIS
A number of arguments support the position that the current abatement
of conflict in Africa is likely to be a lull, not a trend. First, one can point to recent
history. In the early 1990s, Africa was jolted by a series of catastrophic civil
wars—most notably in Somalia, Liberia, and Rwanda—in addition to the longrunning and very destructive wars in Angola and Sudan. A successful transition
from war to sustained peace in Mozambique, and the peaceful transition from
apartheid to democracy in South Africa, took some of the sting out of these setbacks, which were generally interpreted as a costly but one-off result of political
vol.28:2 summer 2004
79
80
the fletcher forum of world affairs
upheavals triggered by the end of the Cold War. As a result, the perceived lull that
followed from 1995 to 1998 was misread as the beginning of a trend toward sustained peace and democratization, 24 led by a “new generation” of leaders—such
as Uganda’s Yoweri Museveni, Rwanda’s Paul Kagame, Ethiopia’s Meles Zenawi,
and Eritrea’s Isaias Afwerki—who were viewed by some as “forerunners of an
African renaissance” and lauded for having “rejected the failed policies of their
predecessors.”25 U.S. President Clinton made the African renaissance the theme
of his six-nation tour of Africa in March 1998.
Yet 1998 turned out to be Africa’s annus horribilis. That year, the continent
was swept into several unthinkable new wars and witnessed the reignition of several old ones. Worst was the DRC’s bloody civil war. It produced an estimated
three million deaths—by some counts, the bloodiest war since World War II26—
and became the site of Africa’s first continental war, drawing in forces from
Uganda, Rwanda, Zimbabwe, Angola, Namibia, Sudan, and Chad, with some of
the external militaries occupying Congolese territory in a sordid bid to control
and expropriate valuable minerals. Equally shocking was the conflict in Ethiopia
and Eritrea, two countries headed by new generation leaders who surprised the
world by engaging in an utterly avoidable and deadly war over a desolate stretch
of disputed borderland. If the DRC was Africa’s first continental war, the
Ethiopian-Eritrean war was Africa’s version of World War I—a war its protagonists appear to have stumbled into, which was fought with a lethal combination
of trench warfare and late twentieth century military technology. Elsewhere,
Angola slipped back into full-scale civil war after a failed UN peacekeeping operation; insurgencies threatened to derail a UN peacekeeping force in Sierra Leone,
and plunged parts of Liberia and Guinea into armed violence; and CongoBrazzaville reverted to heavy fighting after a failed peace process. Signs of
impending trouble in previously stable states left observers thinking that the
worst was yet to come. A coup overthrew the government in Côte d’Ivoire, an
omen of impending civil war there; Zimbabwean President Mugabe’s erratic
behavior and military adventurism in the Congo was a worrying harbinger of
Zimbabwe’s imminent political meltdown; Uganda’s economic recovery was
threatened by two insurgencies and deadly pastoral clashes along the Kenyan
border; Kenya-watchers braced for worsening communal violence as the corrupt
Moi regime lurched toward elections; and Nigeria struggled with worsening communal violence even as its political situation dramatically improved following the
death of dictator Sani Abacha in 1998. Many, but not all, of these crises had a
significant war economy aspect to them. No one who followed Africa closely in
that period can feel safe making an optimistic forecast about peace and reconciliation in 2004.
One could nonetheless argue that Africa in 2004 is much less likely to see
yet another wave of new conflicts, simply because there are not that many left
vol.28:2 summer 2004
A “SUDDEN OUTBREAK OF TRANQUILITY”: ASSESSING THE NEW PEACE IN AFRICA
that have not already occurred. There is some truth to this claim, but Africa can
take little solace from the notion that the situation will improve because it cannot
get any worse. In fact, the situation could actually get worse. There remain unexploded tinderboxes on the continent. Ethiopia and Nigeria, both large, multiethnic states struggling with deep levels of communal violence and worrisome
splits between their Christian and Muslim populations, are but two examples of
big states with big problems.27 Zimbabwe, a crisis generated almost entirely by
President Mugabe, is another.
The lull hypothesis is strengthened further when one considers the general
empirical literature on civil wars. Three findings are especially troubling. First,
the most important risk factors associated with the outbreak of civil wars are high
poverty, sharp inequalities in income distribution, economic decline, and dependence on high value primary commodity exports (diamonds and oil).28 This is
precisely the lethal cocktail that defines the economic landscape of most African
countries.
Second, analysts have found a high correlation between a “youth bulge”
(the demographic phenomenon occurring when the population of 15 to 29 year
olds makes up a disproportionate part of the
total population) and political destabilizaOne could nonetheless
tion. A recent survey of countries facing
youth bulges between 2000 and 2015 con- argue that Africa in 2004
cluded that this demographic trend is is much less likely to see yet
almost exclusively concentrated in sub- another wave of new
Saharan Africa—25 of the total of 30 counconflicts, simply because
tries worldwide facing youth bulges are in
there are not that many
sub-Saharan Africa.29
Third, empirical research on civil left that have not
wars confirms that the single greatest prealready occurred.
dictor of armed conflict is a recent history of
armed conflict. Roughly half of all countries
emerging from civil wars fall back into armed conflict within 10 years.30 The
World Bank refers to this as “the conflict trap” and concludes with the grim
observation that “the chief legacy of a civil war is another war.”31 Since Africa is
now wall-to-wall in post-conflict settings, it is by definition at extremely high risk
of backsliding into renewed armed conflict. This already occurred in the 1990s
in a number of places—Angola, Sierra Leone, and Burundi, to name a few.
One could argue further that most of Africa’s post-conflict situations are
especially ripe for backsliding because most feature fragile power sharing settlements, not peace achieved through an outright victory or comprehensive reconciliation. These are truces and peace accords that could easily be undone by spoilers
or aggrieved parties. An unsettling aspect of some of Africa’s most successful cases
vol.28:2 summer 2004
81
82
the fletcher forum of world affairs
of peace to date is the fact that many outstanding conflict issues were left unaddressed or were papered over in the hurried rush to broker power sharing arrangements between former adversaries. Those outstanding issues—accountability for
war crimes, return of stolen property, and real reconciliation at the communal
level—can fester and serve as dry kindling for those who wish to set a fire. Pressure
to reach power sharing arrangements as a recipe to end a war, often coming from
impatient external mediators, has too often served as a substitute for actual reconciliation, producing conditions ripe for backsliding. “You can’t just divide the cake,
eat it, and hope everything is forgotten,” notes an official from Angola, where a
third of the population is displaced and one million died in the war. “Reconciliation
goes far beyond just dividing power.”32
But the most persuasive set of evidence in support of the lull hypothesis is
close, case-by-case scrutiny of each of Africa’s conflicts in suspension. When one
reads past the diplomatic boosterism that inevitably accompanies international
mediation and peace-building initiatives, situation analyses produced by local
human rights groups and country experts are often much more sobering. A few
examples suffice.
Sudan. In Sudan, the peace process between the government and the
Sudanese People’s Liberation Movement/Army (SPLM/A) is lauded as one of the
major breakthroughs in Africa’s new peace. The U.S.-backed talks have already
produced ceasefire accords and agreement on most details related to power sharing and resource distribution in a six-and-a-half-year transitional period; top officials from the government and the SPLM/A are directly involved in the talks, and
most observers expect breakthroughs on outstanding issues to be resolved and a
final accord to be signed by spring of 2004. Hopes are high that this will bring
to a close Africa’s longest-running and costliest civil war. Yet country analysts are
almost uniformly alarmed at the situation. The most immediate crisis in Sudan
is in Darfur, where government-backed Arab militias (Janjaweed) are terrorizing
local populations accused of supporting two rebel movements. The militia attacks
have left one million people internally displaced and have produced what is
presently the worst humanitarian crisis in Africa. Humanitarian access to the
Darfur area is essentially nonexistent; what food relief gets through to stricken
villages is being systematically looted by the militia, which earns its pay through
war booty, and which is suspected of engaging in a government-backed campaign
of ethnic cleansing in Darfur to provide land for Arab nomads to settle.33
Meanwhile, lethal battles are breaking out between pro-government and proSPLM/A militia in key oil-producing regions. Critics argue that these setbacks
underscore that the government of Sudan is not serious about peace, but is simply
using proxies to wage war by other means. Others argue that the peace process,
as currently designed, is incomplete and must be a comprehensive, national
process including numerous other rebel groups and the Darfur crisis, lest a peace
vol.28:2 summer 2004
A “SUDDEN OUTBREAK OF TRANQUILITY”: ASSESSING THE NEW PEACE IN AFRICA
brokered in one part of the country merely intensify war in another.34 Still others
worry that the peace process is advancing solely because SPLM/A leadership is
eager to grab a share of the oil wealth produced in disputed regions of Sudan, and
is signing on to power sharing without addressing the needs of the people of
southern Sudan, thus creating a recipe for renewed civil war. The president of the
Sudan Studies Association issued a letter sounding this alarm:
There is a giddiness in the air about the profits and careers to be made from
a peace agreement in Sudan. This giddiness is leading to willful blindness:
never mind what the various agreements actually say, just sign the damn
things. The people of southern Sudan, and other Sudanese suffering from
war and repression, deserve better.35
From this perspective, what may emerge from the Sudanese peace talks is inclusion of the SPLM/A leadership at the (oil-drenched) feeding trough of the state,
while new insurgencies erupt among Sudanese communities left out of the accord
or, worse, on the wrong end of the government’s long-running campaign to ethnically cleanse zones of the country for settlement by its Arab populations. There
is still a reasonable chance for enduring peace in Sudan, but even cautiously optimistic analyses foresee a lengthy period of continued armed conflict and backsliding.36
Democratic Republic of Congo. When one looks beneath the surface of the
current “peace” in the DRC, the situation is even more alarming. There, a
10,000-person UN peacekeeping force (MONUC) is attempting to monitor a
shaky peace held together in a Government of National Unity and Transition.
There is, to be sure, good news from the DRC—the armies of neighboring states
have withdrawn from the country and widespread warfare is no longer the norm.
But the government has had great difficulty extending its authority beyond
Kinshasa, which observers describe as a “garrison town.” Worse, the eastern portion of the DRC, in particular the district of Ituri, remains a zone of “spiraling
violence bordering on genocide.”37 Uganda and Rwanda have continued to
engage in proxy war there, while local warlords and war entrepreneurs now operate in a context of complete breakdown of law and order. Underlying conflicts
over land, economic opportunity, and political power, which have fueled so much
of the warfare in eastern Congo, have gone unaddressed.38 UN forces continue to
be targeted by local militias and have been unable to prevent massacres. In
Katanga province, two rival administrations coexist, one answering to the government in Kinshasa and the other beholden to a former rebel movement. Much
of the rest of the DRC remains parceled out between rebel groups and the former
government areas, in what is less a government of national unity than a set of unintegrated fiefdoms presented to the world as a state. Some analysts worry that
the government in Kinshasa will simply focus its energies on the west and south
vol.28:2 summer 2004
83
84
the fletcher forum of world affairs
of the DRC, quarantining rather than resolving the violence in the east and central basins.
Cynics would argue that only in contemporary Africa would situations like
those in Sudan and the DRC be considered the centerpiece of “a sudden outbreak
of tranquility.” Close analysis of other African countries presumed to be moving
toward peace reveal similar patterns—dangerous fault lines, unresolved crises,
and festering tensions just beneath (or above) the surface. In Liberia, the arrival
of 12,000 of the expected 15,000 UN peacekeepers (the largest of the UN’s current 13 peacekeeping missions worldwide), a donor conference that raised
US$520 million for post-conflict reconstruction, and the removal of Charles
Taylor from the political scene has offered new hope for the war-ravaged country.39 But ill-prepared UN demobilization efforts in December 2003 produced
chaos, squabbles over positions in the transitional government have paralyzed the
political process, local leaders continue to block disarmament efforts, and a
number of key faction leaders appear to be
playing the role of spoiler.40 In Burundi,
Cynics would argue that
South African mediation and African peaceonly in contemporary
keeping forces have been very effective in
Africa would situations like promoting reconciliation and the establishin Sudan and the DRC be ment of a government of national unity in a
country that experienced double genocide
considered the centerpiece
in the mid-1990s. But even with this
progress, western regions of the country
of “a sudden outbreak
continue to be plagued by serious armed
of tranquility.”
violence and displacement.
Somalia’s 17-month-long peace
process has yielded a ceasefire accord and raised hopes of a power sharing agreement to revive the country’s collapsed state. But observers are pessimistic, citing
ongoing clashes in southern Somalia and interminable haggling over power sharing formulas among the political leaders as evidence that many key warlords are
not taking the talks seriously. Uganda continues to serve as a model of economic
recovery and may soon move toward multiparty democracy, but the long-running
insurgency in the north of the country (the Lord’s Resistance Army) has worsened
since 2002; this has raised suspicions that the Ugandan government is intentionally allowing the war to fester as part of its continued tensions with the Acholi
people of northern Uganda. UN and French peacekeeping troops have imposed
a ceasefire between government forces and rebels groups in Côte d’Ivoire, but the
country remains divided between the predominantly Christian south and
Muslim north, internal rivalries within the northern militias threaten more instability, armed violence remains endemic in the country’s “Wild West” border area
with Liberia and Guinea, and efforts to initiate disarmament have been rebuffed
vol.28:2 summer 2004
A “SUDDEN OUTBREAK OF TRANQUILITY”: ASSESSING THE NEW PEACE IN AFRICA
by rebel leaders. UN Secretary-General Annan warned of “hard-line elements
among the various Ivorian parties who remain determined to undermine the
peace process,” foreshadowing what may become a Somalia-like showdown
between UN peacekeepers and spoilers in Côte d’Ivoire.41 While Nigeria’s political situation is generally improved since 1998, ongoing clashes between government forces and local militias in oil-producing areas of the Niger Delta, and
violent sectarian (Christian-Muslim) clashes in several northern states, continue
to present the worrisome possibility of Africa’s most populous and powerful state
spiraling into uncontrolled communal violence.
THE ENDURING PEACE SCENARIO
A more optimistic outlook on Africa’s new peace would not dispute most
of the sobering facts and analyses noted above, but would point out a number of
new factors at play that will make backsliding into renewed conflict much less
likely.
First, there is now a robust commitment by African leaders to maintaining
peace and preventing conflict, a feature that was entirely absent from the African
political scene until recently. This commitment is enshrined in the new African
Union, which has aggressively pursued diplomatic and peacekeeping responses to
the continent’s political crises and in January 2004 established a Peace and
Security Council empowered to intervene militarily in trouble spots, drawing on
a planned African Stand-by Force. The commitment has also been captured in
the New Partnership for Africa’s Development, which pledges to build Africa’s
capacity for prevention, management, and resolution of conflict, including
peacemaking and peace enforcement measures.42 Key in this regard is the leadership of Africa’s most powerful states—South Africa and Nigeria. South Africa has
taken the lead in successful diplomatic initiatives in the DRC and Burundi, while
Nigeria has assumed the role of regional policeman for troubled West Africa.
Regional organizations have, with external backing, also assumed much more sustained and effective mediating roles. For instance, IGAD—comprised of states in
the Horn of Africa—has mediated both the Machakos peace process on Sudan
and the Mbagathi peace talks on Somalia.43 This enhanced capacity within Africa
to provide diplomatic and peacekeeping interventions into pre- and post-conflict
situations is a significant new tool for reducing warfare.
Second, there is now a much greater willingness by both African states and
the international community to hold government and rebel leaders accountable
for war crimes. The War Crimes Tribunal in Rwanda and Charles Taylor’s exile
to Nigeria are but two examples. This may serve as a deterrent, sending a message
to potential spoilers that the cost of plunging their countries back into civil war
is too great.
vol.28:2 summer 2004
85
86
the fletcher forum of world affairs
Third, there is also currently a much more serious international commitment to monitoring and enforcing arms embargoes and other sanctions on wartorn countries. In the past, UN Security Council resolutions calling for arms
embargoes in places like Somalia were routinely ignored. Now, a committee of
experts has been charged with reporting violations of the embargo, producing documentation of arms shipments, and naming names, all of which is having a chilling effect on arms trafficking.44 In countries such as Angola and Sierra Leone,
where wars have been fueled by “conflict diamonds,” sustained international
efforts to eliminate the trade in smuggled diamonds appear to be paying off.
Fourth, mediators have been emboldened by the fact that in at least one
case—Angola—a simple change of leadership precipitated the end of a 30-year
civil war. Within weeks after UNITA (National Union for the Total
Independence of Angola) leader Jonas Savimbi was killed in combat in February
2002, his commanders sued for peace. UNITA had already been under pressure
in 1997 once it lost its principal regional backer—the Mobutu government of
Zaire—and was increasingly isolated due to UN sanctions and travel bans.45
Angola demonstrated that even in zones of lucrative war economies, peace is possible. It also underscored the potential importance of individual leaders as a variable in the ending of protracted wars. It remains to be seen if the removal of
Charles Taylor from Liberia will have the same beneficial effect.
Fifth, the global context in which peace-building in Africa occurs has
changed dramatically since the al-Qaeda terrorist attacks of September 11,
2001, and the subsequent war on terrorism. To the extent that the U.S. government has come to view some war zones and
collapsed states as possible safe havens for
[T]here is now a much
terrorist activities, local players in these
greater willingness by both wars find themselves under much greater
scrutiny, and must take much greater care
African states and the
not to be seen as spoilers in Western-led
international community
efforts to revive effective government and
to hold government and
end wars. There is, in other words, a seriousness of purpose on the part of the
rebel leaders accountable
United States, which both governments
for war crimes.
and rebel leaders must take into account. In
practice, this factor appears to vary from
case to case, with the counterterrorism dimension most visible in Sudan’s peace
process and most ambiguous in the Somali peace talks. “If Sudan’s rulers make
peace this year,” opines The Economist, “it will be because they are terrified of
what George Bush might do to them if they don’t.”46 In Somalia, local perceptions that the United States would provide strong support to a revived government would serve to focus the minds of otherwise recalcitrant warlords, who do
vol.28:2 summer 2004
A “SUDDEN OUTBREAK OF TRANQUILITY”: ASSESSING THE NEW PEACE IN AFRICA
not want to be on the wrong side of a counterterrorism policy. But for the
moment, the peace process in Somalia has been so muddled and unpromising
that the United States has refrained from making such a gesture. Instead, the
United States has been working through local warlords to pursue the handful of
foreign terrorist suspects who have been detected in Mogadishu. Inasmuch as
the warlords are spoilers in the Somali peace process, this particular counterterrorism policy arguably works against, not
for, peace-building in the country.
Finally, strengthened regional and [I]t is universally recognized
international capacity for and commitment that timely and effective
to conflict prevention—better conflict early support for demobilization,
warning systems, more aggressive and uniemployment generation,
fied diplomatic intervention, and greater
willingness to threaten and use a range of judicial and police reform,
sanctions against leaders who are tempted to and other post-conflict tasks
use violence to achieve political goals— can make the difference
improve the odds that simmering crises can
be kept from boiling over. Likewise, impres- between consolidation of a
sive efforts to fashion more appropriate and shaky peace and backsliding
effective post-conflict foreign assistance may into renewed war.
minimize instances of backsliding. Both
conflict prevention and post-conflict assistance remain works-in-progress; most diplomats and aid officials concede that
they are still on the steep end of the learning curve. Moreover, foreign aid’s
impact—both positive and negative—is routinely overstated by the aid industry
and its detractors, and care must be taken not to exaggerate the impact of postconflict aid. At the same time, however, it is universally recognized that timely
and effective support for demobilization, employment generation, judicial and
police reform, and other post-conflict tasks can make the difference between consolidation of a shaky peace and backsliding into renewed war.
CONCLUSION
Available evidence suggests that setbacks and reversals are almost inevitable
in at least some, and perhaps most, of the African peace processes now underway.
Conditions are simply not favorable for widespread consolidation of peace across
a continent that exhibits all of the high risk symptoms of new or renewed conflict. But several post-conflict settings appear to stand a good chance of avoiding
a slide back into conflict, with Angola chief among them. The robust peacekeeping responses to the crises in Liberia, Sierra Leone, and Côte d’Ivoire also give
hope that West Africa’s conflicts will be given enough time, funds, and diplomatic
vol.28:2 summer 2004
87
88
the fletcher forum of world affairs
attention to allow for a consolidation of peace. Strong external pressures on
Sudan may succeed in eventually producing peace there.
Where backsliding does occur, it is likely to look quite different from the
civil wars of the 1990s. A variety of external factors are working against governments, rebel movements, warlords, and
predatory third states reigniting full-scale
Where backsliding does
civil war. Instead, in the coming five to 10
occur, it is likely to look
years many African communities hoping to
enjoy the “new peace” will instead
quite different from the
encounter a “new purgatory”—peace withcivil wars of the 1990s.
out reconciliation, governments of national
unity that are neither unified nor provide
governance, and communal violence and armed criminality that replace open
warfare but have comparable effects on human security. NOTES
1 “Making Africa Smile,” The Economist, January 17, 2004, 10.
2 Estimates of war casualties and famine casualties produced by war are very hard to secure with precision in
Africa. The conflict in the DRC is said to be responsible for about three million deaths; Sudan, two million;
the Rwandan genocide, 500,000 to 800,000; Angola, one million; Liberia, 200,000; and Somalia’s war and
famine, 300,000. Those six conflicts alone thus produce estimated casualties of seven million people.
3 “World Report 2003: Africa Overview,” Human Rights Watch, <http://www.hrw.org/wr2k3/africa.html>
(accessed March 3, 2004). In response to the emerging peace in Africa, in March 2004, the UN High
Commission for Refugees convened a high-level meeting of donors and other UN specialized agencies to
plan for the repatriation of up to two million African refugees in coming years. See UNHCR, “Joint Effort
Agreed for Repatriation, Reintegration in Africa,” ReliefWeb, March 8, 2004, <http://www.reliefweb.int/>
(accessed March 22, 2004).
4 It is revealing to compare the annual reports on Africa by human rights organizations from the 1980s and
today. In recent years, these reports are devoted increasingly to documentation of armed conflicts, as well as
the abuses perpetrated by both states and the explosion of nonstate actors the wars have spawned.
5 Paul Collier et al., “Breaking the Conflict Trap: Civil War and Development Policy,” World Bank Policy
Research Report 26121 (Washington, DC: The World Bank, May 2003), 13.
6 The Bush administration highlighted this security concern explicitly in the 2002 National Security Strategy, contending that “America is now threatened less by conquering states than we are by failing ones.” The National
Security Strategy of the United States of America, September 2002, The White House, September 17, 2002.
7 The term “African renaissance” was coined by Thabo Mbeki, then the prime minister of South Africa;
President Bill Clinton popularized the term by using it as the theme of his 1998 six-nation tour of Africa.
8 In early 2004, press coverage of Africa’s peace began to pick up. See for instance “A Survey of Sub-Saharan
Africa: Coping With Conflict,” The Economist, January 17, 2004, 8-9; David White, “More Signs of Peace,
But Progress is Slow,” Financial Times, January 21, 2004, 6; Jean-Marie Guehenno, “A Fragile Peace on a
Bloodied Continent,” International Herald Tribune, January 30, 2004, 6; Abraham McLaughlin, “A
Continent at Peace: Five African Hot Spots Cool Down,” Christian Science Monitor, January 2, 2004, 7;
CNN Inside Africa. “Remaking Africa,” transcript # 122701cb.k13 (December 27, 2003) [accessed via
Lexis-Nexis]; “African Leaders Look for Peace in 2004,” BBC News, January 1, 2004,
<http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/africa/3361665.stm> (accessed March 2, 2004); and Edward Harris, “Peace
Spreads in West Africa, Future Unsure,” Associated Press (February 4, 2004) [accessed via Lexis-Nexis].
9 The best-known rendition of this argument is Robert Kaplan, “The Coming Anarchy,” Atlantic Monthly 275
(2) February 1994: 44-76.
10 Richard Betts, “The Delusion of Impartial Intervention,” Foreign Affairs 73 (6) November-December 1994:
21-33.
vol.28:2 summer 2004
A “SUDDEN OUTBREAK OF TRANQUILITY”: ASSESSING THE NEW PEACE IN AFRICA
11 As with all theories, there are variations and internal debates within this school of thought that cannot be
captured here.
12 David Keen, “Incentives and Disincentives for Violence,” in Mats Berdal and David Malone, eds., Greed
and Grievance: Economic Agendas in Civil Wars (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2000), 24.
13 Ibid.
14 Jean-Francois Bayart, Stephen Ellis, and Beatrice Hibou, The Criminalization of the State in Africa (Oxford:
James Currey Press, 1999), xiv.
15 This has been a particularly important theme in analyses of the crises in Angola, Sierra Leone, Liberia, and
the DRC, where primary resources such as diamonds, gold, and timber are abundant. See, for example,
William Reno, Warlord Politics and African States (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1998); Global Witness, A Rough
Trade: The Role of Companies and Governments in the Angolan Conflict, <http://www.oneworld.org/globalwitness/reports/Angola/diy.html> (accessed March 2, 2004); and Steven Ellis, The Mask of Anarchy: The
Roots of Liberia’s War (New York: New York University Press, 1999).
16 Over 90 percent of all wartime casualties in the post-Cold War era are said to be civilians.
17 William Reno, “Shadow States and the Political Economy of Civil War,” in Mats Berdal and David Malone,
eds., Greed and Grievance: Economic Agendas in Civil Wars (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2000), 50.
18 Among the best of the many works exploring this issue are David Keen, The Benefits of Famine (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1994); Mark Duffield, “The Political Economy of Internal War: Asset Transfer,
Complex Emergencies and International Aid,” in Joanna McRae and Anthony Zwi, eds., War and Hunger:
Rethinking International Responses (London: Zed, 1994); Alex de Waal, Famine Crimes: Politics and the Disaster
Relief Industry in Africa (Oxford: James Currey Press, 1997); John Prendergast, Frontline Diplomacy:
Humanitarian Aid and Conflict in Africa (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 1996); Geoff Loane, “Literature
Assessment of the Wider Impact of Humanitarian Assistance,” in Geoff Loane and Tanja Schumer, eds., The
Wider Impact of Humanitarian Assistance: The Case of Sudan and the Implications for European Union Policy
(Baden-Baden: Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft, 2000); David Shearer, “Aiding or Abetting? Humanitarian Aid and
Its Economic Role in Civil War,” in Berdal and Malone, eds., Greed and Grievance, 189-203; and Mary B.
Anderson, Do No Harm: How Aid Can Support Peace—or War (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1999).
19 Earlier, somewhat reductionist variations of this explanation have also been subject to criticism and refinement; few now argue that economic greed is the sole factor driving wars, but is rather one of a number of
complex motives impelling individuals and groups towards armed violence.
20 Collier et al., “Breaking the Conflict Trap,” 82.
21 David Keen, “Incentives and Disincentives for Violence,” 26.
22 See for instance Charles Tilly, “War Making and State Making as Organized Crime,” in Peter Evans, Dietrich
Rueschemeyer, and Theda Skocpol, eds., Bringing the State Back In (New York: Cambridge University Press,
1985).
23 William Reno, Warlord Politics and African States (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1998). I have explored
this possibility in the Somali context in Somalia: State Collapse and the Threat of Terrorism, Adelphi Paper 364
(Oxford: Oxford University Press for the IISS, 2004).
24 A closer look at Africa from 1995-1998 revealed that the “lull” in conflicts was partly imaginary. Armed conflicts in Burundi and Congo-Brazzaville, for instance, were at their height in 1996-1997.
25 Marina Ottaway, Africa’s New Leaders: Democracy or State Reconstruction? (Washington DC: Carnegie
Endowment for International Peace, 1999), 1. Ottaway, writing after Ethiopia and Eritrea had gone to war,
does not share this optimistic assessment of the new generation of leadership.
26 “Making Africa Smile,” 10.
27 For a frank appraisal of Africa’s big states, see Marina Ottaway, Jeffrey Herbst, and Greg Mills, “Africa’s Big
States: Toward a New Realism,” Policy Outlook, Carnegie Endowment, Democracy and Rule of Law Project
(February 2004). Their analysis concludes with the sobering observation that we must “accept the fact that
in twenty years the map of Africa is unlikely to look like that of today and of forty years ago” (8).
28 Collier et al. “Breaking the Conflict Trap,” 4.
29 National Intelligence Council, Global Trends 2015: A Dialogue about the Future with Nongovernmental
Experts (Washington DC: NIC, December 2000), 25.
30 Collier et al., “Breaking the Conflict Trap,” 7.
31 Ibid., x.
32 Quoted in International Crisis Group, “Angola’s Choice: Reform or Regress,” ICG Africa Report #61 (Luanda
and Brussels: ICG, April 2003), 2.
vol.28:2 summer 2004
89
90
the fletcher forum of world affairs
33 John Prendergast and Andrew Stroehlein, “Don’t Breathe a Sigh of Relief for Sudan Just Yet,” The Observer,
January 20, 2004; UN OCHA, Integrated Regional Information Network, “One Million at ‘Immanent
Risk’ in Darfur, Says US Government,” ReliefWeb, March 3, 2004, <http://www.reliefweb.int/> (accessed
March 4, 2004); and UN OCHA, Integrated Regional Information Network, “Relief Supplies Being Stolen
From Recipients in Darfur,” ReliefWeb, February 27, 2004, <http://www.reliefweb.int/> (accessed March 4,
2004).
34 International Crisis Group, “Sudan: Towards an Incomplete Peace,” Africa Report #73 (Nairobi and Brussels:
ICG, December 11, 2003).
35 Michael Kevane, “Comments on Wealth-Sharing Agreement signed at Naivasha by Government of Sudan
and Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army on January 7, 2004,” unpublished report, no date,
<http://www.sudan.net> (accessed March 4, 2004).
36 Dina Esposito and Bathsheba Crocker, “To Guarantee the Peace: An Action Strategy for a Post-Conflict
Sudan,” (Washington DC: CSIS Post-Conflict Reconstruction Project, February 2004), <http://www.csis.org/
isp/pcr/0401_sudan.pdf> (accessed March 4, 2004).
37 International Crisis Group, “Congo Crisis: Military Intervention in Ituri,” Africa Report #64 (Nairobi/New
York/Brussels: ICG, June 13, 2003), 1.
38 Koen Vlassenroot and Tim Raeymaekers, “The Formation of New Political Complexes: Dynamics of
Conflict in Ituri, Democratic Republic of Congo,” Occasional Paper, Centre of African Studies, University
of Copenhagen (October 2003).
39 Taylor was pressured to accept exile in Nigeria, where for a time he continued to phone in orders to his minions in Liberia. He now faces demands for extradition for war crimes.
40 International Crisis Group, “Rebuilding Liberia: Prospects and Perils,” Africa Report #75 (Freetown/Brussels:
ICG, January 30, 2004).
41 UN OCHA, “Cote d’Ivoire: UN Sends Peacekeepers, But Disarmament on Hold,” IRIN (February 29,
2004), <http:www.irinnews.org> (accessed March 3, 2004).
42 “World Report 2003: Africa Overview: New Life for African Multilateralism,” Human Rights Watch,
<http://www.hrw.org/wr2k3.Africa.html> (accessed March 3, 2004); “Kenyan Paper Says AU Peace and
Security Council ‘A Milestone’,” BBC Monitoring Service (January 3, 2004) [accessed via Lexis-Nexis].
43 For a recent assessment of IGAD’s capacity as conflict manager, see Ulf Terlinden, “IGAD—Paper Tiger
Facing Gigantic Tasks,” Policy paper written for Friedrich Ebert Stiftung, Berlin (February 2004).
44 See United Nations, Security Council, “Report of the Panel of Experts on Somalia pursuant to Security
Council Resolution 1474 (2003),” UN SC S/2003/1035 (November 4, 2003).
45 International Crisis Group, “Dealing with Savimbi’s Ghost: The Security and Humanitarian Challenges in
Angola,” Africa Report #58 (Luanda/Brussels: ICG, February 26, 2003), 3.
46 “Making Africa Smile,” 10.
vol.28:2 summer 2004