Elections and political change in post-war Bosnia and Herzegovina

This article examines attempts to use electoral politics to promote substantive political change in post-war Bosnia and Herzegovina. Since 1990 elections have been a key part of virtually all negotiated agreements to end civil wars. The utility of democracy for building peace is often asserted but rarely backed with long-term commitment and resources on the ground. Bosnia since 1996 is a rare exception. There, international actors sought not only to establish a democratic political system but to use electoral democracy as a tool with which to transform the nature of politics in Bosnia in short order. This article focuses on efforts to shape the development of political parties and the party system, assesses the degree to which it has succeeded and examines the broader implications of Bosnia's experience for other state-building efforts of its kind.     

The internal–external security nexus and EU police/rule of law missions in the Western Balkans

Common Security and Defence Policy (CSDP) police/rule of law missions in the Western Balkans are increasingly guided by externally imposed normative agendas that respond primarily to EU internal security needs rather than functional imperatives or local realities. In line with these needs, EU police reform efforts tend to prioritise effectiveness and crime fighting over longer- term democratic policing and good governance reforms. In practice this means that police reform initiatives are technocratically oriented, yet value ridden fitting EU security concerns and needs. As a result, the police reform process can be—and often is—disconnected from the political and socio-economic reforms necessary for long-term stability and sustainable peace. Police assistance in Bosnia and Herzegovina has been shaped by a determined albeit questionable focus on organised crime and corruption. The focus of EU police reform in Macedonia on primarily crime-fighting aspects of policing has compromised thefunctioning of the Macedonian police. Similarly, the politics of (non-)recognition of Kosovo's self-proclaimed independence and the intrusiveness of EULEX Kosovo's executive mandate contravene meeting local challenges.     

The Road from Dayton to Brussels? The International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia and the Politics of War Crimes in Bosnia

Abstract

The tenth anniversary of the massacre of 7–8,000 Bosnian Muslim men and boys at Srebrenica in July 1995 set in stark relief the continuing salience of war crimes in the political life of Bosnia and Herzegovina. With the country now firmly on a path ‘from Dayton to Brussels’, dealing with the war crimes legacy is critical to its future development. Cooperation with the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) is a non-negotiable condition for further progress toward membership of the European Union and NATO's Partnership for Peace, while in the long-term, dealing with the legacy of war crimes is crucial to establishing lasting peace in Bosnia and in the region. This article examines the potential contribution of the ICTY to the restoration of peace in Bosnia in the context of debates about the role of post-conflict justice in societies in transition from war to peace and in the context of the international community's use of the war crimes issues as a political bargaining tool. It will be argued that the two are inextricably linked as short-term pragmatic advantages brought by cooperation work in tandem with longer-term goals of peace and reconciliation.     

Security sector reform: The building of security in Bosnia and Herzegovina

This article addresses the issue of Security Sector Reform (SSR) in Bosnia and examines whether the reform of security structures has enhanced security of Bosnia as a whole. The experience of recent armed conflict, and fragmentation and ethnicization of security structures have created special challenges for SSR in Bosnia. Transformation of the security sector in Bosnia is made even more complicated by the plethora of international actors involved in the process. The article argues that, despite the complexity of the task, SSR has produced some notable results, particularly in redressing the balance of power between the state and entities in the spheres of defence, policing and intelligence. However, while some of the SSR initiatives appear to be very successful in their main objective, they have inadvertently created some new security risks and/or displaced problems into another area. Thus, the question remains whether Bosnia's security has been enhanced in the process. The article identifies two main obstacles which block further progress in the building of security in Bosnia: first, the lack of local ‘ownership’ of SSR, and second, the Dayton constitutional arrangements. The article concludes that until these two fundamental issues are effectively addressed Bosnia will remain a weak, marginalized country filled with insecurity, divisions and adversity.     

The North down under: antinomies of conflict and intervention in Solomon Islands

Drawing upon recent critiques of the ways in which organised political violence in the global ‘South’ is interpreted and responded to, this paper examines the recent conflict and intervention in Solomon Islands. We argue that standardised liberal templates have served to frame both the aetiology of the Solomons conflict and the manner of its proposed resolution. Australia's intervention in Solomon Islands can be said to represent the ‘local North’ as it seeks to impose a liberal peace over a ‘deviant’ and ‘unruly’ neighbour. We draw upon published material to highlight the social, cultural and historical contexts of the conflict. We then demonstrate how the ‘off-the-shelf’ intervention, with its emphasis on asserting a liberal peace, fails to account for these complex social dimensions of the conflict. The antinomies of conflict and intervention in Solomon Islands demonstrate how both the liberal interpretation of developing-country conflict and its bedfellow, the liberal peace, attempt to divorce conflicts from their social contexts. In doing so, the demonstrable potential for violent intrastate conflict to result in positive social transformation is reduced.     

Human Trafficking: The Nadir of an Unholy Trinity

Terrorism, corruption, and international organized crime, a very “unholy trinity,” which globalization has at once enabled and encouraged, represent the most dangerous security threats to the developing democracies of Europe and the Eurasian region. While neither as lethal as the first order effects of terrorism, nor as corrosive to one’s confidence in government as state corruption, international organized crime’s trafficking of human beings can destroy the very “soul” of a state. Human trafficking – the commodification of human beings – represents a modern form of slavery, exploits and ruins women, and can kill. No nation can unilaterally defend itself against this threat.     

The failure of a liberal peace: Sri Lanka's counter-insurgency in global perspective

The victory by the Sri Lankan government over the LTTE in 2009 apparently ended over 25 years of civil war. However, the ramifications of the government's counter-insurgency go far beyond Sri Lanka's domestic politics. The military campaign against the LTTE poses a significant challenge to many of the liberal norms that inform contemporary models of international peace-building—the so-called ‘liberal peace’. This article suggests that Sri Lanka's attempts to justify a shift from peaceful conflict resolution to counter-insurgency relied on three main factors: the flawed nature of the peace process, which highlighted wider concerns about the mechanisms and principles of international peace processes; the increased influence of ‘Rising Powers’, particularly China, in global governance mechanisms, and their impact on international norms related to conflict management; and the use by the government of a discourse of counter-terrorism and counter-insurgency to limit international censure. The article concludes that the Sri Lankan case may suggest a growing contestation of international peace-building norms, and the emergence of a legitimated ‘illiberal peace’.     

Kicking the opium habit?: Afghanistan's drug economy and politics since the 1980s

Four misconceptions plague the efforts of the Afghan government and the international community to succeeding in weaning Afghanistan off its narcotics economy. The first myth is that the explosion of opium poppy cultivation in Afghanistan is a new phenomenon emerging from the fall of the Taliban. The second misconception is that if the Taliban regime had remained in power, given its religious fervour, it would have extirpated the illicit economy. The third misconception is that the warlords sponsoring the illicit economy gain only immense financial profits and weapons from the drug trade, a notion that critically ignores the significant political capital that they also reap from such involvement. The final myth and the most dangerous for efforts to cement progress in Afghanistan is that large-scale eradication of the opium crop is the quickest and most effective way to stabilize the country. Only massive economic investment in Afghanistan and wise patience not to demand immediate visible measures of ‘the success’ of counter-narcotics policies can produce a decrease in Afghanistan's illicit economy that it is truly durable and not politically destabilizing.     

In the shadows of war and peace: making sense of violence after peace accords

This article addresses an urgent but largely sidelined issue in the study of peace processes: that high levels of violence—usually framed as ‘crime’—are often ubiquitous in societies experiencing peace processes, even after the signing of peace accords. From South Africa to El Salvador, Guatemala to Northern Ireland, rising interpersonal violence has come to characterise the ‘peace’. This violence often takes place in the context of ambitious post-conflict development efforts. The article argues that even the seemingly non-political violence after peace accords is intimately linked to war, as well as the peace process—in both the causes of violence and in the types of violence that perpetrators use. In order to conceptualise post-peace accord violence, the article presents a framework of violence based on the perpetrators of violence and the types of violence (social, economic or political) that occur. This unpacking of post-peace accord violence emphasises the interconnectedness of political and non-political violence, and stresses the importance of security for development.     

Of ‘witch's brews’ and scholarly communities: the dangers and promise of academic parrhesia

In a series of lectures in the early 1980s, Michel Foucault resurrected the Greek word for frankness or truth-telling—‘parrhesia’—to investigate the inter-relationships and tensions that existed between freedom, truth-telling and political power. He concluded that in order for one to ‘tell the truth’ against a powerful superior, one needs the courage to oppose a community of which the parrhesiastes (‘truth teller’) is a member. This paper uses parrhesia to investigate the practice of the international relations (IR) scholar in speaking out against his or her scholarly community. Tony Smith's 2007 book Pact with the devil is used as an example of academic-intellectual parrhesia not only to illustrate the content of a potential form of parrhesia, but to demonstrate the challenges IR scholars who wish to practise academic parrhesia face in criticizing members of their academic community. Smith's critique of democratic peace theory specifically, and liberal IR theory more generally, is particularly noteworthy considering Smith's former position as a leading liberal proponent. The paper reviews, and then supplements and extends, Smith's critique of democratic peace theory.     

Development engagement with organised crime: a necessary shift or further securitisation?

Organised crime is increasingly being recognised as a development problem as well as a security threat. Underdevelopment creates a conducive environment for crime, while illicit flows undermine development progress. In response, development actors have begun to consider organised crime in their programming. However, there remains a reluctance to directly engage with organised crime, as there are fears that development will be further securitised. This has parallels with the reluctance of development actors to engage with conflict in the 1990s. This article draws on emerging reports from development agencies that begin to consider how organised crime can be addressed in development programming, comparing it to Goodhand's earlier framework on development and conflict. It evaluates what the different levels of engagement—working around crime, working in crime(-affected countries) and working on crime mean for the securitisation of development, assessing whether development engagement with organised crime is a necessary shift or further securitisation.     

From self-reliant churches to self-governing communities: comparing the indigenization of Christianity and democracy in sub-Saharan Africa

Christian missionaries, especially from Anglo-American Protestant denominations, have been remarkably successful in their effort to plant ‘self-propagating, self-supporting, self-governing’ churches throughout the world and especially in sub-Saharan Africa. Today's international non-governmental organizations and inter-governmental organizations engaged in development, humanitarian assistance, peace-building and human rights resemble ‘secular missionaries’ spreading their gospel of democracy, good governance, peace, justice and sustainable development. This article investigates the extent to which today's secular missionaries might learn from the indigenization of Christianity in sub-Saharan Africa. I conclude that an essential ingredient in the missionary strategy of evangelization is conspicuously absent in contemporary programmes of development, democratization, or peace-building. In particular, the extensive efforts devoted by Protestant missionaries to the translation of their Biblical message into local languages and symbolic repertoires bear little resemblance to efforts to transplant Western ideals of universal human rights or the institutional templates of democratic governance first developed in the United States and Western Europe.     

India as a democracy promoter? New Delhi's involvement in Nepal's return to democracy

According to the theory of ‘democratic peace’, India, as the largest democracy in the world and as South Asia's predominant regional power, should be expected to promote democracy in neighbouring countries. However, New Delhi lacks any kind of official democracy-promotion policy, and its past record on democracy promotion efforts in the region is mixed at best. Against this background, the article analyses the substantial role India has come to play in the peace and democratization process in Nepal in the years 2005–2008, asking whether this constitutes a departure from New Delhi's traditional policy of non-interference in its neighbours' internal affairs and a move towards a more assertive approach to democracy promotion. However, the analysis shows that India's involvement in Nepal was the product of short-term stability concerns rather than being an indicator of a long-term change in strategy with the intention of becoming an active player in international democracy promotion.     

The problems of ‘nation‐building’: imposing bureaucratic ‘rule from above’

With the problems of stabilising Iraq continuing under the ‘fully sovereign’ Iraqi interim government, which formally replaced the United‐States‐led transitional administrative authority on 28 June 2004, many critics have argued that the United Nations (UN) should play a much larger role in the transition process. This article suggests that while imposing an alternative set of external administrative ‘advisers’ might be popular with European powers, it is unlikely that greater UN involvement would make much difference to the people of Iraq. Using the example of the international protectorate of Bosnia, which is also a ‘fully sovereign’ state, where the UN plays a fully engaged role, it is clear that external enforcement can provide little legitimacy for Iraqi institutions. This article challenges the idea that the ‘rule of law’ can be imposed from outside by focusing on two areas of legal activism in Bosnia: constitutional change and property return. It suggests that the ‘rule of law’ approach sees legal or administrative solutions as a short cut to addressing political problems, fetishising the legal framework at the same time as marginalising the political sphere. Rather than more coercive external involvement in the form of pressures for more legislation and better law enforcement, the experience of Bosnia highlights the need for greater levels of political legitimacy, a need that runs counter to the logic of the ‘rule of law’ approach.     

Conflict Resolution through Democracy Promotion? The Role of the OSCE in Georgia

This article qualitatively and empirically analyses the OSCE's efforts to promote democracy after intra-state war in Georgia. This regional organization is rooted in a comprehensive approach to security that directly links security to democratic values. Therefore, the OSCE is a particularly appropriate subject for studying the issue of democracy promotion in the context of conflict-resolution processes. Georgia provides a difficult environment for such a goal. Given that its two secession conflicts are ‘frozen’, democracy can, especially in this context, be considered a well-suited means to indirectly contribute to conflict resolution. By contrasting the democratic development in Georgia with OSCE activities since 1992, this article will assess OSCE democracy promotion efforts. When these efforts are measured with regard to progress in peace and democratic quality, the effectiveness of external democracy promotion by the OSCE has to be called into question. However, the article argues that democratization is a long-term process in which internal factors play a decisive role. The OSCE, like other international organizations, can only reach its normative goals to the degree of the reform orientation and political will of the target state's government. The potential for impact is limited, but can be increased by commitment and context sensitivity.     

Brazil as ‘Southern donor’: beyond hierarchy and national interests in development cooperation?

This article analyses Brazil's growing role in external development assistance. During Lula da Silva's presidency, cooperation with developing countries grew dramatically. While the official position is that Brazilian development assistance is moved not by national economic or political interests, but by international ‘solidarity’, and does not reproduce the North–South traditional aid relations, we suggest that it is not completely divorced from national, sub-national or sectoral interests and cannot be viewed apart from Brazil's broader foreign policy objectives. Brazil does pursue political, economic and commercial interests and, concomitantly, has made a positive difference in the recipient countries. However, more empirical research and field investigation are needed to better gauge the impact of Brazil's assistance initiatives and their contributions to South–South cooperation more broadly. During Lula's terms (2003–2010), Brazil could be classified as a ‘Southern donor’, which expresses the country's own novelties, and tensions, of simultaneously being a donor and a developing country.     

Securitisation from below: the relationship between immigration and foreign policy in South Africa's approach to the Zimbabwe crisis

The political and economic debacle in Zimbabwe has led to a large-scale influx of Zimbabweans into neighbouring South Africa. This article argues that there is a complex and significant link between the domestic response to this immigration influx and South Africa's foreign policy towards Zimbabwe. South Africa's foreign and security policy elite preferred to use an immigration approach of benign neglect as a tool to promote its ‘quiet diplomacy’ approach towards the Zimbabwean regime, treating the influx as a ‘non-problem’. But increased xenophobic violence, vigilantism and protests in townships and informal settlements against Zimbabwean and other African immigrants, culminating in widespread riots across the country in 2008, contributed to a change not only in immigration policy but also in the mediation efforts towards the Zimbabwean parties. I argue that this foreign policy change was pushed by a process of ‘securitisation from below’, where the understanding of Zimbabwean immigrants as a security threat were promoted not by traditional security elites but by South Africa's marginalised urban poor.     

The role of women in economic transformation: market women in Sierra Leone

Various studies have concluded that economic life did not die out during the conflict in Sierra Leone, but took on different forms. Different stakeholders at all levels were engaged in economic activities during the war. The specific roles of women in the shadow economy are under-researched, with the result that most analysis and policy-options are inadequate. While some of Sierra Leone's market women strategically participated in war economies to ‘do well out of war’, most did so out of the need to survive. With the end of the war, market women have been able to make a successful transformation to peace economies through micro-credit assistance.     

Broadening ‘business’, widening ‘peace’: a new research agenda on business and peace-building

ABSTRACT

What role does business play in peace-building and conflict reduction? This special issue tackles this complex question, exploring varied business efforts to bring peace through six rigorous qualitative cases in Myanmar, Democratic Republic of Congo, South Sudan, Somaliland, Brazil, Guatemala and El Salvador. Three main findings cut across this issue. First, local context is paramount to success; there is no one universal formula that a regulator, business or peace practitioner aiming to advance a business agenda for peace can employ for operational success. Second, rather than compartmentalising ‘peace’ into projects that often carry ‘win-lose’ consequences for local communities, business-peace projects must first understand who they are empowering so that they do not unwittingly make the conflict worse. Third, investment and access are deeply intertwined in fragile and conflict-affected areas, and business-peace projects that simply try to improve business access typically exacerbate inequalities favouring elite actors. We close with a discussion on how to take the business and peace-building agenda forward with scholarship and policy, stressing that business-peace projects must be assessed at the societal and not project level if their impact is to be truly beneficial for a political economy of peaceful development.     

The way back in: Reintegrating illegal armed groups in Colombia then and now

Back in the early 1990s, Colombia reintegrated five left-wing guerrilla groups. Whether as groups or individuals, these guerrillas found space for legitimate political participation at the local and national levels. Society accepted them and they embraced democracy and contributed to the strengthening of liberal political ideas and human rights norms in the country. Fifteen years later Colombia is once again attempting to reintegrate ex-combatants, 33,000 from the Autodefensas Unidas de Colombia, the so-called ‘paramilitary’—a right-wing force that sought to fight guerrillas—and about 11,000 ‘individually demobilised’ combatants of FARC, ELN and AUC who have since 2002 deserted their group. This time, however, the task of transforming illegal armed groups into legitimate political entities is proving to be harder. In particular, the reintegration of the paramilitary has elicited wide criticism from Colombians and the international community. Why are things different today? By examining and comparing the processes of political reintegration of the M-19 and the paramilitary this article will argue that there are at least four critical factors that either allow or bar former combatants from becoming legitimate players with a capacity for political interlocution: the international and domestic political and normative contexts; the nature and behaviour of the illegal armed group (how much power they command, to what extent groups use war for personal profit and whether they commit egregious crimes); the terms of the peace negotiation; and the practical dimensions of exercising political interlocution.