I am proposing to research the various activities that actors who are external to a conflict engage in during the peacebuilding process because I want to identify the specific variables and attempt to measure them in order to help my reader understand how those external entities can exert control over territory to interfere in the basic safety and stability that is critical to any successful peace process.

In discussing reports published by the United Nations Secretary General, the United Nations Peacebuilding Fund outlines five recurring priority areas for international assistance:[1]

1. Support to basic safety and security
2. Political Processes
3. Provision of basic services
4. Restoration of core government functions
5. Economic revitalization

Policy makers have a tendency to look at conflict—especially civil war—as binary in nature. Under this rubric, two sovereign state entities come to the table (sometimes the international table, like the UN), and can come up with solutions to solve the conflict issues in one or all of the above five categories.  But this approach to civil war is overly simplistic.  As Stathis Kalyvas states, “civil wars are not binary conflicts but complex and ambiguous processes that foster an apparently massive, though variable, mix of identities and actions—to such a degree as to be defined by that mix.”[2]

My research topic falls under the 1^stpriority area for international assistance—support to basic safety and security. In the preliminary research I conducted while preparing for my literature review, I came to find that there are a mix of entities and activities, some of which can be unique, at work in the theatre of safety and security.  At this early stage, my thought is that finding variables that can be measured could potentially help the intervention and peacebuilding fields craft more viable peacekeeping solutions.

One example of this can be found in my last post where I cited research conducted by Romain Malejacq. Malejacq looked at warlords and the coercive power they exert over a space that is normally governed by a state entity but is now plagued by war and crippling instability.[3]Understanding hostile forces on the ground is a necessity when attempting to develop long term strategies for success. There are many examples of conflicts where the military has intervened, or the United Nations peacekeeping forces have intervened. Malejacq’s research assessed the measurable effects that various activities conducted by outside actors could have on instability within a conflict-ridden state.

This is where the puzzle I am looking at starts to get even more interesting. There is other research similar to Malejacq’s out there that is attempting to understand the actors in conflict zones, but defining the variables that matter depends on the specific contextual field a researcher is looking at. This is complicated by the fact that the actors external to these conflicts seem to approach the basic safety and security problem with pre-established ideas about the nature of the problem and the best solution.  For example, the Counterinsurgency Manual now lays out an updated approach to insurgencies that is intended to counter the effects such insurgencies are attempting to maintain on the ground. The COIN Manual states the objectives of insurgents as the following, “Stated another way, an insurgency is an organized, protracted politico-military struggle designed to weaken the control and legitimacy of an established government, occupying power, or other political authority while increasing insurgent control.”[4]

On the other side of the fence from the military is the peacebuilding community. It is commonly known that the goal in peacekeeping is deterrence. As recent as December 2017, the United Nations funded a study called The Improving Security Peacebuilding Project, which presents an overall strategy for how the United Nations Peacekeepers should posture their forces.[5]This report repeatedly emphasizes the historical inability of peacekeeping leadership to understand hostile forces, and the necessity for a more aggressive posturing.[6]

Both the peacebuilding community and the military community have communicated a pressing need to identify new solutions to counter the actors who drive instability in high conflict areas. Both communities could benefit from attempts to understand the “complexity, and ambiguity” that Kalyvas discusses in the Ontology of Political Violence.[7]Finding ways to measure actors and actions in conflict zones—as Malejacq was able to do—will help bring both fields to a better understanding of how to most effectively train, posture, and direct their personnel on the ground for the purpose of facilitating and then maintaining peace.

Posing my thoughts on this puzzle as a general question:

-What are the factors that enable actors who are external to the binary civil war context to exert control over territory as they strive to facilitate the peace process?

To pose a more specific question:

-Why has the United States and its allies not been able to create a stable regime in the conflict-ridden country of Afghanistan?

Notes

[1]United Nations Peacebuilding Fund. “What is Peacebuilding?” United Nations Peacebuilding Fund Application Guidelines, 2018. http://www.unpbf.org/application-guidelines/what-is-peacebuilding/.

[2]Kalyvas, Stathis N. “The Ontology of “Political Violence”: Action and Identity in Civil Wars.” Perspectives on Politics 1, no. 3 (2003): 475-94. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3688707.

[3]Malejacq, Romain. “Warlords, Intervention, and State Consolidation: A Typology of Political Orders in Weak and   Failed States.” Security Studies, Vol. 25, No. 1 (2016): 85-110. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/09636412.2016.1134191?needAccess=true.

[4]Department of the Army. “Counterinsurgency.” FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, 2006. https://www.hsdl.org/?view&did=468442.

[5]Cruz, Lieutenant General (Retired) Carlos Alberto dos Santos. “Improving Security of United Nations Peacekeepers: We need to change the way we are doing business.” The Improving Security Peacekeeping Project, 2017. https://peacekeeping.un.org/en/improving-security-of-united-nations-peacekeepers-independent-report.

[6]Ibid.

[7]Kalyvas, Stathis N. “The Ontology of “Political Violence”: Action and Identity in Civil Wars.”

Bibliography

Cruz, Lieutenant General (Retired) Carlos Alberto dos Santos. “Improving Security of United Nations Peacekeepers: We need to change the way we are   doing business.” The Improving Security Peacekeeping Project, 2017. https://peacekeeping.un.org/en/improving-security-of-united-nations-peacekeepers-independent-report.

Department of the Army. “Counterinsurgency.” FM 3-24/MCWP 3-33.5, 2006. https://www.hsdl.org/?view&did=468442.

Kalyvas, Stathis N. “The Ontology of “Political Violence”: Action and Identity in Civil Wars.” Perspectives on Politics 1, no. 3 (2003): 475-94. http://www.jstor.org/stable/3688707.

Malejacq, Romain. “Warlords, Intervention, and State Consolidation: A Typology of Political Orders in Weak and   Failed States.” Security Studies, Vol. 25, No. 1 (2016): 85-110. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/09636412.2016.1134191?needAccess=true.

United Nations Peacebuilding Fund. “What is Peacebuilding?” United Nations Peacebuilding Fund Application Guidelines, 2018. http://www.unpbf.org/application-guidelines/what-is-peacebuilding/.