Civil–military relations in francophone Africa and the consequences of a mistaken analysis

Abstract

The Building Security Overseas Strategy is at its core an ‘Intervention to end all Interventions’ – from a Western as well as an African perspective. Two of its main pillars are security sector reform in specific countries and systematic support to the development of the African Peace and Security Architecture. This article addresses the question why such efforts have met little success in francophone Africa. It argues that the failure of Western advisers to understand the sociological dynamics of African armed forces, shaped by a political culture based on personal loyalty to the leader, is at the root of the problem. In that context, the Huntingtonian-type distinction between the civilians and the military does not apply as military and civilians act in concert within common clientelism systems. As a result of the curtailing of the state-formation experience in most African countries, the military never had to demonstrate its performance as a state builder, nor did it have to bargain its legitimacy against the support of the citizens. Partnership in that context will remain a misnomer, at least until African military can credibly demonstrate commitment to state-building grounded in a broad-based social contract.

Keywords::

• political culture
• African Standby Force
• EAC
• donor recipient partnership

Notes

^1. See Mackie, ‘A Question of Leadership?’.

^2. By UNSC Resolution 2098 of 28 March 2013.

^3. UN, AU (and RECs), and EU operations in francophone Africa include ONUB, BINUB, MISAB, BONUCA, FOMUC and FOMAC, MINURCA, EUFOR CHAD CAR, MICOPAX, ONUC, MONUC, Artemis, UNAMIR (and Turquoise), MINUCI, MISMA; and active in 2013 NINUCA, MONUSCO, MINUSMA, EUCAPS Sahel Niger, EUPOL AND EUFOR DRC, see http://www.operationspaix.net/a-propos.html, University of Montreal.

^4. See Evans, Rueschemeyer, and Skocpol, Bringing the State Back In.

^5.Feaver, ‘The Civil–military Problematique’; Finer, and Stanley, The Man on Horseback; Huntington, The Soldier and the State; Janowitz, The Professional Soldier; Schiff, The Military and Domestic Politics; for the quote, Gow, Legitimacy and the Military, 26.

^6. Accordingly ‘quasi-statehood’ is marked by the empirical non-existence of a state that still forms the legal basis for the sovereign rights of local stakeholders, see Jackson, Quasi-states.

^7. Generals Franco, Giorgios Padadopoulos, and Ibrahim Firtina being some examples.

^8.Chrétien, ‘Féodalité ou féodalisation’.

^9. With the end of the Cold War African countries aligned with communist civil–military ideology, like the Republic of Congo (Brazzaville), quickly adapted their terminology to the Western ‘Huntingtonian’ canon.

^10.Trotha, ‘Über den Erfolg’, 226.

^11.Gutteridge, The Military in African Politics, 9.

^12. Ibid., 19.

^13. Ibid., 41.

^14. African soldiers trained and deployed all over the huge African (and at times Asian) empire. It was normal that soldiers as well as NCOs from Upper Volta would serve side by side with others from Senegal in the Madagascar campaigns. Conversation with Gabonese retired officer, December 2010, Libreville.

^15. In Libreville, Gabon, a handful of African veterans still live in the Maison d'Anciens Combattants and gratefully receive a small pension from France. Visit, Libreville, 2011.

^16. Gutteridge, The Military in African Politics, 20f.

^17. Post-WWII regular European conscripts from Belgium did their service in Africa. They remained with their units, without contact with native African soldiers, Interview with former Belgian conscript in Congo, Liège, 2012.

^18.Grier, ‘Colonial Legacies and Economic Growth’, 319.

^19.Crocker, Military Dependence 278.

^20.Murray, ‘Militarism in Africa’, 36.

^21.Herbst, States and Power in Africa, 109–12, quoted by Egnell and Halden, Laudable, Ahistorical and Overambitious, 37.

^22. Murray, ‘Militarism in Africa’, 37.

^23. See Leonard, Social Contracts and Security.

^24. The DRC and Cameroon with the West, the Congo Republic and Angola with the East etc.

^25.Thomson, Introduction to African Politics, 133. Mehler specifies this group as ‘military officers down to the rank of Colonel, Mehler Breaking the ‘Insecurity Trap’?, 8.

^26. The literature on clientele and patronage is extensive. A few titles particularly relevant to Africa include Boone, ‘States and Ruling Classes’; Chabal, Africa; Chabal and Daloz, Africa Works; Herbst, ‘Warlord Politics and African states’; Herbst, States and Power in Africa; Jackson and Rosberg, Personal Rule in Black Africa; Okruhlik, ‘Rentier Wealth’; Wirtz, ‘Körper, Kopf und Bauch’.

^27. This observation is shared by many Africans from other African sub-regions. South, East, and especially West Africans claim that such an attitude has long ceased to be relevant or had never existed in their communities.

^28. INHEA, International Network for Higher Education, http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/soe/cihe/inhea/profiles/Gabon.htm.

^29.Almond and Verba, The Civic Culture. See also Lezhnev, ‘Facts and Opportunities’; Inglehart, Modernization and Postmodernization; Inglehart and Baker, ‘Modernization’; Ngoma-Binda, ‘Democratic Republic of Congo Democracy and Political Participation’.

^30.Pye, ‘Political Culture’, 218.

^31. On resilience, see Mazrui, ‘Monarchical Tendency’; Mazrui, ‘Soldiers as Traditionalizers’. See also Geertz, The Interpretation of Cultures; Inglehart and Baker, ‘Modernization’; Ngoma-Binda, ‘Democratic Republic of Congo Democracy and Political Participation’; Taylor and Williams, ‘Political Culture’.

^32. Path dependency is here used in a figurative sense. The term was ‘imported’ from economic to social sciences by Pierson, ‘Increasing Returns’.

^33.Mazrui, ‘Seek Ye First’.

^34.Bourdieu, ‘The Forms of Capital’, 257.

^35. ‘Closed Society’ according to the definition by Popper, Die offene Gesellschaft.

^36. Smith, Democratisation and Good Governance, 23.

^37.Englebert, ‘Pre-Colonial Institutions’, 14.

^38. See Bachiri and Balibutsa, Maniragaba, Causes et Moyens de Prévention des Crimes Rituels and Moore and Sanders, Magical Interpretations, Material Realities.

^39. Chabal and Daloz, Africa Works, 113.

^40.Schneider, ‘Colonial Legacies’, 95f.

^41. Both military and civilian members of the elites may be compared to early modern European aristocracy, whose offspring was equally separated between knighthood and clergy to still fight over the same resources by similar means.

^42. For Central African examples, Pierre Nkurunziza of Burundi, Denis Sassou-Nguesso of Congo Brazzaville, François Bozizé of CAR, and Idriss Déby Itno of Chad swiftly change between Western suits, folkloristic head gear, and uniforms.

^43.Landé, ‘The Dyadic Basis of Clientelism’.

^44. Term formerly used by Mazrui, ‘The Lumpen Proletariat and the Lumpen Militariat’.

^45.Melmot, ‘Candide au Congo’, 25.

^46. Via the so-called African Peace Facility (APF), based on the 9th and 10th European Development Funds.

^47. Statement by the AU Commissioner for Peace and Security, Lamamra Ramtane, ‘The African Capacity for Immediate Response (AICRC) is to Crisis is adopted’, AU Press release, 27 May.

^48. Interviews with technical assistants in AU capacity building, Paris, August 2013, and Arusha, May 2013.

^49. See Guicherd, ‘L'investissement de l'UE dans la sécurité collective en Afrique centrale’.

^50. See Bachmann, ‘The African Standby Force’.

^51. For a timely assessment of the ASF, see Théroux-Bénoni, ‘Enhancing Africa's Responsiveness’.

^52. CPX Trend Marker 2005 June, CPX Hot Springs 2006, FTX Natural Fire 2009 then 2010, FTX Mlima Kilimandjaro 2009, CPX Natural Fire II 2011 ($750k US funding), CPX Ushirikiamo Imara 2011 modified into a FTX in January 2012, next CPX in Bujumbura 2013.

^53. See Ncube and Akena, ‘Wer finanziert die AU?’.

^54. Telephone interview with technical assistant at Easbrig, June 2013.

^55. Interview with military adviser, Nairobi, March 2013.

^56. Interview with senior Rwandan military, Kigali, September 2013.

^57.Ndayiziga, ‘Enjeux autour de l'intervention du Burundi en Somalie’.

^58.Menkhaus, ‘State Fragility as a Wicked Problem’.