UN peace operations and the dilemmas of the peacebuilding consensus

Abstract

What is the nature of the ‘peace’ that is being installed in conflict zones through UN peace operations? It tends to be assumed that UN peace operations contribute to the construction of a liberal international order made up of democratic states. In practice this has often resulted in a ‘virtual peace’ based upon contested attempts to import liberal democratic models. This essay argues that much of the impetus for this type of thinking arises from a liberal desire to ‘resolve’ conflict – to reproduce a positive peace through contemporary peace operations rather than the negative peace that was supported by more traditional peacekeeping. ‘Peace’ in some cases now legitimates and rests upon long-standing and deep interventions in conflict zones via a ‘peacebuilding consensus’. This lies in a peace constituted by a specific form of external governance. Understanding these developments clearly shows how important peace operations are in creating forms of peace as a contribution to the remaking of the global order.

Acknowledgements

Sections of this article draw on a presentation for a panel on ‘New Wars’ at BISA, London School of Economics, 14–16 December 2002. Thanks to the participants of the panel, and Ali Watson, Ian Hall, Nick Rengger, Roland Bleiker, Costas Constantinou, Paul Williams and Alex Bellamy.

Notes

Saint Augustine, City of God, XIX, 13, 1, London: Penguin Classics, 1991.

William Blake, The Marriage of Heaven and Hell, Oxford Paperbacks, 1975.

For an elaboration of this point see Oliver P.Richmond, Maintaining Order, Making Peace, London: Palgrave, 2002, esp.Ch.VI.

Michael Pugh, ‘Peacekeeping and Critical Theory’, BISA, London School of Economics, 18–18 December 2002, p.1. Pugh argues that ‘Modern versions of peacekeeping can be considered as forms of riot control directed against unruly parts of the world’. Ibid., p.2.

See, among many others, Kofi A. Annan, ‘Democracy as an International Issue’, in Global Governance, Vol.8, No.2, p.135.

Chris Brown, Selective Intervention: A Defence of Inconsistency, Paper presented at University of St Andrews, 11 November 2002.

I use the term ‘peacebuilding’ to denote multilevel and multidimensional approaches to ending conflict as denoted. See also: Kofi Annan, ‘Annual Report of the Secretary General on the work of the Organisation’, UN doc. A/53/1, 27 August 1998, para. 28.

Mike Pugh has also described what he calls the ‘New York consensus’. See Pugh (n.4 above), pp.6–9. These conceptions are similar to, and perhaps familiar as the ‘Washington Consensus’, which has often come to be used as a synonym for neoliberalism and ‘market fundamentalism’. See John Williamson, Senior Fellow, Institute for International Economics, ‘What Should the Bank Think about the Washington Consensus?’, Paper prepared as a background to the World Bank's World Development Report 2000, July 1999, www.worldbank.org/research/journals/wbro/obsaug00/pdf/(6)Williamson.pdf, p.1.

Nicholas J. Wheeler, ‘The Political and Moral Limits of Western Military Intervention to Protect Civilians in Danger’ in Colin McInnes and Nicolas J. Wheeler (eds.), Dimensions of Western Military Intervention, London: Frank Cass, 2002, p.3.

This is essentially what Mandelbaum calls the combination of peace, democracy and free markets. Michael Mandelbaum, The Ideas that Conquered the World, New York: Public Affairs, 2002, p.6.

For a critique of this, see in particular, Mark Duffield, Global Governance and the New Wars: The Merging of Development and Security, London: Zed Books, 2001.

Wheeler, ‘The Political and Moral Limits’, p.5.

Indeed, Michael Ignatieff has recently called this ‘Empire Lite’. Michael Ignatieff, Empire Lite: Nation-building in Bosnia, Kosovo and Afghanistan, London: Vintage, 2003, pp.22–3.

See Dag Hammarskjöld, Summary Study of the Experience Derived From the Establishment and Operation of the Force: Report of the Secretary-General, in Official Records of the General Assembly, Thirteenth Session: Annexes. A/3943, 9 October 1958. New York: UN, July 1960, pp.8–42.

Erwin A. Schmidl, Peace Operations Between Peace and War, London: Frank Cass, 2000, pp.7–9.

Pugh (see n.4 above), p.5.

Johan Galtung, Peace by Peaceful Means Peace and Conflict, Development and Civilization, London: Sage, 1996, p.viii.

For an elaboration of this point see, for example, James A. Stegenga, The United Nations Force in Cyprus, Ohio: Ohio State University, 1968.

The UN implicitly began to work for a federal solution after the territorial division of the island in 1974. See, for example, General Assembly Resolution 3312(XXIX), 1 November 1974.

See the language of UN Security Council resolutions establishing these forces' mandates. See UN Security Council Resolution 143, 4 July 1960 and UN Security Council Resolution 186, 4 March 1964.

Norrie Macqueen, United Nations Peacekeeping in Africa Since 1960, London: Longman, 2002, p.44.

Ibid. pp.49 89.

Ibid. p.105. By international community here, I am referring to those liberal states, international and regional organizations and institutions, agencies and NGOs which operate on the basis of such liberal assumptions in theory (though they are clearly not consistent in practice).

For a good overview see Michele Griffin, ‘Retrenchment, Reform, and Regionalization: Trends in UN Peace Support Operations’, International Peacekeeping, Vol.6, No.1, 1999.

Paris argues that the inclusion of development means that peacebuilding is effectively a new era in developed-developing world relations. Roland Paris, ‘International Peacebuilding and the “Mission Civilisatrice”’, Review of International Studies, Vol.28, No.4, 2002, p.638.

For one of the best known examples, see J. Lederach, Building Peace – Sustainable Reconciliation in Divided Societies, Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 1997.

Max Singer and Aaron Wildavsky, The Real World Order, New Jersey: Chatham House Publishers, 1993, p.3. Singer and Wildavsky divide the world up into zones of peace and turmoil; in the latter zone stability is a ‘meaningless goal’, this being a classic example of the problematic analyses that Realist assumptions often produce. Ibid., p.9.

See Boutros Boutros-Ghali, An Agenda for Peace: Preventive Diplomacy, Peacemaking and Peace-keeping, A/47/277-S/24111, 17 June 1992; An Agenda for Development: Report of the Secretary-General, A/48/935, 6 May 1994; An Agenda for Democratization, A/50/332 AND A/51/512, 17 December 1996.

Danilo Zolo, Cosmopolis: Prospects for World Government, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1997, pp.14–15.

For a development of this line of thought see François Debrix, Re-Envisioning UN Peacekeeping, Minnesota: University of Minnesota Press, 1999, p.56.

Boutros-Ghali, An Agenda for Peace, para. 55.

Kofi Annan, cited by Philip Wilkinson, ‘Sharpening the Weapons of Peace: Peace Support Operations and Complex Emergencies’, in Tom Woodhouse and Oliver Ramsbotham, Peacekeeping and Conflict Resolution, London and Portland, OR: Frank Cass, 2000, p.63.

Letters from the Secretary General to the President of the General Assembly and the President of the Security Council, Report of the Panel on UN Peace Operations, A/55/305-S/2000/809, 21 August 2000.

Annan (see n.5 above), p.135.

Ibid. p.135. This is in line with David Held's thesis about the lack of global democracy hindering domestic democratization. David Held, Democracy and the Global Order, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1995, p.72.

The UN has also established the Electoral Assistance Division in 1992 to guide states making a transition to democracy. See General Assembly Resolution A/RES/46/137, 9 March 1992.

As Paris points out, this entails the globalization of the very notion of a state; Paris (n.25 above), p.639.

Michael Mann, The Sources of Social Power, Vol.2, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1986, p.55.

See William Bain, ‘The Political Theory of Trusteeship and the Twilight of International Equality’, International Relations, Vol.17, No.1, 2003.

See L. Kyle, International Trusteeship – A Concept Due For Revival?, Royal College of Defence Studies, www.mod.uk/rcds/kyle.htm.

See Ronnie D. Lipschutz, ‘The Clash of Governmentalities: The Fall of the UN Republic and America's Reach for Imperium’, ‘Exploring Imperium’, University of Sussex, 11 December 2002; Martin Shaw, ‘Exploring imperia: Western-global power amidst the wars of quasi-imperial states’ ‘Exploring Imperium’, University of Sussex, 11 December 2002, www.theglobalsite.ac.uk.

Ian Clark, ‘Another Double Movement: The Great Transformation after the Cold War?’, Review of International Studies, Vol.27, Special Issue, 2001, p.248.

Paris (n.25 above), pp.642–5.

This is essentially what Mandelbaum calls the combination of peace, democracy and free markets; The Ideas that Conquered the World, p.6.

Adam Watson, ‘Foreword, Forum on the English School’, Review of International Studies, Vol.27, No.3, p.469.

Martin Shaw, ‘Post-Imperial And Quasi-Imperial: State and Empire in the Global Era’, Millennium, Vol.31, No.2, pp.327–36.

Ignatieff (n.13 above), p.vii. Indeed, he argues that this ‘humanitarian empire is the new face of an old figure: the democratic free world, the Christian west’, ibid., p.17.

Ibid. p.98.

St Thomas Aquinas, Summa Theologicae, II–II, 158, 1, ad 3.

See President Clinton, Prime Minister Blair, and Secretary‐General Kofi Annan's apparent agreement that sovereignty should not override the need for humanitarian intervention at the Millennium Summit, 6–8 September 2000. For the declaration see, Report of the Secretary-General, ‘We the peoples: the role of the United Nations in the 21st century’ (A/54/2000).

For a fascinating evaluation of this complex operation see Elizabeth M. Cousens, ‘Building Peace in Bosnia’, in Elizabeth M. Cousens and Chetan Kumar, Peacebuilding as Politics, London: Lynne Rienner, 2001, pp.113–52.

Michael Pugh, ‘Bosnia and Herzegovina in South-east Europe’, in War Economies in Their Regional Context: The Challenge of Transformation. Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner for the IPA, 2003, pp.235–6.

UNDP Resident Representative, cited by Pugh, ibid., p.256.

Ibid. p.267.

For example, see Kosovo Report: Conflict, International Response, Lessons Learned, Independent Commission for Kosovo, Oxford University Press, 2000.

See David Chandler, Faking Democracy, London: Pluto Press, 2002.

Jurgen Habermas, ‘Bestialität und Humanität’, Die Zeit 18:1, 1999.

Richard J. Goldstone, ‘Whither Kosovo? Whither Democracy?’, Global Governance, Vol.8, No.2, p.144.

See Richard Falk, Human Rights Horizons, London: Routledge, 2000, p.68.

Xanana Gusmao, East Timor's first president, has regularly complained that UN intervention has entailed attempts to construct a value system that may not even have been attained in the Western states where many of the ‘internationals’ come from. Cited in Simon Chesterman, ‘East Timor in Transition: From Conflict Prevention to State-Building’, International Peace Academy, 2001, p.26.

For more on this, see UN Deputy Special Representative of the Secretary General for Reconstruction, UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, www.irinnews.org/report.asp?ReportID=22325, 24 February 2002. See also Lakhdar Brahimi, cited in Ignatieff (n.13 above), pp.96–7. Brahimi says that he has tried to make such that UN activities are coordinated, and that Afghanistan is not flooded with ‘out of work nation-builders’ from Kosovo, Bosnia and East Timor. He has made sure that the Afghan government is in control rather than the internationals.

Peter Marsden, ‘Afghanistan: The Reconstruction Process’, International Affairs, Vol.79, No.1, 2003, pp.94–7.

See UN Security Council Resolution 1401, 28 March 2002.

Ignatieff (n.13 above), p.92.

Graham Day and Christopher Freeman have argued that what is required in this case is ‘policekeeping’, an approach based upon ‘Chapter VII and-a-half’ of the UN Charter in which the responsibilities of ‘cosmopolitan humanitarianism’ leads to military intervention followed by regional policing and reconstruction along the lines suggested by the peacebuilding consensus. See Graham Day and Christopher Freeman, ‘Policekeeping is the Key: Rebuilding the International Security Architecture of Postwar Iraq’, International Affairs, Vol.79, No.2, 2003, p.301.

By this he means neutrality and a tendency not to differentiate between victims and aggressors. Macqueen, United Nations Peacekeeping in Africa Since 1960, p.12. This excellent volume also provides a useful analysis of the shortcomings of the role of the UN in Africa, which he argues relates to a gap between the peacekeeping model and the operational realities of conflict in African ‘neo-patrimonial’ states; ibid. pp.12, 23.

Ibid. p.3.

BBC News, ‘Nationalists prosper in struggling Bosnia’, http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/europe/2304653.stm, 7 October 2002.

David Chandler, From Kosovo to Kabul: Human Rights and International Intervention, London: Pluto, 2002, p.194. Ignatieff also agrees with this analysis (see n.13 above), p.93.

Richard Caplan, A New Trusteeship? The International Administration of War-torn Territories, Adelphi Paper No.341, Oxford University Press, 2002, p.84.

Roland Paris, ‘Peacebuilding and the Limits of Liberal Internationalism’, International Security, Vol.22, No.2, 1997, p.79.

UN, Report of the Panel on UN Peace Operations, www.un.org, 21 August 2000.

For an interesting discussion of this, see Alexandros Yiannis, ‘The Creation and Politics of International Protectorates in the Balkans’, Journal of International Relations and Development, Vol.5, No.3, 2002, pp.258–74.

Paris (n.25 above), p.638. Paris argues that peacebuilding missions attempt to transplant the values and institutions of the liberal democracies in the domestic affairs of peripheral states.

George Soros, The Crisis of Global Capitalism, Boston: Little, Brown, 1998.

See J. Stiglitz, More Instruments and Broader Goals: Moving towards the Post Washington Consensus, Helsinki: UN University, 1998.

Chandler has commented that such deep interventions, based upon ‘massive intrusions by foreign states and bodies’ are profoundly undemocratic. See Edward S. Herman, ‘Introduction’ in Chandler (n.69 above), p.x.

Mary Kaldor, New and Old Wars: Organised Violence in a Global Era, Cambridge: Polity Press, 1999, esp. Ch.7.

Yiannis (n.73 above), p.263.

See UN Security Council Resolution 186, 4 March 1964.

Eric Hobsbawm, ‘War and Peace’ The Guardian, 23 Feb. 2002.

Yiannis (n.73 above), p.289.

Chandler (n.69 above), p.190.

Caplan (n.70 above), pp.7, 11.

Michel Foucault, ‘Truth and Power’ in P. Rabinow (ed.), The Foucault Reader, London: Penguin, 1989, p.65; George Orwell, 1984, London: Signet Classic, 1969, p.164; Rudyard Kipling, ‘The White Man's Burden’, in John Beecroft (ed.), Kipling: A Selection of His Stories and Poems, Vol.II, NY: Doubleday, nd, pp.444–5.