Beyond rwanda and kosovo: The interactive dynamics of international peacekeeping and Ethnic Mobilisation

Abstract

Within the past few decades there has been a significant increase in multilateral interventions in ethnic conflicts in the name of peacekeeping. Most hope that these operations will assist in conflict resolution and reduce violence. However, recent examples indicate that this may not always be the case. This paper explores why international efforts to contain, curtail and resolve ethnic conflicts may not prove successful and even backfire. This enquiry is addressed by employing a cross-national comparative analysis of the involvement of peacekeeping operations in two recent ethnic conflict situations. A sociological model of mobilisation is systematically applied to the United Nations Assistance Mission for Rwanda (UNAMIR) in Rwanda (1994) and NATO's Kosovo Force (KFOR) in Kosovo (1999) to determine whether international actors addressed the primary components that led to mobilisation of the contentious parties. This work argues that the key to successful peacekeeping is to address the primary components of violence. The paper synthesises conflict studies with work on social mobilisation theory and research on peacekeeping, offering both theoretical and policy-relevant contributions to understanding the nexus between effective peacekeeping and factors leading to violent mobilisation.

Notes

1. Currently the UN is involved in 11 peacebuilding operations and 16 peacekeeping operations. NATO forces are engaged in Bosnia and Kosovo, the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia and Afghanistan. The EU is involved in four conflict prevention missions and 17 other peacebuilding and conflict resolution missions.

2. Research on the success and failure of peacekeeping is controversial. For a discussion of the debate in the literature, see Virginia Page Fortna, “Inside and Out: Peacekeeping and the Duration of Peace after Civil and Interstate War”, International Studies Review, Vol. 5, No. 4 (2003), pp. 97–114; and Ibrahim A. Elbadawi and Nicholas Sambanis, External Interventions and the Duration of Civil Wars (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2000), pp. 1–19.

3. A. J. R. Groom, “Peacekeeping: Perspectives and Progress”, International Affairs, Vol. 47, No. 2 (1971), pp. 340–352.

4. Peacekeeping operations refer to multilateral operations that monitor cease-fires, patrol buffer zones, assist in civil administration, promote the delivery of humanitarian assistance, and separate and demobilise combatants. Peacebuilding refers to “work to remove the causes of violence and build relationships that will make its recurrence unlikely”; David Last, “From Peacekeeping to Peacebuilding”, The Online Journal of Peace and Conflict Resolution, Vol. 5, No. 1 (2003), available: <http://www.trinstitute.org/ojpcr/5_1last.pdf>. See also Lakhdar Brahimi, Report of the Panel on the United Nations Peace Operations (New York: United Nations, 2000), A/55/305–S/2000/809.

5. Michael W. Doyle and Nicholas Sambanis, “International Peacebuilding: A Theoretical and Quantitative Analysis”, American Political Science Review, Vol. 94, No. 4 (2000), p. 779.

6. John N. Clarke, “Revisiting the New Interventionism”, Peace Review Vol. 14, No. 1 (2002), p. 93.

7. Ethnic conflicts are disputes, protest, contention and violence grounded in political, economic, cultural, or territorial issues between a government and a self-defined ethnic group. This definition is largely borrowed from Michael Brown, Ethnic Conflict and International Society (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1993), p. 5.

8. Chaim Kaufmann, “Possible and Impossible Solutions to Ethnic Civil Wars”, International Security, Vol. 20, No. 4 (1996), pp. 136–175.

9. Fortna, op. cit., pp. 97–114.

10. Barbara Walter, “The Critical Barrier to Civil War Settlement”, International Organization, Vol. 51, No. 3 (1997), pp. 335–364; and Doyle and Sambanis, op. cit., p. 779.

11. Amitabh Dubey, Domestic Institutions and the Duration of Civil War Settlements, Conference paper presented at International Studies Association—Annual Meeting, New Orleans, 2002.

12. Robert Cooper and Mats Berdal, “Outside Intervention in Ethnic Conflict”, Survival, Vol. 35, No. 1 (1993), pp. 118–142.

13. Robert Johansen, “Enhancing United Nations Peace-Keeping”, in Chadwick F. Alger (ed.), Enhancing United Nations Peace-Keeping (Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 1998), pp. 100–102.

14. United Nations, “Implementation of the Recommendations of the Special Committee on Peacekeeping Operations and the Panel on United Nations Peace Operations” (21 December 2001), A/56/732, pp. 1–17.

15. John Darby and Roger MacGinty, Contemporary Peacemaking: Conflict, Violence and Peace Processes (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), p. 3.

16. As Fortna explains, that “to assess accurately the effects of peacekeeping, we need to take into account the military outcome of the war, whether a treaty was signed, whether it was an ethnic conflict, its cost and duration, how many factions were involved, levels of economic development, availability of easily ‘lootable’ resources, and the country's level of democracy” (Fortna, op. cit., pp. 97–114).

17. Yet, again, there is a lack of consensus as Walter's research finds that ethnic identity is not significant in determining the probability of a successful peacekeeping operation; Walter, op. cit., pp. 335–364. See also Ted Robert Gurr and Barbara Harff, Ethnic Conflict in World Politics (Boulder, CO: Westview Press, 1994); Ted Robert Gurr and William H. Moore, “Ethnopolitical Rebellion: A Cross-Sectional Analysis of the 1980s and Risk Assessments for the 1990s”, American Journal of Political Science, Vol. 41, No. 4 (1997), pp. 1079–1103; John J. Mearsheimer and Robert A. Pape, “The Answer”, The New Republic, Vol. 208, No. 24 (1993), pp. 22–29; and Doyle and Sambanis, op. cit., p. 779.

18. Patrick M. Regan, “Conditions of Successful Third-Party Intervention in Intrastate Conflicts”, Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 20, No. 2 (1996), p. 352.

19. Kenneth D. Bush and E. Fuat Keyman, “Identity-Based Conflict: Rethinking Security in a Post-Cold War World”, Global Governance, Vol. 3, No. 3 (1997), p. 315.

20. Paul Diehl, Daniel Druckman and Wall James, “International Peacekeeping and Conflict Resolution: A Taxonomic Analysis with Implications”, The Journal of Conflict Resolution, Vol. 42, No. 1 (1998), pp. 33–55.

21. Doyle and Sambanis, op. cit., p. 779.

22. Gurr and Harff, op. cit.

23. Darby and MacGinty, op. cit., p. 3.

24. Doug McAdam, Sidney Tarrow and Charles Tilly, Dynamics of Contention (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), p. 10.

25. The operation in Kosovo is controversial; see arguments from Ivo Daalder and Michael O'Hanlon, Winning Ugly (Washington, DC: Brookings Institute Press, 2000); George Jatras, “Off-Track in the Balkans”, The Washington Post (15 October 2001), p. A18; Milcho Manchevski, “NATO Gave Us This Ethnic Cleansing”, The Guardian (15 August 2001), p. 1.12; Ted G. Carpenter (ed.), NATO's Empty Victory: A Post-Mortem on the Balkan War (Washington, DC: CATO Institute, 2000); Timothy W. Crawford, “Pivotal Deterrence and the Kosovo War: Why the Holbrooke Agreement Failed”, Political Science Quarterly, Vol. 116, No. 4 (2001–02), pp. 499–523; Carlotta Gall, “Attempt to Quiet Fighting in Macedonia May Backfire”, New York Times (6 August 2001), p. A4; and Denise Groves, “Waging the Peace in Kosovo”, Weekly Defence Monitor (28 October 1999), available: <https:///www.cc.columbia.edu/sec/dic/ciao/pbei/cdi/di991028.html

26. Total casualty estimates range from 500,000 to 937,000. See Human Rights Watch, “Leave None to Tell the Story: Genocide in Rwanda” (March 1999), available <http://www.hrw.org/

27. United Nations, The United Nations and Rwanda 1993–1996 (New York: United Nations Press, 1996), p. 35.

28. Linda Melvern, “The Security Council: Behind the Scenes”, International Affairs, Vol. 77, No. 1 (2001), pp. 101–113.

29. United Nations, op. cit., p. 36.

30. Jean-Marie Guehenno, “The United Nations Post-Brahimi”, Journal of International Affairs, Vol. 55, No. 2 (2002), pp. 489–500.

31. Alan Kuperman, The Limits of Humanitarian Intervention (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2001).

32. Christopher Clapham, “Rwanda: The Perils of Peacemaking”, Journal of Peace Research, Vol. 35, No. 2 (1998), pp. 193–210.

33. Although many former members of the KLA returned to their homes, some were recruited into the KPC.

34. Lord Robertson, “NATO in the New Millennium”, NATO Review, Vol. 47, No. 4 (1999), p. 4.

35. Manchevski, op. cit., pp. 1–12.

36. Retate Flottau, Olaf Ihlua and Claus Christian Malzahn, “The Lost Victory”, Der Spiegel (17 April 2000), pp. 184–190.

37. Lord Robertson, “Statement by the NATO Secretary General”, NATO Press Release (12 April 2001), p. 47.

38. Sean Taylor, “The Bloodshed Continues”, MacLean's, Vol. 116, No. 25 (2003), p. 29.

39. Daalder and O'Hanlon, op. cit., p. 215; Dick Leurkijk and Dick Zandee, Kosovo: From Crisis to Crisis (Sydney: Ashgate, 2001), pp. 116; Ted Galen Carpenter, “Kosovo and Macedonia: The West Enhances the Threat”, Mediterranean Quarterly, Vol. 13, Winter (2002), p. 21.

40. Ted Galen Carpenter, “Exit the Balkans Pronto”, Christian Science Monitor (29 January 2001), p. 9.

41. Julia Geshakova, “Kosovo: Violence Threatens Prospects For Multiethnic Society”, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty (19 March 2004), available: <http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/library/news/2004/2003/mil-040319-rfer1040301.htm>

42. Sidney Tarrow, Power in Movement (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), p. 1.

43. Charles Tilly, From Mobilization to Revolution (New York: McGraw-Hill, 1978), p. 69.

44. Doug McAdam, Political Process and the Development of Black Insurgency (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1982), p. 51.

45. This is not necessarily a linear process, and each component often influences the others. For example, the accumulation of resources may contribute to the solidarity of a group. Mobilisation is operationalised as both overt and clandestine ethnic-based protests and includes violent and non-violent activities as indicated by demonstrations, rallies, attacks on property, terrorist acts and small-scale guerrilla activities. See Gurr and Moore, op. cit., p. 1079 for a complete list of the range of protest activities and levels of violence.

46. Alynna Lyon, “International Influences on the Mobilization of Violence in Kosovo and Macedonia”, The Journal of International Relations and Development, Vol. 5, No. 3 (2002), pp. 275–294.

47. Tilly, op. cit., p. 76.

^aAdapted from Doug McAdam, Political Process and the Development of Black Insurgency (Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press, 1982), p. 51.

48. Joseph Craig Jenkins and Charles Perrow, “Insurgency of the Powerless: Farm Worker Movements (1946–1972)”, American Sociological Review, Vol. 42, No. 2 (1977), p. 250.

49. David J. Elkins, “Globalization, Telecommunication, and Virtual Ethnic Communities”, International Political Science Review, Vol. 18, No. 2 (1997), pp. 139–152.

50. Milton J. Esman and Shibley Telhami, International Organizations and Ethnic Conflict (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1995), pp. 41–71.

51. Alan J. Kuperman, “The Other Lesson of Rwanda”, SAIS Review, Vol. 16, Winter/Spring (1996), p. 235.

52. United Nations, “Report by Mr. B. W. Ndiaye, Special Rapporteur, on his mission to Rwanda” E/CN.4/1994/7/Add.1 (11 August 1993), in United Nations, The United Nations and Rwanda 1993–1996, op cit., p. 204.

53. “Letter from the Minister for Foreign Affairs of Belgium to the Secretary-General” (14 March 1994), in United Nations, The United Nations and Rwanda 1993–1996, op. cit., p. 244.

54. See Alison Des Forges, The Silence (New York: Scalo Publishers, 1995); Kuperman, op. cit., pp. 221–240.

55. Mel McNulty, “France's Role in Rwanda and External Military Intervention: A Double Discrediting”, International Peacekeeping, Vol. 4, No. 3 (1997), p. 26.

56. Peter Shiras, “Humanitarian Emergencies and the Role of NGOs”, in James Whitman and David Pocok (eds.), Humanitarian Emergencies and the Role of NGOs (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996), pp. 106–117.

57. John Sislin and Frederic S. Pearson, Arms and Ethnic Conflict (Boulder, CO: Rowan & Littlefield, 2001), p. 167.

58. Chris Bird, “Gun Deal Wins KLA New Role as Guard Force”, The Guardian (21 September 1999), p. 15; NATO, Undertaking of Demilitarisation and Transformation by the UCK (20 June 1999), available: <http://www.nato.int/kosovo/docu/a990620a.htm>.

59. Carlotta Gall, “As Talks Snag, NATO Puts Off Disarming Kosovo Rebels”, New York Times (30 September 1999), p. A3.

60. Denise Groves, Waging the Peace in Kosovo, 1999, available: <http://www.cc.columbia.edu/sec/dic/ciao/pbei/cdi/di991028.html>.

61. See Robert H. Reid, “Role in Future Snags KLA Demobilization”, The Atlanta Constitution (20 September 1999), p. A1; Robert H. Reid, “NATO Troops Attempt to Stop March by Ethnic Albanians”, New York Times (21 February 2000), p. A1.

62. Steven Erlanger, “A One-Time Ally Becomes the Problem”, New York Times (25 March 2001), p. 4.16.

63. Alexandre Peyrille, “AFP Examines Links between FRYOM Albanians Forces, Kosovo's TMK,” Agence France Presse (31 July 2001), p. FBIS-EEU-2001-0731.

64. “Europe: Better and Worse; Kosovo and Macedonia”, The Economist, 361 (17 November 2001), p. 50.

65. Manchevski, op. cit., pp. 1–12.

66. Ian Fisher, “Report Says Macedonians Killed Civilians in Revenge”, The New York Times (5 September 2001), p. S1.

67. This study uses Sidney Tarrow's definition: “consistent—but not necessarily formal or permanent—dimensions of the political environment that provides incentives for people to undertake collective action by affecting their expectations for success or failure” (Tarrow, op. cit., p. 82).

68. Ibid., p. 99.

69. Keith Richburg, “Witnesses Describe Cold Campaign of Killing in Rwanda”, Washington Post (8 May 1994), p. A1.

70. Michael Dravis, “Hutus and Tutsis in Rwanda”, Minorities at Risk, available: http://www.bsos.umd.edu/cidcm/mar/rwanda.htm>.

71. Peyrille, op. cit., p. FBIS-EEU-2001-0731.

72. Chris Hedges, “Kosovo's Next Masters?”, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 78, No. 3 (1999), p. 24.

73. In April 1999, several members of the US Congress jointly proposed the ‘Kosova Self-Defense Act’ with a $25 million allocation to the KLA. Representative Eliot Engel of New York argued, “The KLA is on the ground in Kosovo now and, with the proper weapons, could defend innocent Kosovars against Serb predication … When Serb forces do leave, the KLA can serve as a peacekeeping police force until a government is organized”; Michael J. Waller, “Flirting with KLA Terrorists”, Insight on the News (17 May 1999), pp. 16–18. For NATO and the member states, the KLA seemed a natural ally against Milosevic's brutality. Despite the fact that the act was never passed, the KLA perceived itself as NATO's anointed instrument of multi-ethnic democracy. One KLA leader explains: “we think that the Americans … support us”; Jeffrey Smith, “Training Arms, Allies Bolster KLA Prospects”, The Washington Post (26 May 1999), p. A24.

74. See also Crawford Young's work on the dynamics of ethnic identity in conflict situations; Crawford Young, “Explaining the Conflict Potential of Ethnicity”, in Darby and MacGinty, op. cit., pp. 9–18.

75. Bush and Keyman, op. cit., p. 318.

76. Gurr and Moore, op. cit., p. 1083.

77. Kaufmann, op. cit., pp. 136–175.

78. United Nations, op. cit., p. 17.

79. Mark Drumbl, “Punishment, Post-Genocide: From Guilt to Shame to Civis in Rwanda”, New York University Law Review, Vol. 75, No. 5 (2002), pp. 1221–1326.

80. Darby and MacGinty, op. cit., p. 4

81. “SPS Official Igic Urges UN to End Mission in Kosovo”, Tanjug (2 April 2000), p. FBIS-EEU-2000-0402.

82. “Violence in Kosovo: Who's Killing Whom”, ICG Balkans Report (1999), available: <http://www.crisisweb.org/projects/reports.cfm>.

83. Cited in “The Kosovo Formula”, The Washington Post (23 November 2001), p. A42.

84. Momčilo Trajković, a Serb leader, illustrated this perspective by stating that: “as long as the decision on the formation of the KPC was not withdrawn, then the Kosovo Serbs would not return to the Council, nor would they cooperate with those that were the creators of the transformation of the KLA”; International Crisis Group, op. cit.

85. Peter Finn, “Rebels with a New Cause; NATO, Yugoslavia Join to Rein in Deadly Successor”, The Washington Post (2 December 2000), p. A19.

86. Ian Fisher, “Report Says Macedonians Killed Civilians in Revenge”, The New York Times (5 September 2001), p. S1; Alissa Rubin, “Despite Peace, Ethnic Hatred Still Splits Macedonia”, The Los Angeles Times (4 April 2002), p. A5.

87. Garentina Kraja, “NATO Sends Reinforcements to Kosovo after Ethnic Clashes Kill 22, Injure Hundreds”, The Associated Press (18 March 2004).

88. In fact, there are cases (Yemen Arab Republic and Haiti) in which disarmament was not part of the negotiated peace agreements. See Joanna Spear, “Disarmament and Demobilization”, in Stephen John Stedman, Donald Rothchild and Elizabeth Cousens (eds.), Ending Civil Wars, Disarmament and Demobilization (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2003), pp. 141–182.

89. Barbara Walter, Committing to Peace: The Successful Settlement of Civil Wars (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 2001).

90. Spear, op. cit., p. 182.

91. Human Rights Watch/Africa, “HRW Critical of French Government's Role in Rwanda” (11 July 1994), p. 1.

92. Washington was hesitant for continued involvement and the UN force has continually suffered from lack of personnel, with only 2000 deployed after 5000 were promised; see Retate Flottau, Olaf Ihlua and Claus Christian Malzahn, “The Lost Victory”, Der Spiegel (17 April 2000), pp. 184–190. The UNAMIR operational budget was approved two days prior to the outbreak of the genocide.

93. Alison Des Forges, Leave None to Tell the Story (New York: Human Rights Watch, 1999).

94. Orlanda Brugnola, Helen Fein and Louise Spirer, Ever Again?: Evaluating the United Nations Genocide Convention on Its 50th Anniversary and Proposals to Activate the Convention (New York: Institute for the Study of Genocide, 1999).

95. Daniel Vernet, “Kosovo-Macedonia—Return to Realpolitik”, Le Monde (27 March 2001), p. FBIS-EEU-2001-0326.

96. Jean-Marie Guehenno, “The United Nations Post-Brahimi”, Journal of International Affairs, Vol. 55, No. 2 (2002), pp. 489–500.

97. McAdam, Tarrow and Tilly, op. cit., p. 56.

98. David A. Lake and Donald Rothchild, “Containing Fear: The Origins and Management of Ethnic Conflict”, International Security, Vol. 21, No. 2 (1996), p. 42.

99. Sonia K. Han, “Building a Peace That Lasts: The United Nations and Post-Civil War Peace Building”, New York University Journal of International Law and Politics, Vol. 26, No. 4 (1994), pp. 837–892.

100. Ibid.; William J. Durch, The Evolution of UN Peacekeeping: Case Studies and Comparative Analysis (New York, NY: St. Martin's Press, 1993); and Chandra Lekha Sriram and Karin Wermester, From Promise to Practice: Strengthening UN Capacity for the Prevention of Violent Conflict (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2003).

101. Diehl, Druckman and James, op. cit., pp. 33–55.