The Afghan Local Police: unpacking a hybrid security arrangement

Abstract

Our article takes issue with some applications of ‘hybridity’ in contemporary peace studies. We want to correct the view of ‘hybridity’ as mere expressions of resistance by the local to the external interventionist blueprints. We make our case based on field research of a community defence programme developed by the US military to address weaknesses in the Afghan state. Our critical reconstruction of ‘hybridity’ to two provincial studies presses the need to encompass the co-construction of hybrid outcomes, the fluidity of the process and complexities in the local context that shape the choices of both local and international actors. We argue that negative local experiences with the Afghan Local Police can be attributed to elite capture and pragmatic adaptations to the logic of the battle field. We further suggest that even ‘prescribed’ hybridity can work when the context matches the assumptions and conditions outlined in the original blueprint. Our analysis highlights the dangers of simplifying the local and cautions against scaling-up context-specific hybrid security mechanisms to a national level in a diverse and competitive environment such as Afghanistan.

Keywords:

• Afghanistan
• hybrid peace
• the ‘local’
• security provision
• peacebuilding
• Afghan Local Police

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the comments received by two anonymous reviewers and the suggestions and edits made by Christian Downie, Michael Pusey and Matthew Wilkinson.

Notes

1. Mac Ginty, “Warlords and Liberal peace,” 587.

2. Goodhand and Sedra, “Rethinking Liberal Peacebuilding,” 214.

3. Murtazashvili, “Informal Federalism”; and Goodhand and Sedra, “Rethinking Liberal Peacebuilding.”

4. Kilcullen, “Deiokes and the Taliban”; and Giustozzi, “Hearts, Minds, Barrel of a Gun.”

5. Schmeidl and Karokhail, “Pret-a-Proter States”; and TLO, “Inclusive Statebuilding.”

6. ICG, Future of Afghan Local Police, 2.

7. E.g. Felbab-Brown, “Hurray for Militias?”; Hakimi, “Getting Savages to Fight Barbarians”; and Goodhand and Hakimi, Counterinsurgency.

8. Vincent et al., “The Afghan Local Police.”

9. Chandler, “Peacebuilding”; and Mac Ginty and Richmond, “Fallacy of Hybrid Political Orders.”

10. Mac Ginty and Richmond, “Fallacy of Hybrid Political Orders,” 220–221.

11. Mac Ginty, “Hybrid Peace.”

12. Paffenholz, “Unpacking the Local Turn.”

13. Zanker, “Moving Beyond Hybridity.”

14. Schroeder and Chappuis, “New Perspectives,” 141.

15. The Liaison Office (TLO) emerged in 2003 at the request of community elders in Afghanistan’s South-east to improve participation and knowledge exchange in the peace and reconstruction process. The lead author of this publication was a co-founder of and worked with TLO until 2015, remaining on its board. The co-author worked for TLO from 2007 to 2011 and continues to consult for them.

16. Jarvis and Lister, “Vernacular Securities”; and Luckham and Kirk “Understanding Security.”

17. Mann, “Bypassing the Graveyard.”

18. Glickstein and Spangler, “Reforming Afghan Security Forces.”

19. Pugh, “The Problem-Solving and Critical Paradigms.”

20. Paffenholz, “Unpacking the Local Turn.”

21. Chandler, “Peacebuilding”; Mac Ginty and Richmond, “The Local Turn”; Richmond, “Legacy of State Formation”; and Mac Ginty, “Indigenous Peace-Making.”

22. Mac Ginty and Richmond, “The Local Turn.”

23. Paffenholz, “Unpacking the Local Turn,” 860.

24. Ibid., 861.

25. Mac Ginty, “Hybrid Peace.”

26. Boege et al., On Hybrid Political Orders, 10.

27. Millar, “Disaggregating Hybridity,” 501.

28. Ibid.

29. Baker, “Linking State and Non-State.”

30. Schmeidl and Karokhail, “Pret-a-Proter States’; and Schmeidl, “Not all Hybrid Structures”; Richmond, “Dilemmas of Hybrid Peace.”

31. Millar, “Disaggregating Hybridity,” 504.

32. Mac Ginty, “Hybrid Peace.”

33. Bagayoko et al., “Hybrid Security”; and Zanker, “Moving Beyond Hybridity.”

34. Zanker, “Moving Beyond Hybridity.”

35. Mac Ginty, “Hybrid Peace”; and Zanker, “Moving Beyond Hybridity.”

36. Central Statistics Organization, Afghanistan Living Conditions, 14.

37. Barfield, Afghanistan, 24–27.

38. According to the CIA World Factbook, about 30 minor languages exist in Afghanistan.

39. Bruno, "A Tribal Strategy.”

40. Barfield, Afghanistan.

41. Ibid.

42. Murtazashvili, “Informal Federalism.”

43. Jochem et al., “Establishing Local Government”; and Schmeidl, “Engaging Traditional Justice Mechanisms.”

44. Jochem et al., “Establishing Local Government.”

45. Schetter, “Playing the Ethnic Card’.

46. Suhrke, When More is Less; and Schmeidl, “Emperor’s New Clothes.”

47. Rubin, “Peace Building,” 175.

48. Jarstad, “Unpacking the Friction in Local Ownership,” 384.

49. Goodhand and Sedra, “Rethinking Liberal Peacebuilding,” 240.

50. Ibid., 243.

51. Etzioni, “COIN,” 347.

52. Goodhand and Hakimi, Counterinsurgency, 9.

53. Brown, The U.S. Surge, 14.

54. Gaston et al., Lessons Learned on Traditional Dispute Resolution; and Coburn and Dempsey, Informal Dispute Resolution.

55. Monsutti, “Fuzzy Sovereignty.”

56. AECOM International, Afghanistan Social Outreach Program, 2.

57. Ibid., 1.

58. Ibid., 4.

59. Ibid., 5.

60. Human Terrain Research Reachback Center, My Cousin’s Enemy.

61. Guest et al., “The Tribal Path,” 3; and Bergen, “How not to Lose Afghanistan.”

62. Saum-Manning, VSO/ALP, 2; AIHRC, From Arbaki to Local Police; and Goodhand and Hakimi, Counterinsurgency.

63. Lefèvre, Local Defence in Afghanistan; ICG, Future of Afghan Local Police; and Moyar, Village Stability Operations.

64. Strandquist, “Local defence forces.”

65. Felbab-Brown, “Hurray for Militias?”; and Bergen, “How Not to Lose Afghanistan.”

66. Rector, “Afghan Local Police.”

67. Moyar, Village Stability Operations, 9.

68. Jones, “Going Local.”

69. Wilder, Cops or Robbers?, 14; see also US DoD, Report on Progress, 68.

70. ICG, Future of Afghan Local Police, 6–7.

71. Hulslander and Spivey, “Village Stability Operations,” 28; and Goodhand and Hakimi, Counterinsurgency.

72. Hulslander and Spivey, “Village Stability Operations,” 127.

73. Rubin and Oppel, “U.S. and Afghanistan Debate.”

74. PTRO, Afghan Local Police. AIHRC, From Arbaki to Local Police; Human Rights Watch, Just don’t Call it a Militia; and Barber, No Time to Lose.

75. Goodhand and Hakimi, Counterinsurgency, 11.

76. AIHRC, From Arbaki to Local Police, 13.

77. Ibid., 14–15.

78. Saum-Manning, VSO/ALP.

79. ICG, Future of Afghan Local Police, 9.

80. Ibid.

81. Goodhand and Hakimi, Counterinsurgency, 38; and Baczko and Dorronsoro, Militia System in Kunduz.

82. Goodhand and Hakimi, Counterinsurgency, 43.

83. Baczko and Dorronsoro, Militia System in Kunduz.

84. Goodhand and Hakimi, Counterinsurgency, 38.

85. This section draws on research for TLO, Dutch Engagement; and TLO, Uruzgan.

86. Schmeidl, Man who would be King.

87. Derksen, Politics of Disarmament, 22, 110; and Schmeidl, Man who would be King.

88. Derksen, Politics of Disarmament, 110.

89. Warlord, Inc.

90. Derksen, Politics of Disarmament.

91. Goodhand and Hakimi, Counterinsurgency, 10.

92. Hulslander and Spivey, “Village Stability Operations,” 127.

93. Bijlert, “Trouble in Gizab.”

94. Bijlert, “Khas Uruzgan Violence”; and McGeough, “The Untouchable.”

95. Rubin and Rahimi, “Afghan Officials.”

96. Ibid.

97. Shah and Nordland, “Taliban Gain Ground.”

98. Jones, “Going Local.”

99. Naval Postgraduate School; https://my.nps.edu/web/ccs/nangarhar.

100. Rasmussen, US ‘mother of all bombs’ killed 92 Isis militants, say Afghan officials.

101. Mansfield, Devil is in the Details, 2.

102. Saum-Manning, VSO/ALP.

103. Foschini, “How Outside Interference”; and Mumtaz, “Three Faces of Shafa.”

104. Mansfield, Devil is in the Details.

105. Alokozay and Nordland, “Bomber Kills.”

106. Schmeidl and Karokhail, “The Role of Non-State Actors.”

107. Mac Ginty, “Hybrid Peace,” 407; and Zanker, “Moving Beyond Hybridity.”

108. Chandler, “Peacebuilding”; and Millar, “Disaggregating hybridity.”

109. Zanker, “Moving Beyond Hybridity.”

110. Mac Ginty, “Warlords and Liberal Peace”; and Mac Ginty and Richmond, “The Local Turn”; Paffenholz, “Unpacking the Local Turn.”

111. González, “Going ‘Tribal’.”

112. Human Terrain Research Reachback Center, My Cousin’s Enemy, 5–6.

113. Jones and Muñoz, Afghanistan’s Local War; and Jones, “Going Local.”

114. Moyar, “Village Stability Operations,” 10.

115. Schmeidl and Karokhail, “Role of Non-State Actors”; and Tariq, Tribal Security.

116. Jones, “Going Local.”

117. Jones and Muñoz, Afghanistan’s Local War, 31–32.

118. Schmeidl and Karokhail, “Integration of Traditional Structures,” 63.

119. Millar, “Disaggregating Hybridity”; and Mac Ginty and Richmond, “The Fallacy of Constructing.”

120. Baczko and Dorronsoro, Militia System in Kunduz; and Goodhand and Hakimi, Counterinsurgency.

121. Mac Ginty, “Hybrid Peace”; and Paffenholz, “Unpacking the Local.”

122. Goodhand and Hakimi, Counterinsurgency, 43.