Feb 12, 2012
New Book | Peace as Governance
Cool new book out (Peace as Governance) that looks at negotiation incentives used in peace agreements - excerpt:
In order to end armed conflict, and ensure that it does not recur, numerous tactics are used by national governments, the international community, and others engaged in conflict resolution. These tactics include amnesties, financial rewards, offers of inclusion in structures of power, and threats of reprisal and use of force, among myriad others. There is a thriving debate in the literature regarding the appropriate tactics and incentives for peace negotiations, as well as the peacebuilding processes promoted by the international community. This book critically analyzes one key set of negotiation incentives used in peace agreements: inclusion of armed groups in structures of power. Though I loosely term these incentives as ‘power-sharing’, they are much broader than traditional power-sharing, and rely on explicit institutionalization of the state and the use of state institutions. These negotiation incentives can involve inclusion of previously excluded or outlawed groups as legitimate political parties, sharing of resources with such groups, inclusion of former combatants in reformed military or police forces, and offers of partial or complete autonomy. This approach is largely used to bring non-state armed groups into negotiations, rather than as leverage on governments themselves. The book, drawing upon studies in Sri Lanka, Sudan, and Colombia, demonstrates the limitations and even dangers of using such strategies.
For further information and to order please visit the Palgrave website.
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For a very influential
For a very influential article on the topic of "spoilers," see:
Spoiler Problems in Peace Processes
Stephen John Stedman
International Security, Vol. 22, No. 2 (Autumn, 1997), pp. 5-53
http://fsi.stanford.edu/publications/spoiler_problems_in_peace_processes...
"The wars of the 1990s confirm a basic finding from the study of civil war termination: "peacemaking is a risky business." The greatest source of risk comes from spoilers - leaders and parties who believe that peace emerging from negotiations threatens their power, worldview, and interests, and use violence to undermine attempts to achieve it. When spoilers succeed, the results are catastrophic. But not all spoilers do succeed."
The inclusion of non-state
The inclusion of non-state armed groups in negotiations depends upon the a priori ability to engage those groups in a positive-sum game. The rents from the armed groups engaging in responsible governance must approach the rents from keeping their arms and performing acts of violence. Yet the costs (real or perceived) of violence are low, for the group is already armed & can resort to Machiavellian tactics of the unarmed obeying the armed.
Non-state armed groups have a peculiarly nasty habit of engaging in constructive negotiations and peace-building actions for a time, then turning back to their arms stockpiles and their violent ways when it suits the group's purposes: the behavior of Sadr and the Mahdi Army is a notable example. I am curious what the book says about this phenomenon.