Africa: Understanding and Managing Violent Conflicts

Africa Today, 2000

The continent of Africa has been highly susceptible to intra and inter-state wars and conflicts. This has prompted the insinuation that Africa is the home of wars and instability. Most pathetic about these conflagrations is that they have defied any meaningful solution and their negative impacts have retarded growth and development in Africa while an end to them seems obscure. What then are the causes of these unending wars in Africa? How far have they weakened cohesion, unity and the potential development of the African continent? What can we do to overcome this monster? Answers to these questions form the bone of contention of this paper.

African Research Review, 2011

The continent of Africa has been highly susceptible to intra and interstate wars and conflicts. This has prompted the insinuation that Africa is the home of wars and instability. Most pathetic about these conflagrations is that they have defied any meaningful solution and their negative impacts have retarded growth and development in Africa while an end to them seems obscure. What then are the causes of these unending wars in Africa? How far have they weakened cohesion, unity and the potential development of the African continent? What can we do to overcome this monster? Answers to these questions form the bone of contention of this paper.

Is Violence Inevitable in Africa? Theories of Conflict and Approaches to Conflict Prevention, 2005

This volume is an attempt to analyse the causes of conflict in Africa, to review the various approaches to conflict prevention or conflict resolution and to discuss some of the practical difficulties in ending violence. It brings together a wide range of scholars and practitioners, with specialist knowledge of a large number of African countries. The study of conflict and conflict resolution has, over the years, resulted in the publication of a large volume of material, extending from NGO reports to theories of war. As a result, books on the subject often lack a clear focus. For this reason, the editors have been careful to ask the contributors to address the question in a way that would ensure not just that the chapters were complementary but that the book as a whole should be coherent. The intention here is to provide, within a single volume, a survey of the various approaches to conflict in Africa, a systematic discussion of some of the root causes of violence, as well as case studies on the consequences of violence and the effects of conflict resolution. The book is in four parts. The Introduction develops a political analysis of violence in Africa. Part I discusses a variety of theories of conflict and outlines the main approaches to conflict resolution. Part II presents case studies of conflict management and resolution. The Conclusion reviews the literature and offers an original way forward.

Since the independence processes in the African continent, armed conflicts, peace and security have raised concern and attention both at the domestic level and at the international scale. In recent years, all aspects have undergone significant changes which have given rise to intense debate. The end of some historical conflicts has taken place in a context of slight decrease in the number of armed conflicts and the consolidation of post-conflict reconstruction processes. Moreover, African regional organizations have staged an increasingly more active internal shift in matters related to peace and security, encouraged by the idea of promoting “African solutions to African problems”. This new scenario, has been accompanied by new uncertainties at the security level and major challenges at the operational level, especially for the African Union. This article aims to ascertain the state of affairs on all these issues and raise some key questions to consider.

International Peacekeeping, 1998

Journal of Contemporary African Studies, 2002

Africa is in a deep and persistent malaise. It is by far the least developed continent economically, and the most conflict-prone politically. In policy-making circles and media characterisations, it is "the hopeless continent" (The Economist May 13-19, 2000). Such pessimism is driven in part by the failure to manage-much less resolve-the destructive consequences of multiple violent conflicts. The ineffectiveness of conflict management efforts by the United Nations, the OAU, sub-regional organisations, or eminent personalities like Nelson Mandela or Jimmy Carter, is itself due in large part to the lack of a conceptual framework for analysing internal turmoil. Without an appropriate diagnosis of the causes of conflict, remedial action becomes a futile, if not dangerous exercise. This article seeks to articulate in preliminary form a framework for understanding and diagnosing the causes of Africa"s multiple internal conflicts. It suggests that these are rooted in the everyday politics and discourses of weak states, rather than in outbreaks of ancient hatreds, the pathology of particular rulers, or the breakdown of normally peaceful domestic systems; and argues that the direction of effective conflict resolution lies in reconfiguring local politics and reconstructing the malformed African state rather than in the "saving failed states" approaches of recent years.

2010

Violent conflict in sub-Saharan Africa has been responsible for the direct and indirect deaths of millions of civilians and has contributed significantly to the low levels of human security in the region. The countries of sub-Saharan Africa that have been embroiled in violent conflict are characterised by abject poverty, inadequate service provision, political instability, retarded economic growth and other challenges to overall development that deter the enhancement of human security. The successful and sustainable resolution of these conflicts represents an enormous barrier to future prosperity in the region. Moreover, the post-conflict reconstruction of these countries, and those around them, symbolises perhaps the greatest challenge for sub-Saharan Africa. To design and develop successful policy responses and to learn from previous initiatives, it is thus necessary to fully comprehend the concept of conflict and its context.

2015

Pamela has written and co-authored a number of articles and books, including the Guide to IGOs, NGOs and the Military in Peace and Relief Operations (USIP, 2000). With Chester A. Crocker and Fen Osler Hampson, she has written and edited a series of books on international conflict management published by USIP including most recently, Managing Conflict in a World Adrift (2015) also published by CIGI, Leashing the Dogs of War: Conflict Management in a Divided World (2007); Taming Intractable Conflicts: Mediation in the Hardest Cases (2004); and Rewiring Regional Security in a Fragmented World (2011). They are also series editors for the Routledge Studies in Security and Conflict Management.

The contributions to this volume have sought to reflect on the complex discourse on violent conflict and conflict prevention in sub-Saharan Africa has developed since the early 1990s. This discourse deals with at least two separate, but closely interconnected questions.