Civilian Contribution to Multidimensional Peace Operations in Africa

Abstract

Conflict is one major challenge confronting mankind and since 1960, the UN has carried the burden of force deployment to save humankind, restore peace and bring development through peacekeeping a typical military approach. Research and experience over the years have shown changing nature of conflict and therefore requiring a different response. Newer strategies employed are a multidimensional approach to peace operations. This phenomenon is an evolved peacekeeping that now combines efforts of the military, police, and civilian experts in conflict management, transforming from military-led to civilian-led multidimensional missions with their qualitative role exponentially increasing. The actual relevance of civilian actors in multidimensional peace operations, the agency notwithstanding, seems disregarded to systematically record and document civilian achievements. A scholarly search for literature shows a lot more works on uniformed actors. Even liberal authors and contemporary works lump civilian and military contributions together, creating a yawning gap in the literature on the civilian component in peace operations. The burden of this thesis is to explore and establish civilian contribution and influence on peacekeeping operations in Africa, focusing specifically on UNMISS and AMISOM now ATMIS at the global and continental levels. The study is underpinned by Kant’s liberal peace theory which is the bane of peace operations and the functional theory which encourages the strength of different parts in making the whole successful. A desk review, a designed survey questionnaire and an interview guide with the UN/AU mission success indicators informed the methodology used to gather data which resulted in the fact that the majority of the mission milestone was made possible by the civilians, especially through the leadership, civil affairs, political affairs, coordination unit, human rights, and protection units as well as the integrated training cell. Major impact-driven projects and interventions through humanitarian, health, education, judiciary, and capacity enhancement in Somalia and South Sudan cannot be over-emphasized. This study has succeeded in contributing to the existing literature on peace operations by accounting for the contributions of the civilians which is the ultimate study objective, as restoring calm to the communities through monitoring and reporting human rights violations, crime control through police and judiciary capacitation, improved health through building and equipping medical Centers, reducing youth vandalism through increased education, improving the socio-economic situation and boosting investor confidence through effective economic measures, in the case of Somalia returning the administration from Nairobi to Mogadishu, improving elections, and building the capacities of State institutions and relevant officials to take over the country governance when the mission exits. The afore civilian achievements prove that the civilian component provides the social vehicle and ingredients for peace operations in Africa and their absence will render the missions unsuccessful. The use of liberal peace theory is challenged as absolute peace is not gained neither in Somalia or South Sudan. Part of the reasons coming from the inherent weakness of the liberal pace theory which favors external interventions to local intervention challenges the holistic achievement of the Functionalist theory due to coordination issues among the actors. The study provides an opportunity for the peace UN, AU, and RECs/RMs to justify the cost of including civilians in the theatre and suggests alternative research areas to academia while suggesting international job opportunities as an alternative to the unemployed graduates. Further research could consider (i) Specific civilian achievements in a mission (ii) the importance of having the civilian component in multidimensional peace operations (iii) Civil-military joint achievements in multidimensional peace operations (iv) multidimensional peace operations make the needed impact. And (v) Is the cost of having a civilian component in multidimensional peace operations worth it?