• ARMED CONFLICT: Global Political Violence: Explaining the Post-Cold War Decline • ARMED GROUPS: Indonesia: How GAM Won in Aceh • GENDER: Cote d'Ivoire - Targeting Women: The Forgotten Victims of the Conflict • HEALTH: The Trauma of Ongoing Conflict and Displacement in Chechnya • TERRORISM: Combating Terrorism: The Challenge of Measuring Effectiveness • DEVELOPMENT: Livelihood Creation in Stabilization and Reconstruction Operations • GOVERNANCE: Military Spending and the Risks of Coups d'Etats • HUMAN RIGHTS: State of the World's Minorities 2007 • POST-CONFLICT: The Demobilization and Political Participation of Female Fighters In Guatemala • SMALL ARMS: Armed Conflict and Disarmament: Selected Central African Case Studies • PEACEMAKING: Peacemaking and Mediation: Dynamics of a Changing Field • GOVERNANCE: Mapping and Fighting Corruption in War-Torn States ARMED CONFLICT Global Political Violence: Explaining the Post-Cold War Decline International Peace Academy This paper reviews global trends in political violence since the end of World War II, focusing in particular on the decline in conflict numbers that followed the end of the Cold War. It argues that the single most compelling explanation for this decline is found in the upsurge of peacemaking and peacebuilding activities that started in the early 1990s,was spearheaded by the UN, but also involved many other international agencies, donor governments, and NGOs. The paper also examines trends in war fatalities, which have been declining unevenly since the early 1950s and reviews possible explanations for the change.Trends in civilian deaths from organized political violence—including genocides and terrorism—are also reviewed. After the end of the Cold War, the number of violent conflicts being waged around the world began to decline rapidly, dropping by some 40 percent between 1992 and 2005. This startling change followed nearly four decades of inexorable increase.1 The highest intensity conflicts—those that kill 1,000 or more people a year—declined by 80 percent over the same period. The post-Cold War decline in armed conflicts was part of a broader pattern of reduced political violence that has gone largely unnoticed in the media,much of the policy community, and even parts of the research community. Continue Reading More on Armed Conflict ARMED GROUPS Indonesia: How GAM Won in Aceh International Crisis Group When local elections were held in Aceh on 11 December 2006, conventional wisdom (shared by Crisis Group) was that candidates from the Free Aceh Movement (Gerakan Aceh Merdeka, GAM) would not do well. They might pick up two or three of the nineteen district races, but the biggest prize – the provincial governorship – was almost certainly out of reach. The old Jakarta-linked parties would benefit from deep pockets, established structures and a split in the former insurgency’s leadership. Polls just before formal campaigning began showed GAM’s governor/deputy governor slate – Irwandi Yusuf and Muhammad Nazar – virtually out of contention. But GAM won overwhelmingly, in what an analyst called “a perfect storm between the fallout from the peace accord and the failure of political parties to understand the changing times”. The challenge now is to govern effectively and cleanly in the face of high expectations, possible old elite obstructionism and some GAM members’ sense of entitlement that it is their turn for power and wealth. Continue reading More on Armies, Paramilitaries, Non-State Armed Groups GENDER Cote d'Ivoire - Targeting Women: The Forgotten Victims of the Conflict Amnesty International Hundreds, possibly thousands, of women and girls have been victims of widespread and, at times, systematic rape and sexual assault committed by combatant forces or by civilians with close ties to these forces. The scale of rape and sexual violence in Côte d’Ivoire in the course of the armed conflict has been largely underestimated. Many women have been gang raped or have been abducted and reduced to sexual slavery by fighters. Rape has often been accompanied by the beating or torture (including torture of a sexual nature) of the victim. Rape has been committed in public and in front of family members, including children. Some women have been raped next to the corpses of family members.In the context of the political and military crisis which has divided Côte d’Ivoire since September 2002, leaving the south controlled by the government and the north by an armed opposition group, the New Forces (Forces Nouvelles), national and international human rights provisions are no longer observed. All armed factions have perpetrated and continue to perpetrate sexual violence with impunity. Continue reading More on Gender and Security HEALTH The Trauma of Ongoing Conflict and Displacement in Chechnya Conflict and Health Conflict in Chechnya has resulted in over a decade of violence, human rights abuses, criminality and poverty, and a steady flow of displaced seeking refuge throughout the region. Years of conflict have resulted in severe destruction of health infrastructure. Many doctors have left the country, while those who remain in Chechnya often fear for their personal safety. Lack of experienced medical personnel, especially in remote rural districts, is one of the biggest problems facing Chechnya's health system today. At the beginning of 2004 MSF undertook quantitative surveys among the displaced populations in Chechnya and neighbouring Ingushetia. The results of the study demonstrate that the health needs of internally displaced in both locations are similarly high and equally unaddressed. The high levels of past confrontation with violence and ongoing exposure in both locations is likely to contribute to a further deterioration of the health status of internally displaced. As of March 2007, concerns remain about how the return process is being managed by the authorities. Continue reading More on Health and Security TERRORISM Combating Terrorism: The Challenge of Measuring Effectiveness Congressional Research Service This report is designed to assist congressional policymakers to understand and apply broad based objective criteria when evaluating progress in the nation's efforts to combat terrorism. It is not intended to define specific, in-depth, metrics for measuring progress against terrorism. Measurement of progress, or lack thereof, may be framed in terms of incidents, attitudes and trends. A common pitfall of governments seeking to demonstrate success in anti-terrorist measures is overreliance on quantitative indicators, particularly those which may correlate with progress but not accurately measure it, such as the amount of money spent on anti-terror efforts. As terrorism is a complex multidimensional phenomenon, effective responses to terrorism may need to take into account, and to some degree be individually configured to respond to, the evolving goals, strategies, tactics and operating environment of different terrorist groups. Although terrorism's complex webs of characteristics -- along with the inherent secrecy and compartmentalization of both terrorist organizations and government responses -- limit available data, the formulation of practical, useful measurement criteria appears both tractable and ready to be addressed. Continue reading More on Terrorism DEVELOPMENT Employment Generation and Economic Development in Stabilization and Reconstruction Operations United States Institute of Peace It seems logical that improving the lives of those who have suffered from conflict would include a program to generate economic well-being in the immediate period after hostilities subside. Yet livelihood creation, the root of potential economic success and security, has often become a secondary objective in the transformation from war to peace. An obvious reason for this relegation to a lower priority is that security, humanitarian needs, and restoring the rule of law often overtake the economic development priorities of any peace-building mission. Even in Iraq, the largest stabilization and reconstruction effort undertaken by the U.S. government, restoring livelihoods and getting people back to work remains an unresolved challenge and an unmet agenda. Of the nearly $20 billion of U.S.-appropriated funds to reconstruct Iraq, only $805 million was directed toward jump-starting the private sector. Although employment generation is not a new subject in “postwar” literature, lessons about implementation vary from one country to the next. Current knowledge about “golden hour” job creation, which is creating jobs within one year of the cessation of hostilities, is culled more from specific pilot studies than from a coherent overview of what tools exist and how they can be applied. This report advances current research by providing such an overview for U.S. government policymakers. Continue reading More on Development and Security GOVERNANCE Military Spending and the Risks of Coups d?'Etats Centre for the Study of African Economies The governments of many developing countries face a risk of a coup d?état perpetrated by their own military establishment. The phenomenon is especially acute in Africa. The authors of this article decompose the risk into its component parts: the risk of a plot; the risk that a plot will mature into an attempt; and the risk that an attempt with succeed; and analyze theoretically and empirically the interdependence between these risks and military spending. Since governments can be presumed to want to reduce the risk of a coup, they investigate how they might adjust military spending. They show that although the response might be either to reduce or increase spending, the expected relationship is nonmonotonic, with governments reducing spending until a threshold level of risk is reached above which they increase it. Using both global and Africa-specific data sets we model the interdependence empirically. They find that in countries with low coup risk governments react to it by cutting military spending. However, when coup risk is high, as in Africa, governments respond by increasing spending. An implication is that in these high-risk environments external security protection against coups might reduce military spending. Continue reading More on Governance and Security HUMAN RIGHTS State of the World's Minorities 2007 Minority Rights Group International It is something of a paradox that, in the period from the aftermath of the Cold War to the early years of the ‘war on terror’, the world became, by most objective criteria, much safer. Certainly, the number of conflicts fought around the world has steadily fallen and, the great Congolese war apart, the total number of people who have died in them has decreased too. Each research institute compiles its figures somewhat differently, but most conflict experts recorded 20 or fewer major armed conflicts in 2006, compared to a high of over 30 in 1991. Of course, whether a community feels safe is as much a judgement about the future as an evaluation of the present. Wars as a whole may be less common, but in threequarters of the major armed conflicts around the world in 2006, particular ethnic or religious groups were the principal target. In 2007, minorities have more cause than most to feel unsafe. Continue reading More on Human Rights POST-CONFLICT The Demobilization and Political Participation of Female Fighters In Guatemala International Peace Research Institute, Oslo // Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs This report focuses on how the female fighters of the Unidad Revolucionaria Nacional Guatemalteca (URNG) in Guatemala fared in the demobilization and reintegration process that began in 1997, and to what degree the women became socially and politically active afterwards. The study seeks to explain why there are quite varying levels of post conflict social and political activity among these women in 2006, ten years after the peace accord between the Guatemalan government and the URNG was signed. The report concludes that three types of factors were particularly decisive in shaping the female fighters’ capability and capacity for post conflict social and political activity. The first was the women’s background in terms of education and skills. The second factor was the duration of the participation in the guerrilla and the new skills they learnt during this period. The third was the character of the demobilization and reintegration process itself - in terms of socio-economic assistance, possibilities to acquire new skills, access to family and social networks; assistance to single mothers and mothers with sick or disabled children; and collective reintegration versus individual reintegration. Continue reading More on Peace Operations and Post-Conflict Reconstruction SMALL ARMS Armed Conflict and Disarmament: Selected Central African Case Studies Institute for Security Studies The proliferation and misuse of small arms and light weapons (SALW) continues to undermine development, the safety and security of individuals and states, as well as good governance in Africa. This is acutely apparent in Central Africa, where, since the advent of colonialism, citizens have been suffered varying degrees of armed conflict. This is has resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths, displacement and the loss of property. This monograph considers the nature and extent of armed conflict, the misuse and proliferation of small arms, as well as disarmament processes (or the lack thereof) in three Central African states: the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), the Central African Republic (CAR) and Chad. These three countries are amongst the seven lowest in terms of human development (out of 177 countries), and all have experienced frequent episodes of armed conflict since being granted independence. The central objectives of this publication are to provide an objective analysis of the dynamics of armed conflict, small arms proliferation and misuse, and disarmament in the DRC, CAR and Chad. Continue reading More on Small Arms, Light Weapons and Landmines PEACEMAKING Peacemaking and Mediation: Dynamics of a Changing Field International Peace Academy This paper offers a thorough analysis of the main challenges facing those engaged in conflict resolution today, both normative and practical. These include the challenges of fragile states, normative change, and unpredictable engagement by leading powers, and a sometimes overcrowded field of would-be public and private peacemakers. This analysis points to a growing danger of fragmentation and incoherence in the field, and suggests the need for rationalization through the development of professional standards, a gatekeeping mechanism, burden sharing, and improved training and knowledge management. The UN, it argues, has a significant role to play in many of these areas, and may do so if adequate support is provided by states, both through support for the new Mediation Support Unit, and through more nuanced allocation of peacemaking tasks to the Security Council, UN envoys, and non-UN peacemakers. Continue reading More on Conflict Resolution and Peacemaking GOVERNANCE Mapping and Fighting Corruption in War-Torn States Henry L. Stimson Center In war-torn states, enduring corruption--the abuse of entrusted office for illegitimate private gain--may jeopardize peace, stem economic growth, and lead to the emergence of grievances, both old and new, that could bring a country back to war. When building peace, failing to fight corruption at best renders other efforts less efficient and at worst makes them useless, a fact that the peacebuilding community has begun to recognize and address. This article reviews and consolidates, from the English-language literature on the subject, what the world’s specialists in corruption have to say about how to recognize and fight it in post-conflict circumstances, especially where international peace operations are deployed. Its structured summary or "meta-analysis " of the literature is built around two charts: one that depicts patterns of corruption in post-conflict states and a second that maps and connects the most frequently mentioned steps for dealing with it. The latter closely resembles a comprehensive state-building strategy. Continue reading More on Governance and Security Compiled by Robert Hartfiel Human Security Research is produced by the Human Security Centre at the Liu Institute for Global Issues at UBC. The Human Security Centre produces the annual Human Security Report and is funded by the governments of Canada, Norway, Sweden, Switzerland and the United Kingdom. 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