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For many scholars and diplomats, nation-building and peacekeeping seem to be inextricably linked. Moreover, the Secretary-General’s 1999 Report on the work of the UN speaks of the need for ‘multidimensional peacekeeping operations’. This in itself seems to demonstrate a need for a new definition or a new objective for the conventional work of peacekeeping. Therefore, the question thus becomes: how did nation-building come about and what are we looking forward to in the peacekeeping dimension?
One has to bear in mind that in the peacekeeping epoch, nation-building has become synonymous with peace-building. “Following a long period of relatively simple operations, we had a period of assertive multilateralism from about 1998 onwards, where more complex operations in places like Namibia, El Salvador, and Cambodia saw peacekeepers engaging in what would come to be called ‘peace-builing’.”4 In this sense, “peace can not be kept without recovery, basic infrastructure, government services, and social and economic improvement (and all of which can contribute in the longer run to institution-building, democratization, human rights and reconciliation)…”5 and it involves “tasks such as disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of former combatants, resettlement of refugees, police training and supervision, election monitoring and other transitional administrative tasks.”6
In 1999 the Security Council issued mandates for a “comprehensive peace-building operation that would include a military component but where the focus would be primarily on major civilian elements of post-conflict recovery, such as rehabilitation, reconstruction and good governance in both Kosovo and East Timor.”7 However, this is not the first time the Security Council has issued a mandate for peacekeeping missions that included peace-building activities. Other peacekeeping missions have entailed tasks such as electoral assistance in Cambodia and peace efforts in Burundi, Tajikistan, Liberia and Guinea-Bissau, to name a few. Chapter VII operations in Somalia, Bosnia, and the genocidal calamity in Rwanda have all made the approach to peace-building a much more difficult one.
Nation-building or peace-building has become more comparable to development in the peacekeeping era. Mr. Omar Bakhet, Director of the UNDP Emergency Response Division, notes that development has been associated with peace-building in the sense that it takes place in or after a conflict with the additional purpose of fostering an environment secure enough to allow for the exit of foreign troops or other organizations. He furthers notes that this associations fails to take into account the metaphysical aspects of peace-building - that while development focuses on poverty eradication, environment protection and social development, peace building is more concerned with the healing of human relations within a target community.
When dealing with the concept of nation-building, certain issues surface. For many of the nations that contribute troops, the issue of peacekeepers going into a situation they’re not trained for is indeed alarming. GOP presidential nominee George Bush, during the presidential debates, openly stated that American troops are trained to go to war and win, not to go and build nations or engage in nation-building. However, it seems that George Bush undermines the special responsibility that lies within the American civil society. Enduring peace requires a strong, viable, and assertive civil society – a society, which widens democratic space and facilitates opportunities for citizens to participate in the political realm. Indeed this special responsibility is what is needed from all peoples for supporting and building constituencies for peace-building activities.
Former Secretary-General Boutros Boutros Ghali noted in his ‘An Agenda for Peace’ that there can be no peace without economic and social development. He draws a connection between developmental activities and peacekeeping. It a fundamental belief that peacekeeping can not occur without there being peace to keep and peace can not exist without the political, social and economic vivacity of the people and the state. Thus, the United Nations and other international and regional organizations should engage in nation-building and peace-building activities in addition to peacekeeping. After all, nowhere in the charter can one find a provision for peacekeeping responsibility placed on the member-states; thus peace-building can be adopted just as peacekeeping has. Some believe that nation-building or peace-building holds more value than peacekeeping. Many scholars have placed the blame on the developed world, many of whom are the colonial powers. Imperialism has placed much of the developing world in a state of economic instability. It is argued that if responsible colonial powers put more effort into conflict management, prevention, and other such things, they would be laying the foundation for a fruitful society. Therefore is peace-building a possible solution to peacekeeping?
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Ahmad Rashady
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Nice! Yambwa, Nziya Jean-Pierre | Jun 17th, 2004
A very comprehensive explanation on peacebuilding and peacekeeping. Well detailed and useful for peacebuilders
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