CONFLICT AND CONFLICT RESOLUTION
AP Photo
November 20, 2009
"Reconciliation Means Never Having to Say You're Sorry"
Op-Ed, The Huffington Post
By Yvonne Malan, Research Fellow, International Security Program/Intrastate Conflict Program
"The world loved the Rainbow Nation success story and chose, along with many South Africans, to ignore that reconciliation can easily be used to justify impunity. Jansen's description of the Reitz Four, that they too are his children and that he cannot disown them, echoes the mythology of the TRC that perpetrators were sinners who strayed and need to be forgiven (and granted amnesty), not as individuals who broke the law and need to be held accountable. Any serious discussion about rights and responsibility is quickly marginalised, with dangerous implications for any attempts to foster a respect for human rights and a respect for the rule of law."
September 19, 2009
"The US Must Help Rebuild Somalia"
Op-Ed, Boston Globe
By Robert Rotberg, Director, Program on Intrastate Conflict and Conflict Resolution
This week's US raid in Somalia that killed Al Qaeda operatives removed dangers to the United States and its allies, but did little to bring progress to one of the least governed places in the world.
AP Photo
July/August 2009
"Disorder in the Ranks"
Magazine or Newspaper Article, Foreign Policy
By Robert Rotberg, Director, Program on Intrastate Conflict and Conflict Resolution
The label "failed" remains a powerful way to describe those states that no longer serve their people. That harsh term sharpens the attention of policymakers and helps single out countries that should be of utmost concern. The threat of such state failure also focuses attention on the soon-to-crumble; it is those countries that need the most external help.
AP Photo
June 2009
"Empowerment Boom or Bust? Assessing Women's Post-Conflict Empowerment Initiatives"
Journal Article, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, issue 2, volume 22
By Megan Mackenzie, Former Research Fellow, International Security Program/Women in Public Policy Program, 2008-2009
Over the past decade, the term 'empowerment' has been generously employed and woefully ill-defined. In particular, women's empowerment has been embraced by such a vast number of development actors that it appears to be a unifying mission within development. Despite the boom in women's empowerment initiatives, there remains little critical analysis of the use of empowerment in general, and the perceived success or failures of specific empowerment initiatives. Using the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration process in Sierra Leone as a case study, this paper examines how reintegration was described as a source of empowerment for women. Drawing from interviews and analysis of related policy discourses, it is argued that, rather than representing a radical shift in development approaches towards more inclusive and representative policies, empowerment projects are shaped by neoliberal ideas such as individualism, responsibility and economic order and carry implicit, gendered and disciplining messages about appropriate social behaviour.
AP Photo
June 13, 2009
"The False Unity in Zimbabwe"
Op-Ed, Boston Globe
By Robert Rotberg, Director, Program on Intrastate Conflict and Conflict Resolution
Prime Minister Morgan Tsvangirai of Zimbabwe, who visited President Obama yesterday, needs all the American support he can get. Although the head of government of an impoverished and beleaguered nation battered by a decade of severe mismanagement and corruption, Tsvangirai is hardly in charge. President Robert Mugabe is still calling too many of the crucial governing shots.
AP Photo
April 2009
"Securitization and Desecuritization: Female Soldiers and the Reconstruction of Women in Post-Conflict Sierra Leone"
Journal Article, Security Studies, issue 2, volume 18
By Megan Mackenzie, Former Research Fellow, International Security Program/Women in Public Policy Program, 2008-2009
This article focuses on the construction of "soldier" and "victim" by post-conflict programs in Sierra Leone. Focusing on the absence of individual testimonies and interviews that inform representations of women and girls post-conflict, this article demonstrates that the ideal of the female war victim has limited the ways in which female combatants are addressed by disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR) programs in Sierra Leone. It is argued that titles given to female soldiers such as "females associated with the war," "dependents," or "camp followers" reveal the reluctance of reintegration agencies to identify females who participated in war as soldiers. In addition, I argue that men and masculinity are securitized post-conflict while women—even when they act in highly securitized roles such as soldiers—are desecuritized and, in effect, de-emphasized in post-conflict policy making. The impact of this categorization has been that the reintegration process for men has been securitized, or emphasized as an essential element of the transition from war to peace. In contrast, the reintegration process for females has been deemed a social concern and has been moralized as a return to normal.
Photo by Michael Casey
April 8, 2009
"Frazer offers lessons on transformative U.S.-Africa policy"
News
By Beth Maclin, Communications Assistant
Former Assistant Secretary of State for African Affairs Jendayi Frazer gave a public address," Solutions: A Transformative U.S.-Africa Policy," at Harvard Kennedy School's John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum on April 7, 2009. Belfer Center Director Graham Allison moderated the event.
Spring/Summer 2009
"Governance and Leadership in Africa: Measures, Methods, and Results"
Journal Article, International Affairs
By Robert Rotberg, Director, Program on Intrastate Conflict and Conflict Resolution
Governance is performance-the delivery of high quality political goods to citizens by governments of all kinds. In Africa, as everywhere else, those political goods are security and safety, rule of law, participation and human rights, sustainable economic opportunity and human development. The Ibrahim Index of African Governance, created at Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, evaluates forty-eight sub-Saharan African countries according to fifty-seven variables.
AP Photo
April 2009
"Nasty, Brutish and Long"
Magazine or Newspaper Article, Prospect, issue 157
By Monica Duffy Toft, Associate Professor of Public Policy
It’s a busy time for civil wars. The Sri Lankan army has pushed far into Tamil territory, seeking a decisive victory. The killings in Northern Ireland show how spoilers try to gain advantage over rivals in any political process. Then there is the threat that recently pacified civil wars, such as those in Iraq and Sudan, will come back, while the global recession may push new ones forward.
AP Photo
March 26, 2009
"China's Grand Bargain"
Op-Ed, Boston Globe
By Robert Rotberg, Director, Program on Intrastate Conflict and Conflict Resolution
AS THE G20 group of nations prepares to meet next week to discuss the world economy, a grand bargain with geostrategic significance is implicitly being crafted between Washington and Beijing. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton hinted as much when she said in February that the United States would not hammer China about its human rights violations.
