Crisis response and conflict prevention

Transcription

1 CHAPTER 21: INCREASING POLICY COHERENCE IN CRISIS RESPONSE Summary Five years after the EU adopted its programme on conflict prevention at the Göteborg European Council, it is apparent that the commitments made then have not been implemented in full. A critical factor in this has been the shift in focus towards crisis response, with the EU s foreign policy developing much more in that responsive area, following the raising of the terrorist threat, than in the longer-term efforts of conflict prevention. EU actions in conflict-prone regions of the world need to therefore to be reviewed, taking greater account of the potential role of the EU, and given actions, in preventing conflict. This article was written in May Damien Helly: Saferworld s EU policy and advocacy coordinator, based in Brussels. He has a PhD in political science from Sciences po, Paris. He is former Caucasus Project Director for the International Crisis Group and has worked extensively on EU s external action in the Former Soviet Union and the new neighbourhood. He is the co-author of L Union européenne, acteur international, L Harmattan, 2005 and of various articles on EU s foreign policy and the Caucasus. Introduction Crisis response and conflict prevention address, and are supposed to influence in a complementary fashion, two different phases in the conflict continuum from latent tensions to open violence. Since the adoption of the Göteborg programme in June 2001, conflict prevention has been a key priority for the EU s external action. However, the focus on terrorism after 11 September 2001 as well as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, have demonstrated that preventing conflict, while ensuring one s own security and pursuing strategic interests, are not always easily compatible and may harm political coherence. This article looks at current trends at work in the EU in the field of conflict prevention and crisis response. It first argues that the implementation of the 2001 programme for prevention of violent conflicts has fallen short because of an increasing focus on crisis response. It then states that EU policies should be more systematically conflictsensitive in order to achieve coherence when responding to or preventing conflicts. It concludes on future challenges for crisis response. Long-term conflict prevention is essential Since 2001 crisis response has tended to replace conflict prevention at the top of the EU security agenda. The EU has launched several short-term ESDP operations to react to crises. It has developed new crisis management capacities such as the Rapid Reaction Mechanism. It has created the African Peace Facility to support African responses to local conflicts. This attention paid to crisis response was more than necessary. Yet it has hidden the importance of long-term, pro-active and sustainable commitments to conflict prevention and peacebuilding policies. Contemporary conflicts are recurrent, may be cross-border as well as internal and involve substate stakeholders. Military forces organised for the Cold War alone are unable to prevent such conflicts today. Enhancing the EU s capabilities with battle groups to respond to conflicts does not tackle their root causes nor solve deep political disagreements. Without a coherent foreign policy led by strong political will and vision, the EU will only have the force to respond and manage but not necessarily the power to solve conflicts. Responding to crises may help to cure symptoms in the short term but is in itself a failure of prevention. Five years after Göteborg: commitments need to be better implemented Key 2001 commitments of the Göteborg conflict prevention programme have hardly been implemented, illustrating the EU s lack of coherence. However, it would be unfair to state that the EU has not tried to achieve results and progress in this area. Member States have committed themselves to work on joint preventive strategies in the Council. Saferworld and International Alert have repeatedly offered to successive EU presidencies to work jointly on the drafting of pilot preventive strategies, but in vain. It seems that Member States prefer not to commit themselves to costly engagements that are politically too risky and not always unanimously backed up by its 25 members or national constituencies. Member States were also encouraged to develop national action plans to increase their capabilities for conflict prevention. Some countries (among which the UK, Germany and Sweden) have started to create cross-institutional structures with specific budget lines to address conflict prevention but these remain isolated cases. More dialogue and exchange between Member States about their efforts to comply [ 238 ]

2 with their initial decisions in 2001 remains a challenge. According to the 2001 conflict prevention programme, it is the responsibility of the Council s general secretariat, presidencies and Member States (through COREPER and PSC) to make sure that it is implemented. This should be done through regular reports, reviews and examination, before each presidency, of potential conflict areas. Despite guidelines for coordination between the Commission and Member States, which were quoted in the new Stability Instrument, struggle for legal competences over security activities continues between Member States and the European Commission. The Commission has started to focus on root causes of conflict in development policies and has published a checklist of key indicators of conflict 1. This list has been used by Commission staff in the framework of a three-year exercise on conflict assessment and country conflict analyses and this is planned to be continued. If done well such an initiative will boost the EC s capacities to act as a more conflict-sensitive donor. Our experience in Uganda, where EC staff are already very supportive of conflict-sensitive approaches, shows that further work on how to apply the checklist and how to use it to provide informative conflict analysis that can be linked to programming is still needed 2. Member States have committed themselves to support the UN Programme of Action (UNPoA) on Small Arms. Some progress was made in 2005 and 2006 to mobilise non-eu countries around key principles and to review and improve the full implementation of the UNPoA. This has come despite the failure to adopt an outcome document at the June 2006 Review Conference. However the EU as whole has not yet become a champion of the idea of an international agreement on small arms. Progress was made in 2005 on the idea of an international treaty on arms trade (ATT) but this does not really replace substantive political commitments to fully implement and review the UNPoA. In the same year, an important step was also made when the EU adopted its strategy to combat illicit trafficking and accumulation of SALW 3 and their ammunitions. The implementation of the strategy is monitored regularly and the Council receives progress reports every six months. The Göteborg programme emphasised the need to use crisis management tools for preventive purposes. This has been more and more the case, but because crisis management operations are meant to remain short in time, the key challenge is to link them with longerterm peacebuilding community actions in development, reconstruction or reintegration. The recently created UN Peacebuilding Commission offers the EU a historic opportunity to strengthen EU-UN relations in the field of conflict prevention. It would be beneficial to see the EU specifically supporting the UNPBC preventive and consultative work with relevant civil society organisations in conflict-affected countries. The role of non-state actors (NSAs) in partner countries, mentioned in the Göteborg programme, is still marginal and deserves particular attention from the EU. Ongoing initiatives aiming at linking track I and II diplomacies are without doubt extremely promising. The creation of a new thematic instrument on NSAs for offers new opportunities to channel conflict prevention and peace-building activities through the work of non-state actors in the field of governance, democracy and human rights. Finally, recent support to the African Union and African sub-regional organisations is to be welcomed, but Göteborg commitments to strengthen their preventive capacities are sometimes either not taken up as a priority in budget allocations or not seen as primary by beneficiaries themselves. Despite all efforts to ensure conflict prevention is taken into account in EU s external action, a lot still remains to be done at the political level. First of all, Member States would benefit from a reassessment of the 2001 programme by looking at what they have not managed to implement and at how they could improve their action in conflict prevention and peacebuilding. Second, the tension between conflict prevention/peacebuilding and crisis response must become an incentive for coherent action rather than an obstacle for action. Competition between first and second pillars should similarly enhance political dedication to prevent deadly conflicts rather than slowing down political initiatives. Third, more awareness raising through large-scale training programmes teaching the benefits of conflict prevention is needed in the Member States and in EU institutions. NGOs are under the (maybe unfounded) impression that many diplomats or development experts are still not aware of, or convinced by, conflict prevention s added-value, while studies have already demonstrated that it offers long-term econo- 1 See: Chapter 24 by Guy Banim in this publication. 2 Programming and implementation of the Country Strategy Paper for Uganda: Taking conflict into account, Saferworld Briefing, June Small arms and light weapons (SALW). [ 239 ]

3 mic, political and development benefits 4. This lack of awareness about preventive approaches and their contribution to strategic planning and impact evaluation has too often resulted in the continuation of incoherent external trade, development and security policies. Added value of conflictsensitive approaches Being conflict-sensitive means bearing in mind peace and conflict factors at every stage of the assistance (needs assessment, planning, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation) in conflict-affected areas. This means having a thorough and up-to-date understanding of conflict dynamics and stakeholders and being aware of what to do, or what not to do, to maximise positive impact on peacebuilding and minimise spoiling actions. A good effort at conflict sensitivity will involve impartiality, inclusion, participatory processes, transparency, respect, partnership and an acceptance of uncertainty and limitations 5. As a major donor and a new security actor, the EU has a strong impact on conflicts. To remain credible worldwide and in conflict-affected areas it is key that the EU keeps being seen as a constructive actor and fair peacebuilder. This is possible if its development assistance and crisis response remain conflict sensitive. Conflict sensitivity is a well-known, deeply discussed and constantly reviewed approach by peace-building NGOS 6, peacekeeping international organisations and many donors, including the EC. Unfortunately it seems EU policy-makers and practitioners in Brussels and in the Commission s delegations have not yet really appropriated it. The challenge therefore is to put it into practice more systematically. More generally, despite the existence of the European Security strategy and the 2001 programme for conflict prevention, NGOs are convinced that the EU still needs to use more country-based knowledge to better inform its own conflict-sensitive approaches of crisis response 8. Because of chronic instability in many areas, Country Strategy Papers sometimes need to be complemented by more detailed and frequent monitoring at national, and local levels. This work should also include, in volatile contexts, contingency planning exercises in order to adjust EU assistance to changing circumstances. Coherence of EU external instruments and policies, identified as one of the main challenges for a common external action, has been further blurred and complicated by the emergence of ESDP as a new set of instruments, procedures and actors like Ministries of Defence, PSC, EUMC and EUMS. Mainstreaming conflict prevention in the political, development, trade and humanitarian DGs Saferworld s conflict sensitivity projects in Northern Uganda 7 In Northern Uganda, Saferworld has conducted conflict-sensitive work to assess the impact of ongoing assistance from the Swedish Development Agency. This work has led to a number of preventive recommendations to the donor about how to avoid increasing tensions and to contribute to peacebuilding. In a project aimed at bringing electricity to rural settings, one of the recommendations was that local people should be employed. Not only would they benefit directly from the project but potential rivalry from other communities could be avoided. On a shea nut exporting project supported by SIDA, recommendations consisted of taking measures to improve the safety of the women employed to gather the nuts. Following the first report, further conflict monitoring and consultation workshops were organised with local communities to ensure aid projects continued to match volatile local conflict dynamics. 4 Chalmers, M., (April2005), Spending to Save. Is Conflict-Prevention Cost-effective? CICS Working paper. In (March 2005), Larger Freedom, Report of the UN Secretary General. 5 Zainab Hawa Bangura, Conflict Sensitive Approaches to Development (the case of Sierra Leone), Keynote address for the CMI 2005 Annual Autumn Seminar, 22 November On contemporary debates about conflict sensitivity: Paffenholz, T., Peace and Conflict Sensitivity in International Cooperation: An Introductory Overview, Internationale Politik und Gesellschaft 4/2005. Berghof Research Center s papers on Peace and Conflict Impact Assessment (PCIA). On PCIA and similar concepts, see: Bush, K., (2005), Fighting Commodification and Disempowerment in the Development Industry, Barbolet, A., Goldwyn, R., Groenewald, H. and Sherriff, A., (2005), The utility and dilemmas of conflict sensitivity. See also Saferworld and International Alert website: 7 Saferworld, (February 2005), Study to Explore the Impact of a Rural Electrification Project on the Peace and Conflict Dynamics in Uganda. (December 2005), Conflict and peace analysis report for the Northern Uganda Shea Nut Project in Otuke country of Lira district. 8 Wallace, W., (March 2005), Is there a European Approach to War?, European Foreign Policy Unit Working Paper 2005/2, LSE. [ 240 ]

4 or structures has never been easy. The task has become even more difficult after the birth of a European defence policy focussing on crisis response and management. The development of rapid reaction capacities and operations has had an ambiguous impact on the image, role and identity of the EU as a central conflict prevention advocate 9. By taking more risks, the EU has started to intervene on complex contexts (like, for instance, in Iraq, in Moldova/Transdniestria or in the Democratic Republic of Congo) where its firm policy lines may have dissatisfied peace spoilers and their constituencies. Indeed, more direct engagement in conflicts has resulted in more partiality thus making it increasingly difficult for EU non-military conflict prevention tools (humanitarian, development, trade, political and even civilian crisis management) to be perceived as conflict sensitive and politically neutral. The actual purpose of the Conflict Prevention Network funded by the European Commission is to support more early warning but also more consultation and dialogue on conflict prevention-related issues relying on participatory approaches. Such approaches would involve local communities and governments, non-state actors in beneficiary countries as well as international NGOs and think tanks. Conclusions: challenges for crisis response The EU s ambitions to prevent and respond to conflicts are still constrained by four main challenges. The first one is to agree on a human security doctrine 10, which will include a review and update of the 2001 conflict prevention programme. On the basis of threats identified by the EU Security Strategy ESDP framework documents have been flourishing and are setting EU crisis response priorities in the coming years. The Commission has repeatedly emphasised the need for a human security approach in numerous speeches and spends considerable amounts in this field 11. In-depth discussions on a human security approach and operational implications for the EU are currently on going. It is to be hoped that they will lead to the adoption of an EU human security strategy or doctrine that would gather the substance of existing constructive EU commitments to conflict prevention and peacebuilding mentioned in various documents. Such a strategy would help the EU to strike a balance between short-term crisis response and longer-term conflict prevention 12 by adopting key guidelines for applying conflict sensitivity more systematically and by legitimising a large-scale role for civilian experts working in the field of conflict prevention, crisis response, humanitarian aid, reconstruction, peace-building and reconciliation. Strengthening the professionalisation of peace-building functions at the level of the EU would also help Brussels institutions to mirror the recently created UN Peace-building Commission. The EC has already started to work on its contribution to the UNPBC. In the near future Member States and Brussels institutions will need to broaden and strengthen the existing network of actors working on crisis response by including more and more conflict prevention and peacebuilding government and non-government experts on conflict prevention and peacebuilding. A second challenge is to raise awareness about conflict sensitivity to ensure coherence, credibility and legitimacy. There is a need to mainstream conflict sensitivity in all instruments and policies for external action. This will have to be reflected in the adoption of conflict-sensitive approaches in trade, development, external relations and humanitarian policies as well as in programme and project management. More staff need to be trained and hired to work on conflict sensitivity in the Commission and in its delegations although this is subject to budgetary constraints imposed by Member States. In the current zero growth scenario, one way forward is definitely to mobilise external expertise in order to strengthen EC delegations staff capacities to adopt more conflict-sensitive working methods. Regular coordination with other donors on conflictsensitive approaches to development needs to become a habit in all EC Delegations to raise awareness and build capacities to appropriate and reproduce conflict-sensitive practices in the EU institutions 13. Thirdly, the EU s global reach must be balanced by democratic oversight. Peace, conflict prevention and conflict response are too important to be monopolised by track I 9 In line with the fundamental values of the EU, the highest political priority will be given to improving the effectiveness and coherence of its external action in the field of conflict prevention, thereby also enhancing the preventive capabilities of the international community at large. EU programme for the prevention of violent conflicts, An EU Human security doctrine, Report to Javier Solana, Barcelona, See Commissioner Ferrero-Walder s and the Directorate-General for External Relations webpages, 12 These linkages are deeply analysed in the two EC communications on Linking Relief, Rehabilitation and Development (LRRD), COM (1996)153 final of , COM 2001 (153) final of See also Contribution by EU High Representative Javier Solana to the EU Strategy for Africa, 21 November 2005, Council Doc. S377/05. For sustainable ESDP missions, civil and military initiatives need to be better linked to the EU s longer term conflict prevention and development programs and vice-versa. We should develop integrated military and civilian [security sector reform] teams, including the full spectrum of necessary competencies. 13 Schmelze, B., (2005), New Trends in Peace and Conflict Impact Assessment (PCIA), Bergholf Research Center. [ 241 ]

5 diplomacy. Initiatives such as the Conflict Prevention Network/Partnership are promising measures to include NGOs and think tanks in the debates. Participation and consultation with local communities, as a part of EU agreements with third countries are to feed into EU policies and programmes comprising conflict prevention and crisis response dimensions. The European Parliament and national parliaments have a role to play here because of their competences over budget allocations. NGOs consider that, as long as this does not affect their rapidity and efficiency, crisis response bodies should remain under the scrutiny of the European Parliament and (indirectly) national parliaments to ensure proper accountability with regard to European citizens. Parliamentary structures are usually backed by a broad range of skilled and professional security, peacebuilding as well as conflict prevention civil society organisations and networks. In the short term, the first test for progress on mainstreaming conflict sensitive approaches to development has been to define the scope of the Commission s external financial instruments and to set conflict sensitivity as a priority. This has been achieved in part with the Stability Instrument that will mainly focus on crisis response. Other instruments will also need to incorporate explicit language on conflict prevention especially to back up large programmes that have peacebuilding components and that need to be adopted in the Council s working groups. Appropriate allocation of resources will then be required to fit political ambitions. With the 2005 stalemate on the European Constitution, Brussels institutions are still very much embedded in bureaucratic and legal infighting over competences in the conflict and (human) security field. Conflict prevention NGOs fear that this situation will remain until a strong presidency, in the appropriate political context, dares to re-launch fundamental constitutional debates and re-open the possibility to create a Common European External Service. Five years after the adoption of the Göteborg programme on conflict prevention, efforts led at that time by late Ana Lindh should not be forgotten and left aside. To keep it alive it would be good that future presidencies review it to fit new realities such as the linkage between conflict prevention, crisis response and conflict-sensitivity, the increasing importance of Security Sector Reform approaches and the role of civilian actors in the EU and in beneficiary countries to apply appropriate democratic control. [ 242 ]