Peacekeeping, peace enforcement and ‘stability operations’ ask soldiers to use violence to create peace, defeat armed threats while having no enemies and uphold human rights without taking sides. The ...challenges that face peacekeepers cannot be easily reduced to traditional just war principles. Built on insights from care ethics, case studies including Darfur, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti and Liberia and scores of interviews with peacekeepers, trainers and planners in the field in Africa, India and more, Daniel H. Levine sheds light on the challenges of peacekeeping. And he asserts that the traditional ‘holy trinity’ of peacekeeping principles – consent, impartiality, and minimum use of force – still provide the best moral guide for peacekeepers.
The concept of UN peacekeeping has had to evolve and change to meet the challenges of contemporary sources of conflict; consequently, peacekeeping operations have grown rapidly in number and ...complexity. This book examines a number of issues associated with contemporary multinational peace operations, and seeks to provide insights into the problems that arise in establishing and deploying such forces to meet the challenges of current conflicts. The focus of the book is three case studies (Lebanon, Somalia and Kosovo), involving a comparative analysis of the traditional peacekeeping in Lebanon, the more robust peace enforcement mission in Somalia, and the international administration undertaken on behalf of the international community in Kosovo. The book analyses the lessons that may be learned from these operations in terms of mandates, command and control, use of force and the relevance of international humanitarian and human rights law to such operations.
As of September 2017, the United Nations alone deployed 110, 000 uniformed personnel from 122 countries in fifteen peacekeeping operations worldwide. Soldiers in these missions are important actors ...who not only have considerable responsibility for implementing peace and stability operations but also have a concomitant influence on their goals and impact. Yet we know surprisingly little about the factors that prompt soldiers' behavior. Despite being deployed on the same mission under similar conditions, various national contingents display significant, systematic differences in their actions on the ground.In Military Cultures in Peace and Stability Operations, Chiara Ruffa challenges the widely held assumption that military contingents, regardless of their origins, implement mandates in a similar manner. She argues instead that military culture—the set of attitudes, values, and beliefs instilled into an army and transmitted across generations of those in uniform —influences how soldiers behave at the tactical level. When soldiers are abroad, they are usually deployed as units, and when a military unit deploys, its military culture goes with it. By investigating where military culture comes from, Ruffa demonstrates why military units conduct themselves the way they do.Between 2007 and 2014, Ruffa was embedded in French and Italian units deployed under comparable circumstances in two different kinds of peace and stability operations: the United Nations Interim Force in Lebanon and the NATO mission in Afghanistan. Based on hundreds of interviews, she finds that while French units prioritized patrolling and the display of high levels of protection and force—such as body armor and weaponry—Italian units placed greater emphasis on delivering humanitarian aid. She concludes that civil- military relations and societal beliefs about the use of force in the units' home country have an impact on the military culture overseas, soldiers' perceptions and behavior, and, ultimately, consequences for their ability to keep the peace.
In Sexual Exploitation and Abuse by UN Military Contingents: Moving Beyond the Current Status Quo and Responsibility under International law Róisín Burke explores the difficulty of dealing with ...sexual offences committed by UN military contingent personnel.
Do States, through their military forces, have legal obligations under human rights treaties towards the local civilian population during UN-mandated peace operations? It is frequently claimed that ...it is unrealistic to require compliance with human rights treaties in peace operations and this has led to an unwillingness to hold States accountable for human rights violations. In this book, Kjetil Larsen criticises this position by addressing the arguments against the applicability of human rights treaties and demonstrating that compliance with the treaties is unrealistic only if one takes an 'all or nothing' approach to them. He outlines a coherent and more flexible approach which distinguishes clearly between positive and negative obligations and makes treaty compliance more realistic. His proposals for the application of human rights treaties would also strengthen the legal framework for human rights protection in peace operations without posing any unrealistic obligations on the military forces.
Peacekeeping operations are considered one of the main tools for negotiating conflicts and are used by the international community to renew and keep international peace and security. The practice of ...peacekeeping activities has faced fundamental changes that have influenced its aims and principles. That is why the effectiveness of modern peacekeeping operations and operations for peace maintenance, as an answer to global challenges, need further assessment and explanations. The article aims to 1) characterise peacekeeping activities and principles and assess their effectiveness; 2) determine the main problems in the function of peacekeeping mechanisms; identify optimal methods for the future peacekeeping operations of the UN and NATO.
This study proposes a complex systematisation of present approaches, assessing the effectiveness of both peacekeeping operations and operations for the maintenance of peace. The key goal is to develop optimal scenarios for peacekeeping missions.
The practical importance of the research is the frameworks and conclusions that can be used as methodical recommendations in the work of international organisations that regulate peacekeeping activities.
You, The People Chesterman, Simon
2005, 2004-03-18, 20040101
eBook
Transitional administrations represent the most complex operations attempted by the United Nations. The missions in Kosovo (1999—) and East Timor (1999–2002) are commonly seen as unique in the ...history of the United Nations. But they may also be seen as the latest in a series of operations that have involved the United Nations in ‘state‐building’ activities, in which it has attempted to develop the institutions of government by assuming some or all of those sovereign powers on a temporary basis. Viewed in light of earlier UN operations, such as those in Namibia (1989–1990), Cambodia (1992–1993), and Eastern Slavonia (1996–1998), the idea that these exceptional circumstances may not recur is somewhat disingenuous. The need for policy research in this area was brought into sharp focus by the weighty but vague responsibilities assigned to the United Nations in Afghanistan (2002—) and its contested role in Iraq (2003—).This book seeks to fill that gap. Aimed at policy‐makers, diplomats, and a wide academic audience (including international relations, political science, international law, war studies, and development studies), the book provides a concise history of transitional administration and a treatment of the five key issues confronting such operations: peace and security, the role of the United Nations as government, establishing the rule of law, economic reconstruction, and exit strategies. Research for the book has been conducted through extensive field research and interviews with key UN staff and local representatives in almost all of the territories under consideration. The unifying theme is that, while the ends of transitional administration may be idealistic, the means cannot be.
Does United Nations peacekeeping protect civilians in civil war? Civilian protection is a primary purpose of UN peacekeeping, yet there is little systematic evidence for whether peacekeeping prevents ...civilian deaths. We propose that UN peacekeeping can protect civilians if missions are adequately composed of military troops and police in large numbers. Using unique monthly data on the number and type of UN personnel contributed to peacekeeping operations, along with monthly data on civilian deaths from 1991 to 2008 in armed conflicts in Africa, we find that as the UN commits more military and police forces to a peacekeeping mission, fewer civilians are targeted with violence. The effect is substantial—the analyses show that, on average, deploying several thousand troops and several hundred police dramatically reduces civilian killings. We conclude that although the UN is often criticized for its failures, UN peacekeeping is an effective mechanism of civilian protection.
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Making War and Building Peace examines how well United Nations peacekeeping missions work after civil war. Statistically analyzing all civil wars since 1945, the book compares peace processes that ...had UN involvement to those that didn't. Michael Doyle and Nicholas Sambanis argue that each mission must be designed to fit the conflict, with the right authority and adequate resources. UN missions can be effective by supporting new actors committed to the peace, building governing institutions, and monitoring and policing implementation of peace settlements.
