Rebuilding States and Societies After War

Rebuilding States and Societies after War International Studies 601 Spring 2015 Tuesdays 2:25-4:25 pm, L173 Education

Professor Scott Straus [email protected] Office Hours: Thursdays 1:15-3 pm, 224 North Hall

Overview This class focuses on an old problem but one that has received new international attention: how to rebuild states and societies after war, in particular after civil war. Since the early 1990s, the predominant form of warfare across the globe has been civil war in which two or more armed groups fight each other for territorial control in an internationally recognized state. Whereas global powers often have neglected such “small wars,” the importance of these conflicts has increased significantly since the end of the Cold War. This is the case for two main reasons. The first is international security. One of the most visible contemporary threats is global terrorism. For the past two decades, global terrorist organizations have based themselves most commonly in countries with ongoing civil wars. The second is greater emphasis on cross-border humanitarianism. Civilian actors around the world have demonstrated renewed interest in the suffering of those harmed through war, human rights violations, and poverty. With the end of the Cold War, the United Nations faced an opportunity to fulfill one of its core mandates, which concerns the wellbeing of all people everywhere. These two broad trends have coalesced in a number of policy domains, from conflict prevention, to economic development, to peacekeeping. This course focuses on one of those key domains, namely, building peace in countries that have experienced armed conflict and, often, significant human rights abuse.

To date, policy initiatives have dominated debate about how to rebuild states and societies after civil war. Moreover, policy typically revolves around a standard set of prescriptions: peacekeeping, democratization, economic liberalization, infrastructural investment, demobilization, and some mechanism of accountability for past crimes. Somewhat absent, until relatively recently, has been a theoretical understanding, informed by historical experience and empirical analysis, of the actual dynamics and challenges in a post-war society. A theoretical understanding is important because many policy packages seem to fail: the majority of countries in which civil war has ended fall back into civil war within a decade. That record presents an essential question: why do some post-conflict states remain peaceful while others return to war? What in fact leads to building peace in a society that has experienced war? A theoretical understanding is also important because there exists a great deal of variation in the policies and approaches that post-war governments pursue. The prescriptions that international actors advocate do not result in similar outcomes globally. That result may be fine but it suggests that international actors are missing something about the dynamics that shape domestic policymaking after civil war. Hence this question: why do some governments pursue a particular package of initiatives while other governments pursue other ones?

This course privileges these and related questions. The course approaches the topic in three main ways. First, the course examines some of the major policy documents that dominate debate about post-war peacebuilding. Second, the course focuses on some of the emerging academic literature with the understanding that this literature is both disparate and nascent. Third, the course looks at a number of case studies. The cases come from most world regions. They represent both a variety of policy trajectories (in terms of post-conflict paths out of war) and a variety of outcomes (in terms of their overall success at building peace after war—though what constitutes “success” is up for discussion). Through the case studies, we shall assess how well both the policy frameworks and the academic literature works.

Requirements The class is a discussion-oriented seminar in which preparation and participation are essential. Each student is expected to come to class having read the assigned material and ready to contribute at least one question or comment during the discussion. By 9 am on Tuesday morning, each student must send to the professor two questions that he or she would like to discuss or have clarified during the class. The format for each class will vary. In the first half of the semester, the professor will prepare mini lectures on the themes for the week. Following the mini lecture, there will be a short break followed by a discussion. In the second half of the semester when the courses focuses on specific cases, students must prepare a short (seven to ten minute) presentation on a specific aspect of the reconstructing country.

In addition to the classroom discussion and presentation, each student will be responsible for a final research project. (Joint, team-based research projects are permissible but not required and must be approved by the professor.) The research project must be theoretically motivated and empirically comparative. Theoretically motivated means that the project must investigate a specific research question and bring explanatory academic studies to bear on the question. Empirically comparative means that the project must be grounded in a comparison of at least two countries. One of the countries may be a case that was examined during the class but at least one case must be one not covered in detail in class.

The final project will be presented in two forms. First, each student will be required to make a 10 minute oral presentation to the entire class. Second, each student will be required to submit a 18-20-page, double-spaced paper. The papers will be graded on the quality of writing, argument, and research. The professor will complete a random draw to determine when students will present. Grading Breakdown: Seminar Participation: 35% Case Study Short Presentation: 15% Research Project Presentation: 15% Final Paper: 35%

Course Material All the required reading for the course, except for the Peter Uvin book (see below), will be available on the learn@UW website for the course. I have made electronic copies available in order to cut the cost of taking this (new and still experimental) course. However, there are a few books on which I draw heavily and you may wish to order copies of those. I have not ordered these or the requried books from the bookstore. I would encourage you to order the books online via Amazon.com or Barnes and Noble or whatever outlet you prefer.

REQUIRED Peter Uvin, Life After Violence: A People’s Story of Burundi (London: Zed Books, 2009).

RECOMMENDED Christoph Zürcher, Carrie Manning, Kristie Evenson, Rachel Hayman, Sarah Riese, and Nora Roehner, Costly Democracy: Peacebuilding and Democratization after War (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 2013).

Roland Paris, At War’s End: Building Peace after Civil Conflict (New York, Cambridge University Press, 2004). Course Outline

PART I: CONCEPTUAL AND THEORETICAL FRAMEWORKS

January 20: Course Introduction and Major Concepts

January 27: Causes of Civil War, Challenges of Reconstruction, and Key Policy Documents

United States Institute of Peace, Guiding Principles for Stabilization and Reconstruction, Washington, DC: 2009, pp. 16-36. (2-8-4.7).

World Bank, World Development Report 2011. Chapters 1 and 3.

Boutros Boutros Ghali, “Agenda for Peace,” 1992, pp. 16-17.

Stanley McChrystal’s Diagram for Stabilization in Afghanistan, also known as the “hairball,” see http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2010/04/27/world/27powerpoint_CA0_337- span/27powerpoint_CA0-articleLarge.jpg

February 3: Theoretical Frameworks on Peacebuilding

Séverine Autessere, Peaceland: Conflict Resolution and the Everyday Politics of International Intervention (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014), Chapter 1.

Christoph Zürcher, Carrie Manning, Kristie Evenson, Rachel Hayman, Sarah Riese, and Nora Roehner, Costly Democracy: Peacebuilding and Democratization after War (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 2013), Chapters 2 and 3.

Nicholas Sambanis and Michael Doyle, Making War and Building Peace: United Nations Peace Operations (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2006), Chapter 2.

Jeremy Weinstein, “Autonomous Recovery and International Intervention in Comparative Perspective,” Center for Global Development Working Paper # 57, 2005.

February 10: Post-Conflict Security

Eric Shibuya, Demobilizing Irregular Forces (Cambridge: Polity, 2012), pp. 1-84.

Monica Duffy Toft, Securing the Peace: The Durable Settlement of Civil Wars (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010), Chapter 2. Michael Boyle, Violence after War: Explaining Instability in Post-Conflict States (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014), Chapter 3.

February 17: Post-Conflict Power-Sharing and Democratization

Philip Roeder and Donald Rothchild, Sustainable Peace: Power and Democracy after Civil Wars (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2005), pp. 1-19.

Anna Jarstad and Timothy Sisk, From War to Democracy: Dilemmas of Peacebuilding (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008), Chapter 4.

Virginia Page Fortna, “Peacekeeping and Democratization,” in Jarstad and Sisk, Chapter 2.

Roland Paris, At War’s End: Building Peace after Civil Conflict (New York, Cambridge University Press, 2004), Introduction and Chapter 1. CONSIDER CHAPTER 1 at INTRO TO COURSW ASSIGN CONCLUSION AND INTRO HERE

February 24: Post-Conflict Society

David Bloomfied, Teresa Barnes, and Luc Huyse, Reconciliation after Violent Conflict: A Handbook (Washington: IDEA, 2003), Chapters 1-9.

March 3: International Dilemmas and Post-Conflict Economies

Christoph Zürcher, Carrie Manning, Kristie Evenson, Rachel Hayman, Sarah Riese, and Nora Roehner, Costly Democracy: Peacebuilding and Democratization after War (Palo Alto: Stanford University Press, 2013), Chapters 4 and 5.

Séverine Autessere, Peaceland: Conflict Resolution and the Everyday Politics of International Intervention (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2014), Chapters 2,3, and Conclusion.

PART II: CASE STUDIES

March 10: Cambodia, East Timor, and Sri Lanka

Geoffrey Robinson, “East Timor Ten Years on: Legacies of Violence,” Journal of Asian Studies 70:4 (2011), pp. 1007-1021.

Johanna Herman, “Peacebuilding and Transitional Justice in Cambodia: Attempts at DDR and the Rise of Victim-Centered Justice,” in Chandra Lekha Siriam, Jemima Garcia-Godos, Johanna Herman, and Olga Martin-Ortega, eds., Transitional Justice and Peacebuilding on the Ground: Victims and Ex-Combatants (London: Routledge, 2013), pp. 103-120. Soth Plai Ngarm and Tania Miletic, “Cambodia’s Post-War Struggle for Peace,” CDA Cumulative Impact Study, 2009, focus on pp. 25-46.

Sharika Thiranagama, “Claiming the State: Postwar Reconciliation in Sri Lanka,” Humanity 4:1 (2013), pp. 93-116.

March 17: Northern Ireland and the former Yugoslavia

Niall Fitzduff and Sue Williams, “How Did Northern Ireland Move Toward Peace,” CDA Cumulative Impact Study, 2007, skip appendices.

International Crisis Group, “Bosnia’s Future,” Europe Report No. 232, 2014.

Roland Paris, At War’s End: Building Peace after Civil Conflict (New York, Cambridge University Press, 2004), Chapter 6.

Skim: International Crisis Group, “Setting Kosovo Free: Remaining Challenges,” Europe Report No. 218, 2012.

March 24: Guatemala and El Salvador

Tani Marilena Adams, “Consumed by Violence: Advances and Obstacles to Building Peace in Guatemala Fifteen Years After the Peace Accords,” CDA Cumulative Impact Study (2011), Focus on Part Two.

Monica Duffy Toft, Securing the Peace: The Durable Settlement of Civil Wars (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2010), Chapter 5.

April 7: Afghanistan and Iraq

Michael Boyle, Violence after War: Explaining Instability in Post-Conflict States (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014), Chapter 8.

Anand Gopal, No Good Men among the Living: America, The Taliban, and the War through Afghan Eyes (New York: Metropolitan Books, 2014), selections.

SKIM: Andrew Beath, Fotini Christia, and Ruben Enikolopov, “Empowering Women through Development Aid: Evidence from a Field Experiment in Afghanistan,” American Political Science Review 107:3 (2013), pp. 540-557.

April 14: Burundi (and Namibia and Mozambique) Peter Uvin, Life After Violence: A People’s Story of Burundi (London: Zed Books, 2009).

April 21: Rwanda and Côte d’Ivoire ARTICLES AND CHAPTERS LISTED BELOW ARE NOT REQUIRED. Work on your research projects. Professor will discuss his research.

Scott Straus and Lars Waldorf, “Seeing like a Post-Conflict State,” in Scott Straus and Lars Waldorf, eds., Remaking Rwanda: Human Rights and State Building after Mass Violence (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 2011, Introduction.

Ingrid Samset, “Building a Repressive Peace: the Case of Post-Genocide Rwanda,” Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding 5:3 (2011), pp. 265-283.

Andrea Purdekova, “’Civic Education’ and Social Transformation in Post-Genocide Rwanda: Forging the Perfect Development Subjects’, in Campioni, M. and P. Noack, eds., Rwanda Fast Forward: Social, Economic, Military and Reconciliation Prospects (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012)

April 28: Student Presentations

May 5: Student Presentations