Ngos and Conflict Management

RESPONSES TO INTERNATIONAL CONFLICT HIGHLIGHTS FROM THE MANAGING CHAOS CONFERENCE NGOS AND CONFLICT MANAGEMENT Pamela R. Aall UNITED STATES INSTITUTE OF PEACE CONTENTS Key Points v Preface 1 1 Reframing the Issues 3 2 The Changing Nature of NGOs 5 3 New Roles for NGOs 7 4 The Challenge of Coordination 11 5 NGOs as Conflict Managers 14 Contributors 15 Managing Chaos Conference Agenda 18 About the Author 24 About the Institute 25 v approaches outside of military intervention, including humanitarian relief, preventive action and conflict resolution, development assistance, and institution-building. = Because of the nature of their basic mission, humanitarian relief NGOs are often the first to KEY POINTS arrive on the scene of complex emergencies. Consequently, they are often trapped in the midst of these conflicts as they attempt to carry out their relief operations. Accordingly, this type of NGO has had to broaden its traditional role to include ensuring political stabil- ity and fulfilling basic governmental functions in states plagued with severe crisis. = The changing nature of both conflict and humanitarian relief has sparked an examination within the NGO community as well as among officials of the United Nations and its member Reframing the Issues governments of the roles that NGOs should play in preventing, managing, and resolving = The nature of conflict has changed substan- conflict. tially in the post–Cold War era. Instead of wars among nation-states, conflict most often ap- The Changing Nature of NGOs pears now as struggles for power and domi- nance within states, pitting ethnic group = United by a commitment to improving condi- against ethnic group, religion against religion, tions around the world, NGOs otherwise rep- and neighbor against neighbor. resent a great diversity of objectives, functions, and organizational structures. The numbers of = This type of virulent subnational conflict typi- NGOs have increased dramatically in recent cally results in waves of refugees who fall prey years, bringing more resources to more areas to a deadly combination of starvation, epi- afflicted with crisis. Their activities fall into demics, and despair that spirals out of control two broad categories: direct operations, or “op- since governments and the services they pro- erational” NGOs (including humanitarian re- vide are on the verge of collapse during such lief and conflict resolution NGOs), and advo- crises. Moreover, these refugee crises typically cacy NGOs. draw neighboring countries into the conflict as well, and threaten to turn a subnational con- = NGOs that focus on humanitarian relief have flict into a regional and international confla- traditionally maintained a strict policy of neu- gration. The international community finds it- trality in their activities, providing aid to the self responding to more and more of these destitute or services to antagonists regardless “complex emergencies”—such as those in of their political, ethnic, or religious affiliation. Rwanda, Somalia, and Bosnia—in the = post–Cold War era. As they find themselves serving expanded roles during complex emergencies, many = Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) play NGOs are reconsidering the circumstances un- a critical part in the international response to der which they can and should adhere to such such crises, offering many different skills and strict neutrality. In these crisis situations, vi NGOs find themselves having to work closely leadership necessary to translate early warning with governments to carry out their role of into effective interventions. providing assistance. = In addition, many in the NGO community be- = The fundamental change in the demands of to- lieve that NGOs and the international commu- day’s humanitarian crises may lead NGOs to nity at large should concentrate on techniques consider an equally fundamental change in that link crisis management and humanitarian their program development—redirecting con- relief activities to the longer-term goals of con- tributions and other sources of funding from flict resolution and sustainable development relief programs alone to those that address the (peacebuilding). Relying on grass-roots and interdependence of relief, development, and mid-level approaches that sustain the process conflict resolution. of peacebuilding through the use of indige- nous resources and technologies, rather than New Roles for NGOs the traditional top-down policy of providing development aid, is a way to ensure that the = While NGOs cannot be expected to solve all conflict accompanying complex emergencies the problems associated with humanitarian does not recur once outside actors leave the crises, the new environment in which these or- country. ganizations operate suggests the following four fundamental roles: early warning func- The Challenge of Coordination tions, human rights monitoring, relief and re- habilitation, and conflict resolution activities. = With so many actors at different levels of the Yet it may be detrimental for NGOs to assume international system available to intervene in all these roles simultaneously. complex emergencies, coordination is essen- tial to avoid overlapping, and often counter- = Of these four roles, the early warning and con- productive, responses that result in wasted re- flict resolution functions typically engender sources and inefficient operations. the most debate, not only because of their rela- tive newness in the repertoire of NGO capabili- = While the many different types of NGOs arrive ties, but also because both of these roles sub- on the scene with a variety of skills and tech- sume many other increasingly important—and, niques to address different aspects of complex some would argue, controversial—tasks NGOs emergencies, there is little coordination must consider in carrying out their primary among them to manage these emergencies in missions during complex emergencies. an integrated way. = Because of their close involvement with local = One way of ensuring an effective international communities, NGOs are in an excellent posi- response calls for the NGO community to co- tion to serve an early warning function, alert- ordinate its members’ separate responses to ing the international community to potential complex emergencies, aiming for a compre- breakdowns in a distressed country’s govern- hensive strategy that allows major actors to ment or in relations among the country’s ma- participate in an integrated fashion. The ulti- jor domestic groups. In such a way, NGOs can mate challenge to governments and interna- serve as the first step in preventive action to tional organizations is to construct a system avert future complex emergencies. that can respond to a complex emergency in a comprehensive, unified, integrated way, com- = Some in the NGO community argue that bining diplomatic skill, military power, and NGOs should use their early warning vantage NGO field experience under a UN mandate. point to advocate specific policies to their re- spective governments aimed at stemming = Coordination is required not only for the over- brewing conflicts. Yet the fact remains: Gov- all response, but also at each level of the re- ernments must find the political will and sponse as well. The United States government vii may want to consider reforming both the way NGOs as Conflict Managers it deals with the UN and its own fragmented decision-making apparatus for humanitarian = While NGOs are fast becoming powerful new crises. Such reform would include creating a actors in complex emergencies by managing single entity responsible for all relief, with one conflict and taking on certain functions of im- senior official in charge. periled governments, the question arises: Are NGOs fully equipped to handle all the dimen- = While NGOs do not share the full degree of ac- sions of complex emergencies, including vio- countability that circumscribes the range of ac- lent conflict? tions undertaken by states and international organizations during complex-emergency in- = Different types of NGOs possess distinct skills terventions, NGOs do not operate entirely in- and approaches, and their role as conflict man- dependently during these types of crises. In ager is appropriate if the role remains part of a fact, in any complex emergency, powerful larger, coordinated effort of relief, helping to states usually provide the kind of leadership re-establish civil society, and providing a and determination to put an end to mass suf- framework for sustainable development. fering and internecine conflicts, and NGOs typically perform their functions within such a context. 1 conflict and while international political and military interventions are under way. NGOs created to provide food, shelter, and medical supplies during humanitarian crises find themselves increasingly pressed to provide other vital services lacking in these crisis-ridden societies—including the provi- sion of basic governmental functions in the case of failed states. PREFACE The fall 1994 conference of the United States In- stitute of Peace, “Managing Chaos: Coping with International Conflict into the Twenty-First Cen- tury,” provided a timely forum for numerous dis- cussions regarding the changing character of international conflict, the new institutions of conflict resolution, and the new diplomacy and tools for conflict management. While the conference fo- cused on the most important foreign affairs issues of our time, it gave special attention to the changing—and expanding—role of NGOs in managing

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