RETURNING CULTURE TO PEACEBUILDING: CONTESTING THE LIBERAL PEACE IN SIERRA LEONE Jevgenia Viktorova Milne A Thesis Submitted for the Degree of PhD at the University of St. Andrews 2009 Full metadata for this item is available in the St Andrews Digital Research Repository at: https://research-repository.st-andrews.ac.uk/ Please use this identifier to cite or link to this item: http://hdl.handle.net/10023/938 This item is protected by original copyright Jevgenia Viktorova Milne Returning Culture to Peacebuilding: Contesting the Liberal Peace in Sierra Leone PhD Thesis University of St Andrews School of International Relations 30 November 2009 2 I, Jevgenia Milne, hereby certify that this thesis, which is approximately 99,000 words in length, has been written by me, that it is the record of work carried out by me and that it has not been submitted in any previous application for a higher degree. I was admitted as a research student in September 2004 and as a candidate for the degree of PhD in September 2005; the higher study for which this is a record was carried out in the University of St Andrews between 2005 and 2009. date: 30 November 2009 signature of candidate ……………………. I hereby certify that the candidate has fulfilled the conditions of the Resolution and Regulations appropriate for the degree of ……… in the University of St Andrews and that the candidate is qualified to submit this thesis in application for that degree. date …………………………… signature of supervisor ……………………… In submitting this thesis to the University of St Andrews we understand that we are giving permission for it to be made available for use in accordance with the regulations of the University Library for the time being in force, subject to any copyright vested in the work not being affected thereby. We also understand that the title and the abstract will be published, and that a copy of the work may be made and supplied to any bona fide library or research worker, that my thesis will be electronically accessible for personal or research use unless exempt by award of an embargo as requested below, and that the library has the right to migrate my thesis into new electronic forms as required to ensure continued access to the thesis. We have obtained any third-party copyright permissions that may be required in order to allow such access and migration, or have requested the appropriate embargo below. The following is an agreed request by candidate and supervisor regarding the electronic publication of this thesis: Access to Printed copy and electronic publication of thesis through the University of St Andrews. date ………… signature of candidate ………………. signature of supervisor …………….. 3 4 Abstract This thesis investigates the advantages and limitations of applying culture to the analysis of violent conflict and peacebuilding, with a particular focus on liberal peacebuilding in Sierra Leone. While fully aware of the critique of the concept of culture in terms of its uses for the production of difference and „otherness,‟ it also seeks to respond to the critique of liberal peacebuilding on the account of its low sensitivity towards local culture, which allegedly undermines the peace effort. After a careful examination of the terms of discussion about culture enabled by theoretical approaches to conflict in Chapter 2, the thesis presents a theoretical framework for the analysis of cultural aspects of conflict and peace based on the processes and effects of meaning-generation (Chapter 3), developing the conceptual apparatus and vocabulary for the subsequent empirical study. Instead of bracketing out the recursive nature of cultural theorising, the developed approach embraces the recursive dynamics which arise as a result of cultural „embeddedness‟ of the analyst and the processes which s/he seeks to elucidate, mirroring similar dynamics in the cultural production of meaning and knowledge. The framework of „embedded cultural enquiry‟ is then used to analyse the practices of liberal peacebuilding as a particular culture, which shapes the interaction of the liberal peace with its „subjects‟ and critics as well as framing its reception of the cultural problematic generally (Chapter 4). The application of the analytical framework to the case study investigates the interaction between the liberal peace and „local culture,‟ offering an alternative reading of the conflict and peace process in Sierra Leone (Chapter 5). The study concludes that a greater attention to cultural meaning-making offers a largely untapped potential for peacebuilding, although any decisions with regard to its deployment will inevitably be made from within an inherently biased cultural perspective. 5 6 Table of Contents Abstract ........................................................................................................................ 5 Abbreviations ............................................................................................................... 9 1. Introduction ............................................................................................................ 11 A case for „returning culture to peacebuilding‟ ................................................. 11 Culture: Advantages and limitations of the concept .......................................... 12 Methodological issues ....................................................................................... 15 Approach, aims and ambitions of this research ................................................. 19 2. Culture in Conflict and Peacebuilding: Spaces of theoretical investigation .......... 23 I. Possible approaches to culture ........................................................................... 23 Culture overshadowed ....................................................................................... 23 Culture in an auxiliary role: Openings for the reflection on culture .................. 27 An explicit focus on culture ............................................................................... 33 II. Culture in the context of conflict and violence ................................................. 40 Culture: A source or a medium of violence? ..................................................... 40 Violence and cultural change ............................................................................. 43 Cultural avenues of conflictive mobilisation ..................................................... 46 Conclusions............................................................................................................ 50 3. Theoretical Framework: Embedded cultural enquiry ........................................... 53 Introduction ............................................................................................................ 53 Aspects of cultural analysis (of conflict and peacebuilding) ............................. 56 (i) Culture as signification ..................................................................................... 62 „Ordering‟ and meaning-generation .................................................................. 63 Definitional dynamics ........................................................................................ 66 (B)ordering and identity .................................................................................... 69 (ii) Culture as politics ............................................................................................ 72 Cultural constitution of the political .................................................................. 73 Cultural „ordering‟ of violence .......................................................................... 76 Violence and the dynamics of bordering ........................................................... 79 (iii) Culture as rhetoric ........................................................................................... 80 Translation ......................................................................................................... 81 The tropological movement ............................................................................... 82 Cultural „templates‟ ........................................................................................... 84 Cultural change and the issue of „social fabric‟ ................................................. 86 Conclusion ............................................................................................................. 88 4. The Culture of Liberal Peacebuilding.................................................................... 93 Introduction ............................................................................................................ 93 I. Significational dynamics of liberal peacebuilding ............................................. 96 The „monologism‟ of the liberal peace .............................................................. 96 The merging of peace and war ........................................................................... 99 7 The fusion of rationality and myth .................................................................. 102 Liberal peace as a technology .......................................................................... 105 II. Unclosing the monologue? The culture of liberal peacebuilding and its „others‟ ............................................................................................................................. 110 The „other(s)‟ of culture in liberal peacebuilding ............................................ 110 The „other‟ of the critique of