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Institute for National Strategic Security, National Defense University Towards a Taxonomy of Militaries in Contemporary Africa Author(s): Alan Doss, Jeffrey Herbst and Greg Mills Source: PRISM , Vol. 4, No. 3 (2013), pp. 126-139 Published by: Institute for National Strategic Security, National Defense University Stable URL: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/26469832 REFERENCES Linked references are available on JSTOR for this article: https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2307/26469832?seq=1&cid=pdf- reference#references_tab_contents You may need to log in to JSTOR to access the linked references. JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at https://about.jstor.org/terms Institute for National Strategic Security, National Defense University is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to PRISM This content downloaded from 140.105.48.10 on Wed, 27 Feb 2019 08:57:57 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms United Nations A voter from Zam Zam Internally Displaced Persons Camp, North Darfur, submits her ballot on the first day of Sudan’s national elections. This content downloaded from 140.105.48.10 on Wed, 27 Feb 2019 08:57:57 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms Towards a Taxonomy of Militaries in Contemporary Africa By Alan Doss, Jeffrey Herbst and Greg Mills1 “What a society gets in its armed forces is exactly what it asks for, no more no less. What it asks for tends to be a reflection of what it is. When a country looks at its fighting forces, it is looking in a mirror; the mirror is a true one and the face that it sees will be its own.” General Sir John Hackett2 he African development and governance picture is today highly differentiated with some coun- tries developing successful democracies while riding a wave of growth, others facing outright T institutional failure, and a great number in-between. Critical to understanding the different paths that countries have taken, and the likely even greater divergences in the future, is the relationship between civilians and soldiers. Starting soon after independence in the early 1960s, the seizure of power by soldiers was emblematic of the problems African states faced in promoting good governance. Now, at a time when most soldiers are back in their barracks, economic growth has accelerated and democratization has progressed. However, the picture varies greatly from country-to-country. In this paper, we develop a taxonomy of African militaries to understand why some countries have better civil-military relations than others, what is the likely path in the future, and the potential role, if any, for outsiders. African militaries are characterised, just as African states themselves, by different capacities and civil-military records. Alan Doss is a former UN SRSG for Liberia and Congo, and is currently Senior Political Adviser with the Kofi Annan Foundation. Jeffrey Herbst is President of Colgate University. Gregg Mills heads the Johannesburg-based Brenthurst Foundation1. PRISM 4, NO. 3 FEATURES | 127 This content downloaded from 140.105.48.10 on Wed, 27 Feb 2019 08:57:57 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms DOSS, HERBST AND MILLS Figure 1: Sub-Saharan and Global Conflicts While sub-Saharan Africa has enjoyed the 40 countries regularly conducting multiparty best post-independence growth decade on record elections although, again, across the region there during the 2000s, at over 6%, it remains an exceed- are significant variations in the integrity of these ingly poor continent, with an annual per capita elections. Extreme predatory warlordism, once income level of just over US$1,200 (in current evident in Sierra Leone and Liberia, is also appar- terms). The patterns of growth have however been ently on the decline. However, there are, as will be highly differentiated between states: some have argued, less obvious but no less insidious ways in got richer, while others have faltered or failed. which military actors engage in the political econ- This is, however, overall a positive phenomenon, omy of African societies. Indeed, such a role is not showing that African countries no longer fall only made possible by the liberation credentials of into a single category (if they ever did), but, as some militaries and by their relative monopoly on in other developing regions, there are all kinds: violence, but by the contemporary African trend performers and failures; big and small (which towards state involvement in economies as evident usually perform much better in Africa); land- for example in the resource nationalism debate. locked and littoral; autocratic and democratic (by Continued differentiation is therefore perhaps now the overwhelming majority). In particular, the most important “master narrative” in Africa. Africa’s larger and resource rich countries (the Accordingly, this paper considers the abovemen- Democratic Republic of Congo and Nigeria, for tioned taxonomy of African militaries, highlight- example) have generally had a poor development ing in turn where and how external parties might record since independence, which in part is due to play a useful role. But, first, how has the role of the extent of territory and the complex make-up African militaries changed and how does this relate of their societies, consisting of many groups to the overall governance record? within a single state, which has made effective governance that much harder. African Militaries and Security The state of democracy is also healthier in One consequence of the degeneration of politics Africa today than 20 years ago, with more than during the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s was the high 128 | FEATURES PRISM 4, NO. 3 This content downloaded from 140.105.48.10 on Wed, 27 Feb 2019 08:57:57 UTC All use subject to https://about.jstor.org/terms MILITARIES IN CONTEMPORARY AFRICA Figure 2: Number of Coups (successful and attempted) by Sub-Region 1960-69 1970-89 1990-2010 West Africa 19 49 36 Central Africa 8 14 13 Eastern Africa 10 26 12 Southern Africa 0 10 6 Total 37 99 67 incidence of violence in Africa. The end of the Cold Throughout the 1960s, 1970s and 1980s, War enabled some conflicts (e.g. in Angola, Namibia much of the African continent had become milita- and Mozambique) to eventually wind down, but rised. Relatively few states avoided military coups, there was also an intense period of strife after 1990, and those that did had to find some accommoda- as the geopolitical cards were reshuffled. Wars in tion with their armed forces. Central Africa, West Africa and Sudan, and between As the table below4 further illustrates, more Ethiopia and Eritrea, signalled a continent in crisis. than half the total of regime changes in this period The failure of the United States and the United comprised coups. But violent regime change has Nations in Somalia in 1993 and the Rwandan geno- declined significantly as a percentage since 1990 and cide in 1994 suggested that the continent could not even further since 2000. The number of successful count on external intervention to end conflict, even coups in Africa declined from a peak of 21 between though at the same time the continent was host to 1960-69, to 20 in 1970-79, 20 again in 1980-89, 17 several UN peacekeeping missions. And still, in the in the 1990s, and just seven between 2000-09.5 1990s, Africa was shaking off the last of its colonial Aside from the implications of these military or liberation struggles with the advent of a multira- adventures for African civil-military relations, and cial democracy in South Africa in 1994. their effect on democracy and accountability, the Much has changed. Twenty years after the end militarisation of society generated a culture of of the Cold War, the wars in West and Southern violence and stimulated the growth and prolif- Africa have wound down, although there is still eration of armed gangs, warlord formations, the conflict in the Horn and Central Africa. As the contemporary surge in piracy, death squads, guer- table below illustrates, Africa has seen a substantial rilla armies and proxy forces of all kinds with truly decrease in the number of conflicts, from 15 in the devastating human consequences, especially for 1990s to five between 2000 and 2010. Accordingly, women and children.6 Restoring civil governance, there has been a decrease in the number of global stability and the rule of law thus requires, as a first battle deaths from 160,000 a year in the 1980s to step, keeping the military in the barracks and put- 50,000 annually in the 2000s.3 ting armed non-state actors out of business. The remaining conflicts appear to be con- centrated in “hard cases,” such as the Democratic Africa’s Democratic and Republic of the Congo, that have no immediate or Governance Trajectory obvious resolution. New conflicts will undoubtedly Ending conflict can have at least as large an impact break out in sometimes surprising places, such as on poverty as improved growth rates. Indeed, as Mali, but it is hard to believe that the continental the World Bank’s argues, peace is likely to lead to level of violence will revert to what was seen in the increased growth. The opposite also holds true: 1990s. The fall in the level of violence parallels the as Paul Collier has shown, “Civil war is develop- aforementioned change in democratic structures.

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