Walls and other boundaries to irregular migration: is the US approach that different from the European one?
At this seminar 5 June, we will take a closer look at the policies implemented in areas bordering Europe and ask how this affects the neighboring countries and migration flows.
Assessing the Effectiveness of the United Nations Mission in Mali (MINUSMA)
This report assesses the extent to which the UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA) is achieving its current strategic objectives, and the impact the Mission has had on the political and security situation in Mali. Until 2016 MINUSMA managed to strengthen stability in northern Mali, decreasing the number of civilians killed in the conflict, and allowing large numbers of displaced persons to return home. MINUSMA also assisted the peace process, culminating in the 2015 Algiers Agreement. Many of these achievements are still standing. However, since 2016 MINUSMA’s effectiveness in terms of stabilisation and the protection of civilians has decreased. In the North, the signatory parties have been making slow progress in the implementation of the Algiers Agreement and the 2018 Pact for Peace. In addition, central Mali has destabilised significantly, as Jihadist activities have stoked a vicious cycle of inter-communal violence that has reached unprecedented levels. MINUSMA has only been mandated to help the Malian government address the situation since June 2018. As one of the largest multidimensional peacekeeping operations – currently including nearly 13,000 soldiers and 1,800 police officers from 57 contributing countries, and almost 750 civilians – MINUSMA has been provided with significant resources and an extraordinarily ambitious mandate. However, the Mission finds itself at a crossroads. It needs time to succeed, but this is valuable time Mali does not have. Civilians have come under increasing attack, and the US, in particular, is losing interest in supporting a costly UN peace operation that is not able to deliver quick results. This report considers the degree to which there is an alignment between the mission’s resources and its mandate. It also makes an assessment of the options available to the Mission to increase its effectiveness in the face of extremely challenging circumstances.
To engage or not engage? Libyan Salafis and state institutions
At the beginning of the recent escalation of hostilities in Libya in April 2019, one of the key questions posed was what role, if any, quietist Salafis would play. Followers of this trend have grown significantly in influence in recent years, including in the security sphere and government institutions. As a result, their decisions, especially those regarding military engagement, have the potential to have important consequences at the national level. The fact that these “quietist” Salafis in Libya are armed already poses interesting ideological questions. Moreover, the fact that their behaviour during the recent fighting in Tripoliihas been somewhat unpredictable indicates that their ideology of obedience to the sitting ruler requires further interrogation.This research brief looks at the way in which the quietist Salafis have evolved to gain such a strong position in Libya, assessing their behaviour in four distinct periods. It contrasts this behaviour with other Salafi trends in Libya, particularly the political Salafism associated with certain former leaders of the Libyan Islamic Fighting Group (LIFG). It argues that Libyan Salafis have adapted and renegotiated ideologies in the changing political context after 2011. More than pure ideology, the way in which they have responded to the constraints and opportunities created by this context has been the key factor in the evolution of the different groups and ultimately their fortunes.
Should I stay or should I go? Security considerations for members leaving al-Shabaab in Somalia
The Somali jihadi organization al-Shabaab, yet again featured in the news internationally when they attacked a business and hotel complex in Nairobi 15 January this year. This is not the first time the group carries out largescale attacks outside the Somali boarders. Other examples are the Garissa University College attack in 2015, the mass shooting at Westgate shopping mall in Nairobi in 2013 and the Kampala attacks in 2010. However, the majority of the atrocities committed by al-Shabaab take place in South Central Somalia. The Global Terrorism Index 2018 ranked Somalia as number 6 on its list of countries most impacted by terrorism in 2017.1 Al-Shabaab was behind the deadliest terrorist attack in 2017 worldwide, when a suicide bomber detonated an explosives-laden truck, killing 587 people in Mogadishu. Although al-Shabaab has had several military setbacks the last few years, the group still poses a significant threat to security and stability in the region. As the name al-Shabaab (‘the youth’) indicates, young people predominate in the group. This means that thousands of individuals spend parts of their youth in al- Shabaab. The question then arises: how to best assist the ones who want to leave the group?
Constructed anarchy: governance, conflict and precarious property rights in Bukavu, DR Congo
What is the nexus between conflict, property rights and land governance in some parts of DR Congo?
Local Ownership as Global Governance
The ownership discourse has profoundly altered the management of development aid. Nominally, it seeks to instil greater freedom as well as responsibilities among aid recipients. Revisiting two ethnographic studies (the World Bank–Uganda partnership and NGO relations in Ethiopia), this article shows how ‘ownership’ practices also involve new forms of tacit governance mechanisms that enable the donor to retain control. By using ‘freedom’ as a formula underpinning governance at a distance, developmentality is made contingent on the donor’s ability to frame the partnership and the conditions under which the recipient exercises the freedom that has been granted.
The violence in Mali is getting bloodier, but religion is not necessarily at its root
The massacre of Fulani in central Mali on 23 March marks a grave, new turn in the conflict. How did we get here? NUPI researchers Natasja Rupesinghe and Morten Bøås provide insight into possible reasons.
EUNPACK Executive Summary of the Final Report & Selected Policy Recommendations. A conflict-sensitive unpacking of the eu comprehensive approach to...
Since adopting a ‘comprehensive approach’ to crisis management in 2013, the EU has spent considerable time and energy on streamlining its approach and improving internal coordination. New and protracted crises, from the conflict in Ukraine to the rise of Daesh in Syria and Iraq, and the refugee situation in North Africa and the Sahel, have made the improvement of external crisis-response capacities a top priority. But the implementation of the EU’s policies on the ground has received less scholarly and policy attention than the EU’s actorness and institutional capacity-building, and studies of implementation have often been guided primarily by a theoretical or normative agenda. The main objective of the EUNPACK project has been to unpack EU crisis response mechanisms and provide new insights how they are being received and perceived on the ground by both local beneficiaries and other external stakeholders. By introducing a bottom–up perspective combined with an institutional approach, the project has tried to break with the dominant line of scholarship on EU crisis response that has tended to view only one side of the equation, namely the EU itself. Thus, the project has been attentive to the local level in target countries as well as to the EU level and the connections between them. The research has been conducted through an inductive and systematic empirical research combining competencies from two research traditions that so far has had little interaction, namely peace and conflict studies and EU studies. A key finding in our research is that while the EU has been increasingly concerned with horizontal lessons learnt, it needs to improve vertical lessons learnt to better understand the local dynamics and thus provide more appropriate responses.
How can the EU improve its response to crises?
Researchers within and beyond Europe have been studying the EU's approach to conflict and crises. Here's what they found out.