tag:theconversation.com,2011:/uk/topics/demobilisation-30668/articlesDemobilisation – The Conversation2023-07-10T14:46:00Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/2087742023-07-10T14:46:00Z2023-07-10T14:46:00ZDRC violence has many causes – the UN’s narrow focus on ethnicity won’t help end conflict<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/535574/original/file-20230704-17-up8tx7.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Soldiers from South Sudan prepare to be deployed to help restore peace in the DRC. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">Samir Bol/AFP via Getty Images</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The UN Group of Experts on the Democratic Republic of Congo’s <a href="https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N23/123/80/PDF/N2312380.pdf?OpenElement">2023 mid-term report</a> reduces the very complex causes of violence in the eastern part of the country to inter-communal violence. This widely disregards armed groups’ motivations to resort to violence. </p>
<p>This narrow approach will perpetuate the cycles of violence in a country whose population hasn’t known peace for <a href="https://theconversation.com/conflict-in-the-drc-5-articles-that-explain-whats-gone-wrong-195332">three decades</a>. A failure to account for the other major reasons for the conflict in the experts’ brief to the <a href="https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/content/what-security-council">UN Security Council</a> could lead to the adoption of inappropriate measures to stabilise the DRC. </p>
<p>I have <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=4SlemykAAAAJ&view_op=list_works&sortby=pubdate">researched</a> the micro and macro causes of conflict in eastern DRC since 2017 to understand the motivations of individuals, groups and communities. In my view, most of the violent confrontations are consequences of the <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-drcs-colonial-legacy-forged-a-nexus-between-ethnicity-territory-and-conflict-153469">legacy of colonialism</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/burundis-gatumba-massacre-offers-a-window-into-the-past-and-future-of-the-drc-conflict-191351">state fragility</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-the-drcs-army-and-police-arent-yet-ready-to-protect-citizens-114326">dysfunctional and corrupted security services</a>. </p>
<p>From South Kivu to North Kivu and Ituri in the eastern region, the legacy of colonialism has categorised local communities into native and non-native. This has created conflict along the lines of belonging and its associated rights. The Congolese state <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-banyamulenge-how-a-minority-ethnic-group-in-the-drc-became-the-target-of-rebels-and-its-own-government-201099">hasn’t tackled this issue</a> – and state authority is absent in many areas. </p>
<p>The Congolese army is largely dysfunctional and corrupted. It’s among those <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10246029.2018.1486719">feeding violence</a> at local levels. It has <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2015/12/16/dr-congo-kidnappings-skyrocket-east">failed to protect civilians</a> and <a href="https://twitter.com/KivuSecurity/status/1304083139334156289">picked sides</a> in inter-community violence. </p>
<h2>Inside the report</h2>
<p>In recent years, the UN group of experts has narrowed all this complexity into inter-communal violence, with limited details on what drives it. Yet the mandate of the group – established in 2000 – is to <a href="https://www.un.org/securitycouncil/sites/www.un.org.securitycouncil/files/en/sc/repertoire/2000-2003/00-03_5.pdf#page=16">investigate and analyse</a> connections between resource exploitation and the persistence of conflict. Its reports should help the UN understand the bigger picture in eastern DRC. </p>
<p>This <a href="https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N23/123/80/PDF/N2312380.pdf?OpenElement">latest report</a> highlights five major events:</p>
<p><strong>Violence in the west</strong>: Maindombe, one of the western provinces, had appeared to be more stable than the north and south Kivus and Ituri in the volatile east. But it’s estimated that more than <a href="https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/03/30/dr-congo-rampant-intercommunal-violence-west">300 civilians have been killed</a> in Maindombe between June 2022 and March 2023. The violence is between the <a href="https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N23/123/80/PDF/N2312380.pdf?OpenElement#page=7">Teke and Yaka ethnic communities</a>. The former consider themselves the original inhabitants of the region and the Yaka as non-native. </p>
<p><strong>The Allied Democratic Forces:</strong> Designated as a <a href="https://www.state.gov/state-department-terrorist-designations-of-isis-affiliates-and-leaders-in-the-democratic-republic-of-the-congo-and-mozambique/">terrorist organisation in 2021</a> by the US, this group is active in Beni (North Kivu) and parts of Ituri province. The group has secured strategic and financial support from other terrorist groups, including Somalia’s Da’esh and IS-Somalia. The report notes that dismantling the terror group’s complex funding mechanisms and networks needs greater collaboration among countries.</p>
<p><strong>Rwanda and M23:</strong> In North Kivu, the UN report has called attention to the violence perpetrated by the <a href="https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N23/123/80/PDF/N2312380.pdf?OpenElement#page=13">Rwandan-backed M23 rebel group</a>. The conflict has forced thousands of civilians to flee, deepening a humanitarian crisis. The UN experts warn that the <a href="https://theconversation.com/what-m23s-on-and-off-insurgency-tells-us-about-drcs-precarious-search-for-peace-182520">M23</a> has the military capacity to wage and sustain conflict due to recruitment campaigns in Rwanda, Burundi and Uganda. This report is the first to name <a href="https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N23/123/80/PDF/N2312380.pdf?OpenElement#page=17">high-ranking Rwandan military generals</a> involved in fighting alongside M23 rebels.</p>
<p><strong>The rise of the Twirwaneho:</strong> In South Kivu, the UN report <a href="https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N23/123/80/PDF/N2312380.pdf?OpenElement#page=30">documents clashes</a> among groups claiming to be protecting their ethnic communities. The report highlights the Twirwaneho, an armed (self-defence) group affiliated to the <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-banyamulenge-how-a-minority-ethnic-group-in-the-drc-became-the-target-of-rebels-and-its-own-government-201099">Banyamulenge</a>, a minority ethnic group in South Kivu.</p>
<p><strong>The Codeco threat:</strong> The report also documents atrocities committed in Ituri province against civilians and internally displaced people. Here, it highlights the rebel group <a href="https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N23/123/80/PDF/N2312380.pdf?OpenElement#page=25">Codeco’s</a> attacks. It terms the violence inter-communal. </p>
<h2>The report’s loopholes</h2>
<p>The report is consistent with previous reports in terming ethnic communities’ “antagonism” as the source of violence. The DRC has more than 250 ethnic groups. But based on <a href="https://www.jpolrisk.com/category/article-type/working-paper/">my research</a>, it’s my view that violence in the country is intrinsically complex. Using a single lens can be misleading.</p>
<p>In my view, there are four major loopholes in the report. </p>
<p>First, the UN experts disregard the prominent roles played by other major actors in the conflict, such as the national army. It also ignores the <a href="https://theconversation.com/burundis-gatumba-massacre-offers-a-window-into-the-past-and-future-of-the-drc-conflict-191351">regional ramifications</a> of the violence. This includes the support provided by <a href="https://www.crisisgroup.org/africa/central-africa/democratic-republic-congo/b150-averting-proxy-wars-eastern-dr-congo-and-great-lakes">Rwanda to Burundian rebel groups in South Kivu</a>. State fragility also helps explain why the DRC’s conflict has persisted for three decades. Adding these factors would broaden understanding of the root causes of the conflict and its persistence. </p>
<p>Second, the UN experts tend to jump to conclusions based on largely questionable premises. For instance, evidence of “<a href="https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N23/123/80/PDF/N2312380.pdf?OpenElement#page=34">mass recruitment</a>” and the <a href="https://documents-dds-ny.un.org/doc/UNDOC/GEN/N23/123/80/PDF/N2312380.pdf?OpenElement#page=32">formation of new alliances</a> between Twirwaneho, M23 and Red-Tabara rebel groups isn’t clear. Since 2017, Red-Tabara, for instance, has been <a href="https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/174098/1/05_GIC_Mayhem-in-the-mountains_WEB-2.pdf#page=79">attacking the Banyamulenge</a>. </p>
<p>Third, the report shows signs of bias. For instance, it highlights the Twirwaneho and ignores other groups active in South Kivu. I’ve covered this bias in <a href="https://www.jpolrisk.com/why-the-un-fails-to-prevent-mass-atrocities/">a study</a> that analyses 324 incidents recorded by <a href="https://kivusecurity.org/">Kivu Security Tracker</a> and 29 reports from the UN’s peacekeeping mission in the DRC, Monusco. Monusco is one of the main sources of the UN experts’ information. </p>
<p>Fourth, in North Kivu, the experts have only documented atrocities and human rights abuses committed by M23 and the Rwandan Defence Forces. They’ve left out those committed by the Congolese military, and other local and foreign militias. </p>
<h2>Way forward</h2>
<p>A close look at the UN report indicates that the experts struggle to document atrocities in a timely manner. It took more than a year to document violence in South Kivu and Ituri that erupted in 2017 and this is happening in Maindombe. </p>
<p>UN experts shouldn’t see violence in eastern the DRC as solely tit-for-tat militia confrontations, and fail to account for their motivations to resort to violence. For instance, some armed groups in the east exist to chase out those seen as “foreigners”. </p>
<p>A simplified perspective won’t help to bring peace if the negative role played by security services is superficially covered. Moreover, the DRC has failed to establish a comprehensive disarmament and demobilisation scheme.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/208774/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Delphin R. Ntanyoma does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The causes of violence in the DRC are complex. Narrowing them down to the single lens of ethnicity can be misleading.Delphin R. Ntanyoma, Visiting Researcher, University of LeedsLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1581492021-05-06T13:26:03Z2021-05-06T13:26:03ZPeacebuilding in Côte d’Ivoire: why it’s hard to reintegrate combatants and achieve justice<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/398953/original/file-20210505-19-1xmcdhp.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Social reintegration and personal reconciliation should be paramount in post-conflict Cote d'Ivoire </span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/residents-walk-past-barricades-and-burning-tires-on-the-news-photo/110173388?adppopup=true">Issouf Sanogo/AFP via Getty Images </a></span></figcaption></figure><p>A decade ago the Ivoirian government, with the help of the United Nations, started programmes to build peace after nine years of war. The conflict ended after President Alassane Ouattara was <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2011/apr/15/alassane-ouattara-ivory-coast">brought to power</a> with the help of Forces Nouvelles rebels and French and UN troops. </p>
<p>Côte d’Ivoire has not returned to war. But elections in <a href="https://www.garda.com/crisis24/news-alerts/166266/cote-divoire-ruling-coalition-wins-municipal-and-regional-elections-update-6">2018</a> and <a href="https://www.theafricareport.com/48878/cote-divoire-alassane-ouattara-re-elected-for-a-3rd-term-with-94-27/">2020</a> were marred by <a href="https://www.garda.com/crisis24/news-alerts/166266/cote-divoire-ruling-coalition-wins-municipal-and-regional-elections-update-6">violence</a>.</p>
<p>Many Ivoirians claim much remains to be done to unite the country.</p>
<p>Post-conflict countries often implement recovery programmes. One type is known as disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration. It involves collecting weapons, dismantling armed groups and reintegrating combatants into civilian society. Countries may also work towards holding perpetrators accountable. This “transitional justice” programme often involves truth and reconciliation commissions, prosecutions and reparations.</p>
<p>The success rate of these post-conflict programmes has been mixed. Some countries, like Angola and Spain, have avoided a thorough engagement with past human rights abuses and war-era crimes. They also managed to <a href="https://www.africanews.com/2021/04/05/angola-celebrates-19-years-of-peace-and-the-end-of-armes-conflicts//">maintain peace</a> long after the conflict ended. South Africa <a href="https://www.beyondintractability.org/library/reconciliation-through-restorative-justice-analyzing-south-africas-truth-and-reconciliation">claims</a> its truth and reconciliation commission and transitional justice programmes helped prevent a recurrence of conflict. Demobilising programmes have often been viewed with scepticism for failing to reintegrate combatants into society – <a href="https://academic.oup.com/jrs/article/33/4/832/5902023">the Democratic Republic of Congo</a>, Iraq and <a href="https://www.hrw.org/reports/2005/westafrica0405/7.htm">Liberia</a> are examples.</p>
<p>Cote d'Ivoire implemented both the disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration and the transitional justice types of programmes. Past <a href="https://www.corteidh.or.cr/tablas/r25604.pdf">research indicated</a> that these types might be more effective if they worked more closely together rather than always being isolated. But Cote d'Ivoire opted to keep them apart. I set out to explore why. </p>
<p>I spent 12 months in 2017-2018 <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13533312.2020.1850281">researching</a> the implementation and success, or lack thereof, of the programmes in Côte d’Ivoire. I found that generally civilians, victims and ex-combatants were dissatisfied by both programmes and the way they had been implemented. </p>
<p>Also, it was highly likely that a more coordinated approach would have addressed many of their grievances. </p>
<p>Coordination was not implemented, however, for three main reasons. It posed a risk of destabilisation; it was not in the interests of political elites; and it was too technically challenging. These obstacles underscore the need for a more nuanced approach that takes into account the local context and the political dynamics of a post-conflict state. </p>
<h2>The post-conflict period</h2>
<p>After the Ivoirian conflict, the government first established a programme to demobilise, disarm and reintegrate combatants from both sides of the conflict. It also aimed to prepare them for civilian life. Simultaneously, the government set up several programmes intended to assist with reconciliation. The most prominent was the dialogue, truth and reconciliation commission. This sought to take testimony from Ivoirians and to provide reparations to victims. It was also intended to produce a report providing the truth about the war.</p>
<p>When I interviewed Ivoirian civilians, victims and ex-combatants in nine cities, I found that many were disappointed. Although there were some ex-combatants who fought on the losing side and were pleased to have post-conflict assistance, the vast majority of ex-combatants were frustrated. The absence of sustained financial help or provision of employment infuriated them. Many pro-Ouattara combatants complained that they had been unable to socially or economically reintegrate because they were viewed with suspicion by many residents. </p>
<p>Equally, those who had participated in the truth and reconciliation commission felt it had failed to foster reconciliation. Victims, civilians and ex-combatants were angry that the government had not followed through on the commission’s <a href="http://www.gouv.ci/doc/presse/1477497207RAPPORT%20FINAL_CDVR.pdf">findings</a>. These included suggestions that the rule of law should be reinforced in the management of land sales. This has long been a contentious issue in Cote d'Ivoire. The findings also indicated that an impartial and fair legal system would be essential to reconciliation. Ivoirians didn’t like the fact that the commission’s report was not released for several years after it was given to the president. </p>
<p>They also felt <a href="https://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/analysis/2018/02/28/how-selective-justice-eroding-peace-cote-d-ivoire">prosecutions</a> and arrests for war-era crimes were one-sided. Opposition supporters were arrested en masse, while very few pro-Ouattara supporters have been prosecuted for their role in the conflict. </p>
<p>Ethnic tensions persisted and fear of a further conflict was evident in many of the towns I visited. </p>
<h2>What went wrong?</h2>
<p>Disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration, and transitional justice, have historically been implemented in <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/14678800903395999">silos</a>. It is assumed that the former will serve the needs of ex-combatants and the latter will aid victims and that there is no need for coordination. </p>
<p>In fact, UN <a href="https://www.un.org/ruleoflaw/files/TJ_Guidance_Note_March_2010FINAL.pdf">policy guidance</a> and a <a href="https://academic.oup.com/jrs/article-abstract/27/2/234/1580786">majority</a> of <a href="https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.521.2396&rep=rep1&type=pdf">scholarship</a> in this field calls for increased linkages to ensure their success. </p>
<p>External advisors and UN officials I interviewed in Côte d’Ivoire said they tried to get the Ivoirian government to link its programmes. These efforts were repeatedly ignored. </p>
<p>Through interviewing policymakers and government officials, I found three core reasons related to the political context. </p>
<h2>Political obstacles to coordination</h2>
<p>Most prominently, there was a significant risk of destabilisation where coordination was attempted. Disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration, and transitional justice are, in some respects, contradictory processes. One reintegrates ex-combatants while the other seeks to hold them accountable, which is likely to prompt them to spoil the peace. Bringing these programmes together was dangerous in Côte d’Ivoire, where former warlords were prominent and powerful. </p>
<p>Secondly, there was an absence of political will to coordinate programmes. The government’s post-war priorities centred on presenting a positive image to the international community and attracting foreign investment, as well as shoring up support for itself and marginalising the opposition. Demobilising combatants was evidence of this. Transitional justice might have uncovered the crimes committed by the government and marginalised powerful figures on whom the government depended. </p>
<p>Finally, there were considerable technical challenges to coordinating programmes.</p>
<h2>What should be done</h2>
<p>These findings indicate a need for the UN to reconsider its emphasis on coordinating reintegration and transitional justice irrespective of the post-war context. Instead, political dynamics must be accounted for. </p>
<p>A more practical option might be to coordinate programmes at a local level. These could focus on social reintegration and personal reconciliation, rather than seeking to coordinate all the aspects of both mechanisms.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/158149/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Jessica Moody received funding from the Economic and Social Research Council while she was conducting field research for this article. </span></em></p>Based on the Cote d'Ivoire experience, the United Nations must reconsider its emphasis on coordinating reintegration and transitional justice irrespective of the post-war context.Jessica Moody, PhD Candidate and Freelance Political Risk Analyst, King's College LondonLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1461662020-09-15T10:16:29Z2020-09-15T10:16:29ZHow millions of veterans were returned to civilian work en masse after WWII<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/357958/original/file-20200914-22-1mt3e9f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=21%2C21%2C4800%2C3217&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">After the end of the war, millions of servicemen and women needed a job.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/blyth-northumberland-england-may-16-2015-278465540">Coxy58/Shutterstock</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>The present government’s struggle to get Britain back to work amid the pandemic looks a little less daunting when compared to the challenge that faced its predecessor in 1945. In <a href="https://www.hachette.co.uk/titles/maureen-waller-2/london-1945/9781529338164/">her fine account</a> of the war’s end, historian Maureen Waller reminds us that at the beginning of September 1945, 4,243,000 men and 437,000 women were serving in the armed forces. Many were frantic to come home and their skills were needed desperately.</p>
<p>Ernest Bevin, minister of labour in the wartime coalition, had started planning for their demobilisation in 1942, but his plans had assumed that war against Japan would drag on after the defeat of Germany, allowing time for gradual demobilisation. Instead, the atomic attacks on Hiroshima and Nagasaki brought the fighting to a sudden end. Labour’s victory in the 1945 general election added to the pressure: the party’s manifesto had promised immense change. </p>
<p>Social historian David Kynaston recalls <a href="https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/austerity-britain-a-world-to-build-9780747585404">the problems</a> facing the new government. Three quarters of a million homes had been destroyed or were badly damaged and much surviving housing consisted of “Victorian slums in the major cities and large pockets of overcrowded, inadequate-to-wretched housing almost everywhere”. National debt had ballooned to £3.5 billion.</p>
<p>With Bevin promoted to foreign secretary, his successor at Labour and National Service was the veteran trades unionist George Isaacs. In September 1945, Isaacs represented the government at the Trades Union Congress (TUC) conference in Blackpool. My <a href="https://durham.academia.edu/TimLuckhurst">own research</a> in historic newspaper archives reveals the mood of delegates meeting there. </p>
<h2>Manpower key to reconstruction</h2>
<p>The Manchester Guardian gave extensive coverage to a speech by the former miner, now TUC President Ebby Edwards on September 11 1945. Edwards insisted that manpower was the key to reconstruction. On VE Day, civilian industries employed 4 million fewer workers than in 1939. Edwards warned that “if the government is so ill-advised as to attempt to hold men in the national forces indefinitely, there will be grave danger of a repetition of the incidents that marked demobilisation at the end of the last war”. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/pathways/firstworldwar/spotlights/demobilisation.htm">demobilisation scheme devised in 1917</a> meant that men who had served longest were generally the last to be demobilised. This provoked mutinies at British army camps in Calais and Folkestone and a demonstration by 3,000 soldiers in central London. </p>
<figure class="align-right zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/357941/original/file-20200914-22-rsastq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Clement Attlee Labour prime minister 1945" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/357941/original/file-20200914-22-rsastq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/357941/original/file-20200914-22-rsastq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=788&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/357941/original/file-20200914-22-rsastq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=788&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/357941/original/file-20200914-22-rsastq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=788&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/357941/original/file-20200914-22-rsastq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=991&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/357941/original/file-20200914-22-rsastq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=991&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/357941/original/file-20200914-22-rsastq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=991&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">Clement Attlee became Labour prime minister in July 1945.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clement_Attlee#/media/File:Person_attlee2.jpg">Wikipedia</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The Manchester Guardian reported that Clement Attlee, who became the Labour prime minister in July 1945, was acutely aware that demobilisation in 1945 must be fairer and faster. Attlee estimated that to get industry and services working again “an increase of about 5 million workers was required”. He said his government was determined “to do justice between all those who were serving and in particular to those serving overseas”.</p>
<p>The Times, still, in 1945 an elite, establishment broadsheet, was not an instinctive cheerleader for Attlee’s proudly socialist government. On September 14 1945 its editorial regretted the absence of “detailed information about many important aspects of demobilization policy”. </p>
<p>The Times conceded that: “Since the final surrender in South-East Asia occurred so recently … Ministers may reasonably ask for a few weeks more to complete their plans.” However, Britons would “expect an early instalment of the speeding up of which, as the Prime Minister has said, the demobilization plan is capable”.</p>
<p>The Economist, a weekly political publication read by opinion formers, <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/1461670X.2014.944367">took the view</a> that Bevin’s original plan for demobilisation was based on sound principles. He had recognised that those who had served longest should be released from the armed services first. His scheme gave priority to housebuilders who had urgently needed skills. However, The Economist sought a rebalancing of military and civilian power. “Instead of the service departments telling the civilians how many they can release,” it declared on September 15, “the civilians should tell the military how many they may keep”. Speed was essential.</p>
<p>For soldiers, sailors and airmen who had been abroad for years, no return date could be too early. If today’s government is grappling with a desperately complex balancing of risk and reward, their predecessors faced an equally urgent desire for the fairer world Labour had promised its voters. A few at least were already displaying their impatience in letters to the fiercely pro-government Daily Mirror, which remained determined to represent “the ordinary bloke in all three services” and to voice “the grumbles and grievances of the private, the rating and the erk” (slang for an aircraftsman of the lowest rank in the Royal Air Force).</p>
<p>No politician under such pressure could fail to feel gratitude towards a loyalist of RAF man and Mirror reader I.A.C. Guthrie’s calibre. In his letter, published in the Mirror on September 24 1945, Guthrie defended the demobilisation scheme against “Irresponsible statements by public nonentities” who had convinced “numbers of servicemen that they are receiving a raw deal over demobbing”. This was unfair to Attlee’s new administration he explained, adding: “Only an irresponsible government would have tried to impress by a ‘lighting demob’ that would have done irretrievable harm to the country.”</p>
<p>Today such tribal loyalty is most frequently expressed not in newspapers but via social media, and not always in such polite English. Seventy-five years ago, this crisis ended reasonably well for Labour. Waller records that Attlee’s government demobilised a third of the armed forces by Christmas 1945 and the rest by Easter 1946.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/146166/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tim Luckhurst has received research funding from News UK and Ireland Ltd. He is a member of the Society of Editors and the Free Speech Union. This article is based on research for his current work in progress, a book for Bloomsbury Academic under the provisional title Reporting the Second World War. Newspapers and the Public in Wartime Britain </span></em></p>Demobilisation of millions after an abrupt end to war led to a political crisis 75 years ago.Tim Luckhurst, Principal of South College, Durham UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1123222019-02-28T11:10:46Z2019-02-28T11:10:46ZWhat rights do the children of Islamic State have under international law?<p>The case of Shamima Begum, the British teenager who, aged 15, left her home in London and travelled to Syria to join Islamic State, is not a one off. It’s now reported that <a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-47276572">a number more</a> women who left the UK to live in the Islamic State caliphate are now in refugee camps in Syria.</p>
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<p><em>You can listen to more articles from The Conversation, narrated by Noa, <a href="https://theconversation.com/uk/topics/audio-narrated-99682">here</a>.</em></p>
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<p>The UK dealt with the <a href="https://theconversation.com/shamima-begum-legality-of-revoking-british-citizenship-of-islamic-state-teenager-hangs-on-her-heritage-112163">Begum case by stripping her of citizenship</a>, a measure only possible because she appears eligible for Bangladeshi citizenship through her parents – despite a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2019/feb/20/rights-of-shamima-begums-son-not-affected-says-javid">denial of this</a> by Bangladesh. While the UK may hope this action absolves it of responsibility for Begum, the wider problem hasn’t gone away. </p>
<p>It’s unlikely that all of the other British women and girls involved in Islamic State will have dual citizenship. This makes it impossible to side step the difficult questions around how to deal with them by removing their citizenship – as rendering a person stateless contravenes international law. </p>
<p>The children of these women and girls – such as <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-47270857">Begum’s new baby boy</a>, born in a Syrian refugee camp – were born to British citizens. This means they fall under the jurisdiction of the UK, raising further issues around how the UK will ensure the children’s international legal rights and fulfil its international legal obligations.</p>
<h2>Child soldiers</h2>
<p>Under international standards, there’s a strong case that girls who joined Islamic State before they turned 18 were, in fact, child soldiers. The <a href="https://www.unicef.org/emerg/files/ParisPrinciples310107English.pdf">2007 Paris Principles</a>, formally endorsed by 105 states worldwide, including the UK, define a child soldier as:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>Any person below 18 years of age who is or who has been recruited or used by an armed force or armed group in any capacity, including but not limited to children … used as fighters, cooks, porters, messengers, spies or for sexual purposes. It does not only refer to a child who is taking or has taken a direct part in hostilities. </p>
</blockquote>
<p>These girls may not fit the stereotypical image of the child soldier as small, vulnerable, and forcibly abducted from their home by ruthless warlords and forced to fight. But they travelled to join Islamic State after being radicalised and recruited through the internet and social media machinery of a brutal terrorist group. Since then, many will have been sexually exploited by that group as the “wives” of Islamic State fighters, bearing multiple children, while still children themselves. Applying the definition of the Paris Principles, they can be considered child soldiers. </p>
<p>International law, under Article 39 of the <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/crc.aspx">Convention on the Rights of the Child</a> (CRC) and Article 6 of the <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/professionalinterest/pages/opaccrc.aspx">Optional Protocol on Children in Armed Conflict</a>, advocates approaching children who commit crimes while associated with armed groups as victims, with a focus on restorative justice and social reintegration. It’s those who recruit and use children as soldiers who should be prosecuted, as these actions constitute war crimes under international law. </p>
<p>Such an approach would require the UK to take all appropriate measures to promote the physical and psychological recovery and social reintegration of former child soldiers, including any children associated with Islamic State, in an environment which fosters health, self-respect and dignity. The situation becomes more complex when those concerned are no longer children, as the international legal protections cease to apply when the age of 18 is reached. This means that those such as Begum who spent the majority of their time with Islamic State as children, but are now adults, now fall outside the legal regimes protecting children. </p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/261405/original/file-20190228-106353-2old47.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/261405/original/file-20190228-106353-2old47.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=267&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261405/original/file-20190228-106353-2old47.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=267&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261405/original/file-20190228-106353-2old47.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=267&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261405/original/file-20190228-106353-2old47.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=336&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261405/original/file-20190228-106353-2old47.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=336&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261405/original/file-20190228-106353-2old47.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=336&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Shamima Begum (right) being interviewed by Sky News in a Syrian refugee camp in mid-February.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EWcJHxmXD1Q">Sky News via YouTube</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Children born of Islamic State</h2>
<p>Still, the international legal protections of the CRC will continue to apply in the cases of many of the children born to women and girls who are British citizens. </p>
<p>The UK is under binding, legal obligations to consider the best interests of these children, to ensure their rights to life, survival and development, to be legally registered with a name and nationality. As far as possible, they have rights to know and be cared for by their parents, and to the highest attainable standards of health and education. It seems unlikely that the best interests of these children will be served and their rights ensured if they are left in refugee camps or at the mercy of the Syrian state. </p>
<p>Difficult questions remain over what can and should be done with girls who joined Islamic State and their children. Other countries, such as Sierra Leone, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Sri Lanka and Colombia, haven’t had the luxury of washing their hands of the thousands of child soldiers, and the children born to them, whose actions during conflict were unlawful, socially destructive and morally reprehensible. Instead, they have worked within international frameworks to <a href="https://childrenandarmedconflict.un.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Reintergration-brochure-layout.pdf">find solutions</a> that have incorporated disarmament, demobilisation, rehabilitation, reintegration and education. </p>
<p>The UK may have dodged the Begum issue through the removal of her citizenship, but the real challenges around how to respond to child soldiers without dual nationality and how to ensure the rights of the children born to Islamic State “wives” have yet to be addressed.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/112322/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Alison Bisset does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>With more cases of women such as Shamima Begum expected, the UK is under legal obligations to protect the rights of any children involved.Alison Bisset, Associate Professor in International Human Rights Law, University of Reading, University of ReadingLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/836012017-10-16T00:36:09Z2017-10-16T00:36:09ZPeace makes strides in Colombia, but the battle is far from won<p>One year after Colombians initially <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/colombians-vote-on-historic-peace-agreement-with-farc-rebels/2016/10/02/8ef1a2a2-84b4-11e6-b57d-dd49277af02f_story.html">rejected a peace agreement with the FARC guerrilla group</a>, today the outlook for peace seems almost promising. On Oct. 10, the country’s constitutional court <a href="https://colombia2020.elespectador.com/politica/acuerdo-de-paz-una-politica-de-estado-por-12-anos">shielded that accord from any changes for a period of 12 years</a>, removing fears that future governments could water down or undo the controversial deal.</p>
<p>With this much-anticipated decision, nine judges made it possible for the country to institutionalize peace after 50 years of internal conflict. </p>
<p>But for all the speculation among scholars about the FARC’s transition from armed rebellion to political party – <a href="https://theconversation.com/colombias-farc-rebels-have-rebranded-as-a-political-party-now-they-need-a-leader-82728">my own included</a> – the end of the conflict remains uncertain. Colombia’s violence was never just about the FARC, and peace won’t be, either. </p>
<h2>Not just the FARC</h2>
<p>On the one hand, there are positive signs of calm in the country. On Oct. 1, <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/09/colombia-eln-leader-readies-troops-ceasefire-170930163656526.html">a ceasefire went into effect</a> with the National Liberation Army (ELN), <a href="http://www.warscapes.com/blog/eln-and-peace-colombia">the FARC’s lesser-known rebel sibling</a>. </p>
<p>Established in Colombia in 1964, the same year as the FARC, the ELN aimed to promote a <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-11400950">Cuban model of armed revolution in Colombia</a>. This set them apart from the FARC, with <a href="https://www.farc-ep.co/decima-conferencia/decima-conferencia-nacional-guerrillera.html">its Marxist-Leninist approach to social change</a>. So did the ELN’s less militaristic approach to violence. The group didn’t shy away from <a href="http://cdn.ideaspaz.org/media/website/document/529debc8a48fa.pdf">ambushing Colombia’s armed forces</a>, but its preferred methods were sabotage – bombing oil pipelines, <a href="http://www.verdadabierta.com/victimarios/eln/6293-radiografia-de-los-artefactos-explosivos-del-eln">laying landmine fields</a> – and extortion.</p>
<p>The ELN still has 1,500 to 2,000 troops stationed across the country, in <a href="http://www.insightcrime.org/news-analysis/despite-peace-talks-colombia-eln-guerrillas-continue-expansion">territory that intersects with areas once occupied by the FARC</a>. Thus, any narrative of the Colombian conflict that touts the FARC’s centrality risks missing the key role that the ELN must play in building a lasting peace. </p>
<p>As such, the ELN ceasefire is an important step in its peace process, which <a href="http://www.verdadabierta.com/procesos-de-paz/eln/6545-negociacion-con-el-eln-en-su-fase-publica">started in February 2017</a>. On Oct. 5, the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/the_americas/un-approves-monitoring-of-eln-rebel-cease-fire-in-colombia/2017/10/05/02416d52-aa14-11e7-9a98-07140d2eed02_story.html">U.N. announced a mission</a> to verify its implementation.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"916306751665983490"}"></div></p>
<p>This opens the door to broader deescalation of violence in Colombia, which remains high since the peace agreement. At least 200 human rights activists <a href="https://www.elespectador.com/noticias/investigacion/la-lista-roja-de-defensores-de-derechos-humanos-articulo-713488">have been killed over the past two years</a>, and <a href="https://elpais.com/internacional/2017/07/22/colombia/1500740630_359655.html">drug cartels, organized crime groups and paramilitary organizations</a> continue to operate in the country. This dangerous dynamic does not miraculously disappear along with the FARC, or the ELN for that matter. </p>
<p>Recidivism is another threat: In past peace efforts in Colombia, demobilized fighters from one rebel group simply <a href="https://www.wilsoncenter.org/sites/default/files/Peace.Conflict.Spanish.pdf">rejoined other armed organizations</a>. This fueled the war, giving it a continuity that went beyond particular organizations to become a kind of generalized social phenomenon.</p>
<h2>Spoiler alert</h2>
<p>Despite recent advances, implementing the FARC agreement is still a significant challenge: The accords are ambitious, and they must be carried out in a country whose populace <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-latin-america-37537252">voted against the peace agreement by a thin margin</a> just one year ago. </p>
<p>There were <a href="http://www.semana.com/nacion/articulo/acuerdo-de-paz-con-las-farc-enfoque-de-genero/504340">numerous conspiracy theories</a> floated during the peace talks, including allegations that the negotiations’ inclusion of gender and LGBTQ issues would promote a “homosexual agenda” in Colombia.</p>
<p><div data-react-class="Tweet" data-react-props="{"tweetId":"915945226937696256"}"></div></p>
<p>But the deal’s opponents raised <a href="https://theconversation.com/colombias-peace-plebiscite-the-case-for-yes-and-the-case-for-no-66325">valid claims</a>, too. Some <a href="http://www.warscapes.com/opinion/uncertainty-peace-agreements-and-public-participation-colombia">wondered</a> whether conflict victims would actually see justice served, while others expressed concerns about former rebels joining the political process. </p>
<p>In the end, many Colombians were profoundly uncertain about how the principles of the FARC agreement would be interpreted and implemented. Just over <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/oct/02/colombia-referendum-rejects-peace-deal-with-farc">50 percent of them rejected the peace agreement</a>, which ultimately had to be approved via a fast-tracked passage through Congress. </p>
<p>As the 2018 presidential election season heats up, some candidates and parties have found that <a href="http://www.eltiempo.com/politica/debate-en-redes-por-video-de-cambio-radical-contra-las-farc-137494">attacking the accords</a> is now a good way to mobilize votes. </p>
<p>This, in my assessment, is a dangerous electoral strategy. FARC fighters could interpret such political bluster as the state reneging on its commitments, which could in turn produce a spike in recidivism: Why should guerrillas hold up their end of the deal if the government won’t?</p>
<p>Indeed, there are already reports that demobilized fighters are being recruited by <a href="http://www.semana.com/nacion/articulo/choco-eln-y-autodefensas-oprimen-a-comunidades-advierte-hrw/527800">other armed groups</a>. This has real potential to foil the peace process.</p>
<p>The court’s decision has now shielded the agreement from populist proposals of renegotiating a “better deal.” But there are other reasons why the Colombian government could fail to keep its commitments to the FARC – namely the ongoing <a href="http://lasillavacia.com/el-duro-aterrizaje-de-las-farc-la-realidad-62692">challenges of implemention</a>. </p>
<p>From <a href="https://theconversation.com/latest-threat-to-colombias-peace-process-murders-a-kidnapping-delays-and-of-course-politics-73895">delays in disarming rebels</a> and underfunded mental health care for ex-combatants to setbacks in passing the laws necessary to activate components of the peace deal, the process has been fraught. </p>
<p>Colombia, a middle-income South American nation, may simply lack the institutional capacity necessary to fulfill its own landmark agreement. After all, a weak state unable to deliver on promises made to its citizens is one reason that warlords and armed actors <a href="http://www.altocomisionadoparalapaz.gov.co/mesadeconversaciones/PDF/Informe%20Comisi_n%20Hist_rica%20del%20Conflicto%20y%20sus%20V_ctimas.%20La%20Habana%2C%20Febrero%20de%202015.pdf">got so powerful there in the first place</a>. </p>
<h2>Political tensions</h2>
<p>There have been remarkable achievements, of course. In June, the FARC <a href="http://caracol.com.co/radio/2017/06/26/nacional/1498513260_592266.html">surrendered its weapons to the U.N.</a>, and its guerrillas are now concentrated in reintegration camps. The government has even managed to keep demobilized fighters safe throughout this process.</p>
<figure class="align-center ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190220/original/file-20171013-3520-1nplqxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/190220/original/file-20171013-3520-1nplqxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=378&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190220/original/file-20171013-3520-1nplqxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=378&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190220/original/file-20171013-3520-1nplqxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=378&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190220/original/file-20171013-3520-1nplqxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=475&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190220/original/file-20171013-3520-1nplqxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=475&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/190220/original/file-20171013-3520-1nplqxa.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=475&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The FARC: Not the only players in the game of peace.</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Fernando Vergara</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>But the next big hurdle is just around the corner: the phases of <a href="http://www.altocomisionadoparalapaz.gov.co/Documents/informes-especiales/abc-del-proceso-de-paz/abc-jurisdiccion-especial-paz.html">transitional justice and historical reckoning</a>. Colombia’s Congress is now debating legislation <a href="https://www.elespectador.com/noticias/politica/en-congreso-se-debate-la-ley-que-pone-en-marcha-la-jep-articulo-715151">detailing how FARC fighters will be punished</a>, or not, for their transgressions. </p>
<p>Lawmakers must also set up the <a href="http://www.altocomisionadoparalapaz.gov.co/Documents/informes-especiales/comision-verdad-proceso-paz/index.html">Colombian Truth Commission</a>, which will allow Colombians to understand, for the first time, the full extent of the atrocities committed in their country.</p>
<p>At present, this legislation is being filibustered by some right-wing politicians, who want Colombia’s transitional justice to be more punitive. Meanwhile, members of the Cambio Radical Party stand accused of seeking <a href="http://lasillavacia.com/el-presidente-santos-ha-quedado-rehen-de-su-coalicion-62873">bribes from President Juan Manuel Santos’ administration</a> in exchange for their votes. As the May 2018 election nears, such political tensions are likely to rise. </p>
<p><a href="https://theconversation.com/advice-for-colombia-from-countries-that-have-sought-peace-and-sometimes-found-it-67419">Peace-building often looks like this</a>. It’s messy and long and nonlinear, a national process that takes political leadership, sacrifice and no small dose of patience.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/83601/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Fabio Andrés Díaz Pabón does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A court decision securing last year’s peace deal and a new ceasefire have invigorated Colombia’s peace process, but there are plenty of ways it could still go wrong.Fabio Andrés Díaz Pabón, Researcher on Conflict, Peace and Development, International Institute of Social StudiesLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/799652017-07-17T00:38:08Z2017-07-17T00:38:08ZWhy police reforms rarely succeed: Lessons from Latin America<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/178326/original/file-20170715-14254-18b221a.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Riot police in Buenos Aires, Argentina.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AP Photo/Victor R. Caivano</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>President Donald Trump’s appointment of Attorney General Jeff Sessions has led people to <a href="https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/will-trump-reverse-obamas-push-for-greater-police-oversight/">speculate</a> about the fate of recent police reform efforts. </p>
<p>Early into his tenure, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/28/us/politics/jeff-sessions-crime.html">Sessions said</a> he intended to “pull back on” the Justice Department’s investigations of police department abuses, saying they diminish effectiveness.</p>
<p>Americans have mobilized extensively in the past three years against police brutality, militarization and corruption through the Black Lives Matter and related movements. Government officials at the federal level have responded to these demands by creating <a href="https://cops.usdoj.gov/pdf/taskforce/Implementation_Guide.pdf">specialized task forces</a> to recommend best practices, and investigating troubled police departments and <a href="http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/justice-departments-review-police-agreements-matters/story?id=46566294">enforcing reforms</a>. Courts have also worked to roll back <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/13/nyregion/stop-and-frisk-practice-violated-rights-judge-rules.html">unconstitutional stop-and-frisk policies</a>, while city governments have created <a href="http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/philip-eure-picked-nyc-inspector-general-nypd-article-1.1737785">independent oversight agencies</a> and enacted robust <a href="http://www.governing.com/topics/public-justice-safety/gov-how-cincinnati-got-its-cops-on-board-with-community-policing.html">community policing</a> programs. </p>
<p>But will it stick?</p>
<p>My research on police reform in Latin America shows that such reforms are highly vulnerable to political reversals. These cases reveal how they can be quickly rolled back before they can take hold and demonstrate results.</p>
<p>Understanding the politics of police reform in Latin America may be informative for those who hope for changes in policing in the U.S.</p>
<h2>Police reform and politics</h2>
<p>Leaders in <a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/267833394_La_reforma_de_la_policia_Colombiana_Esperanzas_o_frustraciones">Colombia</a> and <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/Seguridad_democracia_y_reforma_del_siste.html?id=8KwEAQAAIAAJ">Buenos Aires Province, Argentina,</a> overhauled their police institutions in 1993 and 1998, respectively. These reforms were a response to rising crime rates, as well as pervasive police violence, corruption and ineffectiveness in fighting crime.</p>
<p>Comprehensive <a href="http://www.alcaldiabogota.gov.co/sisjur/normas/Norma1.jsp?i=6943">police reform</a> <a href="http://www.gob.gba.gov.ar/legislacion/legislacion/l-12154.html">laws</a> were crafted through broad political consensus. Lawmakers in the Colombian congress and the Buenos Aires provincial legislature enacted sweeping legislation to demilitarize, decentralize and professionalize Colombia’s National Police and the Police of Buenos Aires Province. The reforms also improved recruitment standards and training, strengthened oversight agencies and created formal spaces for community participation. </p>
<p>Only one year after reforms were passed, however, Ernesto Samper was elected president of Colombia. He vowed to undermine his predecessor’s dramatic overhaul of the National Police, saying his government would “<a href="http://www.eltiempo.com/archivo/documento/MAM-500653">let the police regulate itself</a>.” </p>
<p>Similarly in Buenos Aires Province, Carlos Ruckauf was elected governor in 1999. He left his predecessor’s police reform legislation intact. However, he made his preferred approach to crime-fighting clear: “<a href="https://www.clarin.com/politica/seguridad-desato-debate-duhaldismo_0_S12g6lRte.html">we have to hit the criminals with bullets</a>.” </p>
<p>Both politicians used citizens’ concerns over rising crime to lead calls for greater police autonomy, in order to be “tougher” on crime. Under their administrations, hard-fought police reform gave way to periods of “<a href="http://pdba.georgetown.edu/Security/citizensecurity/Colombia/evaluaciones/reformasycontrarreformas.pdf">counter-reform</a>.” These were <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/20488148?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents">characterized by</a> increased police autonomy, weakened accountability, militarization, unchecked corruption and <a href="http://www.cels.org.ar/web/wp-content/uploads/2016/10/IA2000.pdf">extrajudicial killings</a>.</p>
<p>Other research on policing in Latin America has provided compelling evidence of the impact of such <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1470-9856.2008.00270.x/abstract">political rhetoric</a>. When politicians promoting “tougher” police strategies are elected, <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/210702">police killings</a> and repression of citizens increase.</p>
<p>These examples reveal how the long-term aims of police reforms can be difficult to reconcile with the short-term goals of politicians. </p>
<h2>Police support for reform</h2>
<p>My research also demonstrates that police forces that are resistant to reforms have considerable power to undermine them. In Buenos Aires Province, police officials <a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/pad.1752/abstract">succeeded in dismantling</a> a system of neighborhood security forums that allowed citizens to conduct oversight of police. Police officials felt the forums gave citizens too much control over police affairs. As a result, they lobbied the governor and security minister to reduce the funding and staff needed to implement them. </p>
<p>By contrast, <a href="http://www.conseg.sp.gov.br">a similar participatory system</a> in São Paulo, Brazil, has endured for three decades. There, police are incorporated into the governance structure of the community councils, allowing for a more collaborative relationship. As a result, many police officers have come to see forum members as their advocates. Although citizens in São Paulo do not have oversight authority, the police’s cooperation has contributed to the persistence of these participatory spaces. </p>
<p>Thus, reformers must identify and bolster police officials with a stake in sustaining reforms. Without support from insiders, reform is unlikely to last.</p>
<h2>Sustaining momentum</h2>
<p>Police reform is also made vulnerable by the fact that, after reform passes, its proponents demobilize. In Buenos Aires and Colombia, human rights and activist organizations remained active when politicians began to reverse reforms. But the broadly shared societal outrage that led to reform in the first place dissipated. With it went the momentum needed to sustain reform in the long term.</p>
<p>Research from both <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1023%2FB%3APOBE.0000035959.35567.16?LI=true">the U.S.</a> and <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/article/504728/pdf">Latin America</a> has shown that campaigning for “tough on crime” policies, or “<a href="https://global.oup.com/academic/product/penal-populism-and-public-opinion-9780195136234?cc=us&lang=en&">penal populism</a>,” is a highly successful strategy for winning elections. As scholars have shown, such policies can <a href="http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/1462474503005001293">generate broad support</a> among a diverse set of voters. So-called <a href="https://books.google.com/books/about/Contesting_the_Iron_Fist.html?id=Sms2zfTVkLQC">“pro-order” coalitions</a>, the collection of civil society organizations, media outlets and politicians that advocate for “<a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/studies-in-american-political-development/article/frontlash-race-and-the-development-of-punitive-crime-policy/9744286F944F1A250B94CD3AFB1A6021">law and order</a>” policies, have similarly demonstrated great capacity to mobilize resources and public support. </p>
<p>Failing to sustain reform coalitions means there is little counterweight to these pressures.</p>
<h2>‘Counter-reform’ in the US?</h2>
<p>Is the U.S. entering a period of “counter-reform” similar to that observed in Colombia and Argentina? </p>
<p>Opponents of reform, <a href="http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/02/27/517583304/attorney-general-jeff-session-focuses-on-violent-crime-and-police-morale">including Sessions</a>, warn of “a longer-term trend of violent crime going up.” They have also <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2017/02/28/us/politics/jeff-sessions-crime.html">floated theories</a> such as the “<a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/volokh-conspiracy/wp/2016/07/20/the-ferguson-effect/?utm_term=.de83be86f565">Ferguson effect</a>,” the idea that growing scrutiny of police activity has made police more timid. Such arguments may scare voters into believing that police reform may make police less effective in fighting crime.</p>
<p>Meanwhile, President Trump has engaged in rhetoric similar to his Colombian and Argentine counterparts. As a candidate, he called on police to be “<a href="http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-trump-chicago-police-crime-met-20160823-story.html">very much tougher</a>” in fighting crime. As president, he has said his will be “<a href="https://www.whitehouse.gov/law-enforcement-community">a law-and-order administration</a>” that will “empower” police.</p>
<p>It is too early to tell whether these police reform efforts will backslide. While the U.S. context differs in some ways from Latin America, these examples demonstrate that police reform is a continuous and contentious process that is difficult to achieve and highly prone to reversal.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/79965/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Yanilda González received funding for this research from the Social Science Research Council and Open Society Foundations.</span></em></p>Research shows how politics can easily halt reforms that require time to take effect.Yanilda González, Assistant Professor, School of Social Service Administration, University of ChicagoLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/793172017-06-21T15:19:33Z2017-06-21T15:19:33ZWhy ex-combatants pose a threat to Côte d’Ivoire’s stability<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/174022/original/file-20170615-23537-17eka4n.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A soldier stands guard after a clash with demobilised ex-rebel fighters at the entrance of Bouaké,Côte d'Ivoire, 23 May 2017. </span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">REUTERS/Abdul Fatai </span></span></figcaption></figure><p>Dissatisfied ex-combatants who aren’t serving in Côte d’Ivoire’s formal military structures pose the biggest long-term threat to the stability of the country. This is particularly true in regions where groups of these men were present during the civil wars.</p>
<p>At least 42,564 ex-combatants <a href="http://www.refworld.org/pdfid/4912a5832.pdf">emerged</a> out of Côte d’Ivoire’s <a href="http://www.war-memorial.net/Civil-War-in-C%C3%B4te-d-Ivoire--3.248">first</a> civil war which stretched from 2002 to 2007. By the end of the <a href="https://www.insightonconflict.org/conflicts/ivory-coast/conflict-profile/">second</a> civil war, which started in 2010 and ended in 2011, the number of ex-combatants had risen to <a href="https://peaceaccords.nd.edu/provision/demobilization-ouagadougou-political-agreement-opa#footnoteref17_ems8269">74,000</a>. </p>
<p>The Ivorian government set out to integrate only about <a href="http://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-39933868">8,400 ex-combatants</a> into the national army. The majority of ex-combatants were supposed to go through a regular disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration (DDR) programme. The programme <a href="http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/issues/ddr.shtml">was designed to</a> remove weapons from combatants and take them out of military structures by helping them to integrate socially and economically into society. </p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.un.org/apps/newsFr/storyF.asp?NewsID=39695#.WUlcpXdh3oz">UN claims</a> that the programme in Cote d'Ivoire has been successful. But recent protests and <a href="https://www.voanews.com/a/ex-combattants-face-uncertain-future-in-ivory-coast/1659849.html">reports of disorder</a> perpetuated by ex-combatants in Bouaké are evidence that the process hasn’t been seamless. Former combatants – particularly those who weren’t enlisted in the army – continue to pose a threat to the country’s stability. </p>
<p>But the government’s efforts at integrating former combantants into the national army hasn’t worked particularly well either as was evident recently when they <a href="http://www.africanews.com/2017/01/06/ivory-coast-ex-combatants-seize-weapons-and-takeover-former-rebel-city//">mutinied</a>. Their demand for financial bonuses, which they said had been promised to them, was only resolved after the government offered to pay them a total of <a href="http://africanarguments.org/2017/05/17/cote-divoire-the-mutiny-may-be-over-but-the-armys-problems-are-not/">about</a> $12,000.</p>
<p>This had a ripple effect, and set off a <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2017-05-23/clashes-between-ivory-coast-police-ex-rebels-leave-three-dead">new wave of violence</a> by ex-combatants enrolled in the disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration programme. They too wanted payment from the government.</p>
<p>The reason for these episodes is therefore down to the different incentives and opportunities offered to both groups. </p>
<h2>A recurring issue</h2>
<p><a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/isqu.12186/full">Research</a> into the disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration programmes has highlighted some serious flaws. The programmes don’t sufficiently address the destitute state that ex-combatants find themselves in. This problem doesn’t just affect Côte d’Ivoire. It’s been a <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-amnesty-efforts-in-the-niger-delta-triggered-new-violence-74085">recurring issue</a> in conflict affected societies where similar programmes have been applied, such as Nigeria, <a href="http://www.irinnews.org/report/95045/nepal-%22disqualified%22-maoist-ex-combatants-threaten-step-protests">Nepal</a> and <a href="http://allafrica.com/stories/201207190363.html">Angola</a>. </p>
<p>Côte d’Ivoirian <a href="http://koaci.com/cote-divoire-demobilises-testent-nouvelle-fois-forces-lordre-gesco-109510.html">ex-combatants</a> that carried out the recent protests aren’t interested in the disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration programme. This is because many of them face an uncertain future with dim job prospects. And their situation seems much worse than their compatriots who have been integrated in the military, securing jobs and financial rewards. </p>
<p>This issue needs to be addressed to reduce the risks of conflict recurrence and instability in Côte d’Ivoire.</p>
<p><a href="http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.0361-3666.2005.00323.x/epdf">Research</a> shows that cash payments, known as reinsertion grants, are an important component of these kinds of programmes. Payments ensure that ex-combatants don’t burden their families and communities. In some instances, this is a one-off grant. In most cases, ex-combatants get an agreed sum that could last up to 12 months. <a href="https://theconversation.com/how-amnesty-efforts-in-the-niger-delta-triggered-new-violence-74085">In Nigeria</a> ex-combatants have received monthly payments for more than five years. But this is an exception.</p>
<p>In addition to these financial payments, ex-combatants receive vocational training. In principle, the grants are terminated at the end of it. Ex-combatants are expected to find jobs based on the skills they have gained. The results have been mixed. <a href="https://onuci.unmissions.org/en/ex-combatants-received-training-certificates-masonry-carpentry-electricity-and-plumbing-unoci">UN reports</a> that many ex-combatants gained new skills but that these didn’t translate into employment for all of them. </p>
<h2>Reintegration in Côte d’Ivoire</h2>
<p>The first programme in Côte d’Ivoire was part of a <a href="http://unscr.com/en/resolutions/1609">UN resolution</a> to facilitate the reintegration of ex-combatants that participated in the first Ivorian civil war.</p>
<p>The <a href="http://www.unddr.org/country-overview/cote-d-ivoire_4.aspx">plan</a> stated that ex-combatants would be entitled to a reinsertion grant of 499,500 CFA (USD$850) over a period of six months. At the end of demobilisation, ex-combatants interested in resuming studies would receive an additional education grant. Those interested in entrepreneurship or agricultural projects would receive micro-credit loans ranging from $170 to $300 per individual.</p>
<p>Violence broke out again in 2010 <a href="http://www.france24.com/en/20101221-ivory-coast-fear-violence-abidjan-gbagbo-resists-international-pressure-ouattara">after</a> Laurent Gbagbo refused to step down after losing the presidential election to Alassane Ouattara. Many ex-combatants rejoined armed factions, such as the <a href="http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/world/africa/iv-army-fafn.htm"><em>Forces Nouvelles</em></a>, to fight in the <a href="https://www.onwar.com/aced/chrono/c2000s/yr10/secondcivilwarivory2010.htm">second war</a>. This created the need for a <a href="http://www.irinnews.org/news/2012/06/29/will-ddr-work-time">new programme</a>. </p>
<p>Once he was in office Ouattara <a href="http://www.irinnews.org/feature/2011/10/05/rebranding-army">implemented reforms</a> to manage the armed groups that had been active in the second war. These included the integration of some rebel factions into the national army based on an <a href="https://peaceaccords.nd.edu/provision/demobilization-ouagadougou-political-agreement-opa">agreement</a> between the rebels and the Ivorian government. This was followed by the establishment of the Authority for Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration. Its focus is on ex-combatants who were not integrated into the national army. It provided transitional financial support and vocational training to facilitate their reintegration back into society. <a href="https://issafrica.org/events/view-on-africa-cote-divoire-which-challenges-remain-in-the-peacebuilding-process">Under it</a>, at least 90% of 74,000 ex-combatants were disarmed, demobilised and reintegrated. </p>
<p>But the recent incidents show that there are many groups that are dissatisfied and that there is still instability within the armed forces. </p>
<h2>The way forward</h2>
<p>It is important for the Ivorian government to design appropriate policies that reorient ex-combatants towards meaningful reintegration instead of renegotiating cash payments as a reward for their participation in the civil war. </p>
<p>In Colombia, for example, <a href="http://www.reuters.com/article/us-colombia-deforestation-peace-idUSKBN19102V">new approaches</a> that connect economic, political and social reintegration are beginning to take root. These allow ex-combatants to participate in issues such as environmental conservation and protection that are important to their communities, while earning a living. </p>
<p>This approach could prove useful in places such as Côte d’Ivoire as the country rethinks its reintegration programme. This is because reintegration is not just about finding jobs, but also about finding meaning and connecting ex-combatants to a purpose beyond the individual.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/79317/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Tarila Marclint Ebiede received funding from Marie Curie Sustainable Peacebuilding (SPBuild) fellowship, awarded within the Initial Training Network under the Marie Curie Action of the Seventh Framework Programme (F7) for his PhD research.</span></em></p>Côte d'Ivoire’s government needs to provide different incentives and opportunities to former combatants.Tarila Marclint Ebiede, PhD researcher, KU LeuvenLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/644522016-08-26T20:19:48Z2016-08-26T20:19:48ZA momentous peace deal with the FARC – so what next for Colombia?<p>The groundbreaking news reached me when I was in Bogotá in a meeting with the head of the Colombian Army: after more than 50 years of armed conflict, and four years of negotiations, the Colombian government and the leftist guerrilla group, the FARC, have reached a final <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-37180752">peace agreement</a>. The historic deal looks set to bring to an end the longest running war of recent history. The agreement is cause for huge celebration, but an official end to war with the FARC is only the start of the road to peace. </p>
<p>Securing sustainable peace needs a balance of addressing the immediate security risks during <a href="http://www.politics.ox.ac.uk/publications/securing-peace-in-the-borderlands-a-post-agreement-strategy-for-colombia.html">the period of transition</a>, as well as anticipating the long-term challenges that may emerge. </p>
<h2>‘Yes’ or ‘no’ to peace</h2>
<p>The deal states that the FARC will lay down their arms and make the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/aug/24/colombia-government-farc-rebels-peace-deal-52-year-war">transition</a> towards being a legally recognised political party. On Monday, 29 August, the definite bilateral ceasefire will start. This will be no easy task for the guerrillas, who began their fight against the state back in the mid-1960s as a leftist group championing the needs of the rural dispossessed. <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/25/colombia-conflict-death-toll-commission">More than 220,000</a> have been killed in the ensuing conflict which became every time more intertwined with the illicit drug trade, involving not only the FARC, but also other insurgent, paramilitary and criminal groups. </p>
<p>The deal is proof that the government and the FARC are making a huge step forward towards peace in the violence-ridden country. But despite such a momentous agreement, the peace deal, including the proposed 180-day long demobilisation process, is still subject to the approval of the Colombian population. A “yes” or “no” referendum is due to be held on October 2. It is not yet clear cut which side will win.</p>
<p>It might be hard for the casual observer to see why the Colombian people wouldn’t want peace. But both in the large cities and in rural regions some people’s enthusiasm for peace has clashed with the scepticism of others. As a taxi driver in the capital city, Bogotá, put it to me on the morning after the peace deal – how can Colombians be sure that ex-FARC combatants, after a life in the jungle, will be able to reintegrate into civilian life? Will they not use the demobilisation as a pretext to continue life as entrepreneurs of violence, fuelling insecurity in urban areas? </p>
<p>On the other hand, we have to consider that people in marginalised rural regions, who have been hit hardest by the ongoing fighting face huge uncertainty. For generations, their lives have been <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2011/apr/23/colombia-farc-killed-mothers-justice">caught up</a> with the fighting. Without knowing what peace will bring, and whether the situation may deteriorate, they might prefer to maintain the status quo. </p>
<p>Local elites could also jeopardise the process if they stand to lose some of their considerable power as a result of the peace agreements. Any threat to their political or economic position, may give them an incentive to violently deter state interventions.</p>
<p>The government will need to reassure people that voting for peace will produce positive change. Engaging in a dialogue with rural populations on the ground is key. This should go beyond sending messages from Bogotá, and should include the different indigenous languages spoken in Colombia, to show a real commitment to those people.</p>
<h2>Protecting civilians</h2>
<p>If “yes” wins the vote and the deal goes ahead prioritising the protection of civilians is critical. In the immediate post-FARC period more violence is possible, as a number of other armed groups –- old and new, leftist and rightist –- fight to take the FARC’s place. </p>
<p>In many parts of the country, third parties are often better placed than the state to fill <a href="https://theconversation.com/colombias-deal-with-the-farc-could-bring-peace-or-create-a-power-vacuum-48130">power vacuums</a>. The <a href="http://www.cfr.org/colombia/colombias-civil-conflict/p9272">leftist ELN group</a>, for example, has assumed governance functions such as the provision of basic services or conflict resolution in regions such as Arauca, in north-east Colombia, for decades, ensuring local support where the state has been absent. Life will be extremely unstable for local people until it becomes clear who the new “ruler” is. </p>
<p>Civilians living in areas where the FARC were previously operating could also be stigmatised as FARC collaborators. Without the FARC’s protection, civilians’ lives are at risk if they are exposed to violence from any of the other armed groups still active in Colombia. Equally, civilians risk punishment by groups other than the FARC for participating in processes perceived to be against their interests, such as the peace deal.</p>
<p>The management of risks to civilian security in the initial transition period is therefore critical to long term stability. To this end, the country’s security apparatus and the <a href="http://colombia.unmissions.org/en/mandate">United Nations Mission in Colombia</a> are busy preparing the complex process of the FARC’s demobilisation.</p>
<h2>The ins and outs</h2>
<p>The UN is mandated to collect weapons and monitor the disarmament process, to take place in 23 “normalisation zones” and eight <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/monkey-cage/wp/2016/06/28/tk-tk-colombias-margin-states-and-the-peace-process/">camps</a> that the government and the FARC had identified together. In these territories, which are distributed across the country, former FARC combatants will gather to lay down their arms and prepare themselves for reintegration into civilian life. </p>
<p>The normalisation zones will be surrounded and secured by three safety rings. The UN and international observers are in charge of the inner one, the police are charge of the middle one, and the armed forces of the outer ring. </p>
<p>Preventing violence within the zones is of the highest priority. Yet the armed forces will have to be prepared against threats from the outside. These could come from armed groups such as the ELN, or one of the many right-wing and criminal groups involved in the illicit drug trade and other forms of transnational organised crime that plague the country. </p>
<p>Just one unintended shot could have destabilising effects for the entire demobilisation process. Protocols have been put in place to avoid or address even a single soldier’s mistake on the tactical level. </p>
<p>High levels of international attention and the presence of UN observers in the field are likely to deter violent actions in or near to the normalisation zones. However, once the UN leaves and the normalisation zones cease to exist, violence may return. </p>
<p>Unresolved grievances may also fuel acts of retaliation by other armed groups against former combatants. These ex-FARC members will also be vulnerable to recruitment (by force or willingly) by other violent non-state groups. As a result, groups such as the ELN may be strengthened.</p>
<h2>The long term</h2>
<p>After the immediate demobilisation process is over, a reshuffling of participants in illicit activities will produce power struggles over roles in the drug trade, gasoline smuggling, human trafficking, sexual exploitation and other forms of organised crime. </p>
<p>Both ex-guerrillas, and military personnel who may have to leave the armed forces due to budget cuts will now face the difficulties of a transition into civilian life. Reintegration programmes are crucial not only for former combatants but also for those who have served their country for years.</p>
<p>Securing peace therefore requires the coordination of all security-related government institutions across ministries, in partnership with the UN, and in line with the protection needs of civilians. This joint effort can boost confidence in tackling both immediate and long-term security challenges, paving the way for the Colombian people to vote “yes” to peace.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/64452/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Annette Idler received funding from UK Higher Education Innovation Funding. </span></em></p>History was made with the agreement between the Colombian government and the FARC. Making the gesture a reality will require a concerted effort from all involved.Annette Idler, Director of Studies, Changing Character of War Programme, University of OxfordLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.