Peacebuilding, power, and politics in Africa
By: edited by Devon Curtis and Gwinyayi A. Dzinesa ; foreword by Adekeye Adebajo
Series: Cambridge Centre of African Studies series; Cambridge Centre of African Studies series
Publisher: Ohio University Press
Published: 2012
Place of publication: Athens
Language: eng
Number of pages: 353
ISBN-13: 9780821420133; 9780821444320
Subjects: International cooperation; Peace-building; Politics and government
Description: "Peacebuilding, Power, and Politics in Africa is a critical reflection on peacebuilding efforts in Africa. The authors expose the tensions and contradictions in different clusters of peacebuilding activities, including peace negotiations; statebuilding; security sector governance; and disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration. Essays also address the institutional framework for peacebuilding in Africa and the ideological underpinnings of key institutions, including the African Union, NEPAD, the African Development Bank, the Pan-African Ministers Conference for Public and Civil Service, the UN Peacebuilding Commission, the World Bank, and the International Criminal Court. The volume includes on-the-ground case study chapters on Sudan, the Great Lakes Region of Africa, Sierra Leone and Liberia, the Niger Delta, Southern Africa, and Somalia, analyzing how peacebuilding operates in particular African contexts.

The authors adopt a variety of approaches, but they share a conviction that peacebuilding in Africa is not a script that is authored solely in Western capitals and in the corridors of the United Nations. Rather, the writers in this volume focus on the interaction between local and global ideas and practices in the reconstitution of authority and livelihoods after conflict. The book systematically showcases the tensions that occur within and between the many actors involved in the peacebuilding industry, as well as their intended beneficiaries. It looks at the multiple ways in which peacebuilding ideas and initiatives are reinforced, questioned, reappropriated, and redesigned by different African actors."--pub. desc.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references and index.
Table of contents: title: Introduction : The contested politics of peacebuilding in Africa / Devon Curtis; title: Peace as an incentive for war / David Keen; title: Statebuilding and governance : the conundrums of legitimacy and local ownership / Dominik Zaum; title: Security sector governance and peacebuilding / Eboe Hutchful; title: The limits of disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration / Paul Omach; title: The role of the African Union, new partnership for Africa's development, and African Development Bank in postconflict reconstruction and peacebuilding / Gilbert M. Khadiagala; title: Peacebuilding as governance : the case of the Pan-African Ministers Conference for Public and Service / Chris Landsberg; title: The United Nations Peacebuilding Commission : problems and prospects / 'Funmi Olonisakin and Eka Ikpe; title: Financing peace? : the World Bank, reconstruction, and liberal peacebuilding / Graham Harrison; title: The International Criminal Court : a peacebuilder in Africa? / Sarah Nouwen; title: Sudan : the politics of negotiating peace / Sharath Srinivasan; title: Peacebuilding in the Great Lakes Region of Africa / René Lemarchand; title: Peacebuilding through statebuilding in West Africa? : the cases of Sierra Leone and Liberia / Comfort Ero; title: Oil and peacebuilding in the Niger Delta / Aderoju Oyefusi; title: Disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration in Southern Africa : Namibia, Angola, and Mozambique / Gwinyayi A. Dzinesa; title: Peacebuilding without a state : the Somali experience / Christopher Clapham.