The document discusses the peace and security cluster of NEPAD and the African Union. It provides context on the causes and nature of conflicts in Africa. Key points include: - NEPAD recognizes the importance of peace and security but its understanding of the link between governance, security, and development is limited. - Democracy, good governance, and human rights need to be explicitly prioritized to effectively link human security to development. - Africa's conflicts are complex with roots in economic issues, shifts in global power, and the proliferation of small arms exacerbating internal divisions. - A human security approach focusing on democracy, political solutions, and collective security is needed to build peace.

1. Preventing Conflict and Promoting Peace and Security within
NEPAD and the African Union – Some Preliminary Comments 1
By J. ‘Kayode Fayemi2
For most people today, a feeling of insecurity arises more from worries about the daily life
than from the dread of a cataclysmic world event. Job security, income security, health
security, environmental security, security from crime, these are the emerging concerns of
human security all over the world.
UNDP, Human Development Report,
1994
I have been asked to make my intervention on the peace and security clusters of the
NEPAD document, focusing on the operational challenges and prospects for its
realisation. I would like to start by prefacing my presentation with a general comment.
There are many reasons why Africans should be enthusiastic about NEPAD’s wide-
ranging vision for promoting good governance, conflict prevention, fair trade, debt
repayment, and poverty reduction. However, it is also important to question the neo-
liberal orthodoxy that has informed NEPAD whilst arguing for its grounding in
historical context. My presentation therefore examines the peace and security cluster
of NEPAD within the framework of the entire NEPAD Strategy document, highlight
what I consider to be good aspects of the cluster, providing a critical perspective of its
overarching order whilst emphasising the need for African ownership of the process
and products of NEPAD, especially in the context of a newly established African
Union (AU). In this context, my own view is that the official promoters of NEPAD
must recognise the need for genuine partnership with the African people if the vision
is to be translated into concrete initiatives, since the people have so far played little or
no part in NEPAD’s conception, design and formulation so far.
1
Being paper prepared for presentation at the CDD Seminar on NEPAD: Challenges and Prospects
held at the Royal Commonwealth Club, London in June 2002.
2
Kayode Fayemi is Director of the Centre for Democracy & Development; Lagos and London.
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2. Whilst the original NEPAD document released after the October 2001 meeting
of its Heads of State Implementation Committee (HSIC) in Abuja recognised the
centrality of peace and security to Africa’s development agenda, the document
clearly exhibits a limited understanding of the linkage between governance, security
and development. A closer reading of the four key areas for policy intervention in the
document – a) Development of early warning systems; (b) Post conflict reconstruction
and development, including disarmament, demobilisation and rehabilitation; c) Action
to curb the illicit proliferation, circulation and trafficking of small arms and light
weapons on the continent and d) promotion of peace support operations – reveals this
link to be tenuous and superficial with very little attention paid to a holistic peace
building and human security approach to development. The March 2002 meeting of
the HSIC developed this cluster in a more comprehensive manner by adding four key
aspects – namely, 1) Support of efforts to promote democracy, good governance and
respect for human rights through appropriate policy and institutional reforms; (2)
Enhancement of capacity to conduct thorough and inclusive strategic assessments of
situations in regions affected by conflict, (3) Resource mobilisation for the African
Union Peace Fund and finally, the HSIC summit also pushed for the ratification of the
OAU Convention on Combating Terrorism as a means of addressing the regional
dimension of this problem.
The March 2002 meeting equally addressed another critical cog in the wheel
of operationalising the peace and security cluster by acknowledging the unclear
relationship between NEPAD and the OAU Secretariat, especially the Conflict
Management Centre charged with the responsibilities for operationalising the
Mechanism for Conflict Prevention, Management and Resolution as well as the
relationship between the peace and security clusters of NEPAD and the security and
stability calabashes of the Conference on Security, Stability Development and
Cooperation in Africa (CSSDCA), already incorporated into the OAU since its
adoption at the Lome Summit of 1999. Also the relationship between Regional
Economic Communities (RECS) and NEPAD in the promotion of peace and security
also received some attention at the March meeting. I should state at this point that
extensive work has been done on the NEPAD document and the revised Central
Organ document of the Mechanism for Conflict Prevention, Management and
Resolution by a Committee of OAU Ambassadors with a group of experts leading to
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3. the recommendation to consolidate both aspects into the work of a new organ of the
African Union to be known as the Peace and Security Council.
In my view, the most critical addition to the list of priority areas by the HSIC
at their March 2002 meeting were those underscoring the need to promote democracy,
good governance and respect for human rights through appropriate policy and
institutional reforms. Although this was an assumption that runs through the entire
NEPAD document, stating it explicitly as a priority area elaborates on the purpose,
object, and the mechanisms for the attainment of security and peace and moves the
peace and security cluster away from the traditional, military and state-centric focus
of the original priority areas. Democratising security to prevent conflict and build
peace also captures the very essence of human security and effectively links human
security to human development by underscoring the fact that both require democratic
governance in order to attain peace. This recognition of the need to re-conceptualise
‘security’ in a more responsive direction with a move away from the traditional
emphasis on national/state security to a focus on ‘human security’ with an expansion
in the scope of the concept from its narrow meaning of (physical security) to include
access to the means of life, the provision of essential goods, a clean and sustainable
environment as well as human rights and democratic freedoms is clearly
commendable and ought to be the critical scaffolding for the implementation of the
NEPAD agenda.
Indeed, the increasing linkage drawn between security and development, on
the one hand rooting insecurity in conditions of underdevelopment, and on the other,
the recognition that security is an essential precondition and component of
development as well as the tendency to see defence and security as both a public
policy and governance issue (thus broadening the range of communities and
constituencies that can participate in this formerly restricted area) ought to be
welcome by all those following these debates by African leaders in their quest to
promote NEPAD. Yet while it is now accepted that efforts to address Africa’s violent
conflicts must be linked to wider democratisation and sustained development efforts,
the challenge remains how to translate this new understanding into specific policies
and how to ensure effective implementation of these policies through the promotion
of the core values contained in them. This is even more so within the context of a
New Partnership for Africa’s Development that is keen to promote certain core values
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4. that are subject to monitorable benchmarks at a time that these values are not
subscribed to on a continental basis.
The critical question therefore is to what extent is there a common perception
of security in Africa and is this common perception articulated and universally
shared? If it is, is it possible to identify the underlying consensus and the common
value systems in them. A cursory glance points to continuing tension between a
‘national security’ – nation building approach and a ‘human security’ – peace building
approach, yet there need not be a Manichean divide between the two. Yet, when a
country goes for one approach or the other, the values promoted are dissimilar. It is
therefore important to understand the causes and nature of conflicts in Africa in order
to know the values of security to be promoted on a regional, national and local basis.
Understanding the Causes, Nature and Context of Conflict in Africa
To understand the causes and nature of violent conflict, perhaps the most important
task is to examine in a more nuanced manner the historic roots and contemporary
trajectories of Africa’s violent conflicts and to move away from simplistic
interpretation of causes based on notions such as ‘greed’, ‘poverty’, or ‘ethnicity’.
Africa’s conflicts share a common backdrop of economic stagnation and faltering
democratic rule that undermined state capacity and legitimacy in the 1980s. Yet each
conflict has followed its own trajectory shaped by political and policy choices partly
made by African governments and partly imposed by the international context.
Among the most critical elements in understanding the new conflict equation arising
out of the 1990s political transition on the continent are:
• The shifts in global and geopolitical power relations; in particular the end of the
cold war and the withdrawal of the metropolitan security umbrella which paved
the way for serious challenges to some client regimes in a manner previously
considered impossible.
• With the demise of universalistic ideological battle between socialism and
capitalism, new forms of conflict emerged in the form of identity issues anchored
on religion and ethnicity in particular.
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5. • The withdrawal of assistance by big states also resulted in the search for new
forms of sustenance leading to the exploitation of resources and criminal activity;
• Increasing availability and privatisation of instruments of violence, transforming
the military balance between the state and society.(A recent survey indicates that
the permanent members of the Security Council were together responsible for
81% of world arms exports from 1996 – 2000. The G8 nations sold 87% of total
arms exports to the entire world. US’ share of that is over 50 per cent and 68% of
arms supplied to the developing world comes from the United States.)
• New forms of violent and trans-national crime (Hutchful 2001).
Yet in this context of internal cleavages and external fuelling of conflicts, one could
almost reach the flawed conclusion that the 1980s was a period of unbridled peace.
The truth is however more complex that this. Examined critically, the most important
lesson of the 1990s conflict in Africa is that the 1980s laid a solid basis for them
through the severe economic and fiscal compression exemplified by the structural
adjustment shocks of the period. It is no longer in doubt that the erosion of social
capital, political legitimacy and institutional weakening of many African states can be
directly linked to the policy choices that informed governance during this period:
• Decomposition of the security sector was a key component of this state collapse.
• Equally, the State lost its central relevance due to the SAP’s agenda to retrench it
from basic services’ provision to the citizens;
• State militarism largely driven by the authoritarian culture which was so
widespread in the 1980s laid the basis for the new and more deadly societal
militarism represented by the warlords of the 1990s and the violent nature of
crime
In short, the nature of conflict and politics in Africa was in essence redefined by the
peculiar context of the 1990s and the nature of partnership between Africa and its
development partners. Addressing violent conflicts in Africa therefore requires
broadening the notions of security and developing multi-faceted responses. Four
pillars of peace and security ought to form the core of this agenda: 1) human security
as the bedrock for peace; 2) democracy and open governance; 3) transformation of
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6. violent conflicts through political processes; and 4) collective security for all African
states.
At the heart of this conflict prevention agenda is the transformation of Africa’s
security establishments. Until recently, the mantra among donors is to emphasise cost-
cutting approach to dealing with security sector problems. However, the solutions
required are first and foremost political in nature and this relates essentially to the
deepening of democracy on the continent in order to prevent conflict. To achieve this
political consensus, governance in the security sector which treats security actors as
stakeholders in processes of democratisation and administrative reform is central,
both in terms of long term containment of conflict and in terms of democratic
consolidation. The appropriate framework for achieving governance in the security
sector is human security. Yet, if human security provides the framework, regionalism
is the basic institutional scaffolding that Africans should pay particular attention to
since the gains of a human security approach are best realised within a regional
context, hence the importance of NEPAD in the context of the new African Union.
Although regionalism has taken a much firmer root in Africa, crowned
recently by the launch of NEPAD, regionalism still faces a critical problem of
entrenchment in a region where efforts to build homogenous nation-states on the basis
of artificially constructed boundaries have resulted in forced unity through the
promotion of the principle of “non-interference”. Since sovereignty of the nation-state
is regarded as sacrosanct and inviolable, states that have ceased to function as states in
the traditional sense of providing basic needs for the citizens still enjoy support and
assistance in development circles even when it is known that these states are nothing
but privatised entities. Even when regional and sub-regional mechanisms put in place
by Africans have developed autonomous capacity to handle local conflicts in spite of
the inherent challenges of regionalism, the critical issue for NEPAD remains how best
to address the legacy of the Westphalia logic of sovereignty as well as moving away
from the regionalism of leaders in which regional integration is only recognised as
happening at the level of leaders with scant regard paid to the rising regional
consciousness at the level of the citizens and addressing the regionalism of institutions
in which several institutions are created, primarily ion name only with little or no
capacity to manage them. It is only when regionalism is taken seriously as a response
to globalisation that Africans can define a new relationship with the International
community.
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7. The institutional and operational suggestions above will only have meaning if
it permeates the realities of the ordinary citizens. Although NEPAD acknowledges the
fact that poor people rate insecurity as a key cause of poverty, it seems clear that the
evidence for seeing poverty as a cause of armed conflict is generally weak in Africa.
The most poverty stricken parts of the continent are clearly not the most conflict
ridden. Yet, while it is true that inequality or relative deprivation rather than poverty
is more to blame for conflict, it is important to take a far more complex view of the
causes of conflict in their economic, political, environmental and cultural dimensions.
Clearly, poverty – as exemplified by the inequality arising out of unfair
sharing of global opportunities – remains the greatest threat to security and
democratic consolidation in Africa today and, at the broadest level, globalisation is
resulting in deep polarisation between rich and poor throughout the continent.
Whereas quantitative accounts of the problems do not always tell the whole story,
even the available statistics for the African continent paint a gory picture – especially
in terms of the link between globalisation and conflict and the impact of conflict on
poverty on the continent.
Acknowledging the fact that an exclusive focus on the nation state has
prevented an understanding of region specific determinants in the poverty-security-
development complex might help NEPAD promoters to address some of the policy
issues and possibilities that can make a difference. Having secured an understanding
of the nature and context of conflict on the continent, what then are the prospects for
addressing the challenges and what should NEPAD leaders and actors do?
Prospects for addressing current challenges?
For a start, as we move towards the G8 summit in Canada and the first African Union
summit in Durban, South Africa, it is important to acknowledge that Africa’s violent
conflicts and security problems can only be resolved through genuine global
partnership. The 1980s were a testament to the dangers of ‘broad brush’ approaches,
characterised by the external imposition of macro-economic stabilisation and
structural adjustment programmes that were sufficiently inflexible to account for the
diversity of circumstances and need on the continent. Developing more ‘home grown’
approaches will require donors to relinquish greater responsibility to Africa’s leaders
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8. and their people. Given the different trajectories that we have seen on the continent, it
is important to develop a typology of African states in the post cold war transitions
decade in order to avoid the broad-brush strategies that did not work in the 1980s.
It is possible to identify in this context at least five categories of African states
ranging from progress to stasis, and in a few cases reversal, and requiring different
responses from NEPAD strategists and development partners. It is possible to talk of
1) Consolidating states – South Africa, Botswana, Mauritius, Ghana, Senegal, Benin;
2) Semi, Virtual or proforma democracies in transition – Nigeria, Kenya, Tanzania 3)
States in Conflict or emerging out of conflict – Sierra Leone, DRC, Liberia, Eritrea,
Rwanda, Burundi; 4) States in relapse or remilitarisation – Zimbabwe, Togo, Guinea
Bissau, Madagascar and; 5) Authoritarian States or States that have collapsed –
Somalia. I have identified issues that are common to all the states in question below
and why it is important to respond to them differently, even if they are treated in a
continuum. Ultimately, my argument is that given the “glocal” nature of the conflicts
afflicting many of the states, state rebuilding can only be reinforced in the context of
regional integration supported by global partnership. Equally, by arguing for an
adoption of a peacebuilding approach to national security, this should result in an
assessment of each country’s security environment with a view to evaluating the
structures, roles and missions of the peacebuilding process and the security
establishments.
Support for peace building and reconstruction: State rebuilding after state collapse
often requires a strong support for peace building and reconstruction measures. Peace
in this context has often been interpreted as mere absence of war and state rebuilding
is often seen only in terms of physical reconstruction. While physical reconstruction
may be a necessary departure point for state rebuilding, the defining characteristic of
state rebuilding from a human security approach is the presence of holistic security
and a model of conflict management, which emphasises the fundamentals of military
security, democratisation and consensus building, development, economic reform,
human rights and human dignity for the citizens to engage their rulers.
Therefore, although the conventional wisdom is to ignore it, the security
required in the immediate aftermath of conflict might also require higher rather than
lower security expenditure to enable the state and citizens cope with the impact of
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9. conflict – rehabilitating refugees and the internally displaced, providing for a secure,
safe and enabling environment in which development initiatives can succeed and
reintegrating former combatants into society and economy. In situations where
conditions of poverty prevail after post war conflict, it is reasonable to predict a
correlation between the lack of development opportunities in terms of direct income
generation to survivors, an increase in criminality and a re-ignition of conflict.
For policy makers, especially international donors who just want to “move the
money” because of the domestic pressure from disaster management and relief
agencies, there is always the pressing need to construe their role in terms of
immediate restoration of peace and stability, rather than security and development
through the promotion of common values and the rule of law. The concentration on
elections and elections monitoring in say Liberia, Sierra Leone and Nigeria in recent
times gave an impression that what mattered most was the election, not democracy
nor recognition that elections are not enough to guarantee democracy and
development. Experience has since shown that while there are immediate tasks that
must be addressed in terms of peace building and reconstruction in every conflict
situation – disaster relief and management, repatriation and reintegration of refugees
and reduction in the proliferation of small arms and clearance of explosives, these are
not the most successful ingredients of a successful peace building strategy.
To promote sustainable security and peace building strategies therefore –
African leaders and international development agencies must take a comprehensive
look at peace building and reconstruction strategies treating them as a continuum with
short term (relief and emergency aid and creating a secure and enabling environment);
medium term (peace support operations) and long term (reconstruction, democracy &
development) components in an integrated manner. Donor countries should be
encouraged to foster greater coherence amongst their own policies at an inter-agency
level, as well as within their own regional structures (such as EU, OECD, etc). A
good example as we pointed out in the preceding section is the fact that arms sales
from developed countries is often at variance with the emphasis the same countries
place on conflict prevention and security sector governance.
Equally, in this respect, there is a need for stronger cooperation between the
Bretton Woods institutions, the UN Systems and other multi and bi-lateral
development agencies as well as independent development institutions to reduce the
overzealous focus on achieving fiscal discipline and macro-economic stability at the
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10. expense of efforts to protect social spending. Donor responses have often involved
conditionalities relating to automatic decreases in military spending and reductions of
military and other security forces with no attention paid to the expensive nature of
security and the objective security threats that each country faces. For example, it
seems to me unrealistic to impose conditionality like automatic demobilisation on a
state like Rwanda with implacable neighbours like Rwanda, Burundi, Uganda,
Tanzania and Congo coming from the context of genocide. Especially in post conflict
situations, this realization should inform international attitudes towards security sector
transformation on the one hand, and post conflict reconstruction on the other.
Third, it is extremely important that international institutions should seize the
momentum provided by the weak capacity of the state to align external assistance
with local needs and efforts, not an opportunity to impose received wisdom and new
theories of development. This is important in the context of recent claims that
NEPAD is Africa owned – a claim that is rejected by many Africans. Where state
institutional capacity is weak, an immense burden of responsibility is placed on IFIs
and development agencies in which real dialogue with the people and wide
consultations underscore whatever actions are taken. Finally, international donors
cannot ignore the international context in their response to peace building and
reconstruction efforts. How, for example, has the often convoluted linkage between
trans-national corporations, proliferation of arms and promotion of neo-liberal
globalising trends by the industrial world undermine the success of security and
development reforms in countries emerging out of conflict, especially within the
context of an unstable region in which domino effect is real rather than imagined.
These are some of the issues that are central to any discussion of the policy
lever on peace building and reconstruction efforts and the extent to which the
guideline document considers them critically would determine the possibilities of
success that might accompany critical intervention.
The Challenge of strengthening the territorial state: As has been argued above, this
thinking itself is a product of the state-centric notions of security that dominated
traditional thinking in the cold war era. Since the state is increasingly seen as
unrepresentative and illegitimate in Africa however, are there conditions under which
war might be seen to be a legitimate means of removing regime types that promote
conflicts and in which leaders have encroached upon common pool resources. To this
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11. end, some questions might suffice in any consideration of complex political situations
rather than focusing exclusively on state monopoly of means of coercion. This is not
to suggest that states do not have legitimate needs for security which might
necessitate legitimate procurement and monopoly of means of coercion, but this has
to be demonstrated to ensure that security is treated as common public good, not just
regime good. It may therefore be necessary to consider:
• Under which circumstances, if any, is war necessary to remove bad
governments? That is how do we distinguish between justifiable rebellion and
needless conflict?
• How is regional economic and political co-operation built between and among
states to address the pathology of militarism?
• How can state-centric definitions of security be de-emphasised, and the role of
civil society in peace building increased in the quest for common values?
• How is democratic control of the military to be built in states undergoing
political transition or moving from war to peace – through parliamentary
oversight, effective institutions of governance and genuine interaction between
the military and the rest of society?
Acknowledging the need to ask these questions should help to address some of the
policy challenges posed for conflict transformation and security sector reform within
the NEPAD context and subject state monopoly of violence to international and
regional checks. Although there is evidence to suggest that African leaders and their
international partners now accept the argument about broadening the agenda, the
commitment to the mutually reinforcing interaction between the values of democracy,
equity and sustainability still remain subordinate to the core need for macro-economic
stability, regime security and integration into the international political economy in
the NEPAD document. This is why many are still suspicious of the African leaders
and their development partners’ commitment to a human security approach in spite of
the new rhetoric about local ownership and social capital.
Promoting social coherence through civil society development and multi-cultural
tolerance
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12. If peace-building is taken as the sum total of activities that will support peace making
and conflict transformation: demobilisation, re-structuring of the local security system
– police and the military; resettlement of refugees and the internally displaced
persons; removal of dangerous weapons – mines and other unexploded firearms,
reconstruction of shattered infrastructure and humanitarian and disaster relief – very
few still advocate that this could be done with the exclusion of civil society. Indeed,
even African leaders and international development agencies now see civil society as
key to the successful implementation of these various aspects of post-conflict peace
building process. In discussing rights based approach to governance and security
sector transformation, local ownership and development of social capital rests with
the civil society, but it is important to place this within the context of developing
institutional mechanisms for the management of diversity and difference and
incorporating international human rights framework into domestic law. Hence, the
rights of the people to their resources should not be compromised at the altar of
encouraging foreign direct investment, especially where this undermines
environmental security.
Since states are usually products of war and rampage, it might sound far-
fetched to base the quest for tolerance on the notion of reclaiming the militarised mind
through the creation of structures capable of mediating conflict between belligerent
parties. Perhaps, an explanation of this construction is necessary here. It is suggested
that the military option now prevalent in several parts of the African continent is the
inevitable consequence of the acute nature of internal contradictions and the almost
total absence of democratic institutions that can assist in the management of deep-
rooted conflicts.
It was assumed in policy and development circles that support for neo-liberal
democracy will help achieve this objective, hence there was the enthusiasm for
democracy assistance and ‘good governance’ in the early 1990s and donor countries
made some efforts to move economic assistance away from former concerns about
stimulating economic growth to an emphasis on political objectives, including support
for processes of democratisation and building of civil society.
Although the above represented a shift from the days of the super-power
ideological rivalry, even this shift in the leadership’s thinking and IFIs’ assistance has
concentrated primarily on the reform of the public sector and involvement of the ‘civil
society’ to the extent that it promotes the neo-liberal paradigm, not on an alternative
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13. vision of bottom-up reforms driven by societal consensus. The fact that many of the
transitions of the last decade in Africa now approximate to – at best electoral
democracies and at worst elected dictatorships, has raised new questions on how to
deepen the democratic content of current reforms in a process oriented, participatory
and accountable manner. At every level, the idea of constitutionalising
democratising polities that have largely functioned as ‘virtual’ democracies along
multifaceted lines is taking shape.
Today, the fact that the struggle for reconstituting the African state is taking
place in no fewer than twenty African states in Angola, Kenya, Nigeria, Zimbabwe,
Cote d’Ivoire, Swaziland and Lesotho, to mention but a few, underscores a
paradigmatic shift from constitutionality to constitutionalism, a situation where
constitutions are now seen as tools for building bridges between the state and civil
society, a social compact based upon a foundation of consensus among the constituent
elements within the polity and between them and the state in the quest for common
value systems. What has to be emphasised however for the purpose of NEPAD and
human security is the importance of an organic link between the constitution as a rule
of law instrument incorporating international human rights framework and primarily
concerned with restraining government excesses, and the constitution as a
legitimisation of power structures and relations based on a broad social consensus and
the values in diverse societies. In short, if NEPAD is to promote the mutually
reinforcing role of development, security and democracy, the task today is largely
between bridging the gap between “juristic constitutionalism” and “political and
socio-economic constitutionalism” in the search for common core values if the ‘New
Africa’ espoused in the NEPAD document is to have meaning and be accountable to
its citizens.
The core issues around values in NEPAD can only be addressed in the context
of principles and values to which all Africans willingly subscribe. Values of
representation, ownership, accessibility to all levels of government, accountability,
openness and collective responsibility. CSSDCA has done a lot of work on
developing a consensus driven value systems which is what would be the subject of
the peer review mechanism. NEPAD is also developing a similar mechanism in
preparation for the Durban summit of the African Union. While this is welcome by
all, the scepticism that has attended the search for common values to be promoted
across Africa has been informed by the anti-democratic and reprehensible behaviour
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14. of some of African leaders and their total contempt for some of the supposed values
to which they have committed themselves. In spite of this general scepticism,
constitutionalism as a social compact remains the best route for forging the kind of
value system and reorientation that can deepen our democracy in order to prevent
conflict and build peace.
Building assets that provide security against disasters and economic shocks
Conventionally, the way most development agencies have promoted the building of
assets against disasters and economic shocks has been to focus on macro-economic
stability strategies like Structural adjustment reforms, electoral democracies and
support of measures that seek to provide the enabling environment for foreign direct
investment and the global integration of the economy – a mutual pursuit of political
and economic liberalisation. This is the fundamental principle guiding the NEPAD
document. So far, the logic of trickle down economics has failed to produce an
integrated world economy in which all zones are winners. Indeed, as Caroline Thomas
and Peter Wilkin argue,
In the process of globalisation, the continent (Africa) has quite literally been left behind in
terms of the distribution of the spoils of the process. The promised advantages of economic
restructuring, as hailed by the IMF, World Bank and individual developed countries, have not
been borne out. Foreign investment fails to flow in; debt burdens continue; commodity prices
fluctuate; environmental degradation proceeds…and industrialisation fails to occur. (Thomas
& Wilkin: 1998).
This clearly contradicts the core assumption of globalisation that wealth would
automatically be created when the free market gains universal acceptance in the
world. By arguing that the way to build assets against shocks is not via the creation of
local self sufficiency, but national economies should concentrate on what they can
contribute to the world economy, globalisation ignores the comparative advantage of
the North, locks African states further into relative powerlessness by creating
conditions for conflict which further weakens the mediatory role of the states. Instead,
it empowers those elites within the state who can form part of the convoluted network
in business and government capable of acting independently of the juridical state. The
fallout of this globalising trend is the unregulated trade in mineral resources,
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15. proliferation of arms and narcotics and the illicit trade in narcotics all of which
ultimately undermine food security, environmental security and the security of the
individual – all factors responsible for conflict today. It has also helped in deepening
the rural-urban divide, fostered inter-generational strife occasioned by youth
frustration and exacerbated the scourge of refugees and the internally displaced, all of
which have moved the hapless below the poverty line and moved them closer to
violence and conflict.
In my view therefore, the greatest assets against shocks and disasters
ultimately lie with the development of human resources, better management of natural
resource endowment and respect for local ownership of the reform agenda whether in
determining the role of the State or in arriving at the most effective poverty inducing
mechanisms. In fairness, the NEPAD document pays some attention to this, but only
within the context of free and unregulated market. Hence, it is also useful to examine
and analyse individual situations on their merit, rather than assume that the market is
God. This is of course not to suggest that market has no role in reforming states
structures. It is to say that there are no universal models of the market as providing the
best assets against shocks and disasters, hence leaders and donor agencies must learn
from their own experiences of the market, security and public sector reforms in
formulating realistic policies that are not driven by dogma, even as they admit that
certain assumptions undergird their work based on their stated values and principles.
Conclusion: In pursuit of human security and human development in Africa
There is definitely a sense in which a deep feeling of disillusionment that is
widespread in Africa with the current democratisation and development agenda
threatens to undermine the whole campaign that NEPAD has generated. Indeed, many
feel that the hype is more than what the eventual product offers. Hence, one can see a
major opposition to the current slow pace of democratic and economic development.
Indeed, deepening democratic development remains an uphill task in several African
countries, especially in the aftermath of the global shock occasioned by the 9/11
tragedy in America. There are indications that even the enthusiasm that greeted the
NEPAD initiative in the G8 countries has been enveloped in another global shift
which is now in favour of despotic peace in place of democratic, even if unsettling,
freedom. The greatest challenge of course is to understand that despite the frustrations
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16. and impatience of the people with this democratic deficit, there is some realisation
that transitions are inherently unstable and unpredictable.
It is our hope that the leaders will bear the above in mind as they prepare the
Action Plan for this much needed partnership for Africa’s Development – one that
secures the world and promote peace. Based on the above comments, a number of
measures seem to suggest themselves to us about how best to take the NEPAD Peace
and Security clusters forward in the context of the new African Union, especially in
developing a human security approach that promotes human development:
1. There is an urgent need for clarification of values and norms subscribed to by
Africans and adopted in a widespread manner by the citizens. (ECOWAS
Supplementary Protocol on Democracy & Good Governance adopted by the
Heads of Government in Dakar in December 2001 is a good example here)
2. There is a need for conceptual clarity through a comprehensive approach to
human security in policy and development circles – one that recognises that while
there is no teleological link between elections and democracy, deepening
democracy offers the best chance of preventing violent conflict and building
durable peace
3. There is a need to recognise the challenge of strengthening regional integration
and promote regional mechanisms that can help sustain democratic development
and consolidation by adopting a regional approach to conflict prevention;
4. Policy instruments must recognise the need to reconcile economic and social
development and enhance the input of non-state actors – in policy formulation to
enhance social capital rather than entrench the leverage of IFIs and donor agencies
on States;
5. Recognition of legitimate security needs of nation-states must be factored into the
human security approach through the promotion of governmental and non-
governmental peace-building strategies
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17. 6. Policy instruments must problematise the link between globalisation and conflict,
rather than assume that it is always going to be positive in the promotion of pro-
poor growth in the search for and implementation of sustainable livelihood and
poverty reduction strategies;
7. Policy instruments must locate the security agenda within the democracy and
development framework and reflect the link between politics and economics, and
between security and opportunities;
8. There is the need for democratic governance, not just civilian control of military
and security establishments in democratising polities;
9. Human security approach is a process, whose results will not necessarily be
immediate, hence the need for a long term view by interested stakeholders and
anti-poverty strategists.
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18. REFERENCES
Buzan, B. et al. 1998. Security: A New Framework for Analysis. Boulder, Colorado:
Lynne Rienner.
CODEP, 2000. Report on the outcomes of the consultation on globalisation and
conflict for the White Paper on International Development: Globalisation &
Development. London, June 2000.
DFID, 2000. Security Sector Reform and the Management of Military Expenditure:
Risks for Donors, High Returns for Development, Report on an International
Symposium, February 14-16, 2000.
Fayemi, J.K. 2000. “Security Challenges in Africa”, Seminar: Indian Journal of
Opinion, Special Issue on African Transitions 490, June 2000.
Hutchful, E. 2001. Contribution to the ALF Project on Security and Demilitarisation
in Africa. Mimeo. December 2001.
Martin, B. 2000. New Leaf or Fig Leaf? The Challenge of the New Washington
Consensus. Report prepared for Bretton Woods Project and Public Service
International.
NEPAD Strategy Document – www.nepad.org
Thomas, C. & P. Wilkin (eds.) 1998. Globalisation, Human Security & the African
Experience, Boulder, Colorado: Lynne Rienner.
UNDP, Human Development Report 1994.
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