1st Edition
Peacebuilding in Contemporary Africa In Search of Alternative Strategies
Peacebuilding in Contemporary Africa explores the challenges and opportunities faced by countries and societies transitioning from armed conflicts to peace in contemporary Africa. It evaluates the effectiveness, outcomes and failures of existing peacebuilding initiatives implemented by stakeholders, and proposes new strategies and approaches to facilitate the transition. The book investigates both micro- and macro-level conflicts in various parts of Africa, as well as the efforts made to resolve them and build peace. The book pays particular attention to grassroots-based micro-level conflicts often disregarded in peacebuilding literature, which tends to focus on macro-level, neo-liberal state reconstruction and peacebuilding efforts.
The book adopts an evidence-based, policy-relevant approach to peacebuilding in Africa. The various chapter contributors offer a lucid analysis and critique of some of the prevailing paradigms and strategies of peacebuilding practiced in Africa. Together, the authors recommend innovative strategies to mobilise and coordinate governance institutions and partnerships at all levels (international, regional, national, and local) to prevent conflict escalation in volatile states and advance the rebuilding of violence-affected states and communities.
Peacebuilding in Contemporary Africa provides a much-needed perspective from African scholars, and will be of interest to students, researchers, policy makers and practitioners with an interest in promoting legitimate policy interventions and sustainable peace in Africa.
PART I Conceptual Debate
- Introduction: Peacebuilding in Contemporary Africa
- The Peacebuilding and Development Debate: Is Contemporary Peacebuilding Development in Disguise?
- Peacebuilding in Micro-level Inter-Community Conflicts in West Africa: Examples from Ghana and Nigeria
- Marginalization and Violent Conflict in the Karamoja Region of Uganda
- Peacebuilding in Micro-Level Inter-Community Conflicts: Examples from Selected Countries in Southern Africa
- Peacebuilding in Sierra Leone One and Half Decades after the Civil War: At What Stage Does a Country Cease to be Post-Conflict?
- The Task of Rebuilding Liberia
- Conflict Intervention, Insecurity and the Challenges of Peacebuilding in South Sudan
- Boko Haram Insurgency, Terrorism and the Challenges of Peacebuilding in the Lake Chad Basin
- Obstacles to Peace and Security in North Africa
- Peacebuilding through Peace Education in the Horn of Africa: A Transformative Cosmopolitan Perspective
- Transiting from Armed Conflict to Peace in Contemporary Africa: Changing Tides, Research Findings and Future Directions
Kenneth Omeje
Mala Mustapha & Usman A. Tar
PART II Neglected Dimensions of Peacebuilding: Micro-Level Conflicts
Afua Boatemaa Yakohene
Tony Karbo
Pamela Machakanja and Chupicai Manuel
PART III Conventional Wisdom and Practices in Peacebuilding: Macro-Level Conflicts
Ibrahim Bangura
T. Debey Sayndee
Nicodemus Minde
Usman A. Tar and Bashir Bala
Ibrahim Bangura and Sampson Lau
PART IV In Search of Alternative Strategies
Yonas Adaye Adeto
Kenneth Omeje
Biography
Kenneth Omeje is Senior Research Associate at the University of Johannesburg, South Africa; Research Fellow at the Centre for African Studies, University of the Free State, South Africa; Visiting Professor at the Institute for Peace and Security Studies in Addis Ababa University, Ethiopia; and Visiting Professorial Fellow at the Nigerian Defence Academy, Kaduna, Nigeria. He has previously held the positions of Professor of International Relations at the United States International University in Nairobi, Kenya and Senior Research Fellow at the John and Elnora Ferguson Centre for African Studies, University of Bradford, UK.
Peacebuilding in Contemporary Africa aims to scrutinise the conventional peace building method used on the continent; in doing so it identifies areas which are often ignored and proposes alternative strategies accordingly. This remarkable volume is the result of 13 contributors including the editor, who opens the volume by intelligently introducing the intellectual debates on peacebuilding in Africa and closes it by skilfully laying out the proposed alternative strategies.
Niguse Mandefero Alene, Department of Political Sciences and International Studies, Bahir Dar University, Bahir Dar, Ethiopia