Category: Daniel Serwer
Free Syria: better than local ceasefires
SAIS hosted at noon a launch event for the Syria Justice and Accountability Centre (SJAC) report on “Examining Syrian Perspectives on Local Ceasefires and Reconciliation.” Ellen Laipson (Stimson) moderated with Mohammed al Abdallah (SJAC), Craig Charney (Charney Research), Joseph Bahout (Carnegie Endowment) and me as panelists. These are my speaking notes for the event:
1. First let me join Ellen in lauding SJAC and Craig for their truly heroic and fascinating report. People in conflict zones have surprising perspectives. It is important they be heard.
2. I am a vigorous supporter of the Syrian opposition, but it should give us pause that regime-controlled areas report relatively good conditions and services while rebel areas are struggling to survive. Bashar al Assad is not entirely wrong when he claims to be providing a measure of security and government services, especially in Damascus and along the Mediterranean coast.
3. While conditions vary, there is an area of consensus: Syrians, who (importantly) continue to identify as such, support the idea of local ceasefires. But the reasons differ. Pro-regime people think local ceasefires will strengthen the regime’s grip and expel foreigners. Anti-regime people want relief.
4. Both want freedom of movement and the universal desire of people in conflict: normal lives.
5. The devil is in the details. I know something of local ceasefires, having worked on the Bosnian Federation—where the ceasefire between Croat and Muslim forces largely held—while the Federation was fighting the Bosnian Serb Army in 1994-95.
6. But I also can’t forget Srebrenica, where UN forces stood by while Serbs massacred thousands of Muslim men and boys. Local ceasefires that amount to surrender could look more like Srebrenica than any of us would like.
7. The key to local ceasefires is security for both sides. In the Bosnian Federation, the often criticized UN peacekeepers provided that security by manning checkpoints set up between the Muslim and Croat forces. At Srebrenica, the Dutch UN forces failed to do so.
8. The problem is that there are no peacekeepers, UN or otherwise, in Syria and little prospect for deploying them. I don’t know any serious country that would consider putting its troops into the current fluid and perilous situation, even if a local ceasefire can be negotiated.
9. Nor, judging from the Charney interviews, are Syrians prepared to see coordination between the opposing forces, which of course is vital even if peacekeepers were available. But let’s suppose FSA and regime forces were willing to coordinate. Spoilers from Jabhat al Nusra or the Islamic State would likely intervene in ways that would make it impossible to continue.
10. So the usual techniques for achieving and sustaining local ceasefires are not available in Syria.
What do we do?
11. Faute de mieux, I am thrown back on a Turkish idea: protected areas that opposition Syrian opposition would govern and non-extremist Syrian forces would guard on the ground while the US-led coalition ensures protection from air and artillery bombardment.
12. I hesitate to call these “safe areas,” as they would not be safe. They would be target-rich environments that the regime would attack unless prevented from doing so.
13. Nascent areas of this sort already exist, both along the Turkish border in the north and on the Jordanian border in the south. What needs to be done is to declare them, draw clear lines around them, protect them, and begin to weave them together into a Free Syria.
14. This idea is different from local ceasefires and reconciliation across the divide between opposition and regime. I just don’t think there is much basis, even in this fairly optimistic report, for believing there is sufficient trust to achieve much in that direction, even at the local level.
15. Sulha and musalaha, the traditional dispute resolution mechanisms, require—as does reconciliation in the West—acknowledgement of harm and willingness to compensate.
16. Anyone who can see in Assad’s recent interviews willingness to acknowledge and compensate for harm is reading more between the lines than I am able to do. Nor would the Syrian government have anything like the resources required to compensate for the harm it has done.
17. Of course protected areas have their downsides. They could lay the basis for ethnic or sectarian partition. They could lead to abandonment of less protected areas, increasing displacement. They could open the door to pushing refugees back into Syria. They would require serious, coordinated efforts at protection, both on the ground and in the air.
18. But protected areas might also give refuge from violence to hundreds of thousands, perhaps even millions, of people. If established along borders in the north and south they would enable humanitarian relief to be far more effective and prevent it from being exploited by the regime, as is common today. They would provide opportunities for the relatively moderate opposition to demonstrate that it can govern and counter extremists effectively.
19. Opposition success would also remove an important reservation in the international community, which wants to know “what comes next.” This is important for the US, which has prioritized the fight against the Islamic State. It will only support efforts that have potential to aid that fight.
20. Gradually expanded, Free Syria areas could present Assad with a serious rival, creating the necessary precondition for a national ceasefire, peace settlement and political transition.
21. For me, those advantages outweigh the disadvantages, though I admit it is a close call.
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When displacement isn’t temporary
Kammi Scheeler, a master’s student in my post-war reconstruction and transition course at SAIS, writes:
The World Bank hosted a panel Wednesday on the need for alternatives to refugee camps, as part of its three-day forum on Fragility, Conflict and Violence. Three themes emerged from the speakers’ presentations:
- Displacement should be treated as a development issue, not a humanitarian one. National development planning should take into account all populations in the area, including displaced persons.
- Displaced persons must be recognized as active participants in development with the capacity to contribute to host communities.
- Government capacities to process and support refugees in alternative ways need to be strengthened.
The first presenter on the panel was Steven Corliss, Director of the UNHCR Division of Programme Support and Management. He discussed UNHCR’s policy to seek alternatives to camps in as many circumstances as possible. Where not possible, the UNHCR still works to protect the rights of refugees and create living conditions that foster individual empowerment and dignity.
The UN High Commissioner for Refugees has said “anyone who thinks refugee camps are a good idea has never lived in one.” Camps will not disappear, as they remain needed to meet immediate needs in emergency situations. The problem, Corliss believes, is when camps are used as an automatic response to displacement, or when host governments do not have the tools to provide alternatives.
One of the primary pitfalls of camps is the loss of human capital. Typical refugee camps operate as temporary, emergency relief, providing little opportunity for inhabitants to utilize or develop skills. In protracted situations, their inhabitants lose the ability to manage their own livelihoods.
There is a persistent concern among hosts that allowing refugees to integrate will deter them from returning home. Camps will remain as host governments insist upon them. But when refugees are better integrated into local communities and labor markets, they are able to contribute economically and maintain independent livelihoods, encouraging earlier repatriation and better reintegration upon return.
The second speaker, David Apollo Kazungu, is the Commissioner of Refugees for the Ugandan Government. Uganda’s shared borders with the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Rwanda and South Sudan have led to a persistent influx of refugees escaping conflict since the 1950s. Uganda is now host to 415,000 refugees, with more expected from South Sudan in coming months. Refugees in Uganda are predominantly settlement-based, living alongside and sharing resources and services with Ugandan nationals. Although refugee status is meant to be a temporary solution, the persistent conflicts and instability of Uganda’s neighbors has led to more protracted situations.
This has necessitated a shift from humanitarian support to development support. Uganda’s Settlement Transformation Agenda is a uniquely comprehensive and progressive approach to refugee integration. Its key tenets include security enhancement, access to justice, settlement survey and planning, infrastructure development, refugee and host community empowerment, and peace building and conflict resolution initiatives.
Commissioner Kazungu stressed the importance of these last two programs saying, “refugeehood should be a chance to reconcile and learn to live side by side.”Since most of Uganda’s refugees fled their homes due to conflict, the government of Uganda is making a stronger effort to facilitate conflict resolution among diverse refugee populations so that they may create more stable communities upon return to their home countries. Although Uganda has shown a great deal of openness and commitment to receiving and integrating refugees, they face challenges such as encroachment, land inelasticity, and dwindling resources with no signs of decline in refugee inflows.
The remaining panelists included Niels Harild, the lead social development specialist for the World Bank’s Global Program on Forced Displacement, who reiterated the importance of viewing displacement as a development issue rather than merely a humanitarian one. The second half of the event provided examples of alternatives in action, with World Bank project leaders sharing data from programs in Turkey and Azerbaijan. In Turkey, the Bank is assessing the impact of Syrian refugees on host communities and recommending policies for integrating refugees outside camps. Azerbaijan has approximately 600,000 internally displaced persons supported by a Social Fund for the Development of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs). This project provides settlements and services to raise the standard of living for IDPs and also creates income-generation opportunities. Both cases highlight the range of possible ways to incorporate displaced persons into longer-term national development planning.
PS: In response to a comment on this piece, here is Killian Kleinschmidt at TedX Hamburg:
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A war the military alone can’t win
Ashley Augsburger, a master’s student in my post-war reconstruction and transition class at SAIS, writes:
With the Administration’s submission to Congress of an Authorization for Use of Military Force against ISIS, debate is likely to continue regarding the nature, extent, and strategy of the conflict in Iraq and the region. Thursday’s panel discussion of these issues, “The Battle Against the Islamic State: Where Do We Go From Here?,” at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace featured Iraqi Ambassador Lukman Faily, Former Ambassador and visiting fellow at the Washington Institute James Jeffery, and Marwan Muasher, Vice President of Studies at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.
The discussion focused on Iraq’s challenges in facing ISIS, the larger public perception of ISIS in the region, actions that regional actors can take to address the larger ideological battle, and the necessary components of addressing the root causes of ISIS’s emergence and success over the past six months.
Faily addressed the question “where do we go from here” with an initial outline of the advances the Iraqi government has made in achieving a more inclusive and unified government, followed by three specific needs to create a more predictable and coherent policy to combat ISIS:
• Humanitarian concerns: With over 2.1 million displaced persons, primarily in the Kurdish region, affected communities need basic service provision and support.
• Military preparedness: The military requires appropriate training and equipment, complemented by allied forces intelligence sharing and technological support.
• Reconstruction assistance: Iraq is struggling with the “day after scenario” in liberated areas and needs to address governance and service provision for their populations.
While there must be a zero-tolerance policy toward ISIS in Iraq domestically, Faily said regional stability and the battle against ISIS also require a predictable and comprehensive policy towards Syria.
Jeffery focused on American involvement in the battle against ISIS and the challenges of defining a goal and appropriate methods moving forward. While uncomfortable, America has no choice but involve itself militarily in Iraq yet again. The challenge looking forward is to outline a strategy of engagement: “who will dig these guys out?” Jeffery asserted that a policy of containment is not sufficient, as ISIS is an extraordinary movement that is dangerous to the entire region.
Having just returned from six months in Amman, Muasher discussed the Jordanian perspective. He emphasized the broader context of the ISIS threat and the larger agenda needed to address underlying causes of ISIS’s emergence and appeal. While there is no public support for ISIS, many Jordanians are struggling with the question whether this is a war on their own values. While the murder of the Jordanian pilot has sparked demands for revenge, much like the US post 9/11, the larger commitment to a fundamental, values-based war is undecided. Regardless, regional stability is contingent upon a larger solution that includes a nonmilitary strategy alongside military engagements. Without addressing issues of economic opportunity and political inclusion, ISIS will not be defeated.
Questions and panel discussion focused primarily on how to combat the ideology behind ISIS and the extent to which the US should be involved. Jeffery emphasized the need for security first, but he was clear that an ideology will not be defeated militarily. Panelists agreed that it is the region’s responsibility to fight ISIS’s ideology. The United States should not wage an ideological war. Prompted with a question by Carnegie Fellow Jessica Matthews, Muasher highlighted the lack of “ground troops” to speak out against ISIS ideology, as so many of the governments fighting ISIS also suppress legitimate, liberal voices in their own countries.
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Sources of fragility in West Africa
Min Kyung Yoo, a master’s student in my post-war stabilization and transition class, writes about a presentation yesterday on drivers of violence in West Africa by Alexandre Marc, Chief Technical Specialist of Fragility, Conflict, and Violence at the World Bank:
West African countries have experienced robust economic growth in the past decade. Since 1990, there has also been improvement in democratic consolidation, which seems to hold better than in other parts of Africa. Most governments in the region are elected and many people resist constitutional changes. In addition, West Africa has one of the most mobile populations in the world, hosting 7.5 million intra-regional migrants, and demonstrates strong regional cooperation through the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS).
Despite these positive signs, the Ebola crisis, the Nigerian war with Boko Haram, Mali’s fragility and the Burkina Faso revolt show the region is still fragile. Intra-state civil wars dominate in West Africa, including long-standing ethnic conflicts that disrupt national and regional economies. Politics in West Africa is ethnically oriented and political institutions are very weak. Political and election-related violence is a growing challenge. The nature of violence and conflict has shifted in the past decade, with new threats such as illegal trafficking, religious radicalization, and piracy. Piracy is more rampant along the coast of Guinea than off Somalia.
Marc discussed in depth five drivers of conflict and violence in West Africa:
1. Drug trafficking
Protracted conflicts and political instability, corruption, porous borders, and geographic location all contribute to making West Africa attractive to traffickers. While physical drug trafficking takes place in Guinea and Guinea Bissau, Senegal and Ghana are drawn into the business as they have more reliable and functioning banking system in which drug traffickers perform financial transactions. Drug trafficking has potential to compromise officials and security agents, destabilize governments and weaken states, erode the region’s social fabric and damage economic development.
2. Religious extremism
Religious extremism in West Africa is largely home-grown, and has developed in areas with strong grievances—unemployment, corruption, and perceived marginalization. Increasing traditionalization, intergenerational crisis, disillusionment with the state, as well as external factors such as civil wars in Algeria and Libya, have accelerated radicalization.
3. Challenges of youth inclusion
West Africa hosts a rapidly growing population, but lacks capacity to address the needs of youth. Challenges include poor quality education and few employment opportunities. Unemployment is rarely a main or direct cause of conflict. But youth tend to have high expectations and seek to assert themselves outside both traditional and modern institutions. Meeting the expectations of youth has been a big challenge, leading to frustration and alienation. Gender dimensions and rapidly changing gender roles should not be neglected.
4. Migration
Tensions surrounding migratory flows—including discriminatory notions of citizenship and foreigner, political and social marginalization, competition over land, resources, and employment—have contributed to violence and conflict in West Africa in past decades. Rapid urbanization across the region and the influx of migrants into urban center is another source of instability. Informal settlements populated by unemployed and marginalized youth intensify perceptions of inequality and increase the risk of violent crime and gang activity.
5. Fragility of political and land institutions
Competition for control over political processes that guarantee access to resources has been at the core of much conflict and violence in recent decades. The high incidence of military coups in the region reflects this trend. Almost every conflict in the sub-region features land: ambiguities around legal pluralism (customary and statutory land tenure), ineffective land management, and unequal distribution.
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Give, even at the office
Here is Deah Barakat, a dental student murdered with his wife and sister-in-law last night in Chapel Hill, NC appealing for support to help Syrian refugees in Turkey:
His cause has exceeded its modestly stated goal by a long shot, but I’m sure it can use more: Syrian Dental Relief. I gave, here at the office. It’s quick and easier than writing a check.
PS: Try this too, if that wasn’t enough to convince:
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Hobbits will inherit the earth
Eric Rahman, a master’s student in my Post-war Reconstruction and Transition class this term, writes about Srdja Popovic’s appearance at SAIS yesterday:
Srdja Popovic is a Serbian political activist and executive director of the Centre for Applied Nonviolent Action and Strategies (CANVAS). He was a leader of the student movement Otpor!, which helped topple Serbian president Slobodan Milošević. He has taught at the Harvard Kennedy School, NYU, and the University of Colorado, among others.
There are few individuals with a history of working in such close proximity to conflict who exhibit quite the optimism and exuberance as Popovic. In an event held at the Johns Hopkins School of Advanced International Studies on the morning of February 10, the author of the recently published Blueprint for Revolution: How to Use Rice Pudding, Lego Men, and Other Nonviolent Techniques to Galvanize Communities, Overthrow Dictators, or Simply Change the World discussed his vision for effective social mobilization to execute non-violent revolution.
He relied on a metaphor drawn from J.R.R. Tolkien’s Lord of the Rings series:
it is the average individual, the person you would least expect, the hobbits, who
can have the greatest impact and transform their societies through non-violent means. Popovic pointed to the electrician Lech Wałęsa and the camera shop owner Harvey Milk to illustrate that it is not institutional elites who bring about change but rather it is hobbits, who rely on their creativity to build a movement and have a lasting impact.
In spite of humorous analogies and moments of levity, Popovic presented a sober
analysis of which conditions and methods are most conducive to fomenting a social movement that can truly effect change in repressive societies. He advocates non-violence even when pitted against a brutally violent adversary. Non-violence is preferable not because violence is morally unacceptable, but because non-violence is the most effective and efficient means to combat a growing menace, as illustrated by the statistics in Erica Chenoweth and Maria Stephan’s Why Civil Resistance Works: The Strategic Logic of Nonviolent Conflict.
The threat of ISIS he likened to a swarm of mosquitos. The temptation is
to swat them. But to combat the infestation, one has to turn attention to the source: wet areas or the swamps. There is a confluence of pernicious factors that coalesced to create permissive conditions for ISIS’s rise, but one fundamental issue is the failure of states to deliver services and the resulting vacuum of credibility and legitimacy. This can only be countered by the actual provision of expected basic
services by governments. Service provision will undercut the ISIS narrative and shrink recruitment.
There is an alarming perception among many Iraqi youth that ISIS is ‘cool.’ This perception is destabilizing and arises from lack of alternatives. There is no Iraqi ‘Batman’ or ‘Superman’ young people can look to for moral-cultural education during their formative years, which leaves them susceptible to the sophisticated propaganda machine of an organization such as ISIS.
The Arab spring and the Ukrainian crisis illustrate in Popovic’s view the consequences when a movement lacks long-term vision. In Egypt for example, the
revolution achieved its expressed goal of unseating Hosni Mubarak within the first month of the protests (four years ago today!). But once the moment came to construct a new model of government and service delivery, there was a dearth of strategic planning and the movement began to disintegrate. A similar situation existed in Ukraine following the Orange Revolution in 2003, causing the intra-Ukrainian conflict to simmer and break out again into crisis last year.
Popovic summed up his argument with an apt analogy: “Non-violent struggles are like video games. They have levels and you need a new set of skills for each level.” Despite the challenges faced and the skills required, it is the hobbits who eventually carry the day.
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