Free and fair elections, accompanied by smooth transitions of democratically elected leaders, constitute one of the key pillars of democracy. The dawn of democratisation and advent of multi-party politics after the end of the Cold War in 1991, seemingly held great promise for Africa. However, in recent years, many elections in Africa have consistently become a source of violence. Electoral violence is threatening to become an intractable source of conflict on the African continent, making it hard for emerging democracies to consolidate their status as free democratic societies. Many remain largely autocratic or semi-democratic. African leaders are all too often not ready to relinquish political power, while political elites are ‘power hungry’ and use violence to skew the outcomes of elections in their favour. Hence, electoral violence is employed in order to manipulate civilian election choices and outcomes. Election violence is often deliberately used to target civilians, and in countries like Kenya involves inter-ethnic clashes. These “new wars” are fought unconventionally using ‘crude weapons’, (Kaldor 2013). Kaldor describes how these ‘new wars’ are fought as intra-state (within the state) wars in developing countries. Often, they are waged via state or county networks based on identity or ethnicity. The consequences of electoral violence include the destruction of property, reversed development, injuries, rape, death, internally displaced persons and refugees. Electoral violence persists despite attempts to contain it and measures to effectively manage these processes often prove to be inadequate. The study utilises an exploratory case study of Kenya during 2007-2008 Post-Election violence. The causes, the immediate steps that were initiated to mitigate violence and the reforms undertaken to generate peace structures and prevent future occurrences of post-election violence were explored. Forty-five participants representing involved citizens, negotiators and mediators were interviewed. The research was triangulated via the interview process, together with the use of primary document analysis and an extensive review of the literature. The data was analysed via the use of grounded theory. The research findings reveal that the causes of electoral violence are multi-faceted and multi-layered, with deep underlying issues. The causes include weak institutions, corruption, a non-representational electoral system, ethnicity and ethnic militia. Further causes include statelessness as experienced by certain groups, abuse of state resources and human rights violations. The role of political elites who withhold crucial information, thus denying the public the opportunity to make informed choices during elections was also found to contribute to electoral violence. Other information-related causes include biased media and sensational reporting. Findings also show that socio-economic issues such as poverty, unemployment, scarce resources and unmet basic human needs cannot be underestimated. Lastly, the causes of electoral violence included diverse interests of internal and external actors at play during elections. The findings revealed that although the Kenyan mediation process included the signing of a peace agreement, the root causes of electoral violence such as corruption, weak institutions, abuse of state resources and the unjust electoral system were not adequately addressed. A model for mediation for electoral violence which was explored and developed sought to build on the strengths of the Kenyan mediation process and address its inherent weaknesses, thus making this a significant contribution flowing from the study. The election model for mediation proposes certain key phases which include a pre-mediation process that will ensure a cessation of all hostilities; the mapping of the root causes of electoral violence and electoral reforms that provide resolutions that are acceptable to all the parties. Training of personnel at all levels of government to implement these reforms is also proposed. These measures can ensure the integrity and independence of electoral institutions from political manipulation. Training constitutes a crucial stage in the process of consolidating the emerging democracies. The model for mediation developed is therefore not only meant to mitigate electoral violence but is also intended to serve as a preventive measure. Many African states currently experience structural weaknesses similar to those that existed in Kenya before the 2007-2008 elections (and still persist). These fault lines include corruption, weak institutions, human rights violations, and lack of information. The proposed model for mediation which aims to counter these problems can thus be applied and adapted for implementation in Africa and globally. Several recommendations with implications for policy development are proposed to curb electoral violence. They include constitutional reforms, training of government and electoral officials and the introduction of a properly representational election system. This study, which focuses specifically on post-election violence, recommends further research investigating the pre-election phase, and ‘voting day’ causes of electoral violence for a more comprehensive approach to electoral violence research.

No description available.

This thesis examines the artisanal mining-combatant-recruitment nexus in war torn zones. With a case study of the Kivus in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), which has experienced one of the world’s worst blood-shedding over the last two decades, the study uses a constructivist Grounded Theory approach to research in terms of both data collection and analysis. It focuses on the existing body of knowledge on conflict analyses with a particular reference to the absurdity of abundance theory, which singles out the endowment of natural resources and weak governance as the main fuelling-factors of the conflict in the DRC. Data collection was carried out using diverse methods including literature reviews, interviews and focus groups. In particular, the study aims to explore how the demilitarisation of the mining zones could contribute to enhancement of the Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration (DDR) of ex-combatants and promote social cohesion, sustainable peace and security in the eastern DRC. The analysis of the conflicts in the DRC and the acquaintance of belligerents with artisanal mining revealed the convoluted multi-layered nature of the conflicts in the country and their intricate causalities. The examination of the demilitarisation of the mining zones pertinent to the nexus between artisanal mining and the recruitment, reintegration and re-recruitment of combatants in the Kivus identified a few prerequisites in order to sever the artisanal mining-combatant-recruitment relationship that largely swivel around “bottom-up solutions”. The research contributes to knowledge in three broad areas; firstly, it contributes to ongoing academic debates on conflict analyses, the political economy of armed conflicts vis-à-vis mining sector as well as the mining sector and DDR of combatants in the DRC. Secondly, it offers empirical analysis and data on the combatants’ recruitment and DDR process and the artisanal mining sector with regards to state failure and protracted armed conflict in the DRC. Finally, it underlines the need to re-evaluate “the concept of community-based approach”, a key approach to improving peacebuilding and post-conflict recovery in the eastern DRC.

M.A. (Industrial Relations) / Please refer to full text to view abstract

M.Ed. (Education) / Conflict is a general phenomenon in social relationships. Due to the fact that the teacher and the pupils are together for about six hours a day, there is a great possibility that conflict can arise in the classroom. There can be a variety of reasons for this conflict. It is very important that the teacher must be aware of the fact that he is going to deal with conflict from time to time. Another important aspect for the teacher is that he must be aware of conflict, must know the different kinds of conflict as well as the reasons for the conflict that arises. Further on he must prepare himself for conflict situations so that he is able to handle it in such a way that the pupil as well as himself will benefit from these situations. The handling of conflict must become part of the teacher's daily task. He must have a positive attitude towards conflict situations and must not evade it. Every conflict situation must be analysed and handled according to the merits of the case. other aspects that need attention is the teacher-pupil relationship, communication between the teacher and his pupils and the management of the classroom. The teacher must endeavour to build a relationship of trust with his pupils. That will encourage pupils to be honest and open with the teacher. This will also enable the teacher to handle conflict situations in a positive manner and eventually both parties will benefit from this. Two-way communication should be present in the classroom. This implies that the teacher will give the pupils the opportunity to participate in classroom decisions and the setting of classroom rules. The pupils will then feel more free to discuss with him any problems they may have. The way the teacher manages his classroom is also going to have an influence on classroom conflict. His conduct towards management and leadership will enable him to limit or prevent classroom conflict or will enable him to cope with the situation.

No description available.

No description available.

This dissertation wants to understand the church history regarding the divide which resulted in the so called fundamentalist and the liberal movements in the church being birthed in identifying the reasons for the conflict between the aforementioned groups. It then presents principles of conflict transformation and management in order to understand and to help transform and manage potential confrontational situations between the aforementioned groups effectively. It further propose alternative interpretations to potential conflict-generating Bible texts by extrapolating new information from those texts in order to stir the potential of birthing a second naïve love for the discredited texts by offering new meanings to those same texts. Unfortunately, this objective can’t effectively be measured within the scope of this dissertation, but will nevertheless remain as an objective of hope.

South Africa‟s participation in international peace missions is guided by the White Paper of 1998 and premised specifically on the country‟s foreign policy objectives based on its vision of “a better South Africa, a better Africa and a better world”. South Africa recognises itself as an integral part of the African continent and therefore sees its national interests as being intrinsically linked to Africa‟s stability, unity and prosperity. Since 1994, South Africa has placed itself at the forefront of Africa's peace and security endeavours, trying to transform itself from international villain during apartheid years to Pan-Africanist peacemaker. The country has played an instrumental role in both shaping and setting the normative agenda of the African Union and Southern African Development Community. South Africa‟s participation in conflict resolution and peace missions in Africa is informed by an understanding of the nexus that exists between peace, security and sustainable development. This research focuses on South Africa‟s diplomatic and peacekeeping engagement in Lesotho, covering the constitutional and electoral crises from 1994 - 2015 constitutional crisis. The author shows the importance and way forward to resolve conflicts before they become escalated and deadly. The study calls for a „timely‟ reaction to disputes and conflicts on the African continent via preventive diplomacy, conflict provention and addressing of underlying issues that give rise to disputes and conflict.

Human resource management, or people management, is concerned with the philosophies, policies, programmes, practices and decisions that affect the people who work for an organisation. The various people management functions are aimed at helping the organisation achieve its strategic goals and as such are an integral part of the management process. People management consists of several aspects and sub-divisions of which pro-active conflict handling and management is one and which is also the subject of this study. The objective of this study was to assess causes of conflict and interventions and styles of conflict management in the workplace. Workplace politics, change management, diversity, cultures and religious views are but a few major sources for the emergence of conflict. We are currently in the era of fast change or more aptly put “hyperchange” and conflict is inevitable and management styles can also create and/or escalate conflict situations including, the composition of diversity in the workplace. This adds to the new challenges of management. Organisations in this decade need to acknowledge that their management styles of days gone by are not relevant anymore and one must understand to recognise conflict and resolve it in an appropriate manner. This study assessed the major causes of conflict in the workplace and whether the managerial style of managers and management interventions impacts on the overall conflict situations experienced by staff members in organisations in Cape Town and Windhoek. It also gave an indication if interventions and conflict management training/programmes are in place or used, if at all. Sometimes conflict is resolved successfully or unsuccessfully and what impact it has on the managers, his/her staff and colleagues and the organisation as a whole. This can have a detriment impact on the business and the culture within the organisation and which could result in or give rise to high labour turnover, underlying unhappy staff and disempowerment of managers and staff and poor production and service levels.