Contemporary civil wars are often characterized not only by fighting between rebels and governments, but also by rebel violence against their own community members. In spite of repeated peace negotiations, many of these conflicts seem to go on endlessly. Such instances may reflect attempts or failures on the part of the non-state side to consolidate. To confront the government on the battle field or at the negotiation table, rebels need to become an effective fighting force as well as effective negotiators. So, what do rebels do to consolidate to wage war and negotiate peace? The dissertation approaches the question of rebel capacity by disaggregating the non-state side in civil war and in connection with peace talks. The dissertation offers a set of original case studies from three ethno-separatist conflicts: Sri Lanka, Indonesian Aceh, and Senegal. It combines qualitative methods with one study also containing basic regression analysis. The empirical analysis reveals that the risk perceptions, information asymmetries, and commitment issues that often mark the relationship between the state and non-state parties are also prevalent within the non-state party. The overall argument is that rebels’ consolidation of their capacity to fight and negotiate entails different processes. More specifically, it first specifies conditions under which rebels use violence against members of their own ethnic community as part of the war against the government by emphasizing the importance of timing, territorial control, and ethnic demographic concentration. Second, it explores and highlights the importance of the rich repertoire of non-violent methods which rebels employ to enhance their fighting capacity. Third, it draws attention to the significant role of social network structures on the non-state side by empirically examining these structures, and their relationship to civil war dynamics and peace negotiations. Fourth, it sheds new light on pre-negotiation and ripeness theory by specifying the elements on the non-state side that need to be mobilized for a peace settlement, and what mobilization measures are used at what time. By furthering an understanding of the non-state side in civil war and peace processes, the dissertation helps third parties to engage more constructively in peacemaking, and humanitarian and development assistance.

<p>Inom ramen för ISAF genomförs nu en massiv utbildningsinsats i counterinsurgency, detta för att den nya strategin som tillämpas skall få stort genomslag. Den doktrin som används vid utbildning och vid genomförande är den amerikanska FM 3-24. Den bygger på flera andra doktriner, men är som egen helhet ny och relativt oprövad.</p><p>Syftet med uppsatsen är att undersöka om faktorer i doktrinens operationslinjer bidrar till framgång. Detta görs genom att besvara frågan: I vilken utsträckning var det faktorer som framgår av FM 3-24 ”logiska operationslinjer” som gav framgång vid försvenskningen av Skånelandskapen?</p><p>Designen för undersökningen är en fallstudie, där operationslinjerna i doktrinen har översatts och operationaliserats och sedan jämförts med ett urval av litteratur om försvenskningen av Skånelandskapen.</p><p>Resultatet stödjer att utifrån detta enskilda fall leder användandet av FM 3-24 operationslinjer till ökad sannolikhet för framgång. Vilket ger en ökad legitimitet i doktrinens nyttjande. Uppsatsen har även ett underliggande syfte, att påvisa att det finns svenskt nationellt exempel på COIN.</p>

<p>Den 14 maj firar Israel 60 år som självständig stat. Men konflikten med Palestina är ständigt närvarande. Folket från båda sidor lider av att aldrig känna trygghet, att förlora nära och kära, och att inte kunna nyttja sina mänskliga rättigheter. I denna artikelserie berättar invånarna om hur det är att leva med konflikten som vardag.</p>

<p>Erfarenheter från de senaste årens komplexa konflikter har bidragit till insikten att separata militära insatser ofta är otillräckliga för att skapa fred. <em>Comprehensive Approach</em> ses av många som ett koncept med målsättningen att skapa en integrerad civil-militär ansats för konfliktlösning. Konceptets innebörd är emellertid oklar. Dessutom är det problematiskt att empiriskt belägga att användandet av konceptet leder till framgång, vilket medför svårigheter att granska dess värde.</p><p>Uppsatsen utnyttjar Michael Howards teori om strategins dimensioner för att analysera Storbritanniens syn på <em>Comprehensive Approach</em> som strategiskt koncept. Som metod används en kvalitativ textanalys av systematiserande typ. Utifrån analysen identifieras styrkor och svagheter med konceptet, vilket medför att huvudfrågan vad Storbritanniens syn på <em>Comprehensive Approach</em> innebär och vilket värde <em>Comprehensive Approach</em> har som strategiskt koncept besvaras. Svaret bidrar till ökad kunskap och förståelse för <em>Comprehensive Approach, </em>vilket är uppsatsens syfte.</p><p>Resultatet visar att Storbritannien ser <em>Comprehensive Approach </em>som ett strategiskt koncept som kräver integrerade civil-militära strukturer för att fungera på ett bra sätt. Samtliga Howards dimensioner återfinns, och att ingen dimension överfokuseras är utifrån teorin en styrka. Värdet på <em>Comprehensive Approach </em>som strategiskt koncept kan samtidigt ifrågasättas främst på grund av att det mestadels uttrycks <em>vad</em> som bör uppnås, men däremot sällan beskrivs <em>hur</em> det ska genomföras. Uppsatsen påvisar även svårigheterna att samordna och koordinera aktörer mot ett gemensamt mål i en multinationell miljö, när incitament för samordning saknas.</p>

<p>Uppsatsens problemställning utgår från en eventuell brist i utbildning eller kunskap om gällande doktriner för svenska förband i utlandstjänst. Uppsatsen har ansatsen att visa på en ögonblicksbild av hur ett svenskt förband tolkar begreppet legitimitet och hur det arbetar med att stödja detta i genomförandet av verksamheten. Jämförande underlag och även analysverktyg utgår från ett brett urval inom forskning om upprorsbekämpning och även amerikanska doktriner samt reglementen.</p><p>Uppsatsen utgår från att begreppet legitimitet har stor betydelse för teorier kring upprorsbekämpning och även för den använda amerikanska doktrinen. Begreppet legitimitet har definierats med hjälp av tre frågeställningar, <em>Legitimitet för vem, Vem ska uppfatta vad som legitimt?</em> samt<em> Vem genererar legitimiteten åt vad? </em></p><p><p>Resultatet visar på att det svenska förbandet i det undersökta exemplet har en bred syn på begreppet legitimitet och kopplar det till såväl sig själva som statsmakten i värdlandet och detta både mot befolkningen i hemlandet och också i operationsområdet. Skillnaderna mot vad som i uppsatsen redovisas som COIN teori eller amerikansk doktrin är små. En viktig del är dock att uppsatsen visar på att det svenska förbandets huvudsakliga definition av legitimitet inom ett COIN-perspektiv är stärkandet av landets säkerhetsorganisationers legitimitet kontra den egna befolkningen. Detta skulle skilja sig mot ovan redovisad teori och doktrin.</p></p> / <p>The essay presentation of a problem proceed from a possible lack of training or knowledge about valid doctrines for Swedish units conducting service abroad. The essay have the goal to give a snapshoot picture of how a Swedish unit interpret the concept of legitimacy and how the unit works with different aspects to support this. Relating material and also the tool for conducting the analysis are gathered from a wide selection of science in counterinsurgency and also American doctrines.</p><p>The paper assumes that the concept of legitimacy is important in theories surrounding counterinsurgency and also for the used American doctrine. The concept of legitimacy has been defined by three issues, <em>Legitimacy for whom</em>, <em>Who will perceive what is legitimate</em>? and <em>Who generates legitimacy for what</em>?</p><p>The result shows that the Swedish unit in the examined example has a width of vision of the concept of legitimacy and linking it to both themselves as the state of the host country and that both the population in both the home and area of operation. The differences of what is in the paper are reported as COIN theory or the American doctrine is small. An important part is that the paper shows that the Swedish's unit primary definition of legitimacy in a COIN perspective, are the strengthening of the country's security organizations legitimacy versus its own population. This would differ from the above reported theory and doctrine.</p>

The focus of this study is the assumption that the return of refugees is a necessary condition for the establishment of sustainable peace after armed conflict. This assumption is often made in the peacebuilding literature as well as by policy makers, but it has rarely been the object of systematic analysis. The purpose of the study, therefore, is to test this assumption, which I label the “peace-by-repatriation thesis.” I adopt a two-step approach to analyzing the peace-by-repatriation thesis. The first step is to formulate an analytical framework. The second step is to use the framework to test the peace-by-repatriation thesis on a medium number of cases. The formulation of the analytical framework starts with an examination of previous research. I trace the theoretical foundations of the peace-by-repatriation thesis in research on peacebuilding, forced migration, and partition. The analytical framework is further informed by case studies of Bosnia-Herzegovina and Nagorno-Karabakh, two cases that represent opposing perceptions of repatriation as a condition for peace. I adopt a set-theoretic approach to test the peace-by-repatriation thesis. I describe in some detail how the key concepts of the analytical framework are operationalized. I select and code forty-three cases—terminated conflicts that caused large-scale displacement—and use fuzzy-set analysis to test the peace-by-repatriation thesis. The analysis shows that repatriation is not a necessary condition for sustainable peace. Instead, ending displacement—irrespective of how this is done—turns out to be an important condition for peace. This result is consistent across tests of different combinations of cases and tests using alternative operationalizations of key concepts. Taken together, the fuzzy-set analysis and the case studies suggest that the relationship between repatriation and peace will vary from case to case and that pre-war interethnic relations is one of the circumstances that affect that relationship.

<p>Abstract</p><p>This study examines the conclusions made by Roland Paris in his case study of fourteen major post-war reconstruction efforts following the end of the Cold War, and applies them to the current reconstruction process in post-war Iraq. Paris found a common denominator of the fourteen cases – a belief that a rapid liberalization process, turning war-torn states into liberal market democracies, would foster sustainable peace. Paris calls this belief “Wilsonianism” after Woodrow Wilson, who was one of the first advocates of it. However, as it turned out this immediate liberalization generated a number of destabilizing side-effects, which endangered the very peace such policies were designed to strengthen.</p><p>Thus, the aim of this study is: to try whether the developments in Iraq after 1 May 2003 correspond with Paris’ conclusion from his study of peacebuilding operations during the 1990:s, that a rapid liberalization process endangers the very peace it is expected to bring about.</p><p>Even though I had some difficulties separating the involvement of the American-led coalition as an invading power as opposed to the power behind the liberalization process, I found Paris’ conclusion to be well in accordance with how the post-war reconstruction effort of Iraq has developed.</p>

Why are some issues seen as threats? This dissertation attempts to explain the dynamics of threat construction by national decision-makers. The theoretical ambition is twofold: first, the dissertation aims at improving the research on threat construction by suggesting a broad approach that analyzes this process in a structured manner. Second, the dissertation also contributes to the more mainstream International Relations security research agenda, which often under-problematizes this issue. The point of departure is that the link between a condition (e.g. structure) and threat framing (e.g. agency) is not to be taken for granted, and that threat construction is subjective and varies among actors.  This assertion is supported by the findings of the dissertation’s component parts. Essay I finds that US security doctrines such as the Truman and Bush doctrines are not routine responses to external threats but rather the natural continuation of a political and societal discourse in which certain norms and identities interact. Essay II finds that a condition that could lay the foundation for a threat construction does not necessarily evoke such a reaction, such as the HIV/AIDS epidemic in Russia. Essay III demonstrates the opposite situation; that a securitization can take place although the contextual conditions do not necessarily point toward such a move, such as US President Clinton’s declaration that AIDS is a threat to the national security of the United States. Essay IV proposes a framework that incorporates explanatory factors from the international, the domestic, and the individual levels of analysis. Such a framework allows for a more refined analysis which better captures the contingent relationships between factors. Taken together, the findings of this dissertation indicate that the correlations between conditions and threat constructions are intricate, and that the explanation of a securitization lies in the interaction of certain social and cognitive processes.

This dissertation combines psychology with peace and conflict research in a cross-disciplinary approach to reconciliation processes after intrastate armed conflict. Two overarching contributions are made to the field of reconciliation research. The first is conceptual and methodological. The vague concept of reconciliation is defined and operationalized (Paper I), and a method is proposed for how reconciliation may be studied systematically at the national level (Paper II). By discussing what reconciliation is and how we should measure it, comparative research on reconciliation is facilitated which is imperative if we wish to learn of its promises and pitfalls in post-conflict peacebuilding. The second contribution is empirical. There has been an assumption that truth telling is healing and thereby will lead to reconciliation; healing is the assumed link between truth and reconciliation. This assumption was investigated in two studies in Rwanda in 2006. A multistage, stratified cluster random survey of 1,200 adults was conducted to assess whether witnessing in the gacaca, the Rwandan village tribunals for truth and reconciliation, was beneficial for psychological health; thereby investigating the claim that truth telling is healing (Paper III). The results of the survey are disconcerting. Witnesses in the gacaca suffered from significantly higher levels of depression and posttraumatic stress disorder than non-witnesses also when controlling for important predictors for psychological ill-health such as gender or trauma exposure. To acquire a more comprehensive understanding of the experience of witnessing in the gacaca, in-depth interviews were conducted with 16 women genocide survivors who had witnessed in the gacaca (Paper IV). The results of this study challenge the claim that truth telling is healing, suggesting instead that there are risks for the individuals on whom truth-telling processes depend. Traumatization, ill-health, isolation, and insecurity dominate the lives of the testifying women. Insecurity as a result of the truth-telling process emerged as one of the most crucial issues at stake. This dissertation presents a novel understanding of the complexity of reconciliation in post-conflict peacebuilding, demonstrating that truth and reconciliation processes may entail more risks than were previously known. The results of this dissertation can be used to improve the study and the design of truth and reconciliation processes after civil war and genocide.

<p>C-level Thesis in International Relations Course.</p>