Securing the Peace After Civil War
Abstract
This thesis focuses on the problem of recurring conflict in post-civil war states and seeks to understand the actions undertaken by the international community to alleviate this problem. Specifically, the thesis asks if the strategies of democratization, peacekeeping, and economic assistance have a positive impact on a post-civil war state's likelihood of sustaining the peace. The thesis uses a multi-prong approach to explore this question. First, the author conducts a survey of civil war literature and identifies ethnicity, conflict intensity, and economic development as primary risk factors that lead to a recurrence of internal conflict. Next, the thesis examines the international community?s democratization, peacekeeping, and economic assistance strategies and what impact the risk factors have on the execution of these strategies. Finally, the author offers recommendations to the strategies that can help mitigate the influence of the dominant risk factors. The thesis argues that risks associated with ethnicity, conflict intensity, and economic development directly influence the effectiveness of the strategies used by the international community. The likelihood that democratization, peacekeeping, and economic assistance strategies will fail to sustain the peace can be assessed before the implementation of international action. Consequently, the ability to identify and assess these variables before the execution of policies allows the international community to identify high-risk environments and tailor their strategies to mitigate the risks.
Document Details
- Document Type
- Technical Report
- Publication Date
- Mar 01, 2009
- Accession Number
- ADA497063
Entities
People
- David M. Ware
Organizations
- Naval Postgraduate School