The New Politics of Aid: Emerging Donors and Conflict-Affected States 9781626378407, 9781626378261

Citation preview

The New

POLITICS of Aid

The New POLITICS of Aid Emerging Donors and Conflict-Affected States Agnieszka Paczyńska edited by

b o u l d e r l o n d o n

.

Published in the United States of America in 2020 by Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc. 1800 30th Street, Boulder, Colorado 80301 www.rienner.com

and in the United Kingdom by Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc. Gray’s Inn House, 127 Clerkenwell Road, London EC1 5DB

© 2020 by Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc. All rights reserved

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Names: Paczyńska, Agnieszka, 1967- editor. Title: The new politics of aid : emerging donors and conflict-affected states / Agnieszka Paczyńska, editor. Description: Boulder, Colorado : Lynne Rienner Publishers, Inc., 2019. | Includes bibliographical references and index. | Summary: "Sheds light on both the increasingly complicated and complex landscape of foreign aid and the processes of postconflict reconstruction and peacebuilding"—Provided by publisher. Identifiers: LCCN 2019013677 (print) | LCCN 2019980022 (ebook) | ISBN 9781626378261 (hardcover) | ISBN 9781626378407 (ebook) Subjects: LCSH: Economic assistance—Case studies. | Economic development—Case studies. | Postwar reconstruction—Case studies. | Peacebuilding—Case studies. | BRIC countries—Foreign economic relations—Case studies. | BRIC countries—Foreign relations—Case studies. Classification: LCC HC60 .N47428 2019 (print) | LCC HC60 (ebook) | DDC 338.91—dc23 LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019013677 LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019980022

British Cataloguing in Publication Data A Cataloguing in Publication record for this book is available from the British Library.

Printed and bound in the United States of America

The paper used in this publication meets the requirements of the American National Standard for Permanence of Paper for Printed Library Materials Z39.48-1992.

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Contents

Preface

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1 Emerging Donors and Conflict-Affected States, Agnieszka Paczyńska

2 China: International Developmentalism and Global Security, Chris Alden and Yixiao Zheng 3 India: Between Principles and Pragmatism, Urvashi Aneja

4 South Africa: Balancing Leadership and Strategic Engagement, Gilbert M. Khadiagala 5 Brazil: The Nexus Between Security and Development, Paulo Esteves 6 Russia: Development Aid and Security Interests, Christoph Zürcher

7 Turkey: New Humanitarianism and Geostrategic Ambitions, Pinar Tank 8 Qatar: Conflict Mediation and Regional Objectives, Sultan Barakat and Sansom Milton

v

1 25 53 71 89 105 121 141

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Contents

9 The New Politics of Aid, Agnieszka Paczyńska

161

List of Acronyms Bibliography The Contributors Index About the Book

171 175 187 189 197

Preface

Powers in Postconflict and Transitional Settings: The New Politics of Reconstruction, supported by the United States Institute of Peace. The project consisted of two efforts. The first effort brought together peacebuilding and conflict resolution practitioners who explored the potential areas for collaboration between emerging and traditional donors. The resulting Changing Landscapes of Assistance to Conflict-Affected States: Emerging and Traditional Donors and Opportunities for Collaboration policy brief series, which I edited for publication by the Stimson Center, informs the discussion in Chapter 1 of the book. (The policy briefs are available at the Stimson Center website: www.stimson.org/content/emerging-and-traditional -donors-and-conflict-affected-states-new-politics-reconstruction.) The second effort brought together a group of international scholars to examine how emerging donors conceptualize the relationship between development and security, and how the policies they are pursuing in conflictaffected and postconflict countries differ from the liberal peacebuilding model of traditional donors. That effort led to this book. The contributors to the book, many from emerging donor countries, were chosen because of their expertise in the foreign policies of the individual countries. Each chapter was first presented at a workshop, then revised based on discussions during the workshop and subsequent correspondence among the contributors and editor. This process resulted in a collection of integrated chapters that relate to one another by asking the same questions, using similar terminology, and providing case studies and conceptual material that allow the book to offer new insights into the role

This book is the product of a three-year project, Emerging

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Preface

of emerging donors in the provision of assistance to conflict-affected states and postconflict reconstruction. * * *

The idea for this project first came about during the summer of 2011, when I was walking in downtown Monrovia, Liberia, and a bus drove by with a large sign on its side: “From the People of India to the People of Liberia.” What was India doing in Liberia? Why was it providing assistance? What else besides buses was it offering? Over time, these questions turned into a years-long research project exploring how emerging donors engage with conflict-affected states. Along the way, the advice, collaboration, and friendship of numerous people turned the initial idea into reality. I would like to thank the United States Institute of Peace (USIP), whose grant made this project possible; and Jeremy Moore, Lauren Van Metre, and Katherine Wood at USIP, who supported it. I also thank Brian Finlay, who invited me to become a nonresident fellow at the Stimson Center and offered to publish the series of policy briefs that was part of the project. I thank Dean Kevin Avruch at the School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution, George Mason University, and my colleagues at the university who discussed this project with me and offered helpful comments. In particular, I am grateful to Johanna Bockman, Thomas Flores, and especially Peter Mandaville, my original coconspirator on the project, and Terrence Lyons, who read and commented on the full manuscript and discussed the project with me over many years. I thank Jeremy Tomlinson for all his help in pulling together the research workshop that resulted in this book, as well as Kwaw de Graft-Johnson for help with designing the layout of the policy brief series. I am also grateful to Sasi Gopalan, Sam Johnson, and Alexandra Schaerrer-Cumming for their research assistance, and to Ryan Mu Chiao Chiu for assistance with the translation of Chinese-language sources. I would also like to thank friends, colleagues, and students who have discussed this project with me over the years and whose comments and insights have been enormously helpful, especially Larry Atree, Jo-Marie Burt, Chuck Call, Dawoon Chung, Leslie Dwyer, Pamina Firchow, Owen Greene, Melanie Greenberg, Kristian Harpviken, Susan Hirsch, Patricia Maulden, Rani Mullen, Pinar Tank, Susan Woodward, and Joseph Yarsiah. I have presented what is now Chapter 1 of the book at a number of conferences and workshops, including the American Political Science Association and International Studies Association annual meetings, the International Studies Association Asia-Pacific Conference, the DC Comparative Politics Workshop, and a number of events organized by the Center for Global Studies at George Mason University. I thank panel discussants and those attending for their insightful comments.

Preface

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I am grateful to Lynne Rienner for her encouragement when I was finalizing the manuscript for the book. I also thank all who collaborated on the project: the authors of the chapters—Chris Alden, Urvashi Aneja, Sultan Barakat, Paulo Esteves, Gilbert M. Khadiagala, Sansom Milton, Pinar Tank, Yixiao Zheng, and Christoph Zürcher; and those who wrote the policy briefs—David Alpher, John Miller Beauvoir, Daniel Jasper, Mara Leichtman, Rani Mullen, Martha Mutisi, Jason Tower, Kimairis Toogood, and Peter van Tuijl. This project would not have been possible without all of you! Finally, I especially want to thank Terrence Lyons, Nell Paczyńska Lyons, and Hanna Paczyńska for all their love. I dedicate this book to the memory of my brother Martin Paczyński.

1 Emerging Donors and Conflict-Affected States Agnieszka Paczyńska

in international economic dynamics and a gradual restructuring of global political relationships and collaborations. Emerging donors such as China, India, Brazil, Turkey, and the Gulf states have become more important investors and diplomatic and trading partners for countries affected by fragility, violence, and conflict.1 They are also playing a more prominent role in international peacekeeping and in providing development and humanitarian assistance to countries in the Global South. Despite the recent slowdown of economic growth in China, Russia, and South Africa, the political and economic crisis in Brazil, and the attempted coup in Turkey in July 2016, there is every reason to expect that their importance will continue in the long term. The rising importance of emerging donors came at a particular historical juncture. With the end of the Cold War and the disintegration of the Soviet Union, the relationship between Russia and the United States within the UN Security Council improved, making the UN organization more willing and able to expand its peacekeeping, peace-enforcing, and peacebuilding activities. The scope of the international community’s interventions in domestic conflicts implied a redefining of state sovereignty norms and an expansion of the domain for legitimate external intervention. As Michael W. Doyle points out, “Member states endorsed a radical expansion in the scope of collective intervention. Matters once legally preserved from UN intervention such as civil conflicts and humanitarian emergencies within sovereign states became legitimate issues of UN concern.”2 Traditional donors crafted these interventions around a number of principles and, in particular, promoted the development of market economies and democratic governance as the most effective mechanisms to peacefully resolve conflicts that inevitably

Over the past two decades, there have been significant shifts

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arise in any society and accordingly ensure stability following the cessation of armed conflict. This liberal peacebuilding model prioritized constructing transparent and accountable state institutions, developing participatory political processes (including supporting the capacity development of political parties and civil society organizations), establishing the rule of law, and promoting economic reforms that would allow the private sector (including foreign direct investment) to thrive. Security sector reforms, including the disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR) of former combatants and transitional justice initiatives, were also key components of reconstruction and peacebuilding processes.3 As discussed further below, an extensive critical literature has developed around the concept and application of the liberal peacebuilding model. Recent studies have increasingly acknowledged the growing role of emerging donors in development and humanitarian assistance.4 However, far less scholarship has systematically examined how emerging donors conceptualize and pursue assistance to conflict-affected states, how they conceptualize postconflict reconstruction and peacebuilding, and the relationship between development and security in fragile environments.5 With a few exceptions, comparative volumes that focus on postconflict reconstruction and assistance to fragile states have paid scant attention to emerging donors.6 Furthermore, until quite recently in much of the literature, there has been an underlying assumption that the “international community is composed of like-minded actors with global leverage and legitimacy in the countries in which they intervene.” 7 Although this likely overstates the commonalities and similarities among traditional donors, with the growing prominence of emerging donors this assumption is even weaker and the development and humanitarian assistance landscape has become even more complex. This book adds to these discussions by examining emerging donors’ engagement with conflict-affected states, exploring how their approaches differ from those of traditional donors, and investigating the policies of individual emerging donors. In particular, the volume’s contributors investigated two overarching questions: (1) how emerging donors conceptualize the relationship between security and development; and (2) whether the policies they pursue in conflict-affected states differ from the liberal peacebuilding model of traditional donors. The emerging donors are a diverse group and include economic powerhouses such as China and relatively poor countries such as South Africa. This book examines in detail the engagements of seven emerging donors— Brazil, China, India, Russia, South Africa, Turkey, and Qatar—with conflictaffected states. While the cases were chosen to reflect the differences among emerging donors in terms of the size of their economies, the global reach of their policies, and their type of regime, it is important to underscore that

Emerging Donors and Conflict-Affected States

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these seven cases are only some of the growing number of new actors who are providing development assistance to countries affected by conflict. The contributors to this book paint a picture of an increasingly complicated and complex landscape of donors’ engagement with conflict-affected states. They point out that the emerging donors share some commonalities in their policies vis-à-vis conflict-affected states that differentiate them in important ways from traditional donors. Despite these similarities, however, the contributors show that there is no unified emerging donor model, but rather a diversity of approaches, philosophies, and strategic objectives. How these emerging donors approach their engagements with conflict-affected states differs considerably in terms of areas of focus of assistance, how issues of peacebuilding and reconstruction are conceptualized (if conceptualized at all), whether there is a willingness to shape political dynamics in recipient countries, and the extent of the global reach of these engagements. In other words, rather than introducing an alternative to the liberal peacebuilding model, the growing prominence of emerging donors is creating a more complex landscape of international assistance to conflict-affected and postconflict states. A number of key conclusions emerge from the case studies in this volume. Despite their differences, discussed in more detail later in this chapter, the emerging donors share important principles in how they engage with conflict-affected states that differentiate them from the traditional donors. These differences between emerging and traditional donors are shaped by their distinct historical experiences with development as well as their very different positions within the global political economy. Most important, legacies of colonialism and experience with internal violent conflict shape how emerging donors approach their engagements with conflict-affected states. In particular, emerging donors frame these relationships in terms of South-South collaboration, mutual benefit, and reciprocity, emphasizing partnerships rather than hierarchical relationships. They also place strong emphasis on national ownership and demand-driven assistance, responding to the needs articulated by the conflict-affected states themselves. Unlike traditional donors, emerging donors place importance on the principles of nonintervention and nonconditionality of aid, seeing these as violating norms of state sovereignty. This concern with respecting state sovereignty reflects not just particular historical experiences with external interventions but also continued experiences with internal violent conflict such as the Kashmir conflict in the case of India and the conflict between the Kurds and the Turkish state. Because of these experiences, emerging donors are concerned about the potential continued interference of global actors in their domestic affairs. The norms that underpin how emerging donors frame their engagements with conflict-affected states can be traced to the 1955 Bandung conference, which brought together newly independent states primarily from Asia and Africa and was the beginning of the Non-Aligned Movement. 8

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During the conference, participants developed ten principles to underpin their relationships; these included respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all nations, recognition of equality of all nations, nonintervention and noninterference in the international affairs of other nations, and respect for justice and international obligations.9 However, the contributors to this book find that the policies pursued in practice often differ from these normative aspirations. In particular, policies that emerging donors pursue in their immediate neighborhoods tend to place greater premiums on strategic and security goals while those pursued further abroad tend to prioritize commercial and business interests. Furthermore, as emerging donors come to aspire to more global roles, strict adherence to principles of noninterference becomes more difficult to sustain. Likewise, these norms become strained as emerging donors find their commercial and strategic interests threatened by violent conflict. Finally, the contributors also find that, despite a rhetoric of partnership, implicit conditionalities are sometimes tied to the assistance provided and, in some cases, coercive conditionalities underpin these relationships. These themes are explored in more detail below. Before proceeding, a note about the terminology used in this book is needed. A number of the terms are problematic. First is the term emerging donor. The donors themselves are uncomfortable with this term. Moreover, emerging donors’ assistance provision, of course, is not new and can be traced to the early 1960s and the formation of the Non-Aligned Movement.10 An alternative term, rising donors, while avoiding the problem of characterizing these donors as new, is also imprecise and does not acknowledge that some of them, such as China, Russia, and India, have been significant global powers for some time. Equally problematic are the terms development assistance, aid, and recipient. Emerging donors, because of their own experiences with external interference in domestic affairs, unlike traditional donors conceptualize their relationships in collaborative nonhierarchical ways and couch them in a language of solidarity, experience sharing, and mutual support and benefits. Therefore, they avoid using terms such as assistance, aid, and recipient as these imply hierarchies and power differentials. In other words, although we use these terms throughout the book, it is important to keep in mind that they are contested. Finally, while this is not the focus of this volume, it is important to note that traditional donors, although they abide by the Development Assistance Committee of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD DAC) principles and principles of engagement with fragile states and that support the liberal peacebuilding model approach to addressing challenges of conflict-affected states, nonetheless differ in their

A Note About Vocabulary

Emerging Donors and Conflict-Affected States

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approaches and emphasize different mixes of policies. Therefore, traditional donors are also not a homogenous group. Over the past couple of decades, development and humanitarian assistance from emerging donors has rapidly expanded, and it is clear that the global development funding landscape is changing significantly. By some estimates, it is likely that by 2020 emerging donors may account for close to 20 percent of total foreign aid, thus doubling their contributions since 2012.11 Despite clear growth in the importance of emerging donors, it is challenging to provide exact amounts of aid that they disburse.12 One challenge in assessing the level of emerging donors’ assistance, including assistance to conflict-affected states, is that the way that emerging donors define, disburse, and report aid is significantly different from traditional donors. Unlike traditional donors, most emerging donors do not share information through OECD DAC mechanisms, and do not follow Development Assistance Committee (DAC) standards of aid provision or guidelines for providing assistance to fragile states. In fact, a significant part of the assistance they provide falls outside what would be considered aid under DAC mechanisms and includes loans, lines of credit, trade, and investments, often in energy, natural resources, and agricultural sectors.13 In other words, the cooperative ventures that emerging donors establish with recipient countries often do not conform to how development assistance is measured by DAC donors, raising questions about what should be considered development assistance. Furthermore, many of the emerging donors do not funnel assistance through a single agency but rather through multiple institutions, making it more difficult to track allocated funds. Consequently, various sources report somewhat different levels of aid flows from emerging donors. Despite these limitations, however, available data as illustrated in Figure 1.1 clearly show the growing footprint of emerging donors. Data that contributors to this book have compiled also indicate that, with the exception of South Africa and more recently Brazil (each of which has struggled with domestic economic and political crises), the amount of emerging donors’ assistance has risen significantly. Chinese aid dominates among emerging donors, reaching by some estimates $5.4 billion in 2015, and in 2016 China pledged $1 billion to UN peace support programs (Chapter 2). In 2017, India’s development assistance totaled $1.16 billion, which was four times higher than just a decade earlier (Chapter 4). Russia’s official development assistance (ODA) has grown since 2005 when it transitioned from being a recipient to a donor, reaching $714 million in 2014 and $1 billion just two years later (Chapter 6). Turkey’s development assistance between 2011 and 2012 alone rose by 98.7 percent, and it increased from a mere $85 million in 2002 to $6.2 billion in 2016 (Chapter 7). Finally, Qatar

Emergence of New Donors

Agnieszka Paczyńska

6

Figure 1.1 Aid Flows from Emerging Bilateral Donors, 2010–2015 (in billions of US dollars) 6,000

5,000

4,000

3,000

2,000

1,000

0

2010 China China

2015 UAE

T Turkey urkey

India India

Russia Russia

Source: “Emerging Donors 2.0,” Devex Reports (Washington, DC: Devex International Development, 2018), p. 2.

averaged $540 million in foreign aid between 2007 and 2011 and its humanitarian assistance, while fluctuating from year to year, has increased from $72 million in 2005 to $162 million in 2014 (Chapter 8). As the levels of their assistance have grown, emerging donors have also been forging partnerships outside the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) frameworks. In 2004, for instance, the India, Brazil, and South Africa (IBSA) Dialogue Forum established the IBSA Facility for Poverty and Hunger Alleviation (IBSA Fund) aimed at strengthening South-South cooperation and disseminating best practices in promoting development and fighting poverty.14 More recently, with the establishment of the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) and the New Development Bank (NDB), emerging donors are focusing on providing alternative sources of development and infrastructure financing to those available through Western-dominated financial institutions. The NDB is operated by Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa (BRICS) and is set up “to foster greater financial and development cooperation” between the five. Although voting power is weighed according to the capital share of each member, the initial subscription capital is distributed equally among the five founding member states.15 The BRICS see this bank as providing an alternative source of financing so that countries do not need to rely on only the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund.16

Emerging Donors and Conflict-Affected States

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The liberal peacebuilding and state-building model became dominant in the early 1990s as the international community expanded its interventions in countries emerging out of civil wars. Over time, the model has faced growing criticism from practitioners and scholars alike. These critiques include, but are not limited to, the excessive focus on top-down state building, neglect of grassroots input into the peacebuilding and reconstruction projects, and insufficient local ownership that has had negative impact on sustainability of the efforts.17 The marginalization and exclusion of some actors and narratives has meant that many of the projects were inappropriate, irrelevant, and not seen as legitimate by those who had been excluded from participation in their design.18 The model has also been criticized for making assumptions about the processes of political and economic change and, in particular, that it has been based on Western experiences without taking into account the specificity of postconflict contexts.19 Critics have also argued that the nature of the policies that were promoted as part of the liberal peacebuilding model often contributed to aggravating social conflicts rather than facilitating their resolution. As Roland Paris points out, for instance, “The process of political and economic liberalization is inherently tumultuous. It can exacerbate social tensions and undermine the prospects for stable peace in the fragile conditions that typically exist in countries emerging from civil war.”20 Others have gone further and argued that the liberal peacebuilding project simply represented a new form of hegemonic control and neocolonialism that sought to reinforce global hierarchies.21 A recent effort by the Commission on State Fragility, Growth and Development22 sees the traditional donors’ approaches to addressing challenges of conflict-affected and fragile states as a failure that necessitates a fundamental rethinking of how to move these countries toward sustainable development and peacebuilding and ensure that the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), in general, and Goal 16: Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions, in particular, can be achieved. 23 The commission posits that “international actors have radically overreached their competence in addressing the challenges of state fragility,” that fragile states have been asked to do too many things at once while “domestic actors have been marginalized,” that local specificities have not been taken into account, and that a “strategy for the escape from fragility [has been inferred] from the current characteristics of Western democracies.” 24 Most emerging donors would agree with many of the commission’s critiques. They also have offered alternative approaches to the liberal peacebuilding model that has dominated traditional donors’ thinking about engagements with conflict-affected and fragile states. Although South Africa, as Gilbert M. Khadiagala argues in Chapter 4, has been largely supportive of liberal peacebuilding, advocating democratic

The Failure of Liberal Peacebuilding

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and economic reforms as well as political reconciliation in countries where it has engaged in peacebuilding and peacekeeping operations, other emerging donors have taken a different approach toward their engagements with conflict-affected states. China, Chris Alden and Yixiao Zheng argue in Chapter 2, views liberal peacebuilding with skepticism, seeing it as offering little more than a palliative to conflict and often contributing to exacerbating the very conflicts that it was designed to address. However, this skepticism is less ideological than practical. From China’s perspective, liberal peacebuilding has simply not been effective. This lack of success in its view is a consequence of the ideological attachments of its practitioners who pay too little attention to the results and impacts of the policies they advocate. Consequently, interventions push for the adoption of liberal institutions while disregarding local contexts and conditions. In other words, traditional donors promote a one-size-fits-all model that draws on the Western world’s experiences with political and economic development, which is therefore bound to fail in environments that are fundamentally different. More broadly, Alden and Zheng posit, China views traditional donors as paying insufficient attention to economic development and political stability. They point to the UN Peacebuilding Fund as exemplifying the overall problems with liberal peacebuilding—only a small fraction of the fund’s assistance goes to programs supporting socioeconomic development that China views as essential to sustainable peace. India, Urvashi Aneja argues in Chapter 3, sees effective governing institutions as underpinning sustainable peace. While it views state stability as an important component of international peace and security, unlike the liberal peacebuilding model it does not see any particular form of governance as preferable as long as it is locally rooted and inclusive of all stakeholders. Because international interventions promote democratic governance institutions regardless of context, India views such interventions as typically destabilizing states and eroding national institutions rather than building peace. In other words, like China, India’s critique of liberal peacebuilding is embedded in pragmatic rather than ideological assessments. Turkish critiques of the liberal peacebuilding model have emerged over time. In the 1990s, when Turkey sought to counterbalance Russian and Iranian influence in Turkic states, Pinar Tank argues in Chapter 7, it focused on promoting democratization, free-market economies, and Westernization. With the defeat of the long-dominant secular political elite, however, Turkey’s foreign policies shifted, becoming more activist and more critical of liberal peacebuilding as a result of what it viewed as the approach’s failures in Afghanistan and Iraq. The alternative “humanitarian diplomacy” that it pursued in its engagements with conflict-affected states did not try to re-create failed states in the image of the donor country, but rather focused on supporting key indigenous institutions needed to

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ensure sustainable economic development and efficient governance. Turkey explicitly contrasted its policies with those of traditional donors, pointing to the distinct historical, cultural, and social roots of its approach and, in particular, its grounding in Islamic values. Qatar similarly roots its humanitarian assistance and its critique of liberal peacebuilding in Islamic values. It has, as Sultan Barakat and Sansom Milton point out in Chapter 8, long rejected interventionist policies that push liberal political and economic reforms. In part this is because Qatar recognizes that as a nondemocratic state it would be hypocritical to promote democratization, but primarily it is because Qatar sees its humanitarian assistance as rooted in Islamic principles of charity and sovereignty of recipient governments and communities. That being said, recently Qatar has been shifting its strategies and deepening its collaborations with traditional donors and aligning more closely with global aid norms. In 2016, it joined OECD DAC as a participant and has come out in support of the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) principle and SDG 16. As discussed earlier in this chapter, how emerging donors define, disburse, and report aid is significantly different from traditional donors. At the same time, because they maintain that they follow the Bandung Principles developed in the heyday of the Non-Aligned Movement, emerging donors frame their assistance in terms that prioritize solidarity, cooperation, and mutual support and the principle of noninterference in internal affairs of other states. Consequently, they largely eschew the language of conditionalities used by traditional donors preferring to frame these relationships in collaborative and cooperative terms.25 Emerging donors also claim that they do not interfere in domestic politics of recipient states as that would violate norms of state sovereignty, and that the projects they support are demand driven and emerge from government plans of recipient states.26 Nonetheless, as studies of development assistance have found, the public rhetoric of emerging donors masks more complex rationales for aid provision and the modalities of assistance program implementation.27 It also masks the diversity of emerging donors’ policies and strategic objectives, economic interests, and assistance provision philosophies and priorities.28 The contributors to this volume found that similar patterns can be discerned when looking at emerging donors’ engagement with conflict-affected states. The chapter authors reveal a more nuanced picture and point to the existence of multiple agendas and interests driving emerging donors’ policies. They also highlight that there often are implicit conditionalities attached to the assistance provided and, in the case of Russia, coercive conditionalities that tie support from Russia to political concessions from recipient states.

Emerging Donors Assistance

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Emerging donors share certain commonalities that differentiate them from traditional donors. One of the key differences that the chapter authors found between traditional and emerging donors relates to issues that emerging donors view as affecting state sovereignty. Most, though not all as discussed in the case studies, are deeply wary of what they view as interventionist policies pursued by traditional donors who seek to influence domestic politics— for instance, through democracy promotion and through conditionalities attached to assistance provided, whether relating to human rights, environmental standards, or gender policies. These differences between traditional and emerging donors are a reflection of their different histories and experiences with their own development trajectories. Many emerging donors have known colonial and other forms of domination by more hegemonic global powers and try—at least rhetorically—to avoid replicating such hierarchical relationships when establishing collaborations with conflict-affected states. This is why they tend to frame these relationships in collaborative and cooperative terms, largely eschewing the language of assistance and conditionalities used by traditional donors. At the same time, many emerging donors have been in the past or continue to be conflict-affected states themselves, and many have neighbors that have experienced or continue to struggle with violent conflict. South Africa experienced protracted conflict during the apartheid era. Russia has dealt with internal conflicts in Chechnya and neighboring Caucasus and Central Asian states. In the latter, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan, in particular, have seen periods of violence and instability. India has experienced political assassinations and electoral violence, and has struggled with conflict in Kashmir and sometimes violent confrontations in Gujarat. Civil wars have affected neighboring Afghanistan, Nepal, and Sri Lanka, raising concerns about possible spillover of these conflicts into India. Turkey has had a history of military coups and not only has faced domestic conflict with its Kurdish population but, since the Arab uprisings of 2011, has had to worry about the impact of the Syrian civil war on its own as well as regional stability. China has experienced conflicts with the Uighurs and with Tibet. These encounters with emerging donors’ internal, often violent, conflicts also shape how they conceptualize relationships with states affected by violence. This is why they are wary of interventionist policies that are a core component of the liberal peacebuilding model, viewing such policies as potentially threatening to their own sovereignty.

Legacies of Colonialism and Domestic Violence

Experiences with colonialism, hegemonic power domination, and internal violent conflict color how emerging donors conceptualize the challenges posed by conflict and insecurity to development. The principles of noninter-

Emerging Donors, Conflict, and Development

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ference and at least rhetorical opposition to conditionalities, along with particular understandings of the relationship between development and conflict, the book’s contributors argue, have translated into a focus by most emerging donors on economic rather than political interventions in conflict-affected states. Much of this assistance has prioritized direct investments, trade deals, infrastructure construction, training of civil servants, and apolitical humanitarian assistance as well as a greater focus on peacekeeping than peacebuilding. However, as the contributors also underscore, while the emerging donors do share commonalities, there are significant differences in how these donors are engaging with conflict-affected states with respect to the modalities of assistance and the policies they pursue, including how interventionist they are prepared to be. This is not surprising since emerging donors are a deeply varied group, including economic powerhouses and rising global powers (e.g., China), aspiring global powers (e.g., Brazil and India), regional hegemons (e.g., Russia), smaller regional powers (e.g., Turkey and South Africa), and small states (e.g., Qatar) who, thanks to financial resources, can project their influence in the Middle East and North Africa. Some are democracies; others are authoritarian regimes that include one-party states as well as monarchies. In Chapter 2, Alden and Zheng argue that China’s engagement with conflict-affected states focuses primarily on promoting economic development regardless of the domestic political context in the recipient state. China sees poverty and economic underdevelopment as the root cause of conflict and, therefore, understands development as key to ensuring security, stability, and long-term peace. These policies and the conceptualization of the relationship between development and security emerge out of China’s own experience with national development and its Five Principles of Peaceful Coexistence, which guide its foreign policy by placing particular importance on achieving national self-reliance. Consequently, the bulk of Chinese assistance to conflict-affected countries focuses on infrastructure construction and industrial development, including investments in the mining industries, with some funds channeled toward general budget support, education, and health. In recent years, as Aneja notes in Chapter 3, India has significantly expanded its development cooperation, focusing on grants, loans, and training programs. However, India does not have a policy framework that articulates how engagements with conflict-affected states should be structured despite its extensive involvement in peacekeeping operations. It also avoids using the term fragile, which it views as externally imposing notions of what legitimate statehood looks like. Nonetheless, Aneja argues, in its geographic neighborhood (most prominently in Afghanistan), India’s policies do link issues of political stability, security, and development. Here, because of India’s concerns with the rise of extremism in the region, it supports projects that bolster the legitimacy of the Afghan government, improve economic

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development, and stabilize the country and help it achieve self-sufficiency.29 India’s assistance is demand driven and responds to requests from governments, reflecting its priorities and thus supporting nationally defined development goals. Consequently, India does not provide direct support to civil society groups or communities, even though it does fund programs in agricultural and vocational training, public health, and education, among others. Indian investments in Africa, on the other hand, are driven primarily by commercial and economic interests, in particular access to raw materials and new markets for Indian exports, and are channeled primarily through lines of credit, although the engagements are framed in terms of South-South cooperation principles. Here, Aneja argues in Chapter 3, India takes a risk-averse approach to conflicts and, in contrast to traditional donors, has not articulated a clear philosophy linking security and development. Thus, India tends to work around rather than directly engaging with “sources of political fragility.”30 The exceptions are Sudan, South Sudan, and Libya where India’s investments came under threat due to renewed conflict. Here, like China, the shifting political context has pushed India to more directly articulate the relationship between security and development and to argue for a holistic approach promoting state stability as the prerequisite for international peace and security. In particular, India points to rapid economic growth as essential to ensuring sustainable development and durable peace. For Brazil, Paulo Esteves argues in Chapter 5, developmentalism has been a way of ensuring the country’s autonomy, reducing external dependencies and reshaping its socioeconomic structure. Like China and India, Brazil has believed that addressing root causes of conflict necessitates ensuring sustainable development. At the same time, Brazil sees insecurity and conflict not only as stemming from internal dynamics within states that traditional donors emphasize but also as influenced by the position of conflict-affected states within the political economy and global security architecture, with the major Western powers being the source of much global instability, insecurity, and conflict. As Brazilian ambassador to the United Nations Antonio de Aguiar Patriota noted in 2015: The relationship between security and development cannot be understood from a simplistic perspective. We should clearly reject any notion that poverty itself might constitute a threat to peace. One should not lose sight of the fact that the gravest threats to international peace and security, including world wars, have historically risen from tensions between developed industrial nations. Militaristic agendas and the unilateral use of force are far more significant sources of instability than poverty per se.31

Russia, Christoph Zürcher argues in Chapter 6, also sees a link between security and development. However, unlike China, India, and Brazil, its focus on addressing security threats through development is largely limited to its near

Emerging Donors and Conflict-Affected States

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abroad. Here, aid is very much securitized and aims at addressing various forms of violence—communal violence, state-society violence, and violence that results from transborder drug trafficking and crime. These types of violence that can spill across international boundaries are seen by Russia as a direct threat to its own security. Assistance to the near abroad is provided primarily through bilateral channels and focuses on direct budget support, concessionary loans, and grants. As Zürcher highlights, the 2014 Concept statement links Russian development assistance to its national interests and argues that “active and target policies in the field of international development assistance that take into account the national interests of Russia contribute to the stabilization of the socioeconomic and political situation in its partner countries.” Qatar, unlike the other emerging donors analyzed in this book, has benefited from internal stability and prosperity, although that stability was strained in 2017 when Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain, and Egypt, among others, imposed a blockade on the country. On the other hand, its prosperity has allowed it to “punch above its weight,” as Barakat and Milton argue in Chapter 8, with the small state becoming involved in mediation and postconflict reconstruction efforts as part of its interest in branding itself as a global player as well as pursuing geostrategic and economic interests that are tied to regional stability. Qatar tends to provide development and humanitarian assistance to those countries where it has served as a conflict mediator, and has often used its financial resources to nudge parties to a conflict to a negotiated settlement. Although it has been accused of pursuing checkbook diplomacy, Qatar’s financial ability to support transitions out of civil war has been crucial for reconstruction efforts in Lebanon, Darfur, and Gaza in particular, where it supported education and infrastructure and housing reconstruction. South Africa prioritizes support to other African states—reflecting its resources that are more limited than those available to Qatar, India, or China—through its African Agenda that focuses on the link between peace, security, and development and seeks to enhance security and development. South Africa, as Khadiagala argues in Chapter 4, has drawn on its own experience with reconciliation and stabilization when providing support to conflict-affected states. This concern is reflected in the African National Congress (ANC) Foreign Policy Platform, which posits that “socioeconomic development cannot take place without political peace and stability.”32 Unlike India and China, South Africa has explicitly supported democracy promotion, even if in practice it often has maintained close relationships with authoritarian states; for instance, Libya’s Muammar Qaddafi. The ANC platform underscores its “belief in and preoccupation with human rights . . . just and long-lasting solutions to the problems of the world can only come through the promotion of democracy worldwide.”33 In other words, in South Africa’s view, democracy and socioeconomic development go hand in hand.

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Additionally, emerging donors’ policies vis-à-vis conflict-affected states in their immediate geographic neighborhood and those farther removed often differ, thus underscoring that despite the language of solidarity, collaboration, and mutual benefit, national security and geostrategic interests also significantly shape emerging donors’ policies toward conflict-affected states. Consequently, as Aneja notes in Chapter 3, how India engages with Afghanistan, where its primary concern is fostering stability, is very different from how it structures its relationships with states in Africa where commercial interests loom large. In other words, India wants to ensure that states in its neighborhood are stable and friendly, as this is seen as necessary for India’s security and economic growth. Consequently, Aneja found that India’s “commitment to principles of sovereign equality and noninterference in the region have been selective”(p. 57). When India has believed that its interests are threatened, it has not shied away from exerting political pressure to change domestic politics or military intervention into neighboring states. At other times, it has remained silent on domestic politics of neighboring states—for instance, on the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar—less out of commitment to noninterference and more as a consequence of its regional rivalry with China and desire to retain influence. Likewise, Tank argues in Chapter 7, in Somalia, Turkey pursues humanitarian diplomacy that draws on Islamic principles and sets out to offer a clear alternative to the liberal peacebuilding model, which Turkey views as a failed approach in light of experiences in Afghanistan and Iraq. Its humanitarian diplomacy, undertaken for the “love of God and with no hidden agendas” (p. 130), focuses on reconstructing needed state infrastructure to ensure that economic development and efficient governance can take place, promoting peace and the reconciliation process. However, in Syria whose conflict, unlike those in Somalia, presents an immediate threat, Turkey’s policies have shifted to reflect those concerns. After attempting to mediate the conflict in 2011, Turkey became increasingly concerned about the impact of growing Kurdish autonomy in war-torn Syria on its own Kurdish population, so it abandoned its normative principle of noninterference and began to support Sunni groups that are seeking to overthrow the Bashar al-Assad regime. Similarly, Zürcher argues in Chapter 6 that Russia’s policies vis-à-vis states in its near abroad are very different than toward conflict-affected states more geographically removed. Its policies toward the latter predominantly take the form of modest contributions to multilateral organizations. In the near abroad, development assistance is clearly an instrument for promotion of Russia’s national and security interests. This aid is provided primarily on a bilateral basis and is characterized by coercive conditionalities with an eye toward promoting Russia’s geostrategic interests and aimed at ensuring stability and managing potential transnational threats that could spill over into Russia.

Proximity to the Donor

Emerging Donors and Conflict-Affected States

Nonintervention in a Changing Context and Growing Global Aspirations

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In practice, as suggested by the discussion above, many of this book’s contributors note that maintaining principles of solidarity and noninterference in political affairs of recipient states is harder when confronted with realities on the ground, particularly when they find their nationals, investments, and commercial as well as security interests directly affected by conflict and violence. At the same time, emerging donors also find it more challenging to maintain these principles as they move into more prominent global roles. Finally, domestic political changes in Turkey and Brazil remind us of the links between local political imperatives and foreign policy. China’s emergence as an economic powerhouse with an increasingly prominent international role has resulted, Alden and Zheng argue in Chapter 2, in growing pressure on the country, especially from developing countries, to translate that new prominence into a more active role in providing support (both financial and political) to peace and security provision. At the same time, the West has also been exerting pressure on China to take on more responsibilities in these areas. These dual pressures, as well as China’s desire to protect its international reputation as a responsible power, have translated into greater engagement in peacekeeping operations and mediation of international conflicts and a decline in its opposition to the Responsibility to Protect. At the same time as China’s economic and security interests have come under direct threat from violence in places such as Libya and Sudan, maintaining a policy of noninterference has come to be seen as increasingly difficult and potentially counterproductive as it would threaten to undermine these commercial and strategic interests and potentially open up space for Western powers to reshape political dynamics in these areas without Chinese input. As a consequence, China has become more directly involved in conflict mediation and has begun to reevaluate its assessment of the R2P principle adopted by the United Nations in 2005.34 While China’s and traditional donors’ views on the application of R2P continue to diverge, Alden and Zheng show in Chapter 2 that there is also a clear convergence of these views under way. Thus, Alden and Zheng point out, China has become engaged in mediation of conflicts in Libya and Sudan as its investments in the oil sector have come under threat. On the other hand, Turkey, Tank argues in Chapter 7, has found that its provision of development and humanitarian assistance to Somalia with its emphasis on being on the ground, close to the beneficiaries, inevitably has drawn it into internal Somali politics. For instance, Turkey’s engagement has been criticized for concentrating resources primarily on Mogadishu while neglecting more distant regions. Brazil’s 1988 Constitution, Esteves points out in Chapter 5, states that the country’s foreign policy must be “guided by the principles of non-interference,

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equity among state, the peaceful resolution of conflicts” as well as commitment to human rights norms. Throughout the 1990s, the country maintained this position and frequently voiced concerns about international interventions and the unilateral use of force. Although Brazil was supportive of UN peacekeeping operations, it was opposed to more enhanced missions that focused on peace enforcement as well as humanitarian intervention. In particular, Esteves argues, Brazil was staunchly opposed to the Agenda for Peace and perceived the document as a “reinterpretation of the Security Council’s mandate toward a more militarized direction” (p. 95). It viewed it as an invitation to an expanded scope for future military interventions and coercive measures, especially by major powers, replacing diplomacy and negotiations as a mechanism for addressing international conflicts and security challenges. Brazil argued that the responsibility for peace and security should be the purview of sovereign states and consent for deployment of any peacekeeping operation was essential. In the 2000s, Brazil has begun shifting its long-held position on noninterference. In Latin America, and especially in its policies vis-à-vis Bolivia, Colombia, and Venezuela, Brazil has sought to balance its preference for noninterference with a policy of nonindifference. At the global level, it reduced its opposition to the Agenda for Peace and skepticism regarding the R2P when it became involved in the UN mission in Haiti. Nonetheless, Esteves argues, while Brazil supported efforts to promote human and political rights and development, and has placed reconciliation and fighting poverty at the center of its mission in Haiti, it continued to be wary of what it views as possible expansion of militarizing development. However, the traditional lines of Brazilian foreign policy have been challenged with the election of far-right leader Jair Bolsonaro in 2018, changing both its direction and content. The agenda of human rights and democratic development has been weakened in preference for narrow national self-interest; there is a preference for bilateral over multilateral relations, and there is a clear pivot toward the United States and Israel with a weakening of relations with the Global South. The Bolsonaro government’s decision in February 2019 to support the opposition candidate in Venezuela, Juan Guaido, can thus be seen through the prism of self-interest, due to concern over refugee flows across the border; ideology—in opposition to Venezuela’s left-wing populist president Nicolás Maduro; and alliances, following US president Donald Trump’s lead in intervening in Venezuelan affairs. In 2002 when the secular political elite that long held sway in Turkey lost power and was replaced by the Justice and Development Party, there also was a shift in Turkey’s global engagements. In particular, the new government saw an opportunity to carve out a new role for the country as a “Muslim democracy” both regionally and globally, Tank argues in Chapter 7. At the same time the changing regional context, and particularly the

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intensifying conflict in neighboring Syria, shifted Turkey’s policy from one that emphasized noninterference and respect for state sovereignty to one of direct engagement with the parties to the conflict. In Syria, Turkey began to support Sunni factions opposed to the al-Assad regime and moved from the early attempts to mediate a peaceful resolution of the conflict to openly backing the removal of al-Assad. Qatar also shifted toward a more interventionist stance following the Arab uprisings in 2011. In particular, as Barakat and Milton point out in Chapter 8, it explicitly backed rebels in both Libya and Syria. In Syria alone, between 2011 and 2014, Qatar committed $3 billion to the opposition forces. Elsewhere in the Middle East, Qatar also followed an interventionist path; for instance, by financially supporting Egyptian president Mohamed Morsi and the Muslim Brotherhood. However, this shifting stance created a political backlash, leading Qatar to temporarily scale back its external engagements and, after the imposition of the 2017 blockade, to focus on managing its internal conflict. However, by 2018 Qatar was once again expanding its international mediation efforts, including hosting US-Taliban negotiations in Doha in the winter of 2019. Thus, as in the case of other emerging donors, the policies Qatar has pursued regarding intervention have evolved over time and been shaped by changing global priorities as well as changing regional dynamics. Although, as Aneja argues in Chapter 3, India does not have a “sense of global purpose or ambition with regard to conflict-affected states” (p. 54), in large part because it continues to be preoccupied with its immense domestic challenges, nonetheless like China it has begun to shift its approach to peacekeeping as part of its interest in being seen on the global stage as a responsible power. Its contributions to the UN Democracy Fund, Aneja posits, also need to be seen as a reflection of India’s quest for great-power standing rather than support for democracy promotion per se. Despite these shifts as well as its recognition of the R2P doctrine in 2009, India remains deeply skeptical about the effectiveness of external interventions in conflictaffected states. The country argues that the primary responsibility for building sustainable peace ultimately rests with conflict-affected states, with the international community playing only a supportive role. India believes that external intervention rather than facilitating the reconstruction of conflictaffected states may in fact exacerbate the very problems it was designed to solve if it is conducted “from the outside through unitary force.”35 Although some emerging donors such as India have long provided significant numbers of peacekeeping troops, over the past decade one of the key changes has been their growing involvement in UN peace operations. For instance, between 2001 and 2010, Brazil, China, India, and South Africa’s

Approaches to Peacekeeping

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share of deployed personnel in these operations has increased from 5 percent to 15 percent.36 They also have increasingly participated in operations outside their immediate geographic region.37 In other words, they have become active in shaping the peacebuilding and peacekeeping policies and in the UN Peacebuilding Commission.38 Until recently, China has maintained a low profile in international peace and security issues and has been reluctant to take on more of a leadership role. This relatively low profile, Alden and Zheng argue in Chapter 2, is a reflection of the relatively limited interests and capacity that China has historically had beyond its immediate neighborhood. This began to change after 2000 with China increasingly taking on a more prominent role in UN peacekeeping operations, and by 2004 emerging as the largest troop and police contributor to these missions among the five permanent members of the UN Security Council. China also began to contribute combat troops, first in Mali and later in South Sudan. In 2016, President Xi Jinping further expanded China’s commitment to and engagement with peace and security programs when he announced a $1 billion commitment to UN programs supporting peace initiatives. China has also expanded its support to the African Union (AU), African Standby Force, and the African Capacity for Immediate Response to Crises and pledged to provide support to the African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA). However, despite the expansion of its engagement, China’s focus remains more on support of peacekeeping rather than peacebuilding, and the country makes only a minor contribution to the UN Peacebuilding Fund. India has historically been one of the leading contributors to UN peacekeeping missions and since 2005 it has also been a member of the UN Peacebuilding Commission, viewing both as opportunities for its greatpower aspirations. Despite this long history of engagement, the recent evolution of the way that UN peacekeeping missions are organized, in particular the shift from peacekeeping operations to more robust mixed-mandate operations that also focus on peacebuilding, has presented a challenge to India and its principles of noninterference, local consent, neutrality, and the use of force only in self-defense during peacekeeping operations. Furthermore, India tends to avoid engagement in missions to states where others have strategic interests and are therefore willing to contribute troops to peacekeeping operations. However, in practice, Aneja argues in Chapter 3, there have been numerous occasions where India has participated in mixedmandate missions and contributed combat forces, although it continues to participate in them on an ad hoc basis, underscoring that in practice noninterference principles can prove to be malleable. South Africa, too, contributes troops to UN and AU peacekeeping operations, although it does so exclusively in Africa. Unlike India, it has not hesitated to participate in mixed-mandate missions and has been willing to con-

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tribute directly to combat operations—for instance, when jointly with Tanzania and Malawi it formed the Force Intervention Brigade to deal with rebels in eastern Congo during the UN Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUSCO). However, overall South Africa’s role has been relatively modest as it is itself a postconflict country with meager resources. It has thus preferred to work within multilateral institutions and international partnerships and to leverage its soft power as a trusted mediator to advance its objectives. Brazil, up to 2004 when it agreed to lead the UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), was opposed to the increasingly complex UN operations that went beyond deploying peacekeeping troops and turned into multidimensional operations without (in its view) a well-defined mandate, thus politicizing activities in ways that Brazil viewed as interference in the affairs of member states. Until MINUSTAH, Brazil had preferred to engage in cooperative means that addressed the root causes of conflict and opposed the liberal peacebuilding agenda. This shift reflected Brazil’s growing interest in playing a more prominent global role. By providing peacekeeping troops and humanitarian assistance to Haiti, Brazil could show itself to be an important partner in providing international peace and security.39 Russia wants to be seen as a respectable global power. Consequently, Zürcher argues in Chapter 6, it engages in a balancing game, attempting to act as a “normal donor while at the same time instrumentalizing aid for narrowly defined national interests in its neighborhood.” At the same time, Russia does not participate in multilateral peacekeeping missions and it does not provide much aid to countries hosting such missions. According to Zürcher however, this does not mean that Russia is not involved in conflict management and peacebuilding. Rather, Russia does so in its near abroad and within its own territory in what may be viewed as “domestic peacebuilding,” where it is also party to the conflicts that it seeks to manage. Seeing itself as a regional hegemon, Russia seeks to reintegrate former Soviet states—with the exception of the Baltic states that are now part of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO)—as a way to ensure its own security and stability. South Africa, as Khadiagala discusses in Chapter 4, and Qatar, as Barakat and Milton argue in Chapter 8, have different approaches to engagements with conflict-affected states, with South Africa pursuing policies that are more in line with the liberal peacebuilding model and Qatar focusing on conflict mediation as a way to bolster its global position, pursue its economic and geostrategic interests, and differentiate itself from neighboring Gulf states. South Africa, drawing on its own experience with transition from apartheid to democracy, is especially interested in accelerating socioeconomic

A Role in Conflict Mediation

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development and promoting reconciliation. It has primarily supported, with mixed results, postconflict peacebuilding and mediation in Burundi, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), South Sudan, and the Comoros. In Burundi, South Africa emerged as a key peacemaker, when in 1998 former president Nelson Mandela became involved in mediating an agreement among the warring factions and helped negotiate the Arusha Peace and Reconciliation Agreement in 2000. In the DRC, on the other hand, President Thabo Mbeki’s government guided warring Congolese parties toward signing of the Global and All-Inclusive Agreement in Pretoria in 2011. Unlike other emerging donors, South Africa has not shied away from promoting democracy and political reforms. Like South Africa, Qatar has focused on playing the role of a regional mediator. In Lebanon, its mediation efforts resulted in the signing of the Doha agreement between rival political factions in 2008, while in Darfur mediation between the government of Sudan and rebel factions helped usher in the 2010 cease-fire agreement. Qatar has also led efforts to end conflict in Yemen, Palestine, Afghanistan, and Syria, among others. As Barakat and Milton argue in Chapter 8, there has been a widespread perception that Qatar relies on financial inducements as a tool for bringing together parties in conflict. While this no doubt has been the case in some circumstances, they argue that other motivations also drive Qatar’s engagements and mediation efforts, and “reflect a desire to uphold ethical standards, rooted in deep religious conviction and a commitment to peace,” (p. 143) as well as its interest in raising its global profile through the application of soft power. In other words, like Turkey, Qatar draws on its Islamic identity in the way that it conceptualizes its engagement in mediation and peacebuilding. Additionally, as Western powers have become more constrained in their ability to become involved in mediation efforts as a consequence of counterterrorism legislation, Qatar has been able to play an important role in mediations of armed conflicts. Despite its successes, Qatar’s mediation efforts nonetheless have been constrained by the lack of capacity and institutional knowledge to oversee the postsettlement implementation, although it has been deepening the professionalization of the institutions that lead its foreign engagements. As China has emerged as a global power, Alden and Zheng argue in Chapter 2, it has begun to reexamine the noninterference norm. This reexamination has also been driven by the difficulty of maintaining political neutrality in contexts where there are security concerns when China’s investments and nationals come under threat as violent conflict erupts and spreads, as was the case in Libya and in Sudan. As a consequence, China has begun to appoint special representatives to various unstable regions, including the Middle East, Africa, the Korean Peninsula, Asia with a particular focus on Myanmar, and Syria, and to engage in international mediation efforts. In

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Darfur, for instance, China’s role was key in persuading the government in Khartoum to accept a joint United Nations–African Union (UN-AU) peacekeeping force. It also has promoted political dialogue on the Iranian nuclear issue, has been involved in the South Sudan domestic reconciliation process, has supported the Afghanistan political transition, has been engaged with interethnic reconciliation efforts in Myanmar, and has been involved in putting forward proposals on the political process in Syria. At the same time, China has expanded its security cooperation in Africa through, for instance, the Initiative on China-Africa Cooperative Partnership for Peace and Security (ICACPPS) that aims to bolster indigenous capacities. India, like China, became engaged in mediation processes in Sudan and South Sudan when its investments were threatened. Though unlike China, Aneja argues in Chapter 3, India continues to prefer to support international mediation efforts from the sidelines. Turkey, Tank notes in Chapter 7, has also played a role in facilitating reconciliation efforts by providing political support to the peace process in Somalia. Intentionally framing its mediation efforts in opposition to the Western initiatives that focused on bringing together the leaders of the warring factions, in 2012 Turkey gathered in Istanbul representatives of Somali clans, politicians, and representatives of civil society to facilitate a locally owned reconciliation process. Turkey has continued to support political dialogue and reconciliation in Somalia. On the other hand, its attempt to mediate a peaceful end to the Syrian conflict in 2011 was a failure, one that, Tank argues, contributed to Turkey’s reevaluation of its mode of engagement with Syria and shifted it toward a more direct involvement in the conflict. The chapters that follow explore these key themes in detail, drawing out the nuances and evolution of policies of individual emerging donors toward conflict-affected states. In particular, the contributors to this volume explore the ways in which emerging powers conceptualize notions of peacebuilding and the relationship between security and development, and how these ideas are influenced by their particular historical experiences with external interference in their domestic affairs and internal violent conflicts. They also investigate how the shared rhetoric of noninterference, nonconditionalities, partnerships, and mutual benefits measures up against the actual policies that emerging donors pursue, and how these policies are shaped by their political and strategic objectives, the changing contexts in which they are engaged, and their shifting global aspirations. Taken together, these case studies show the divergences in the ways that different emerging donors shape their relationships with conflict-affected states and paint a picture of an increasingly complex landscape of assistance to conflict-affected states.

Conclusion

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1. World Bank, Conflict, Security and Development: 2011 World Development Report. (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2011). 2. Michael W. Doyle, “War Making and Peace Making: The United Nations’ Post–Cold War Record,” in Chester A. Crocker, Fen Osler Hampson, and Pamela Aall, eds., Turbulent Peace: The Challenge of Managing International Conflict (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2001), p. 529. 3. Mats Berdal, Building Peace After Civil War (London: Routledge, 2009); Anna K. Jarstad and Timothy D. Sisk, eds., From War to Democracy: Dilemmas of Peacebuilding (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008). 4. See, for example, Paul Amar, “Global South to the Rescue: Emerging Humanitarian Superpowers and Globalizing Rescue Industries,” Globalizations 9, no. 1 (2012): 1–13; Cedric de Coning and Chander Prakash, Peace Capacities Network Synthesis Report: Rising Powers and Peace Operations (Oslo: Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, 2016). 5. Benjamin de Carvalho and Cedric de Coning, Rising Powers and the Future of Peacebuilding, Norwegian Peacebuilding Resource Center (NOREF) Report (Oslo: Norwegian Peacebuilding Resource Centre, November 2013); Oliver P. Richmond and Ioannis Tellidis, The BRICS and International Peacebuilding and Statebuilding, NOREF Report (Oslo: Norwegian Peacebuilding Resource Centre, January 2013); Jake Sherman, Megan M. Gleason, W. P. S. Sidhu, and Bruce Jones, eds., Engagement on Development and Security: New Actors, New Debates (New York: Center on International Cooperation, New York University, September 2011); Sultan Barakat and Steven A. Zyck, Gulf State Assistance to Conflict-Affected Environments (London: Centre for the Study of Global Governance, London School of Economics, 2010). 6. See, for example, Roger MacGinty, ed., Routledge Handbook of Peacebuilding (London: Routledge, 2015); Tobias Debiel, Thomas Held, and Ulrich Schneckener, eds., Peacebuilding in Crisis: Rethinking Paradigms and Practices of Transnational Cooperation (London: Routledge, 2016). To my knowledge, one comparative volume explores the role of emerging donors in peacebuilding: Charles T. Call and Cedric de Coning, eds., Rising Powers and Peacebuilding: Breaking the Mold? (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017). However, Call and de Coning’s book pays less attention to how emerging donors conceptualize the relationship between security and development, an issue that is explored here. 7. Ivan Campbell, Thomas Wheeler, Larry Attree, Dell Marie Butler, and Bernardo Mariani, China and Conflict-Affected States: Between Principle and Pragmatism (London: Saferworld, 2012), p. 7. 8. For a discussion of the Non-Aligned Movement and its influence on today’s South-South collaborations, see, for example, Peter Kragelund, South-South Development (London: Routledge, 2019). 9. For all the principles see, for example, Final Communiqué of the AsianAfrican Conference of Bandung, April 24, 1955, http://franke.uchicago.edu/Final _Communique_Bandung_1955.pdf. The ten Bandung Principles, adopted at the 1955 Asian-African Conference are (1) Respect for fundamental human rights and for the purposes and the principles of the Charter of the United Nations; (2) Respect for the sovereignty and territorial integrity of all nations; (3) Recognition of the equality of all races and of the equality of all nations large and small; (4) Abstention from intervention or interference in the internal affairs of another country; (5) Respect for the right of each nation to defend itself singly or collectively, in conformity with the Charter of the United Nations; (6) Abstention from the use of arrangements of collective defense to serve the particular interests of any of the big powers, abstention by any country from exerting pressures on other countries; (7)

Notes

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Refraining from acts or threats of aggression or the use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any country; (8) Settlement of all international disputes by peaceful means, such as negotiation, conciliation, arbitration, or judicial settlement as well as other peaceful means of the parties’ own choice, in conformity with the Charter of the United Nations; (9) Promotion of mutual interests and cooperation; and (10) Respect for justice and international obligation. 10. Led by countries such as Egypt, India, and Indonesia, the Non-Aligned Movement sought to chart an independent path for countries emerging from colonialism that did not want to align with either the United States or the Soviet Union in the intensifying Cold War between the two superpowers. 11. Devex, Emerging Donors, Devex Reports, 2017, https://pages.devex.com /rs/devex/images/Devex_Reports_Emerging_Donors.pdf?aliId=1803737004. 12. Research by Devex estimates that funds from various new donors, including emerging state donors such as Turkey and South Africa, but also new entities such as the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank and Green Climate Fund have been contributing to a rapid expansion of available financial aid “and filling the gaps as traditional donors shrink and shift priorities . . . funding from these donors has increased by a staggering 47 percent in just five years—from $5.7 billion in 2010 to $8.4 billion in 2015.” Devex, Funding Insights: Emerging Donors. A Devex Business Webinar, July 18, 2018, https://pages.devex.com/funding-insights-emerging-donors.html#CM. 13. OECD et al., African Economic Outlook 2011: Africa and Its Emerging Partners (Paris: OECD, 2011), p. 52. 14. The IBSA Facility for Poverty and Hunger Alleviation (IBSA Fund). See “UN Office for South-South Cooperation IBSA Facility,” https://www.unsouthsouth .org/partner-with-us/ibsa/. 15. New Development Bank, https://www.ndb.int. 16. As Kundapur Vaman Kamath, director of NDP, puts it, “Our objective is not to challenge the existing system as it is but to improve and complement the system in our own way.” BBC News, July 21, 2015, www.bbc.com/news/33605230. 17. Roger MacGinty, “Indigenous Peace-Making Versus Liberal Peace,” Cooperation and Conflict 43, no. 2 (2008): 139–163; Kristoffer Linden, “Building Peace Between Global and Local Politics: The Cosmopolitical Ethics of Liberal Peacebuilding,” International Peacekeeping 16, no. 5 (2009): 616–634; Oliver Richmond, Peace Formation and Political Order in Conflict Affected Societies (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016). 18. See, for example, Séverine Autesserre, The Trouble with the Congo: Local Violence and the Failure of International Peacebuilding (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2010). 19. Astri Suhrke, “Reconstruction as Modernization: The ‘Post-Conflict’ Project in Afghanistan,” Third World Quarterly 28, no. 7 (2007): 1292. 20. Roland Paris, At Wars End: Building Peace After Civil Conflict (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2004), p. ix. 21. See, for example, Mark Duffield, Development, Security and Unending War: Governing the World of Peoples (Cambridge, UK: Polity Press, 2007); Peter Uvin, “Difficult Choices in the New Post-Conflict Agenda: The International Community in Rwanda After the Genocide,” Third World Quarterly 22, no. 2 (2001): 177–189. 22. The commission is chaired by David Cameron, former UK prime minister, and cochaired by Donald Kabenka, special envoy of Africa Union Peace Fund and former president of the African Development Bank, and Adnan Khan, research and policy director of International Growth Centre, London School of Economics. 23. The Sustainable Development Goals were adopted by the UN in September 2015.

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24. Commission on State Fragility, Growth and Development, Escaping the Fragility Trap. (London: London School of Economics, Blavatnik School of Government, University of Oxford, International Growth Centre, April 2018), p. 9. 25. Dane Rowlands, Emerging Donors in International Development Assistance: A Synthesis Report (Ottawa, ON, Canada: International Development Research Centre/Centre de recherches pur le développement international, Partnership and Business Development Division, January 2008). 26. Gerda Asmus, Andreas Fuchs, and Angelika Muller, “BRICS and Foreign Aid,” Working Paper No. 43 (Williamsburg, VA: AidData at William & Mary, August 2017). 27. Emma Mawdsley, “The Changing Geographies of Foreign Aid and Development Cooperation: Contributions from Gift Theory,” Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 37, no. 2 (2012): 256–272. 28. See Susan White, Emerging Donors, Emerging Powers: Teasing Out Developing Patterns (Washington, DC: Center for Strategic and International Studies, February 2011); Julie Waltz and V. Ramachandran, “Brave New World: A Literature Review of Emerging Donors and the Changing Nature of Foreign Direct Assistance,” Working Paper No. 273 (Washington, DC: Center for Global Development, November 2010). 29. Most of the projects support rebuilding Afghanistan’s infrastructure and institutions as well as long-term investment in natural resources, support for expanding exports to India, and technical cooperation. 30. Urvashi Aneja, India’s Response to State Fragility in Africa, Issue Brief No. 204 (New Delhi: Observer Research Foundation, October 1, 2017), p. 1. 31. Statement by Ambassador Antionio de Aguiar Patriota at the 7561st meeting of the UN Security Council, November 17, 2015. 32. African National Congress (ANC) Foreign Policy Platform, quoted in Chris Landsberg, “Promoting Democracy: The Mandela-Mbeki Doctrine,” Journal of Democracy 11, no. 3 (2000): 107. 33. Ibid., p. 108. 34. R2P sought to allow the international community to respond more effectively and prevent genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing, and crimes against humanity. See UN Office on Genocide Prevention and Responsibility to Protect, https://www .un.org/en/genocideprevention/. 35. Statement by prime minister of India Manmohan Singh at the General Debate of the 66th Session of the United Nations General Assembly, September 24, 2011, http://gadebate.un.org/sites/default/files/gastatements/66/IN_en.pdf. 36. Sharon Wiharta, Neil Melvin, and Xenia Avezov, The New Geopolitics of Peace Operations: Mapping the Emerging Landscape (Stockholm: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, September 2012). In 2015, these increased commitment levels continued. The BRICS contributed over 13 percent of police, UN military experts, and troops to peacekeeping operations. See UN Peacekeeping, Troop and Police Contributors, https://peacekeeping.un.org/en/troop-and-police-contributors. 37. Ibid., p. 11. 38. Laurence Chandy, New in Town: A Look at the Role of Emerging Donors in an Evolving Aid System (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, April 16, 2012); de Coning and Pradash, Peace Capacities Network Synthesis Report. 39. John Miller Beauvoir, “In Post-Conflict Haiti, Brazil Consolidates Its Status as a Regional Actor,” in Agnieszka Paczyńska, ed., Changing Landscapes of Assistance to Conflict-Affected States: Emerging and Traditional Donors and Opportunities for Collaboration, Policy Brief Series, Brief No. 6 (Washington, DC: Stimson Center, February 2017), pp. 1–11.

2 China: International Developmentalism and Global Security Chris Alden and Yixiao Zheng

and security matters is a relatively new phenomenon, one that has the potential to boost existing peacemaking initiatives as well as strengthen the capacity of international institutions to deliver truly comprehensive reconstruction programs and to introduce new thinking into what for some is an ossified approach to ending conflict. Certainly, the relatively rapid transformation of China’s position on Sudan over the past decade, from one narrowly defined by its official noninterference policy to significant involvement in the mediation and reconstruction process, is one obvious expression of China’s changing engagement. President Xi Jinping’s announcement in 2016 of a $1 billion commitment to UN peace support programs, coupled with a $10 million commitment to the peace and security programs of the African Union (AU) and a further expansion of Chinese peacekeeping troops, underscores the seriousness of Beijing’s intensifying involvement in this sphere.1 Moreover, as Xi’s signature Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) expands its ambit to unstable regions and contested governments around the world, devising a credible response to the challenges of postconflict environments becomes all the more necessary. Yet there are aspects of the international postconflict reconstruction agenda as presently construed that remain outside China’s official policy frameworks and interests. The permissive character of liberal peacebuilding, which is predicated on the fostering of liberal institutions like electoral democracy and ideas like restorative justice as an enduring solution to conflictridden societies, falls beyond the ambit of China’s preferred perspectives and practices. Indeed, for Chinese sources, these established approaches are at

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best mere palliatives to conflicts and at worst complicit in the reigniting of the very conflicts they are allegedly aimed at resolving. Understanding China’s changing approach to postconflict reconstruction is crucial to appreciating the impact that emerging donors are having on international peace and security in the twenty-first century. In this chapter, we examine this by, first, contextualizing the broad debates and prevailing practices in postconflict reconstruction; second, focusing on the evolution of Chinese policy on international peace and security issues; and, finally, exploring the prospective impacts and changes to international approaches.

The Evolution of Chinese Policy Toward Peace and Security

Despite being one of the permanent members of the UN Security Council, China has by and large maintained a relatively low profile in international peace and security in the post–Cold War era. This posture is underlined by strenuous adherence to the principle of noninterference, which is (or at least used to be) the hallmark of China’s general approach to the world’s political and security affairs. Chinese insistence on the noninterference principle is in keeping with Beijing’s perpetual concern over sovereignty and reflects the long-standing Chinese fear of foreign interference in China’s internal affairs. Until recently, China’s overall foreign policy posture largely eschewed international leadership and strategic boldness in favor of a low international profile and strategic restraint. For a country with limited international interest and influence beyond its immediate periphery, this was not so much a policy choice as a strategic necessity, which was emphasized by Deng Xiaoping’s well-known maxim taoguang yanghui (to keep a low profile and hide your strength). As China had neither the capacity to influence the course of events nor substantial interests directly involved in light of the evolving outcome of those events, the best course of action was to avoid embroiling itself in international disputes and domestic conflicts of other states by adopting a low-profile approach to peace and security issues in much of the so-called third world.2 Adherence to the noninterference principle, together with the ritualistic stress on peaceful resolution of conflict through political dialogue and negotiations, allowed Beijing to circumvent difficult political choices in any specific situation by maintaining a relatively disinterested and detached position and avoiding taking sides.3 In view of Chinese policy toward the developing world, it may be argued that the noninterference principle has served as the most important political basis of China’s engagement in the third world. Chinese strategy has hitherto remained largely developmentalist in terms of its goals and ambitions in much of the developing world, not least in the sense that it

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requires China to focus on the promotion of economic and development interests and pursue active economic diplomacy vis-à-vis developing countries. Beijing has therefore employed a largely development-oriented strategy by focusing on economic engagement and development cooperation with developing countries. As a politically expedient diplomatic stance, the principle of noninterference has made it possible for Beijing to pursue such a development-oriented strategy, enabling rapid development of economic partnerships with third world states regardless of the political circumstances within (or among) those countries. This diplomatic pragmatism is most evidently demonstrated by China’s nonconditionality approach to economic cooperation and development aid. The principle of noninterference has necessarily constituted the ethical basis of Beijing’s claim for political legitimacy for such a nonconditionality approach, which is essentially a variant derived from the noninterference principle. Well received by the governments of the developing world, the policies of noninterference and nonconditionality have become useful weapons to criticize Western interference and interventionist policies in the third world. More importantly, China has been able to reap the political benefits conferred by this stance by advancing Chinese economic interests in the third world, unhindered by political burdens. This has paved the way for the success of development-oriented Chinese diplomacy in the third world, and accordingly helped raise China’s status and expand Chinese influence in the third world over the past decade. In no small measure, the principle of noninterference has provided a political framework within which China’s third world diplomacy has operated. In other words, it has served as the cornerstone of Chinese relations with third world countries centered on trade and investment. It is in this context that competing conceptualizations of aid, economic partnership, and South-South cooperation must be situated. 4 China’s aversion to interference—and Western practices of development founded on prescriptive notions of policy-led transformation of developing societies—has led its officials to be decidedly cautious in how it frames and conducts development diplomacy. Aid in the sense codified by the Development Assistance Committee of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD DAC) has never been a feature of Beijing’s policy approach. Following the lead of the Group of 77 (G-77), China has conceptualized its economic involvement in other developing countries as falling under the rubric of South-South cooperation, a broadly framed set of policies in which everything from technical assistance and bartering arrangements to concessional loans and conventional foreign direct investment could conceivably fall. As long as the participating governments were in agreement, the proposed activities were understood—and, by 1978, formalized as such under UN Development

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Programme (UNDP) auspices in Buenos Aires—to be mutually beneficial expressions of development cooperation. 5 Chinese involvement in postconflict development, as a consequence, would necessarily be outside the ambit of policy support. However, as Chinese economic exposure has grown, and the size and complexities of its own economic cooperation have expanded in terms of grants, loans, and investments seemingly administered on an ad hoc basis, Chinese scholars and policymakers have begun to debate how China might more effectively manage this process. In this respect, the announcement in early 2018 that China would create an aid agency was a step toward institutionalization of development cooperation and it marked another change in the government’s evolving view of developmentalism.6 A variant of this developmentalist doctrine of Chinese foreign policy as applied to the domain of peace and security is the emphasis that poverty and economic underdevelopment are the root cause of insecurity and conflicts. What this implies is the claim that economic development is the ultimate solution to conflict and the surest means of achieving lasting peace. On the one hand, this developmentalist understanding of conflict can be seen as a politically expedient defense of the development orientation of Chinese diplomacy in the third world, which has often become the subject of criticism for its alleged indifference to human rights and other liberal political agenda. On the other hand, it may also be argued that such a developmentalist view on peace and (in)security does seem to reflect a genuine belief that is derived from the development orientation of the People’s Republic’s own nation-building experience. Since the Chinese government considered economic development as the overriding task facing the nation and a critical factor for maintaining regime stability, Chinese foreign policy necessarily reflects such a developmental concern. In the realm of peace and security, the Chinese government naturally chooses to see the origins of conflicts more in developmentalist terms.7 Having featured prominently in Chinese policy statements, such developmentalist preconceptions have evolved into a uniquely Chinese way of thinking about the question of peace and security and addressing the fundamental source of conflicts. This is also reflected in the emerging Chinese academic discourse on the developmental peace thesis and the notion of the so-called security-development nexus, especially in the studies of China’s peace and security engagement in Africa.8 Accordingly, this distinctly developmentalist outlook on peace and security has arguably left a significant imprint on the Chinese approach to conflict prevention, conflict resolution, peacemaking, peacekeeping, and peacebuilding. China’s domestic economic success and continued reliance on developmentalist diplomacy in the developing world are more than likely to reinforce this developmentalist thinking on the question of peace and security.

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Growing Chinese Activism in International Peace and Security

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In response to the changing international circumstances in the era of China’s rise, China has begun to enhance its engagement in international peace and security since the 2000s. This changing policy outlook initially stemmed from the new political requirements in relation to the growing needs to protect the country’s reputation as a responsible power. As China’s developmental diplomacy made great inroads into the developing world, Beijing’s economic and political influence also started to rise in the third world. Beijing’s more active posture is in part a response to the growing international expectations within the international community, especially among many developing countries that have increasingly called on China to use its influence and resources to play a more active role in supporting peace and security in Africa and other parts of the developing world. Meanwhile, Beijing has also come under increasing Western pressure to play a more constructive role in peace and security, as Western countries have started to encourage China to act in a more responsible manner in international peace and security, as in the case of the Darfur crisis. To protect the nation’s reputation, Beijing had to meet the growing international expectations by taking a greater share of responsibility for international peace and security and adjusting its noninvolvement posture accordingly. Moreover, China is compelled to step up its involvement in third world peace and security to better protect the country’s rapidly expanding economic and security interests. In the face of the massive presence and ever growing expansion of Chinese personnel and commercial assets across the developing world, the seemingly interminable political violence and chaos in many countries of sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region have posed security challenges of unprecedented scale and complexity. Disruptive events in countries such as Sudan and Libya, in particular, shocked the nation into realizing the extent of exposure of Chinese overseas interests to such security risks abroad. What has aggravated this sense of vulnerability is the lack of palatable alternatives in the light of the failure of host governments or foreign private security firms to provide Chinese companies and personnel with adequate and reliable protection. As growing vulnerability to security threats emanating from turmoil and conflicts in the third world has emerged as a reality confronting Chinese policymakers, Beijing has increasingly awakened to the realization that, if it chooses to continue to stay out of the domestic and international developments in the third world and allow Western powers a free hand in those areas critical to Chinese economic and security interests, China could only remain a passive bystander at its own peril. The gradual shift in Chinese attitudes toward China’s role in international peace and security reflects the weakening of the taoguang yanghui

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doctrine as the overriding strategic imperative when Chinese power has been undergoing a dramatic transformation. As Chinese foreign policy has turned increasingly worldwide in scope, especially since the second half of the 2000s, the taoguang yanghui doctrine has come to be seen as the nation’s self-imposed fetters ill-suited to the age of China’s rise. As part of this emerging paradigm shift in foreign policy thinking, the notion of noninterference has been subject to increasing doubt and scrutiny by Chinese scholars and policymakers. Since the subject is no longer considered a strictly forbidden territory, new thinking advocating greater involvement or intervention in global affairs (including in international peace and security) has emerged in Chinese academic and policy discourse over the same period.9 Notwithstanding the continued dominance of the developmental agenda and the preeminence of economic diplomacy, China has steadily increased its involvement in peace and security in the third world since the 2000s. Though the principle of noninterference remains the official line, Beijing seems to have become increasingly less dogmatic and constrained by it in its behavior (even though it remains skeptical and cautious about the principle of humanitarian interventionism and opposed to armed intervention).10 This growing flexibility is demonstrated by deepening Chinese involvement in international mediation efforts in many parts of the developing world. The establishment of the offices of the special representatives (special envoy) of the Chinese government specifically designated for Middle Eastern, African, Korean Peninsular, and Asian affairs (mainly for the Myanmar issue) and for the Syrian issue over the course of the past two decades clearly represents an enhanced Chinese diplomatic effort in international mediation in some of the world’s hot spots.11 What is most remarkable is the beginning of substantial Chinese diplomatic involvement in international mediation beyond its immediate periphery. A notable example in this regard is the case of Darfur, where Beijing is said to have managed to use its good offices in 2007 to persuade Khartoum to accept the hybrid United Nations–African Union (UN-AU) peacekeeping force.12 To some extent, Africa has been the test case for evolving Chinese posture in international peace and security. Since the end of the 2000s, Beijing has pledged to expand Chinese involvement in African peace and security. Although economic issues continued to dominate the agenda of ChinaAfrica cooperation under the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC) framework, security cooperation has gained increasing salience toward becoming one of the major areas for expanding Sino-African cooperation beyond the traditional focus on economics and development.13 In 2011 the Chinese government signed a memorandum of understanding with the Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), the regional organization for the Horn of Africa, which included Chinese governemnt financial support of $100,000 for operational costs and a donation in 2012 of

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$98 million (600 million yuan) for areas that included “peace and security.”14 This was followed in 2012 by the Initiative on China-Africa Cooperative Partnership for Peace and Security, which was designed to provide material and financial support to help strengthen Africa’s indigenous capabilities for maintaining peace and security and had been incorporated into the existing FOCAC framework. Another indication of growing Chinese interest in international peace and security is the level of Chinese participation in UN peace operations. Over the course of the 2000s, China has taken steady steps to build up its peacekeeping capability and further integrate the Chinese armed and police forces into the UN peacekeeping system.15 As of September 2015, China had contributed a total of more than 30,000 peacekeepers in twentynine peacekeeping missions since its first participation in UN peacekeeping operations in 1990.16 According to the 2013 Chinese Defense White Paper, since 2004 China has become the largest troop and police contributor among the five permanent members of the Security Council. China also dispatches the largest number of troops for engineering, transportation, and medical support among all the 115 contributing nations and contributes the largest share of UN peacekeeping costs among all developing countries.17 Beijing is confident about playing a more active role in international peacekeeping on a multilateral platform under UN auspices. Indeed, the Chinese government’s official position on China’s involvement in international peace and security has always emphasized the necessity of securing the sanction of the Security Council, the support of relevant regional organizations, and authorization from the host government as preconditions for Chinese involvement. However, it may be said that this conditional approach is itself indicative of growing flexibility in Chinese policy in international peace and security. Chinese involvement in international peace and security has reached a new level of activism since the advent of the new Chinese leadership at the end of the 2012. What makes this round of activism special is the distinctively proactive attempt by Chinese leaders to raise the country’s profile in this important domain of international policy. Arguably, this proactive posture has to be seen through the lens of the overall direction of Chinese foreign policy during the reign of President Xi, who is determined to push ahead with the so-called great-power diplomacy with Chinese characteristics (zhongguo tese daguo waijiao). This means that the old foreign policy paradigm of the Deng era has virtually come to an end, as the prevalent foreign policy thinking today requires a kind of diplomatic boldness and political activism to significantly raise China’s international profile and extend Chinese influence. On the global stage, this growing Chinese ambition has been translated into concerted efforts to play a more prominent role in global affairs, not

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only in the area of economic global governance but also in the management of international peace and security. An important tenet of the idea of greatpower diplomacy with Chinese characteristics as applied to the global arena is the desire to boost China’s leadership status and global influence by providing more international public goods. This is in keeping with the rationale behind the current leadership’s unprecedented desire to provide a Chinese contribution to the world, which is manifested in the recent emergence in policy discourse of a plethora of slogan-like catchphrases such as the socalled Chinese solution (zhongguo fang’an), Chinese initiative/proposal (zhongguo changyi), Chinese thinking (zhongguo silu), Chinese voice (zhongguo shengyin), Chinese wisdom (zhongguo zhihui), Chinese contribution (zhongguo gongxian), and China’s role (zhongguo zuoyong). These propaganda terms underscore the global ambition harbored by the incumbent leadership, and are deemed critical to the success of China’s ongoing effort to “develop a distinctive diplomatic approach befitting its role of a major country” and “with a salient Chinese feature and a Chinese vision.”18 Under the direction of President Xi, China has significantly stepped up its involvement in international peace and security since 2013. There has been a notable increase in Chinese activism in diplomatic mediation in the world’s major trouble spots from sub-Saharan Africa to the MENA region. Especially since 2014, Beijing has actively used its good offices to promote political dialogue and peaceful settlement of the comprehensive agreement on the Iranian nuclear issue; the military, political, and economic transition and reconstruction efforts in Afghanistan; the domestic reconciliation process in South Sudan; the interethnic reconciliation in Myanmar; and the political process in Syria as well as between Palestine and Israel.19 Beijing’s deepened engagement in those peace processes, especially in terms of willingness to work with other major powers and to put forward Chinese initiatives and proposals, clearly reflects a new level of political activism in international peace and security and a rather proactive outlook on China’s international responsibility. This is quite distinct from the country’s previously passive approach and is broadly in line with the emerging internationalist tendency characteristic of the current leadership’s diplomatic orientation. This global activism is also underscored by China’s significant contribution to the international response to the Ebola crisis in Africa and shows Beijing’s commitment to supporting international efforts to tackle nontraditional security challenges.20 Africa remains a major regional theater where China has demonstrated its commitment to international peace and security during the Xi era. Cooperation in peace and security is expanding steadily and has become one of the major agendas of China-Africa relations.21 The Chinese president announced at UN headquarters in September 2015 that in the next five years China would provide a total of $100 million of military aid for the African Union to

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support the establishment of the African Standby Force and the African Capacity for Immediate Response to Crises, and that China would deploy its first helicopter unit in UN peacekeeping missions in Africa.22 At the second FOCAC summit held in Johannesburg in December 2015, Xi proposed that China and Africa elevate their relationship to a comprehensive strategic cooperative partnership.23 Security cooperation featured prominently in the FOCAC Johannesburg Action Plan for 2016–2018 and in China’s second Africa Policy Paper issued in the same month as the Johannesburg summit, where Beijing reaffirmed Chinese commitment to providing support to Africa for the development of its collective security mechanism, pledged $60 million in military assistance over three years to the African Union to support the African Peace and Security Architecture Initiative, and promised to play a more active role on the continent by seeking to “exert a unique impact on and make greater contributions to African peace and security.”24 Beijing has also shown a new level of activism by seeking to play a leadership role in UN peace operations. In his address to the Leaders’ Summit on Peacekeeping at UN headquarters in September 2015, Xi announced a string of measures to back UN peacekeeping missions. Declaring that China would join the new UN peacekeeping capability readiness system, President Xi pledged that China would take the lead in setting up a permanent peacekeeping police squad and would build a peacekeeping standby force of 8,000 troops.25 Since the UN is chronically plagued by slow formation and deployment of its peacekeeping forces, the establishment of this standby force is thus commended by one senior UN official as a “robust contribution that has the potential to address critical gaps” in UN peacekeeping capabilities, and demonstrates “China’s leading role in supporting UN peacekeeping.”26 Another notable change in China’s role in UN peace operations is Beijing’s new willingness to contribute combat troops to peacekeeping missions, which marks a departure from the traditional Chinese practice of focusing on noncombat roles such as providing logistic support in engineering, transportation, and medical care.27 In 2013, China sent its first security forces, a whole contingent, to join the UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA).28 While this security unit was a protection and guard team mainly responsible for the security of MINUSMA headquarters and the living areas of peacekeeping forces,29 China further enhanced its security force contributions by dispatching a 700member infantry contingent to South Sudan in 2015, the People’s Liberation Army’s (PLA) first infantry battalion (with an enlarged security role than the protection and guard unit sent to Mali) to participate in a UN peacekeeping mission.30 These developments reflected Beijing’s ambition to seek a prominent leadership role for China in UN peace operations. Arguably, this is also in line with the current leadership’s painstaking efforts to strengthen the PLA’s combat capabilities, as PLA troops are likely to gain

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real-work combat experience through overseas UN peacekeeping missions (especially through participation in combat-related peacekeeping operations).31

Framing China’s Approach to Postconflict Reconstruction

China’s policy approach to postconflict reconstruction in general and peacebuilding in particular has to be seen in the broader context of its role in international peace and security as discussed in the preceding section. Beijing’s more cautious attitude toward the UN’s liberal peacebuilding missions is in stark contrast to the surging Chinese enthusiasm and support for international peacekeeping efforts witnessed in more recent years. This is evidenced by China’s normative support for local ownership and tacit opposition to the promotion of a liberal agenda and imposition of Western political systems through UN peacebuilding operations. This is largely in keeping with its general adherence to the noninterference principle and reflects revived concerns over the West’s democracy promotion in the third world. China has consistently and explicitly articulated its own normative stance and preferred policy approach to peacebuilding, which questions the strength and legitimacy of the (Western) liberal agenda and normative concerns that have hitherto shaped the UN’s postconflict peacebuilding. This shows China’s growing willingness to reshape the international peace and security agenda in a way that maintains a distinctly Chinese normative outlook on peacemaking in accordance with the country’s values and experiences and that promotes the needs and perspectives of the developing world. Thus, China’s approach to postconflict reconstruction is rooted in a critical assessment of the checkered record of Western-led interventionism in societies emerging from war and the overemphasis that these interventions have placed on promoting liberal ideas and institutions without regard to local conditions. An assessment of the (admittedly limited) scholarly literature and statements by Chinese officials reveals a twofold critique of the liberal peace agenda and four basic tenets that they believe should guide postconflict reconstruction. However, neither the critique nor the articulation of these basic tenets should be seen as representative of a full-fledged Chinese policy toward postconflict reconstruction, but rather as part of an evolving conversation within China’s policy circles about how to best tackle this complex policy terrain.32 Chinese Disapproval of the Lopsided Focus on Liberal Agenda First, in China’s view, this liberal peace approach tends to neglect economic development and political stability. Western countries and the Western-

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dominated international organizations and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) place their emphasis on humanitarian intervention and political reconstruction of the state. Political agendas including the rebuilding of state apparatus, elections, and good governance are given priority, as reflected for instance in the focus on funding the establishment of legal assistance centers, courts, police schools, and good governance offices.33 Chinese analysts are concerned about the overwhelming dominance of this Western agenda in UN peacebuilding operations as evidenced by the use of the UN Peacebuilding Fund.34 In recent years, the fund has mainly been used to implement peace agreements in areas such as the establishment and strengthening of law enforcement and security apparatuses, the demobilization and reintegration of ex-military personnel, and good governance. By contrast, only a small proportion of the fund has been channeled into areas for socioeconomic development. For example, the UN efforts in Burundi have concentrated on the organization of elections and assisting the administrative institution building (including the establishment of the good governance office), which have taken precedence over the development agenda and employment issues. Though China recognizes that democracy and good governance are also among the key ingredients for peace and security, in its view liberal democracy is no panacea, and any attempts to seek a one-size-fits-all solution based on Western political and economic liberalism are misguided. 35 The Chinese government is of the view that (liberal) state building “may not always automatically lead to peacebuilding,” and “may in fact spark further conflict” due to its “inherently political nature.”36 By contrast, China recognizes and appreciates the critical importance of economic and societal development in fostering an environment conducive to peace and security. It believes that these are no less important for peacebuilding because they address some of the fundamental causes of conflicts and sources of instability in Africa. Hence, Chinese efforts aimed at postconflict societies tend to concentrate on infrastructure construction. The dispatch of medical teams and the provision of logistic support also feature prominently in Chinese contributions to UN peacekeeping.37 Second, China sees the liberal peace model as often being a misguided approach because it tends to neglect or ignore the actual local conditions and the real needs of the local people (and of the host governments). The current UN approach to peacekeeping and peacebuilding is consistent with Western values and ideals that have been well institutionalized in terms of the reporting, audit, monitoring, and evaluation mechanisms. However, liberal peace projects have been unsustainable and have failed to achieve their intended purpose due to their impracticality, especially as demonstrated in cases such as South Sudan. The existing UN peacebuilding regimes and programs have been over-Westernized and seriously detached from the

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local conditions and realities, and as a result have achieved little effect on the ground. From China’s perspective and based on the Chinese experience, some of the peacekeeping and peacebuilding projects have set the bar and standards too high because of their overidealistic and misplaced ambitions. Many are suffering from the lopsided emphasis on ideals and ideology over results and impact, on appearance and form over content and substance, on freedom and liberty over stability and order, and on democracy and elections over security and (economic) development, which are all too common in the current UN approach to peacebuilding.38 The Chinese government is also concerned that UN peacebuilding missions have been used by Western powers as a convenient platform for promulgating liberal ideology and about the tendency for UN peacebuilding efforts to be conflated with (liberal) interventionism. This liberal intervention challenges China’s position on state sovereignty and the noninterference principle. Though China has shown increasing flexibility on the question of noninterference in internal affairs, “it cannot go too far.”39 These ambivalent feelings and caution are derived from Chinese misgivings and doubts about the political legitimacy and appropriateness of the liberal peace approach and its practical viability and effectiveness. This is well illustrated by observations of Chinese analyst Dongyan Li, whose fieldwork in Africa recorded mixed feedback on UN peacekeeping and peacebuilding operations in Burundi and the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) from local government officials and civil society groups. Local people, by and large, agree on the necessity of a UN peacekeeping and peacebuilding presence in their respective countries. However, criticisms and complaints abound. Insofar as the performance of those UN peace operations is concerned, local opinions are ambivalent and their positive views of the operations are highly qualified. Li’s study suggests that, in some cases, the host governments only half-heartedly support and reluctantly accept the presence of UN peacekeeping and peacebuilding operations in their countries and, to some extent, this is accompanied by a feeling of resentment.40 Moreover, the developments on the ground cast doubt on the viability of the UN peacekeeping and peacebuilding approach and strategies, which are said to have never fully acclimatized to the local conditions and realities.41 Another problem highlighted by Li is the UN’s self-contradictory position on its relations with the host governments. On the one hand, the UN emphasizes the critical importance of the continued consent and effective cooperation of host governments to the success of peacekeeping and peacebuilding operations. On the other hand, the UN is intolerant and refuses to concede control and power to the host governments. When disagreement arises, the UN makes no allowance for local ownership and refuses to trade off local support and agreement for its own principles and values.

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Major Tenets of the Official Chinese Position on Peacebuilding In the light of these challenges, some Chinese analysts such as Li Dongyan and Lei Zhao suggest that China is facing an increasingly complex environment for peacebuilding.42 As Li puts it, the difference between Chinese thinking and the Western approach and the constraining influence of the China threat thesis have combined to undermine China’s enthusiasm for expanding engagement and are the main reasons why China has chosen to adopt the policy of cautious engagement in peacebuilding. Though the Chinese media and public opinion are generally supportive of China’s peace engagement, the official position on UN peacebuilding in particular underscores the continued importance attached to the principle of noninterference, the sanction of the UN Security Council where Beijing’s role as a Permanent Five (P5) member serves to preserve its interests, and the authorization of the host government. In fact, Li summarizes Beijing’s attitude toward UN peace operations as “active support, cautious selection and moderate participation” (jiji zhichi shenzhong xuanze shidu canyu). Li suggests that, in fact, all countries, be they big powers or the host countries, are extremely cautious on the question of peacekeeping and peacebuilding, and that there has never been overwhelming support for UN peacekeeping and peacebuilding operations in theoretical, political, or technical terms.43 These views are mostly consistent with the official position on postconflict peacebuilding of the Chinese government, as evidenced by the various policy statements made by the Chinese Permanent Mission to the United Nations on postconflict peacebuilding. By and large, the Chinese government’s stance on the subject has tended to highlight the following points. First, with respect to peacebuilding priorities, China has become increasingly vocal in advocating development priorities in postconflict peacebuilding, and has repeatedly called for a more diverse peacebuilding agenda. Though China has long stressed the importance of development in peacebuilding,44 only in recent years has it begun to push the development agenda in formal policy statements in the UN Security Council’s open debate on postconflict peacebuilding. A 2013 statement by the Chinese government for the first time unequivocally asserted that “socioeconomic development should be the main way to build peace.” Beijing also openly expressed its disapproval of the UN’s existing peacebuilding priorities by suggesting that “the international community has long tended to focus on human rights, the rule of law and security sector reform, perhaps without granting sufficient attention to economic and social development.” It “urge(d) the international community to grant heightened attention to the socioeconomic development of States by providing them with more genuine assistance” that “should not come with preconditions.”45 Although previous statements had also mentioned the development agenda alongside

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other political issues, none had made this preference for development agenda so urgent and Chinese criticism of Western approach so explicit. Second, the importance of national ownership of postconflict countries has been consistently emphasized. China calls on the UN Peacebuilding Commission and other relevant parties to fully respect the sovereignty and will of the host countries because it is the latter that bear the primary responsibility for peacebuilding and the main burden of ensuring peace and security in their own territories. For instance, the 2013 statement by China explicitly stipulated that the international community should “provide constructive assistance pursuant to the priorities determined by those States themselves.”46 In short, “the role of the international community is to provide assistance rather than substitution,”47 and the Chinese “advocate working on an equal footing with less arrogance, more friendly consultations and fewer attempts to force recipes on the affected countries.”48 Related to this is the third point—the often repeated Chinese criticism of the Western tendency to impose a liberal peacebuilding model on postconflict societies with little regard to their unique situation. China stresses that peacebuilding efforts must take into full consideration the specificities and national circumstances of each postconflict country, and argues that peacebuilding strategies must be devised in accordance with the diverse national contexts across different postconflict countries to target their specific and varied needs and priorities. China’s 2013 statement stressed that “there is no single model for peacebuilding” and the international community should “not just mechanically copy existing templates.”49 Fourth, the Chinese have consistently attached great importance to state and national capacity building. Chinese policy statements since 2009 have emphasized the importance of enhancing the postconflict countries’ capacity in the areas of civil administration and national governance. China’s 2013 statement expressed misgivings about the current peacebuilding focus on liberal political agenda, but not about peacebuilding efforts to build up the state capacity and governing ability of postconflict countries.50 Chinese involvement in postconflict peacebuilding does not fit comfortably within Beijing’s existing policy framework of regional engagement in Africa and other parts of the developing world. Though international peacebuilding efforts take place mainly in Africa, Chinese writings on China’s (security) engagement in Africa seldom discuss China’s involvement in this particular security domain. Insofar as China’s engagement in the postconflict or so-called failed states in Africa is concerned, the notion of peacebuilding does not seem to be a prevalent way of thinking about the country’s role in those contexts. Rather, the idea of postwar (economic) reconstruction appears to be more relevant and is used more often to describe the nature of China’s engagement with those states and regions. The 2009 FOCAC Action Plan (2010–2012) stated for the first time that China “will strengthen cooperation

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with countries concerned in the UN Peace Building Commission and support countries in their post-war reconstruction processes.” However, in subsequent FOCAC Action Plans, even this simple reference to UN peacebuilding was dropped, though the same policy documents displayed a notable increase in Chinese commitment to African peace and security in general and to UN- and AU-sponsored peacekeeping efforts in particular.51 Notwithstanding its growing salience, the peace and security agenda is not the primary driver of Chinese engagement with Africa. The Chinese hold that UN peacebuilding efforts should not be limited to (or at least not prioritize) the liberal political agenda. Rather, China advocates promoting economic and social development as a priority agenda for UN peacebuilding efforts. However, while China may advocate for a developmental approach to UN peacebuilding, the competing policy dynamics in fact transcend the narrow domain of peacebuilding and are part of the emerging competition over the broader political agenda in postconflict countries. In other words, the emerging developmental outlook represents a kind of fledgling Chinese vision for the postconflict political agenda. In fact, China views economic reconstruction as the most important part of the postconflict reconstruction agenda. Hence, so long as UN peacebuilding operations continue to be dominated by the liberal peace model, China will not feel comfortable with peacebuilding in its current form as the overarching policy framework for Chinese and international engagement in postconflict situations. At the same time, China’s economic involvement in postconflict reconstruction is likely to continue to rely primarily on bilateral cooperation and regional cooperative mechanisms instead of UN peacebuilding programs. Accordingly, China tends to look at postconflict engagement mainly in the frame of postwar economic reconstruction, as evidenced by the relevant Chinese literature on the subject. Insofar as China’s involvement in postconflict situations is concerned, Chinese discourse on postconflict reconstruction shows the prominence of the commercial agenda; peacebuilding is hardly a relevant policy concern (not to mention a major postconflict political agenda) for the government and other actors alike. China has embarked on postconflict economic reconstruction in many African countries, such as Sierra Leone, Liberia, Sudan, Angola, and the DRC.52 Its contribution to postconflict economic reconstruction efforts in Sudan and Angola are the two most notable examples. Though it remains to be seen whether China’s experience in Angola and Sudan will actually be completely successful,53 many Chinese sources cite these two country cases as the best examples of effective Chinese postconflict reconstruction efforts. For instance, those sources praise China’s help in building Sudan’s entire national oil industry. The Angolan case, on the other hand, is used as a typical example to illustrate the extent to which China’s postconflict reconstruction efforts have

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helped reinvigorate the African economy. Moreover, the resource (oil) for infrastructure model and its associated cooperative arrangements, which have been implemented in Angola, are often hailed as a workable and productive form of South-South cooperation, given its success there (or at least its initial success in the early years of the country’s postconflict reconstruction since the end of the civil war).54 China and Western countries share the same goal of promoting peace and stability in Africa, but fundamental differences exist in their respective approaches.55 Despite the slow convergence of views on such normative principles as the Responsibility to Protect and responsible sovereignty, China and the West nonetheless remain widely apart in their competing approaches to African security.56 The arguments raised by Chinese analysts against Western-style peacebuilding are fairly consistent. By and large, Chinese misgivings about the Western approach are twofold: the liberal political agenda and the tendency to disregard local conditions. China’s official declaratory position is generally supportive of UN peacebuilding endeavors as a noble idea. However, the Chinese have remained fairly cautious about their involvement in Western-led UN peacebuilding efforts. One reason for this cautious attitude toward UN peacebuilding missions, as highlighted by Chinese analysts, is the lack of political trust between China and the major Western powers. It is true that all of the stakeholders on the ground—including the UN, the governments of host countries, international NGOs, and research institutions—share the same expectations of a more significant Chinese contribution to UN peacekeeping and peacebuilding projects, and they all wish to increase cooperation and expand exchanges with China.57 In spite of these growing international expectations, China continues to believe that Western countries would remain suspicious of its motives and strategic intentions if China were to significantly enhance its engagement in UN peace missions. This political mistrust and the considerable disagreement over the liberal approach have discouraged China from becoming enthusiastically supportive of current UN peacebuilding missions, despite growing Chinese activism in international peace and security. Since the beginning of Xi Jinping’s leadership, Beijing’s international ambitions have increasingly turned global. In the domain of peace and security, China has intensified its engagement with the aim of seeking a more prominent leadership role and greater normative power. Despite this rising political activism and increasing policy flexibility, the principles of noninterference and respect for sovereignty remain the preconditions for China’s involvement in international peace and security, as the Chinese

Reflections on China’s Future Role

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government understands the continuing merits and necessity of this diplomatic principle. Nonetheless, China is determined to play a distinct leadership role in international peace and security. A major thrust of this attempt is reflected in President Xi’s delineation of a new Chinese security concept at the fourth summit of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia in May 2014, where he proposed the notion of “common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable security” that attaches great importance to the integral relationship between economic development and sustainable peace.58 The idea is that sustainable peace and security can be achieved by “focusing on both development and security so that security would be durable,” and that “development means the greatest security and the master key to regional security issues.”59 What this implies is that the security and development agenda must be synchronized to realize lasting peace. The idea is not entirely new and reflects the essentially developmentalist thinking that has long been advocated in Chinese policy discourse on peace and security. Nonetheless, this renewed emphasis on the interdependence between peace and security demonstrates China’s ambition to promote its own normative agenda on the world stage in international security, and reveals Beijing’s disapproval of existing norms and practices in the domain of peace and security which, from the Chinese perspective, are mainly shaped by the agenda and interests of the West. Notwithstanding Chinese disapproval of the existing doctrine and practice of UN peacebuilding operations, Chinese analysts suggest that there is scope for improvement in China’s own approach. For instance, China has made only modest financial contributions to the UN Peacebuilding Fund (whose main donors remain the Western governments), and has participated much less in peacebuilding projects than in peacekeeping operations. Chinese analysts suggest that China needs a more creative approach as opposed to a sheer scale expansion and simple increase in funding contributions, and must rethink and adjust its approach by taking into account the transformation of UN peacekeeping and peacebuilding operations and the country’s changing international role.60 Even Li, who advocates a cautious approach to UN peacebuilding, advises that China must not tie itself down to the principle of noninterference in peacebuilding and peacekeeping. Though China should adhere to its traditional principles and maintain its edge in areas where it has traditionally enjoyed an advantage, those principles— such as the sanction of the UN Security Council, the consent of the host government, and opposition to excessive intervention—should not hinder China from fulfilling its responsibility as a UN member state in UN peacekeeping and peacebuilding operations.61 In summary, Chinese analysts have

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proposed two areas where change is most needed: (1) China’s approach to peacebuilding needs to diversify the makeup of its actors who are involved, and (2) China needs to expand the range of tasks it gets involved in light of the evolving content of UN peace missions. First, China should increase its peacebuilding engagement with nontraditional partners. It has been argued that China’s approach has been too government centric, which has become a significant obstacle to the country’s peacebuilding engagement. This is reflected in the lack of participation of nongovernmental actors from China in the process as well as in the lack of Chinese engagement and interaction with foreign nongovernmental actors such as local civil society groups and international NGOs.62 Since the UN has increasingly focused its efforts on the mobilization, organization, and participation of local civil society groups, NGOs, and privatesector actors, especially in the work of peacebuilding, this has presented a big challenge for China. China could diversify its peacebuilding personnel by encouraging Chinese civil society organizations, charity groups, volunteers, and private-sector enterprises to participate in UN peacekeeping and peacebuilding projects. At the same time, China also needs to build connections with various nongovernment actors in host countries and cater to their different demands and needs. Second, and perhaps more importantly, these analysts argue, Chinese peacebuilding should move beyond the traditional emphasis on infrastructure construction and explore nontraditional fields and more innovative projects. China’s peacebuilding engagement is said to lack diversity in the sense that Chinese (peacekeepers’) efforts tend to concentrate on the hard areas, such as building roads, bridges, and hospitals, and shy away from those soft areas pertaining to political, legal, and institutional rebuilding. Given China’s limited involvement in political affairs, rule of law, and institutional rebuilding, Chinese peacekeeping and peacebuilding efforts are often seen as lacking in soft engagement. It therefore has been suggested that China could seek to play a more active role in peacebuilding agenda setting by trying to promote the economic and social development agenda in UN peacebuilding and peacekeeping and making a stronger link between sustainable development and sustainable/lasting peace. Since social and economic development is not high on the UN peacebuilding agenda, China could try to address this deficiency by using its resources and capabilities to contribute more to programs such as poverty reduction, youth employment, gender equality, and child protection, as well as demobilization and reintegration of former combatants.63 Although China generally disapproves of an excessive focus on the liberal agenda in postconflict reconstruction, this does not necessarily mean that it seeks to undermine UN peacebuilding efforts. Arguably, the Chinese vision of development peace is meant to supplement the existing UN approach to

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peacebuilding. As an alternative approach, it is not so much an attempt to polarize UN peacebuilding politics as an endeavor to render a more balanced perspective on the peacebuilding agenda and postconflict priorities. The idea of development peace is to promote a more balanced approach to peacebuilding lest it concentrate too narrowly on the liberal state-building agenda. China could explore ways to work with the Western approach in a complementary manner. In fact, there is already a tacit recognition of a shared interest in certain areas of peacebuilding. For instance, all stakeholders seem to have a common interest in helping to restore the administrative functions of state organs of the country concerned and in building a capable legal and security apparatus. Indeed, China has already been actively engaged in security cooperation with many African governments in state capacity–building projects, especially with respect to the strengthening of the law enforcement and judicial systems, though these efforts are mostly carried out on a bilateral basis and not necessarily through UN peacebuilding mechanisms. China also seems to have the capacity to make a greater contribution to the rebuilding of the administrative and legal institutions, the resettlement of refugees, and the social reintegration of ex-combatants, and could therefore possibly increase cooperation with the United Nations in those areas. However, the extent to which China would integrate its efforts into the existing peacebuilding approach continues to depend in part on the degree of cooperation and trust between China and other stakeholders, including the UN, the host countries, and other member states.64 Indeed, one has to take a broader view of the Chinese role in postconflict situations by looking beyond the relatively narrow terrain of UN peacebuilding efforts (or peace operations, more generally). As already noted, China is more interested in economic reconstruction than peacebuilding per se. As far as postconflict engagement is concerned, it is in the area of economic reconstruction that China has given full expression to its ideal of development peace in practice. On the one hand, China hopes to contribute to the aspirations for peace by employing its strengths in promoting economic reconstruction through trade, investment, aid, and infrastructure development. But the more significant determinant is the powerful mercantilist drive that has shaped China’s developmentalist approach to diplomacy in the South, as noted earlier. President Xi’s great-power ambitions are likely to raise the profile of China’s involvement in postconflict reconstruction. Of particular significance in this regard are the potential implications of China’s emerging international developmentalism that has become a hallmark of its foreign policy throughout the developing world under Xi’s leadership. For example, Chinese leadership in establishing the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) clearly represents a more internationalist turn in Chinese economic diplomacy. It remains unclear as of this writing in 2019 how the

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potential relevance of the Chinese-led AIIB could be translated into concrete results in postconflict economic reconstruction. But the creation of the AIIB does seem to indicate Beijing’s determination to upgrade and reinvent its developmentalist diplomacy by adopting a more institutional and multilateral approach. This might improve China’s policy options and practices in its economic reconstruction efforts globally, not least in view of the massive demand for infrastructure development and the huge infrastructure funding gap in many parts of the postconflict world. A major manifestation of this international developmentalism is the Chinese Silk Road strategy, which may have some important implications for China’s involvement in the postconflict setting. The Belt and Road Initiative, which refers to the overland Silk Road Economic Belt and the Maritime Silk Road, is designed to involve most of the developing countries. Centered on development cooperation in infrastructure, industrialization, and transport connectivity, as well as trade and investment, the BRI offers great potential for expanding Chinese engagement in developing world economic modernization and reconstruction. In fact, it is already beginning to influence thinking and policy decisions in Chinese relations with some of the postconflict states and countries experiencing political transition. To boost their economic reconstruction or reinvigorate their economies, many postconflict and transition countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Egypt, and postcommunist states in Central and Eastern Europe see the BRI as a real opportunity to deepen cooperation with China and boost development.65 For its part, Beijing has become reasonably confident of its position in the politics of postconflict economic reconstruction. In the past, the Chinese were especially anxious about Western domination of economic reconstruction in postconflict states because of China’s weaker and more vulnerable position in Iraq and Libya following Western armed interventions and regime change.66 But the international situation has become more favorable for China in two important ways. First, the perception of China as an economic superpower and alternative development model cannot be underestimated. The country’s awe-inspiring economic achievement is a huge source of soft power that is bound to strengthen China’s position vis-à-vis other competitors, not least when leaders of postconflict states are seeking to diversify their countries’ international relations and balance the West’s excessive influence. Second, in most cases, the West has proved neither serious nor capable in delivering postconflict economic reconstruction. Countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Syria are still suffering from the devastating long-term effects of Western armed interventions that were carried out without having a proper plan for postconflict political settlement and economic reconstruction. Neither does the United States nor its Western allies have the political will and economic resources to take responsibility for helping governments of postconflict states rebuild their economies, as testified to by developments

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in some of the major postconflict states such as Libya, Afghanistan, and Iraq. As the Global Times, a newspaper often seen as a proxy for Chinese government views, editorialized: “To be honest, America’s ability to carry out largescale foreign aid has reached a historic low since the Second World War; it is even more so for Europe which is fully occupied with its internal problems. The United States was then able to take responsibility for (rebuilding) the entire Europe with the Marshall Plan; today even the combined power of the United States and Europe could not rebuild one Libya without difficulty.”67 Yet China remains concerned about the uncertain security environment in some of the postconflict states. In view of the recurrent political violence and fragile security situation in countries such as Afghanistan, Libya, Iraq, Egypt, and Myanmar where there is no clear boundary separating the postconflict and conflict situations, China’s economic involvement has been constrained. However, the fragile peace and security situations in postconflict societies are exactly the reason why China needs to enhance its engagement in peacebuilding and postconflict reconstruction to help achieve and maintain lasting peace that is essential for the global expansion of Chinese interests in places such as Africa.68 In fact, the Silk Road strategy has increased the salience of some of those states in Chinese foreign policy given the geostrategic importance of their regional position for the success of the Belt and Road. This might, in turn, lead to deeper political engagement to enhance Chinese capacity to shape the security environment along the Belt and Road. Expanding the commitment to postconflict reconstruction through multilateral responses, already featured in Africa, is being supplemented by bilateral security arrangements in countries such as Pakistan to protect infrastructure corridors, by the growth of Chinese private security companies focused on BRI projects, and by active engagement in mediation as seen in the case of the ethnic conflicts in northern Myanmar.69 Among all of the seven emerging donors examined in this book, China is perhaps one of the most vocal advocates of the need to prioritize the economic and social development agenda in UN peacebuilding. Likewise, on the question of the development-security nexus, China has been most vocal about the developmental peace thesis with its long-standing emphasis on the critical role of economic development as the key to lasting peace. Another major indication of this developmentalist mind-set, which seems akin to the developmental orientation of the Brazilian nation-building experience, is the Chinese tendency to regard economic reconstruction as one of the most legitimate and urgent elements of the postconflict agenda. China therefore appears to show a distinct tendency to see postconflict politics primarily through the lens of economic reconstruction and, accordingly, to

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focus the role of Chinese government and commercial actors on providing postconflict assistance in that specific context (as opposed to other forms of postconflict involvement such as peacebuilding or humanitarian assistance, which would better characterize the efforts of some other emerging donor countries examined in this book). Compared to other emerging donors that generally show no interest in promoting the liberal political agenda in postconflict settings (e.g., Russia and India, but also Turkey and Qatar), China also appears to be most vocal about what it sees as the UN’s excessive focus on the liberal political agenda and its consistent failure to give due consideration to the importance of economic and social development issues in the practice of UN-led peacebuilding. The Chinese desire for an alternative approach to traditional peacebuilding engagement is in fact shared by other emerging donors such as Turkey, Brazil, and Qatar (South Africa being the exception as its approach is informed by the precepts of liberal peacebuilding and more aligned with those of the UN and other traditional donors), albeit for different reasons and with each player developing its distinct national approach in terms of normative concerns and best practices. In this regard, China is not alone as an emerging norm maker in trying to reshape peacebuilding practices and postconflict agenda. Notwithstanding those differences, nuanced or otherwise, China shares many commonalities with others in their postconflict engagement, such as the shared preference for a bilateral approach (as seen in the cases of Turkey, India, Russia, and Qatar) and the common emphasis on state capacity building, local ownership, and a demand-driven approach. A more important observation is that, as in the cases of Brazil, South Africa, Turkey, and Qatar, China’s growing activism in international peace diplomacy (not least in terms of mediation and peacekeeping) provides a relevant policy context in which China’s growing roles in postconflict peacebuilding norm making and economic reconstruction efforts have developed. In other words, China’s engagement in the postconflict situation is, broadly speaking, a function of Chinese policy on international peace and security. The other part of the equation is Beijing’s emerging desire to promote norm change in peacebuilding, a pattern that resembles the experiences of some other emerging donors (e.g., Brazil and Turkey) aspiring to pursue norm entrepreneurship in peace, humanitarian, and aid diplomacy. Geopolitical and national security considerations have been the driving factors in Russia’s and India’s postconflict engagement within their respective geopolitical neighborhoods, but such considerations have by and large been much less prominent in shaping the Chinese approach or determining the level of Chinese interest in postconflict engagement. The BRI’s approach seems more closely tied to “strategy as development,” giving geopolitics a distinctively economic development hue. It remains to be seen, however,

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whether and how China’s expansionist politics will fully unfold in postconflict contexts not only within China’s own geopolitical peripheries in countries such as Afghanistan and Myanmar but also in faraway regional theaters.

A previous version of the section Growing Chinese Activism in International Peace and Security appeared in Chris Alden and Yixiao Zheng, “China’s Changing Role in Peace and Security in Africa,” in Chris Alden, Abiodun Alao, Chun Zhang, and Laura Barber, eds., China and Africa: Building Peace and Security Cooperation on the Continent (Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018), pp. 48–53. 1. See Xi Jinping’s first UN address,” Quartz, September 29, 2015, http://qz .com/512886/read-the-full-text-of-xi-jinpings-first-un-address. 2. Third world is a term that was used during the Cold War and, more recently, was replaced by the South. 3. Chris Alden and Yixiao Zheng, “China’s Changing Role in Peace and Security in Africa,” in Chris Alden, Abiodun Alao, Chun Zhang and Laura Barber, eds., China and Africa: Building Peace and Security Cooperation on the Continent (Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008), pp. 41–42. 4. Deborah Brautigaum’s work is the leading scholarship addressing the historical trajectory of Chinese development assistance and the debates around its role. See Deborah Brautigaum, The Dragon’s Gift: The Real Story (New York: Oxford University Press, 2009) and her informative website China Africa Research Initiative. Critics include Moises Naim, “Rogue Aid,” Foreign Policy October 15, 2009, https:// foreignpolicy.com/2009/10/15/rogue-aid/; and, more recently, Luke Patey, “China Model Is Failing Africa,” Financial Times, August 26, 2018. The China Study Group at the OECD DAC produced a detailed assessment of China’s domestic experience and development assistance in the agricultural sector with respect to Africa. See China Study Group, “Effective Development Cooperation: Drawing Lessons from Agricultural Development in Africa” (Paris: OECD DAC, 2013), www.oecd.org /dac/dac-global-relations/china-dac-study-group.htm. 5. See Neissan Alessandro Besharati and Carmen Rawhani, “South Africa and the DRC: Evaluating a South-South Partnership for Peace, Governance and Development,” Occasional Paper No. 235, (Johannesburg: South African Institute of International Affairs, July 2016), pp. 6–10. 6. Lisa Cornish, “China’s New Aid Agency: What We Know,” Devex, April 20, 2018, www.devex.com/news/china-s-new-aid-agency-what-we-know-92553. 7. Xuejun Wang, “Developmental Peace: Understanding China’s Africa Policy in Peace and Security,” in Chris Alden, Abiodun Alao, Chun Zhang, and Laura Barber, eds., China and Africa: Building Peace and Security Cooperation on the Continent (Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018), pp. 67–82. 8. See Chun Zhang, “‘Development-Security Nexus’: The Africa Policies of China, the EU and the USA,” Chinese Journal of European Studies 3 (2009): 68–90; Chris Alden, Chun Zhang, Bernardo Mariani, and Daniel Large, “China’s Growing Role in African Post-Conflict Reconstruction,” Global Review 6 (2011): 100–115; Wang, “Developmental Peace”; Lei Xue, “China’s Development-Oriented Peacekeeping Strategy in Africa,” in Chris Alden, Abiodun Alao, Chun Zhang, and Laura Barber, eds., China and Africa: Building Peace and Security Cooperation on the Continent (Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018), pp. 83–99; Chun Zhang, “China-Africa Cooperative Partnership for Peace and Security,” in Chris Alden, Abiodun Alao, Chun Zhang,

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and Laura Barber, eds., China and Africa: Building Peace and Security Cooperation on the Continent (Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018), pp. 131–132. 9. In recent years, there has been a growing discourse in China calling for a rethinking of the contemporary relevance and merits of this noninterference policy. To the eyes of its skeptics, the noninterference principle has a number of manifestations. It means that China is avoiding taking a stand on important international issues; being vague, evasive, and ambiguous about Chinese positions; adopting a detached (chaotuo) attitude, a noninvolvement (bujuanru) posture, and a wait-and-see (guanwang) approach; adopting a low profile in regional and international politico-security affairs; shying away from important responsibilities and from taking the lead in international affairs; pursuing a decoupling policy, whereby politics and economics are deliberately kept separate; and placing a lopsided emphasis on economic diplomacy and nonconditionality. Perhaps the most well-known proponent of a more interventionist posture is Wang Yizhou, who is associated with the idea of creative intervention. See Yizhou Wang, Creative Involvement: A New Direction in China’s Diplomacy (Beijing: Peking University Press, 2011); Yizhou Wang, “Creative Involvement: To Develop and Update a New Doctrine of Non-interference Based on China-Africa Relations,” Journal of International Security Studies 1 (2013): 4–18. 10. Alden et al., “China’s Growing Role in African Post-Conflict Reconstruction.” 11. They are: special envoy of the Chinese government on the Middle East issue (2002); ambassador for Korean Peninsula affairs (2003; special representative of the Chinese government for Korean Peninsula affairs since 2011); special representative of the Chinese government on African affairs (2007); special envoy of the Chinese government on Asian affairs (2013); special representative of the Chinese government on Latin American affairs (2015); special envoy of the Chinese government on the Syrian issue (2016). 12. China’s diplomatic mediation in the Darfur crisis has been extensively discussed in the Chinese literature. Chinese writers often highlight China’s contribution to the Darfur crisis as follows: Beijing’s political support for the Kofi Annan Plan; the good offices of the Chinese president (Hu Jintao) during bilateral summits with Sudanese counterparts in late 2006 and early 2007 (to persuade President Omar alBashir to allow deployment of the UN-AU peacekeepers in Darfur); the active mediating roles played by the special envoy (Assistant Foreign Minister Zhai Jun) and special representative of African affairs (Ambassador Liu Guijin) appointed by the Chinese government; China’s material and personnel support to the hybrid UN-AU peacekeeping mission, including the dispatch of 315 military engineers; and Chinese humanitarian assistance, including the 80 million yuan aid, the $5000,000 donation to the UN Darfur fund, and a $50 million loan for building water supply facilities in the Darfur region. China’s critical contribution to the implementation of the third phase of the Annan Plan (by persuading al-Bashir to accept the hybrid peacekeeping mission in Darfur) is widely noted in the Chinese literature. According to He Wenping, the success of Beijing’s “quiet diplomacy” in the Darfur issue does not mean that China does not need a review of its Sudan policy and even its approach to Africa; and China must adapt more swiftly to Africa’s changing political circumstances that have become increasingly receptive to the notion of collective security and the practice of foreign interventions on humanitarian grounds. See Wenping He, “The Darfur Issue: A New Test for China’s Africa Policy,” Global Review, no. 2 (2010), http://en.cnki.com.cn /Article_en/CJFDTOTAL-GJZW201002009.htm. 13. This is reflected in the FOCAC’s evolving agenda over the years. See FOCAC’s Archives, https://www.focac.org/eng/zywx_1/zywj. 14. Intergovernmental Authority on Development, “Cooperation with China,” November 21 2011, http://igad.int/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id =370:cooperation-with-china&catid=46:executive-secretary&Itemid=123.

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15. In 2000, China’s Ministry of Public Security established a peacekeeping civilian police training center. In 2001, China’s Ministry of National Defense set up the Office of Peacekeeping Affairs. In the following year, China formally joined the UN Level-1 Standby Arrangement System. In 2009, the Defense Ministry also set up a Peacekeeping Centre as the PLA’s first specialized facility for peacekeeping training and international exchange. In 2012, the Chinese military also introduced the PLA UN Peacekeeping Regulations (Trial). 16. Ruocheng Jin, “Ministry of Foreign Affairs: China Firmly Supports UN Peacekeeping Operations and Preserves World Peace,” Xinhuanet, September 29, 2015, http://news.xinhuanet.com/world/2015-09/29/c_1116715502.htm. 17. See The Diversified Employment of China’s Armed Forces, State Council Information Office of the People’s Republic of China, April 2013, http://english .gov.cn/archive/white_paper/2014/08/23/content_281474982986506.htm. 18. Xinhua, “Xi Jinping Attended the Central Conference on Work Relating to Foreign Affairs and Delivered an Important Speech,” Xinhuanet, November 29, 2014, http://news.xinhuanet.com/politics/2014-11/29/c_1113457723.htm; http://www .fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/zxxx_662805/t1215680.shtml. 19. Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi has highlighted the notable increase in the intensity of China’s international mediation efforts in a series of policy speeches and articles especially since 2014. See Yi Wang, “Reviewing 2014: A Fruitful Year for Chinese Diplomacy,” opening remarks delivered at the Symposium on International Developments and China’s Diplomacy, Beijing, December 24, 2014, http://www .china.com.cn/opinion/think/2014-12/26/content_34412905.htm; see also Yi Wang, “2015: A Year of Flying Colors for Pursuing Major-Country Diplomacy with Distinctive Chinese Features,” opening remarks delivered at Symposium on International Developments and China’s Diplomacy, Beijing, December 12, 2015, www .fmprc.gov.cn/web/wjbzhd/t1323795.shtml (English version: https://www.fmprc.gov .cn/mfa_eng/wjdt_665385/zyjh_665391/t1329609.shtml); see also Wang Yi, “A Year of Full-Scale Development for Major-Country Diplomacy with Distinctive Chinese Features,” QStheory, December 31, 2015, http://www.qstheory.cn/dukan/qs/2015 -12/31/c_1117609412.htm; Wang Yi’s “A Changing China and Its Diplomacy,” speech delivered at Center for Strategic and International Studies, Washington, DC, February 26, 2016, www.fmprc.gov.cn/web/zyxw/t1343410.shtml (English version: https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/wjdt_665385/zyjh_665391/t1345211.shtml). 20. Lyle J. Goldstein, “White Coat Warriors: China’s Heroic Fight Against Ebola,” The National Interest, June 18, 2015; for a critical view, see Ian Taylor, “China’s Response to the Ebola Virus Disease in West Africa,” The Round Table 104, no. 1 (2015): 41–54. 21. See Chinese foreign minister Wang Yi’s remarks on China-Africa relations at the press conference during the annual session of the National People’s Congress in March 2015, http://topics.caixin.com/2015-03-08/100789163.html; see also Wang Yi’s keynote speech on China-Africa relations, delivered at the fifteenth Lanting Forum in November 2015, https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/web/wjbz_673089/zyjh_673099/t1318609.shtml. 22. Xinhua, “Chinese President Pledges Support for UN Peacekeeping,” Xinhuanet, September 29, 2015, http://eng.mod.gov.cn/DefenseNews/2015-09/29/content _4622633.htm; see also Xinhua, “Ministry of Foreign Affairs: China Firmly Supports United Nations Peacekeeping Operations, Firmly Protects World Peace],” Xinhuanet, September 29, 2015, http://news.xinhuanet.com/world/2015-09/29/c_1116715502.htm. 23. Xinhua, “Spotlight: Xi Charts Course for Upgrading China-Africa Ties at Landmark Summit,” Xinhuanet, December 5, 2015, [http://www.chinadaily.com.cn /world/XiattendsParisclimateconference/2015-12/05/content_22637302.htm; see also PRC Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “Xi Jinping Attends the Opening Ceremony of the Johannesburg Summit of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation and Delivers a

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Speech, Proposing to Upgrade China-Africa Relations to Comprehensive Strategic and Cooperative Partnership, Comprehensively Expounding China’s African Policy and Announcing Major Measures to Deepen China-Africa Cooperation,” Ministry of Foreign Affairs, December 4, 2015, https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/mfa_eng/topics _665678/xjpffgcxqhbhbldhdjbbwnfjxgsfwbfnfyhnsbzczfhzltfh/t1322278.shtml. 24. See “Full Text: China Second Africa Policy Paper,” Xinhua, December 5, 2015, http://www.china.org.cn/world/2015-12/05/content_37241677.htm; see also FOCAC, “The Forum on China-Africa Cooperation Johannesburg Action Plan (2016– 2018),” December 25, 2015, https://www.focac.org/eng/zywx_1/zywj/t1327961.htm. 25. Xinhua, “Chinese President Pledges Support for UN Peacekeeping,” Xinhuanet, September 29, 2105, http://www.mod.gov.cn/opinion/2015-10/06/content _4623213.htm. On the same occasion, Xi also declared that China would actively consider the UN’s request for sending more engineering, transportation, and medical personnel to join peacekeeping missions, and would train 2,000 foreign peacekeepers and carry out ten mine-sweeping assistance programs in the next five years. 26. Xinhua, “Interview: China’s Pledge of Peacekeeping Force Helps Meet ‘Critical’ Gaps: UN Peacekeeping Chief,” Global Times, October 5, 2015, http:// www.globaltimes.cn/content/945556.shtml; see also PRC Ministry of National Defense, “UN Thanks China for New Promises Towards Peacekeeping Endeavors,” Ministry of National Defense, October 6, 2015, www.mod.gov.cn/opinion/2015 -10/06/content_4623213.htm. 27. Strictly speaking, the notion of “combat troops” is not a formal term adopted by the United Nations. See Yun Li, “China Dispatches Real Combat Units for Peacekeeping for the First Time,” Xinhua Daily Telegraph, April 9, 2015, http:// news.xinhuanet.com/mrdx/2015-04/09/c_134136845.htm. Nonetheless, it is often used by the press to refer to the security force. See Kathrin Hille, “China Commits Combat Troops to Mali,” Financial Times, June 27, 2013, https://www.ft.com/content /e46f3e42- defe-11e2-881f-00144feab7de#ixzz42gM1xkhc. 28. Jing Chen, “China for the First Time Dispatches Security Forces for Peacekeeping in Mali,” China Youth Daily, December 6, 2013, www.banyuetan.org /chcontent/sz/hqkd/2013125/87177.shtml; see also Mengnan Ji, “Wan Xiao Bin: China’s First Peacekeeping Deployment to Mali Is a “Multi-Win” Gesture,” China National Radio, July 4, 2013, http://mil.cnr.cn/jmhdd/gfsk/wgf/201307/t20130704 _512972523.html. 29. Xinhua, “China to Send Security Force for Peacekeeping Mission in Mali,” Xinhuanet, June 28, 2013, http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/china/2013-06/28/c _132492919.htm. 30. Li, “China Dispatches Real Combat Units for Peacekeeping for the First Time”; see also Pengi Li, Aiming Li, and Yize Liu, “Our First Peacekeeping Infantry Battalion has been Deployed in 5 Stages, Including 13 Female Troops,” 81.cn, April 7, 2015, http://www.81.cn/jwgz/2015-04/07/content_6432403.htm; Peng Li, Aiming Li, and Yize Liu, “Chinese Blue Helmets on Duty for Peace at 9 UN Mission Sections,” 81.cn, April 7, 2015, http://news.mod.gov.cn/headlines/2015-04/07/content_4578846.htm. 31. According to the 2015 Defense White Paper, the PLA’s participation in international peacekeeping is regarded as one of the military operations other than war (MOOTWs) that is said to be “an important approach to enhancing their operational capabilities” and will be incorporated into “military modernization and PMS (preparation for military struggle).” See China’s Military Strategy (Beijing: State Council Information Office of the People’s Republic of China, May 2015), http://www.mod .gov.cn/affair/2015-05/26/content_4588132_3.htm. 32. See Chris Alden and Dan Large, “On Becoming a Norms Maker: Chinese Foreign Policy, Norms Evolution and the Challenges of Security in Africa,” China Quarterly 221 (2015): 123–142.

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33. Dongyan Li, “The Prospects and Path of China’s Engagement in UN Peacekeeping and Peacebuilding,” Foreign Affairs Review 29, no. 3 (2012): 1–14. 34. Ibid. 35. Pierre Englebert and Denis Tull, “Post Conflict Reconstruction in Africa: Flawed Ideas About Failed States,” International Security 32, no. 4 (2008): 106– 139. Their work is often cited by the Chinese scholars to illustrate the limited effectiveness, if not failure, of the Western approach. 36. Lei Zhao, “Two Pillars of China’s Global Peace Engagement Strategy: UN Peacekeeping and International Peacebuilding,” International Peacekeeping 18, no. 3 (2011): 351–352. 37. Li, “The Prospects and Path of China’s Engagement in UN Peacekeeping and Peacebuilding.” 38. Ibid. 39. Zhao, “Two Pillars of China’s Global Peace Engagement Strategy,” p. 353. 40. Li, “The Prospects and Path of China’s Engagement in UN Peacekeeping and Peacebuilding.” 41. Ibid. 42. Ibid.; Zhao, “Two Pillars of China’s Global Peace Engagement Strategy.” 43. Li, “The Prospects and Path of China’s Engagement in UN Peacekeeping and Peacebuilding,” p. 3. 44. People’s Daily, “Role of Development in Peace-Building Stressed,” February 6, 2001. http://french.china.org.cn/english/2001/Feb/7092.htm. 45. Min Wang, “Statement by Ambassador Wang Min at the Security Council Open Debate on Post-Conflict Peacebuilding,” April 25, 2013, www.china-un.org /chn/zgylhg/jjalh/alhzh/jshp/t1035428.htm. 46. Ibid. 47. Min Wang, “Statement by Ambassador Wang Min at the Security Council Open Debate on Post-Conflict Peacebuilding,” January 21, 2011, www.china-un.org /chn/zgylhg/jjalh/alhzh/jshp/t788922.htm. 48. Wang 2013, “Statement by Ambassador Wang Min at the Security Council Open Debate on Post-Conflict Peacebuilding.” 49. Ibid. 50. Ibid. 51. See FOCAC, “Forum on China-Africa Cooperation Sharm El Sheikh Action Plan (2010–2012),” November 12, 2009, https://www.focac.org/eng/zywx_1/zywj /t626387.htm; FOCAC, “The Forum on China-Africa Cooperation Beijing Action Plan (2013–2015),” July 23, 2012, https://www.focac.org/eng/zywx_1/zywj/t954620.htm; FOCAC, “The Forum on China-Africa Cooperation Johannesburg Action Plan (2016–2018),” December 15, 2015, https://www.focac.org/eng/zywx_1/zywj/t1327961 .htm; FOCAC, “Forum on China-Africa Cooperation Beijing Action Plan (2019-2021), September 25, 2018, https://www.focac.org/eng/zywx_1/zywj/t1594297.htm. 52. Xuejun Wang, “Review of China’s Engagement in African Peace and Security,” China International Studies 32, no.1 (2012): 72–91. 53. Some Chinese analysts have raised doubts about the sustainability of China’s approach in Angola. See Yuyan Zhang, “Analysis of China’s Changing Management of the ‘Angolan Model,’” International Review no. 1 (2012): 58–64; Haifang Liu, “Angola’s Post–Civil War Development and Reflections on ChinaAngola Cooperation,” Foreign Affairs Review 28, no. 2 (2011): 38–50. According to Liu, most of the existing Chinese writings on China-Angola relations have shied away from investigating the underlying problems facing the so-called Angola model, and most have tried to advocate replicating this model in other African countries without first asking deeper questions about the reasons for its success and its applicability elsewhere. Liu also observes that the lack of studies on the Angola

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model is in marked contrast to the booming research into this subject abroad. Liu suggests that this is due to all sorts of restrictions and constraints in China, though she does not specify what those restrictions are. 54. Wang, “Review of China’s Engagement in African Peace and Security.” 55. Zhao, “Two Pillars of China’s Global Peace Engagement Strategy.” 56. Wang, “Review of China’s Engagement in African Peace and Security.” 57. Li, “The Prospects and Path of China’s Engagement in UN Peacekeeping and Peacebuilding.” 58. Jinping Ji, “New Asian Security Concept for New Progress in Security Cooperation,” speech delivered at the fourth summit of the “Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia,” Shanghai, May 21, 2014, http:// china.org.cn/chinese/2014-06/03/content_32561159.htm. 59. Ibid. 60. Zhao, “Two Pillars of China’s Global Peace Engagement Strategy”; Li, “The Prospects and Path of China’s Engagement in UN Peacekeeping and Peacebuilding.” 61. Li, “The Prospects and Path of China’s Engagement in UN Peacekeeping and Peacebuilding.” 62. Ibid. 63. Ibid.; Zhao, “Two Pillars of China’s Global Peace Engagement Strategy.” 64. Li, “The Prospects and Path of China’s Engagement in UN Peacekeeping and Peacebuilding.” 65. See Congxiao Jiang and Ruiqing Zhu, “Explaining Diplomacy Afghan Leader Visits China: How Can China and Afghanistan Achieve Win-Win,” Xinhuanet, May 16, 2016, http://news.xinhuanet.com/world/2016-05/16/c_128986248.htm; Yue Qu, “Wang Yi Meets with Afghanistan Minister of Foreign Affairs, Rabbani,” Xinhuanet, January 26, 2016, http://news.xinhuanet.com/world/2016-01/26/c_1117904070.htm; Xu Chen, “Iraq Prime Minister: Iraq Looks Forward to Further Develop Bilateral Relations,” Xinhuanet, December 21, 2015, http://news.xinhuanet.com/world/2015 -12/21/c_1117527330.htm; Bowenpress, “US Unreliable! Iraqi Prime Minister to Visit China to Seek Investments and Anti-Terrorism Support,” Bowenpress, December 21, 2015, http://bowenpress.com/news/bowen_50046.html; Beijing Youth Daily, “China Reaches Major Deal with Egypt to Develop Capital,” Beijing Youth Daily, January 22, 2016, http://news.ifeng.com/a/20160122/47179152_0.shtml; Jie Jiang and Yachen Wang, “Egyptian Ambassador: New Suez Canal is Significant Component of ‘One Belt, One Road’ Initiative,” Xinhuanet, August 3, 2016, http://news .xinhuanet.com/world/2015-08/03/c_1116124416.htm. 66. As in the case of Iraq, Beijing was frustrated by Western domination of the postconflict reconstruction markets and US attempts to exclude Chinese companies from the Iraqi market. See Da Shao, “China’s ZTE Wins Iraq Reconstruction Contract,” China.org.cn, February 9, 2004, http://www.china.org.cn/english/2004/Feb/86666.htm. 67. Editorial, “Such Is the Plight of Libya, and Obama Says It Was Not Well Thought Out,” Global Times, April 12, 2016, http://opinion.huanqiu.com/editorial /2016-04/8805679.html. 68. Alden et al., “China’s Growing Role in African Post-Conflict Reconstruction.” 69. See Helena Legarda and Mela Nouwens, Guarding the Silk Road: How China’s Private Security Companies Are Going Global (London: International Institute for Strategy Studies/Mercator Institute for Chinese Studies, 2018).

3 India: Between Principles and Pragmatism Urvashi Aneja

power with a growing network of global engagements raises questions around how it will contest and contribute to global development and security architectures. In conflict-affected states, in particular, how does India understand the relationship between security and development and how does this challenge the liberal peacebuilding model? In this chapter, I attempt to systematize India’s approach to conflict-affected states by categorizing its engagement across three tiers—its immediate neighborhood, its extended neighborhood (particularly in the Indian Ocean littorals), and its engagement across global platforms. Across these tiers, principles and pragmatism are combined in variance with geographical proximity and strategic priorities. The core idea consistent across all three tiers is the priority accorded to state stability, rather than particular internal governance arrangements, for international peace and security. The international community’s primary responsibility toward conflict-affected states is to build the capacity of the state to manage its own affairs. India does not, however, have a singular overarching framework guiding its engagement. Rather, the core ideas guiding India’s policy must be inferred from its various regional and global engagements. India’s engagement in conflict-affected states is not very different from that of the traditional donors insofar as it is a mix of principled beliefs and strategic priorities. The specificity of these principles and priorities, however, is different, being reflective of particular historical experiences and domestic priorities. India’s concern with the impact of global security conversations on how it manages its internal security challenges, particularly in Kashmir, is likely to remain a critical part of New Delhi’s calculation as it engages with conflict-related issues at global platforms. The difference

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between India and traditional donors is increasingly about the scope and nature of international responsibility in conflict-affected states and the longer-term impacts of international engagement, rather than a singularly principled view of the appropriate course of action. Moreover, there is gradual, but growing, convergence between the traditional and emerging donors about the centrality of economic growth and productivity as being necessary for development and security. The comparison between India and traditional donors must, however, be situated historically. It can be argued that the development interventions by Western states are derived at least partly from a sense of historical responsibility and moral obligation rooted in their colonial histories. Development assistance is thus conceived as a form of charitable giving. The other main factor that has driven global development policy in Western capitals is the perceived threat to their national security from persistent underdevelopment and volatility in the third world. In India’s case, there is no similar historical experience that leads to a sense of global obligation or creates the impetus for a global mission. If anything, its experiences as a former colony and as leader of the Non-Aligned Movement (NAM) lead it to reject the hierarchical and paternalistic relationship fostered through charity and to instead emphasize ideas of reciprocity, mutual benefit, and partnership. Neither are the effects of global instability directly experienced in India as yet; India’s security concerns emanate almost entirely from its immediate neighborhood. It is necessary to recognize these distinct historical trajectories when framing expectations and evaluations about the roles that emerging powers like India have as providers of global development and security. These different historical trajectories and security realities, combined with immense political and social inequities in India and the domestic political pressures they create, explain why India does not have a sense of global purpose or ambition with regard to conflict-affected states. Two features of India’s approach that are relevant across all three tiers should be noted at the outset. First, India’s long-standing commitment to the principles of sovereign equality and noninterference is rooted in its colonial history and its leadership of the Non-Aligned Movement during the Cold War, and is reinforced by current security concerns, particularly in Kashmir. After almost 200 years of colonial rule, the principles of sovereign equality and noninterference were critical for the new Indian republic at an ideological and a pragmatic level. During the Cold War, India led the NAM based on the five Panscheel Principles: mutual respect for each other’s territorial integrity, mutual nonaggression, mutual noninterference in domestic affairs, equality and mutual benefit, and peaceful coexistence. Similar principles have guided Brazil’s (Chapter 5) engagements. At the same time, and particularly in the post–Cold War period, India faced multiple internal insurgencies. The principle of noninterference thus became a

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strategic tool to resist external intervention in its own territory. This principled and strategic posturing has also led to India’s rejection of the narratives around fragile states, arguing that labeling a state as fragile imposes an external standard of legitimate statehood, can provide a basis for military intervention, and, thus, violates the principle of sovereign equality. The second feature of India’s approach is its current contributions to global security and development. The country has been a leading contributor to UN peacekeeping missions, a factor of historical continuity and contemporary great-power aspirations. India is one of the oldest and largest contributors to UN peacekeeping operations and has been a member of the Peacebuilding Commission since 2005. Further, from being one of the largest recipients of foreign aid, India is now an emerging global development partner. India intentionally uses the term development partner rather than donor to distinguish its approach as nonhierarchical and reciprocal. It currently contributes $1.16 billion in grants, loans, and training programs toward development cooperation—representing a fourfold jump in just a decade. Since the mid-2000s, India has employed lines of credit (LOCs) as one of its key development partnership instruments. LOCs are intended to facilitate mutually beneficial outcomes for India and its partners—India provides credit to partner states for specific infrastructure projects, and partner states contract Indian firms to complete the projects. These development partnerships are governed by the principles of South-South cooperation—in particular, sovereign equality and noninterference; mutual benefit for win-win outcomes; demand-driven partnerships, based on requests by recipient states; and the absence of political conditionality.1 These principles of South-South cooperation can be seen as a continuation of the Panscheel Principles, but reoriented toward facilitating economic partnerships. They help establish a certain kind of social relationship between India and its partners, based on reciprocity and partnership.2 Yet the language of Southern solidarity is also employed strategically to legitimate the pursuit of Indian economic interests.3

Security and Development in India’s Immediate Neighborhood

South Asia is one of the most volatile regions in the world. Conflict with Pakistan, the threat of extremism, and political and economic instability have defined much of India’s security landscape. While India does not subscribe to the narrative of fragile states, it is worth mentioning that six of the fifty fragile states are in South Asia. As a result, India’s engagement in the region has been driven primarily by security considerations. Like Russia, (Chapter 6) India regards the immediate neighborhood as its legitimate sphere of influence—it has thus circumvented the principle of noninterference when its interests have been threatened and has opposed any UN-led peacebuilding

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missions in the region.4 India’s engagement in the region has been aimed at creating stable and friendly states rather than promoting a particular set of governance or human rights values. India is now looking to increase economic engagement and connectivity in the region to support domestic economic growth. As a result, India has accelerated its neighborhood support programs, packaged as mutually beneficial development partnerships. Development as Stabilization The liberalization of the Indian economy was a turning point in India’s engagement with South Asia. Up until the mid-1990s, India’s neighborhood policy was dominated by security concerns vis-à-vis Pakistan. It was only when India’s economy became more integrated with the global system that India began to improve its relations in the neighborhood. As Ashok Malik argues, “There was the realization that India could not bypass South Asia, and that its ability to reach its potential as an economic actor, a safe and credible business destination, and a regional and Asian power was to a substantial extent dependent on establishing a certain equanimity in its near neighborhood.”5 Stability in South Asia, with competent and friendly states, was thus increasingly seen as necessary for Indian territorial security and economic growth.6 The United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government between 2004 and 2011 articulated this objective in terms of a comprehensive neighborhood strategy based on political engagement, support for political stability, assistance for economic development, and improved connectivity and market access for neighbors to the Indian economy.7 The importance of the neighborhood to Indian strategic and economies priorities was further elevated under the Narendra Modi government, with what has been termed a neighborhood first approach. This orientation was meant to signal the political and diplomatic priority that India would accord to the region, along with support to neighbors in the form of resources, training, and equipment.8 The centrality of stability and security in South Asia, combined with India’s economic interests, has led New Delhi to prioritize development cooperation in South Asia—the bulk of India’s development partnerships are concentrated in South Asia. Development partnerships are intended to build friendly relations and goodwill for India while also creating mutually beneficial development outcomes for India and its partners. In 2015–2016, India provided $1.14 billion in grants and loans to South Asian countries (except Pakistan), a nearly fourfold jump from $383 million extended in 2009–2010. Out of India’s total development partnership budget in 2015– 2016, approximately 74.6 percent was pledged for Bhutan, followed by 9.1 percent for Afghanistan, 6.6 percent for Sri Lanka, 4 percent for Nepal, and 2.8 percent each for Bangladesh and Maldives.9 These partnerships are intended to be mutually beneficial—in Bhutan, for example, India is helping finance a hydroelectric plant that is being built through a joint venture

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between an Indian and Bhutan public sector enterprise, and any excess electricity generated will be sold to India at a low cost. India’s engagement in Afghanistan is the clearest example of the interlinking of security and development policy. Concerned by the impact of the rise of the Taliban in Afghanistan and Pakistan, India is one of the largest single bilateral donors to Afghanistan. A stable Afghanistan is seen as the best possible mechanism to thwart the rise of extremism in the region. In 2011, India became the first country to sign a Strategic Partnership Agreement with Afghanistan since the Soviet invasion in 1979. Under the partnership agreement, India provides assistance for the rebuilding of Afghanistan’s infrastructure and institutions, long-term investments in Afghanistan’s natural resources, and education and technical cooperation to help Afghanistan achieve self-sufficiency, as well as promoting Afghan exports to India. The bulk of India’s assistance has been concentrated in large infrastructure projects that can enhance the legitimacy and capacity of the new Afghan government—notable infrastructure projects include the construction of the Afghan parliament building in Kabul, the Indian-built and -financed Zaranj-Delaram road that links Afghanistan to Iran, and the power-generating Afghan-India Friendship Dam.10 Unlike many of the Western donors engaged in Afghanistan, India tends not to make direct social-sector investments for governance or human rights promotion, nor does it work directly with civil society groups or community-based organizations. India’s engagement in Afghanistan is demand driven (i.e., it is based on specific requests from the Afghan government) and projects are typically carried out in partnership with the Afghan government. New Delhi has, however, committed to numerous small development programs in public health, education, community infrastructure development, agriculture, and vocational training. India has also contributed to building Afghanistan’s security capability; for example, through training Afghan police officers as part of a trilateral project funded by the United States. Having Indian troops on the ground in Afghanistan would be unacceptable to Pakistan and would provoke Taliban hostilities against India; India thus has been supportive of the presence of US and North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) troops in Afghanistan. Selective Noninterference India’s commitment to the principles of sovereign equality and noninterference in the region has been selective. New Delhi has been driven first by its strategic priorities and then by its principled commitments. As C. Rajamohan argues, India’s neighborhood policy was not framed in terms of intervention versus sovereignty. Instead, it was framed in terms of the pursuit of two legacies of British Empire: (1) a desire to continue India’s role in promoting order and stability in the region; and (2) of maintaining India’s primacy in the subcontinent and preventing other great powers from encroaching on

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its neighborhood.11 When India has seen its own interests in the neighborhood threatened, it has not hesitated to use force to intervene militarily—this was the case in 1971 when India sent troops to East Pakistan, in 1987 when it intervened in Sri Lanka to protect the Tamil population from an economic blockade against the Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam (LTTE), and in 1988 when it intervened in Maldives to prevent a coup. India has also circumvented the principle of noninterference through nonmilitary measures when its interests have been at stake. Its engagement in Nepal provides an instructive example. The promulgation of a new constitution in 2015 was hoped to represent the culmination of a decade-long civil war in Nepal. The Madhesi and Janjati populations that live in areas neighboring India protested that their aspirations as equal citizens had not been fulfilled by the constitution. As Dhruva Jaishanker writes, New Delhi was confronted with a tough choice: “Either it could have welcomed a flawed Nepal constitution . . . risking escalation that could have damaged Indian interests. Or it had to take some form of action to urge Kathmandu to revisit the more contentious aspects of the constitution. . . . After Indian diplomatic entreaties were dismissed, it opted for the latter.”12 The nature of India’s engagement on questions of human rights and governance is shaped by its historical commitment to the principle of noninterference. However, geopolitical concerns, particularly China’s growing influence in the region, also affect New Delhi’s calculations. In the case of Sri Lanka, for example, India has been wary of China’s growing investments in the country. India’s provision of military equipment to the Mahinda Rajapaksa government during the 2009–2011 civil war and its abstaining from a UN resolution demanding an independent international investigation of war crimes during the war were driven by a calculation of its leverage in Sri Lanka vis-à-vis China.13 Similarly, India’s silence on discrimination against the Rohingya by the ruling regime in Myanmar has been shaped by not only its broader commitment to the principle of noninterference but also its interest in retaining influence in Myanmar vis-à-vis China. India has nonetheless been receiving Rohingya refugees, allowing them to settle in different parts of the country, particularly after the 2012 communal violence in Rakhine state. In December 2012, External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid visited the state and donated $1 million for relief. But since the renewed conflict in Rakhine in 2017, Delhi has made no official pronouncement.14 Domestic politics also play a crucial role in how India structures its security and development engagements in the neighborhood. Nitin Pai notes that, with increasing proximity, the number of domestic stakeholders and the size of their stakes increase. As he points out, “India’s federal structure and the contemporary reality of coalition governments ensures that decisions are not outcomes of a rational calculation by the Indian government, but political resultant of the interplay of stakeholder interests.”15 Sri Lanka provides an instructive example: despite India’s support to the Rajapaksa regime dur-

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ing the civil war, in response to pressure from the large Tamil constituency in India, India was also financing a $270 million project to build 50,000 houses for Tamils displaced by the civil war.16

Economic Interests and Peacebuilding in the India Ocean Littorals

Africa has been a key focus of India’s development and security engagements in its extended neighborhood. However, these engagements have typically been envisaged in isolation from each other; in other words, India does not have a cohesive security and development strategy in Africa. This is in contrast to India’s policy in its immediate neighborhood, where it increasingly sees security and development objectives as interrelated. While India has long provided for African security through its contribution to peacekeeping missions, these have not been driven by specific or direct security interests.17 India’s development investments in Africa, on the other hand, are driven primarily by economic and commercial interests; India has tended not to engage with issues of domestic governance or human rights. Growing Chinese influence or threats to Indian economic investments by instability in African states might result in a more cohesive security development strategy. At present, a more cohesive positioning is limited to selective advocacy on global platforms; for example, India has called for a holistic approach to conflict prevention in Africa linked to sustainable development18 and a focus on strengthening the capacities of the African Union (AU), regional organizations, and national governments.19 Economic Diplomacy as Development Partnerships India’s development partnerships with Africa are primarily driven by economic and commercial interests such as access to raw materials and new markets to sustain Indian economic growth. By 2015, Africa supplied onefifth of India’s crude oil imports; this figure had been zero in 2005. In 2012, mineral products, precious stones, and metal imports from Africa constituted 86 percent of all Indian commodity imports. As these figures indicate, India’s investments are concentrated in resource-rich parts of Africa, including oil investments in fragile states such as Sudan, Nigeria, and Libya. These development partnerships, however, are framed around the principles of South-South cooperation to legitimate these economic engagements as a form of Southern solidarity and to differentiate India’s approach from that of traditional donors. In the past decade, a total of almost $9 billion in concessional credit was approved for nearly 140 projects in more than forty African countries, with special emphasis on less developed countries (LDCs) and Small Island Developing States (SIDS) partners.20 In October 2015 at the third India-Africa Forum Summit held in New Delhi, India made a pledge of concessional credit worth $10 billion

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to Africa in the next five years, a doubling of its existing commitment, and grant assistance of $600 million, including an India-Africa Development Fund of $100 million and a Health Fund of $10 million.21 Human rights or governance considerations or conditions have been absent from India’s development partnerships in Africa. As Emma Mawdsley argues, reasons for this include the anchoring of South-South cooperation in historical principles of noninterference and respect for sovereign decisionmaking, and the inclination toward supporting growth and productivity rather than good governance, democracy, and social programs.22 In fragile or transitional settings, there is thus a danger that India’s development partnerships could entrench the power of unrepresentative elites or the structural conditions perpetuating insecurity.23 Some researchers argue, for example, that India’s (and China’s) resource grab in Africa could perpetuate the structural conditions contributing to poverty and conflict.24 Yet emerging powers such as India are also expanding the choice of development partners available to African states. As Lucy Corkin points out, the availability of this choice is allowing Southern states to exercise new forms of ownership and agency over their development trajectories.25 The development gains to India’s partners will ultimately depend on their capacity to manage the partnership, so as to ensure the equitable spread of development gains across their peoples and institutions.26 Security Investments in Africa Indian contingents have served in twenty-two UN peacekeeping missions in sixteen African countries, and India is one of the largest contributors of peacekeepers to UN missions in Africa. Over the past decades, thousands of African military officers have received professional training from India.27 India also has maritime security interests in the Indian Ocean—approximately 80 percent of India’s energy imports traverse the Indian Ocean and its different channels. This has led to the emergence of defense agreements and joint naval training programs with several countries in East Africa and Indian Ocean island states. This also includes defense assistance through the deployment of Indian naval vessels to patrol territorial waters and providing support to African coast guards, as well as an Indian radar surveillance and listening post in East Africa.28 The changing nature of peacekeeping operations in the past two decades, from peacekeeping to robust peacebuilding often involving the use of force, has posed a challenge for India’s commitment to the principle of noninterference. India thus has pressed the case against abandoning the traditional principles of local consent, neutrality, and non-use of force except in self-defense in UN peacekeeping. However, practice has in fact departed from official policy on numerous occasions—India has participated in a number of mixed-mandate missions and has frequently contributed combat and police forces to UN missions. But this has been mostly ad hoc—the

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ambiguity has given India space to withdraw from or refuse to participate in some missions while being more actively involved in others. The difference between policy and practice has mostly been based on the requirements of particular missions—in South Sudan, for example, when UN camps came under heavy attack in Malakal and Pibor, the Indian battalion played a vital role in protecting civilians seeking shelter. Garima Mohan also argues that India, like China, has become more pragmatic in its foreign policy approach to peacekeeping as a future responsible power.29 Moreover, African governments have themselves called for more robust peacekeeping—AU mandates are in fact frequently more ambitious, muscular, and intrusive than UN missions. The challenge for India, as Kudrat Virk argues, then becomes one of willingness to “re-think its approach to peacekeeping, not merely as an aspect of its UN diplomacy but of its Africa policy, or risk neglecting the context in Africa itself and forfeiting the pay-off of its past contributions.”30 Looking Ahead—Rebalancing Principles and Pragmatism? India has tended to pursue a risk-averse approach to African conflicts. In a sense, then, India’s security and development interventions in Africa do not display coherence in the whole-of-government articulation of the security development nexus by traditional donors. However, the question of coherence will become important if Indian security investments are under threat. This was already a concern in Sudan, where India’s strong commercial engagement in Sudan and South Sudan forced it to appoint a special envoy to help mediate in the conflict as it encouraged a negotiated settlement to the political issues facing Sudan and South Sudan. This departure from its typical engagement in Africa was primarily driven by the high investments already made by the Indian Oil and Natural Gas Corporation in Sudan. India, however, preferred a backdoor approach and remained on the sidelines of international efforts to broker peace.31 Will India be ready to embrace a more robust or muscular form of peacekeeping in Africa? Will India think more coherently about its security and development investments in fragile contexts on the continent? And how can India ensure that its investments and development partnerships will not exacerbate existing conflict fault lines in Africa? Addressing these issues will be relevant from the perspective of safeguarding Indian economic investments as well as building effective and inclusive development partnerships with African states. If India is to be an effective peacekeeper, a credible development partner, and a prudent investor, it might be increasingly untenable to think of these roles separately. At global platforms, New Delhi has argued for a holistic approach to security and development and that state stability is a prerequisite for international

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peace and security. Where it has differed from Western powers has been in the scope of the international community’s responsibility toward securing peace and development. India has argued that the responsibility of the international community is to support national governments in managing their own affairs, particularly through financing mechanisms that can support nationally defined development objectives. This posture is reflective of India’s principled commitment to the ideas of sovereign equality and noninterference, as well as pragmatic concerns about the outcomes and sustainability of such interventions and the precedents they could set for India as it manages its own internal security threats. Development and Security for Comprehensive Peacebuilding India has long been a provider of security in conflict-affected states as one of the largest contributors to UN peacekeeping missions. Following from the consistent priority it has accorded to the norms of state sovereignty and noninterference, India has participated in peacekeeping missions only after consent by the host state. Satish Nambiar also argues that a selectivity criteria has been applied to participation in UN peacekeeping operations—for example, India declined to participate in the conflict in East Timor, which broke out on the question of ethnic separatism, as it resonated closely with the Kashmir conflict. India has tended to stay away from regional groups and security structures and, as a matter of policy, does not get involved in regions where other states have more pressing strategic interests and are thus willing to commit troops.32 As argued earlier, this reflects India’s own limited capacity and domestic development priorities, but also the absence of a global sense of purpose or mission. The shift toward more robust forms of peacekeeping, as I argued in the previous section, poses normative and operational challenges for India. It challenges the principle of noninterference and consent and, at a practical level, it has “serious inherent risks and less than certain outcomes.”33 However, as W. P. S. Sidhu argues, India seems to be evolving a “peacebuilding as state-building” approach, at least at the level of its global pronouncements. In other words, recent statements by India’s foreign policy elite suggest that India now envisions a more comprehensive approach to peacebuilding—one that combines the provision of humanitarian assistance with activities that help resume economic activity and create political and administrative institutions to improve inclusive governance.34 Hardeep Puri in his capacity as India’s permanent representative to the UN argued, for example, that peace cannot be restored to post conflict societies and their citizens cannot be free from fear and want, unless national authorities are able to govern effectively. The capacity of effective governance, in turn, depends on the existence of institutions that enables these authorities to respond effectively to the aspirations of the people. Political and administrative institutions that

India: Between Principles and Pragmatism decentralize governance are, in our experience, the key to nation building. Institutions must be locally relevant and must include all stakeholders, particularly the weak and under-privileged, in the governance process. . . . The key to these institutions . . . lies in what we call “inclusiveness.”35

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As a member of the Peacebuilding Commission, India has also called for member states to follow through on their commitment to safeguarding international peace and security by increasing their contributions to UN peace operations. Noting that member states have failed to meet their commitments to peacekeeping budgets, India’s representation to the UN has argued that “talking of promoting sustainable peace and preventing conflicts will cut little ice” without adequate “resources to back it.”36 In addition, India has argued that sustainable peace must also be rooted in broader commitments to conflict prevention and sustainable development. Tanamay Lal in his capacity as India’s permanent representative to the UN argued, for example, that “a more holistic approach toward gender equality and empowerment, access to healthcare, education and employment and strengthening of democratic institutions and processes are all important aspects of a holistic approach to prevent conflict.”37 In negotiations around the Sustainable Development Goals and the post-2015 development agenda, India further clarified its understanding of the relationship between development and peace and security. In a statement on “Indian priorities in the post-2015 Development Agenda,” Counselor Amit Narang argued that “the task of the development agenda must be to create conditions for rapid economic growth, for eradication of poverty, want and hunger and for holistic and sustainable development. All these, in our view, will in turn contribute to build lasting peace, prevent conflict, and promote stability. In other words, peace and stability in the context of the development agenda should be looked at from a developmental lens.”38 There is a gradual, but growing, convergence between the traditional donors and India on the need for a holistic linking of peace and development, and the centrality of an economic growth for development agenda.39 The divergence is primarily around the scope of responsibility. At the 2015 Financing for Development conference in Addis Ababa, India emphasized that South-South cooperation has a role to play insofar as it can spur economic growth, but it cannot be expected to provide any new and direct finance for global development. At global negotiations around the Sustainable Development Goals in 2015 and in consultations leading up to the World Humanitarian Summit in 2016, India argued for a “common but differentiated responsibility” toward achieving global development40 and humanitarian41 objectives. That is, while states have a common responsibility to secure global peace and development, the nature and magnitude of that responsibility differs across states in proportion to historic responsibility and capacity. In other words, the responsibility for global development as a targeted allocation of finances and programs must continue to lie with Western industrialized states.

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The Responsibility to Protect and the Protection of Civilians India’s position on Responsibility to Protect (R2P) debates and the protection of civilians is also indicative of its approach to conflict-affected states. Consistent across all of India’s statements has been its emphasis that the primary responsibility for sustaining peace lies with member states. The role of the UN is to support and build the capacities of member states to respond to internal crises. India has thus argued for a sequential application of the three R2P pillars. “In our view,” noted the permanent representative of India to the UN in 2012, “The three pillars cannot be mixed, and the support aspect, including the capacity building under Pillar Two, should take precedence over the response aspect under Pillar Three.”42 India was highly skeptical of the R2P doctrine during negotiations at the World Summit in 2005. It articulated its “reservation on intrusive monitoring and finger pointing while dealing with specific human rights situations in individual countries” and made it clear that “any discussion which is used as a cover for conferring legitimacy on the so-called ‘right of humanitarian intervention’ or making it the ideology of some kind of ‘military humanism’ is unacceptable.”43 At the UN General Assembly in 2009, India for the first time recognized the notion of responsibility, with Puri stating that “it has been its (India’s) consistent view that the responsibility to protect its population is one of the foremost responsibilities of every state.”44 But at the same time, Puri insisted on “extra vigilance” in the application of R2P exclusively through the Security Council.45 India’s key concern thus shifted—there was now a tentative agreement with the notion of Responsibility to Protect and the focus was now on putting in place better safeguards for R2P operations. India’s position on R2P was further clarified by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh at the General Assembly on September 24, 2011, when he warned that “societies cannot be reordered from outside through military force” and that any such attempts are “fraught with danger.”46 Mixing Principles and Pragmatism: Libya and Syria India’s responses to the crises in Libya and Syria are indicative of the above position. India voted in favor of the Security Council Resolution 1970 in 2011, reminding the Libyan state of its responsibility to protect its population. Yet it was wary about the use of military force and calls for a no-fly zone as suggested by Resolution 1973. India argued that the use of force could lead to greater bloodshed, that diplomatic means to resolve the crisis had not been fully explored, and that the international coalition was supporting the rebels in what was rapidly becoming a civil war with the objective of regime change. India, however, abstained rather than rejected Security Council Resolution 1973, arguably because it was concerned about its international reputation.47 As Kudrat Virk argues, “India’s abstention reflected the continuing tug- of-war between its genuine concerns about the appropriateness of armed intervention and its reluctance to break from consensus.”48

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On Syria, India has consistently argued that both sides must enter into a cease-fire and begin an inclusive process of political reconciliation led and determined by the Syrian people. India abstained from draft resolutions introduced at the Security Council in October 2011 calling for the Syrian president to step down. When India’s objections to the October 2011 resolution were removed, however—including reference to the threat of military measures and selectivity in the renouncement of violence—it shifted its position and voted in favor of the draft resolution of February 4, 2012.49 In 2017 India joined thirtytwo other countries, including Pakistan, in abstaining from a UN vote calling for an immediate cease-fire in Syria, making it clear that while protection of civilians should be prioritized, Syria’s “territorial integrity” should also prevail as a critical objective—in an effort to back a unified Syria, instead of a divided state under the control of various rebel factions and warlords.50 India’s voting on the Syrian crisis demonstrates a mix of pragmatic concerns—the precedent Syria could set for how India handles its internal security threats and geopolitical concerns. Ramesh Thakur argues, for example, that India’s support for the February 2012 draft resolution may have had more to do with pressure from Saudi Arabia and concern over antagonizing the six Gulf states, host to India’s largest expatriate population of 7 million Indian nationals.51 Kabir Taneja, on the other hand, links India’s posturing on Syria to concerns about international interference in India’s handling of extremism in its own backyard. Interestingly, this line of reasoning has also been employed by Syrian diplomats in their engagement with India. The Syrian envoy in New Delhi stated, for example, in August 2016 that “what is going on in Kashmir, is a first step in terrorism. The government of India has a right to solve it in any manner.” 52 This coincides with Syria’s stance that it is fighting with terrorists in its own war. Finally, India has been concerned with the fallout from international interference, noting that the continuous meddling by foreign powers, including the arming of rebels, has contributed to destabilization in Syria and the region. India and Syria have, however, maintained good ties through the war years—a steady stream of officials from Damascus have visited New Delhi for talks and consultations while business delegations from India have visited Damascus. Reports from January 2017 suggested that India is considering contributing to reconstruction projects in Syria; in 2017, it hosted Syrian officials to discuss these proposals. Notably, India has already renewed its commitments to its prewar projects, specifically the Tishreen power plant. This once again highlights the primacy India accords to stable and friendly states over particular internal governance arrangements. Multilateral and Minilateral Engagement India is a founding member of the UN Democracy Fund, and made the second-largest contribution to this fund after the United States. This might seem at odds with India’s reservations on international interference in

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internal governance and human rights issues. However, India’s support for democracy promotion does not reflect a principled posturing about the value of promoting democracy globally. Rather, as Sidharth Mallavarapu argues, India’s support for the Democracy Fund needs to be understood as part of a larger Indian quest for great-power standing and its recalibration of ties, particularly with the United States in the post–Cold War period.53 After years of tense Indian-US relations, the political value of democracy provided an important basis for building a partnership between the world’s two largest democracies. A 2005 joint statement between former prime minister Manmohan Singh and former president George W. Bush read, for example, “Building on their common values and interests, the two leaders resolve to create an international environment conducive to the promotion of democratic values, and to strengthen democratic practices in societies which wish to become more open and pluralistic.”54 However, as Jan Cartwright argues, India has retained a concern with not being a proselytizer, but to be an exemplar.55 India has also been an active member of the Human Rights Council, and in 2011 was reelected to the council. India’s approach, however, has been to avoid confrontation, favoring instead dialogue and diplomacy. In 2011, India, along with its partners, sent a delegation to Damascus to discuss methods of peacefully resolving the Syrian dispute; the mission, however, produced no perceptible impact on the parties.56 India tends not to contribute to large multilateral funds, such as the UNled Syria reconstruction fund, preferring Southern and strategic groups such as IBSA (India, Brazil, South Africa) and BRICS (Brazil, Russian, India, China, and South Africa, and Commonwealth countries). This is a factor of its limited capacity and its calculation that its interests are better served through more strategic groupings. In 2006 India cofounded the Global Network of Exim Banks and Development Finance Institutions, and in 2007 it promoted the setting up of the Development Cooperation Forum under the UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC). India is one of largest contributors to the Commonwealth Fund for Technical Cooperation and a significant contributor to the South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation (SAARC) Development Fund; it also played a key role in establishment of the IBSA Facility for Poverty and Hunger Alleviation, managed by the UN Development Programme and the Special Commonwealth Assistance for Africa program. India does not have a singular or overarching policy framework guiding its engagement in conflict-affected states. This is a factor of its limited capacity and its domestic development priorities. Unlike traditional donors, India’s policies are not guided by a sense of broader moral purpose or historical obligation, nor is it equally impacted by global instability and fragility. Recently, India argued for common but differentiated responsibilities toward global develop-

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ment and humanitarian assistance, indicating that the primary responsibility lies with Western industrialized states. South-South cooperation will promote global development by facilitating economic growth, but Western states must commit to mobilizing adequate financial resources for development. The paramount priority for India is the existence of stable and friendly states—from the perspective of international peace and security and from India’s economic growth agenda. India typically does not engage with issues related to the internal governance of states, unless its interests are directly threatened. Its engagement with conflict-affected states often tends to be conflict blind, bilateral, transactional, and focused on mutually beneficial economic growth opportunities. India’s engagement with conflict-affected states is a reflection of both principles and pragmatism: the prioritization of principled or pragmatic concerns, or the manner in which they are combined, is dependent on geographic proximity and strategic priorities. Thus, in South Asia, India’s engagement is primarily driven by concerns about the rise of extremism, concerns about domestic politics, its economic growth agenda, and, increasingly, concerns about the balance of power in the region vis-à-vis China. This approach is pragmatic rather than principled, and security and development are increasingly seen as existing on the same continuum. India’s engagements in Africa reflect a more dynamic mix of principles and pragmatism. Its contributions to African peacekeeping are guided by the principles of noninterference, consent, and nonuse of force, though it has departed from this posturing in response to the specific on-ground needs of particular missions. India’s development partnerships with African states are driven primarily by economic considerations, but these are guided and legitimated through the principles of South-South cooperation. India’s development partnerships in Africa tend to steer clear of conflict-related issues, and at present there is no cohesive security and development strategy. This posturing might change with China’s growing influence or if Indian investments are jeopardized by insecurity in African states; even if India does begin to engage with issues of African conflict, it is likely to be through bilateral means or smaller regional groupings and not through broader international coalitions. On global platforms, India argues more clearly for a cohesive and principled approach to peace, security, and development. However, its main point of contention with traditional donors is around the scope of international responsibility and the impact of international engagement. While India now cautiously accepts the notion of “sovereignty as responsibility,” it has consistently argued that the primary responsibility of the international community is to provide support to national institutions and governments to manage their domestic insecurity. Moreover, India’s caution is rooted in the observation that international interference has typically ended up destabilizing states and eroding local institutions, rather than restoring peace. The breaking down of traditional North-South divisions in the context of shifts

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in the global balance of power will create new partnership opportunities between traditional donors and India, but these are likely to be concentrated in an economic growth for development agenda. 1. Sachin Chaturvedi, Anuradha Chenoy, Deepta Joshi, Anuradha Joshi, and Khush Hal Lagdhiyan, Indian Development Cooperation: The State of the Debate, Evidence Report No. 95 (Brighton, UK: Institute of Development Studies, September 1, 2014). 2. Emma Mawdsley and Gerad McCann, India in Africa: Changing Geographies of Power (Cape Town: Pambazuka Press, 2015). 3. Urvashi Aneja and Tanoubi Ngangom, “Elephants in the Room: Challenges for India as an Emerging Development Partner,” Occasional Paper (New Delhi: Observer Research Foundation, February 2016). 4. W. P. S. Sidhu, “India’s Evolving Role in Development and Security in States at Risk,” in Jake Sherman, Megan M. Gleason, W. P. S. Sidhu, and Bruce Jones, eds., Engagement on Development and Security: New Actors, New Debates (New York: Center on International Cooperation, New York University, September 2011), pp. 23–30. 5. Ashok Malik, “India’s Neighborhood Policy Through the Decades,” in Ritika Passi and Aryaman Bhatnagar, eds., Neighborhood First: Navigating Ties Under Modi, Global Policy (New Delhi: Observer Research Foundation and Global Policy Journal, 2016), p. 16. 6. Nitin Pai, The Paradox of Proximity: India’s Approach to Fragility in the Neighborhood (New York: Center on International Cooperation, New York University, April 2011). 7. P. Chidambaram, “The Most Difficult Neighborhood in the World,” Outlook India, May 27, 2011, www.outlookindia.com/website/story/the-most-difficult -neighbourhood-in-the-world/272010. 8. Dhruva Jaishankar, “India’s Five Foreign Policy Goals: Great Strides and Great Challenges,” The Wire, May 26, 2016, https://thewire.in/38708/indias-five -foreign-policy-goals-great-strides-steep-challenges/. India’s development partnerships in its immediate neighborhood are also driven by concerns about China’s growing influence in the region. In response to this threat and to ensure regional connectivity, India is engaging with South Asian countries on a subregional level. It has signed motor vehicle agreements with Bangladesh, Bhutan, and Nepal. 9. Pretty Bhogal, “India’s Foreign Aid to South Asia,” Observer Research Foundation Commentaries, November 11, 2016, www.orfonline.org/research/indias -foreign-aid-to-south-asia/. 10. Rani D. Mullen and Kashyap Arora, Indian Development Cooperation with Afghanistan and the “Afghan-India Friendship Dam” (New Delhi: Centre for Policy Research, June 2016). 11. C. Raja Mohan, “India and International Peace Operations,” SIPRI Insights on Peace and Security, no. 3 (2013): 1–8. 12. Jaishankar, “India’s Five Foreign Policy Goals.” 13. Jonathan Goodhand, “Stabilizing a Victor’s Peace? Humanitarian Action and Reconstruction in Eastern Sri Lanka,” Disasters 34, no. 3 (2010): 342–367. 14. Prashant Jha, “India’s Rohingya Dilemma: A Clash of Interests and Values,” Hindustan Times, January 11, 2017, www.hindustantimes.com/india-news/india-s-rohingya -dilemma-a-clash-of-interests-and-values/story-D4nTxcFqxUBbaXcl3IBgfO.html. 15. Pai, The Paradox of Proximity. p. 13. 16. “India Offers More Aid to Lanka for IDPS,” Asian Tribune, October 18, 2009, www.asiantribune.com/news/2009/10/18/india-offers-more-aid-lanka-idps.

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17. W. P. S. Sidhu, “India’s Evolving Role in Development and Security in States at Risk,” in Jake Sherman, Megan M. Gleason, W. P. S. Sidhu, and Bruce Jones, eds., Engagement on Development and Security: New Actors, New Debates (New York: Center on International Cooperation, New York University, September 2011), pp. 23–30. 18. Statement by Tanmaya Lal, deputy permanent representative of India to the United Nations, “Open Debate on Peacebuilding in Africa,” UN Security Council, July 28, 2016, www.pminewyork.org/adminpart/uploadpdf/31640dpr_28july_sc.pdf. 19. Ibid. 20. Statement by Tanmaya Lal, July 28, 2016. 21. Aneja and Ngangom, “Elephants in the Room.” 22. Emma Mawdsley, “Human Rights and South-South Development Cooperation: Reflections on the Rising Powers as International Development Actors,” Human Rights Quarterly 36, no. 3 (2014): 630–652. 23. Aneja and Ngangom, “Elephants in the Room.” 24. Dessalegn Rahmato, “Up for Grabs: The Case of Large Indian Investments in Ethiopian Agriculture,” in Fantu Cheru and Renu Modi, eds., Agricultural Development and Food Security in Africa (London: Zed Books, 2013), pp. 93–106; Fantu Cheru, Emerging Economies and Africa’s Natural Resources: Avoiding the Resource Curse and Building More Resilient Societies (Ottawa, ON, Canada: North-South Institute, 2014). 25. Lucy Corkin, Uncovering African Agency: Angola’s Management of Africa’s Credit Lines (London: Ashgate, 2013). 26. Aneja and Ngangom, “Elephants in the Room.” 27. Ruchita Beri, “India’s Role in Keeping Peace in Africa,” Strategic Analysis 32, no. 2 (2008): 197–221. 28. Andriana Erthal Abdenur, Chris Alden, Danilo Marcondes de Souza Neto, Elling N. Tjonneland, and Anthoni van Nieuwkeerk, Rising Powers and the African Security Landscape, CMI Report No. 4 (Bergen: Chr. Michelsen Institute, October 2014). 29. Garima Mohan, Modernizing India’s Approach to Peacekeeping (Berlin: Global Public Policy Institute (GPPI), October 4, 2016). 30. Kudrat Virk, “Deconstructing India’s Peacekeeping Role in Africa,” in Urvashi Aneja, ed., Asia with Africa: Opportunities and Challenges (New Delhi: Observer Research Foundation, March 2016), p. 56. 31. Saferworld, “Rising Powers and Conflict,” Issue Paper No. 3 (London: Saferworld, November 2012. 32. Satish Nambiar, For the Honour of India: A History of Indian Peacekeeping (New Delhi: Centre for Armed Forces Historical Research, United Service Institution of India, 2009). 33. IANS, “India Urges for Political Solutions over Peacekeeping Response,” Financial Express, February 13, 2018, www.financialexpress.com/india-news/india -urges-for-political-solutions-over-peacekeeping-response/1063831/. 34. Siddhu, “India’s Evolving Role in Development and Security in States at Risk.” 35. Statement by Ambassador Hardeep Singh Puri, permanent representative of India at the UN Security Council, on “Post-Conflict Peacebuilding: Institution Building,” January 21, 2011, https://undocs.org/S/PV.6472. 36. Statement by Ambassador Syed Akbaruddin, permanent representative of India at the UN Security Council, on “Conflict Prevention and Sustaining Peace in connection with the agenda item Maintenance of International Peace and Security,” January 10, 2017, https://undocs.org/en/S/PV.7857. 37. Statement by Ambassador Tanmaya Lal, deputy permanent representative of India at the UN Security Council, on “Protecting Civilians in the Context of Peacekeeping Operations,” June 10, 2016, www.pminewyork.org/adminpart/uploadpdf /78898dpr_10june.pdf.

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38. Counselor Amit Narang, “Indian Priorities in the Post-2015 Development Agenda,” statement delivered at an event organized by the Observer Research Foundation, New York University Center for International Cooperation, and Saferworld, New York, May 15, 2015, www.pminewyork.org/adminpart/uploadpdf/61644can_15may.pdf. 39. Homi Kharas, Koji Makino, and Wooden Jung, Catalyzing Development: A New Vision for Aid (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2011). 40. Narang, “Indian Priorities in the Post-2015 Development Agenda.” 41. H. E. Ms. Sujata Mehta, Secretary (West), speech delivered at a symposium “Leave No One Behind: Making the World Humanitarian Summit Relevant for India,” organized by the Observer Research Foundation, New Delhi, May 4, 2016, on the World Humanitarian Summit, http://pmindiaun.org/pages.php?id=1286. 42. Statement by Ambassador Hardeep Singh Puri, permanent representative of India to the UN at the “Informal Interactive Dialogue on the Report of the SecretaryGeneral on the Responsibility to Protect: Timely and Decisive Action,” September 5, 2012, www.un.int/india/2012/ind2058.pdf. 43. Statement by Nirupama Sen, permanent representative of India to the United Nations, on the “Role of the Security Council in Humanitarian Crises at the Security Council,” July 12, 2005, www.un.int/india/2005/ind1118.pdf. 44. Rahul Rao, Third World Protest: Between Home and the World (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2019). Rahul Rao argues that it was only when Ambassador Hardeep Puri represented India at the UN, from 2009 onward, that there was a change in India’s official position. This was due to the different ideological makeup of Puri as well as the withdrawal of the leftist parties from the ruling coalition government in India. 45. Statement by Permanent Representative of India to the United Nations at the General Assembly Plenary Meeting on “Implementing the Responsibility to Protect,” July 24, 2019, http://www.un.int/india/2009/ind1584.pdf. 46. Statement by Manmohan Singh, prime minister of India, at the General Debate of the 66th Session of the United Nations General Assembly, September 24, 2011, http://gadebate.un.org/sites/default/files/gastatements/66/IN_en.pdf. 47. “R2P Being Selectively Used to Bring About Regime Change: India,” India Post, February 22, 2012, www.indiapost.com/r2p-being-selectively-used-to-bring -about-regime-change-india/. 48. Virk, “Deconstructing India’s Peacekeeping Role in Africa,” p. 81. 49. Madhan Mohan Jaganathan and Gerrit Kurtz, “Singing the Tune of Sovereignty? India and the Responsibility to Protect,” Conflict, Security and Development 14, no. 4 (2014): 476. 50. Kabir Taneja, “A Role for India in Rebuilding Syria,” Live Mint, February 5, 2017, www.livemint.com/Opinion/qEWiKK2mPCQ1b8696YGxwN/A-role-for-India-in -rebuilding-Syria.html. 51. Ramesh Thakur, “R2P After Libya and Syria: Engaging Emerging Powers,” Washington Quarterly 36, no. 2 (2013): 71. 52. Taneja, “A Role for India in Rebuilding Syria.” 53. Sidharth Mallavarapu, “Democracy Promotion Circa 2010—An Indian Perspective,” Contemporary Politics 16, no. 1 (2010): 49–61. 54. Ministry of External Affairs, Government of India, “Joint Statement, India–US,” July 18, 2005, https://www.mea.gov.in/bilateral-documents.htm?dtl/6772 /Joint_Statement_IndiaUS. 55. Jan Cartwright, “India’s Regional and International Support for Democracy: Rhetoric or Reality?” Asian Survey 49, no. 3 (2009): 403–428. 56. Rob Jenkins and Emma Mawdsley, “Democratic Emerging Powers and the International Human Rights System,” International Policy Papers (New York: Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, August 2013).

4 South Africa: Balancing Leadership and Strategic Engagement Gilbert M. Khadiagala

South Africa is now regarded by the international community as an honest and reliable peace broker. Today the Burundi people and the people of the DRC [Democratic Republic of Congo] are each governed by democratically elected governments after decades of instability. We attribute this to the dedication and professionalism demonstrated by our soldiers in the pursuit of the goal of eradicating conflict on our continent. We will continue to work with the African Union and the United Nations in the pursuit of peace.1 —Jacob Zuma

leadership in its African regional neighborhood. These leadership expectations stem from the size of its economy and resource endowments relative to its neighbors. Yet this role is also contested domestically because of South Africa’s slow recovery from the ravages of apartheid, stark inequalities, high levels of unemployment, and enormous demands on the state to right the wrongs of the past. These tensions and expectations are captured in South Africa’s contribution to postconflict reconstruction in Africa over the past twenty years. In this chapter, I reveal that while the postapartheid leadership has attempted to involve South Africa in postconflict reconstruction across Africa, this role has been muted and modest precisely because, for the most part, South Africa is a postconflict society with meager means and resources to effectively devote to these roles. Thus, while regional and international actors want South Africa to do more in contributing to postconflict reconstruction, Pretoria has proceeded cautiously and strategically about its engagements. I also suggest that South Africa compensates for these limits to leadership by working within multilateral

As an emerging power, South Africa is expected to provide

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institutions and international partnerships to advance the objectives of postconflict reconstruction. This chapter begins with an overview of South Africa’s policy posture toward conflicts in Burundi, the Comoros, Democratic Republic of the Congo, and South Sudan. South Africa’s involvement in these conflicts as a peacemaker and peacekeeper laid the foundations for subsequent initiatives in the postconflict phase. Next, my analysis focuses on specific contributions to postconflict reconstruction in these four countries, probing the nature and extent of these engagements. Then, I examine South Africa’s role in the articulation of the African Union (AU) Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Development (PCRD) framework against the backdrop of profound reversals in stabilization bids in Africa. Finally, I address the multiple crises around postconflict reconstruction and peacebuilding in Africa, and their implications for the future of South Africa’s leadership on norms and policies on postconflict reconstruction.

Shaping South Africa’s Posture Toward African Conflicts

In the heady first years of postapartheid, South Africa prioritized Africa in its foreign policy in a bid to showcase its emergence on the global stage. Dubbed the African Agenda, this policy sought to highlight the link among peace, security, and development in Africa. From this perspective, South Africa’s peacemaking and peacebuilding initiatives across Africa were to be undergirded by the overall objective of enhancing security and development.2 During the presidency of Nelson Mandela, South Africa held up its negotiated transition to majority rule as a model for reconciliation and stabilization in African countries that were recovering from conflicts. An African National Congress (ANC) document on foreign policy in October 1993 highlighted the fact that “socioeconomic development cannot take place without political peace and stability” and that “these are the prerequisites for socio-economic development.”3 Under Thabo Mbeki, South Africa added impetus to these objectives through the advocacy of an African Renaissance, continental unity, and economic reconstruction through initiatives such as the New Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD). Mbeki was a firm believer in Africa’s self-determination and the collective search for local solutions to African problems. Both Mandela and Mbeki prioritized peacemaking and peacekeeping initiatives, particularly in the Great Lakes region where conflicts threatened to undo the broad objectives of African renewal. As Chris Landsberg suggests, “South Africa’s peacemaking policy toward conflicts in the Great Lakes region has been based on broad georegional tactics and strategies, as Pretoria located them within the framework of a broader Africa policy of conti-

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nental renewal and development vision called the African Renaissance.”4 Peacemaking and peacekeeping fundamentally tied South Africa’s hands, allowing it to participate in postconflict reconstruction in only the few countries where it had established some diplomatic footprints. Beyond Burundi and the DRC in the Great Lakes region, South Africa has had limited engagements in postconflict initiatives in the Comoros and South Sudan where it had prior diplomatic commitments in the transitions from war to peace.5 Mandela’s initial foray in peacemaking was in 1996–1997 in the DRC where he sought to end the rebellion against the government of Mobutu Sese Seko. But the bid to craft a soft landing for the beleaguered Mobutu failed after the rebels captured Kinshasa in May 1997.6 In the aftermath of the rebel victory, the DRC was engulfed in a regionalized civil conflict in which the Mbeki government had to assume a leadership role. In the protracted Inter-Congolese Dialogue (ICD) held in South Africa, Mbeki shepherded the Congolese parties into signing the Global and All-Inclusive Agreement in Pretoria in December 2002, which produced a transitional government that started to stabilize the DRC. Following the inauguration of the transitional government, South Africa contributed troops to the UN Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (MONUC) and remained part of the UN Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (MONUSCO).7 In 2013, with the Kinshasa government facing formidable threats to peace and stability in eastern Congo, South Africa combined efforts with Tanzania and Malawi to form a Force Intervention Brigade (FIB) that defeated a rebel group, the M-23, supported by Rwanda and Uganda. Authorized by a UN Security Council resolution, the FIB has maintained a steady presence in the region with each of the three countries contributing 850 soldiers.8 In Burundi, South Africa became a key peacemaker beginning in October 1998 when regional actors appointed retired president Mandela to mediate among the warring factions. This intervention spurred South Africa’s peacemaking and peacekeeping roles that made a vital difference in the stabilization of Burundi. Mandela helped negotiate the Arusha Peace and Reconciliation Agreement of August 2000, in which warring parties embarked on national reconciliation and reconstruction. Through additional peace initiatives by other South African leaders, including Jacob Zuma, then South African deputy president, the transitional government concluded several cease-fire agreements with rebels who had been excluded from the Arusha process. 9 South Africa also paved the way for the AU and UN peacekeeping missions in Burundi by deploying the South African Protection Support Detachment (SAPSD) from October 2001 to April 2003 to secure the leaders of the transitional government. During the African Union Mission in Burundi (AMIB) from May 2003 to May 2004, a South African was force commander. Likewise, South Africa provided

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the first force commander of the UN Mission in Burundi (UNIB) when it was established in June 2004. South Africa was the last country to withdraw its military forces from Burundi in 2009.10 Political unrest in the Comoros occasioned by attempted secession of two of its three islands—Moheli and Anjouan—forced the intervention of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) and the AU as mediators and peacekeepers between 2001 and 2007. South Africa played a role in the first the OAU Observer Mission in Comoros (OMIC), dispatched from November 2001 to February 2002 to supervise a peace agreement negotiated by the OAU.11 In 2004, the AU requested South Africa to contribute a 462-member security force to the African Union Mission for Support to the Elections in the Comoros (AMISEC). With South Africa as the lead nation, AMISEC was mandated to support the reconciliation process in the Comoros, the implementation of the agreements signed by the Comorian parties, and secure free and fair presidential elections in May 2006. When violence flared up again in Anjouan in 2007 after its leader reneged on leaving power, the AU sent a new peacekeeping force, but Mbeki withdrew South African troops from the Comoros, charging that there would be no military solution to the crisis.12 Although South Africa did not have a role in the negotiations that produced the Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA) on South Sudan in 2005, the ANC and the South Sudan Liberation Movement (SPLM) had long-standing relationships forged during the liberation years when the two movements were in exile. In Harare, Zimbabwe, for instance, the ANC and SPLM shared the same offices; after 1994, the ANC gave its offices and property to SPLM. 13 After the CPA, the ANC, and SPLM signed a Memorandum of Understanding to deepen the relationship. In the buildup to the elections for an interim administration and the independence referendum, there were high-level interactions between the ANC and SPLM. Party-to-party ties were bolstered with the establishment of formal diplomatic ties between Juba and Pretoria in September 2011. On the military side, the South African National Defense Force (SANDF), deployed since July 2004 under the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS) and the UN Mission in Sudan (UNMIS), contributed to the successful referendum that resulted in South Sudan’s independence. Furthermore, South Africa deployed additional troops to Juba to help secure the airspace during the independence celebrations in July 2011.14

The Parameters of Postconflict Reconstruction in the DRC, Burundi, the Comoros, and South Sudan

Informed by the precepts of liberal peacebuilding, South Africa’s postconflict reconstruction in select African countries has focused on state

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building, democracy promotion, and economic development. According to the Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO), South Africa views postconflict reconstruction as a form of “technical cooperation and development with emphasis on the promotion of democracy, good governance, prevention and resolution of conflict, socioeconomic development, humanitarian assistance, and human resource development.”15 Since the mid-2000s, under the mantle of the African Renaissance, South Africa has prioritized stabilization and postconflict recovery in countries where it has had peacemaking and peacekeeping engagements. As Cheryl Hendricks and Amanda Lucey accurately observe, while peacemaking and peacekeeping roles confer access to postconflict countries, they also place “enormous responsibilities on [South Africa’s] shoulders. The expectation is that it will not just be another donor, but an empathetic, appropriately knowledgeable partner with a vested interest in the future development of the continent.”16 Reconciling these expectations in the face of resource constraints and a weak domestic constituency for Africa remains the key obstacle in South Africa’s quest for a credible postconflict reconstruction policy. Although diverse government departments played distinctive roles in meeting postconflict reconstruction objectives, the pivotal institution was the African Renaissance Fund (ARF) established in 2000 by an act of parliament with an initial funding of $50 million. Reflecting Mbeki’s vision of the African Renaissance, its core objectives were to promote cooperation between South Africa and other countries, democracy and good governance, conflict prevention and resolution, socioeconomic development, humanitarian assistance, and technical and capacity-building assistance.17 Based in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (renamed the Department of International Relations and Cooperation in 2009), the ARF was replenished every year by parliamentary allocations; in coordination with the national treasury, DIRCO decided on the core projects to be funded by the ARF. Foreign donors also supplemented the ARF through trilateral cooperation. In addition to support for peace processes and postconflict reconstruction, various government departments tapped into the ARF for myriad projects such as agricultural schemes in Zimbabwe, restoration of ancient scholarly manuscripts in Timbuktu, and debt repayment for a number of African countries. These multiple roles of the ARF compromised its ability to focus on postconflict development, leading to widespread demands for the creation of a new funding vehicle. As a result, South Africa sought to transform the ARF into the South African Development Partnership Agency (SADPA), which aims to coordinate assistance to Africa. SADPA is envisaged to be the overarching policy and coordinating authority for South Africa’s engagements in peace and security in Africa and for trilateral coordination. 18

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The DRC South Africa has been engaged in postconflict reconstruction in the DRC since 2002, following the signing of the Global and All-Inclusive Agreement. To deepen this relationship, both countries signed a General Cooperation Agreement in 2004 that created a Binational Commission with a focus on postconflict reconstruction and development. Subsequently, South Africa and the DRC signed additional Memorandums of Understanding (MoUs) in various areas of cooperation. The broad areas of postconflict reconstruction have revolved around (1) capacity building; (2) security sector reforms (SSRs); and (3) economic development. Most of these activities have been delivered by a wide range of government and nongovernment actors, including DIRCO, the Department of Public Service and Administration (DPSA), the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI), the Independent Electoral Commission (IEC), the SANDF, the South African Police Service (SAPS), the Public Administration Leadership and Management Academy (PALAMA), nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and universities. Given South Africa’s meager resources, some of these activities have entailed building partnerships with the United Nations and other donors that have been involved in the DRC’s reconstruction.19 With respect to capacity building and institutional reforms, South Africa’s DPSA has supported a Public Service Census project in the DRC’s ten provinces since 2005 to help to identify its public servants and to establish effective control over the civil service. Further, the DPSA has provided assistance with the development of law for decentralization of government and an anticorruption strategy. Through the PALAMA, South Africa supported the establishment of a National School for Public Administration (ENA) to train public servants in areas such as project management, leadership, human resources, and public administration. DIRCO has also been involved in a capacity-building program to train Congolese diplomats. By 2015, this program had provided training for more than 700 diplomats. As part of this initiative, DIRCO assisted in the establishment of a Diplomatic Academy and the renovation of infrastructure for the Foreign Ministry.20 In other interventions, the IEC provided administrative and logistical assistance to the Congolese electoral commission during the 2006 elections. In the presidential and parliamentary elections of November 2011, South Africa provided assistance, including the use of the SANDF to transport ballot papers and other electoral materials from South Africa to the DRC. It is estimated that the South African government contributed approximately 126 million rands toward the 2011 elections.21 Most of the activities regarding security sector reforms were envisaged in the 2004 Agreement of Defense Cooperation and a further agreement on Practical Assistance to the Government of the DRC. Under these agreements, South Africa has assisted in the development of a military

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strategy and a master plan for the reform of the armed forces, provided training for three battalions of the Congolese armed forces, and provided a needs assessment for the armed forces. In 2008, the SANDF trained former DRC armed groups, which later became known as the Rapid Reaction Battalion that is providing security in eastern Congo, particularly after the withdrawal of MONUSCO. Similarly, the SAPS have provided organizational and operational capacities to the Congolese National Police to guarantee safety and security. In addition, the SAPS have offered technical assistance and training in human resources management, crowd management, and VIP protection.22 More contentious has been South Africa’s role in the DRC’s economic recovery, with critics charging that the South African corporate sector has hegemonic designs on the DRC’s vast natural resources. Mainly concentrated in the manufacturing, retail, and mining sectors, South African corporations have established a prominent presence in the DRC. But South African public corporations, such as Eskom, and the DTI have equally been engaged in a variety of sectors to rebuild economic institutions. The DTI, for instance, has helped in the articulation of legislation on trade and industrial policy, competition policy, microfinance, and intellectual property rights. More important, the DTI has supported the Bas Congo Spatial Development Initiative that seeks to link Kinshasa to the Atlantic coast. Public corporations have invested in bids to revive electricity generation, revenue collection, and rehabilitation of infrastructure. The most ambitious project has been South Africa’s technical and financial contribution to the revival of the Inga Dam, which is slated to provide electricity to the DRC and its neighbors.23 In a critical assessment of the South Africa’s postconflict activities in the DRC, Hendricks and Lucey point to the problems of limited resources and lack of coordination: South Africa’s funding is limited and many of its projects have been conducted through unilateral funding arrangements. In a field with very resourceful donors, and in a context where post-conflict development and peacebuilding are difficult to implement and sustain, South Africa has to be more strategic in order to be effective. To date the majority of the interventions can be characterized as short term and uncoordinated programs that have lacked sustained impact. There is also little evidence of followup or of monitoring and evaluation to address issues as they arise.24

Burundi South Africa made tremendous investments in peacemaking and peacekeeping in Burundi, but it did not show the same enthusiasm in postconflict reconstruction after its troops withdrew in 2009. There are several explanations for

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this limited engagement. First, unlike the DRC, Burundi has few resources, a small and undeveloped market, and hardly any meaningful infrastructure. Second, the donor postconflict landscape in Burundi is saturated with multiple actors and agencies that limit South Africa’s ability to make a decisive difference. Third, unlike the DRC that belongs to the Southern African Development Community (SADC), South Africa seemed to treat Burundi as a distant problem whose postconflict recovery issues could be managed effectively through the East African Community (EAC), to which Burundi belongs. Finally, since 2006, Burundi has been one of the first countries to benefit from the resources of the UN Peacebuilding Commission. The latter and other UN agencies in Burundi have afforded South Africa opportunities for collaboration in some projects through trilateral partnerships that are low cost and low risk. As a result, Hendricks and Lucey noted that “South Africa’s post-conflict development and peacebuilding agenda in Burundi appears ad hoc, piecemeal, and without substantial impact.”25 Despite these limits, South Africa and Burundi signed a General Cooperation Agreement in 2007 followed by an MoU in 2008 on cooperation in institutional and human capacity building and trilateral cooperation. In one of the trilateral initiatives, South Africa’s PALAMA, the leadership agency, was funded by the Canadian Development Agency (CIDA) to the tune of $10.5 million to provide training to improve management and leadership capacity of the public services in Burundi, Rwanda, and South Sudan from 2008. As part of this program, the PALAMA helped establish Management Development Institutes (MDIs) in the three countries.26 In other trilateral projects, South Africa worked closely with the UN Peacebuilding Commission, UN Development Programme (UNDP), and United Nations Integrated Office in Burundi (BINUB) to implement the UN Action Plan for Burundi that aimed to rebuild governance by capacitating the electoral commission, human rights, gender, youth, and truth and reconciliation commissions. During President Zuma’s state visit to Burundi in August 2011, the two countries signed five additional MoUs covering defense, education, agriculture, economic cooperation, and sports and recreation.27 The Comoros In postconflict reconstruction in the Comoros, South Africa had a once off engagement that was captured in President Mbeki’s cochairing a Round Table Donors’ Conference in Mauritius in December 2005. At this event, donors pledged $200 million for reconstruction and development over a four-year period; South Africa pledged $10 million and offered technical support for the organization of elections on the islands. Among the priority areas identified for funding were public finance reforms, economic infrastructure development, strengthening of governance and justice, and security and combating terrorism.

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South Sudan Even before the warring parties in Sudan signed the CPA, the AU created a Ministerial Committee on Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Development in Sudan to reflect Africa’s determination to help in the transition from war to peace. South Africa chaired this committee that sought to build bridges between the North and South. The involvement with South Sudan was strengthened after its independence in July 2011 and culminated in the signing of a General Cooperation Agreement and a Declaration of Intent on Defense. The two countries subsequently signed additional MoUs in agriculture, trade and economic cooperation, transport, and culture. In engaging South Sudan, South Africa initially emphasized its strategic role in aiding in the transformation of SPLM from a liberation movement to a governing party on the lines of the postapartheid ANC. Thus, the ANC-SPLM exchanges highlighted capacity building and sharing of experiences on party development, electoral management, and governance.28 Beyond intraparty exchanges, Pretoria’s assistance to peace and consolidation in South Sudan prioritized capacity building for civil servants to enable them to attain the administrative and managerial skills to provide services to the people. Organized through the University of South Africa, by 2013 these training programs had benefited 1,600 officials from South Sudan.29 The bulk of the training involved diplomacy, leadership, public finance, public administration, intergovernmental relations, housing policies, e-government, procurement, and management of government information. As part of the CIDA-funded multicountry project, South Africa set up an MDI in Juba to train public servants. The Department of Higher Education has also offered scholarships to South Sudan Ministry of Education officials for advanced degrees in education planning at South African universities. Similarly, the SAPS has given operational training to senior South Sudan police on crime prevention and community policing while the SANDF has trained the South Sudan army.30 Reflecting the consistent theme of resource constraints, South Africa’s postconflict capacity and development programs in South Sudan have benefited from partnerships with other donors. As Hendricks and Lucey note, Given the limited funding available, South Africa has preferred to engage with South Sudan in terms of trilateral arrangements, where it provides the “expertise” and the third party provides funding. Cognizant of South African access and potential to share experiences, other governments have been interested in entering into such agreements. For example, South Africa and South Sudan entered into a trilateral agreement with the German government to conduct training of rule of law institutions, and with the Norwegian government to conduct police training to support the CPA and provide overall security capacity building.31

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In Burundi, the DRC, and South Sudan, the emphasis on improving governance and building institutional capacity through technical assistance and personnel training has underscored South Africa’s pragmatic disposition to lend a hand where it can without overreaching its resources. As Brendan Vickers notes, the concentration on “institutional public goods is largely a result of the fewer resources that Pretoria is working with in comparison with China, India, or the Gulf States, but also of soft power strategy that aims at building shared norms and values to create and sustain ‘good governance’ and stability.”32 Furthermore, trilateralism seeks to overcome resource constraints while also tapping into the wide range of South African expertise that has been useful to countries emerging from conflicts. Many observers of South Africa’s engagements in postconflict reconstruction in Africa, however, have criticized it for lack of coherence, coordination, and effectiveness. Faith Mabera and Andrea Royeppen, for instance, suggest that “in spite of South Africa’s laudable repertoire in peacebuilding and post-conflict reconstruction activities, most of these engagements lacked sustainable impact as a result of their ad hoc, uncoordinated and incoherent manner of implementation.”33 Similarly, Landsberg notes that “South Africa faces two related challenges in the realm of post-conflict reconstruction and development. On one hand, there is poor coordination amongst the various national departments that are involved in PCRD. On the other hand, there is poor coordination amongst the international donors and governments involved in PCRD.”34 South Africa has highlighted the significance of SADPA as the new vehicle for financing postconflict recovery and development that would potentially overcome questions of coordination and effective implementation.35 Discussions to establish SADPA stemmed from the need to rationalize and coordinate the aid regime encompassed under the ARF and to build on the growing significance of trilateral partnerships. With respect to the former objective, South Africa recognized that while a wide array of public institutions engaged in postconflict reconstruction, it was difficult to accurately quantify the impact of these institutions. In 2006, the National Treasury requested public institutions to report their expenditures on development cooperation, but the results were inconclusive because some did not submit accurate numbers. At the end of the exercise, South Africa estimated that its total development assistance amounted to between $363 million and $475 million, about 0.18 percent of gross domestic product (GDP).36 To address issues of coordination would entail abolishing the ARF, which was ineffective because it fell under the jurisdiction of two public institutions— DIRCO and the National Treasury. The other rationale for SADPA was that it would coordinate the trilateral partnerships whereby external donors leverage South African expertise to support development needs of a third country, as had occurred in Burundi and South Sudan.37

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Since the ANC proposed the formation of SADPA in June 2007, there has been slow progress toward the enactment of legislation and the establishment of institutions to govern it. It was not until April 2012 that the relevant ministries approved the SADPA Institutional, Strategic, and Operations (SISO) framework. Although established as a separate agency under the Public Service Act, SADPA will receive policy direction from DIRCO. Its mandate will be to support South African foreign policy by coordinating all outgoing international development cooperation as well as bilateral and multilateral partnerships. Alongside SADPA is a new Partnership for Development Fund governed by an advisory board that recommends projects to DIRCO and the Ministry of Finance; SADPA will then manage the fund and use its activities to implement development cooperation programs. SADPA was supposed to become operational in August 2013, but by 2019 it had yet to be established. In the interim, the ARF has remained in place.38 When it is established, South Africa hopes to dedicate 0.2 to 0.5 percent of its GDP to development assistance. In addition, the agency will inherit the ARF’s annual $50 million allocation and what is left over in the ARF account (around $100 million as of early 2013). While the ARF was limited to offering mostly single-party grants, SADPA will pursue multipartner cooperation using instruments such as microgrants, loans, joint ventures, and public-private partnerships.39

Forging a Continental Initiative on Postconflict Reconstruction

The ANC’s foreign policy document unveiled in 2015 reiterates South Africa’s leadership in “conflict prevention, peacekeeping, peacebuilding and postconflict reconstruction in Africa.”40 To meet this renewed objective, South Africa has been instrumental in continental efforts to establish a PCRD framework that draws from its bilateral and trilateral experiences in capacity building and development. Like the domestic arena, however, these continental initiatives have been slow and incremental, and also confront serious resource constraints. Moreover, the difficulties of galvanizing disparate African voices and resources around the PCRD are compounded by the profound political reversals in Burundi, the DRC, and South Sudan that have dampened the enthusiasm for postconflict reconstruction in Africa. Formally unveiled in 2006, the AU’s PCRD framework is intended to serve as a guide for the development of comprehensive policies and strategies that seek to consolidate peace and prevent relapse into violence and promote sustainable development in countries and regions emerging from conflict. More specifically, the policy seeks to (1) help address the root causes of conflict; (2) encourage the planning and implementation of

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reconstruction activities; and (3) enhance complementarities and coordination between and among diverse actors engaged in PCRD processes. Some of its underlying principles include African leadership, national and local ownership, and capacity building for sustainability. 41 In bids to mobilize African resources, the AU created the African Solidarity Initiative (ASI) in July 2012 to support the PCRD. Although the PCRD gives South Africa more ways to engage Africa on postconflict reconstruction, almost ten years since its formation the PCRD has been hobbled by organizational and resources constraints. As Tim Murithi suggests, “Even though the PCRD exists, it is, however, unclear whether the AU/NEPAD will be able to mobilize their resources and build the capacity to undertake peace-building effectively.”42 With only one permanent staff member in Addis Ababa, the PCRD is barely functional. Expectations that South Africa would assume more leadership of the PCRD structures have been frustrated by South Africa’s reluctance to fill its quota of staff members at AU headquarters. Further hampering the operation of the PCRD is that the coordinator of the ASI does not work for the AU on a fulltime basis. In February 2014, President Zuma hosted the first conference of the ASI at which African countries pledged a paltry $3 million for PCRD activities; South Africa did not make any financial pledge at this conference. In the future, South Africa may engage more meaningfully with the AU’s PCRD through SADPA funding, but the lack of continental commitment to the PCRD has weakened the momentum that attended its creation.43 Under the Zuma presidency (2009–2018), South Africa’s policies toward Africa lost coherence as domestic concerns took prominence. The ARF’s annual report for the 2017/2018 financial year revealed the declining emphasis on postconflict reconstruction in Africa: the ARF provided 16 million rands to the government of Swaziland to feed its children; 14 million rands for Liberian elections; 10 million rands for drought relief in Namibia; 10 million rands to Saharawi refugees in Algeria; 12 million rands for a rice and vegetable production project in Guinea; and 11.2 million rands to the UN Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East, for its work with women and children in Gaza. Revealingly too, 600 million rands in the ARF were unspent because of lack of capacity to implement aid projects.44 The additional dilemma for South Africa in driving postconflict reconstruction and development on the continent is that Burundi, the DRC, and South Sudan have, in recent years, faced relapses into conflicts, making it more difficult for South Africa to justify its engagement to domestic constituencies. Mandela and Mbeki struggled to fend off domestic opposition to postconflict reconstruction in Africa, particularly from constituencies that favored more investment in redressing the ills of apartheid.45 As Burundi, the DRC, and South Sudan have plunged into renewed violence and political instability, there has been a resurgence of skeptical voices

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about South Africa’s resource commitments to postconflict reconstruction initiatives that do not contribute significantly to producing sustainable peace and stability. In Burundi, President Pierre Nkurunziza changed the constitution to permit a third five-year term in power in 2015, in effect abrogating the foundations of the country’s post–civil war settlement. This move reignited violence and threatened to return Burundi to full-fledged civil conflict. Similarly, after postponing elections for over two years, President Joseph Kabila conceded to leave power following the December 2018 elections, but there have been concerns that he may continue to influence the new president, Felix Tshisekedi. In South Sudan, the internal splits within SPLM since 2013 sparked the resumption of war, with a heavy toll on civilians and reconstruction efforts. A tentative peace was finally reached in October 2018, but there is widespread skepticism about its ability to resolve the conflict.46 The new president Cyril Ramaphosa has yet to articulate a policy toward peacebuilding in Africa and has relied mostly on SADC and the AU in efforts to manage the current crises in these countries.47 Although conscious of its continental responsibilities and determined to prioritize African concerns in its foreign policy, South Africa will continue to face increasing demands from some domestic constituencies to disengage from postconflict reconstruction activities, particularly if more African countries return to political instability. In twenty-five years since the fall of apartheid, South Africa has done much to establish its leadership in postconflict reconstruction and development in Africa. Compared to the other leading African economies—Algeria, Nigeria, and Egypt—South Africa has contributed significantly to efforts to resuscitate war-torn societies and provide the institutional foundations for political and economic recovery. These engagements have stemmed from South Africa’s attempts to link peace, security, and development in postconflict settings; this nexus has, in turn, propelled support for institutional capacity building to prevent the relapse into conflict. South Africa’s leadership in the articulation of Africa’s peacebuilding and post-conflict reconstruction framework equally speaks to its desire to contribute to the AU’s goals of enhancing peace, security, and integration. Through its involvements in peacebuilding in a few African countries, South Africa has carved out a modest role that is commensurate with its limited capacities and resources. The selective nature of postconflict engagements has also arisen from South Africa’s attempt to focus on only those countries where it has had previous leadership roles in peacemaking and peacekeeping. As South Africa continues to develop stronger institutions of development assistance in Africa, questions of involvement in postconflict recovery and development are bound to emerge, in part because the

Conclusion

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postconflict reconstruction terrain in Africa is competitive and replete with multiple actors and constituencies that bring distinctive resources, responsibilities, and restraints. In addition to bilateral donors, postconflict reconstruction in Africa has been dominated by the UN Peacebuilding Commission and the African Development Bank, raising questions about South Africa’s strength and comparative advantage. Amid the pessimism surrounding the sustainability of postconflict reconstruction processes in fragile states, there are growing demands for South Africa to scale down its commitments because there are other actors who have more resources and capabilities to make a significant difference. Yet the dilemma for South African leaders is that they cannot cave in to pressures for disengagement from postconflict reconstruction because of the commitment to African ownership of African problems. The importance of trilateral partnerships in South African foreign policy provides some compromises on questions of resources and responsibilities. South Africa has worked closely with the United Nations and other traditional donors in implementing postconflict initiatives, but its recent membership in groupings such as Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa (BRICS) and India, Brazil, and South Africa (IBSA) has furnished more vistas for engagement to draw from the resources and expertise of these actors. However, it is too early to determine whether the BRICS, for instance, will translate their economic and trade interests into investment in peace, security, and sustainability. 1. “South Africa Soldiers Applauded for Their Peacekeeping Efforts,” BuaNews, April 24, 2010, www.sanews.gov.za/south-africa/sa-soldiers-applauded -peace-keeping-efforts-africa. 2. For excellent discussions of postapartheid South African foreign policy, see Chris Alden and Garth La Pere, “South Africa’s Post-Apartheid Foreign Policy: From Reconciliation to Ambiguity?” Review of African Political Economy 100 (2004): 283–297; Matthew Graham, “Foreign Policy in Transition: The ANC’s Search for a Foreign Policy Direction During South Africa’s Transition, 1990– 1994,” The Round Table 10, no. 5 (2001): 405–423; Jack E. Spence, “The Debate over South Africa’s Foreign Policy,” South African Journal of International Affairs 4, no. 1 (1996): 118–125. 3. African National Congress (ANC) Foreign Policy Platform, quoted in Chris Landsberg, “Promoting Democracy: The Mandela-Mbeki Doctrine,” Journal of Democracy 11, no. 3 (2000): 107. 4. Chris Landsberg, “South Africa,” in Gilbert M. Khadiagala, ed., Security Dynamics in Africa’s Great Lakes Region (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 2006), p. 121; Devon Curtis, “South Africa: ‘Exporting Peace’ to the Great Lakes Region,” in Adebajo Adekeye and Chris Landsberg, eds., South Africa in Africa: The PostApartheid Era (Scottsville, South Africa: University of Kwazulu-Natal Press, 2007), pp. 253–273.

Notes

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5. Peter Vale and Sipho Maseko, “South Africa and the African Renaissance,” International Affairs 74, no. 2 (1998): 271–287. 6. Christopher Williams, “Peacemaking from the Inside Out: How South Africa’s Negotiated Transition Influenced the Mandela Administration’s Regional Conflict Resolution Strategies,” South African Journal of International Affairs 22, no. 3 (2015): 359–380; Christopher Williams, “Explaining the Great War in Africa: How the Conflict in the Congo Became a Continental Crisis,” Fletcher Forum 37, no. 2 (2013): 81–100. 7. For South Africa’s engagement during this period, see Gilbert M. Khadiagala, “South Africa’s Role in Conflict Resolution in the Democratic Republic of the Congo,” in Kurt Shillinger, ed., Africa’s Peacemaker? Lessons from South African Conflict Mediation (Cape Town: CTP Book Printers, 2009), pp. 67–80. 8. Emeric Rogier, “The Inter-Congolese Dialogue: A Critical Overview,” in Mark Malan and Joao Gomes Porto, eds., Challenges of Peace Implementation: The UN Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies, 2004), pp. 25–42; Christoph Vogel, “DRC: Assessing the Performance of MONUSCO’s Force Intervention Brigade,” African Arguments, July 14, 2014. 9. Roger Southall and Kristina Bentley, An African Peace Process: Mandela, South Africa, and Burundi (Pretoria: Human Science and Research Council Press, 2005); George Rautenbach and Waldermar Vrey, “South Africa’s Foreign Policy in Africa: The Case of Burundi,” in Henri Boshoff, Waldermar Vrey, and George Rautenbach, eds., The Burundi Peace Process: From Civil War to Conditional Peace (Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies, 2010), pp. 11–49. 10. Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO), Status Report on the RSA/Burundi Bilateral Relations on Areas of Public Administration (Pretoria: DIRCO October 14, 2009); Gilbert M. Khadiagala, “The United Nations and Regional Organizations in the Stabilization of Burundi,” in Jane Boulden, ed., The United Nations and Regional Organizations in Africa (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), pp. 101–119. 11. Simon Massey and Bruce Baker, “Comoros: External Involvement in a Small Island State,” Programme Paper No. AFP 2009/1 (London: Chatham House, July 2009); David Francis and Thomas Kwasi Tieku, The AU and the Search for Peace and Reconciliation in Burundi and Comoros (Geneva: Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue, 2011). 12. “South Africa Disappoints Comoros on the Eve of Military Action,” IRIN, March 14, 2008. 13. African National Congress, “Media Briefing Statement by ANC National Chairperson, Comrade Baleka Mbete, Following the Occasion of the Republic of South Sudan’s 9th July Independence Day Celebrations,” July 22, 2011; “SA to Lend Helping Hand to South Sudan,” BuaNews, July 8, 2011. 14. “South Africa, South Sudan Establish Ties,” SouthAfrica.Info, September 27, 2007. 15. DIRCO, The Establishment of the African Renaissance Fund and International Cooperation Fund (Pretoria: DIRCO, 2004), p. 3. 16. Cheryl Hendricks and Amanda Lucey, SA’s Post-Conflict Development and Peacebuilding Experiences in the DRC: Lessons Learnt, Policy Brief No. 47 (Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies, October 2, 2013), p. 7. 17. DIRCO, African Renaissance Annual Report, 2010–2011 (Pretoria: DIRCO, 2011); Sven Grimm, South Africa as a Development Partner in Africa, EDC2020 Policy Brief no. 11 (Bonn: European Development Cooperation March 2011). 18. Neissan Alessandro Besharati, South African Development Partnership Agency: Strategic Aid or Development Packages for Africa? Research Report No. 12

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(Johannesburg: South African Institute of International Affairs, August 2013); Brendan Vickers, “Towards a New Aid Paradigm: South Africa as Africa’s Development Partner,” Cambridge Review of International Affairs 25, no. 4 (2012): 535–557. 19. Hendricks and Lucey, South Africa’s Post-Conflict Development and Peacebuilding Experiences in the DRC; Cheryl Hendricks, “South Africa’s Approach to Conflict Management in Burundi and the DRC: Promoting Human Security?” Strategic Review for Southern Africa 37, no. 1 (2015): 9–30. 20. Hendricks and Lucey, South Africa’s Post-Conflict Development and Peacebuilding Experiences in the DRC, p. 5. 21. DIRCO, Democratic Republic of the Congo (Pretoria: DIRCO, September 30, 2016, www.dirco.gov.za/foreign/bilateral/drc.html. 22. Ibid. 23. Ibid.; Matthew Hill and Tom Wilson, “DR Congo Moves to Build USD 100 Billion Grand Inga Dam, to Pick Phase One Contractor by August 2016,” Mail and Guardian, May 7, 2016. 24. Hendricks and Lucey, SA’s Post-Conflict Development and Peacebuilding Experiences in the DRC, p. 5. 25. Hendricks and Lucey, Burundi: Missed Opportunities for South African Post-Conflict Development and Peacebuilding? (Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies, Policy Brief no. 48, October 2013), p. 2. 26. Department of Public Service and Administration, Status Report on the RSA/Burundi Bilateral Relations on Areas of Public Administration (Pretoria: Department of Public Service and Administration, Annual Report, October 14, 2009). 27. South African Presidency, “President Jacob Zuma to Visit Burundi,” August 10, 2011; Cheryl Hendricks and Amanda Lucey, Burundi: Missed Opportunities for South Africa Post-Conflict Development and Peacebuilding? Policy Brief No. 48 (Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies, October 2013). 28. African National Congress, “Media Briefing Statement by ANC National Chairperson, Comrade Baleka Mbete, Following the Occasion of the Republic of South Sudan’s 9th July Independence Celebrations.” 29. Vickers, “Towards a New Aid Paradigm,” p. 546; Cheryl Hendricks and Amanda Lucey, South Africa and South Sudan: Lessons for Post-Conflict Development in Peacebuilding Partnerships, Policy Brief No. 49 (Pretoria: Institute of Security Studies, December 2013). 30. DIRCO, Report on South Sudan Visit by a Team from the Department of Public Service and Administration (Pretoria: DIRCO, September 2009); Vickers, “Towards a New Paradigm.” 31. Hendricks and Lucey, South Africa and South Sudan, p. 3. 32. Vickers, “Towards a New Aid Paradigm,” p. 545. 33. Faith Mabera and Andrea Royeppen, “Trilateral Development Cooperation Can Enhance South Africa’s Development Partnership Capabilities in Peacebuilding and Post-Conflict Reconstruction,” Global Insights, no. 114 (2015), p. 3. 34. Chris Landsberg, “South Africa’s ‘African Agenda: Challenges of Policy and Implementation,” Pretoria: South Africa’s Presidency, undated), p. 24. 35. Shoayb Casoo, “The South African Development Partnership Agency,” paper presented at the Overseas Development Institute Cape Conference, London November 14–15, 2012. 36. Thandrayan Braude and Elizabeth Sidiropoulous, Emerging Donors in International Development Assistance: The South African Case (Ottawa, ON, Canada: International Development Research Centre, January 2008); Besharati, South African Development Partnership Agency, p. 32.

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37. Hany Besada and Evren Tok, “South Africa, BRICS, and the South African Development Partnership Agency: Redefining Canada’s Development Assistance to Africa Through Triangular Cooperation,” Canadian Foreign Policy Journal 21, no. 3 (2015): 272–285; Besharati, South African Development Partnership Agency, p. 32; Vickers, “Towards a New Aid Paradigm,” pp. 551–552. 38. Carien Du Plessis, “SA and Africa: Plan to Implement Humanitarian Aid Projects in Africa Stalled in a State of Promises, Not Delivery,” Daily Maverick, October 24, 2018, www.dailymaverick.co.za/article/2018-10-24-plans-to-implement -humanitarian-aid-projects-in-africa-stalled-in-a-state-of-promises-not-delivery/. 39. Janet Lau, “Waiting for South Africa’s New Aid Agency,” Devex, November 25, 2013; Jolyon Ford, “Engaging the Private Sector in Post-Conflict Recovery,” Paper No. 269 (Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies, October 2014); Lucey and O’Riordan, “South Africa and Aid Effectiveness.” 40. DIRCO, Building a Better World: The Diplomacy of Ubuntu: White Paper on South African Foreign Policy (Pretoria: DIRCO, May 13, 2011), p. 20. 41. African Union/New Partnership for African Development (AU/NEPAD), African Post-Conflict Reconstruction Policy Framework (Addis Ababa: AU/NEPAD, June 2005). 42. Tim Murithi, “The AU/NEPAD Post-Conflict Reconstruction Strategy: An Analysis,” Conflict Trends, October 18, 2012, p. 12. 43. Amanda Lucey and Sibongile Gida, “Enhancing South Africa’s Post-Conflict Development Role in the African Union,” Paper No. 256 (Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies, May 2014); Lucey, “South Africa Must Do More for Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Development in the AU,” (Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies, May 21, 2014). For calls to disengage from African conflict zones, see Mamnaledi Mataboge, “Fear for South African Troops in the DRC War Zone,” Mail and Guardian, August 30, 2013. 44. Du Plessis, “SA and Africa.” 45. See, for instance, Faranaaz Parker, “South Africa Will Need to Build Bridges at the African Union,” Mail and Guardian, July 17, 2012. 46 For analysis of the crises in the three countries, see Obi Anyadinke, “South Sudan’s Never Ending War,” IRIN, October 12, 2016; Clayton Vhumbunu, “Conflict Resurgence and the Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan: An Imposed or Hurried Pact?” Conflict Trends, October 19, 2016; Jason Burke and Benjamin Takpiny, “South Sudan Celebrates New Peace Accord Amid Joy and Skepticism,” The Guardian, October 21, 2018; Samuel Oakford, “Burundi on the Brink: A Year of Violence, and the World Isn’t Sure What to Do,” Vice News, April 28, 2016; Institute for Security Studies, The Political Crisis in the DRC: Another Test for the AU’s Preventive Diplomacy, Peace and Security Council Report (Pretoria: Institute for Security Studies, June 14, 2016); “Tense DRC Counts Votes in Presidential Poll,” TimesLive, December 31, 2018. 47. On Burundi, for instance, see Shannon Ebrahim, “Why SA Must Help Save Burundi,” The Star, May 8, 2016; Stephanie Wolters, “Burundi Crisis: Time for South African to Lead,” ISS Today, January 21, 2016. For broad prescriptions of South Africa’s renewed engagements in the DRC and South Sudan, see Alfredo Tjiurimo Hengari, “What South Africa Should Get Out of Its Engagement in the DRC,” SAIIA: African Perspectives, Global Insights, (2015): 2–15; Ian Liebenberg and Benjamin Mokoena, “South Africa’s Role in African Peace,” IOL News, September 26, 2014.

5 Brazil: The Nexus Between Security and Development Paulo Esteves

a great deal of change in the past two decades. Brazil’s international stance was widely known for its attachment to the principles of sovereignty, nonintervention, and noninterference as well as for its quest for autonomy and status recognition. Nevertheless, since the beginning of the 2000s, Brazil has adopted a different path with its decisions to lead the peacekeeping operation in Haiti (under Chapter VII of the UN Charter), to get involved in the military coup in Honduras, and to engage in contentious development projects in Africa. What has changed? How did the Brazilian foreign policy community come up with these new understandings and attitudes toward the long-standing principles that had sustained the country’s international stance? In this chapter, I discuss Brazil’s approach to international security, focusing in particular on the intersections between security and development. First, I address the main tenets of the BFPC and discuss how, after World War II, sovereignty was reinterpreted or coupled with Brazilian aspirations for autonomy and development. As I demonstrate, since the nineteenth century the principles of sovereignty and nonintervention were the BFPC’s international culture cornerstones. Nevertheless, after World War II, sovereignty/autonomy, development, and nonintervention became BFPC’s main tenets, guiding its strategic choices and articulating Brazil’s international stance for at least forty years. Then I discuss how the BFPC interpreted the transformation of the international system after the end of the Cold War. After that, I address how the BFPC has changed its perceptions regarding Brazil’s position within the international system in the new millennium. The main argument here is that interpretations of the world and one’s self-understanding are always intertwined. Thus, after the Cold War,

The Brazilian foreign policy community (BFPC) has experienced

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the BFPC had to update not only its own ideas and understandings of the international system but, above all, how it imagines the policies Brazil must pursue within it. In doing so, the BFPC had to review its main tenets while simultaneously reinventing itself. At the time of this writing, there was continuation and coherence in the fundamental precepts underpinning Brazil’s foreign policy thinking. However, after the 2018 election of far-right-wing president Jair Bolsonaro, earlier policies were dismissed for ideological reasons, which indicates a very different direction for the future of Brazilian global engagement. Nonetheless, the main argument remains that interpretations of the world and one’s self-understanding are always intertwined.

Brazil’s International Stance: Nonintervention, Development, and Autonomy

Since the country’s independence in the nineteenth century, the BFPC1 was troubled by the great powers’ undisputed position in the maintaining of international order. Brazilian elites became aware of the country’s subaltern position and started to develop an international agenda underpinned by the concept of sovereign equality and its corollary, nonintervention.2 Not surprisingly, over the years Brazil has shown its preference for regulated environments over unmediated relations with major powers.3 Regional and multilateral fora became the loci where the BFPC sought recognition and to construct its place within the international system. Accordingly, Brazil has taken part in the Hague Conferences and joined, after World War I, the Paris Peace Conference and the League of Nations.4 Sovereign equality (and its corollaries nonintervention and noninterference) as well as the preference for regulated and isonomic environments are parts of what Monica Herz calls “international culture.”5 Such international culture underpins a given stance cultivated by a foreign policy community. Indeed, as Jutta Weldes points out, national interests or preferences do not exist out there ready to be apprehended by an enlightened decisionmaker.6 They are not pregiven; neither are they determined by the international system nor created by any leadership. National interests and foreign policy practices are processes of positioning that require national elites to interpret the international system. Furthermore, these interpretations are always embedded in a set of patterns or understandings shared by the foreign policy community. In this chapter, I thus assume that these interpretations are underpinned by international culture. Following Herz, I understand international culture as a set of discourses produced by the foreign policy community regarding the international system and the position Brazil could seize within it. While assessing the international system and imagining how the nation could fit in (either in actual or potential terms), the BFPC would be able to design a foreign policy strategy and articulate Brazil’s stances within specific fields such as international security. Nevertheless, a country’s international culture is

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constantly in flux, and is formed by values, beliefs, and ideas that not only are shared by the foreign policy community but also are rooted in, and refer to, the broader social context in which this community is embedded and from which this community’s legitimacy streams in the first place. Within the limits of this chapter, it is impossible, however, to address the sociopolitical dynamics within Brazil—although it would certainly be worth deepening the analysis of this dimension, particularly at a time of sociopolitical upheavals that are likely to impact future Brazilian foreign policy engagement. Keeping that in mind, I focus on identifying some of the main tenets structuring the BFPC’s international culture in general, and on how the BFPC articulates its stance within the field of international security more specifically. After World War II, with the creation of the United Nations and the Bretton Woods Institutions, the BFPC encountered the discursive formation around the notion of development and, together with it, the concept of autonomy. Autonomy became a ubiquitous concept that would guide, as a mirage in the horizon, the BFPC’s historical path. By contrast with the notion of independence—that is, the nonexistence of subordination ties with any foreign power—autonomy had a positive value as it also implied a country’s ability to self-fashioning and self-government. Keeping and enlarging the country’s autonomy would then become the BFPC’s main goal. Relatedly, the pursuit of autonomy constituted what was called “Brazilian nationalism.” According to Chancellor Horácio Lafer, in a speech delivered in 1959, “Nationalist thinking is one in essence: constructive and fraternal in relation to friendly nations, but zealous to preserve the freedom to interpret the reality of the country and find Brazilian solutions to Brazilian problems.”7 Autonomy required, nevertheless, a two-pronged approach: domestic development and international standing. Domestic development was considered a precondition to building an autonomous state. San Tiago Dantas framed the relationship between development and autonomy: “to develop means to emancipate.”8 This meant that emancipation should be achieved externally through the elimination of political and economic dependence on decisionmaking centers located abroad, and internally through changes in the social structure.9 In a way, Brazilian policymakers and academics were “encountering development,” as suggested by Arturo Escobar in his study of development as an anthropological field.10 Viewed as a path toward autonomy, development assembled knowledge and practices, creating a particular way of understanding the world as well as the country’s position within it. These idea became known as “developmentalism.” Developmentalism articulated a generative geography that ascribed specific places for specific actors and a set of policies to be adopted to promote domestic modernization or, to use San Tiago Dantas’s metaphor, to emancipate the country. With respect to domestic policy, developmentalism was a model organized around three components: (1) import-substituting industrialization, particularly in basic industry; (2) attracting foreign capital, both public and private, to boost

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investment; and (3) a strong presence of the state either as coordinator or implementer of development initiatives.11 As a modernizing narrative, developmentalism contributed to filling the gap between present and future, or between the country’s current peripheral position and the promise of (or the desire for) great-power status. In this sense, the quest for great-power status meant achieving an autonomous position within the international system. Although it did not create this ultimate desire for achieving great-power status, developmentalism did provide the rationale for making it plausible. Moreover, developmentalism was source for the conception of the international system as hierarchical, and the formula for climbing up the hierarchical axis. Hence, developmentalism not only established a way to ascend the ladder but also created the ladder itself. When the BFPC encountered development, the old quest for greatness was turned into a program to fulfill such a goal. This program offered the basis for a narrative according to which the greatpower status was a destiny that was already manifested. At the beginning of the twentieth century, Joaquim Nabuco referred to this Brazilian fate, or what he called the “prophetic feeling of her future.”12 In a similar fashion, in 1974, Araujo Castro asserted the country’s “destiny to greatness.”13 Meanwhile, as the great-power status was not yet achieved, the BFPC should strive to keep and to enlarge its own policy space. The pursuit of autonomy qualifies the principle of sovereign equality. To be autonomous meant to move from de jure to de facto sovereignty. Furthermore, it implied the country’s self-identification as an underdeveloped country. This self-understanding conditioned the ways the BFPC positioned itself within the international system, and generated the two subsequent strategies adopted by the BFPC: Americanism (from 1902 to 1960) and globalism or universalism (from 1960 to 1990).14 While the first signaled a bandwagon strategy aimed at profiting from an alignment with the United States, the second supported the establishment of a variety of partnerships (including partnerships with developing countries) to reduce dependency on the superpower. Despite the differences, or even contradictions between these strategies, they were underpinned by the same rationale: the quest for autonomy. In a sense, the pursuit of autonomy managed to turn approaches as distinct as bandwagoning and hedging into twin strategies.15 After the 1960s, instead of aligning itself with one of the superpowers, the BFPC tried to build up a Southern coalition and, at the same time, foster its international image as a trusted player. Thus, even though the BFPC was trying to advance a revisionist agenda, it certainly did not wish Brazil to appear as an international threat. Almost two decades after San Tiago Dantas’s speech, Brazilian chancellor Saraiva Guerreiro summarized the BFPC’s dilemma: “The first condition for the success of foreign policy is to arouse confidence. We do not have a

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power surplus or surplus of cultural attraction, economic or political, and we have to build our presence on trust that is expressed by the consistency, the scruples . . . and the preference in dialoguing with other countries.”16 Guerreiro’s assessment became commonsensical within the BFPC. But despite its claims for autonomy and de facto sovereignty, the BFPC then recognized its own weakness, described by Guerreiro as the lack of “power surplus.” Guerreiro’s diagnosis thus pointed to the fragile position generated by the developmental perspective: until the country did fulfill its “destiny to greatness,” this lack of “power surplus” would impose itself on the BFPC’s behavior, frame its policy space, and contain its autonomy.17 Thus, while climbing the developmental ladder, the Brazilian government should behave as a good citizen, relying on international rules and preferring to act within multilateral environments. Guerreiro’s reasoning was thus mainstreamed in the BFPC, shaping its international stance. While the BFPC was nurturing its quest for great-power status and autonomy, its actual position in the international system’s hierarchical axis kept the principle of nonintervention and the preference for regulated multilateral environments as the main tenets of Brazil’s international stance. The way the Brazilian foreign policy community positioned itself within the international system was expected to result from an assessment of its international aspirations for autonomy and de facto sovereignty, in parallel with its understanding of Brazil’s political capabilities and economic assets. Consequently, the faith in a brighter future precluded the BFPC from continuing to follow bandwagoning as a strategy. Thus, since the 1960s, and regardless of the type of domestic political regime, the BFPC adopted various nuanced hedging strategies. This strategy by the Brazilian government was called “globalism,” “universalism,” or even “pragmatism.” In any case, the BFPC has tried to diversify its alliances and partnerships to avoid excessive dependence on the great powers. The end of the Cold War and the redemocratization of Brazil signaled a significant shift in the country’s foreign policy. At that moment, the BFPC could finally state the main principles of the country’s foreign policy based on Brazil’s 1988 Federal Constitution. Thus, Article IV establishes that Brazilian foreign policy must be guided by the principles of nonintervention, equality among states, and peaceful resolution of conflicts, among others. In addition, while the constitutional text preserves the importance of national autonomy, it also states a commitment to international norms, especially in those that relate to human rights and the condemnation of racism. Since the end of the 1980s and during the following decades, the BFPC has tried to adapt the country to a changing international environment. This adjustment

The BFPC and an Agenda for Peace

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depends on the BFPC’s assessment, and the cornerstone question here is: How should this occur? In 1993 Chancellor Celso Lafer suggested that the adjustment in Brazil’s foreign policy to the international environment should combine “tradition and innovation.”18 Accordingly, Brazil should creatively adapt itself to the changing international system. Although Lafer (in 1993) and Luiz Felipe Lampreia after him (from 1995 to 2001) were clearly advocating a convergence between the domestic and the international arenas, they did not suggest a passive adaptation of Brazilian foreign policy to international norms. Quite the contrary, the BFPC was envisaging a strategy of affirmative presence that, in spite of the constraints under which Brazil would have to maneuver, would allow the country to intervene and perhaps transform international norms and regimes in more favorable terms. During Fernando Henrique Cardoso’s presidential terms, this position was called “critical convergence,” “autonomy by integration,” or “autonomy by participation.”19 Ambassador Gelson Fonseca Jr. conceptualizes these as follows: A positive participation, always supported by some criteria of legitimacy, opens the door for a series of attitudes which have given a new look to the Brazilian diplomatic work. Autonomy today no longer means keeping “distance” from controversial issues to protect the country from undesirable alignments. Instead, autonomy means “participation,” a desire to influence an open agenda with values which express its diplomatic tradition and ability to see the direction of the international order with its own eyes, with a unique perspective. Perspectives that correspond to our national complexity.20

Looking back to the 1990s, it is possible to see the BFPC’s attempts to adapt itself to a liberal international order, trying to reduce the decalage between emerging international norms and domestic sociopolitical and economic dynamics. In Cardoso’s own terms, “The Brazil which is entering the 21st century is a country whose primary goals of internal transformation and development are consistent with the values diffused and universalized at the international level.”21 By acceding to the main international rules, the BFPC was trying to engage with the most important international economic dynamics and mechanisms and to address long-standing domestic human rights and environment problems. Domestic and international spheres thus seemed to be a continuum. According to Lampreia, There is no duality between our internal and external positions any longer. Brazil is now an open, democratic society who wants to improve its conditions in the social, human rights, and environmental realms. Brazilian society identifies itself with the prevalent values in the international environment. It makes no sense, therefore, to have a foreign policy whose major axis would be an aggressive and sharp criticism of the international order and its main actors; even when one knows and is pointing out the need to change and to improve the current reality of international affairs.22

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Although Cardoso and Lampreia were confident that Brazil’s alignment with international norms would grant the country the desired degree of autonomy and the best policy outcomes, this alignment continued to be perceived as problematic in at least one field: collective security. Since the end of the Cold War and Brazilian redemocratization, the BFPC did make essential changes in its positioning regarding international security, acceding to the most important conventions in the field.23 Nevertheless, international interventions were still seen as major concern for Brazilian foreign policy. Lampreia stated in 1999, “As an intermediate country of a great and peaceful tradition, we cannot, however, support the unilateral use of military means, even against gross violators of international order as Iraq.”24 The BFPC was once again reinforcing the multilateral arena as the exclusive field in which the subject of intervention could be discussed. For the chancellor, supporting unilateral actions “would mean to legitimize the law of the stronger, ignoring the rule of international law, which is the greatest protection for States.”25 Fighting for the respect of multilateral standards has always been high on Brazil’s agenda, even in what refers to the UN Security Council and Brazil’s rejection of any argument for unilateral interventions. During the 1990s, the BFPC tried to stand firmly against any proposal for peace enforcement or humanitarian intervention: “We are not prepared to contribute to an intervention force that would impose peace or conditions, nor to take sides, because that would be completely against our view. I mean, from our perspective, peacekeeping rather than peace enforcement is a golden rule to be encouraged in international forces under the aegis of the United Nations.”26 In fact, during the 1990s the BFPC fought against a more robust conception of peacemaking. At the beginning of that decade, Brazilian decisionmakers recognized that a movement of reinterpretation, and possibly transformation of collective security arrangements, was at play. The UN document called An Agenda for Peace was seen as particularly disturbing in this sense. A number of Brazilian diplomats perceived the document as a “reinterpretation of the Security Council’s mandate in a more militarized direction.”27 The possibility of establishing a standby military force (as foreseen in Article 43 of the UN Charter) was interpreted as opening a door to future military interventions. For Antônio Patriota, the document disregarded “the Charter’s fundamental distinction between peaceful resolution of disputes, as established in Chapter VI, and the coercive responses to aggression and threats to peace as mentioned in Chapter VII.”28 For Brazilian representatives, the Secretary-General’s proposal would replace diplomacy and negotiation with coercive mechanisms since “the idea that the freer use of military and coercive means for the preservation of international peace would strengthen the Organization and the Security Council is reflected in several postulations by the Agenda for Peace and can be considered as its main assumption.” 29 Along with the majority of developing countries, the BFPC adopted a cautious and suspicious attitude

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toward the document and the coercive measures adopted by the Security Council during the 1990s. Thus, from the perspective of those who were advocating a new liberal world order, the Brazilian position on peacekeeping operations immediately after the Cold War seemed conservative. For the BFPC, peacekeeping operations should be seen as a last resort, since the responsibility for peace and security should be a primary responsibility of sovereign states. Consent should be a mandatory requirement for the deployment of any operation and, as Lauro Eduardo Soutello Alves argues, “It is worrisome that in the absence of a political agreement and without the prior consent of all parties, the UN ends up being a party to a conflict, breaking with the impartiality considered necessary for the success of a mission and for their own legitimacy.”30 On the one hand, since Brazil’s redemocratization, the BFPC intensified its participation in multilateral arenas. On the other hand, when it came to the collective security agenda, Brazilian representatives essentially maintained the principle of nonintervention. As Eugenio Diniz points out, much of Brazil’s uneasiness about the transformation of collective security arrangements was due to the possibility of having peace enforcement actions, as well as the Security Council as a whole, being used by the major powers to justify unilateral actions.31 In this vein, as Ambassador Patriota emphasizes, “The famous statement of paragraph 17 of that report, ‘the time of absolute and exclusive sovereignty has passed,’ can be seen as another component of this general design of capacity building for coercive actions, for peace enforcement through the use of force, and for the revision of the principle of consent.”32 The apparent lack of a distinction between peacekeeping and peacemaking, together with a coercive understanding of this latter instrument, made An Agenda for Peace unacceptable for the BFPC. Moreover, even one of the major concerns of Brazilian decisionmakers, namely, the issue of development, was addressed by An Agenda for Peace with an extremely politicized vocabulary. For Patriota, the concept of postconflict peacebuilding “distinguishes itself from traditional practices of promotion of development, since it is a politically inspired enterprise seen through the prism of the immediate preservation of peace and security.”33 During President Cardoso’s two consecutive terms, Brazil positioned itself as a restless opponent of any coercive interpretation of peacekeeping practices and a severe critic of multidimensional operations. Besides the necessary consent of the parties involved in any conflict, Brazil argued that any peacekeeping operation should have a clear and well-defined mandate to be deployed. The incorporation of humanitarian components within peacekeeping mandates was often seen as an unnecessary politicization of an activity that would otherwise be neutral.34 In short, during the 1990s, Brazil’s main efforts toward collective security arrangements, and in particular toward peacekeeping operations, were

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(1) to contain any further advancement of what was considered an interventionist agenda; (2) to emphasize the consent of the parties as a necessary condition; (3) to strengthen the peaceful and diplomatic instruments available for the resolution of conflicts; (4) to take a critical stance regarding the aggrandizement of the Security Council’s agenda, in general, and the absorption of the humanitarian and developmental agendas under it, in particular; and (5) to address the root causes of conflicts—usually connected with development problems—through cooperative rather than military means. Table 5.1 summarizes the ways that the BFPC positioned itself within the international system at large and within the collective security regime in particular. From 1995 onward, the focus of the debate on autonomy shifted from the BFPC position vis-à-vis the major power(s) to its relations with a complex multilateral environment. What should be Brazil’s position regarding the changing regulations of international trade? In the realm of international security, should Brazil commit to international arms control norms? And what about the emerging environmental norms? As I have demonstrated, in almost all fields of international politics and action the BFPC has responded in consonance with what Fonseca calls “autonomy by participation,” meaning a simultaneous attention to multilateral negotiations and commitments and domestic adaptation to cope with international norms. In the case of collective security, however, the BFPC remained essentially attached to the 1945 UN Charter.35 Under the Bolsonaro government that began its tenure in January 2019, multilateralism has been disparaged and international norms regarded as left-wing propaganda. At the same time, its willingness to intervene in the intensifying crisis in Venezuela suggests that Brazil might be breaking with its past anti-interventionist approach, although the policy might also indicate a reinterpretation of the nonindifference policy. Table 5.1 The BFPC and the Peace and Security Agenda, 1995–2001 International Assessment

Period/ Dimension

1995–2001

International System

Globalization under Western leadership

Security Field

National Aspirations

Foreign Policy Strategy

The BFPC’s Stance at the Security Field

Humanitarian Normal state/ Autonomy Nonintervention intervention global player by as coercive participation peacemaking/ threat against sovereign rights and national jurisdiction

Note: BFPC, Brazilian foreign policy community.

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Considering the BFPC’s resistance to the advancement of the liberal agenda during the 1990s, especially regarding international intervention, one may be surprised by Brazilian representatives’ decision to support and commit the country to the deployment of a peacekeeping operation in Haiti.36 In the BFPC’s view, 2004 Haitian crisis represented an opportunity to combine its two main concerns regarding international peace: intervention and development. UN Security Council Resolution 1542 of April 30, 2004, authorized the establishment of the UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH). Two aspects of MINUSTAH’s mandate are noteworthy: first, it prescribes a range of actions under Chapter VII; second, it contains a peacebuilding component that focuses on economic and social development in the fight against poverty.37 The former indicates what might be a shift in Brazil’s position toward peace enforcement. The latter, in turn, signals Brazil’s attempt to transform the peacebuilding agenda. MINUSTAH can be considered a turning point in Brazil’s stance within the international security field. Brazilian representatives were tacitly acknowledging a broader understanding of what might constitute a threat to international peace and security, a position Brazil opposed during the 1990s as the discussion in the previous section highlights. Furthermore, the BFPC commitment to MINUSTAH meant a decision to employ the new security vocabulary that emerged from An Agenda for Peace, and the Responsibility to Protect. This, however, did not mean that Brazilian representatives were adhering to the whole liberal agenda. From the Brazilian point of view, the reference to Chapter VII was narrowed to stabilization and the protection of civilians, while activities related to political processes, human rights, and development were framed within the classic scope of peacekeeping. Besides, development components were carefully kept apart from the military ones. This was rather critical for the BFPC’s positioning against the socalled militarization of development or peacebuilding practices as a whole. Indeed, Resolution 1542 represented for many diplomats “a milestone in the consolidation of peace, and in establishment of the interdependence of three pillars: there will be no stability without advances in the fields of security, development, and reconciliation—a thesis that Brazil has been defending in its plea for a gradual demilitarization of peace operations.”38 What has changed, then? Since 2004, during the first term of President Luiz Inàcio Lula da Silva Lula (hereafter Lula), Brazil began to shift its international positioning: instead of a rigid noninterventionism, Chancellor Celso Amorim articulated Brazilian foreign policy as guided by the principle of nonintervention but tempered by what he called “non-indifference.” In March 17, 2004, during a lecture in London, Amorim applied the concept of nonindifference when describing Brazil’s orientation toward its neighbors: “We . . . become actively engaged in the not always easy search for stability in Venezuela, Bolivia, Colombia, in a spirit in which our traditional attachment

The BFPC and Nonindifference

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to non-interference in the internal affairs of others is tempered by what I like to call ‘non-indifference.’”39 Nonindifference was the concept with which Brazilian foreign policy would try to overcome its reactive and negative responses to the liberal agenda’s positions on security and development issues. In this sense, it is worth mentioning that, right after presenting Brazilian policy toward South America in terms of nonindifference, Amorim acknowledged Brazil’s aspiration to alter the multilateral environment: “Let me touch now upon other aspects of Brazil’s foreign policy. In so doing, I would like to distinguish between two sets of cases: (a) on the one hand, situations that are part of the international agenda, irrespective of our will; and (b) on the other hand, our effort to reshape the international agenda—albeit in a limited way—with a view to creating a world more conducive to international cooperation for peace and development.”40 Exactly forty-three days after this lecture, Brazil negotiated the mandate and committed itself to MINUSTAH. In addition to ensuring that the tripod of “security, reconciliation and development” were included, Brazilian representatives were also able to add combating poverty to MINUSTAH’s mandate. By then, the understanding that development issues are constitutive of peacebuilding processes were already well established within UN practices. Brazil’s objective therefore was to expand development beyond the liberal frame, by incorporating practices and specific policies designed to combat poverty and hunger. In a 2007 internal correspondence, the Foreign Office emphasized the tripod’s relevance: “Brazil acts on the idea that peace, to be sustainable, requires long-term commitment and sustained actions on the tripod security, political reconciliation and development. From the Brazilian perspective, this is the paradigm for international cooperation to solve conflicts that should guide the international community.” Moreover, according to the document, “This has to be a longterm commitment and, after an initial phase in which force is the most important aspect of a PKO [Peacekeeping Operations], the deeper causes of crises, often linked to poverty, inequality, and the institutional weakness must be attacked.”41 Thus, although this strategy in many ways resembles the UN discourse on multidimensional peacekeeping operations, Brazil sees limits to the military component of such missions and a new way of conceptualizing their development component. Even though the BFPC has maintained its critique of collective security reforms that are part of the liberal agenda based on the principle of nonintervention, when confronted with the Haitian crisis the notion of nonindifference allowed Brazil to accept a certain degree of coercion and to interpret reconciliation and development on its own terms. In this sense, Brazil’s position toward collective security in general, and peacekeeping operations in particular, might be at a turning point. If Brazil’s position is still driven by its old quest for great-power status and autonomy, nonindifference might mean only a tactical attempt to prevent the transformation

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of the collective security regime. Nonindifference might be just another step in the continuous ladder climbing. Nevertheless, nonindifference might also be a rupture with the narrow understanding of autonomy that had guided Brazilian foreign policy for so long. If so, nonindifference would be a way to locate and destabilize the claims for universality underpinning Western discourses on peacekeeping. In this sense, nonindifference could be regarded as an attempt to address some of the concerns about the mainstream discourses on peacekeeping, especially as they relate to human rights, and rearticulate questions of development and inequality in terms of international responsibility. Thus, while high priority was given to the discourse on humanitarian intervention in the international security realm, the concept of nonindifference—at least in the way that the BFPC was articulating it—emphasized the developmental dimension of humanitarian crises. Table 5.2 summarizes the ways that the BFPC positioned itself within the international system at large and within the collective security regime in particular between 2002 and 2007. The publication of the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty’s report in 2001 and the debates about humanitarian intervention that took place in the 1990s as An Agenda for Peace and the Responsibility to Protect were considered events that pointed to structural changes within the field of international security. With this in mind, in this chapter I analyzed how the BFPC (1) interpreted these events and the potential structural changes that they were pointing at; (2) articulated Brazil’s identity in terms of national aspirations; and (2) structured its stance within the international security field. In more theoretical terms, I assumed that these

Conclusion

Table 5.2 The BFPC and the Peace and Security Agenda, 2002–2007 International Assessment

Period/ Dimension

2002–2007

International System

Security Field

National Aspirations

Foreign Policy Strategy

The BFPC’s Stance at the Security Field

Asymmetric Humanitarian Developmental Autonomy Nonindifference globalization intervention as state/regional by a last resort/ power with a participation/ regional global reach diversification power with a global reach

Note: BFPC, Brazilian foreign policy community; R2P, Responsibility to Protect

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events and the potential structural changes they were related to were subject to a process of continuous interpretation by the BFPC. As highlighted before, the process of interpretation is informed by foreign policy aspirations—what is understood here, to resort to the work of Weldes, as a set of “well-established meanings and social relations out of which representations about the world of international relations are created.”42 The BFPC had not only mobilized the meanings and representations already entrenched in national aspirations to interpret events and structural change at the international security field after the Cold War—a process called here “international assessment”—but also adapted and eventually transformed its main tenets. In this sense, international assessment was also a process of selfunderstanding and positioning within the international security field. Every assessed event had the potential to trigger a self-evaluation process that mobilized, in turn, foreign policy and national imaginaries; that is, the ways the BFPC was negotiating and representing Brazil’s identity in front of domestic and international audiences. This way, depending on the way Brazil was represented in a given context, the BFPC could articulate specific stances in the international arena. To analyze how the BFPC interpreted the events and processes that could eventually lead to structural changes within the international security field, I drew on its foreign policy aspirations to identify its main tenets, ways of self-representation, and strategies for international insertion. Regarding the Brazilian foreign policy aspirations, I identified autonomy as a key concept around which the BFPC’s debates have taken place. As highlighted, the concept of autonomy usually encompasses two dimensions within these debates: capacity and ability to make decisions based on a given configuration of the national interest (in terms of national resources and of international constrains), and international recognition of the country’s status. In this chapter, I showed that when the BFPC assesses the international system, it usually considers how a given systemic configuration contributes to or constrains national autonomy. Furthermore, the concept is often mobilized by the BFPC to describe and make sense of its own strategies. Indeed, as I discussed, these strategies are variations of a common and desired outcome: autonomy by participation, autonomy by diversification, and so forth. It should be noted that the periodization that I adopted in this chapter follows the BFPC’s own political and social dynamics. Instead of adopting a more conventional periodization based on presidential terms, I identified two key moments when relevant changes in the BFPC’s interpretation of the international system structures, its national aspirations, and its foreign policy strategies occurred. Table 5.3 presents a synthesis of the BFPC’s positioning strategies with regard to the international security field from 1995 to 2012.

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Table 5.3 A Synthesis of BFPC Positioning Strategies in the International Security Field, 1995–2012 International Assessment

Period/ Dimension

International System

1995–2001: Globalization Nonintervention under Western leadership

Security Field

National Aspirations

Foreign Policy Strategy

Role at the Security Field

Humanitarian Normal state/ Autonomy Mediator intervention global player by as coercive participation peacemaking/ threat against sovereign rights and national jurisdiction 2002–2007: Asymmetric Humanitarian Developmental Autonomy Mediator/ Nonindifference globalization intervention as state/regional by development a last resort/ power with a participation/ partner restructuration global reach diversification of R2P pillars Note: BFPC, Brazilian foreign policy community.

1. Amaury de Souza (2002, 2008) referred to a “foreign policy community” as a way to grasp the multiplicity of actors involved in the shaping of Brazilian foreign policy. Following de Souza’s insight, what is hereby called the “Brazilian foreign policy community” not only comprises the most conspicuous decisionmakers such as diplomats, ministers, and the presidency, but also bureaucrats across several ministries and social and state institutions, parliamentarians, private sector representatives, and civil society organization leaders. The foreign policy community is a not a discrete entity, however. On the contrary, it has to be treated as a social environment where values, beliefs, representations, and images are shared and disputed, within the community and the society at large. See Roxanne Lynn Doty, “Foreign Policy as Social Construction,” International Studies Quarterly 37, no. 2 (1993): 297–320. 2. See Carlos Henrique Cardim, A Raiz das Coisas—Rui Barbosa—O Brasil no Mundo (Rio de Janeiro: Record, 2008). 3. See Gustavo Sénéchal de Goffredo Jr., Entre poder e direito: A tradição grotiana na política externa brasileira (Brasília: Intituto Rio Branco/Alexandre de Gusmão Foundation (FUNAG), 2005); Gelson Fonseca Jr., O interesse e a regra: Ensaios sobre o multilateralismo (Rio de Janeiro: Paz e Terra, 2008); Celso Lafer, A identidade internacional do Brasil e a política externa brasileira: Passado, presente e futuro (São Paulo: Perspectiva, 2004); Ricardo Ubiraci Sennes, “Intermediate Countries in the Multilateral Arenas: The Case of Brazil in the GATT and UN Security Council Between 1980 and 1995,” in Andrew Hurrell, ed., Paths to Power: Foreign Policy Strategies of Intermediate States (Washington, DC: Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, 2000), pp. 82–117. 4. From 1856 with its accession to the Declaration Respecting Maritime Law, and 1919 when Brazil joined the League of Nations and the International Labour Organization, Brazil has signed and ratified thirty-three international treaties or conventions. Paulo Roberto de Almeida, Formação da diplomacia econômica no Brasil (São Paulo: Editora SENAC, 2001), pp. 613–614.

Notes

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5. Monica Herz, Does the Organisation of American States Matter? Crisis States Working Paper Series no. 2 (London: London School of Economics, April 2008), p. 11. See also Monica Herz, “Brazil: Major Power in the Making?” in Thomas Volgy, Renato Corbetta, Keith A. Grant, and Ryan G. Baird, eds., Great Powers and the Quest for Status in International Politics: Global and Regional Perspectives (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2011), pp. 159–179. 6. Jutta Weldes, “Constructing National Interests,” European Journal of International Relations 2, no. 3 (1996): 275–318. 7. Horácio Lafer, Discurso de Posse como Ministro das Relações Exteriores (Rio de Janeiro: Fundação Alexadre de Gusmão, Centro de História e Documentação Diplomática [CHDD], August 4, 1959). Lafer was minister of foreign affairs from 1959 to 1961. 8. San Tiago Dantas, “Discurso de paraninfo do Instituto Rio Branco,” Revista Brasileira de Política Internacional 7, no. 27 (1964): 535. San Tiago Dantas was minister of foreign affairs from 1961 to 1962. 9. Ibid. 10. Arturo Escobar, Encountering Development: The Making and Unmaking of the Third World (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1995). 11. Kathryn Sikkink, Ideas and Institutions: Developmentalism in Brazil and Argentina (Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press, 1991). 12. Joaquim Nabuco, Ambassador of Brazil, “The Nationality Sentiment in the History of Brazil,” conference at Yale University Hispanic Club, May 15, 1908, p. 9, http://biblio.wdfiles.com/local—files/nabuco-1908-spirit/nabuco_1908_spirit.pdf. 13. Araújo Castro, Relações Brasil- Estados Unidos à luz da problemática mundial. Brasília: Mimeo, 1974. João Augusto de Araújo Castro was minister of foreign affairs until 1964. 14. On the so-called Brazilian foreign policy paradigms, see Leticia Pinheiro, Politica externa brasileira (1889–2002) (Rio de Janeiro: Zahar, 2010), and Celso Amorim, “Uma visão brasileira do panorama estratégico global,” Contexto Internacional 33, no.2 (2011): 265–275. 15. On hedging, see T. V. Paul, James J. Wirtz, and Michel Fortmann, eds., Balance of Power: Theory and Practice in the 21st Century (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 2004); Evan S. Medeiros, “Strategic Hedging and the Future of Asia-Pacific Stability,” Washington Quarterly 29, no. 1 (2005–2006): 145–167. 16. Ramiro Saraiva Guerreiro, “Brazilian Foreign Policies Explained—Lecture by Foreign Minister Ramiro Saraiva Guerreiro at the War College,” Revista Brasileira de Poítica Internacional, no. 97 (1982): 113. 17. Ibid. 18. Carlos Ribeiro Santana, “Política externa em perspectiva: Um balanço sobre a diplomacia dos presidentes Collor, Itamar, Cardoso e Lula,” Carta Internacional 1, no. 3 (2006): 9. 19. Tullo Vigevani and Marcelo Fernandes de Oliveira, “A Política externa brasileira na era FHC: Um exercício de autonomia pela integração,” Interthesis 15, no. 2 (2003): 31. 20. Gelson Fonseca Jr., A Legitimidade e Outras Questões Internacionais (Rio de Janeiro: Paz e Terra, 1998), p. 368. 21. Lecture by the President of Brazil, Fernando Henrique Cardoso, at the Brazilian Center for International Relations (CEBRI), Rio de Janeiro, September 14, 2000, http://ftp.unb.br/pub/UNB/ipr/rel/discpr/2000/2929.pdf. 22. Luiz Felipe Lampreia, “A política externa do governo FHC: Continuidade e renovação,” Revista Brasileira de Política Internacional 42, no. 2 (1998): 9. 23. As Herz points out “During the Cold War era, decision-makers in Brasilia believed that a condominium of great powers controlled and froze the global distribution of power. According to this view, the United States and the Soviet Union reached a sort of accommodation that was dangerous for international security and

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detrimental to the interest of developing nations.” Herz in “Brazil,” p. 178. Nevertheless, since the first civilian government after the military coup, security and defense policies have changed in a very significant way. In this sense, according to Herz, “The most significant step in the direction of accepting international security norms was the change in policy toward the Non-Proliferation Regime after the transition to democracy in the 1980s. In 1987, the Brazilian government acknowledged the ‘parallel’ nuclear program (Brazilian Autonomous Program of Nuclear Technology), under military direction, and by 1991, the International Atomic Energy Agency was allowed to inspect formerly secret nuclear facilities. In 1998, Brazil deposited the instrument of accession to the NPT.” Herz, “Brazil,” p. 163. 24. Luiz Felipe Lampreia, Diplomacia brasileira: Palavras, contextos e razões (Rio de Janeiro: Lacerda Editores, 1999), p. 327. 25. Ibid. 26. Ibid., p. 95. 27. Antonio de Aguiar Patriota, O Conselho de Segurança após a Guerra do Golfo: A articulação de um novo paradigma de segurança coletiva (Brasília: IRB/FUNAG, 1998), p. 57. 28. Ibid. 29. Ibid. 30. Lauro Eduardo Soutello Alvez, “O Brasil e as operações de paz da ONU,” Carta Internacional, no. 37 (1996): 3. 31. Eugenio Diniz, “Relacionamentos Multilaterais na Unipolaridade,” Contexto Internacional 28, no. 2 (2006): 502–565. 32. Patriota, O Conselho de Segurança após a Guerra do Golfo, p. 60. 33. Ibid. 34. Afonso José Sena Cardoso, O Brasil nas operações de paz das Nações Unidas (Brasília: FUNAG, 1998); Paulo Roberto Campos Tarrisse da Fontoura, O Brasil e as Operações de Manutenção da Paz das Nações Unidas (Brasília: FUNAG, 1999). 35. Fonseca Jr., A Legitimidade e Outras Questões Internacionais, p. 367. 36. On Brazilian engagement in peacekeeping operations, see Eduardo Uziel, Conselho de segurança, as operações e manutenção da paz e a inserção do Brasil no mecanismo de segurança coletiva das Nações Unidas (Brasília: FUNAG, 2010); da Fontoura, O Brasil e as Operações de Manutenção da Paz das Nações Unidas. 37. According to Resolution 1542, paragraph 13, the Security Council “emphasizes the need for Member States, United Nations organs, bodies and agencies and other international organizations, in particular OAS and CARICOM, other regional and subregional organizations, international financial institutions and non-governmental organizations to continue to contribute to the promotion of the social and economic development of Haiti, in particular for the long term, in order to achieve and sustain stability and combat poverty.” Resolution 1542, adopted by the Security Council at its 4961st meeting, on April 30, 2004. 38. Gilda Motta Santos Neves, Comissão das Nações Unidas para Consolidação da Paz: Perspectiva brasileira (Brasília: FUNAG, 2009), p. 86. 39. Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Lecture by Ambassador Celso Amorim, Minister of Foreign Affairs of Brazil, at the London School of Economics, March 17, 2004, http://www.itamaraty.gov.br/en/speeches-articles-and-interviews/7612-palestra -proferida-pelo-ministro-celso-amorim-na-london-school-of-economics. 40. Ibid. 41. Neves, Comissão das Nações Unidas para Consolidação da Paz, p. 86. 42. Jutta Weldes, Constructing National Interests: The United States and the Cuban Missile Crisis (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1999), p. 10.

6 Russia: Development Aid and Security Interests Christoph Zürcher

recipient of international development aid to that of a donor. Its aid spending steadily increased, to $714 million in official development assistance (ODA) by 2014,1 and to $1 billion by 2016.2 Real aid flows are perhaps much higher when counting transfers that are not recorded according to Development Assistance Committee of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD DAC) standards.3 After transitioning from a recipient to a donor, it took Russia almost another decade to finally formulate an aid strategy. In April 2014, a strategic concept for Russian aid was mandated by a presidential decree.4 This concept places Russian international development firmly at the service of Russia’s national interest, emphasizes security threats to be addressed by development aid, and gives priority to bilateral aid to its near abroad (a term that means the former Soviet republics neighboring Russia), especially to Central Asia and parts of the Caucasus. This concept has been in the making for many years. Compared to the final 2014 Concept, previous drafts were more reminiscent of the global “donor speech” with its emphasis on pro-poor and participative development goals in the poorest countries (see 2007 Concept). Such language has been vastly reduced in the current 2014 Concept. Now the focus on the national interest, defined to a large extent in geopolitical terms, and the emphasis on Russia’s near abroad are predominant.5 This turn toward a heavily nationalized and securitized development policy notwithstanding, Russia still seems to be eager to be a respected member of the club of big donor nations, and foreign aid is very much seen as a way to earn soft power in its immediate neighborhood and on the global stage.6 One of the key characteristics of Russian development aid

Around 2005, Russia completed the transition from being a

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policy is therefore to balance the attempt to be a “normal” donor at the global stage while, at the same time, instrumentalizing aid for narrowly defined national interests in Russia’s neighborhood. In this chapter, I discuss two questions: first, how Russia as an emerging donor understands and conceptualizes the relationship between development and security; and second, to what extent this is different from the approach of traditional donors. Such a task faces a few challenges. To begin with, the evolution of Russian aid on the conceptual and doctrinal level so far has not been matched by an evolution of a national aid system with bureaucratic and institutional foundations. Like in many other emerging donor countries, Russian aid is being handled by a multitude of actors, among them the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Finance, and a recently created agency, Rossotrudnichestvo.7 It thus is not easy to get a complete picture. What is worse, there also are hardly any systematic data available. Russia provides only short and highly aggregated summaries of its aid flows (calculated according to Development Assistance Committee [DAC] standards). Scholars therefore have to painstakingly search for individual data entries in news reports. Clearly, our understanding of Russian aid remains sketchy. Second, a related challenge is that Russian aid, like Chinese (Chapter 2) and Indian (Chapter 3) aid, practices often blur the line between transfers that qualify as ODA, transfers that do not qualify as ODA but are no less important (e.g., reduced tariffs on fuel for Central Asia or Armenia), and transfers that are explicitly meant as development aid but are given in the form of foreign direct investment (FDI). Hence, if we take into account transfers that would qualify as ODA under DAC rules, we would miss important other flows. Third, there is the important conceptual problem of whether or not Russia actually engages in conflict regulation and peacebuilding. When we think about peacebuilding and postconflict reconstruction, we typically think of multilateral efforts that involve a multitude of actors, with the objective of creating the conditions for peace in some distant place emerging from violence. Russia is not a participant in such efforts: neither does it participate in international peacebuilding missions, nor does it provide significant aid to countries where such a mission is under way. However, one can adopt a different perspective and argue that Russia is indeed massively involved in conflict management and peacebuilding within its own territory and within its near abroad, especially in the Caucasus and Central Asia. Domestically, Russia is struggling with its unruly North Caucasus regions, where organized crime, Islamist ideology, and national aspirations form an explosive mix that is difficult to contain. Furthermore, the wounds from the Chechen separatist wars (1994–1996, 1999– 2009) are still wide open. Russia’s attempt to rebuild Chechnya and to sta-

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bilize the region could be seen as domestic peacebuilding, but the awkward fact remains that the peacebuilder in this case is also a party to the conflict. This sits uneasy with a more traditional understanding of peacebuilding. In its near abroad, Russia perceives itself as a regional hegemonic power. Russian foreign policy aims at reintegration of the former Soviet space, with the exception of the Baltic states that are firmly integrated in Western institutions such as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the European Union (EU). The objective is to create an integrated economic and security space with Russia at its core. This obviously means that Russia, by projecting its military and economic power within its neighboring countries, also seeks to promote stability. For example, Russia’s military presence essentially freezes the conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan about Karabakh, secures the border of Tajikistan against spillovers from Afghanistan, deters potentially disruptive territorial conflicts within Central Asia, and provides security guarantees for Abkhazia and Ossetia, two territories that de facto seceded from Georgia and are recognized as independent states only by Russia. In sum, while Russia is clearly not a traditional peacebuilder, it is engaged in managing ongoing or potential violent conflicts within its own territory and in neighboring countries. Accordingly, the new Russia development aid concept heavily emphasizes that Russian aid should be a tool to “help to eliminate or prevent tensions and conflicts, especially in regions adjacent to Russia.”8 However, Russia’s role as a conflict manager is also always closely intertwined with Russia’s geopolitical self-interest. The chapter proceeds as follows. First, I briefly describe how Russian aid is shaped by the Soviet legacy and by geopolitical realities, and argue that Russian aid is to a large extent an extension of its foreign policy, predominantly defined in geopolitical terms. Second, I analyze the conceptual basis for Russia’s role as a donor by focusing on one key document, the Decree of the President of the Russian Federation on the Approval of the Concept of the State Policy of the Russian Federation in Promoting International Development of 2014 (2014 Concept).Third, I provide a description of Russia’s aid policies in Central Asia—a region that Russia sees as a priority in its aid policies. This “miniature” case study allows us to assess how, in practice, Russian development aid relates to issues of security and conflict. I conclude the chapter with a summary and discussion of the findings.

The Soviet Legacy, Geopolitics, and Russia’s Foreign Policy in Its Near Abroad

Russia’s circumstances are unlike any of the traditional donors. Russia’s southern neighborhood consists of developing countries facing serious challenges in terms of socioeconomic development, demographic pressures,

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and political instability. Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan are all in the high warning bracket of the 2015 State Fragility Index. Security threats are not a distant reality but a prominent feature of this neighborhood. There are numerous linkages and transnational interdependencies between Russia and its southern neighbors, partly as a legacy of the Soviet Union and partly because of Russia’s attempts to create a unified economic and security space in its near abroad. The threat of negative spillovers is therefore real. Any assessment of Russia’s development policies has to take these realities into account. Therefore, when comparing Russia’s policies to those of other DAC donors, one should ask not only whether and how they differ but also what policies more traditional donors would—hypothetically—pursue in such a neighborhood. As I show, Russian development aid is conceptualized as a tool for promoting the national interest, which is seen very much in terms of geopolitics, especially so within the former Soviet space. Once Russia reemerged as an actor in international politics after the collapse of the Soviet Union, its foreign policy in its near abroad has been consistently focused on creating an integrated economic space with a shared security architecture, with Russia at the center and the political and economic influence of Western countries and China minimized. Belarus and Armenia in the west and Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan in the south are all, for various reasons, already closely integrated in this space. Despite Russia’s self-understanding as a great power, its capacities are limited (and will probably remain so for the foreseeable future, given the low price of oil that accounts for much of Russia’s economy). Russia’s geopolitical ambitions are therefore heavily focused on its near abroad. In its southern neighborhood, Russia has been strengthening its military position wherever possible. On October 5, 2012, Russia and Tajikistan signed an agreement that extended Russia’s lease on the 201st Motorized Rifle Division military base until 2042. Under the agreement, Russia pays no lease and its 7,000 soldiers are granted immunity. In return Russia, which supplies the bulk of fuel used in Tajikistan, agreed to remove import duties on light oil products exported to the country and promised to lower the hurdles for Tajik labor migrants to Russia, which is Tajikistan’s economic lifeline. In June 2014, Russia pressured Kyrgyzstan to terminate a lease for its Manas Air Base to US air forces; the base was used by the US Air Force to support the war in Afghanistan. In December 2015, Russia and Armenia signed a collective security deal on a united regional air defense system in the Caucasus. Kazakhstan and Belarus are already part of this joint regional air defense system, and Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan may soon join. Russia has also pushed for the economic integration of its near abroad. The most significant step was the creation in 2011 of the Commonwealth of

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Independent States Free Trade Area (CISFTA), in which Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Uzbekistan, Moldova, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan are members, and in 2019 Tajikistan is expected to ratify the agreement. Russia’s foreign policy is aimed at further strengthening the security and economic ties in this region, ensuring that Russia remains the hegemon. Development aid, in doctrine and in practice, has to serve this purpose.9 Russia’s development strategy is formulated in a presidential decree of April 2014. This decree was preceded by a semiofficial concept on Russia’s Participation in International Development Assistance, which was approved by the president of the Russian Federation on June 14, 2007 (2007 Concept). This earlier concept already placed development aid in the context of pursuing Russia’s national interest but also made numerous references to development goals shared by the wider donor community. Specifically, Russia’s international development assistance was to be based in the UN Millennium Goals, emphasizing the needs of low-income countries. By contrast, the 2014 Concept clearly emphasizes national interests and gives preference to bilateral aid in Russia’s near abroad.10 According to the 2014 Concept, Russian development cooperation should be used for promoting “sustainable economic development, providing disaster relief, and for providing assistance in situations of domestic and international conflicts.”11 It is interesting to see, for the purposes of this chapter, that the conflict management aspect appears to be an important component of Russia’s international development approach. The 2014 Concept characterizes Russian aid as “effective mechanisms for solving global and regional problems” and as a tool for countering “new challenges and threats.” The “systematic implementation of the current concept will promote the national interests of Russia in this area.” The concept then calls for Russia to employ

Russia’s 2014 Concept on International Development

active and targeted policies in the field of international development assistance that take into account (“otvechaet na”) the national interest of Russia, contribute to the stabilization of the socio-economic and political situation in its partner countries, build good-neighborly relations with neighboring countries, help to eliminate or prevent tensions and conflicts, especially in regions adjacent to Russia, strengthen its position in the world community and, ultimately, create favorable external conditions for the development of the Russian Federation.12

Interestingly, the concept makes a clear distinction between international development at the global level and at the regional level, whereas the regional level refers to Russia’s near abroad.

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At the global level, the key objectives are poverty reduction, sustainable development, disaster relief, and aid transparency and effectiveness. These are traditional staples of international development and are in line with the global aid discourse. The document adds the promotion of a “stable and just world order based on the universally recognized norms of international law and cooperative relations between states” and the “promotion of a positive perception of the Russian Federation and its cultural and humanitarian influence in the world.” In the context of the icy relations between Russia and the West, where each side accuses the other of ignoring international law (in Russia’s view, the West’s wars in Kosovo, Iraq, Libya, and Syria contradict international law, whereas Russia’s wars in Georgia and Ukraine contradict international law from the Western point of view), the reference to a world order based on “recognized norms of international law” sounds like a battle cry. The 2014 Concept then describes the objectives at the regional level. That section is longer and more detailed than the section on the global level, underlining once more where Russia’s development aid priorities lie. Key objectives are, according to the concept, the establishment of goodneighborly relations with neighboring countries; the elimination of tension and conflicts; the combating of drug trafficking, international terrorism, and organized crime; and the promotion of integration processes within the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), including promotion of trade, economic cooperation, and good governance. Thus, the development priorities in Russia’s near abroad are quite different from the priorities in more distant regions. While the latter are in line with the current global development discourse, the former are, to a large extent, geared toward the creation of a unified economic and security space around Russia’s peripheries. This is also reflected in the paragraph in the 2014 Concept that describes which regions are considered to be the main recipients of Russian international development aid. These are, first, the CIS countries and the Republics of Abkhazia and Ossetia (which are recognized only by Russia, not by Western countries). A second tier of beneficiaries of Russian aid are “other countries conducting a policy of good-neighborliness and alliance with Russia,” and “countries with historically friendly relations with Russia.” A third tier are countries “involved in the implementation of joint projects of mutual interest” and countries with which “cooperation is in the national interests of the Russian Federation.” Hence, Russian aid is earmarked for neighbors and allies; this is a clear departure from the 2007 Concept, which also included recipient countries’ needs and poverty levels as reasons for giving aid.13 The 2014 Concept also outlines sectoral priorities: the quality of governance systems, including the management of public finances; improving the conditions for trade and investment in the target countries; strengthen-

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ing productive capacities; and facilitating regional economic integration. Investing in these sectors will help to create more beneficial conditions for regional economic integration, which is one of Russia’s objectives. Mentioned too are further sectors that usually matter most for pro-poor development such as water and electricity; food security and rural development; health; education, especially primary and vocational education; the environment; and, finally, the development of the institutions of a democratic society, including the protection of human rights. The concept also explicitly mentions the security sector, specifically national systems for combating organized crime and international terrorism, as well as postconflict peacebuilding, including through the expansion of Russia’s participation in international peacekeeping operations. The 2014 Concept calls for multilateral and bilateral aid. Bilateral aid is to be given in the form of grants or loans, in-kind aid (goods or services), technical assistance, and debt relief, but also in preferential tariffs to facilitate access of products and services to the Russian market. It is notable that the preferential tariff is a widely used instrument of Russian bilateral aid (as it was the case for Soviet aid), but it is not an official DAC category. Finally, the 2014 Concept briefly describes the bureaucratic-institutional setup of Russian international development aid. According to the concept, various branches of the executive will continue to implement Russia aid. No branch is specifically mentioned, but it can be assumed that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Ministry of Finance will still be the main players. The concept also mentions that a “commission of the Russian Federation on issues of international development assistance will be established in order to coordinate the activities of federal executive bodies in the field of international development assistance.”14 As of the spring of 2019, such a commission has not yet been established. As mentioned above, we have only scarce data on Russian aid allocation, but the few numbers we have show that regional aid allocation is in line with the priorities that the 2014 Concept outlines. From 2011 to 2015, Russia gave $194 million to Asia (which includes the Central Asian countries in Russia’s immediate neighborhood), $115 million to Central America (mainly to its old allies Cuba and Nicaragua), and only $30 million to Africa.15

From Concept to Practice: Russian Development Cooperation in Central Asia

In this section, I describe how Russian development aid looks on the ground. I focus on one region only, Central Asia, a region that the new aid concept has identified as a priority and where security threats are abundant. Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, all former Soviet republics, were always less developed and considerably poorer

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than the western part of the Soviet Union and depended heavily on transfers from Moscow. The Central Asian countries today are challenged by problems that are characteristic of many developing countries such as low living standards, poor infrastructure, and shortages of key development resources. While there are considerable differences, they are, by and large, plagued by weak institutions, high corruption, internal conflicts, authoritarian regimes, and few civil liberties. Furthermore, they are also exposed to various transnational threats, many of which stem from Afghanistan. There is a real threat that domestic Islamic movements in Tajikistan and Uzbekistan may receive support from Afghanistan, where ethnic Uzbeks and Tajiks live. Other problems include drug trafficking and illegal migration. A recent report by the influential Russian International Affairs Council summarizes Russian interests in Central Asia.16 Not surprisingly, geopolitical interests are seen as a top priority. The report recommends that Russia should use development aid as an instrument for “maintaining its general geopolitical influence in the region, which helps Russia to preserve its status as a great power and control the post-Soviet space,” and also for “preventing other great powers from establishing control over the region (especially in the light of China’s increased activities to this end).”17 The report also lists Russian security interests that include preventing instability in Afghanistan from spilling over to post-Soviet Central Asia; providing security guarantees for Central Asian states that are members of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan); creating antiterrorist and anti–drug trafficking safety belts around Afghanistan, counteracting new security threats such as terrorism, Islamic extremism, drug trafficking, organized crime, uncontrolled migration, and corruption; preventing the decay of state structures, which could lead to the emergence of failed states; preventing various internal state conflicts—ethnic, regional, and subethnic—from erupting into armed confrontations; and preventing violent regime change in Central Asia.18 There can be no doubt that these issues are very real. Turkmenistan, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan share borders with Afghanistan, and their security is affected by the security situation in Afghanistan. All Central Asian republics perceive Islamist radicalism as a vital threat. Also very real is the drug trafficking problem. The Northern Route through Central Asia to Russia is one of the three main routes for the transportation of opiates from Afghanistan, by far the world’s largest producer of opium. Much of the opiates are absorbed by the Russian market. According to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), the market is valued at around $25 billion and is larger than the markets in Western and Central Europe combined. Drug addiction is a huge problem for the Central Asian states as well as for Russia.19 Finally, Central Asia has seen its share of internal violence and unrest. In Kyrgyzstan, a popular uprising known as the Tulip Revolution forced

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President Askar Akayev’s resignation in 2005. Opposition leaders formed a coalition and a new government was formed under President Kurmanbek Bakiyev. In the same year, security forces in Uzbekistan killed several hundred civilians in the so-called Andjian massacre. The Uzbek government at first said that the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan organized the unrest, but many observers argue that the “Islamist radical” label was just a pretext for maintaining a repressive regime in the country. In 2010, Kyrgyzstan was again shaken when civil unrest broke out, which eventually led to Bakiyev’s resignation. Later the same year, ethnic clashes occurred between the two main ethnic groups—the Uzbeks and Kyrgyz—in Osh, killing more than 200 people and inciting fears of a civil war. Tajikistan experienced a vicious civil war between 1993 and 1997, in which around 50,000 people were killed. Since the end of the war, the authoritarian regime under the leadership of President Emomali Rahmon has maintained a precarious stability, but in 2010 there were concerns that Islamic militarism in the east of the country was on the rise again. Islamist militants ambushed Tajik soldiers twice, killing fifty-eight. In 2012, new clashes between Tajik forces and armed militias in the region of Badakhsan were reported. In sum, it is evident that Central Asia is a region where classical problems of development overlap with security threats such as communal violence, state-society violence, transborder violence, and drug trafficking and crimes related to it. As shown above, Russia’s development policies on a doctrinal level are geared toward promoting its national interests, which are clearly defined in terms of security and geopolitical rivalry. How does this concept actually translate into policies on the ground? Our insights are necessarily sketchy, given the disparate data situation. But it is clear from the few sources that we have that Central Asia is a major recipient of Russian aid. In 2011, the last year for which there is systematic data, the region received 28 percent of Russia’s total ODA. Forty percent of this aid was multilateral aid, and most observers expect that the share of multilateral aid has been shrinking since then. Much of the multilateral aid is implemented via the World Bank’s many trust funds such as the Food Price Crisis Rapid Response Trust Fund for Tajikistan and the Kyrgyz Republic, the Europe and Central Asia Region Capacity Development Multi-Donor Trust Fund for strengthening institutional capacity, the Multi-Donor Programmatic Trust Fund to Support Statistical Capacity Building in Eastern Europe and CIS Countries, the Russia Education Aid for Development Trust Fund, and the Eurasian Centre for Food Security. Russia also contributes to UN multilateral programs that deliver humanitarian aid through numerous channels—mainly, the World Food Programme and UN Development Programme—with a focus on the two poorest countries, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan.

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But more important than multilateral aid is bilateral aid, of the ODA type and of the more informal type. The most important type of Russian bilateral aid is direct budget support in the form of concessional loans and grants. Kyrgyzstan is, together with Tajikistan, the largest recipient of Russian loans and grants. According to Victor M. Sergeev, Andrey A. Kazantsev, and Vladimir I. Bartenev, Russian loans and grants have more political strings attached than the financial aid provided by other donors.20 In most cases, they constitute payment for major concessions on the part of the recipient countries’ governments in addressing Russian priorities, above all its security interests. For example, in 2005 immediately after a government coup brought Bakiyev to power, Kyrgyzstan received a $189 million loan, while in 2009 it was given a loan of $300 million on exceptionally preferential terms and a $150 million grant in exchange for Bakiyev’s promise to shut down the US air base in Manas. In 2010, it received a $20 million loan for social support and a $30 million credit from Russia’s Rosselkhozbank. In 2012, Kyrgyzstan was given a $25 million grant from the Ministry of Finance; $10 million of the grant money was to go to health care, $10 million to social protection, and $5 million to education.21 Debt relief is another important transfer type. Typically, debts are restructured on generous terms or are forgiven in exchange for political concessions or stakes in strategically important companies within the Central Asian states. For example, in 2012 Kyrgyzstan’s debts to Russia were restructured and Russia promised $1.1 billion in military aid plus investments in the construction of hydroelectric power stations in exchange for establishing an integrated military base on Kyrgyz territory. Such agreements are not new: In 2004, a $242.5 million loan to Tajikistan was forgiven in exchange for the lease of the Nurek optical-electronic facility that monitors outer space for a symbolic charge of 0.30 cents a year until 2049, and a $50 million debt was forgiven in exchange for a majority stake in a hydroelectric power plant.22 In addition to aid that OECD DAC would classify as ODA, there are other types of transfers. For example, Russia has reduced tariffs on oil products to Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan, resulting in hundreds of millions of dollars in subsidies. In 2012, reduced tariffs saved Kyrgyzstan $480 million.23 In exchange for reduced tariffs, Russia gained from Tajikistan an agreement to extend the stationing of the Russian 201st Motorized Rifle Division military base in Tajikistan. Russia also provides financial and technical assistance for combating drug trafficking. Between 2011 and 2012, $37 million was committed to Kyrgyzstan and $5.4 million to Tajikistan.24 These funds are to be spent on infrastructure and institutional reform of law enforcement agencies. Besides strengthening law enforcement, promoting economic development, especially job creation, is also seen as an instrument for combating the narco

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economy. In 2013, Russia announced the establishment of a Russian Corporation for Cooperation with Central Asia, with initial capital of about $64 million. The objective of the corporation is to promote economic development and to create up to 30,000 jobs. But it would also allow Russia to acquire majority shares in Central Asian hydropower plants, poultry production, and high-tech industrial assembly.25 We see again here how the lines between development aid, foreign direct investment, and geopolitically defined national interests are blurred. Finally, an immensely important resource flow is remittances from Russia to the Central Asian states, above all to Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan. Both countries crucially depend on these remittances. In 2014, remittances accounted for 30.3 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP) in Kyrgyzstan and for a staggering 41.7 percent in Tajikistan, by far the highest numbers worldwide.26 Labor migration is the lifeline of these economies. Obviously, Russia’s economy, due to its aging population, equally depends on a supply of cheap labor from these countries. Despite this self-interest, labor migration to Russia is arguably one of the most important factors supporting the fragile stability of the region by creating income for hundreds of thousands of young men and easing demographic pressures in countries with a shortage of employment and productive agricultural lands. Like most other post-Soviet countries, Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan depend on access to Russian labor markets and are highly vulnerable to changes in migration rules. Russia could, and occasionally does, use this as leverage. But with regard to Central Asia, Russia has extended work permits for Tajik labor migrants to three years (for other countries, the length varies from three months to one year). It remains to be seen how the sharp decline of the Russian economy over the past two years will affect migrant workers and, by extension, the socioeconomic situation in their home countries. It is clear, however, that it will not be possible to substitute labor migration with classical development approaches to income generation. In sum, Central Asia is a priority region of Russian aid, for geopolitical reasons and for security threats such as Islamist violence, violent regime change, state failure, and drug trafficking and related crimes. The smaller part of Russian aid comes in the form of contributions to multilateral funds that address traditional development priorities such as food security and capacity building. The larger part of Russian aid is in the form of bilateral aid. This aid consists of what can be classified as ODA in DAC terms as well as more informal aid. Bilateral budget support is clearly an important form of aid. Debt relief, financial and technical support for law enforcement, and military aid are also important. Less typical aid flows, but important ones for the Central Asia states, are preferential tariffs for Russian imports and, especially, remittances. Importantly, budget support, debt relief, and preferential tariffs are typically tied in the sense that they are

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given for substantial political concessions, predominantly with regard to the Russian military presence in the region. In this chapter, I asked two related questions: The first is how Russia as an emerging donor understands and conceptualizes the relationship between development and security. The second is whether Russia’s approach challenges or accommodates the liberal peacebuilding model promoted by traditional donors. While our understanding of Russia as an emerging donor remains sketchy because of a lack of systematic data and because Russia’s aid doctrine, aid practices, and its organization of aid infrastructure are still developing, it is nevertheless possible to shed some light on these questions. How does Russia understand and conceptualize the relationship between development and security? As I demonstrated in this chapter, Russia has a two-tiered aid policy. One tier is directed at the global level and predominantly takes the form of contributions to multilateral aid disbursement mechanisms. Its focus is on traditional staples of international aid, such as energy, health, rural development, and food security, and the recipients appear to be chosen based on needs criteria.27 This tier of Russian aid shows little or no evidence of securitization. The situation is very different for the second tier, which has a focus on Russia’s near abroad. Here, development aid is clearly seen as one instrument for countering transnational security threats. Explicitly mentioned are the elimination of tension and conflicts, and combating drug trafficking, international terrorism, and organized crime. Equally important is the promotion of good relations with neighboring countries and of integration processes within the Commonwealth of Independent States as well as furthering trade, economic cooperation, and good governance. Development aid is thus clearly an instrument for the promotion of national interests, and security is an important aspect of this. One consequence is that, by design, security becomes national security, as in security for the Russian Federation. This, then, poses an important question: Does security for Russia overlap with, for example, national security for the Central Asian states? And if it does, does it also overlap with human security for the population of the Central Asian states? The answers to these questions are less simple than it may seem. Central Asian countries are, to variable degrees, authoritarian states with little or no respect for basic civil and human rights. All Central Asian countries have a bad human rights track record, with Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan being the worst offenders, and Tajikistan quickly closing the gap. There is little doubt that Russian foreign policy and, by extension, its aid policy have contributed to stabilizing these regimes in

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Central Asia, either by directly supporting the regimes—most blatantly in Tajikistan and later, when a pro-Russian government came to power, also in Kyrgyzstan—or at least by tolerating the authoritarian practices of the regimes in Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan. Russia is not known for using its massive leverage over the region to push for good governance, democracy, or human rights. Another important factor for the region’s stability is, without doubt, the Russian military presence. This presence is a credible deterrence for the type of violent regime changes that would lead to an anti-Russian orientation in these countries. And while Russia did not, and perhaps could not, prevent two episodes of violent regime changes in Kyrgyzstan and various instances of violent clashes between the regimes and its opposing forces, it has unarguably helped to keep secular authoritarian regimes in place that are, to various extents, open for business with Russia. In sum, while it certainly cannot be an excuse for human rights abuses committed by Central Asia governments on a regular basis, the stability that Central Asia has acquired with Russian assistance has prevented sectarian and religious mass violence. The examples of Afghanistan and Tajikistan in the early 1990s, and of Iraq and Syria more recently, demonstrate the destructive and violent forces that state failure can unleash and how incredibly difficult it is to rebuild states once they have collapsed. In light of this discussion, one could answer my first question—how Russia understands and conceptualizes the relationship between development and security—like this: with regard to the poorest developing countries, Russian aid doctrine and aid practice are all but silent on the linkages between aid and security. In its near abroad, however, development aid is treated as an extension of a foreign policy that is geared toward increasing Russian national security. In Central Asia, this means the development aid is used to support the regimes in power and help them to develop better law enforcement capacities. But aid is also tied to political concessions, especially with regard to Russia’s military position in the region. A vitally important issue, and one that lies beyond the scope of this chapter, is whether or not the stability that Russia helped create is sustainable in the long run. This stability is based on authoritarian regimes, with a small elite base, that rule with the help of clan-like patron-client networks. There is little or no participation of civil society, and the social contract between regimes and the population seems shaky. If we factor in demographic pressures, the threat of Islamist radicalism, and possible spillovers from Afghanistan and poverty, then the region’s stability begins to look fragile. Russia’s aid doctrine and, even more so, its aid practice in the region do not seem to engage with such questions. Stability, it appears, is perceived as a function of regime stability, and not as a function of a viable social contract between regimes and society.

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This leads us to the second question: Does Russia’s approach challenge or accommodate the liberal peacebuilding model promoted by traditional donors? It should be mentioned that Central Asian countries today are not recipients of peacebuilding. Despite the fact that there are no shortages of conflict potential, there have been no active armed conflicts in Central Asia in the late 2010s. Therefore, my answer to this question must be, to some extent, based on hypothetical reasoning. For the purposes of this chapter, let us define the liberal peacebuilding model as one that is based on the key principles of liberalism—individual freedoms, representative government, and constitutional limits on arbitrary violence.28 Liberal peacebuilding, therefore, would seek to create the conditions for a representative and democratic self-government and for a market-based economy, and would aim to strengthen the capacities of the state while at the same time ensuring that the state remains constrained by the rule of law. As we have seen, Russia’s aid polices in its near abroad are not designed to support the development of such institutions. Russia lends support to authoritarian regimes that it sees fit to provide stability and to manage transnational threats that could spill over to Russia. It seems unlikely that Russian policies in cases of violent conflict would embrace the principles of liberal peacebuilding. Liberal principles are absent from Russian domestic politics, and there is no reason to assume that they would play a role in a Russian conception of conflict management and peacebuilding. In fact, one could look at how Russia handled the violent conflicts in the North Caucasus. Russian conflict management is based on a combination of sheer military power and on empowering local elites who are loyal to Moscow. This type of peacebuilding is, in fact, rather an indigenization of counterinsurgency. It has brought a modicum of stability back to Chechnya, and Russia has showered the regime of Ramzan Kadyrow, the Chechen big man who runs Chechnya as a personal fiefdom, with financial and military support. But the Chechen “peace,” if one wants to call it peace, is most certainly the antithesis to liberal peacebuilding. Clearly, most traditional bilateral donors and all multilateral donors would reject the Russian model for not being compatible with the normative foundations of their foreign aid policy. Yet do all DAC donors adhere to the liberal peacebuilding model in practice? This is another interesting question, but one that is beyond the scope of this chapter. I therefore confine myself to two short observations. First, some of the more recent peacebuilding missions were launched in the aftermath of military interventions, Iraq and Afghanistan being the prime examples. In such missions, elements of peacebuilding overlap with elements of counterinsurgency, and there are fundamental tensions between the two objectives. Hence, the model of liberal peacebuilding may often be just that—a model, quite different from the messy realities where counterinsurgency, geopolitical interests, and classical

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liberal peacebuilding are intertwined. Second, there clearly are massive differences between the traditional donors themselves, and not all traditional donors will uphold the principles of liberal peacebuilding in practice. Hence, perhaps the notion of traditional donors masks important differences, which we will have to address before a comparison between emerging donors and traditional donors can reveal meaningful insights.29 There may be areas where the Russian approach of today is not that different from the historical US approach to Central America, or the current French approach in l’Afrique francophone. The blurring of the border between development policies, national interests, and geopolitics is not a Russian exclusivity. 1. Patty A. Gray, “Russia as a Recruited Development Donor,” European Journal of Development Research 27, no. 2 (2015): 273–288; Gregory Chin and Anton Malkin, Russia as a Re-emerging Donor: Catching Up in Africa (Waterloo, Canada: Centre for International Governance Innovation, March 8, 2012), www.cigionline .org/publications/russia-re-emerging-donor-catching-africa. 2. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), The Russian Federation’s Official Development Assistance (ODA) (Paris: OECD, 2016), www.oecd.org/russia/russias-official-development-assistance.htm. 3. Marina Larionova, Mark Rakhmangulova, and Marc P. Berenson, The Russian

Notes

Federation’s International Development Assistance Programme: A State of the Debate Report, Rising Powers in International Development, Evidence Report No. 88

(Brighton: Institute for Development Studies, August 2014); Victor M. Sergeev, Andrey A. Kazantsev, and Vladimir I. Bartenev, “Assisting Development in Central Asia: Strategic Horizons of Russian Engagement,” Working Paper no. 10 (Moscow: Russian International Affairs Council, 2013). 4. Decree of the President of the Russian Federation on the Approval of the Concept of the State Policy of the Russian Federation in Promoting International Development, April 20, 2014 (hereafter 2014 Concept). The Concept is available in Russian and English at http://www.mid.ru/en/foreign_policy/official_documents/-/asset _publisher/CptICkB6BZ29/content/id/64542?p_p_id=101_INSTANCE_CptICkB6BZ29 &_101_INSTANCE_CptICkB6BZ29_languageId=ru_RU (accessed May 3, 2019). All subsequent quotations refer to this document. 5. See also Lorenzo Piccio, “In Course Correction, Russian Foreign Aid Program Turns Inward,” Devex, December 8, 2014, www.devex.com/news/in-course-correction -russian-foreign-aid-program-turns-inward-85035; “Kosachev Konstantin: A Change of Course for Russian Foreign Aid,” Devex, December 4, 2014, www.devex.com /news/konstantin-kosachev-a-change-of-course-for-russian-foreign-aid-85005; Vladimir I. Bartenev and Elena Yatsenko, Development Assistance as Leverage for Russia’s Footprint in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan (Moscow: Russian International Affairs Council, 2013). Available at https://russiancouncil.ru/en/analytics-and-comments /analytics/development-assistance-as-leverage-for-russia-s-footprint-in. 6. Andrey Makarychev and Licínia Simão, Russia’s Development Assistance, with a Focus on Africa, NOREF Policy Brief (Oslo: Norwegian Peacebuilding Resource Centre, July 2014). 7. Rossotrudnichestvo is a Russian federal agency that was established in 2008 under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. One of its tasks is to develop

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and implement medium- and long-term programs in the field of bilateral international development, especially with the member states of the Commonwealth of Independent States. Other tasks involve the promotion of Russian culture, language, and education in the CIS and beyond. While the bureaucratic-infrastructural setup of Russian aid is developing, it is often assumed that Rossotrudnichestvo will handle some or even most of Russian bilateral aid to the CIS, whereas multilateral aid will be handled by the Ministry of Finance. Rossotrudnichestvo’s website and description of its approach to foreign aid are available at http://rs.gov.ru/en/activities/1. 8. Decree of the President of the Russian Federation on the Approval of the Concept of the State Policy of the Russian Federation in Promoting International Development, April 20, 2014 (hereafter 2014 Concept). The Concept is available in Russian and English at http://www.mid.ru/en/foreign_policy/official_documents /-/asset_publisher/CptICkB6BZ29/content/id/64542?p_p_id=101_INSTANCE _CptICkB6BZ29&_101_INSTANCE_CptICkB6BZ29_languageId=ru_RU. All subsequent quotations refer to this document. 9. Andrey A. Kokoshin and Vladimir I. Bartenev, “Security-Development Nexus in Strategic Planning in the Russian Federation: From Goal-Setting to Forecasting,” Studies on Russian Economic Development 27, no. 1 (2016): 5–12; Vladimir I. Bartenev, “Securitization in the Sphere of International Development: An Analysis of the Political Discourse,” Vestnik mezhdonarodnykh organizatsiy 3, no. 34 (2011): 37–59. 10. Piccio, “In Course Correction, Russian Foreign Aid Program Turns Inward”; 2014 Concept. 11. 2014 Concept, see footnote 8. 12. Ibid. 13. Ibid. 14. Ibid. 15. Gerda Asmus, Andreas Fuchs, and Angelika Müller, “BRICS and Foreign Aid,” Working Paper No. 43 (Williamsburg, VA: AidData at William & Mary, August 2017). 16. Sergeev, Kazantsev, and Bartenev, Assisting Development in Central Asia. 17. Ibid., p. 55. 18. Ibid. 19. David Trilling, “Russia Plans to Fight Drugs at Home with Jobs in Central Asia,” Euraisanet.org, April 26, 2013, www.eurasianet.org/print/66891. 20. Sergeev, Kazantsev, and Bartenev, Assisting Development in Central Asia. 21. All figures quoted from ibid. 22. Danny Anderson, “Risky Business: A Case Study of PRC Investment in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan,” China Brief: A Journal of Analysis and Information 18, no. 14 (2018): 14–16. 23. Trilling, “Russia Plans to Fight Drugs at Home with Jobs in Central Asia.” 24. Ibid. 25. Trilling, “Russia Plans to Fight Drugs at Home with Jobs in Central Asia.” 26. World Bank Data, “Personal remittances, received (% of GDP),” http://data .worldbank.org/indicator/BX.TRF.PWKR.DT.GD.ZS?order=wbapi_data_value_2014 +wbapi_data_value+wbapi_data_value-last&sort=asc. 27. Larionova, Rakhmangulova, and Berenson, The Russian Federation’s International Development Assistance Programme. 28. Roland Paris, “Saving Liberal Peacebuilding,” Review of International Studies 36, no. 2 (2010): 337–365. 29. Bartenev, “Securitization in the Sphere of International Development.”

7 Turkey: New Humanitarianism and Geostrategic Ambitions Pinar Tank

humanitarianism, peacebuilding, and development. Interest in the emerging powers has grown parallel to their global impact, although there still is limited scholarship on the particularities of their humanitarian and reconstruction assistance. In this chapter on Turkey’s humanitarian assistance, I focus particularly on two aspects of the country’s humanitarian and assistance policies: first, how humanitarianism is mobilized in an effort to project Turkey’s identity as a global middle power through norm entrepreneurship; and, second, the interplay between domestic politics and foreign policy in the engagement with humanitarian and development assistance. Similar to other cases in this book, Turkish assistance is closely intertwined with fulfilling national interests. My aim in this chapter is to engage in a wider conversation about how emerging donors contribute to the field of humanitarianism long dominated by traditional donors. The prevailing argument among emerging donors is that their approaches are different and, by extension, that they provide alternatives to traditional—understood as Western—approaches. Emerging donors are frequently grouped together, although the differences between them are often as great as the commonalities. By focusing on a single case study, in this chapter I illustrate the particularities of Turkey’s approach and its political and ideological underpinnings. My goal is to fill a gap in our understanding through the analysis of how Turkey approaches humanitarian assistance and postconflict reconstruction conceptually. By offering new methodologies and practices, Turkey hopes not only to make its mark on the field but also to project itself globally as an aspiring middle power.

The rise of new powers has made its mark in the fields of

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The term middle powers is one that requires some clarification because definitions of the concept are as numerous as assessments over which countries belong in the category. A few points in particular are worthy of consideration in the context of the Turkish case. First, for the category to have analytical value, it is useful to draw the distinction between emerging and traditional middle powers. Even within the emerging category, states such as Turkey and Brazil differ in basic factors like size and geography, making it problematic to group them together. However, there are key commonalities within this category related to countries’ understandings of humanitarianism. Constitutively, traditional middle powers, such as Norway and Canada, are often “wealthy, stable, egalitarian, social democratic and not regionally influential” while emerging middle powers identify regionally and are supporters of regional integration.1 The latter frequently are also materially inegalitarian societies whose democracies are recent and, often, challenged. Second, they often opt for reformist (but not radical) global change. Finally, emerging middle powers are recognized by their foreign policy behavior, which is a product of “contextually located deliberate action” (favoring foreign policy projection).2 Characteristically, middle power foreign policy extends beyond immediate geography. Thus, the concept is often used in the context of diplomacy (middle power diplomacy) by emerging powers to define their potential role in global governance. James Manicom and Jeffrey Reeves provide three ideal-type categorizations—with some overlap between categories.3 They divide middle powers into positional middle powers, which are capable of exercising influence due to their size and seek to form international order in a way that will reflect their interests; behavioral middle powers, which also seek to promote their own interests, but through the building of coalitions with like-minded states, and act as bridge builders between great powers; and, finally, ideational middle powers, which do the above as well as claiming a degree of moralism in their foreign policy while maintaining liberal internationalist values and framing their position on specific issues. Turkey has traditionally been seen as a behavioral middle power branded as a bridge builder to the Middle East and an ally of traditional Western powers. Nonetheless, its approach since 2011 to humanitarian and development assistance indicates a directional shift toward an ideational middle power, albeit with decreasing liberal internationalist values. This chapter is divided into three parts. In the first part, I provide a general introduction to Turkey’s contribution through a quantitative lens. Since 2011, the country has been viewed as an important rising star in the field of humanitarian assistance. In particular, the civil war in Syria has placed Turkey on the front lines of the greatest humanitarian challenge since World War II. This is reflected in its growing humanitarian assistance

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budgets as well as the international community’s recognition of Turkey’s key role through the UN’s decision to plan the first World Humanitarian Summit in Turkey in 2016. Humanitarian and development assistance contributions form a background for discussing the wider shifts in Turkey’s foreign policy. In the second part of the chapter, I examine the particularities of the Turkish case, focusing on the interplay between domestic politics and foreign policy. From 2002, a new political elite of conservative Muslim leaders, led by the Justice and Development Party (AKP), replaced the traditional secular elite and its narrower foreign policy aspirations. The geopolitical context after September 11 opened up an opportunity for the AKP to aspire to a greater role for Turkey as a Muslim democracy in the regional context and, later, as an emerging power in the global arena. Thus, the Kemalist dictum “peace at home, peace in the world” underpinning a noninterventionist stance that had limited Turkey from playing an activist regional role was conversely reinterpreted by the AKP to mean a Turkish commitment to leadership in peacebuilding and mediation efforts. For an aspiring middle power, norm entrepreneurship can be a vehicle for recognition on the global stage. Thus, in the third part of the chapter, I introduce the new methodologies and practices launched by Turkey. These policies represent an effort at providing an alternative to the Western liberal peacebuilding model and its perceived failures in Afghanistan and Iraq. In this respect, Turkey shares commonalities with other emerging powers, such as Brazil (Chapter 5), for which humanitarian assistance has become an extension of foreign policy and a tool of soft power.4 To illustrate this, I introduce the Turkish notion of “humanitarian diplomacy” and examine how it is operationalized in the case of Somalia—Turkey’s most successful humanitarian assistance venture. Finally, I compare Turkey’s humanitarian assistance in Somalia to its second most critical case, Syria, and the challenges of realpolitik versus normative policy. Turkey’s contribution to the field of humanitarian assistance has also included wider engagement with mediation as well as post conflict reconstruction linking sustainable development to security. However, these efforts are juxtaposed with the domestic agenda and undermined by internal challenges of security, civil unrest, and democratic governance that curtail foreign policy ambitions. It is at this juncture, when national interests compete with normative policies, that Turkey’s contributions to the humanitarian and postconflict reconstruction agenda are tested. Thus, I conclude the chapter with some brief insights into the country’s commitments and credibility as a significant actor within the humanitarian and reconstruction field when faced with internal challenges that question its capacity and legitimacy.

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Turkey has experienced a growth in commitments toward humanitarian and development assistance. Turkish humanitarian assistance programs were already established in the early 1990s, but it was then prime minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s much publicized trip to Somalia in 2011 that signaled the global launching of Turkey’s humanitarian profile. The country’s contributions have grown exponentially since 2002, when aid was only at $85 million.5 From 2011 to 2012, at a time of declining development assistance by traditional donors, Turkey’s rose by 98.7 percent.6 In 2013, Turkey’s total development assistance, including both official and private flows, was $4.347 billion, with $3.307 billion delivered through public entities as official development assistance; $820 million supplied by the Turkish private sector in direct investments; and $280.23 million in assistance distributed by Turkish nongovernmental organizations (NGOs).7 By 2015, according to the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) figures, Turkey’s net official development assistance (ODA) was $3.9 billion, an increase of 26 percent in real terms from 2014.8 The share of Turkey’s total ODA allocated to Syria has increased from 52 percent in 2013, to 65 percent in 2014, and to 70 percent in 2015.9 The largest share of Turkish bilateral development cooperation in 2015 was channeled to Syria and Somalia (followed by Kyrgyzstan and Afghanistan). It included projects that provided humanitarian and refugee support, as well as assistance to education, good governance, and strengthening civil society.10 By 2016, Turkish ODA reached $6.2 billion in large part due to Turkey’s response to the refugee crisis in neighboring Syria, the largest beneficiary by a significant margin, followed by Somalia.11 Turkey’s commitment to humanitarian assistance is evident in the development of an institutional infrastructure for aid disbursement and its placement at the center of government power. The Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TIKA), founded in 1992, is the official channel of government aid coordinated centrally through the Office of the Prime Minister since 2005. Already by 2006, TIKA’s outreach through development and aid activities led the Group of 8 (G8) meeting in April to place Turkey at the top of the list of emerging donor countries.12 By 2014, TIKA had a total of forty offices worldwide. From the outset TIKA developed as an extended arm of the Turkish Ministry of Foreign Affairs with its focus in the early 1990s on counterbalancing the influences of Iran and Russia on the Turkic states and promoting the Turkish model: democratization, free-market economics, and Westernization.13 TIKA experienced a significant growth period after 2004 due to political stability under the AKP government, the transformative influence of the European Union (EU), and, most importantly, Turkey’s growing economic recovery. In 2005, TIKA was designated the sole institution for coordinating and reporting ODA and became a central player in Turkey’s new

Turkish Contributions and Institutional Infrastructure

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foreign policy. TIKA’s area of activity was expanded and its mission redefined in 2011 with the establishment of Program Coordination Offices (thirty offices by 2012). Additionally, TIKA cooperated with NGOs in the field (seventy-one in 2012), particularly in Africa (with Somalia topping the list in 2012). Strategically, the organization identified “development assistance as a significant foreign policy instrument” and sought a new vision focusing on project-based assistance with “visibility and addressing basic needs of the population.”14 The system of sectoral distribution of assistance prioritized the “Social Infrastructure Development” (93.8 percent of the budget) with health and education as key areas. Included within the “Social Infrastructure Development,” albeit with a modest post, was the “Prevention and Resolution of Conflicts; Peace and Security.”15 Another state organization founded in 2009, Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency (AFAD), coordinates humanitarian emergency relief, both internal disaster response as well as external humanitarian assistance in coordination with the Foreign Ministry. It focuses on disaster preparedness, management, and response. AFAD is the primary agency responsible for on-the-ground Turkish assistance to Syrian refugees.16 Cooperation with other institutions, both national and international, is a key objective with an aim to increase “the presidency’s performance in international humanitarian aid.”17 Turkey’s closely coordinated strategy between the office of the Prime Ministry and the Foreign Ministry is made possible by majoritarian governments under the AKP that espouse their vision.18 However, the Foreign Ministry is a legal and political entity whose priorities may change under future coalition governments.19 In common with several other emerging donors, there is a preference for bilateral humanitarian assistance to crisis-affected governments.20 Bilateral assistance has the advantage of defining foreign policy priorities more clearly. Although it is a member of the OECD, Turkey is not a member of the Development Assistance Committee of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD DAC), which has long been dominated by donors from the Global North. The Development Assistance Committee (DAC) consists of twenty-nine members and is known as the “venue and voice of the world’s major bilateral donors” in coordinating and monitoring humanitarian aid.21 Although some emerging donors are hardly new to humanitarianism, their contributions have often been outside the traditional “club” of the DAC and other key forums in which the policy, principles, and practices of humanitarian donorship are discussed and debated. The DAC functions to provide oversight into member states’ “strategies, policies and institutional frameworks to ensure capacity to deliver a development co-operation program: an accepted measure of effort; and the existence of a system of performance monitoring and evaluation.”22 Emerging donors’ absence from the DAC is often as much by choice as by exclusion.

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The Global Humanitarian Assistance Report for 2015 notes that it is donors outside the OECD DAC that choose to give bilateral humanitarian assistance. In Turkey’s case, multilateral ODA accounted for only 4 percent of Turkey’s total ODA, disbursed through regional development banks such as the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank, which received nearly 71 percent of multilateral contributions, and the United Nations (14 percent), while the remaining 15 percent went to other multilateral organizations.23 Turkey’s official response for abstaining from the DAC is the “lack of preparedness from a whole-of-government approach necessary to comply with DAC.”24 Turkey also distinguishes itself from traditional donors in that the business community is a significant actor in Turkish civil society and politics, also in the formulation of humanitarian politics.25 The AKP’s conservative voters include a rising middle class represented by the Association of Independent Industrialists and Businessmen (MUSIAD), which actively lobbies the AKP government on issues related to foreign economic investment and humanitarian assistance.26 Turkish investment in development aid serves as a door opener for the business community. Examples include Turkish construction firms engaged in the building of large civilian engineering ventures such as the Suleja-Kaduna motorway in northern Nigeria and the Al-Halfaia Bridge in Sudan. Turkish firms also are involved in symbolically significant cultural projects such as the Midrand mosque complex in South Africa—the first model of Ottoman architecture in the Southern Hemisphere. Finally, a number of significant Turkish NGOs operate internationally in the field of humanitarian assistance. The largest of these are either state sponsored like the Turkish Red Crescent or faith-based charities supported by the conservative business community (Humanitarian Relief Foundation), and until 2016, the Islamic Gülen movement (Kimse Yok Mu or Is Anybody There?).27 The growth of Turkey’s humanitarian initiatives has raised its global stature. It has also been a departure from Turkey’s traditional foreign policy. Christopher Hill argues that foreign policy is “primarily generated from within.”28 It is also generated for the consumption of a domestic audience. This being the case, although domestic and foreign policy are often treated separately in scholarly analysis, an evaluation of the interplay between them is better suited to understanding the dynamics behind Turkey’s stateled humanitarian assistance. The historical lines of modern Turkish foreign policy focus on nonintervention and a disengagement from neighbors in the Middle East.29 Mustafa Kemal Ataturk, the founder of the modern Republic, codified Turkey’s traditional isolation from the region through the dictum “peace at home, peace in the world,” which sums up the belief that peace at home can

The Rise of the Humanitarian State

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be achieved only by remaining at a distance from the turbulent politics of the Middle East. The policy of decoupling Turkey from the region also contributed to strengthening the Kemalist agenda of Westernization domestically. Significant with regard to questions of humanitarian intervention, the principle entailed “utmost respect for the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of third countries,” in the words of former Turkish foreign minister Hikmet Cetin.30 Regional upheaval after the Arab uprisings made what was a difficult task impossible. However, until the early 2000s, the secular political elite and the Kemalist military dominated Turkish politics and sought to uphold Atatürk’s line, looking instead toward the West and the tantalizing, if elusive, aspiration of EU membership. The 1980s saw an opening to the Middle East under then president Turgut Özal, whose liberal economic policies sought new markets and a redefinition of Turkey’s value to the West as a partner in the East.31 Nonetheless, the ever watchful eye of the military meant that Turkey’s identity remained anchored in the West. The threat of political Islam spreading from the Middle East and undermining the achievements of the secular state limited Turkey’s desire to claim a regional leadership role. Instead, the country offered itself up as a bridge to the Middle East. Turkey’s foreign policy experienced a critical shift following the removal of the secular elite from power and the rise after 2002 of the AKP with its Muslim identity. The party’s focus on EU membership for Turkey defined the AKP’s early years in power, reassuring liberals about democratic reforms and keeping the still powerful military at bay. Meanwhile, an opportunity to redefine Turkey as a model Muslim democracy opened up after the attacks of September 11. The George W. Bush administration’s need for a new model for the Middle East as part of the Bush Doctrine contributed toward consolidating the AKP’s position. After the AKP’s second election victory in 2007, then foreign minister Ahmet Davutoğlu launched a policy of strategic depth seeking to redefine Turkey’s foreign policy as multidimensional and activist. As the architect of Turkey’s “zero problems with neighbors” foreign policy, Davutoğlu advocated the “adoption of a new discourse and diplomatic style” in regional and international politics that “prioritizes Turkey’s civil-economic power” with the intent to augment Turkey’s soft power in the region.32 Most importantly, Davutoğlu, through his multivector foreign policy, launched Turkey as the center of several regions (the Balkans, the Middle East, and the Caucasus) rather than being a periphery state. Disappointment with the lagging EU membership process further spurred the search for a new geopolitical position. The inadequacy of Davutoğlu’s foreign policy of zero problems in attending to the multiplicity of challenges that followed the Arab uprisings resulted in a new initiative introduced in 2013, labelled humanitarian diplomacy. The understanding of the term as a tool prioritizing the soft power

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of the state differed significantly from the original concept developed by humanitarian organizations such as the International Committee of the Red Cross and Médecins Sans Frontières, where the term has “no political pretensions whatsoever but seeks humanitarian dialogue between protagonists in a conflict or disaster.”33 The adoption of humanitarian diplomacy was not merely a rhetorical shift. Whereas the zero problems policy had essentially continued support for authoritarian regimes in pursuit of state interests, the shift to humanitarian diplomacy implied a normative change from state to human security in line with the regional awakening precipitated by the Arab uprisings. As first introduced by Davutoğlu for Turkey’s foreign policy elite, the new framework consisted of three dimensions: improving citizens’ lives at home so as to enhance Turkey’s domestic capacity, a proactive and human-focused policy in crisis regions and cultivating humanitarian sensibilities within the UN system. In his definition of this concept, Davutoğlu emphasized that it is more than humanitarian aid: it is a welding together of power—capacities and resources—and “conscience.”34 The latter is an analytically challenging concept. Central to the idea of humanitarian diplomacy, in Davutoğlu’s words, is “connecting with the conscience of mankind.” He elaborates as follows: “The realities of our era require the rise of a human oriented diplomacy, which can move beyond the realist-idealist divide on the one hand and the hard-power versus soft-power dichotomy on the other.”35 Thus, humanitarian diplomacy is defined by a “critical equilibrium” between conscience and power.36 Davutoğlu also notes the four sources of Turkey’s power: these are its organizational capacity at the Foreign Ministry, political will, interagency coordination between the ministry and associated institutions, and public support. Unlike the zero problems policy, none of the sources of Turkey’s power identified by Davutoğlu include the country’s democracy or governance form.37 Despite a stronger emphasis on human over state security, the Turkish approach remained wary of transgressing state sovereignty, alluding to an inherent tension in its approach to the protection of civilians. In 2012 E. Fuat Keyman and Onur Sazak identified the Turkish position as closer to state building over nation building (differing from the approach of the United States in Afghanistan and Iraq).38 They referenced Francis Fukuyama’s distinction between the “humanitarian state” and the “humanitarian nation” model in analyzing Turkey’s humanitarianism.39 Turkey’s approach in Somalia after 2011, for example, was regarded as closer to the humanitarian state model that does not try to reconstruct the failed state in the image of the donor country, but rather reconstructs the infrastructure through building up key state institutions needed for economic development and supporting efficient government.40 If so, this was a departure from earlier approaches to Africa in which, according to pro-state think tanks, Turkey was a model to be

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emulated for “her experience of nation building.”41 In any case, as discussed below, the cautious approach that framed discussions over Somalia unraveled during the Syria crisis. To conclude, the traditional foreign policy fundamentals of Turkey have undergone significant changes under a government whose ideology presents a break with the past. An engagement with the humanitarian and peacebuilding agenda has emerged along with the realization that these arenas can be vehicles for profiling international aspirations, consolidating economic interests, and strengthening the conservative Islamic AKP’s domestic support.

An Alternative Turkish Model for Humanitarian Assistance and Reconstruction

In a seminal article on postconflict reconstruction in Afghanistan, Astrid Suhrke criticizes the conflation of postwar reconstruction with the greater agenda for development and modernization and notes “the underlying model of reconstruction and modernization is derived from Western experiences of liberal political development and economic growth.”42 The model is an imported package of modernization whose intention is not merely to reconstruct but also to redesign through programs that include the building of transparent, effective, and accountable states; the promotion of liberal democratic institutions; support for the rule of law (human rights and gender equality); and support for civil society through capacity-building projects and open market–based economic development.43 These are all elements that make up what is collectively referred to as the liberal peace. Alternative models offered by emerging donors, as discussed in other chapters in this book, are challenging the hegemony of this model in peacebuilding and postconflict reconstruction. Turkish policymakers claim that the country’s humanitarian initiatives are distinct from traditional humanitarian powers by pointing to a form of exceptionalism evolving from their respective historical, social, and cultural roots. For the ruling AKP, challenging the Western model of reconstruction resonates with the party’s critical understanding of the Kemalist project of modernization domestically. Internationally, it engages in norm entrepreneurship through advocating a distinct form of Turkish assistance. Martha Finnemore and Kathryn Sikkink define a “norm” as “a standard of appropriate behavior for actors with a given identity.”44 Introducing new norms—“norm entrepreneurship”—requires that actors compete with existing norms and define a new standard of “appropriate behavior.” The challenge is to frame new ideas in “ways which resonate with the actors in question and then to persuade these same actors of the advantages of the new norm compared with the previous.”45 Not least, the process requires

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credible norm entrepreneurs with the legitimacy to gain necessary traction in the field. However, the ability to do so cannot rely solely on the symbolic framing of Turkish aid by state interests or pro-state actors, but also involves the assessment of beneficiaries. Consequently, Turkey frames its legitimacy as a humanitarian actor through its exceptionalism to the existing liberal framework and an alternative methodological approach. As expressed by the AKP government and its supporters, Turkish exceptionalism is a result of the country’s historical and cultural links with the Muslim world. As in the case of Qatar (Chapter 8), Turkey’s criticism of liberal peacebuilding is rooted in Islamic values. A senior aid official describes Turkey’s commitment to Somalia through a common understanding of Islamic values as a “more pure” humanitarianism—undertaken for the “love of God and with no hidden agenda.”46 Where traditional donors are regarded as having vested political interests, Turkey contends that its engagement is apolitical. The focus on Islamic values is simply presented as an alternative normative framework to the Western liberal peacebuilding engagement. Furthermore, Turkey’s humanitarian presence is regarded as methodologically different from traditional humanitarian engagements by its closeness to beneficiaries’ immediate needs.47 On the ground, beneficiaries of the Turkish approach commend it for its efficiency, its delivery methods—Turkish humanitarian workers collaborate closely with the local population—and its visible results. Among the beneficiaries of humanitarian assistance in Somalia, there has been, by and large, enthusiasm for the Turkish approach, which is holistic and diverse, combining business, education, development, and aid with peacebuilding and politics. 48 Somali president Hassan Sheikh Mahamud described the Turkish approach in a 2013 speech: “The Turkish model in Somalia is very, very clear. . . . They said we want to do this thing in Somalia, and they do it. They don’t have the restrictions that many of the Western world has [sic] got. They are there. They come there, starting from their top leadership, the prime minister of the country with his family. . . . They are building or implementing projects that are really tangible ones.”49 Turkey’s success is due first and foremost to the (relative) stability on the ground ensured by African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM) forces that allows for the delivery of aid and the building of infrastructure.50 However, the grassroots contact of Turkish humanitarians is also made possible through the perception that Turkey, by being a part of the beneficiary’s faith community, is divested of an opposing (contradictory) self-interest, even when the benefit to Turkey is economic. Thus, Theodore Baird points out that geoeconomic domination does not figure in assessments of Turkish engagements in Somalia, but is rather replaced by frameworks of cooperation and ethical assistance.51

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According to Turkish ambassador to Somalia in 2014, Kani Torun, assistance to Somalia is a win-win solution for brothers in faith: “Turkey wanted to expand its influence, as we wanted to improve our bilateral relations with not only Somalia but also with other African countries for mutual benefit. We call this a win-win situation. Somalia is a part of this strategy.”52 In other words, Turkey’s Somalia strategy is key to the larger reorientation of its foreign policy toward Africa. According to official documents from Turkey’s embassy in Somalia, Turkey’s policy is “based on an inclusive and multi-dimensional strategy” that focuses on “reintegrating Somalia into the international community, contributing comprehensively to humanitarian aid efforts, and realizing long-term development projects for rebuilding the infrastructure.” It also goes further by providing “support to political reconciliation process [sic] in the country” and helps “to improve the security environment by providing support to Somali security forces.”53 As part of the holistic approach to aid, Turkish foreign policy elites engaged early on in peace and reconciliation processes. In May 2012, the Turkish ministry of foreign affairs (MFA) invited 300 influential Somalis to Istanbul to determine agenda issues to be discussed at the Istanbul II Conference on Somalia a month later. The delegates included 135 clan elders as well as politicians and civil society activists. This was a departure from the earlier London Conference on Somalia from the perspective of inclusivity; Turkey stated that it sought only to act as the facilitator for a locally owned process.54 This also contrasted with perceptions of “Western actors who engage only with those whom they believe will be the victors of the political end-game.”55 The strategy outlined by Turkey’s Somalia embassy in February 2016 continues the integrated approach to humanitarian assistance through the establishment of Working Groups Based on State and Peacebuilding Goals. Of particular significance are the goals focused on advancing inclusive political dialogue to support the reconciliation process for the formation of a federal government of Somalia. To this end, three rounds of negotiations were held in Turkey from July 2013 to January 2014. Turkey also offers capacity building to strengthen electoral processes. In the realm of security and stability, the country coordinates with the United States in combating piracy as well as contributing financially to AMISOM ($2 million in 2009 and 2012). Furthermore, Turkey prioritizes the strengthening of state security institutions through capacity building and accountability of the police. Turkey also constructs training centers and military academies to assist in developing Somalia’s army as well as hosting cadets for longer training exchanges in Turkey. According to official figures, for the financial years of 2014 and 2015, the Turkish General Staff contributed $7 million in total to Somalia in the field of security.56 In October 2017, Turkey opened a military

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base in Mogadishu to help prepare the Somali National Army to confront the al-Shabab threat after the withdrawal of AMISOM.57 However, the country’s initiatives have not been without criticism. Efforts at peacebuilding and stabilization, combined with the role of humanitarian and development assistance donor as well as business partner, inevitably imply Turkish involvement in internal Somalia politics. Thus, the International Crisis Group warned in its 2012 report that Turkey would do well to remain impartial to “avoid being manipulated by Somali politicians.”58 Corruption has been an area of critical concern due to, among other things, the lack of transparent bidding processes for contracts.59 Another area of criticism has been the concentration of Turkish aid in Mogadishu to the detriment of other regions. The linking of diplomatic and development assistance to the establishment of the rule of law and accountable and effective institutions, as suggested by International Crisis Group, would contribute toward perceptions of Turkey as a responsible donor. As described by government elites, Turkey’s influence in the world is a consequence of its power and, equally importantly, its novel approach that emphasizes conscience and values. Turkey’s humanitarian initiative in 2011 came at a time when Somalia had lost the attention of the international community and therefore refocused attention on the crisis, resulting in the gratitude of the Somali people. Turkey’s continued commitment toward Somalia has had an important symbolic effect that outweighs its presence on the ground. However, even though the Turkish approach may convey prestige internationally, its engagements in peacebuilding, contributions to security and stabilization forces, and dealings with the business community politicize Turkey’s assistance with risks for its humanitarian presence.

The Turkish Peacebuilding Model and the Challenges of the Arab Uprisings

To the ideologue behind Turkey’s foreign policy, former prime minister Davutoğlu, Somalia and Syria represent the two critical cases for Turkish humanitarian policy.60 They illustrate differing humanitarian approaches illustrative of the challenges inherent in Turkey’s ambitious humanitarianism. The Somalia engagement functions as a better showcase of Turkey’s stated approach to humanitarian assistance while the Syrian situation presents greater challenges due to its proximity and the repercussions for Turkey’s internal security. Prior to the Arab uprisings, Turkey pursued a pragmatic regional foreign policy of mutual economic benefit toward countries with which it had a cultural or ideological affinity. Ziya Önis argues that the AKP government’s relations with the Middle East pre-2011 were based not on the principle of democracy promotion but rather “on the Westphalian logic of respecting the

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independence of nation states and the principle of non-intervention in the domestic politics of states.”61 Turkey’s historical relations with the region were premised on the persistence of authoritarian regimes with which it could pursue interdependent economic relations. However, after 2009, as Turkey’s identity was increasingly defined as multidimensional formed by its global historical and cultural encounters, the country’s engagement with the region took on a normative tone. As noted earlier, the global framing of Turkey’s identity was the background from which the idea of humanitarian diplomacy emerged, influencing its relations with its immediate neighborhood. Although the AKP’s dealings with Iran and Sudan prior to the Arab uprisings presented the dilemma of ethics versus self-interest—democracy promotion was not then paramount—this tension came to the fore only after the Libya and Syria crises.62 The popular uprisings brought with them economic unrest and placed the AKP in a difficult situation with respect to championing democracy (human security) versus protecting economic interests (state security). As the crisis in Libya unfolded, Turkey was initially unwilling to support UN Resolution 1973 that sanctioned an intervention whose outcome would threaten Turkey’s investments ($15 billion) and necessitate the withdrawal of 25,000 Turkish workers from the country.63 The normative dimension of Turkey’s Libya policy was not focused on the legitimacy of the intervention. Instead, Turkey’s reluctance to support oppositional forces in Libya gave rise to the perception of self-interest trumping a normative policy in defending the protection of like-minded communities, particularly since the AKP’s response to Libya contrasted with the early support given to the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt, a country where Turkey did not have great economic interests. When the Syrian conflict began in 2011, Turkish-Syrian relations were on the road to recovery. In fact, relations with the Bashar al-Assad government had begun to improve before the AKP’s rise to power in 2002. Turkey had some years earlier pledged to upgrade the 1998 Adana Protocol, a framework security cooperation arrangement. Syria, for its part, saw Turkish friendship as a way out of isolation and a bridge to Europe.64 The United States welcomed Turkish initiatives as a means to weaken Syria’s ties to Iran. Turkey was even invited by Syria as an intermediary in an effort to resolve the conflict between Syria and Israel over the question of the Golan Heights.65 At this juncture, Turkey’s actions were those of a behavioral middle power, protecting its own interests while cooperating and providing a bridge for a great power, the United States. Turkey’s primary interest in improving relations with Syria had been preventative: to insure against Syria’s support of the Kurdistan Worker’s Party (PKK). Cordial relations continued through to the start of the Syrian uprising, with Erdoğan stating that intermarriages and migration flows between the two countries made the turmoil in its neighbor more “like a

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domestic affair.”66 This illustrated the central aspect of the AKP’s foreign policy: a common history with the region required Turkish engagement. Thus, in 2011 Turkey made attempts to mobilize its soft power, presuming that the AKP government had the necessary leverage over the al-Assad regime to mediate a peaceful resolution to the Syrian crisis prior to the outbreak of hostilities. A stable Syria with a friendly al-Assad regime was seen as key to Turkey’s internal security, particularly with respect to fears over Kurdish irredentism. As illustrated by Urvashi Aneja (Chapter 3) in the case of India’s strategy toward Afghanistan, Turkish policies were linked to concerns over political stability—in Turkey’s case, that of a spillover igniting the Kurdish conflict. When attempts at resolution failed, the AKP’s lack of leverage with the al-Assad regime was interpreted as a public humiliation for Erdoğan and resulted in a revision of Turkey’s policy on Syria toward one that advocated regime change. The government’s rhetoric shifted quickly toward support for Sunni groups against the Ba’athist regime. The shift was backed by policies focused on bringing down the alAssad regime by supporting the opposition, hosting Free Syrian Army officials, and, more controversially, covertly arming groups fighting it—from the Free Syrian Army to Jabat al Nusra—a Sunni extremist group with ties to al-Qaeda.67 With criticism from the West over Turkey’s policies, the AKP government sought instead alliances with other Sunni actors such as Saudi Arabia and Qatar. In March 2015 Erdoğan made a visit to the newly crowned prince Salman bin Abdul-Aziz of Saudi Arabia, during which a pact was signed between the two countries for collaboration in Syria in return for Turkish support for Saudi Arabia in Yemen.68 These developments broke with Keyman and Sazak’s conceptualization of the Turkish humanitarian state approach by advocating intervention that sought to reconstruct the Syrian state to reflect the values of Sunni Turkey. Domestic security concerns overshadowed Turkey’s exceptional humanitarianism. These threats were founded on a miscalculated Turkish policy toward Syria, and involved the flow of Syrian refugees across Turkey’s border (2.7 million by September 2016)69 and the domestic repercussions of complex regional politics, particularly in terms of Turkish-Kurdish relations. Thus, Turkey’s calls for intervention were reinforced by economic, societal, and security interests. Security concerns were amplified after 2015 as a result of several major bomb attacks—in Suruc (July 2015), Ankara (October 2015), and Istanbul (January and June 2016)—all of which were related to Turkey’s involvement in the Syrian conflict. However, despite the terrorist attacks in Turkey, the threat from the so-called Islamic State remained secondary to the Turkish state’s fears about its own restive Kurds, the consequences of Kurdish unity in the fight against the Islamic State, and international support for the Kurdish cause. Furthermore, Syria’s civil war brought to an end

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the fragile Turkish-Kurdish peace process, reigniting Turkey’s long-standing conflict with its Kurdish population. From the end of 2015, military operations in Turkey’s southeast against PKK rebels targeted civilians and brought the Turkish-Kurdish issue to its worst point since the 1990s. Added to the security implications were the financial costs of a conflict on Turkey’s border. With respect to Syrian refugees, Turkey’s humanitarian policy, though admirably generous, continued to be a significant economic burden. By the end of 2015, the AKP government had spent nearly 5.37 billion euros in response to the influx of Syrian refugees and provided shelter for more than half of the total refugees fleeing Syria.70 Syrian refugees who settled in the border areas and elsewhere have created tensions—both social and economic—despite the World Bank’s evidence that they have not adversely impacted Turkey’s economy.71 By 2014, if refugee-hosting costs alone were measured as international humanitarian assistance, Turkey would have been the third-largest humanitarian assistance donor in volume. The controversial Turkey-EU refugee deal signed in March 2016 was intended to alleviate some of Turkey’s refugee-hosting costs while returning asylum seekers from Greece, making it more difficult for them to reach Europe. Nonetheless, Turkey remained the second-largest government contributor to international humanitarian assistance in 2016, reporting contributions of $6 billion—an increase of 119 percent over 2015.72 Turkey’s humanitarian and assistance policies in Somalia successfully frame its contributions to the peacebuilding and reconstruction agenda by providing an alternative model through the normative approach of humanitarian diplomacy. Despite criticism by the humanitarian community for going it alone, this policy has made its mark internationally and served to lift Turkey’s profile as an emerging middle power. The methodological approach and the symbolic framing of its engagement highlight Turkey as an ideational middle power, not only a behavioral middle power. In essence, Turkey seeks to influence the field of humanitarian assistance as an ideational middle power by providing new normative concepts. However, the Syria case illustrates the extent to which normative policies are secondary once security interests are perceived to be at stake. Turkey’s aspirations to define an alternative humanitarian and peacebuilding model are therefore consistently undermined by domestic security concerns while the legitimacy of the model is weakened by internal democratic challenges and, not least, the inability of Turkish policymakers to resolve the Turkish-Kurdish conflict. Internationally, Turkey’s aspiration to be a middle power engaged in bridge building among great powers has also been diminished as a result of its Syria policy targeting

Conclusion

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Kurdish militants—in particular, when this collides with efforts by the United States and its allies to defeat the Islamic State. In conclusion, the ability of the state to build a stronger development and humanitarian profile has been dependent on the financial and political stability provided by a majority-led government and a growing economy. The central role played by important agencies such as TIKA, as well as Turkish NGOs and the private sector, under the AKP government transformed humanitarian assistance into an important pillar of Turkish foreign policy. However, these very ties between politics and humanitarian assistance risk the sustainability of Turkey’s commitment over time. The author thanks the Research Council of Norway and the Norwegian Centre for Humanitarian Studies at the Peace Research Institute as well as the United States Institute of Peace and George Mason University for research support. 1. Gina Luca Gardini, “Brazil: The State of the Art of Its Rise and Power Projection,” in Gina Luca Gardini and M. Tavares d Almeida, eds., Balancing Power in Emerging States (London: Palgrave Macmillan 2016), p. 20. 2. Andrew Fenton Cooper, Richard A. Higgot, and Kim Richard Nossal, quoted in Eduard Jordaan, “The Concept of a Middle Power in International Relations: Distinguishing Between Emerging and Traditional Middle Powers,” Politikon: South African Journal of Political Studies 30, no. 1 (2010): 166. 3. James Manicom, and Jeffrey Reeves, “Locating Middle Powers in International Relations Theory and Power Transitions,” in Bruce Gilley and Andrew O’Neil, eds., Middle Powers and the Rise of China (Washington, DC: Georgetown University Press, 2014), p. 38. 4. An example would be the concepts of nonindifference and Responsibility While Protecting championed by Brazil. 5. Ibid. 6. Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency, TIKA 2012 Annual Report (Ankara: Reporting and Coordination Unit, Department of Strategy Development, 2012), p. 21. 7. Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency, Turkish Development Assistance 2013 (Ankara: Reporting and Coordination Unit, Department of Strategy Development, 2014), pp. 5, 8–21. 8. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), Turkish Official Development Assistance 2015 (Paris: OECD, 2018), www.oecd.org/dac /stats/turkeys-official-development-assistanceoda.htm. 9. Ibid. 10. Ibid. 11. OECD, Development Cooperation Report 2017: Data for Development (Paris: OECD, 2017), pp. 295–296, https://read.oecd-ilibrary.org/development /development-co-operation-report-2017/profiles-of-other-development-co-operation -providers_dcr-2017-43-en#page11. 12. OECD, Turkish Official Development Assistance 2017. 13. Guner Özkan and Mustafa Turgut Demirtepe, “Transformation of a Development Aid Agency: TIKA in a Changing Domestic and International Setting,” Turkish Studies 13, no. 4 (2012): 647–664.

Notes

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14. Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency, TIKA 2012 Annual Report, p. 15. 15. Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency, TIKA 2012 Annual Report, pp. 22–23. 16. UN High Commissioner for Refugees, “2014 Syria Regional Response Plan Turkey” (Geneva: UN High Commissioner for Refugees, 2015), www.unhcr.org /syriarrp6/docs/syria-rrp6-turkey-response-plan.pdf. 17. Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency (AFAD), 2013–2017 Strategic Plan (Ankara: Republic of Turkey Prime Ministry 2012), p. 80. 18. Following the 2017 adoption of the presidential system, AFAD was placed under the Ministry of Interior in 2018. 19. Andrea Binder, “The Shape and Sustainability of Turkey’s Booming Humanitarian Assistance,” International Development Policy: Revue internationale de politique de développement 5, no. 2 (2014): 1-15. 20. Development Initiatives, Global Humanitarian Assistance Report 2015 (Bristol: Development Initiatives, 2015), p. 5. 21. OECD, DAC in Dates: The History of OECD’s Development Assistance Committee (Paris: OECD, 2006). 22. OECD, “DAC members 2019,” www.oecd.org/dac/dacmembers.htm. 23. OECD, Development Co-operation Report 2018: Joining Forces to Leave No One Behind (Paris: OECD, 2018). The regional development banks received a significant amount of the funding that used to be given to the UN, with a decrease in funding for the UN from 25 percent in 2015 to 14 percent in 2016. 24. Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency official, interviewed by the author, Ankara, August 19, 2014. 25. Altay Atli, “Businessmen as Diplomats: The Role of Business Associations in Turkey’s Foreign Economic Policy,” Insight Turkey 13, no. 1 (2011): 109–128. 26. Dilek Yankaya, “The Europeanization of MÜSİAD: Political Opportunism, Economic Europeanization, Islamic Euroscepticism,” European Journal of Turkish Studies, no. 9 (2009): 1–22. 27. The political rivalry between the AKP and the Gülen movement that culminated in the failed coup in Turkey in July 2016 had already made its mark in the development assistance field from 2013 onward, with the AKP pressuring countries benefiting from Turkey’s aid to shut down Gülen-supported projects. The Economist, “Religious Diplomacy, January 23, 2016. Kimse Yok Mu was shut down by governmental decree in the aftermath of the July 15, 2016, coup attempt. 28. Christopher Hill, The Changing Politics of Foreign Policy (Basingstoke, UK: Palgrave Macmillan, 2003), p. 222. 29. William Hale, Turkish Foreign Policy 1774–2000 (London: Frank Cass, 2000). 30. Hikmet Cetin, “Humanitarian Intervention, Responsibility to Protect, and Turkey’s Approach,” Turkish Weekly, February 16, 2015. 31. Pinar Tank, “Dressing for the Occasion: Reconstructing Turkey’s Identity,” Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 6, no. 4 (2006): 463–478. 32. Ahmet Davutoğlu, “Turkey’s Humanitarian Diplomacy: Objectives, Challenges and Prospects,” Nationalities Papers 41, no. 6 (2013): 870. 33. Philippe Régnier, “The Emerging Concept of Humanitarian Diplomacy: Identification of a Community of Practice and Prospects for International Recognition,” International Review of the Red Cross 93, no. 884 (2011): 1217. Philippe Régnier differentiates between state humanitarian diplomacy and humanitarian diplomacy conducted by humanitarian aid agencies by stating that the neutrality of the former is compromised by its subordination to political and security aims.

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34. Ahmet Davutoğlu, “Turkey’s Zero-Problems Foreign Policy,” Foreign Policy online, (May 20, 2010), https://foreignpolicy.com/2010/05/20/turkeys-zero-problems -foreign-policy/. 35. Ibid. 36. Ibid. 37. Ibid. 38. E. Fuat Keyman and Onur Sazak, “Turkey as a “Humanitarian State,” Project on the Middle East and Arab Spring (POMEAS) Policy Paper No. 2 (Washington, DC: George Washington University, July 2014). 39. The focus of Francis Fukuyama’s article is on the failures of US nation building in Afghanistan and Iraq. He cites critics who maintain that “outsiders can never build nations, if that means creating or repairing all the cultural, social and historical ties that bind people together as a nation” but maintains, in a “white man’s burden” argument, that US “interests dictate that we learn how better to teach other people to govern themselves.” Francis Fukuyama, “Nation-Building 101,” Atlantic Monthly online (January–February 2004), http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2004 /01/nation-building-101/302862/. 40. Keyman and Sazak, “Turkey as a “Humanitarian State.” 41. Salih Zeki Karaca, “Turkish Foreign Policy in the Year 2000 and Beyond: Her Opening Up Policy to Africa,” Foreign Policy: A Quarterly of the Foreign Policy Institute 25, nos. 3–4 (2000): 115–119 cited in Theodore Baird, “The Geopolitics of Turkey’s ‘Humanitarian Diplomacy’ in Somalia: A Critique,” Review of African Political Economy 43, no. 149 (2015): 471. 42. Astri Suhrke, “Reconstruction as Modernization: The ‘Post-Conflict’ Project in Afghanistan,” Third World Quarterly 28, no. 7 (2007): 1292. 43. Ibid. 44. Martha Finnemore and Kathryn Sikkink, “International Norm Dynamics and Political Change,” International Organization 52, no. 4 (1998): 891. 45. Torunn L. Tryggestad, “State Feminism Going Global: Norway on the UN Peacebuilding Commission,” Cooperation and Conflict 49, no. 4 (2014): 466. 46. Senior Turkish aid official, interviewed by the author, Ankara, August 19, 2014. 47. The following section on Turkey’s humanitarian role in Somalia is drawn in part from Pinar Tank, Turkey as a humanitarian actor: the critical cases of Somalia and Syria, NOREF Report (Oslo: Norwegian Peacebuilding Resource Centre, March 2015), https://emergingpowerspeacebuilding.files.wordpress.com/2015/08 /tank-turkey-as-a-humanitarian-actor-somalia-syria.pdf. 48. Pinar Tank, Turkey’s new humanitarian approach in Somalia, NOREF Policy Brief (Oslo: Norwegian Peacebuilding Resource Centre, December 2013), https:// emergingpowerspeacebuilding.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/tank-turkeys-new -humanitarian-approach-in-somalia-tank.pdf. 49. Hassan Sheikh Mahamud, “The Future of Governance in Somalia,” speech at the Center for Strategic and International Studies seminar, Washington, DC, February 17, 2013. 50. African Union diplomat, interviewed by the author, Istanbul, April 12, 2013. 51. Baird, “The Geopolitics of Turkey’s ‘Humanitarian Diplomacy’ in Somalia,” p. 3. 52. Kani Toru, Turkey’s ambassador to Somalia, interview in the Turkish Daily Sabah, June 9, 2014. 53. Directorate General for Africa, “Turkey and Somalia: A Synopsis of Technical and Humanitarian Cooperation,” Ankara: Republic of Turkey, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, 2016, p. 5. 54. However, it should be noted that despite Turkish efforts at inclusivity, Somalia’s main political actors were critical of the event and threatened to renege on

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agreed-on parameters such as the traditional elders’ planned trip to Istanbul to participate in the civil society gathering. See International Crisis Group, Assessing Turkey’s Role in Somalia, Briefing No. 92 (London: International Crisis Group, 2012). 55. African Union diplomat interview. 56. Figures provided in this paragraph are from Turkey’s embassy in Somalia. See Republic of Turkey, Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Directorate General for Africa, “Turkey and Somalia,” pp. 6–12. 57. Haurn Maruf, “Turkish Base Key to Building Strong Somali Army,” Voice of America, October 3, 2017, www.voanews.com/a/turkey-base-somalia-army/4054625.html. 58. International Crisis Group, Assessing Turkey’s Role in Somalia. 59. An example of the lack of control mechanisms was Turkey’s direct budgetary aid to the Central Bank governor in the form of cash payments. This continued until the resignation of his successor over allegations of graft within the Central Bank. According to news reports, the cash was delivered in boxes of $4.5 million to the former Central Bank governor, Abdulsalem Omer. Drazen Jorgic and Tulay Karadeniz, “Biggest Donor Turkey Stops Direct Budget Support,” Reuters, February 13, 2014. 60. Davutoğlu, “Turkey’s Humanitarian Diplomacy.” 61. Ziya Önis, “Turkey and the Arab Spring: Between Ethics and Self Interest,” Insight Turkey 14, no. 3 (2012): 46. 62. It is a truism to state that this is not solely unique to Turkey’s relations with the region. Cemalettin Hasimi, “Turkey’s Humanitarian Diplomacy and Development Cooperation,” Insight Turkey 16, no. 1 (2014): 127–145. 63. Crystal A. Ennis and Bessma Momani, “Shaping the Middle East in the Midst of the Arab Uprisings: Turkish and Saudi Foreign Policy Strategies,” Third World Quarterly 34, no. 6 (2013): 1127–1144. 64. Stephen F. Larrabee, “Turkey’s New Geopolitics,” Survival 52, no. 2 (2010): 166. 65. However, as Turkey’s relations with Israel soured following the Gaza offensive, talks were abandoned. 66. Charlie Rose, “Charlie Rose Talks to Recep Tayyip Erdoǧan,” Blomberg Businessweek, May 12, 2011. 67. In addition, allegations emerged in the Turkish press over Turkey’s transfer of arms to Islamist militants under the guise of humanitarian aid to Syria. These resulted in criminal charges against the journalist and editor who broke the story. See Pinar Tank, The Domestic Repercussions of Turkey’s Syria Policy, Policy Report 2014 (Oslo: University of Oslo, Department of Culture Studies and Oriental Languages, 2015), hf.uio.no/ikos/english/research/projects/new-middle-east/publications /2014/pt-rap-2014.pdf. 68. Fehim Tastekin, “Turks Fear Saudi Alliance Will Drag Country into Syria,” Al-Monitor, Turkey Pulse, May 8, 2015. 69. Syrian Regional Refugee Response, web-based information-sharing portal, September 28, 2016, based on official Turkish government figures. 70. Massimiliano Calì and Samia Sekkarie, “Much Ado About Nothing: The Economic Impact of Refugee Invasions,” Future Development Blog, Brookings Institution, September 16, 2015. Similarly, the OECD notes that GDP growth is forecast to increase from 3 percent in 2015 to above 4 percent in 2017. See OECD, Turkish Official Development Assistance 2015. 71. Ibid. 72. Charlotte Lattimer and Sophia Swithern, “Donors,” Chapter 3 in Global Humanitarian Assistance Report 2017, Development Initiatives, (2018):44, http:// devinit.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/GHA-Report-2017-Full-report.pdf.

8 Qatar: Conflict Mediation and Regional Objectives Sultan Barakat and Sansom Milton

from a little-known oil producer in the Gulf to a major power in the Arab region, with a global role far exceeding expectations for a state of its size. This move from the periphery to the center of global affairs has been spurred by Qatar’s vast wealth derived from its gas exports and its staunchly independent foreign policy. Qatar’s role in conflict mediation—which it has pursued since the late 1990s—is one of the most high-profile manifestations of this independent stance. Qatar has also emerged as a significant actor in postconflict reconstruction assistance, in particular in the Middle East. In this chapter, we explore the changing relationship between Qatari mediation and reconstruction efforts to contribute toward a better understanding of Qatar as an emerging donor in conflict response.

Over the past several decades, Qatar has been transformed

Qatar’s rapid transformation has been enabled by a quarter-century of political stability ushered in by a coup d’état in 1995 in which the dynamic and outward-looking Shaikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani replaced his father as emir, in addition to the vast wealth generated from Qatar’s rise to become one of the world’s largest gas exporters. Qatar’s stability and prosperity enabled the country to embark on significant developments in domestic and foreign policy. Qatar has implemented massive infrastructure projects, in particular those related to its winning bid to host the 2022 World Cup; has made high-profile cultural and educational investments, including Education City, the Qatar Foundation, and the Museum of Islamic Art; and has hosted and financed the Al Jazeera media network

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that has risen to global prominence through its distinctive coverage of events in the Arab world and beyond. These types of investments have been interpreted by many analysts as being driven largely by a strategy of state branding, which is increasingly important in a global political arena in which soft power qualities of image and reputation have increased in importance alongside traditional hard power concerns of military and economic strength.1 Through such a strategy, Qatar seeks to project to a global audience an image of itself as a modern, independent, dynamic, and cosmopolitan member of the international community.2 Qatar’s domestic stability was recently demonstrated in the smooth transition to Shaikh Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani, a rare abdication among monarchies in the region. However, Qatar’s stability is now being tested by the blockade imposed on it by Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates (UAE), Bahrain, and Egypt in a move ostensibly motivated by a desire to combat terrorism but rather reflecting long-standing tensions in the Gulf over Qatar’s independent and often controversial role in the Middle East. In terms of its engagement with conflict-affected states, Qatar has been involved on multiple levels, in particular in regional conflicts, in ways that have garnered widespread international attention and no small amount of controversy. This involvement has ranged from UN-mandated peacekeeping operations in the Djibouti-Eritrea border conflict, as an increasingly visible humanitarian aid donor that channels most of its funding to conflictaffected areas, to forms of intervention in the post–Arab uprisings context in which Qatar has backed rebel groups in Libya and Syria. While Qatar shares some similarities with other Gulf states that also have played an increasing role in conflict zones across the region, the two forms of engagement in conflict-affected contexts that Qatar has pursued most consistently over the past decade to carve out its distinctive niche in the Middle East are conflict mediation and postconflict reconstruction. The meteoric rise of Qatar has been met with an underlying Orientalism in perceptions of its new global cultural and sporting profile,3 which also applies to its new role in punching above its weight in international affairs. Part of this is reflected in a cynical view of its motives, which has been played into by Qatar not being open toward systematic research involving key officials in the country. Such misunderstandings have perpetuated a notion that Qatari engagement in conflict-affected contexts is in essence reducible to the profligate use of its ample financial reserves, which has skewed much analysis. In terms of mediation and reconstruction, Qatar’s involvement in the latter has too often been neglected due to the perception that such investments are merely financial incentives to affect conflict mediation processes. While there undoubtedly are major flaws in the modalities of incentivizing peace deals and postconflict investments in Qatar’s track record, this framing fails to explain the evolution of Qatari engagement in

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conflict-affected contexts and also obscures the ways in which Qatar offers a new and distinctive model of mediation and reconstruction. The most significant change within Qatar’s foreign policy has been its active and ever growing role in regional conflict mediation. The diplomatic influence wielded by Qatar is indicated in particular by the energy with which its leaders have pursued this role, leading efforts to end conflict in Yemen, Darfur, Lebanon, Palestine, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, and elsewhere. From the Qatari perspective, offering a hand in the resolution of armed conflict globally is reflective of a desire to uphold ethical standards, rooted in deep religious conviction, and a commitment to peace. Qatar’s commitment to conflict mediation is enshrined in Article 7 of its 2003 Constitution, which states that “the foreign policy of the State is based on the principle of strengthening international peace and security by means of encouraging peaceful resolution of international disputes.” The decision to focus on conflict mediation as a major aspect of its international engagement forms part of Qatar’s independent foreign policy. While Qatar mediated several minor disputes in the period 2000–2006, it was during 2006–2007 when the country sat on the UN Security Council that its conflict mediation activities increased.4 For instance, Qatar mediated the October 2006 agreement between Hamas and Fatah as well as the negotiations between the Yemeni government and Houthi rebels leading to a cease-fire in 2007 and peace agreement in 2008.5 As a Security Council member, Qatar secured its reputation as an independent actor maintaining relations with Western powers and with Iran and Syria. The most successful mediation undertaken by Qatar was its third-party role in the Lebanese political crisis that threatened to escalate into civil war but was averted through the facilitation of the Doha agreement between rival Lebanese political groups in 2008.6 This agreement was followed by the mediation between the government of Sudan and various rebel factions in an effort to end conflict in Darfur, leading to a cease-fire framework agreement between the government of Sudan and the Justice and Equality Movement (JEM) in 2010 and later including an umbrella movement of rebel groups, collectively known as the Liberation and Justice Movement (LJM).7 More recently, Qatar’s most controversial mediation attempts— those between the rival Palestinian political factions Fatah and Hamas that led to the Doha declaration in 2012 and between the Taliban and members of the international community also in 2012—highlight the unique international reputation that Qatar has succeeded in making for itself as an impartial broker between antagonistic groups. Collectively, these efforts have led Qatar to be dubbed “the non-stop mediator.”8

Conflict Mediation

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While Qatar’s legitimacy as a mediator is bolstered by its track record in ending conflict, there are a number of shortcomings in its role. Importantly, there has been a capacity gap with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs not possessing advanced in-house mediation skills and competencies comparable to those of other seasoned state mediators.9 This lack of capacity is evidenced by the heavy reliance on the efforts and personal attributes of its leaders, particularly former emir Shaikh Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani and former prime and foreign minister Shaikh Hamad bin Jassim Al Thani. In particular, Qatari mediation has been found to possess an inadequate institutional knowledge of “best practice strategies” and to be lacking a “portfolio of skills” in postsettlement implementation and cease-fire monitoring. 10 At the preparatory stage in certain contexts, for example, in Lebanon, Qatar was deemed to have demonstrated a high level of understanding of the conflict dynamics and sources of power and leverage. Yet in others, for example, in Yemen, “Qatari mediation was unaligned with customary practices, or wasata, and therefore peace agreements held inadequate moral compulsion over conflict parties.”11 Despite these criticisms, it is widely acknowledged that Qatar has successfully cultivated a sophisticated engagement with peace and conflict issues that, while not always effective and rarely without controversy, have nonetheless laid firm foundations for the emergence of the country as a key global player in conflict-affected contexts. The intensity of this mediation strategy is all the more remarkable in that Qatar is considered to be a small state. A foundational assumption of international relations theory has long been that international relations is the domain of the great powers, and that small states can aspire to be marginal actors at best.12 In terms of mediation, it is reasoned that great powers with significant resources are the only actors capable of effectively mediating conflict. However, over the past decades, in particular since the end of the Cold War, several small states have carved out a niche role as conflict mediators. Norway’s facilitation of the Israeli-Palestinian peace process that led to the 1993 Oslo Accords and the role of Switzerland as a famously neutral third party are two of the most widely known examples of smallstate mediation.13 More recently, other new third parties have emerged in an increasingly competitive global landscape of conflict mediation, including Brazil, Oman, Cuba, Kuwait, Malaysia, and Ghana,14 in addition to regional mediators such as the Gulf Cooperation Council and the African Union.15 Despite this trend, academic research into conflict mediation has largely ignored small-state mediation.16 However, the existing literature suggests that small states may possess some comparative advantages over big states in pursuing third-party roles in conflict-affected settings, including credibility, trustworthiness, and legitimacy rooted in their perceived neutrality, nonthreatening nature, and “no legacies of foreign excess.”17

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Another feature is that “small states typically do not possess the hard power resources utilized by large states to achieve outcomes and support postagreement processes. Rather, they engage in ‘pure mediation,’ where their capacity to determine or influence outcomes lies in the power of persuasion.”18 Other characteristics typical of small-state mediation are held to be the confinement of action to the realm of regional conflicts and the tendency to wait for an invitation to mediate rather than seeking out opportunities for third-party intervention.19 Furthermore, due to their engagement in mediation activities, small states, including Norway and Switzerland, now possess considerable experience and expertise embodied in their diplomatic resources and increasingly also in their research institutes, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), and think tanks such as the Norwegian Centre for Conflict Resolution (NOREF), Peace Research Institute Oslo, Chr. Michelsen Institute, and the Center for Humanitarian Dialogue. Qatar’s rise to prominence as a heavyweight power in the Middle East and its new role as a third-party mediator offer a unique case that, in many ways, diverts from these typical characteristics of small-state mediation. First, in terms of motivation for embarking on mediation as a major component of foreign policy, small states are held to promote their image as effective global players committed to peace based on a strategic rationale of state branding aimed at generating soft power, thus bolstering their power resources that are usually limited in conventional means of military might, economic resources, and strategic depth. 20 This explanation certainly helps to account for Qatari mediation in some high-profile conflicts in the Middle East during its frenetic period of mediation from 2005 until 2010, such as in Lebanon where the headline-grabbing Doha agreement made a name for Qatar as a major mediator. Yet in other cases, geostrategic and economic motivations for mediation have been more prominent. This increasingly is becoming the case, as stability in potential emerging markets is viewed as critical to Qatar’s economic survival in a world of low oil and gas prices. Second, the tendency for small powers to engage as neutral and impartial actors explains the Qatari mediation strategy prior to the onset of the Arab uprisings, but cannot capture the more partisan approach adopted in the post–Arab uprisings context. Since the early 1990s, Qatar has pursued an independent foreign policy, in part motivated by a desire to step out from the security orbit of Saudi Arabia. For decades, Saudi Arabia and Egypt had viewed themselves as the only powers in the region great enough to act as third-party mediators in conflicts in the Arab world. But the emergence of Qatar as a trusted third party through its high-profile mediation disrupted this regional order and announced the country’s intentions as an independent regional power. This independence is reflected in Qatar’s seemingly contradictory hosting of a US military base, Israeli trade office, Taliban office,

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Yusuf al-Qaradawi, and Khaled Meshaal—which enables Qatar to maintain good offices with diverse protagonists in the most challenging conflicts without jeopardizing its suitability as a mediator. Relatedly, while many Western states are increasingly constrained in their mediation efforts by counterterrorism legislation, Qatar can by contrast engage with a wide range of armed movements. In the historic wave of protests and revolutions throughout the Arab world in early 2011, however, Qatar shifted to a more interventionist stance, in particular in supporting Libyan and Syrian rebels. Similar concerns with regional stability have pushed Turkey (Chapter 7) to pursue more interventionist policies in Syria. Third, while small-state mediators typically rely on trust, communication, and neutrality rather than power, Qatar possesses vast financial capacity and the willingness to back up agreements with a variety of financial carrots that provides a level of leverage over the parties to the conflict that is unusual for a small mediator.21 This practice has, in some cases, led to an unsustainable approach to mediation that only addressed surface issues and failed to resolve the underlying drivers of conflict. It has also served to blur the lines analytically between Qatar’s modalities of conflict mediation and postconflict investment. However, as shown in the next section, this finding has been overgeneralized and, over time, Qatar has developed a more longterm and sophisticated approach to linking its mediation portfolio and postconflict reconstruction investments. Over the past decade, Qatar has emerged as a major donor to conflictaffected and fragile contexts. Over the period 2007–2011 Qatar provided an annual average of $540 million in foreign aid, during which government grants for development projects and programs accounted for 88 percent of total foreign aid with 12 percent allocated to humanitarian assistance, largely channeled through NGOs. North Africa received 69 percent of Qatari aid, and Egypt was the recipient of almost 50 percent. Since then, foreign aid to conflict-affected contexts has increased. Governmental assistance from Qatar during 2010–2011—the initial period of the Arab uprisings—was channeled primarily to Arab countries experiencing conflict or transition, with 77 percent of assistance going to Egypt, 16 percent to Libya, 6 percent to Jordan, and 2 percent to Yemen.22 Qatar has also increased its proportion of foreign aid allocated to humanitarian assistance. As shown in Table 8.1, Qatar’s level of humanitarian assistance increased from a very low level in 2012 to a fairly consistent level above $100 million annually with fluctuations in 2016 and 2018 to lower levels which are nonetheless significantly higher than before 2012. In May 2016 at the World Humanitarian Summit, Qatar pledged $10 billion toward human-

Qatar’s Emergence as a Foreign Aid Donor

Qatar: Conflict Mediation and Regional Objectives Table 8.1 Total Reported Humanitarian Funding from Qatar, 2011–2018 (in millions of US dollars) Year

Total

2009 13

2010 2

2011

17.1

2012

104.9

2013

108.7

2014

155.7

2015

103.3

2016

44.1

2017 101

147

2018

51.5

Source: UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, Financial Tracking Service, https://fts.unocha.org/donors/87/summary/2019.

itarian and development assistance over the coming decade. Taken as an average annual foreign aid expenditure of $1 billion, this would represent a near doubling of Qatar’s annual foreign aid expenditure. A notable feature of Qatari humanitarian assistance is its focus on fragile states, which received 94 percent of its funding between 2009 and 2013,23 which is the joint second highest of all donors (with Brazil, India, Kuwait, and South Africa).24 Table 8.1 provides an overview of Qatar’s humanitarian assistance. Similar to other nontraditional donors such as China and Brazil (Chapters 2 and 5), Qatar is quietly offering an alternative to the conventional bestpractice aid policies of powerful Western donors.25 Qatar has not approximated the liberal peacebuilding model that has influenced traditional donors’ engagement in postconflict contexts. This is due in part to a recognition that if a nondemocratic polity were to promote liberal democratic reforms in wartorn societies, it would be seen as disingenuous or hypocritical. Yet it is also rooted in a principled rejection of interventionist pushing of liberal economic and political reforms. Qatar and other Gulf state donors—long before the Paris Principles of Aid Effectiveness and the emergence of ownership as a buzzword in Western aid policy—have avoided conditionality and tying of aid, which is rooted in a respect for Islamic principles of charity and the sovereignty of recipient governments and communities.26 Qatar shares other similarities with Gulf state donors—which are by no means new donors—including a focus on the Middle East, weakly institutionalized aid frameworks, prioritization of infrastructural assistance, and a tendency for aid levels to correlate with oil prices.27 Yet there is also a divergence of aid approaches within the Gulf states, with the UAE joining the Development Assistance Committee of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD DAC), which contrasts with Saudi Arabia’s invoking of Islam in its aid policy. Qatar had long favored an individualistic approach to aid but has recently moved toward greater adherence to global aid norms, as evidenced by its accession to the OECD DAC as a participant. This alignment with international aid norms is primarily motivated by a recent desire to better coordinate with international donors and to reduce the perceived otherness of Qatar as a donor state that has made it difficult for Qatar to truly work together with other international donors. This process has

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not been without difficulties, however, in that efforts are under way to ensure coherence between culturally specific and OECD DAC interpretations of aid categories. For instance, Qatar has attempted to expand global norms by including matters such as Ramadan meals in what would typically be considered food distributions and mosque building under construction.28 Qatar’s role as a foreign aid donor has evolved considerably over time, with a shift from a highly personalized use of aid by the emir to an institutionalized aid architecture. For much of its history, Qatar has preferred personalized distribution of aid, such that donations appear to be closely linked to the emir himself. However, the grip of the Qatari emirs on aid allocation has slowly eased with authority incrementally given to institutions. Under Emir Khalifa (1972–1995), aid disbursement was highly personalized, which is largely explained by the fear that as an independent source of patronage and wealth, any aid-allocating body could threaten regime stability. Under Emir Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani (1995) a phase of institutionalization occurred with the establishment of the Qatar Development Fund (QDF) in 2002, the Qatari Authority of Charitable Activities (QACA) in 2004, the Standing Committee in 2008, and the Department of International Development (DID) in 2009. Yet although established by law, neither the QDF nor the Standing Committee was active during Emir Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani’s era and the QACA’s role was limited to monitoring NGOs. Additionally, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs was not officially tasked with managing aid until 2009, when the DID was established as a department under the minister’s assistant for international cooperation affairs. So, while the emir initiated aid institutionalization, he still preferred a more personalized and centralized approach to aid disbursement with the bulk of the aid, particularly the large sums, expended by himself and his prime minister, Hamad bin Jassim bin Jaber Al Thani. In short, even when concern with domestic stability was less of an issue, aid was perceived to be too powerful a tool to be delegated to an institution. Under Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani (2013 to present), institutionalization of Qatar’s aid architecture has continued. The emir activated the Qatar Development Fund, signaling a shift in Qatari aid management. In early 2015, the fund was split from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and mandated to be a public institution reporting to the cabinet. A vibrant Qatari civil society has also emerged, with much assistance provided to conflictaffected contexts, in particular in the Muslim world. Domestic NGOs include Eid Charity, the Sheikh Thani bin Abdullah Foundation for Humanitarian Services, and the Qatari Red Crescent. Most Qatari NGOs raise the majority of their funds from individual donations, which contrasts with many Western NGOs that often are beholden to state interests as their main funding source. This affords the sector significant decisionmaking auton-

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omy over where to operate even when that contradicts the strategic rationales for Qatari state engagement in conflict zones. By contrast, organizations established under the umbrella of the Qatar Foundation operate as semistate charitable institutions that focus on specific niches such as education or youth unemployment, including Reach Out to Asia, Silatech, and Education Above All. Qatar has emerged as a large Gulf state donor to postconflict reconstruction activities, particularly to states in the Middle East and North Africa. The scale of its reconstruction aid has increased greatly since the 1990s. After the signing of the Dayton Peace Agreement, Qatar provided $5 million in reconstruction aid to Bosnia.29 Similar to other Gulf state donors, Qatar pledged funds to Iraq in its reconstruction after Saddam Hussein and delivered little, with the $100 million that was pledged unable to be publicly tracked. 30 In contrast with these relatively minor roles, in the cases of Lebanon, Darfur, and Gaza, Qatar has been one of the largest bilateral donors for postconflict reconstruction. It is no coincidence that these contexts of Qatari support for reconstruction are three of the highest profile cases of Qatari conflict mediation. There is some debate over the extent to which Qatar ties its foreign policy objectives to its foreign aid, with Homi Kharas providing a skeptical treatment of the broader consensus that there is a clear link between the two domains.31 One area in which Qatar has, in some contexts, utilized aid for foreign policy aims is in the strategic use of its financial capacity to leverage conflict parties to reach negotiated settlements in contexts where it has acted as a third-party mediator, as shown below in the cases of Yemen and Lebanon. Such instrumental allocation of postconflict funding has led to criticism of the sustainability of Qatari mediation,32 and to a general dismissal by analysts of Qatari reconstruction efforts as mere side payments that warrant little examination.33 This is wrongheaded, first, because the link between conflict mediation and developmental investment is a greatly understudied phenomenon34 and the case of Qatar offers a rich case study. Furthermore, and as we show, while some cases of Qatari engagement can be accurately characterized as short-term leveraging of conflict parties, in other contexts the country has emerged as a distinctive and major actor in postconflict reconstruction worthy of greater analysis. In the case of Lebanon, Qatar provided over $250 million in housing reconstruction assistance following the July War in 2006. The average compensation per household for housing to properties of all levels of damage was $32,389—almost three times greater than the next-largest contributor.35 Qatar’s strong support for housing reconstruction significantly

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contrasts with the trend in OECD DAC donorship, marked by a 26.5 percent reduction in funding for shelter reconstruction over the 2002–2006 period, with greater allocations to state building, public administration reform, and other emergent priorities in fragile states.36 Qatari reconstruction is also notable for the modality of “direct execution” that it utilized in which money was transferred directly to individual families through grants that bypassed Lebanese authorities and enhanced “ownership” of reconstruction spending.37 This contrasts with the delivery mechanism employed by Saudi Arabia, in which money was transferred to Lebanese governmental agencies, as well as with mechanisms employed by other emerging donors discussed in this book. The emergence of Qatar as a major player in the reconstruction of Lebanon is explained by the highly politically charged nature of the reconstruction.38 Pledges of reconstruction funding sparked interstate competition in a battle for hearts and minds as Sunni Gulf states feared that Shiite Iran would win favor from large-scale assistance. In response, Qatar invested in rebuilding Bint Jbeil, a Shiite area in southern Lebanon.39 Great effort was made to publicize Qatari generosity, for example, through the high-profile visit of Emir Hamad bin Khalifa Al Thani to reconstructed villages in southern Lebanon in 201040 and the outreach campaign that included advertising banners to convey the message of Qatari goodwill in ‘Aita al-Cha’b.41 Qatar’s involvement in reconstruction was followed by its role in mediation in the 2008 political crisis that brought Lebanon to the brink of another civil war. While the talks in Doha were a resounding success in the short term, critics have argued that the approach to mediation merely addressed surfacelevel issues without tackling the deep-rooted structural drivers of conflict. Moreover, the claimed payment of $300–$500 million to parties to the agreement was viewed as a form of “checkbook diplomacy.”42 This charge was rightly repeated in the analysis of Qatar’s mediation efforts in Yemen from 2007, which offers the clearest case in which Qatar utilized the promise of reconstruction funding as a form of leverage to affect meditation outcomes. Following a cease-fire brokered in June 2007, on February 1, 2008, a peace agreement was signed in Doha, at which time Qatar pledged $300–$500 million in funding for the reconstruction of Saada governorate, home to the Houthi rebel group.43 The agreement stipulated that the Yemeni government free prisoners of war, grant amnesties to rebels, and rebuild conflict-affected areas, while the Houthi movement was obligated to descend from the mountains and disarm.44 Fighting broke out shortly after the agreement and, by March 2009, President Ali Abdullah Saleh announced the failure of Qatari mediation.45 This prompted the withdrawal of the Qatari pledge of reconstruction assistance that had created soaring expectations,46 particularly among the local populations in Saada where development projects were badly needed.

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The main obstacle to Qatari mediation efforts in Yemen was “the lack of effective follow-up mechanisms to regulate and monitor disputes during implementation and adjudication.”47 Furthermore, the International Crisis Group claims that “the initiative essentially amounted to throwing money at a problem, hoping it would disappear.”48 This is further supported by the reported lack of political will, with the Yemeni mediation efforts handled by Ministry of Foreign Affairs employees rather than by the emir or prime minister, as occurred in other cases including Darfur and Lebanon.49 Qatar’s lack of a long-term commitment to mediation can be partly explained by its motivations for involvement as a mediator being driven by brotherly competition with Saudi Arabia, which was infuriated by Qatar’s role, to prove that it could be a leader in the region. The cases of Yemen and Lebanon provide the clearest empirical evidence of Qatar’s use of a shallow form of checkbook diplomacy that provides carrots to various parties to conflict to reach agreements, often with unsustainable outcomes.50 This finding emerges from an observation of two cases that occurred within the 2006–2010 phase of Qatar’s nonstop mediation in which there was strong motivation to successfully bring about peace deals to bolster the reputation of the country as a regional and global diplomatic player. However, much analysis of Qatar has overgeneralized this finding to taint the entire track record of the emirate as a mediator with the result of explaining away all Qatari postconflict assistance as a side payment to facilitate mediation. This can be observed clearly in the later cases of mediation and postconflict reconstruction in Darfur and Gaza. In the case of Darfur, Qatar brokered the Doha agreement in 2011. As part of the negotiations, Qatar committed to substantial reconstruction funding and proposed ambitious schemes such as the yet-to-be-established Darfur Development Bank.51 In 2013 Qatar hosted a donor conference for Darfur, at which it pledged $500 million to support the Darfur Development Strategy. The promise of investment acted as a form of leverage in Qatar’s mediation efforts with the lure of funding incentivizing rebel groups to agree to a negotiated settlement. Qatar’s mediation in Darfur has been criticized for constituting short-term checkbook diplomacy that bridges surface-level divisions between parties without addressing structural drivers of conflict or longterm postconflict recovery. 52 However, Qatar’s presence in Darfur has proven more long-lasting than in other cases where reconstruction funding has been utilized as a financial carrot. In 2014 Qatar contributed $88 million to the UN Darfur Fund, which accounted for half of the fund’s budget.53 While Darfur witnessed an upturn in violence in 2016, the peace process has continued, with a splinter faction of the Sudan Liberation Movement signing the agreement in January 2017. The less high-profile and longer-term involvement in Darfur, in contrast to Yemen, is explained by Qatar’s deeper strategic interest in Sudan’s

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stability and its potential to act as a major asset that could support the food security of Qatar. As a desert peninsula with little domestic agriculture, Qatar is highly dependent on imports to meet 90 percent of its consumption needs.54 Qatar’s long-term food security is dependent on regional stability in that its main supply routes are highly precarious, affected by the ongoing Yemeni conflict in the Gulf of Aden, and threatened by the prospect of international conflict with Iran and the closure of the Strait of Hormuz.55 Most startling, the Gulf crisis and blockade of Qatar enforced by Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and their allies in mid-2017 brought international attention to the food security of Qatar as the country rapidly moved to secure alternative supply routes in a context where 40 percent of food supplies previously entered through its land border with Saudi Arabia. As part of Qatar’s strategy to bolster its food security through diversifying its sources of imports, the country has purchased land in several countries including Australia, Pakistan, and the Philippines. One of the largest of these investments was the $1 billion deal reached by Hassad Foods, established by the Qatari Investment Authority, to utilize arable land to supply food to Qatar.56 This concern with a critical national interest— food security—in contrast to the case of Lebanon where elements of state branding and soft power were the prime motivations—diverges from the short-term checkbook diplomacy approach and explains the more committed long-term engagement in conflict mediation and postwar reconstruction. Another case where Qatar has been a major actor in mediation and reconstruction over the long term is the Gaza Strip. Following the implementation of the blockade in 2007, Qatar attempted to position itself as a major player in Gaza’s reconstruction and development. In 2010 Qatar offered to restore diplomatic relations with Israel, which had been strained following the 2008–2009 war in Gaza, on the condition that Qatar be granted access to deliver amounts of funding and materials for reconstruction efforts far above those deemed politically acceptable by Israel; however, the proposal was rejected. 57 Since then, Qatar has emerged as the largest and most consistent bilateral donor to the Gaza Strip, and “as one of the few Arab countries to have constructive relations with Israel—has been able to maintain privileged reconstruction access to Gaza. Qatar also has good relations with Hamas and has thus been able to establish an office in Gaza for coordinating reconstruction.”58 Qatar allocated $400 million for reconstruction in 2012, and pledged an additional $1 billion in the aftermath of the 2014 war.59 Qatari reconstruction assistance includes funding for several highways, a prosthetics center, and two large housing complexes—Hamad City with over 3,000 housing units for displaced persons was completed in January 2016. While Qatari assistance has been crucial to averting a humanitarian catastrophe and complete breakdown of the Gaza Strip, the amounts of aid

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and materials permitted entry into the blockaded coastal enclave are far below the levels required to achieve genuine reconstruction. Qatar has, on several occasions, offered to mediate agreements between Hamas and Israel that would provide Qatar with greater access to enable a more transformative reconstruction process. In early 2015, Qatar attempted to broker a deal between Israel and Hamas with a proposal for a five-year cease-fire and lifting of the blockade.60 In the event that the agreement had been brokered, Qatar was ready to invest in a massive reconstruction effort that could have averted the slow and ineffective process of rebuilding under the Gaza Reconstruction Mechanism. Following the Great March of Return protests in early 2018 that represented the deepest instability in Gaza since the 2014 war, Qatar’s envoy to Gaza offered to mediate a cease-fire between Hamas and Israel, with $350 million in Qatari humanitarian aid pledged as part of a deal that was rejected.61 Shortly after, Egypt and the UN jointly brokered a deal that involved Qatar making six monthly payments of $15 million, mostly to fund Hamas’s civil servant salaries.62 Qatar’s provision of cash to address the civil servant pay crisis to enable a deal brokered by Egypt—one of the countries blockading Qatar since June 2017—is a mark of political maturity in that it is underwriting diplomatic initiatives of its rival. It could be surmised that Qatari reconstruction funding has been consistently on offer over the past decade as an incentive for Israel and Hamas to reach a cease-fire or other agreement that would mark the high point for Qatar’s mediation. Yet while Qatar has offered reconstruction funding as a carrot to leverage deals, it has done so repeatedly and not as a short-term approach. Furthermore, the ultimate goal of Qatari involvement in Gaza is more plausibly reconstruction access itself, with its mediation role a crucial potential facilitator of this. In other words, rather than treating reconstruction funding as an instrumental means of clinching a peace deal, Qatar appears to be offering mediation as a means to end the blockade and undertake largescale reconstruction in Gaza. Much of this motivation is due to the goodwill generated toward Qatar in Palestine and the Arab street by its contribution of reconstruction aid to alleviate the suffering of Gaza’s population. Many of the generalized findings about Qatar’s use of financial leverage to bring about mediation outcomes have been derived from a particular period of its hyperactive mediation from around 2006 until 2010. These high-profile initiatives were initially driven, at least in part, by a desire to project an image of Qatar as a major regional power. Over the past few years, this reputational rationale has receded as a driver of Qatar’s engagement in conflictaffected contexts, leading to a more long-term and sustained engagement in the conflict zones in which the country has recently been involved.

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The Arab uprisings in 2011 ushered in a sea change in Qatari foreign policy as it shifted from a highly independent foreign policy to a more partisan and interventionist stance in an attempt to influence the outcome of the Arab uprisings. In the initial months of the uprisings, Al Jazeera’s Arabic language news channel played a major role in voicing the demands of protestors and helped to shape the trajectory of that crucial moment in the region’s history. Qatar played an important role in the 2011 intervention in Libya, with its support deemed crucial by an international coalition that wanted to ensure the intervention was not perceived as a purely Western-led mission with no buy-in from Arab countries. This was followed by the Syrian crisis, which morphed into a full-scale civil war throughout 2011. The estimated $3 billion financial commitment by Qatar over the 2011–2014 period to providing arms and training to Syrian opposition forces represents a sum larger than the annual average of Qatari foreign aid. Yet in contrast to the relatively short intervention in Libya, the Syrian conflict has become a protracted quagmire attracting more negative global attention to the role of Qatar and the Gulf states. It has also given rise to the accusations of terror financing, which have harmed the state’s reputation. Referring to Qatar’s relationship with Islamist groups in Syria, David B. Roberts writes that “the state’s evident relations with an extremist group like Jabhat alNusra, though such actions are doubtless undertaken with the connivance of western intelligence and security agencies, still look bad for the state.” 63 The desire of the former emir and top officials to put Qatar on the global radar through its high-profile conflict mediation has largely paid off in terms of short-term state-branding objectives. Yet the more partisan role in Middle Eastern conflicts that followed was met with considerable blowback. This negative reputational fallout has even led some Western parliaments to debate the suitability of Qatar as an ally, which highlights the potential damage that the short-lived phase of interventionism could have done to the long-term strategy of ensuring Qatar’s security by projecting its image as an independent state.64 Illustrating the significance of this interventionism for Qatari mediation, the Financial Times reported that a Western diplomat concluded “In Syria, Qatar became an active protagonist.” The diplomat added that, having worked to become a kind of Norway of the Gulf, Qatar also wanted to be “the Gulf version of the UK and France, and you can’t be both at the same time.”65 To manage the regional and international blowback that resulted from the Arab uprisings’ interventionist phase, Qatar reevaluated its role in conflict zones within the Middle East by adopting a less interventionist policy. A leadership transition occurred in June 2013, with the young Emir Tamim bin Hamad Al Thani assuming power, which marked a subtle but highly significant shift in Qatari foreign policy. One of the first imperatives facing the emir was to ensure an orderly transition and to consolidate his regime. For a brief moment, it appeared as if the days of high-profile mediation and

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involvement in foreign conflicts might be over, with a more inward-looking shift in policy emphasis, in particular on developing domestic infrastructure to accommodate the 2022 World Cup that will come at a cost of $500 million every month until Qatar’s hosting of the event. This trend was also anticipated based on the known interests of the emir in his time as crown prince, during which “he seldom focused explicitly on foreign policy; never took a portfolio, led a mediation effort, or otherwise focused on a niche issue in Qatar’s international relations.”66 The more internalized focus can be witnessed in the shift from the previous prime minister’s dual role as the foreign minister to the new prime minister’s dual role as interior minister, a symbolic move that reflects the change in priorities. In this phase, while Qatar maintained its role in conflict mediation and postconflict reconstruction (in particular in the cases of Darfur and Gaza where it was already involved and which were analyzed above), no new major mediation processes were undertaken and the country moved away from complex national conflicts to single-issue mediation, focused on prisoner exchange and release of hostages, such as when it facilitated the exchange of US sergeant Bowe Bergdahl for five Taliban prisoners from Guantanamo Bay. Several of these deals involved direct payments from Qatar to rebel groups; for instance, the release of the captive nuns of Maaloula in Syria in 2014, which involved payment of $16 million to Jabhat al-Nusra. Furthermore, in April 2017 Qatar concluded what was reported as a $1 billion payment to the Kata’ib Hezbollah in Iraq and other groups to release a twenty-six-strong hunting party, including Qatari royals, captured near Basra in 2015. The deal was made conditional on Qatari mediation of the highly complex and controversial “four towns” population swap of besieged territories in Syria.67 Such deals reinforce the popular impression that Qatar throws money around in its approach to mediation, although in the case of prisoner releases, the dynamic of checkbook diplomacy can resolve a one-off issue and is not comparable to a short-term financial incentive approach to resolving major intrastate conflicts. The most significant geopolitical development in Qatar’s history occurred in June 2017, when after years of simmering intra-Gulf tensions, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Bahrain, and Egypt enforced a blockade on Qatar and insisted on an end to its independent foreign policy—in particular its support of the Muslim Brotherhood and Hamas—as the price for lifting it. This unprecedented diplomatic crisis has had a major impact on how Qatar engages in conflict response at all levels. In the days after the onset of the Gulf crisis in early June, Qatar withdrew its small number of armed forces from the Saudi-UAE coalition fighting the war in Yemen. One week later, Qatar withdrew its peacekeeping forces from the Djibouti-Eritrea border— after both states sided with Saudi Arabia and the UAE—where they had been stationed for almost ten years following a Qatar-mediated cease-fire between the two countries. In the initial months, the blockade paralyzed

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Qatar’s long-term strategic engagement in mediation as the capacities of its key ministries were geared toward crisis management. This marked a sharp shift in that Qatar turned from offering its mediation services to being a party to mediation efforts by Kuwait, Turkey, the United States, and others. Yet after weathering the initial storm of the crisis, Qatar resumed its more proactive role in conflict response in a new phase that is more outwardly ambitious than under the inward shift of its regime consolidation phase. Qatar is again offering its mediation and facilitation in major intraand interstate conflicts, including through its hosting of intra-Palestinian unity talks, and in several other conflict zones in which it has a clear geostrategic or economic interest. Most notably, in January–March 2019 Qatar provided high-level facilitation of direct US-Taliban negotiations in Doha over the withdrawal of foreign forces from Afghanistan and guarantees that Afghan soil would not be used by international terrorists against US interests. The Afghanistan peace process is the highest-profile mediation attempted by Qatar since the onset of the Arab uprisings in 2011, and marks a diplomatic victory in that Doha is hosting a process that in late 2018 was being facilitated by its blockading rivals in Saudi Arabia and the UAE. While Qatar has acted as a facilitator to talks with the Taliban over a number of years and has hosted the Taliban Political Commission in Doha since 2013, the timing of this recent engagement is best explained not as state branding with the aim of pulling off a diplomatic coup to bolster the image of Qatar in the eyes of a global public audience. Instead, crucially, it should be clarified as an act that demonstrates Qatar’s reliability as a long-term security and counterterrorism partner to the United States and other allies in the context of the existential threat of the Gulf crisis in which the country has stood accused by the blockading states of financing terrorism. The Gulf crisis has accelerated the evolution of Qatar’s approach to engagement in conflict-affected contexts. Prior to the implementation of the blockade of Qatar in 2017, major changes to the country’s mediation portfolio were already under way. Most importantly, a professionalization of Qatar’s infrastructure for engaging with conflict-affected countries is reflected in the appointment of a special envoy for counterterrorism and conflict mediation. Qatar has also increasingly engaged in collaborative mediation efforts with other actors, including nongovernmental organizations and Western states (in particular Norway), as evidenced by the multiactor Doha process in the Afghan peace talks. Learning from Norway and its collaborative approach that involves NGOs and research institutes in mediation, Qatar has also invested in educational capacities specialized in conflict analysis and mediation inside Qatar, in particular the Center for Conflict and Humanitarian Studies. At the global diplomatic level, Qatar has supported various issues, including protecting education in armed conflict,

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championing Sustainable Development Goal 16 on conflict and fragility, and endorsing the Responsibility to Protect, all through the UN system, topics that many other Arab states have traditionally shied away from. The trends of professionalization, capacity development, norm entrepreneurship, and collaboration as part of Qatar’s approach to engaging with conflict zones have all been amplified as part of a strategy of demonstrating that Qatar is a key global security partner given the hostile external environment of the Gulf crisis. Qatar undoubtedly remains highly image conscious, as evidenced by the hiring of Portland Communications, a leading public relations firm, at the heart of government. However, there is no longer an urgent desire to view any particular conflict as a potential quick win in terms of boosting the global profile of the country, with the attendant risks in leveraging conflict parties to reach a deal through sizable postconflict investments. Rather, Qatar has made a commitment to addressing issues of peace and conflict globally over the long term and in a more sustainable manner. Qatar’s rise to prominence as a regional actor engaged in conflict response on a number of scales has brought with it misunderstanding and confusion. Mediation was used for a brief period as a means to make a name for the country on the global stage, which involved utilizing financial hard power to leverage quick results. This observation has often informed a dismissive judgment of Qatar’s postconflict reconstruction, which has been reduced in some analyses to simply financial inducements to bring about an end to various conflicts. Yet over time, Qatar’s conflict response has evolved with a more mature and long-term approach to mediation and postconflict reconstruction driven by the competing demands of domestic power transition and a changing regional security complex in the wake of the Gulf crisis. All of this makes Qatar an interesting, uniquely positioned, and emerging potential partner for engaging in conflict-affected contexts.

Conclusion

This chapter builds cumulatively on work carried out by the authors on Qatar’s role in conflict mediation and postconflict reconstruction over a number of years. 1. Peter Van Ham, “Branding Territory: Inside the Wonderful World of PR and IR Theory,” Millennium: Journal of International Studies 31, no. 2 (2002): 249– 269; Peter Van Ham, “Place Branding: The State of the Art,” ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Sciences 616, no. 1 (2008): 126–149. 2. J. E. Peterson, “Qatar and the World: Branding for a Micro State,” Middle East Journal 60, no. 4 (2006): 732–748. 3. Karen Exell and Trinidad Rico, “‘There Is No Heritage in Qatar’: Orientalism, Colonialism and Other Problematic Histories,” World Archaeology 45, no. 4 (2013): 670–685; Benjamin Smith, Market Orientalism: Cultural Economy and the Arab Gulf States (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2015).

Notes

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4. Sultan Barakat, “Qatari Mediation: Between Ambition and Achievement,” Brookings Doha Center Analysis Paper No. 12 (Doha: Brookings Institution, 2014). 5. International Crisis Group, Yemen: Defusing the Saada Time Bomb, Middle East Report No. 86 (Brussels: International Crisis Group, May 27, 2009). 6. Simon Haddad, “Lebanon: From Consociationalism to Conciliation,” Nationalism and Ethnic Politics 15, no. 3 (2009): 398–416. 7. Anders Gulbrandsen, “Bridging the Gulf: Qatari Business Diplomacy and Conflict Mediation,” master’s thesis, Georgetown University, 2010. 8. Robert F. Worth, “Qatar, Playing All Sides, Is a Nonstop Mediator,” New York Times, July 9, 2008. 9. Sultan Barakat, “The Qatari Spring: Qatar’s Emerging Role in Peacemaking,” Research Paper No. 24 (London: Kuwait Programme on Development, Governance and Globalisation in the Gulf States, London School of Economics, 2012). 10. Barakat, “Qatari Mediation.” 11. Ibid, p. 22. 12. Doug Lieb, “The Limits of Neorealism,” Harvard International Review 26, no. 1 (2004): 26–29; Iver B. Neumann and Sieglinde Gstöhl, “Lilliputians in Gulliver’s World? Small States in International Relations,” Working Paper No. 1 (Reykjavík: Centre for Small State Studies: University of Iceland, 2004); Mehran Kamrava, Qatar: Small State, Big Politics (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2013). 13. Simon Mason and David Lanz, “Switzerland’s Experiences in Peace Mediation,” in Touko Piiperinen and Ville Brummer, eds., Global Networks of Mediation Prospects and Avenues for Finland as a Peacemaker (Helsinki: Finnish Institute of International Affairs and Chr. Michelsen Institute, 2012), pp. 73–78. 14. Pertti Joenniemi, “Finland: A Non-traditional Peacemaker,” Canadian Foreign Policy Journal 19, no. 1 (2013): 53–59; Simon Mason and Damiano Angelo Sguaitamatti, Mapping Mediators: A Comparison of Third Parties and Implications for Switzerland (Zurich: Center for Security Studies (CSS)/Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH), 2011). 15. Laurie Nathan, “Mediation and the African Union’s Panel of the Wise,” Discussion Paper No. 10 (London: Crisis States Research Centre, London School of Economics, 2005); Marco Pinfari, “Nothing but Failure? The Arab League and the Gulf Cooperation Council as Mediators in Middle Eastern Conflicts,” Working Paper Regional and Global Axis of Conflict No. 45, Crisis States Working Papers Series No. 2 (London: London School of Economics, 2009). 16. Andrew Williams, “Mediation by Small States: Some Lessons from the CSCE,” Paradigms 6, no. 1 (1992): 52–64. 17. Randa M. Slim, “Small-State Mediation in International Relations: The Algerian Mediation of the Iranian Hostage Crisis,” in Jacob Bercovitch and Jeffery Z. Rubin, eds., Mediation in International Relations: Multiple Approaches to Conflict Management (London: Macmillan, 1992), pp. 206–231; Daniel Lieberfeld, “Small Is Credible: Norway’s Niche in International Dispute Settlement,” Negotiation Journal 11, no. 3 (1995): 201–207; Deiniol Lloyd Jone, Cosmopolitan Mediation? Conflict Resolution and the Oslo Accords (Manchester, UK: University of Manchester Press, 1999), p. 112; Jacob Bercovitch, “Mediation in the Most Resistant Cases,” in Chester Crocker, Fen Osler Hampson, and Pamela Aall, eds., Grasping the Nettle: Analyzing Cases of Intractable Conflict (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2005), p. 111; Peter Coleman, “The Value Added of Smaller States in Peace Mediation: Smart Peace,” in Touko Piiparinen and Ville Brummer, eds., Global Networks of Mediation: Prospects and Avenues for Finland as a Peacemaker, Report No. 32 (Helsinki: Finnish Institute of International Affairs, 2012), p. 71. 18. Barakat, “Qatari Mediation,” p. 10.

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19. Jacob Bercovitch, “Introduction: Or How to Study and Do Research on Mediation,” in Jacob Bercovitch, ed., Theory and Practice of International Mediation: Selected Essays (London: Routledge, 2011), p. 8. 20. Joseph Nye, “The Place of Soft Power in State-Based Conflict Management,” in Chester Crocker, Fen Osler Hampson, and Pamela Aall, eds., Leashing the Dogs of War: Conflict Management in a Divided World (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace Press, 2007), pp. 389–400. 21. Ibid. 22. World Bank, “Response of the Arab Donors to the Global Financial Crisis and the Arab Spring,” MENA Knowledge and Learning Quick Notes Series, 2013, http://siteresources.worldbank.org/INTMENA/Resources/QN112.pdf. 23. Development Initiatives, Global Humanitarian Assistance Report 2015 (Bristol: Development Initiatives 2015). 24. Ibid. 25. Ngaire Woods, “Whose Aid? Whose Influence? China, Emerging Donors and the Silent Revolution in Development Assistance,” International Affairs 84, no. 6 (2008): 1205–1221. 26. Sultan Barakat and Steven A. Zyck, Gulf State Assistance to ConflictAffected Environments (London: Centre for the Study of Global Governance, London School of Economics, 2010). 27. Ibid.; Debra Shushan and Christopher Marcoux, “The Rise (and Decline?) of Arab Aid: Generosity and Allocation in the Oil Era,” World Development 39, no. 11 (2011): 1969–1980. 28. Senior Qatari officials, interviewed by Sultan Barakat, Doha, January 2016. 29. Barakat and Zyck, Gulf State Assistance to Conflict-Affected Environments. 30. Ibid. 31. Homi Kharas, “Trends and Issues in Qatari Foreign Aid,” Working Paper No. 15-11 (Doha: Silatech, June 2015). 32. Haddad, “Lebanon.” 33. Kristian Coates Ulrichsen, Qatar and the Arab Spring (New York: Oxford University Press, 2014). 34. Ashraf Ghani, Clare Lockhart, and Blair Glencourse, “Assessing the Linkages Between Diplomatic Peacemaking and Developmental Peacebuilding Efforts,” in Mats Berdal and Achim Wennmann, eds., Ending Wars, Consolidating Peace: Economic Perspectives (London: Routledge for International Institute for Strategic Studies, 2010), pp. 53–74. 35. Sultan Barakat and Steven A. Zyck, “Housing Reconstruction as Socioeconomic Recovery and State Building,” Housing Studies 26, no. 1 (2011): 133– 154. 36. Ibid. 37. Sultan Barakat and Steven A. Zyck, Housing Compensation and Disaster Preparedness in the Aftermath of the July 2006 War in South Lebanon (Beirut: Norwegian Refugee Council; York, UK: Post-War Reconstruction and Development Unit, University of York, 2008). 38. Christine Sylva Hamieh and Roger Mac Ginty, “A Very Political Reconstruction: Governance and Reconstruction in Lebanon After the 2006 War,” Disasters 34, no. 1 (2009): 103–123. 39. Barakat and Zyck, Gulf State Assistance to Conflict-Affected Environments. 40. Mohammad Zaatari, “Sheikh Hamad Tours Southern Lebanese Reconstruction Areas,” Daily Star (Lebanon), August 2, 2010. 41. Abir Saksouk Sasso, Nadine Bekdache, and Ismael Sheikh Hassan, “Beyond Compensation: The Post-War Reconstruction Battles of ‘Aita al-Cha‘b,” in Howayda

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Al-Harithy, ed., Lessons in Post-War Reconstruction: Case Studies from Lebanon in the Aftermath of the 2006 War (London: Routledge, 2010), pp. 158–186. 42. Uzi Rabi, “Qatar’s Relations with Israel: Challenging Arab and Gulf Norms,” Middle East Journal 63, no. 3 (2009): 457. 43. International Crisis Group, Yemen. 44. Samy Dorlian, “The Sa’da War in Yemen: Between Politics and Sectarianism,” The Muslim World 101, no. 2 (2011): 181–202. 45. Barak A. Salmoni, Bryce Loidolt, and Madeleine Wells, Regime and Periphery in Northern Yemen: The Huthi Phenomenon (Santa Monica: RAND, 2010). 46. International Crisis Group, Yemen. 47. Barakat, “Qatari Spring,” p. 17. 48. International Crisis Group, Yemen, p. 22. 49. Mehran Kamrava, “Mediation and Qatari Foreign Policy,” Middle East Journal 65, no. 4 (2011): 539–556. 50. Rabi, “Qatar’s Relations with Israel”; Barakat, “Qatari Mediation.” 51. ReliefWeb, “Donors Conference Approves Qatar’s Proposal of Establishing Darfur Development Bank,” March 21, 2010. 52. Ulrichsen, Qatar and the Arab Spring. 53. UN Development Programme (UNDP), “Qatar Confirms USD 88 Million for Sudan Darfur Development,” UNDP, 2014, mptf.undp.org/document/download /12743. 54. Haweya Ismail, “Food and Water Security in Qatar,” part 1: “Food Production” Strategic Analysis Paper (Nedlands, Australia: Future Directions International, 2015). 55. Ibid. 56. Tamara Walid, “Qatar SWF Food Unit Eyes PAVA Stake, Seals Sudan Deal,” Reuters Africa, October 29, 2009; Ismail, “Food and Water Security in Qatar.” 57. Barak Ravid, “Israel Rejects Qatar Bid to Restore Diplomatic Ties,” Haaretz, May 18, 2010, www.haaretz.com/1.5121719. 58. Sultan Barakat, Sansom Milton, and Ghassan Elkahlout, “The Gaza Reconstruction Mechanism: Old Wine in New Bottlenecks,” Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding 12, no. 2 (2018): 222. 59. World Bank, “Reconstructing Gaza—Donor Pledges,” September 12, 2017, www.worldbank.org/en/programs/rebuilding-gaza-donor-pledges#4. 60. Avi Isaacharoff, “Qatar Trying to Broker Long-Term Israel-Hamas Ceasefire,” Times of Israel, March 25, 2015, www.timesofisrael.com/qatar-mediating -long-term-ceasefire-between-israel-hamas/. 61. “Liberman Said to Have Met Secretly with Qatari Rep over Gaza,” Times of Israel, August 17, 2018, www.timesofisrael.com/liberman-said-to-have-met -secretly-with-qatari-rep-over-gaza/. 62. Michael Weiss, “Qatar Diverts Payment of $15m from Hamas to UN Gaza Project,” Irish Times, January 25, 2019, www.irishtimes.com/news/world/middle -east/qatar-diverts-payment-of-15m-from-hamas-to-un-gaza-projects-1.3770939. 63. David B. Roberts, “The Four Eras of Qatar’s Foreign Policy,” Comillas Journal of International Relations, no. 5 (2016): 13–14. 64. Ibid. 65. Roula Khalaf and Abigail Fielding-Smith, “How Qatar Seized Control of the Syrian Revolution,” Financial Times, May 17, 2013. 66. Ibid. 67. Robert F. Worth, “How a Ransom for Royal Falconers Reshaped the Middle East,” New York Times, March 14, 2018.

9 The New Politics of Aid Agnieszka Paczyńska

development and humanitarian assistance landscape, including assistance to conflict-affected states, with emerging donors becoming more important global actors. Although many of these donors are not new, the levels of their assistance have increased significantly and they have expanded their reach beyond their immediate neighborhoods. They also have been forming new partnerships among emerging donors themselves, such as the India, Brazil, and South Africa (IBSA) Dialogue Forum and the New Development Bank, as well as between emerging donors and recipient states, such as the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation and the India-Africa Forum Summit. This book explored how emerging donors are conceptualizing their engagements with conflict-affected states and considered two central questions: (1) how emerging donors frame the relationship between security and development, and (2) whether the policies they pursue in conflict-affected states differ from the liberal peacebuilding model of traditional donors. The cases examined in this volume reflect the diversity of emerging donors. They include states with relatively small economies, still struggling with their own processes of postconflict reconstruction and reconciliation, such as South Africa; small, but wealthy, states such as Qatar; countries with large economies such as China and India; and regional powers such as Brazil and Turkey. The cases include both democracies and authoritarian regimes. Despite these differences, the book’s contributors found that the emerging donors share a number of characteristics that make their approaches to engaging with conflict-affected states distinct from traditional donors. At the same time, they found that despite these similarities, there also are profound differences among the emerging donors in how they approach engaging with

The past two decades have seen significant shifts in the

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conflict-affected states. Thus, while these actors by and large do not subscribe to the liberal peacebuilding model that has framed traditional donors’ interventions in conflict-affected states, they do not offer a single alternative model to such engagements. Rather, what the contributors show is an increasingly complex landscape of international assistance to states grappling with internal conflicts, with emerging donors subscribing to different philosophies and pursuing different strategic objectives. The emerging donors also differ in how they conceptualize, if at all, issues of peacebuilding, state building, and postconflict reconstruction. At the same time, the contributors show that the approaches of emerging donors are not static, but rather are evolving in response to the challenges that emerging donors encounter in conflict-affected states they seek to support, the shifts in domestic politics of the donors, and the changing global ambitions of emerging donors as well as the competition among them. In this chapter, I consider the similarities and the differences among the emerging donors and how these have evolved over time. I conclude with suggestions for future research. This book’s contributors show that emerging donors do share some similar principles in how they engage with conflict-affected states, principles that differ from those of traditional donors. These differences are shaped by the distinct historical experiences of the emerging donors’ own development paths and their positions within the global political economy. In particular, many emerging donors have experienced colonial and other forms of domination by hegemonic powers. As a consequence, they want to avoid, at least rhetorically, replicating such hierarchies in their engagements with conflict-affected states. Rather, they frame these relationships in terms of South-South collaboration and partnership, mutual benefit, and reciprocity. Furthermore, in contrast to traditional donors, emerging donors place importance on nonconditionality of aid since they view conditionalities as unwarranted interference in other states’ domestic affairs. This attachment to norms of state sovereignty and noninterference is also shaped by emerging donors’ experiences with internal violence as well as their location in regions that continue to experience violent conflict. South Africa experienced decades-long struggles against apartheid; India has grappled with conflict in Kashmir and Gujarat and civil wars in neighboring Afghanistan, Nepal, and Sri Lanka; Russia has dealt with the war in Chechnya and conflict in neighboring Central Asian states and the Caucasus; Turkey has been in conflict with the Kurds and, since the beginning of the Arab uprisings, has experienced intensifying regional violence; the Chinese state has been in conflict with the Uighurs and with Tibet among others; and Brazil has been increasingly concerned with the growing numbers of people fleeing

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across its border from the political crisis in Venezuela. These experiences make emerging donors wary of potential external interference into their own affairs and shape their engagements with other conflict-affected states. However, the emerging donors’ critique of the liberal peacebuilding model is not limited to the interventionist nature of that approach. Rather, with the exception of South Africa, emerging donors see these policies as ineffective and unable to address the root causes of conflict; in particular, the insufficient attention those policies pay to promoting economic development and tackling poverty. In other words, the critical assessments of the liberal peacebuilding model by many emerging donors are pragmatic rather than ideological. At the same time, the particular historical legacies of colonial and hegemonic power domination as well as experiences with internal, often violent, conflict shape the way emerging donors conceptualize the relationship between security and development. Because they attempt, at least rhetorically, to abide by norms of noninterference and nonconditionalities, and because they see the primary threats to domestic stability and peace as a consequence of poverty, their interventions generally focus on providing support to economic development and avoid advocating any particular political reforms. Despite these similarities and collaborations, the contributors demonstrate that there are significant differences in the emerging donors’ approaches to engagement with conflict-affected states. They also show that emerging donors’ rhetoric of partnership, nonconditionalities, and respect for sovereignty of recipient states often mask a more complicated set of relationships and interests. At the same time, emerging donors differ in the global reach of their assistance. South Africa, for instance, supports conflict-affected states only in Africa, in large part due to its limited financial resources and continued profound economic and political challenges at home. China and India, on the other hand, have been providing assistance to an increasingly geographically diverse set of conflict-affected states, expanding their footprint not just in Asia but also in Africa and Latin America. The emerging donors also differ in how they conceptualize issues of postconflict reconstruction and peacebuilding, with some such as India not pursuing distinct development assistance policies vis-à-vis conflict-affected states despite historically being one of the biggest troop contributors to UN peacekeeping missions. Yet others, such as Turkey and Qatar, offer a distinct model of support to conflict-affected states that is in contrast to the liberal peacebuilding model and based on Islamic values. South Africa, on the other hand, drawing directly on its own experience with domestic violent conflict and peacebuilding, is more willing than other emerging donors to promote political reforms in the states to which it provides assistance. How emerging donors conceptualize their engagements with conflictaffected states is also shaped by the geographic proximity of the recipient

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country, the shifts in the domestic politics, and the changing global ambitions of the emerging donors as well as their experience of engagement in conflict-affected states. The contributors found that emerging donors’ engagements with conflict-affected states tend to differ depending on whether the recipients are located in the immediate geographic neighborhood or whether they are farther away. Whereas in the latter policies pursued tend to prioritize business and commercial interests, in the former they focus more on strategic and security concerns. These different priorities also imply that emerging donors’ adherence to principles of state sovereignty and noninterference also tends to be less strict when security and strategic objectives are at stake. Russia, for instance, attaches political conditionalities to the aid that it provides to Central Asian states in its near abroad. India was willing to militarily intervene in the Sri Lankan civil war, where it was concerned about possible spillover of violence across its border. Likewise, Turkey moved explicitly to support Sunni factions in the Syrian civil war when the proximity of the conflict threatened its own security. As emerging donors have expanded their assistance to conflict-affected states, they have begun to modify their adherence to nonintervention principles. In contexts of violence, maintaining political neutrality has proven to be unsustainable when the donors’ nationals and investments are threatened; for example, as China discovered when conflicts intensified in Libya and South Sudan. In fact, many emerging donors are discovering, as humanitarian nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) had previously, that an entity’s very presence in the midst of conflict makes it a part of the conflict dynamic.1 As a result, China has come to play a more important role in mediation of conflicts, including in Darfur and South Sudan. Additionally, as their aspirations to play more important global roles have increased, emerging donors have also become more willing to support more interventionist policies. Their growing global presence has also translated, in many cases, into pressure on them to play a more prominent role in supporting the provision of peace and security. Thus, for example, China’s wish to be seen as a responsible power has caused it to become more involved in peacekeeping operation and conflict mediation. China and Brazil have also begun to reevaluate their assessments of the Responsibility to Protect principles, with China moving closer to the traditional donors’ position and Brazil, while remaining wary of military responses, becoming over time more willing to support interventionist responses by the UN as its leadership of the peacekeeping mission to Haiti indicates. Emerging donors have increased their involvement in various UN initiatives to develop more effective engagement with conflict-affected states and in peacekeeping and peacebuilding efforts.Although some emerging donors, such as India, have long provided significant numbers of peacekeeping troops, over the past decade one of the key changes has been their growing involvement in UN peace operations. For instance, between 2001

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and 2010, Brazil, China, India, and South Africa’s share of deployed personnel in these operations increased from 5 percent to 15 percent.2 Their participation in operations outside their immediate geographic region has also grown. At the same time, emerging donors are increasingly looking to shape the peacebuilding and peacekeeping policies and have become active in the UN Peacebuilding Commission.3 The Peacebuilding Commission was established in December 2005 with a mandate to more effectively bring together relevant actors and needed resources, and develop integrated strategies for postconflict reconstruction and peacebuilding. It was designed to serve as a coordinating body within the UN system and to facilitate bringing different UN agencies together to develop coherent, integrated, and strategic peacebuilding efforts. Brazil and South Africa in particular have been actively involved with the work of the Peacebuilding Commission, with Brazil elected to chair the commission in 2014. Brazil used its tenure to “promote further reflection on the interdependence between security and development in peacebuilding activities and the importance of national ownership and capacity building of local staff for the success of policies to help countries emerging from conflict situations.”4 South Africa, on the other hand, has served on all of the Peacebuilding Commission’s specific country configurations (Sierra Leone, Burundi, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, and Central African Republic) and has worked to ensure that African voices are present in discussions about peacebuilding engagements. At the UN General Assembly in September 2015, the international community formally adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the seventeen Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), a framework for addressing global development needs that simultaneously sets out to address the root causes of conflict. The SDGs formally replaced the Millennium Development Goals, representing a change in how development at the global level was conceptualized, and signaled a shift in the relationship between Global North and Global South. In particular, the debates around the content of SDGs showed the growing importance of emerging donors’ voices in the debates about global development architecture. The debates also highlighted the continued differences between emerging and traditional donors on issues that touch on national sovereignty and what emerging donors view as unnecessary and unwelcome interference in domestic policies.5 These differences emerged perhaps most clearly during the negotiations around Goal 16: Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions, which explicitly links issues of economic development and the reduction of violence. The negotiations highlighted concerns among participants from the Global South that the linking of development and security would inevitably lead to the securitization of the development agenda “with aid being used to advance the national security agenda of particular States, rather than to promote development for people,” and that potentially “peace-related targets could translate into new aid conditionalities.”6

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Despite continued differences in how traditional and emerging donors view the relationship between development and security, and continued concerns among emerging donors about the implications of some of the peacebuilding policies for state sovereignty, emerging donors have continued to actively participate in the most recent round of discussions around the UN sustaining peace agenda and, in particular, the reshaping of UN’s approach to one that places greater emphasis on adopting long-term perspectives and on conflict prevention. Emerging donors have been supportive of the overall effort, and particularly the recognition that sustainable peace requires longterm commitment and assistance. Nonetheless, they have also continued to insist that the national sovereignty of member states needs to be respected and that interventions need to take place in accordance with the UN Charter.7 The international system is in a moment of flux and is becoming more multipolar.8 The emergence of new regional powers is affecting not just the global political and economic dynamics but also the composition of the international donor community and its approaches to development and peacebuilding.9 Regional organizations, such as the African Union and the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS), are playing an increasingly important role in conflict prevention, conflict mediation, and peacekeeping.10 At the same time, violent conflict has once again become more frequent and the number of people touched by this violence is growing. Since 2010 there has been a tripling of major violent conflicts, and in 2016 “more countries have experienced violent conflict than at any time in nearly 30 years.”11 Furthermore, by some estimates, by 2030 close to 80 percent the world’s extremely poor people will be living in fragile states thus endangering the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda.12 These realities have been reflected in where aid is being allocated. Official development assistance (ODA) has increasingly flowed to states that are affected by conflict or considered to be fragile by traditional donors. For instance, between 2011 and 2014, “the top 20 ODA recipients were considered fragile according to the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) framework, and overall net ODA flows to fragile states increased by around 140 percent in real terms from 2000 to 2015.”13 These realities have also been reflected in shifts in the traditional donor community’s thinking about engagements with conflict-affected and fragile states; in particular, in how to more effectively address the challenges faced by these states. Emerging donors largely eschew adopting the language of state fragility and, although they have been participating in many of the international fora where these issues are discussed, they remain concerned about the implications of these policy changes for state sovereignty norms. They are especially wary of endorsing what they view as OECD-driven initiatives such

Directions for Future Research

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as the New Deal for Engagement in Fragile States signed in 2011 at the Fourth High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness in Busan, South Korea, and are more comfortable with debates and initiatives taking place within the United Nations. Most emerging donors discussed in this volume endorsed the 2007 Paris Agenda on Aid Effectiveness, which “recognized the need for a consensus on special measures to improve aid effectiveness in situations of conflict and fragility”14 as well as the Accra Agenda for Action.15 Emerging donors had also initially signed on to the Busan Outcome Document that established the Global Partnership for Effective Development Cooperation, which aimed to be more inclusive of Southern donors as well as nonstate actors. But within a few years China, Brazil, and India had left the partnership and, as of early 2019, none of the emerging donors had endorsed the New Deal.16 During the process of rethinking donor community engagement with states labeled as fragile, the International Dialogue on Peacebuilding and Statebuilding was formed in 2008.17 It brought together the g7+ group of fragile and conflict-affected states,18 the International Network on Conflict and Fragility,19 and the Civil Society Platform for Peacebuilding and Statebuilding.20 Here too, however, emerging donors have participated sporadically. Despite emerging donors’ reservations, it appears that they do not necessarily reject the New Deal Compact frameworks at the recipient country level. In Somalia, for example, Gulf states and China are among the biggest budget support donors, and in 2016 Turkey hosted the Somalia High-Level Partnership Forum on the Somalia New Deal Compact.21 In other words, despite emerging donors’ weariness of OECD-driven initiatives, it seems that on the ground there may be more significant room for collaboration between emerging and traditional donors on issues relating to reconstruction and peacebuilding. But we do not know enough about these dynamics. More research is needed to understand the relationships between emerging and traditional donors at the local level. Another area of research is how governments and citizens of conflictaffected states perceive emerging donors and how they compare them to traditional donors. While some case studies have explored these issues, there are few cross-national comparisons. One recent survey of close to 3,500 leaders in the developing world found that China and India have risen rapidly in perceptions of the influence and helpfulness of foreign assistance providers.22 Other studies indicate that there are growing concerns in some quarters about the implications of financial obligations that conflict-affected states may have visà-vis emerging donors, and the extent these obligations may signal new constraints on state sovereignty. For instance, Sri Lanka was forced to sign over the Hambantota Port to China in a ninety-nine-year lease agreement when it could not service Chinese loans that it used to construct the port.23 On the other hand, an Afrobarometer survey conducted in 2014–2015 found largely positive assessments of growing Chinese involvement on the continent.24 We know even less about assessments and perceptions of other emerging donors.

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Other areas that warrant more research and attention include

• To what extent is the existence of a greater number of donors with different philosophies, strategies, and so forth providing recipient states with more leverage and, if so, what are the consequences of that? Does it allow for more country ownership? Does it strengthen the state vis-à-vis civil society? Does it allow for different modes of economic development? • What are the consequences of the growing role that emerging donors are playing in UN peacekeeping operations? Are they becoming norm setters and, if so, how and in what ways? And more broadly, how are the emerging donors changing the peacebuilding and conflict-resolution agendas and policies? • How is the growing competition among emerging donors shaping the way they conceptualize engagements with conflict-affected states? We see this competition intensifying between Russia, China, and India in Central and Southeast Asia as well as in the Sahel region of Africa. We are also witnessing the expansion of the security footprint of emerging donors, including China and the Gulf states in the Horn of Africa. Is this shifting global reach and focus changing how emerging donors think about intervention policies in conflict-affected states and the norms of state sovereignty? Are these shifts also altering the ways in which emerging donors think about engagements with states in their immediate geographic neighborhoods and those farther away? In other words, are the perceptions of security interests changing and thereby expanding the geographic reach of issues that emerging donors see as potentially threatening their own domestic stability? Emerging donors are playing a more significant role than just a decade ago in providing humanitarian and development assistance, including to countries affected by conflict. The role of emerging donors in provision of assistance to conflict-affected states came at a particular historical moment when the end of the Cold War reshaped dynamics within the UN Security Council and allowed for the expansion of peacekeeping and peacebuilding activities. Now, almost three decades later, the international system appears to be at another critical juncture. The world is becoming more multipolar, and the United States is reexamining its global role and retreating from various international agreements and commitments. At the same time, the number of violent conflicts is growing while the global donor community is rethinking its approaches to assistance provision to fragile and conflict-affected states. In the intervening years, emerging donors have expanded the global reach of their engagements with conflict-affected states and many have

Conclusion

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developed new policies toward mediation, peacebuilding, and reconstruction, as the contributors to this book have shown. Emerging donors have been playing an active role in debates within the UN about how to reform approaches to fragile and conflict-affected states. Although they remain wary of engaging with OECD-led initiatives on assistance provision, the fact that traditional donors are looking for new approaches to engaging with conflict-affected states and ways of ensuring the implementation of SDG 16, highlighting the need for more locally driven and more inclusive initiatives, may have created an opportune moment for engagement and fresh thinking. It will be necessary for traditional donors, emerging donors, and partners in conflict-affected states to build a new normative and regulatory framework to shape the next generation of assistance to conflict-affected states. 1. This led to the development of the Do No Harm principle by the humanitarian NGO community. See Mary B. Anderson, Do No Harm: How Aid Can Support Peace—Or War (Boulder: Lynne Rienner, 2010). 2. Sharon Wiharta, Neil Melvin, and Xenia Avezov, The New Geopolitics of Peace Operations: Mapping the Emerging Landscape (Stockholm: Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, September 2012). In 2015, these increased commitment levels continued. Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa (BRICS) contributed over 13 percent of police, UN military experts, and troops to peacekeeping operations. UN Peacekeeping, “Troop and Police Contributors,” https:// peacekeeping.un.org/en/troop-and-police-contributors. 3. Cedric de Coning and Chander Prakash, Peace Capacities Network Synthesis Report: Rising Powers and Peace Operations (Oslo: Norwegian Institute of International Affairs, 2016). 4. Brazilian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, “Brazil Elected as Chair of the Peacebuilding Commission of the United Nations,” Nota 24, January 29, 2014, www.itamaraty.gov.br/en/press-releases/3595-brazil-elected-as-chair-of-the-peace building-commission-of-the-united-nations. 5. Sophie Hermanns, “North-South Perspectives on Sustainable Development Goals,” paper presented at the “Perspectives on the Sustainable Development Goals Agenda: A Background Briefing for Rethinking Sustainability,” Ryerson University, Toronto, ON, Canada, October 2, 2014. 6. Larry Atree and Anna Moller-Loswick, “Goal 16—Ensuring Peace in the Post-2015 Framework: Adoption, Implementation and Monitoring,” UN Chronicle, 51, no. 4 2014 (2015), https://unchronicle.un.org/article/goal-16-ensuring-peace -post-2015-framework-adoption-implementation-and-monitoring. 7. UN, “General Assembly Concludes High-Level Debate on Sustaining Peace with Consensus Resolution Encouraging Further Action by United Nations, Member States,” April 26, 2018, www.un.org/press/en/2018/ga12014.doc.htm. 8. Antonio Guterres, “Remarks to Munich Security Conference,” United Nations, February 18, 2017, www.un.org/sg/en/content/sg/speeches/2017-02-18/secretary-general %E2 %80%99s-munich-remarks. 9. World Bank Group/United Nations, Pathways for Peace: Inclusive Approaches to Preventing Violent Conflict; Main Messages and Emerging Policy Directions (Washington, DC: World Bank, 2017), p. 49.

Notes

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10. Paul D. Williams, “Global and Regional Peacekeepers: Trends, Opportunities, Risks and a Way Ahead,” Global Policy 8, no. 1 (2017): 124–129. 11. World Bank Group/United Nations, Pathways for Peace, p. 1. 12. George Ingram and Jonathan Papoulidis, Rethinking How to Reduce State Fragility (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution, March 29, 2017). 13. World Bank Group/United Nations, Pathways for Peace, p. 254. It is important to note, however, that the majority of ODA goes to only a few countries, with Afghanistan and Iraq accounting for 22 percent of ODA allocated to fragile states. 14. International Dialogue on Peace and Statebuilding, Participating Countries and Organizations, www.pbsbdialogue.org/en/id/participating-countries-and -organisations/. 15. The Accra Agenda for Action “contains the first trilateral cooperation (among traditional and emerging donors and recipient countries) found in official DAC [Development Assistance Committee] circles.” Jan Wouters, Jean-Christophe Defraigne, Matthieu Burnay, eds., China, the European Union, and the Developing World: A Triangular Relationship (Cheltenham, UK: Edward Elgar, 2015), p. 406. A number of emerging donors have endorsed both declarations. See Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, Endorsements of the Paris Declaration and the Accra Agenda for Action (AAA), www.oecd.org/development/effectiveness /countriesterritoriesandendorsementstotheparisdeclarationandaaa.htm. 16. For a discussion of the troubled relationship between emerging donors and the Global Partnership for Effective Development Cooperation see, for example, Gerardo Bracho, “The Troubled Relationship of the Emerging Powers and the Effective Development Cooperation Agenda: History, Challenges and Opportunities,” Discussion Paper No. 25 (Bonn: German Development Institute, 2017). 17. Rachel Lock and Vanessa Wye, Busan and Beyond: Implementing the “New Deal” for Fragile States, Issue Brief (New York: International Peace Institute, July 2012). 18. The g7+ group includes Afghanistan, Burundi, Central African Republic, Chad, Comoros, Côte d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of Congo, Guinea, GuineaBissau, Haiti, Liberia, Papua New Guinea, São Tomé and Príncipe, Sierra Leone, Somalia, the Solomon Islands, South Sudan, Timor-Leste, Togo, and Yemen. 19. The International Network on Conflict and Fragility is a network of Development Assistance Committee of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD DAC) members and key multilateral agencies that work in conflict-affected and fragile states. 20. The Civil Society Platform for Peacebuilding and Statebuilding is a SouthNorth nongovernmental coalition of peacebuilding organizations. 21. Sarah Hearn, Independent Review of the New Deal for Engagement in Fragile States (New York: Center for International Cooperation and International Dialogue on Peacebuilding and Statebuilding, New York University, April 28, 2016). 22. Samantha Custer, Matthew DiLorenzo, Takaaki Masaki, Tanya Sethi, and Ani Harutyunyan, Listening to Leaders 2018: Is Development Cooperation TunedIn or Tone-Deaf? (Williamsburg, VA: AidData at William & Mary, 2018). 23. Sholto Byrnes, “The Example of Sri Lanka Handing over a Port to China Shows the Belt and Road Initiative Was Never Meant to Be Pure Altruism,” The National, September 10, 2018, www.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/the-example -of-sri-lanka-handing-over-a-port-to-china-shows-the-belt-and-road-initiative-was -never-meant-to-be-pure-altruism-1.768918. 24. Afrobarometer, “China’s Growing Presence in Africa Wins Largely Positive Popular Reviews,” Dispatch, no. 122 (October 24, 2016).

Acronyms

AFAD AIIB AKP AMIB AMIS AMISEC

Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank Justice and Development Party African Union Mission in Burundi African Union Mission in Sudan African Union Mission for Support to the Elections in the Comoros AMISOM African Union Mission in Somalia ANC Africa National Congress APSA African Peace and Security Architecture ARF African Renaissance Fund ASF African Standby Force ASI African Solidarity Initiative AU African Union AU/NEPAD African Union/New Partnership for African Development BFPC Brazilian Foreign Policy community BRI Belt and Road Initiative BRICS Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa CIDA Canadian International Development Agency CIS Commonwealth of Independent States CISFTA Commonwealth of Independent States Free Trade Area CPA Comprehensive Peace Agreement DAC Development Assistance Committee DDR disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration DID Department of International Development

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Acronyms

DIRCO DPSA DRC DTI EAC ECOSOC ECOWAS ENA EU FDI FIB FOCAC GDP G8 GPPI G-77 IBSA IBSA Fund ICACPPS

Department of International Relations and Cooperation Department of Public Service and Administration Democratic Republic of Congo Department of Trade and Industry East African Community UN Economic and Social Council Economic Community of West African States National School for Public Administration European Union foreign direct investment Force Intervention Brigade Forum on China-Africa Cooperation gross domestic product Group of 8 Global Public Policy Institute Group of 77 India, Brazil, and South Africa IBSA Facility for Poverty and Hunger Alleviation Initiative on China-Africa Cooperative Partnership for Peace and Security IEBC Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission IEC Independent Electoral Commission ICD Inter-Congolese Dialogue IGAD Intergovernmental Authority on Development JEM Justice and Equality Movement LDCs less developed countries LJM Liberation and Justice Movement LOCs lines of credit LTTE Liberation Tigers of Tamil Eelam MDIs Management Development Institutes MENA Middle East and North Africa MFA Ministry of Foreign Affairs MINUSMA UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali MINUSTAH UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti MONUC UN Organization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo MONUSCO UN Organization Stabilization Mission in the Democratic Republic of the Congo MOOTWs military operations other than war MoUs Memorandums of Understanding MUSIAD Association of Independent Industrialists and Businessmen NAM Non-Aligned Movement NATO North Atlantic Treaty Organization

Acronyms

NDB NEPAD NGOs NOREF OAU ODA OECD OECD DAC

OMIC PALAMA PCRD P5 PKK PLA QACA QDF R2P SAARC SADC SADPA SANDF SAPS SAPSD SDGs SIDS SISO SPLM SSRs TIKA UAE UN-AU UNDP UNIB UNMIS UNODC UPA USIP

173

New Development Bank New Economic Partnership for Africa’s Development nongovernmental organizations Norwegian Centre for Conflict Resolution Organization of African Unity official development assistance Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development Development Assistance Committee of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development OAU Observer Mission in Comoros Public Administration Leadership and Management Academy Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Development Permanent Five (of the UN Security Council) Kurdistan Worker’s Party People’s Liberation Army Qatari Authority of Charitable Activities Qatar Development Fund Responsibility to Protect South Asian Association for Regional Cooperation Southern African Development Community South African Development Partnership Agency South African National Defense Force South African Police Service South African Protection Support Detachment Sustainable Development Goals Small Island Developing States Institutional, Strategic, and Operations framework (of SADPA) Sudan People’s Liberation Movement security sector reforms Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency United Arab Emirates United Nations–African Union UN Development Programme UN Mission in Burundi UN Mission in Sudan UN Office on Drugs and Crime United Progressive Alliance United States Institute of Peace

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The Contributors

Chris Alden is professor of international relations at the London School of Economics and with the South African Institute of International Affairs.

Urvashi Aneja is founding director of Tandem Research and associate fellow at Chatham House. Sultan Barakat is founding director of the Center for Conflict and Humanitarian Studies at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies.

Paulo Esteves is associate professor at the Instituto de Relações Internacionais Pontifícia Universidade Católica do Rio de Janeiro, director of the BRICS Policy Center, and senior research fellow at the Institute for Advanced Sustainability Studies.

Gilbert M. Khadiagala is Jan Smuts Professor of International Relations and director of the African Centre for the Study of the United States at the University of the Witwatersrand.

Sansom Milton is senior research fellow in the Center for Conflict and Humanitarian Studies at the Doha Institute for Graduate Studies.

Agnieszka Paczy ń ska is associate professor of conflict analysis and resolution at George Mason University and nonresident fellow at the Stimson Center.

Pinar Tank is senior researcher at the Peace Research Institute Oslo.

187

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The Contributors

Yixiao Zheng obtained his PhD in international relations from the London School of Economic and Political Science.

Christoph Zurcher is professor in the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa.

Index

AFAD. See Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency Afghanistan: Central Asia threats from, 112; India engagement in, 57; Taliban negotiations regarding, 156; United States failure in, 138n39 Africa: China postconflict reconstruction in, 39–40; Darfur region of, 48n12, 151; of FOCAC, 30–31, 33, 38–39, 49n23; Great Lakes region of, 72–73; India development partnerships in, 59–60, 67; India pragmatism regarding, 61; India security investments in, 60–61; postconflict reconstruction continental initiative for, 81–83. See also specific countries African National Congress (ANC): Foreign Policy Platform, 13; on socioeconomic development, 72; SPLM relations with, 74, 79 African Renaissance Fund (ARF): annual report, 82; objectives and functions of, 75 African Solidarity Initiative (ASI), 82 African Union (AU): China supporting, 32–33; India for strengthening, 59; PCRD framework of, 81–82 African Union Mission in Somalia (AMISOM), 130–132 An Agenda for Peace document, 95, 96

AIIB. See Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank AKP. See Justice and Development Party AMISOM. See African Union Mission in Somalia Amorim, Celso, 98–99 ANC. See African National Congress Angola, 51n53 Arab uprisings: humanitarian diplomacy and, 127–128; Qatar in relation to, 146, 154; Turkey challenges with, 132–135 ARF. See African Renaissance Fund Arusha Peace and Reconciliation Agreement (2000), 20, 73 ASI. See African Solidarity Initiative Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB): establishment of, 6; postconflict reconstruction and, 43–44 Association of Independent Industrialists and Businessmen (MUSIAD), 126 AU. See African Union Autonomy, 90–93, 94, 101

Bandung conference (1955), 3–4 Bandung Principles: definition of, 22n9; emerging donors support of, 9 Behavioral middle powers, 122 Belt and Road Initiative (BRI): postconflict reconstruction expansion from, 44, 45; of Xi Jinping, 25

189

190

Index

BFPC. See Brazilian foreign policy community Bolsonaro, Jair, 16, 90 Brazil: Amorim as ambassador of, 98– 99; on autonomy, 90–93, 94, 101; Bolsonaro as president of, 16, 90; Cold War era in, 103n23; on development, 90–93; Fonseca Jr. as ambassador of, 94; “foreign policy community” of, 101n1; Guerreiro as chancellor of, 92–93; Lampreia as chancellor of, 94–95; MINUSTAH lead by, 19, 98, 99; on noninterference policy, 90–93; noninterference policy shift for, 15– 16, 164; nuclear program in, 103n23; Patriota as ambassador of, 12, 95, 96; on peacekeeping, 96–97; peacekeeping contributions of, 19, 98–99; policy focus of, 12; on sovereignty, 89, 90; UN Peacebuilding Commission involvement of, 165 Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa (BRICS), 6, 84. See also specific countries Brazilian foreign policy community (BFPC): developmentalism model of, 91–92; dilemma for, 92–93; international culture concept regarding, 89, 90–91; nonindifference policy and, 98–100; peace and security agenda and, 93–97, 97tab, 100tab; positioning strategies synthesis for, 102tab; transformation of, 89–90 BRI. See Belt and Road Initiative BRICS. See Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa Burundi: instability and violence resurgence in, 82–83; peacekeeping and peacemaking in, 73–74; postconflict reconstruction in, 77–78 Bush, George W., 66, 127

Central Asia: authoritarian regimes in, 116–117; ODA for, 113–114; Russia development cooperation in, 111–116; Russia military bases in, 108. See also specific countries Chechnya, 118 China: AIIB established in, 6, 43–44; Angola relations with, 51n53; AU

support from, 32–33; BRI of, 25, 44, 45; conflict mediation by, 20–21, 30; Darfur contributions from, 48n12; emerging donor comparisons to, 45– 47; of FOCAC, 30–31, 33, 38–39, 49n23; future role of, 40–41; global aspirations of, 31–32; improvements and increased cooperation from, 41– 45; on liberal peacebuilding model, 8, 34–36; NGOs lack of engagement from, 42; noninterference policy of, 26–27; noninterference policy problems for, 48n9; noninterference policy shift for, 15, 164; peace and security activism by, 29–34; peace and security evolution of, 26–28; on peacebuilding, 37–40; peacebuilding improvements for, 41–43; peacekeeping contributions of, 18, 31, 33–34; PLA of, 33–34, 49n15, 50n31; policy focus of, 11; postconflict reconstruction approach of, 34–40; socioeconomic development prioritized by, 37; South-South cooperation involvement of, 27–28; as sovereignty advocate, 38; taoguang yanghui doctrine of, 29–30; Wang Yi as foreign minister of, 49n19, 49n21; Xi Jinping as president of, 18, 25, 31, 33, 41, 49n23, 50n25 CIS. See Commonwealth of Independent States CISFTA. See Commonwealth of Independent States Free Trade Area Cold War: Brazil during, 103n23; NAM role during, 23n10, 54; post-war period, 54–55, 93, 144–145 Colonialism, 10 Commission on State Fragility, Growth and Development, 7 Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), 110, 119n7 Commonwealth of Independent States Free Trade Area (CISFTA), 108–109 Comoros: peacekeeping in, 74; postconflict reconstruction in, 78 Comprehensive Peace Agreement (CPA), 74 Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia, 41 Conflict: development relationship with, 10–13; economic development as

Index solution to, 28, 41; emerging donors legacies of, 10, 162–163; increase in violent, 166 Conflict mediation: by China, 20–21, 30; by Qatar, 20, 143–146; by South Africa, 19–20; by Turkey, 21 Cooperation: China improvements and increased, 41–45; DIRCO for, 75, 76; FOCAC for, 30–31, 33, 38–39, 49n23; restructure of global, 1; Russia development, 111–116; South-South, 27–28, 55, 63, 67; TIKA for, 124–125 Counterinsurgency, 118–119 CPA. See Comprehensive Peace Agreement

DAC. See Development Assistance Committee Darfur: China contributions to, 48n12; Qatar involvement in, 151 Davutoğlu, Ahmet, 127–128 Democracy: India supporting promotion of, 65–66; Muslim, 127; one-size-fits-all solution of liberal, 35; over security, 36 Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC): Burundi compared to, 78; instability and violence resurgence in, 82–83; peacemaking in, 73; postconflict reconstruction in, 76–77 Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO): on South Africa postconflict reconstruction policy, 75; training by, 76 Development: Brazil on, 90–93; in Central Asia, 111–116; economic, 28, 34–35, 41; India neighborhood policy for security and, 55–59; ODA, 105, 113– 114, 124, 166; for peacebuilding, 62–63; SDGs for, 7, 63, 165; security from Russian, 116; security relationship with, 10–13, 41; socioeconomic, 37, 72; as stabilization, 56–57; 2014 Concept on international, 109–111. See also Postconflict reconstruction Development Assistance Committee (DAC): principles, 4–5; Qatar impacted by, 146–147; Turkey absent from, 125–126 Development partnerships: economic diplomacy as, 59–60; LOC for, 55; SADPA for, 75, 80, 81; in South Asia, 56–57; South-South cooperation for, 67 Developmentalism model, 91–92

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DIRCO. See Department of International Relations and Cooperation Domestic peacebuilding, 19 Domestic violence, 10 Dongyan Li, 36, 37 DRC. See Democratic Republic of Congo Drug trafficking, 112, 114–115

Economic development: as conflict solution, 28, 41; liberal peacebuilding model neglecting, 34–35 Emerging donors: assistance growth of, 5–6, 6fig, 23n12; characteristics of, 9; China comparisons to, 45–47; differences and similarities among, 162–166; diversity of, 2–3, 11, 161– 162; expansion of engagement, 168–169; future research questions regarding, 168; geographic proximity influencing policy, 14; legacies of conflict, 10, 162–163; middle power characteristics of, 122; motivations for engagement, 163– 164; OECD initiatives concern from, 166–167; sovereignty respected by, 3; traditional donors compared to, 3, 4–5, 9, 10. See also specific countries Erdoğan, Recep Tayyip: Somalia trip by, 124; on Syria relations, 133–134

Finnemore, Martha, 129 FOCAC. See Forum on China-Africa Cooperation Fonseca Jr., Gelson, 94 Forum on China-Africa Cooperation (FOCAC): Action Plan, 33, 38–39; framework, 30–31; Xi Jinping speech at, 49n23 Fukuyama, Frances, 138n39 Future research, 166–168

Gaza Strip, 152–153 Geographic proximity, 14 Global aspirations: of China, 31–32; noninterference policy and, 15–17 Global South: assistance to, 1; SDGs impacting, 165. See also South-South cooperation Great Lakes region, 72–73 Guerreiro, Ramiro Saraiva, 92–93 Gülen movement, 137n27

192

Index

Haiti: MINUSTAH in, 19, 98, 99; UN Security Council on, 104n37 Hamas, 153 Hendricks, Cheryl: on postconflict reconstruction in Burundi, 78; on postconflict reconstruction in DRC, 77; on postconflict reconstruction in South Sudan, 79; on South Africa postconflict reconstruction policy, 75 Herz, Monica: on Cold War era in Brazil, 103n23; on international culture concept, 90 Humanitarian diplomacy, 127–128 Humanitarianism: focus on, 121; Qatar funding, 146–147, 147tab; Turkey alternative model for, 129–132; Turkey commitment to, 124–126; Turkey growth in, 126–129; Turkey on front lines of, 122–123

IBSA Dialogue Forum. See India, Brazil, and South Africa Dialogue Forum Ideational middle powers, 122 India: Afghanistan engagement from, 57; development partnerships of, 55, 56–57, 59–60, 67; engagement levels of, 53; on liberal peacebuilding model, 8; LOC from, 55; multilateral funds from, 66; as NAM leader, 54; neighborhood policy of, 55–59; Nepal engagement from, 58; noninterference policy commitment of, 54–55; noninterference policy of, 17, 57–59; Panscheel Principles used by, 54, 55; peace and security negotiated by, 61–66; peacebuilding approach of, 62–63; peacekeeping contributions of, 18, 55, 60–61; policy focus of, 11–12; pragmatism regarding Africa, 61; pragmatism regarding Libya and Syria, 64–65; Puri as permanent representative of, 62–63, 64, 70n44; on R2P, 64; on SDGs, 63; security investments in Africa, 60–61; South Asia engagement from, 55–57, 67, 68n8; South Sudan engagement from, 61; sovereignty commitment of, 54– 55; Taliban concern from, 57; traditional donors compared to, 53–54, 67–68; as UN Democracy Fund member, 65–66; UN Peacebuilding Commission involvement of, 63; United States relations with, 66

India, Brazil, and South Africa (IBSA) Dialogue Forum, 6. See also specific countries Indian Ocean littorals, 59–61 International culture concept, 89, 90–91 Iraq, 138n39 Israel: Hamas relations with, 153; Qatar relations with, 152 Istanbul, 131, 138n54

Justice and Development Party (AKP): aspirations of, 123; Gülen movement rivalry with, 137n27; identity of, 127; Libya response from, 133; MUSIAD lobbying, 126; Syrian refugees impacting, 135

Kazakhstan: as CISFTA member, 108– 109; underdevelopment in, 111–112 Kurdish population, 133–135 Kyrgyzstan: as CISFTA member, 108– 109; Russia aid for, 113–114, 115; Tulip Revolution in, 112–113; underdevelopment in, 111–112

Lal, Tanamay, 63 Lampreia, Luiz Felipe, 94–95 Lebanon: conflict mediation in, 143; postconflict reconstruction in, 149– 150 Liberal peacebuilding model: characteristics of, 1–2; China on, 8, 34–36; definition of, 118; economic development neglected by, 34–35; failure of, 7–9; India on, 8; inefficiency of, 35–36; Qatar on, 9, 147; Russia in relation to, 118–119; South Africa on, 7–8; sovereignty threatened by, 10; Turkey on, 8–9, 130 Libya: India pragmatism regarding, 64– 65; Turkey policy on, 133 Lines of credit (LOC), 55 Lucey, Amanda: on postconflict reconstruction in Burundi, 78; on postconflict reconstruction in DRC, 77; on postconflict reconstruction in South Sudan, 79; on South Africa postconflict reconstruction policy, 75

Mahamud, Hassan, 130 Mandela, Nelson: Arusha Peace and Reconciliation Agreement negotiated

Index by, 20, 73; peacemaking and peacekeeping priority of, 72–73 Manicom, James, 122 Mbeki, Thabo: peacemaking and peacekeeping priority of, 72–73; Round Table Donors’ Conference cochaired by, 78 Middle powers: definitions and classifications of, 122; norm entrepreneurship and, 123; Turkey as aspiring, 121, 135–136 Military operations other than war (MOOTW), 50n31 MINUSMA. See UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali MINUSTAH. See UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti MOOTW. See Military operations other than war MUSIAD. See Association of Independent Industrialists and Businessmen Muslim democracy, 127

NAM. See Non-Aligned Movement Narang, Amit, 63 NDB. See New Development Bank Nepal, 58 New Development Bank (NDB), 6 NGOs. See Nongovernmental organizations Non-Aligned Movement (NAM): Bandung conference as beginning of, 3–4; Cold War role of, 23n10, 54; India as leader of, 54 Nongovernmental organizations (NGOs): China lacking engagement with, 42; of Qatar, 148–149; of Turkey, 124, 126 Nonindifference policy, 98–100 Noninterference policy: Brazil on, 90– 93; Brazil shift in, 15–16, 164; of China, 26–27; China problems with, 48n9; China shift in, 15, 164; experience validating, 162–163; global aspirations and changing, 15– 17; of India, 17, 57–59; India commitment to, 54–55; Qatar shift in, 17; Turkey shift in, 16–17 Norm entrepreneurship: middle powers and, 123; of Turkey, 129–130 Norway, 144, 145 ODA. See Official development assistance

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OECD. See Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development Official development assistance (ODA): for Central Asia, 113–114; increase in, 166; Russia growth in, 105; from Turkey, 124 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD): DAC of, 4–5, 125–126, 146–147; emerging donors concern with initiatives of, 166–167; partnerships outside of, 6

Panscheel Principles: definition of, 54; South-South cooperation and, 55 Patriota, Antonio de Aguiar: on An Agenda for Peace document, 95, 96; on security and development relationship, 12 PCRD framework. See Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Development framework Peace: commitment to, 166; Puri on restoring, 62–63; Zuma on pursuit of, 71 Peace and security: BFPC and agenda for, 93–97, 97tab, 100tab; China activism in, 29–34; China evolution toward, 26–28; India negotiating, 61–66; Qatar for strengthening, 143; stability as prerequisite to, 61–62; UN Security Council for, 1, 64, 104n37, 143; Xi Jinping commitment to, 18, 25 Peacebuilding: China improvements for, 41–43; China on, 37–40; counterinsurgency and, 118–119; domestic, 19; Dongyan Li on, 36, 37; India approach to, 62–63; in Indian Ocean littorals, 59–61; Russia on, 106–107; Turkey model for, 132–135; UN Peacebuilding Commission for, 63, 165; UN Peacebuilding Fund for, 35; UN Security Council expanding, 1. See also Liberal peacebuilding model Peacekeeping: approaches to, 17–19; Brazil contributions to, 19, 98–99; Brazil on, 96–97; China contributions to, 18, 31, 33–34; India contributions to, 18, 55, 60–61; Mandela and Mbeki prioritizing, 72–73; South Africa contributions to, 18–19, 72– 74; UN Security Council expanding, 1; Xi Jinping pledge on, 33, 50n25

194

Index

Peacemaking: BFPC against, 95; by South Africa, 20, 72–74 People’s Liberation Army (PLA): MOOTW approach by, 50n31; in South Sudan, 33–34; training centers for, 49n15 Positional middle powers, 122 Post-Cold War: India, 54–55; redemocratization of Brazil, 93; small-state mediation, 144–145 Postconflict reconstruction: AIIB and, 43–44; BRI for expanding, 44, 45; in Burundi, 77–78; China approach to, 34–40; in Comoros, 78; in DRC, 76– 77; in Lebanon, 149–150; Qatar role in, 149–153; South Africa continental initiative for, 81–83; South Africa dilemma with, 83–84; South Africa objectives for, 74–75; in South Sudan, 79–81; Turkey alternative model for, 129–132; UN Peacebuilding Commission for strategic, 165 Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Development (PCRD) framework, 81–82 Poverty: in Haiti, 98, 99; IBSA Fund for fighting, 6; Patriota on, 12 Puri, Hardeep: on peace restoration, 62– 63; on R2P, 64; significance of, 70n44

Qatar: Arab uprisings in relation to, 146, 154; blockade of, 142, 155–156; conflict mediation by, 20, 143–146; Darfur involvement of, 151; “direct execution” by, 150; domestic stability of, 141–142; evolution of conflict response, 153–157; food security of, 151–152; foreign aid donor emergence of, 146–149; Gaza Strip assistance from, 152–153; humanitarianism funding from, 146–147, 147tab; Israel relations with, 152; on liberal peacebuilding model, 9, 147; NGOs of, 148–149; noninterference policy shift for, 17; policy focus of, 13; postconflict reconstruction role of, 149–153; regional power emergence of, 141–143; Saudi Arabia and UAE relations with, 155; state branding by, 142; Syria aid from, 154; Taliban negotiations facilitated by, 156; transformation of, 141; UN Security Council joined by, 143

Qatar Development Fund (QDF), 148

R2P. See Responsibility to Protect Rajamohan, C., 57–58 Rao, Rahul, 70n44 Reeves, Jeffrey, 122 Regional power, 141–143 Research, future, 166–168 Responsibility to Protect (R2P): China reevaluating, 15; India on, 64 Rossotrudnichestvo, 119n7 Russia: in Central Asia, development cooperation, 111–116; in Central Asia, military bases, 108; challenges regarding policies of, 106; as CISFTA member, 108–109; development for security, 116; domestic peacebuilding by, 19; geopolitics of, 107–109; liberal peacebuilding model in relation to, 118–119; ODA growth of, 105; on peacebuilding, 106–107; policy focus of, 12–13; remittances from, 115–116; Rossotrudnichestvo of, 119n7; stability from, 117; transition from recipient to donor, 105; 2014 Concept of, 109–111

SADPA. See South African Development Partnership Agency Saudi Arabia: Qatar relations with, 155; Turkey collaboration with, 134 SDGs. See Sustainable Development Goals Security: democracy over, 36; development relationship with, 10–13, 41; India investments in African, 60–61; India neighborhood policy for development and, 55–59; for peacebuilding, 62–63; Russia development for, 116. See also Peace and security Sikkink, Kathryn, 129 Silk Road strategy, 44, 45 Singh, Manmohan, 64, 66 Socioeconomic development: ANC on, 72; China prioritizing, 37 Somalia: Erdoğan trip to, 124; Turkey humanitarianism in, 130–132; Turkey ODA for, 124 South Africa: conflict mediation by, 19– 20; on liberal peacebuilding model, 7–8; Mandela leadership in, 20, 72– 73; Mbeki as president of, 72–73, 78; PCRD framework for, 81–82;

Index peacekeeping contributions of, 18–19, 72–74; peacemaking by, 20, 72–74; policy focus of, 13; postconflict reconstruction dilemma for, 83–84; postconflict reconstruction in Burundi, 77–78; postconflict reconstruction in Comoros, 78; postconflict reconstruction in DRC, 76–77; postconflict reconstruction in South Sudan, 79–81; postconflict reconstruction initiative of, 81–83; postconflict reconstruction objectives of, 74–75; as postconflict society, 71; UN Peacebuilding Commission involvement of, 165; Zuma as president of, 71, 82 South African Development Partnership Agency (SADPA): ARF in relation to, 75; functions of, 81; significance of, 80 South Asia, 55–57, 67, 68n8 South Sudan: CPA on, 74; India engagement in, 61; instability and violence resurgence in, 82–83; PLA in, 33–34; postconflict reconstruction in, 79–81 South Sudan Liberation Movement (SPLM), 74, 79 South-South cooperation: China involvement in, 27–28; for development partnerships, 67; India on, 63; Panscheel Principles and, 55 Sovereignty: Brazil on, 89, 90; China advocating for, 38; emerging donors respecting, 3; India commitment to, 54–55; liberal peacebuilding model threatening, 10; as responsibility, 67 Soviet Union: legacy of, 107–109; United States relations with, 103n23. See also Russia SPLM. See South Sudan Liberation Movement State branding, 142 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs): Commission on State Fragility, Growth and Development favoring, 7; India on, 63; 2030 Agenda and, 165 Switzerland, 144, 145 Syria: India pragmatism regarding, 64– 65; Qatar aid for, 154; Turkey ODA for, 124; Turkey policy on, 133–135

Tajikistan: as CISFTA member, 108–109; civil wars in, 113; Russia aid for,

195

113–114, 115; Russia relations with, 108; underdevelopment in, 111–112 Taliban: India concern over, 57; United States negotiations with, 156 Taoguang yanghui doctrine, 29–30 Terminology, 4–5 TIKA. See Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency Traditional donors: China on, 8; emerging donors compared to, 3, 4–5, 9, 10; India compared to, 53–54, 67– 68; middle power characteristics of, 122; Turkey compared to, 124. See also Liberal peacebuilding model Turkey: AKP of, 123, 126, 127, 133, 135, 137n27; Arab uprising challenges for, 132–135; conflict mediation by, 21; criticism toward, 132; DAC absence of, 125–126; Davutoğlu as foreign minister of, 127–128; Erdoğan as prime minister of, 124, 133–134; humanitarian diplomacy adopted by, 127–128; humanitarianism alternative model of, 129–132; humanitarianism commitment of, 124–126; on humanitarianism front lines, 122–123; humanitarianism growth from, 126–129; on liberal peacebuilding model, 8–9, 130; Mahamud on, 130; middle power aspirations of, 121, 135– 136; as Muslim democracy, 127; NGOs of, 124, 126; noninterference policy shift for, 16–17; norm entrepreneurship of, 129–130; ODA from, 124; peacebuilding model of, 132–135; policy focus of, 121; postconflict reconstruction alternative model of, 129–132; Somalia commitment of, 130– 132; Syria policy of, 133–135; traditional donors compared to, 124 Turkey’s Disaster and Emergency Management Presidency (AFAD), 125 Turkish Cooperation and Coordination Agency (TIKA), 124–125 2014 Concept, 109–111 2030 Agenda, 165

UAE. See United Arab Emirates UN Democracy Fund, 65–66 UN Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA), 33 UN Peacebuilding Commission, 63, 165

196

Index

UN Peacebuilding Fund, 35 UN Security Council: on Haiti, 104n37; peacekeeping and peacebuilding expansion by, 1; Qatar joining, 143; R2P application through, 64 UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), 19, 98, 99 United Arab Emirates (UAE): DAC joined by, 147; Qatar relations with, 155 United States: India relations with, 66; nation building failure of, 138n39; reexamination by, 168; Soviet Union relations with, 103n23; Taliban negotiations with, 156 Uzbekistan: as CISFTA member, 108–109; massacre in, 113; underdevelopment in, 111–112

Wang Yi, 49n19, 49n21

Xi Jinping: at Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia, 41; FOCAC speech by, 49n23; peace and security commitment of, 18, 25; peacekeeping pledge by, 33, 50n25; proactiveness of, 31

Yemen, 150–151

Zuma, Jacob: ASI conference hosted by, 82; on South Africa status, 71

About the Book

between security and development? How, and why, do the policies they pursue in conflict-affected states differ from the liberal peacebuilding model of traditional donors? Addressing these questions, the authors of The New Politics of Aid shed light on the increasingly complicated and complex donor landscape. Their work is an essential contribution to our understanding of both the changing dynamics of foreign aid and the processes of postconflict reconstruction and peacebuilding.

How do emerging donors conceptualize the relationship

Agnieszka Paczyńska is associate professor in the School of Conflict Analysis and Resolution at George Mason University and nonresident fellow at the Stimson Center.

197