Overview
an essay about conflict and development
Suggested essay questions1. Do informal or shadow economies cause or just maintain violent conflicts? Answer with reference to at least one example.2. “Political entrepreneurs operate in the political marketplace using money and violence” (de Waal 2015, p3). To what extent does the concept of the political marketplace explain the dynamics of violence in weak or collapsed states?3. To what extent do factional struggles over state power explain conflicts that mobilise along ethnic lines?4. To what extent are systems of political patronage a cause of conflict?5. Ethnicity is not a primary cause of violent conflict, but conflicts may become ethnic. Discuss with reference to AT LEAST ONE case.6. “Ethnicity may channel the pursuit of power and prestige along certain pathways such that the factions that struggle over state control will align along ethnic cleavages. Ethnicity is not an aim in itself, but the organizational means through which individuals struggle to gain access to state power” (Wimmer, Cederman & Mins, 2009, p335). To what extent do factional struggles over state power explain apparent ethnic conflicts? Answer in relation to AT LEAST ONE conflict.7. Electoral competition provides the potential for the politicisation of ethnicity and ethnicised conflict. Discuss with reference to AT LEAST ONE case.8. Has the Responsibility to Protect led to more effective responses to humanitarian emergencies by the international community?9. In an era when famines are preventable, famines are the result of either deliberate political action or the failure to act. Discuss.10. Does goal-oriented humanitarianism risk putting peace before people?11. “Peacebuilding and statebuilding … are based on a negative understanding of the politics of state formation: that is, that states are formed through violent struggles and so intervention is necessary to mitigate the processes they unleash. Rarely has there been a consideration that there may be an internal and non-violent struggle for peace at the grassroots level that has the potential to bring about a sustainable order” (Richmond 2014 Failed Statebuilding, pp 1-2). Discuss.12. “There is very limited evidence from the field that peacebuilders have been able to calibrate peacebuilding interventions so that they play to the strengths of local and external actors. The power (and, it has to be said, clumsiness) of the liberal peace means that its footprint often dominates or at least distorts the peacemaking environment.” (Mac Ginty, 2010, “Hybrid Peace” p 408). Discuss with reference to at least one example.13. To what extent can programmes promoting reconciliation and justice in post-conflict societies reduce ethnic divisions and re-integrate divided societies. Discuss with reference to AT LEAST ONE example.14. To what extent can Everyday Peace activities go “beyond a negative peace of conflict-calming and avoidance, towards everyday diplomacy or people-to-people activities that can move a society towards conflict transformation” (Mac Ginty, 2014 “Everyday Peace” p549)? Answer with reference to at least one case.