Understanding contemporary conflicts in Africa: a state of affairs and current knowledge

Understanding contemporary conflicts in Africa remains directly dependent on the approaches employed to decipher or interpret them. This article first examines the bias of conventional approaches (inherited from the Cold War) and then those of a series of supposedly “newer” approaches. Relying primarily on West African examples, it offers a brief overview of current knowledge, issues, and avenues for research, based on three apparent characteristics of a “new generation” of conflicts: the regionalization of wars, the privatization of violence and security, and the recourse to extreme forms of brutality. These three major trends bear witness to a rapid transformation of war and armed violence over the past 20 years, but they are not sufficient to establish a radical historical break between “old” and “new” conflicts in Africa. By concealing elements of continuity a priori, the most influential “new” approaches actually make it impossible to ponder their own limits. To that end, fashionability and struggles for influence within the Africanist field play a major role in perpetuating dominant, sensationalistic, or simplistic (and invariably incorrect) portrayals of African conflicts.     

Does Military Spending Nonlinearly Affect Economic Growth in South Africa?

Using annual data collected from 1988 to 2015, this study provides evidence of a non-linear relationship between military spending, economic growth and other growth determinants for the South African economy. The empirical study is based on estimates of a logistic smooth transition regression (LSTR) model and our empirical results point to an inverted U-shaped relationship between military spending and economic growth for the data. Furthermore, our empirical results suggest that the current levels of military spending, as a component of total government expenditure, are too high in the South African economy and need to be transferred towards more productive non-military expenditure in order to improve the performance of economic growth and other growth determinants.     

Rebellion and African Ethics

In this paper I draw on Thaddeus Metz’s pioneering work in African ethics, and particularly his account of the concept described by the terms ubuntu (Nguni languages), botho (Sotho-Tswana), hunhu (Shona) or utu (Swahili), to sketch an African normative understanding of the act of rebellion against the authority of the state. Most commonly articulated in the phrase “a person is a person through other persons”, ubuntu is interpreted by Metz as a unique communitarian moral principle which can be described in its essence as the claim that “actions are right, or confer ubuntu (humanness) on a person, insofar as they prize communal relationships, ones in which people identify with each other, or share a way of life, and exhibit solidarity toward one another, or care about each other’s quality of life”. On the face of it, this principle appears at odds with rebellions against state authority. Following Metz, I argue, however, that a deeper grasp of this principle does, in fact, provide a justification for instances of civilian rebellion against state authority, under appropriate circumstances.     

Tanzanian scepticism of a militarised East African Federation and underlying military concerns

Attitudes towards a regional military force are of paramount importance when exploring public support for regional integration. Until now, however, scholarly research has not considered the influence of attitudes towards a regional military mechanism in the sub-Saharan African context. Using Afrobarometer data, we demonstrate that military concerns are vital when exploring Tanzanian attitudes towards the proposed political federation of the East African Community (EAC), the East African Federation (EAF). More specifically, opposition to military cooperation strongly influences Tanzanian scepticism of the EAF. This finding is highly relevant given that referendums in the participating member states must be passed to facilitate political integration. Heightened opposition towards military cooperation raises the possibility of the public rejecting a politically integrated EAC. This poses a potential obstacle to the implementation of joint security policies and crucial mechanisms to provide a more stable region at large. We account for alternative explanations of Tanzanian opinion formation and reflect on the strength of military-orientated concerns for investigating public support for the East African project specifically and regional integration in sub-Saharan Africa more widely.     

How does state security limit the right to protest? State response to popular participation in South Africa

In South Africa, the right to protest has come under threat from the state. Increasing cases of forceful policing and, at times, unlawful procedural prohibitions of protest attest to this. Interviews with members of different community-based organisations across South Africa show that protest is sometimes delegitimised under the guise of security as protestors are constructed as threats to the state. The larger implication of this treatment is that these protestors are treated as non-citizens who are excluded from participating in governance. This study aims to describe this situation through securitisation theory, arguing that South Africa has become a securitised state. It therefore looks at the implications of this securitised response for popular participation in South Africa.     

Guns and butter? Military expenditure and health spending on the eve of the Arab Spring

We examine the validity of the guns-versus-butter hypothesis in the pre-Arab Spring era. Using panel data from 1995 to 2011 – the eve of the Arab uprisings – we find no evidence that increased security needs as measured by the number of domestic terrorist attacks are complemented by increased military spending or more importantly ‘crowd out’ government expenditure on key public goods such as health care. This suggests that both expenditure decisions were determined by other considerations at the government level.     

“The major prize”: apartheid South Africa’s accession to the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, 1988–91

ABSTRACT

This article focuses on the final years of South Africa’s nuclear-weapon program, particularly on the decision-making process leading up to the signature of the 1968 Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT) by the South African government in 1991. In August 1988, after two decades of defiance, negotiations between the apartheid government and the NPT depository powers (the United Kingdom, the United States, and the Soviet Union) ensued at the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) in Vienna. Despite South Africa being the only state to give up its indigenously developed nuclear weapons and subsequently join the nonproliferation regime, little is known about how the national position on NPT accession and IAEA safeguards evolved. Research carried out in multiple archives using hitherto untapped primary sources and interviews with key actors from several countries show how domestic and regional political dynamics influenced Pretoria’s position on entering the nonproliferation regime. In the process, the F.W. de Klerk government managed to skillfully exploit international proliferation fears to advance its own agenda, thereby connecting South African NPT accession with that of the neighboring Frontline States coalition of Angola, Mozambique, Tanzania, Zambia, and Zimbabwe.     

The ligaments of counter-terrorism regime: sexual violence and the vicarious traumatisation of female non-governmental organisation workers: evidence from Nigeria

ABSTRACT

There is a dearth of studies on indirect victims of sexual violence in counter-terrorism efforts. Using Nigeria as a case study, this paper argues that global and state-level counter-terrorism policies have generally failed to account for the psychological effects of the engagement of female NGO workers in counter-terrorism operations or mitigating the effects of terrorism in conflict zones. Specifically, there has been an increase in sexual violence perpetrated by some members of the security agencies involved in counter-terrorism operations in North-eastern Nigeria. As a result, female NGO workers carry out Medicare, psychosocial counselling and advocacy for these victims. Female NGO workers become exposed to the trauma of victims of sexual violence, which affects their mental health and thus performances in counter-terrorism activities in the country. This altered their worldview on issues of safety even among secured locations or among the presence of security agents and reinforced feelings of powerlessness.     

Guerrilla warfare in Katanga: the Sanga rebellion of the 1890s and its suppression

ABSTRACT

This article discusses the origins and development of the Sanga insurgency of the 1890s with a view to demonstrating that, contrary to commonly held stereotypes, pre-colonial warfare was neither simple nor unchanging. Its tactics, it is argued here, repay the sort of close analysis commonly reserved for other typologies and theatres of war. The Yeke, against whose exploitative system of rule the Sanga and their allies rose up in 1891, survived the onslaught by entering into a strategic alliance with Lofoi, a newly established station of the Congo Free State, and its limited contingent of regular Force Publique troops. An in-depth examination of the joint Yeke-Force Publique counterinsurgency campaign leads to the conclusion that the novelty of the ‘small wars’ that accompanied the Scramble for Africa should not be overstated. In southern Katanga and, by implication, elsewhere, these confrontations were shaped by processes of mutual borrowing in which African military practices and even political aims were not necessarily subordinate to European ones.     

The American way of war in Africa: the case of Niger

ABSTRACT

Increasing attention paid to US casualties in far-flung places such as Tongo Tongo, Niger, and headlines claiming ‘secret wars’ have fueled discussion about American military’s involvement in Africa. Though the continent has been a part of the American way of war since the beginnings of the US – consider the early combat actions of US Marines in Tripoli –, current African conflicts are challenging our understanding of war and approaches to winning it. This article examines the ways America seeks to achieve its ends in Africa with a particular focus upon the last 10 years of US counter-terrorism and stability operations in Niger and the Sahel Region. The author proposes unifying American, Allied, and partner efforts through a strategy of Active Containment.