Today Somalia is a failed state. Somalia is anarchistic with there being no real authority rule. There is no rule of law or military to speak of. As with most African countries, Somalia bears the post-colonial scars of divided territories and an even more divided peoples. The United Nations is a global organization that is supposed to promote peace and prevent war. Unfortunately the UN failed to prevent anarchy and chaos within Somalia and now it seems that Somalia is too far gone to for the UN to restore peace and order. My argument for this paper is that if the UN had successfully executed their four principles for peace as identified in the “An Agenda for Peace” by Boutros Boutros-Ghali (1992), Somalia would have decayed into state run by militia-men. To understand how the four principles for peace could have saved Somalia, we need to understand them in their full contexts and how they were or were not adhered to within Somalia.
The first principle for peace is preventative diplomacy. This is the “most desirable and efficient employment of diplomacy”. (Boutros-Ghali 1992:205) The idea is the age-old prevention is better that cure methology. Boutros-Ghali goes on to elaborate his ideas of preventative diplomacy. These ideas include measures to build goodwill between conflicting parties, fact-finding and information sharing between conflicting parties and the UN, early warning systems, the preventative deployment of the UN peacekeeping force and use of demilitarized zones where international aid groups can work without fear for their safety. (Boutros-Ghali 1992:205).
The UN should have identified the potential for conflict in Somalia fairly soon after its colonial independence. Somalia was relatively stable until the United States removed economic aid for the country in 1989. (Meredith 2006:465). The already weakened government collapsed and a power struggle arose between the respective ethnic clans, which effectively tore the country into pieces and brought it into instability. The UN should have never allowed Somalia to become so dependant of foreign aid for that situation was unsustainable and doomed the country to collapse in on itself.
The second principle for peace is that of peacemaking. This is the idea of bringing hostile parties to discussion where they work out their sources of frustrations and conflict. (Boutros-Ghali 1992:207). Peace is so important for the global social interest that parties may be forced into peaceful negotiations by use of economic sanctions and the use of military force. This is exactly why the UN brought in the United States military. The idea was to forge a stable state. The way in which the UN went about attaining this was flawed from the start. The UN never encouraged the Somali militia leader the de-arm themselves. (Meredith 2006:465). They instead tried to work a solution with Somali clans that were armed for war.
The third principle for peace is that of peacekeeping. This is the idea of maintaining the peace once peace is attained. The UN failed at this too. When the United States peacekeeping forces originally arrive in Somalia there was a ceasefire between the clans. This is what opened the opportunity in the first place for the UN to get involved in the Somali conflict. Peacekeeping forces were less than diplomatic. Instead of taking a neutral approach, they allowed a rival militia of Aideed to occupy a town. This sent the wrong message to a powerful clan. The clan responded by starting a riot, which killed several member of the peacekeeping force and started a manhunt for Aideed by the American forces. (Meredith 2006:479). Ironically the American forces went to Somalia in a peacekeeping capacity and left a war behind.
The fourth principle for peace is that of peace-building. Peace-building is the idea of identifying and supporting structures, which are conducive to building a peaceful relationship between two parties. (Boutros-Ghali 1992:204). Somalia never truly got to a point where this could occur. The Black Hawk Down incident occurred and the United States left the country. Had the peacekeepers remained in the Somalia and brokered a peace deal, they could have issued in a representative unity government or taught the different clans to work together towards common national goals.
In conclusion, the four principles for peace are theoretically useful in resolving conflict and maintaining the peace between nations and within nations. The UN was unfortunately unable to successfully use these principles to defuse the situation with Somalia.
List of references:
· Boutros-Ghali, B. 1992. An Agenda for Peace.
· Meredith, M. 2006. The State Of Africa.
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