Peacebuilding

Addressing the legacies of mass human rights violations is a daunting task for any society emerging from conflict. The challenges are all the more complex in South Sudan, where people have struggled with civil wars, state repression, and developmental neglect for generations. With the current conflict, transitional justice – or the range of judicial and nonjudicial measures that countries emerging from a period of conflict or authoritarian rule use to address past human right violations – has come onto the agenda for the first time. However, the foundational elements that are required for transitional justice interventions to succeed are lacking. Political leaders are largely uninformed about the role that transitional justice can play in restoring peace, and some are deeply uncomfortable with the notion of scrutinizing and holding people accountable for wartime abuses. Survivors are conspicuously absent from discussions about how best to address the legacies of the conflict, and human rights advocates are confronted with an ever-shrinking civic space. Moreover, there are real fears that the tense peace that currently exists among most armed groups could collapse at any moment and the country could return to full-scale civil war.

The uncertainties of the current situation make it all the more important for South Sudanese to develop a carefully considered plan for transitional justice that identifies priorities and sequences activities in a manner that sustains and builds momentum over time. Most importantly, transitional justice interventions must be tailored to the context and designed and implemented in a manner that is meaningful to South Sudanese. Transitional justice in South Sudan will be a generational undertaking. While the current generation may not realize the full rewards of their efforts, it is nonetheless incumbent upon us to begin the process and establish a strong foundation that subsequent generations might build upon.

In this selection of articles on the Future and Implementation of the R-ARCSS in South Sudan scholars/experts including Christopher Zambakari, Remember Miamingi, Peter Adwok Nyaba and Jok Madut Jok explore the R-ARCSS and its implementation by focusing on different issues such as the delays in the implementation of the agreement, the security sector reform, and the number of states.

Trade and markets in weak states are often discussed in relation with violence, security and peace-building. A case in point are marketplaces in the Sudan-South Sudan borderlands where communities separated by insecurity and hostility meet, not only to trade but also to negotiate and exchange information. This does not imply that establishment of such markets automatically results in peace and stability. Based on new empirical research on the Amieth market in Abyei – an area contested by the two Sudans – I argue that such markets rely on security guarantees negotiated between a set of heterogenous societal groups and that the overall impact of such border markets is largely determined within a context of hybrid security governance. The conclusion emphasises that without a proper analysis of this context, external assistance to such borderland markets might just as well enable violent conflict actors as being a tool for peace-building.

Over the last 50 years, the various conflicts afflicting South Sudan have caused massive displacements of people. Latest estimates suggest there are more than 1.5 million internally displaced people (IDPs) within the country’s borders, with another 2.2 million refugees displaced outside the country, as a result of the most recent conflicts. Policymakers generally see these populations as highly vulnerable—being less able to provide for themselves and their families away from their original homes—and at risk of involvement in cross-border conflict dynamics. Thus, responses by state actors to these movements tend to focus on managing potential conflict, providing humanitarian assistance for displaced communities, and supporting, facilitating or (in some cases) forcing populations to return to their home areas.

This report aims to better inform those working on humanitarian assistance, particularly to populations on the move, peace and development in South Sudan and the region, particularly international actors less familiar with these dynamics. Billions of dollars are spent on humanitarian and peacekeeping programmes globally every year, yet, despite being critical to the lives of millions of ordinary people, transnational networks are missing from most analyses. The report’s concluding section includes a set of recommendations intended to help international policymakers formulate an informed response to these transnational dynamics.

This article draws on empirical data collected in Yei River County, South Sudan, to contribute to debates on hybrid governance in Africa. Current literature offers a limited understanding of the practical workings of hybridity, and particularly of whether and under what circumstances hybridity may meet the interests and solve the problems of citizens. This article discusses how subsequent historical attempts at state-building have left a complex and layered governance system and analyses how this system functions on the ground in Yei River County, focusing on the land and justice sectors. The empirical analysis reveals institutional development to be ongoing and to be shaped through continuous negotiations among local stakeholders. Whilst in the land sector, this process produced power imbalances and violence, in the justice sector, unexpected institutional cooperation improved access to justice for local citizens. Important factors in determining these institutional outcomes have been what we have termed the two P’s: pragmatism and power.

Between August and November 2019, IOM’s Displacement Tracking Matrix (DTM) conducted Village Assessment Survey (VAS) in Rubkona, Wau and Bor South Counties assessing a total of 63 bomas (13 in Bor South, 11 in Rubkona and 39 in Wau) and carrying key informant interviews at 191 educational facilities and 42 health facilities. In addition to this, 1,147 facilities and services including water points, markets, fishing areas, etc. were also mapped. This dataset contains data collected through health technical questionnaire.

This case study sets out learning from programmatic engagement from the UK’s Peacebuilding Opportunities Fund (POF) among the Otuho people of Eastern Equatoria State. The programme promoted a cultural engagement process aimed to strengthen women’s peace and security at a time when Otuho society undergoes a 22-year cycle of generational change when leadership structures are renewed. This case study draws on POF experience from this engagement, sharing learning associated with influencing cultural processes through public discourse, and the development of bylaws adopted by the community. The learning paper outlines an approach to working with communities from within, while also reviewing social norms and practices which negatively impact women’s participative and leadership roles within society. The programme, working with local advisers, negotiated the consent of community leadership and facilitated public discussion on changes that would positively impact the community, to be adopted as bylaws.The case study shows the potential for change inherent in this community-led approach, outlining a change process that is internally driven, which builds on the positive dimensions of particular cultures, while affirming the need for change.

In this article the author examines the relevance of infant-industry promotion theory to South Sudan’s economic revitalization efforts. As a newly formed state with jurisdiction over people with varied and often conflicting interests, the South Sudanese government will likely experience difficulty developing institutions and procedures that produce an equitable distribution of economic gains across the South Sudanese population. After a brief introduction, Zambakari discusses the role of the state in economic development dating back to the renaissance. He discusses the state and economic development in South Sudan and argues that recent declines in South Sudan’s performance on key human development indicators heighten the urgency of evaluating different strategic options for rebuilding an economy ravaged by civil war. This process will necessarily require careful consideration of the optimal degree of state involvement in designing and implementing these solutions. Infant-industry promotion is one promising approach to leveling the playing field between developing and developed country economies. Lastly, Zambakari presents the case for infant-industry promotion and call for the government to serve an active role in economic development and promotion, an alternative model for development in South Sudan by applying selective economic policies to industries where productive capacities can be developed.

The youth of South Sudan cannot be defined under a single age bracket, and nor can they be defined by a single set of cultural characteristics or interests. Nevertheless, there appears to be a similar motivation emerging among South Sudan’s youth: a sense of tiredness and not having enough, as well as a desire to take matters into their own hands. This document draws on a broad base of secondary research conducted in recent years, but most importantly it surveys the voices of young people in seven states. More than 368 young people were consulted across Eastern, Central and Western Equatoria, Northern and Western Bahr el Ghazal, Unity and Lakes. Its goal is to gain a better understanding of these youth subcultures and to identify their needs, motivations and means for survival, as well as entry points to actively and peacefully involve them so that they may play a major role in peace and reconciliation, peacebuilding and community cohesion interventions.

South Sudan youth comprise 74 per cent of the population. The youth in South Sudan have been, for a long time, the logs that fuel the fire -positively as they drive the rural and urban informal economies, and negatively, as they are easily incentivized to violence and pervasive practices such as cattle raids.

The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) South Sudan commissioned this study to understand youth and their emerging subcultures in South Sudan. The study sought to understand what motivates the youth to join both negative and positive subcultures, what is driving the emerging youth subcultures in different states and how the positive subcultures can be reinforced for peace and development. The study also sought to understand how the youth can be disincentivized from the negative subcultures.

South Sudan’s peace process remains in intensive care, its health dependent on continual attention from its external sponsors, namely neighboring governments and the international community.
This is not sustainable. At worst, it provides opportunities for the military and political elite to continue to run the country in pursuit of their own interests. At best, it buys time to create a more substantial peace process that can enact more far-reaching change.
This policy brief takes stock of recent trends and developments in the peace process and offers a number of considerations to inform efforts by political actors in South Sudan and their international partners to consolidate peace.
The paper proposes the following three short-term steps to restore the implementation of the Revitalised Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in South Sudan (R-ARCSS):
1. Sustained pressure from neighboring countries, coupled with increased investment in track II initiatives, could be used to overcome deadlock and increase communication among the various parties in the new unity government and between the new government and non-signatories to the R-ARCSS.
2. The creation of space for citizens to share their views on the way forward for the country could help to increase South Sudanese ownership over the peace process and create an environment that is conducive to more transformative change. Critically, any such civic engagement process should go beyond a simple airing of grievances and listing of the many things that should be done to helping people organize, set priorities, and determine what they can do at a local level to enact the changes that they want to see.
3. Policymakers and civic actors should make necessary preparations so that they are ready to respond decisively should the agreement collapse and large-scale violence resume.