Am I my brother’s peacekeeper? Strategic cultures and change among major troop contributors to United Nations peacekeeping

Abstract

ABSTRACTWith 16 ongoing peacekeeping operations currently deploying almost 100,000 troops, United Nations (UN) peacekeeping is the largest single source of foreign military intervention in conflict zones. Because UN peacekeeping is entirely dependent on voluntary contributions from Member States, there a pressing need to better understand why nations contribute peacekeeping troops in the first place. This article proposes a model for understanding the peacekeeping contribution issue under the lens of strategic culture. Through the fourth generation of strategic culture and its understanding of the dynamic ways that a country views force, we can better understand why or whether that country may contribute troops to UN peacekeeping. Using the case study of Canadian post-Cold War contributions to peacekeeping to develop the model, this article aims to better understand the decision-making environment of national strategic elites and how criteria for the use of force change over time in complex ways.