Non-state Actors

Abstract

Abstract The expression ‘non-state actors’ suggests different things to different people. On various occasions I have taken the chance to ask a group of diplomats, UN officials, and others to say what they understand by the term non-state actors in the context of a training seminar on human rights. The responses range wide. Most groups of interlocutors cover a spectrum: from rebels, terrorists, and Al-Qaeda, through to business, non-governmental organizations, and religious groups. For some it is ‘bad guys’; for others it is ‘civil society’. Perhaps most tellingly one person once responded: ‘all of us’. And here lies the problem with any attempt to give a lexical meaning of’non-state actor’ in the context of post-conflict peacebuilding: the phrase conjures up different entities depending on context and coincidence.