Participation In Peacekeeping Operations Research Articles

Nacionalni interes Republike Srbije za učešće Vojske Srbije u mirovnim operacijama

Peacekeeping operations are one of the instruments for resolving crises in the world and preventing armed conflicts that threaten global peace and security. This article argues that the participation of the Serbian Armed Forces in UN missions contributed to peacekeeping in the world and produced positive benefits for the country. Namely, the Serbian Armed Forces inherits the tradition of many years of participation in UN and EU peacekeeping operations. This article first provides an overview of the most important contributions of the Republic of Serbia to peacekeeping operations, focusing on the important role that this activity plays in the achievement of foreign policy goals, national development and international relations. This is followed by the presentation of national legislation that regulates the Serbian Armed Forces participation in peacekeeping operations. Therefore, peacekeeping operations are recognized as a type of multilateral mechanism for achieving cooperation between the Republic of Serbia and the UN/EU and a contribution to building trust and the position of a reliable partner in international relations. The theory of international relations that explains such actions of states is the realism theory. In accordance with realists school of thought, state national interests for participation in peacekeeping operations are military security issues, national and strategic interests as well as economic interests, and increased credibility and power of states in international relations. Starting from the fact that global security is comprehensive and indivisible, states are even more interested in participating in peacekeeping operations and perceive it as their national interests and an element of foreign and security policy. This is the initial thesis from which the authors base their analysis presented in the paper.

A system of mental health care in The Veterans of The United States in the context of people affected by MST.

ObjectivesThe research purpose of this article is to describe the mode of operation of the mental health care system for veterans in the United States, in particular the treatment of people suffering from MST.MethodsThe main method used in this study is a systematic review of international literature and websites on the US Department of Veterans Affairs health care system in the context of people affected by MST.ResultsThe analysis allowed to determine the importance of the health care system in the US Department of Veterans Affairs, in particular those suffering from MST.ConclusionsThe highly developed system of psychiatric care for ill veterans in the United States is the result of the enormous international activity of one of the most powerful armies in the world. The American army achieved its status mainly through participation in peacekeeping and military operations abroad. Due to the high involvement of American soldiers in various types of missions, the vast number of cases related to psychological trauma in particular of MST. It became reasonable to introduce legal regulations and create an extensive healthcare system for people with veteran status. In order to care for a group of nearly 19 million people, the United States created an integrated state system of care for veterans and their families. The article presents two clinical cases that highlight the problem of MST mental health disorders that affect not only the veterans, but also their families.

Gender Perspective in UN Police Peacekeeping

Despite the upsurge in conflicts at the turn of the 20th and 21st centuries and the increase in peacekeeping activities, women’s participation in peacekeeping operations has been the exception to the rule rather than the standard practice. However, the UN has focused on the negative and disproportional impact of internal armed conflicts on women and children. For the past two decades, the UN has been working to incorporate a gender perspective into the peacekeeping architecture. The starting point was UN Security Council Resolution 1325, adopted in 2000, which fully recognized the importance of the gender perspective in peace and security. The UN’s further systematic actions in this direction have changed the simplistic view of women as victims of internal armed conflicts and have recognized them as active contributors to peace and security. The purpose of the article is to comprehensively examine the current state of the international community’s commitment to women, peace and security in order to fill the existing theoretical gaps and find further ways to enhance the role of women in peace and security activities. The study is based on interdisciplinary, historical and structural-functional approaches, and uses content analysis of official UN documents and data, analytical reports of international organizations, relevant scientific materials and publications. The authors conclude that UNSCR 1325 (2000) initiated a major shift in UN peacekeeping in the context of a large-scale “Women, Peace and Security” agenda and has led to new approaches to women’s participation in all stages of peace processes. Women’s active and equal participation in peace negotiations and the implementation of political decisions has become an important factor in strengthening peace and security. Moreover, the UN’s current activities are not limited to women’s participation in peacekeeping. In addition to changes in the planning and staffing of peacekeeping operations, the UN has also taken steps to address less visible behavioral issues, including the prevention of sexual and gender-based violence, as well as the professional skills of peacekeeping personnel. At the same time, the increase in the number of women in the military and police components of UN missions has raised some international concerns about the potential masculinization of female peacekeepers.

CHINA’S PARTICIPATION IN UN PEACEKEEPING MISSIONS

2020 marks the 30th anniversary of China’s participation in UN peacekeeping operations. China’s participation in it is gaining weight in China’s diplomatic and military strategy. China is currently the second largest contributor to UN peacekeeping after the United States. The reasons for the rapid development that China’s participation in UN peacekeeping operations has gained in a short period of time are of particular interest to study. The purpose of the research is to examine China’s participation in UN peacekeeping. The study highlights the main stages of China’s attitude to UN peacekeeping and its participation in peacekeeping operations, identifies the motives and reasons for China’s participation in peacekeeping operations, as well as the unique features of Chinese peacekeeping. Results. China’s motivations for becoming a peacekeeper consist of “soft” reputational and “hard” national interests. Support for international peacekeeping under the auspices of the UN provides an opportunity to maintain China’s image as a responsible power interested in creating a stable environment for peaceful development. China encourages the use of political and diplomatic means to resolve conflicts and adheres to the principle of national sovereignty. China’s participation in UN peacekeeping operations is a manifestation of China’s active multilateral diplomacy and a kind of “creative intervention”.

Use of force to protect civilians in United Nations peacekeeping: Military culture, organisational learning and troop reticence

ABSTRACT Combining empirical examples from domestic counterinsurgency operations, with historical and primary field data in longitudinal cases of peacekeeping participation by the Indian troops, we develop a preliminary theory of troop reticence. We find that while there is significant learning around civilian protection on the part of Indian troops from internal counterinsurgency operations, there are also important operational differences. Problems with insubordination to international command, gaps in intelligence analysis, and ambiguity over the rules of engagement amidst host-state directed armed attacks on civilians, can make troops hesitant to execute the protection of civilians (PoC) mandate more robustly.

A price for peace: troop contributing countries’ responses to peacekeeper fatalities

ABSTRACT How do states respond to fatalities of their troops in UN peacekeeping operations (PKOs)? Recent research highlights that participation in peacekeeping is costly for most states. Personnel fatalities should create further costs for contributors and often result in a reduction of their commitments. Studies that evaluate this expectation yield mixed findings. One finds no evidence that OECD countries provide fewer personnel to UN PKOs following fatalities. In contrast, another finds that fatalities generally correspond with reductions in states’ personnel commitments to UN operations in Africa but also reveals that wealthier contributors tend to withdraw at larger magnitudes than their poorer counterparts. This study builds on this work by further hypothesizing that the incentives that motivate states to participate in PKOs condition their willingness to maintain their contributions after experiencing fatalities. An analysis of states’ troop fatalities and commitments to 41 UN operations from 1990 to 2015 supports this expectation. States that are contiguous to an operation, which face greater concerns about the externalities of nearby conflicts, and states that receive side payments for their troop commitments, via foreign aid, are more willing to maintain their commitments in response to fatalities of their troops than other contributors. Additional findings suggest that non-contiguous contributors that do not receive side payments are also inclined to withdraw troops in response to upticks in organized violence surrounding a mission as well as fatalities of other contributors’ troops. These results illustrate that the motives that states face to participate in PKOs also affect their willingness to maintain their troop commitments as their costs for participation increase.

PENGLIBATAN NEGARA-NEGARA ISLAM DALAM MISI PENGAMAN ANTARABANGSA ISLAMIC COUNTRIES PARTICIPATION IN INTERNATIONAL PEACEKEEPING MISSION

International peacekeeping mission is an important mechanism in the aspect of contemporary international conflict management. Since its first implementation by United Nations (UN) wayback in 1948, it attracted interest and participation from many countries in the organization. This includes the Islamic countries. Since the end of the Cold War era in the late 1980s, Islamic countries emerged as among the leading participant and troop contributor to international peacekeeping mission especially the mission organized by the UN. Half of the top-ten troop contributors to the current UN mission today are the Islamic countries such as Bangladesh, Pakistan, Egypt, Indonesia and Ghana. Even though Islamic countries had been contributing actively in numerous UN missions, nothing much were known about it. This article discussed in brief about the scenario of Islamic countries participation in international peacekeeping mission by referring to the mission organized by the UN and non-UN organizations since its early years to the present time. The approach use in this article are historical analysis and content analysis. This article concluded that, firstly, this scenario served as an evidence of Islamic countries un-ending support to the UN as a world governing body; secondly, national interest and not religious interest seems to be the primary driving factor of Islamic countries participation in peacekeeping; and finally, while Islamic countries continued its active participation in this areas of contribution, it nevertheless had to familiarize itself with the impacts and challenges that it currently faced which maybe will limited its noble effort to continue its support to international peacekeeping mission in the near future.

Trade Potential and UN Peacekeeping Participation

ABSTRACT The determinants of a country's UN peacekeeping troop contribution have been persistently studied. Trade, as a crucial self-interest motivation, is one of the important explanatory variables in the extant literature. However, the existing literature presents mixed results on the influence of trade on peacekeeping troop contributions. To capture the effect of trade on contributions precisely, we need to model expectations about future trade volume in a better way. Countries are pressured by the economic and political risks caused by the trade disruption and lobby groups to send peacekeeping troops to enable future trade or secure future investments. Therefore, trade potential, rather than realized trade, drives peacekeeping troop contributions. A gravity model is used to measure the trade potential between the UN peacekeeping mission countries and contributors, and test its relationship with the UN peacekeeping participation. Based on this measurement and a dyadic troop contribution dataset covering the period from 1990 to 2012, this article demonstrates that the counter-factual predictive trade volume is a relevant predictor of UN peacekeeping troop contributions.

Stability abroad, instability at home? Changing UN peace operations and civil–military relations in Global South troop contributing countries

ABSTRACT This article highlights the domestic effects of the ongoing changes in United Nations peacekeeping practice on troop contributing states from the Global South. It juxtaposes scholarship on stabilization, the specific motivations of Global South troop contributing countries, and in particular the effects on civilian control of armed forces of peacekeeping participation. It argues that the “diversionary peace” hypothesis—which posits beneficial effects on civilian control for peacekeeping—has not obtained, and that current developments in United Nations peace operations will negatively affect civil–military relations in postcolonial sending countries. The text suggests avenues for future inquiry. One is the notion that stabilization may lead to a net negative effect on civilian control in unconsolidated democracies. This is due to stabilization's increased militarization, and its turn towards objectives that mimic the counterinsurgency mandates associated with military rule in the Global South, rather than a focus on the socioeconomic well-being of local populations.

CHINA'S INTERNATIONAL PEACEKEEPING CONTRIBUTIONS AND THE EVOLUTION OF CONTEMPORARY CHINESE STRATEGIC CONSIDERATIONS

Following the end of the Cold War and significant changes in the international community, Chinese leaders moved from a reluctant stand in United Nations (UN) activities to a position of active cooperation in UN peacekeeping. In fact, China became the biggest contributor of troops to UN peacekeeping operations among the permanent members of the Security Council. Towards the mid-2000s, China was involved in all seven UN peacekeeping operations on the African continent. This dramatic surge in Chinese peacekeeping participation coincided with Beijing's efforts in the early 2000s to deliberately expand its economic and diplomatic influence globally through trade and diplomatic links, as well as through its participation in international organisations, including UN peacekeeping operations. However, there have always been limits to China's involvement in peacekeeping operations. Beijing's views on peacekeeping have consistently been based on a sound respect for state sovereignty and the principle of non-intervention. In this context, this article points out that on the one hand, China is increasingly expected to concern itself with the global responsibilities of a great power,but as its strategic and material interests have become more integrated and entangled with the African continent, Beijing is more and more compelled to consider its national interest and to protect those interestsin Africa. Consequently, China's growing involvement in peacekeeping has become more difficult to reconcile with the country's commitment to non-interventionism, particularly as witnessed in the case of South Sudan. 

Activities of Multinational Military Companies in the Post-Soviet Space

This article considers the main directions of the activities of Western private military companies (PMCs) in the post-Soviet space. The end of the USSR and the Warsaw Pact led to the creation of an extensive arms market. The collapse of the Soviet army and the prolonged economic crisis frustrated a large number of former military personnel and made them ready to offer their professional skills to almost any solvent customer. The decay of the bipolar system of international relations has created vast zones of instability, mostly localized in Africa, the Balkans, and in the Middle East. The military security function no longer prevails in the largest Western PMCs. These corporations have significantly diversified their activities, thoughtfully excluded the word “military” from their names, and today provide customers with a wide range of services from cargo transportation and consulting to construction and geological exploration. Unlike Iraq and Afghanistan, the post-Soviet space does not provide Western PMCs with any broad field for participation in peacekeeping and counter-terrorism operations. Their contribution to the combat training of the armed forces of Georgia, Ukraine and Azerbaijan was limited to only a few episodes. However, the gradual penetration of Chinese military companies into the Central Asian region has become a fundamentally new phenomenon.

Peacekeeping in Foreign Policy of Japan

The article analyses Japanese approach towards peacekeeping and issues associated with Japans participation in the peacekeeping operations (PKOs). It focuses on factors which influence shaping and transformation of Japans approach towards this sphere of UN activity. For the first time, Japan sent its Self-defense forces to participate in the PKO in the early 1990s and since then peacemaking has become one of the symbols of Japan's contribution to international security. Despite the significance of cooperation with the UN that the Japanese government has underlined, the indicators that characterize Japan's participation in peacekeeping remain at a low level. In the article, the author explores the causes of this phenomenon and identifies patterns that characterize the models of Japanese participation in PKO. Using the historical method and content analysis of official documents and speeches by Japans representatives the author explores the hypothesis that currently, from the point of view of the Japanese government, the issue of participation in the PKOs is important as a way to adapt the public to the expansion of the sphere of activity of the Self-defense forces, but in practice, the ruling circles seek to avoid the risks associated with the participation of the Japanese military in the PKOs, preferring to shift the focus on peace-building, financial, educational and technological contribution that Japan can make to UN operations. The concept of active pacifism promoted by Abe did not lead to a more extensive participation of the Japanese military in the PKOs. An analysis of current trends in peacekeeping suggests that the participation of Self-defense forces in PKOs will remain at a low level and will be offset by other opportunities for Japan to contribute to international peacekeeping.

Female peacekeepers’ added burden

Abstract Twenty years since the adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 1325 there is an almost unanimous call for an increased number of uniformed women in peace operations from policy-makers and multilateral organizations. This continuous push for the inclusion of more women is often justified by arguments about an increased operational effectiveness related to women's ‘added value’: both implicitly and explicitly advocating for greater gender equality. Yet, in this article, I contend that using instrumentalist arguments to increase the number of female peacekeepers may on the contrary undermine gender equality. This is related to the risk of producing self-fulfilling prophecies whereby female peacekeepers try to live up to the high expectations by fitting into gender-stereotypes and/or by working harder than their male colleagues. Rather than increase gender equality, such efforts risk transforming the female ‘added value’ to an ‘added burden’ which male peacekeepers do not have to carry. Anchoring the study in feminist theory with the aim to understand gendered relations of power, to illustrate my argument I draw on extensive interview material from military staff and peacekeepers in South Africa, Burundi, Belgium and Niger; interviews and informal discussions with female and male peacekeepers; and participation in several policy and research workshops on female participation in peacekeeping.

A test of the democratic peacekeeping hypothesis: Coups, democracy, and foreign military deployments

While peacekeeping’s effects on receiving states have been studied at length, its effects on sending states have only begun to be explored. This article examines the effects of contributing peacekeepers abroad on democracy at home. Recent qualitative research has divergent findings: some find peacekeeping contributes to democratization among sending states, while others find peacekeeping entrenches illiberal or autocratic rule. To adjudicate, we build on recent quantitative work focused specifically on the incidence of coups. We ask whether sending peacekeepers abroad increases the risk of military intervention in politics at home. Drawing on selectorate theory, we expect the effect of peacekeeping on coup risk to vary by regime type. Peacekeeping brings with it new resources which can be distributed as private goods. In autocracies, often developing states where UN peacekeeping remuneration exceeds per-soldier costs, deployment produces a windfall for militaries. Emboldened by new resources, which can be distributed as private goods among the selectorate, and fearing the loss of them in the future, they may act to depose the incumbent regime. In contrast, peacekeeping will have little effect in developed democracies, which have high per-troop costs, comparatively large selectorates, and low ex-ante coup risk. Anocracies, which typically have growing selectorates, and may face distinctive international pressures to democratize, will likely experience reduced coup risk. We test these claims with data covering peacekeeping deployments, regime type, and coup risk since the end of the Cold War. Our findings confirm our theoretical expectations. These findings have implications both for how we understand the impact of participation in peacekeeping – particularly among those countries that contribute troops disproportionately in the post-Cold War era – and for the potential international determinants of domestic autocracy.

Diversionary Peace: International Peacekeeping and Domestic Civil-Military Relations

ABSTRACT What is the impact of international peacekeeping missions for civil-military relations at home? This article unpacks the conditions that produce positive effects of peacekeeping participation on the domestic politics of an authoritarian regime. Drawing on field research, I discuss four mechanisms that link foreign policy making to domestic civil-military relations in Ben Ali’s Tunisia. First, the deployment of troops for peacekeeping abroad presents obstacles for the coordination of coup plots at home. Second, incumbents can allocate material resources to meet officers’ economic grievances. Moreover, peacekeeping operations serve to enhance corporate institutionalization through specific training programmes. Finally, peacekeeping contributes to a professional ethos and hence the depoliticization of the officer corps. These findings give rise to the notion that contributing to peace can have similar effects for domestic politics as going to war.

Civilianizing the armed forces? Peacekeeping, a traditional mission for the military

ABSTRACTPeacekeeping is widely believed to introduce a civilian element into military culture. However, empirical tests of whether peacekeeping actually yields civilianizing effects on the armed forces are few. Based on the case of Chile, I argue that participation in peacekeeping has failed to lead to fundamental changes in the military’s role perception vis-à-vis civilian actors, despite some practical learning experiences at the individual level. Peacekeeping has been assimilated into the existing warrior model, where civilian actors play only a secondary role.

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The features of the implementation of peacekeeping activities of Ukraine in the framework of the Strategy for International Peacekeeping Activities of Ukraine, approved in 15.06.2009 by № 435/2009 by the President of Ukraine, are examined and the international legal practice of participation of Ukraine in UN peacekeeping operations is analyzed. Taking into account the legal traditions, an assessment of the importance of the participation of Ukrainian Armed forces in peacekeeping operations under the auspices of the UN for Ukraine was made and recommendations were developed to improve the mechanism for legal regulation of the participation of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in peacekeeping operations. In 2009, the Decree of the President of Ukraine approved the Strategy of International Peacekeeping Activity of Ukraine, a document that outlines a prospective, strategic vision of further peacekeeping activities of the state and defines “priority goals of state participation in international peacekeeping activities, tasks and mechanisms of realization of national interests in this process”. The experience gained in peacekeeping operations abroad over the years has contributed to maintaining the combat capability of the Ukrainian military to gain experience. Ukraine earns political and image dividends by participating in peacekeeping operations, which include support for bilateral relations with coalition members and countries in the region; the opportunity to promote their military equipment and equipment in international markets and more. Today it is necessary to review the Strategy for Peacekeeping Activities of Ukraine and pay attention to the following issues: increasing the level of involvement in the System for creation and determination of the readiness of forces for participation in the UN peacekeeping and security operations; expanding the use and creation of multinational peacekeeping contingents; participation of Ukraine in EU peacekeeping operations; issues of peacekeeping training of international contingents on the territory of Ukraine. The research in the article is devoted to the issue of prospects of Ukrainian peacekeeping activities and ways of improving the mechanism of legal regulation of the participation of the Armed Forces of Ukraine in peacekeeping operations.

Controlling Blue Berets: The Consequences of Political Neglect in the Case of Uruguay’s Participation in Peacekeeping

Peacekeeping has widely been seen as conducive to submit the military to democratic rule. We put the assumption to an empirical test based on the case of Uruguay, today a fully democratic state that has consistently ranked among the world’s top peacekeeping contributors per capita. Specifically, we ask whether participation in peacekeeping has increased civilian control over the military. To answer this question, we focus on three aspects of democratic civil–military relations: civilian oversight, civilian policy management, and armed forces–society relations. We conclude that peacekeeping has done little to trigger greater involvement of civilians in the area of military and defense policy but that it contributed to reduce the gap between the armed forces and society. Nevertheless, due to political neglect by civilian authorities, the state of civil–military relations is one of subordinate military autonomy short of ideal, even if it does not represent a threat to democratic rule.

Political decision-making and the decline of Canadian peacekeeping

ABSTRACTThis article explores the reasons behind Canada’s declining participation in United Nations peacekeeping operations. It proposes a decision-making model that explains how politicians assess opportunities to commit personnel to peacekeeping missions by balancing their policy objectives with the pressures of electoral politics. Emphasizing the importance of voters in political decision-making processes, it argues that participation in peacekeeping is dependent on three key factors: a belief in the value of peacekeeping in principle; a belief in the value of a given peacekeeping operation; and risk aversion in response to the potential costs of peacekeeping. Tracing Canada’s declining participation in peacekeeping operations since the 1990s, it particularly focuses on how this calculus has, in different ways, limited Canada’s involvement in peacekeeping under Stephen Harper’s Conservative government and Justin Trudeau’s Liberal government, arguing that the former undervalued peacekeeping as a means of obtaining its foreign policy objectives and as a feature of national identity, minimizing the perceived benefits of participation, while the latter has focused on the inherent risks of peacekeeping despite a professed commitment to peacekeeping in principle, maximizing the perceived costs of further personnel commitments. The decisions of successive Canadian governments have led to a free-rider problem in which Canada is willing to enjoy the benefits of peacekeeping but unwilling to bear the costs.

China’s evolving motivations and goals in UN peacekeeping participation

This brief examines how the motivations and goals of China’s participation in United Nations (UN) peacekeeping operations have evolved since 1990 as a result of China’s changing national interests. We conclude that China is unlikely to abandon its long-held foreign policy principle of non-interference. However, motivated by a desire to be seen as a responsible global power, Beijing is seriously considering a more proactive approach to humanitarian crises, which may include direct intervention. Furthermore, as a significant contributor of troops and financing, China is uniquely positioned to represent the perspectives of both developing and developed countries in UN peacekeeping. To do so, Beijing will need to increase its leadership role in UN peacekeeping operations and offer creative ideas about how to promote reconciliation and development in post-conflict societies.