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The New U.S. Plan to Stabilize Conflicts: The Case of Libya

The New U.S. Plan to Stabilize Conflicts: The Case of Libya

Wednesday, April 6, 2022

Almost 11 years after ousting the dictatorship of Muammar Qaddafi, Libya remains a largely ungoverned land divided among warlord-led factions that fight with support from rival foreign countries. Libya’s instability resonates widely, permitting the trafficking of weapons to the Sahel and migrants to Europe. Repeated peace efforts have failed to help Libyans form a unified national government, yet Libyans continue to show the capacity to overcome communal divisions and build peace at local levels. That demonstrated capacity offers an opportunity that can be expanded by the U.S. government’s decision, under its Global Fragility Strategy, to direct a new peacebuilding effort toward Libya.

Type: Analysis

Fragility & Resilience

A New U.S. Plan to Avert Wider Conflicts in West Africa

A New U.S. Plan to Avert Wider Conflicts in West Africa

Thursday, April 7, 2022

The United States is setting a new priority on building peace in five West African nations threatened by domestic crises and by violence that is spreading from the neighboring Sahel region. The White House named those countries among others in which to launch a new U.S. strategy to prevent violent conflicts in unstable regions. This choice signaled that stability in coastal West Africa is a vital U.S. interest — and that these five countries, while in varied stages of building democracies, can strengthen democracy and stability with more focused, long-term U.S. support. A broad consultation of scholarly and policy experts on coastal West Africa is buttressing that idea.

Type: Analysis

Fragility & Resilience

Implementing the Global Fragility Act: What Comes Next?

Implementing the Global Fragility Act: What Comes Next?

Thursday, April 7, 2022

Amid the ongoing crisis in Ukraine, the Biden-Harris administration has quietly released a new policy that commits the United States to do more to “interrupt potential pathways to conflict” and reduce threats before they arrive on our shores. This new initiative comes at a difficult time for the United States and the world, given the full-blown crises that require the international community’s urgent attention, from COVID-19 to the climate crisis. Still, it represents an unprecedented and promising commitment at the highest levels of our government to apply the important lessons learned from decades of U.S. involvement in conflicts in Afghanistan, Iraq and elsewhere.

Type: Analysis

Conflict Analysis & PreventionFragility & Resilience

Mozambique’s Crisis Requires a New Playbook to Fight Extremism

Mozambique’s Crisis Requires a New Playbook to Fight Extremism

Thursday, December 3, 2020

Over the past three years, a local Islamist insurgency in the northern Mozambican province of Cabo Delgado has grown in strength and viciousness, developing ties with international terrorist groups and threatening one of the world’s largest natural gas projects. The insurgency is turning Cabo Delgado into a killing field.

Type: Analysis

Violent ExtremismFragility & Resilience

Nigeria's Security Failures: The Link Between EndSARS and Boko Haram

Nigeria's Security Failures: The Link Between EndSARS and Boko Haram

Thursday, December 17, 2020

At first glance, the October state-led killings of protesters in Nigeria’s largest city, Lagos, seem to have little in common with the November Boko Haram massacre of at least 43 farmers in Nigeria’s northeast, or the December 11 abduction of hundreds of school students in Katsina State. With vastly different circumstances, motivations, and perpetrators—and separated by hundreds of miles—all three episodes could easily be recorded as just further tragic installments in Nigeria’s long history of violence. However, these incidents underscore the wider failure of the state to provide security for its citizens, only deepening the trust deficit felt by Nigerians.

Type: Analysis

Violent ExtremismFragility & Resilience

Global Fragility Act: A Chance to Reshape International Security Assistance?

Global Fragility Act: A Chance to Reshape International Security Assistance?

Tuesday, January 19, 2021

When the new U.S. administration gets to work, domestic priorities will be front and center on the agenda. Preventing state fragility and violent extremism abroad may seem less urgent. But implementing the Global Fragility Act (GFA)—which aims to fulfill those goals—should remain a top priority. Successfully advancing the GFA would directly benefit U.S. national security and help establish a more values-driven foreign policy. To this end, the United States should work with allies to create a global architecture for security sector assistance built on principles of aid effectiveness adapted from development financing. A U.S.-brokered international consensus on security assistance would help stabilize fragile states, prevent violence, and increase the value of dollars spent on the GFA.

Type: Analysis

Justice, Security & Rule of LawFragility & Resilience

Could a National Dialogue Solve Ethiopia’s Political Crisis?

Could a National Dialogue Solve Ethiopia’s Political Crisis?

Tuesday, January 19, 2021

While the recent conflict in Tigray renewed international focus on Ethiopia, more challenges lie ahead, including elections now scheduled for June 5. The state of Ethiopia’s political transition is contested, and the country remains polarized. However, as Ethiopian scholars Emebet Getachew, Mehari Taddele Maru, and Yohannes Gedamu discuss, a national dialogue process may have the potential to address the country’s dilemmas.

Type: Analysis

Fragility & ResilienceMediation, Negotiation & Dialogue

How to Advance Peace and Stability in Coastal West Africa

How to Advance Peace and Stability in Coastal West Africa

Tuesday, December 6, 2022

The U.S. government has identified stability in Coastal West Africa as a foreign policy priority, engaging five countries in particular — Benin, Côte d’Ivoire, Ghana, Guinea, and Togo — through its Strategy to Prevent Conflict and Promote Stability, which was adopted in December 2021. The strategy reflects the U.S. government’s consideration of the five countries as strategic focal points in the fight against transnational terrorism and violent extremism emanating from the neighboring Sahel region.

Type: Analysis

Fragility & ResilienceDemocracy & GovernanceViolent Extremism

Is the Climate Crisis Leading to ‘Rupture’ in Southeast Asia’s Mekong?

Is the Climate Crisis Leading to ‘Rupture’ in Southeast Asia’s Mekong?

Thursday, December 15, 2022

In natural environments and in human societies, pressure for change can build up gradually for years, then suddenly reach a point of no return. Living in the new “Anthropocene” era of climate crisis, people worldwide are increasingly aware of the linkages between ecological, social and political stability. Stress in one of these domains can contribute to a rupture in others. According to human geographer Sango Mahanty, such a rupture is “a dramatic episode of nature-society disruption that is adverse, intense, and ripples across scales” of space and time. In Southeast Asia, one of the most visible instances of rupture is the explosion of dam construction on the Mekong River and its tributaries.

Type: Analysis

EnvironmentFragility & Resilience

Fragile States Provide Extremists Fertile Ground to Recruit and Grow

Fragile States Provide Extremists Fertile Ground to Recruit and Grow

Tuesday, February 21, 2023

Editor’s Note: Below are the excerpts of an interview originally published by the European Eye on Radicalization with USIP’s Mona Yacoubian about the various drivers of terrorism and constructive ways to address the phenomenon. She says the fragility of states provide an enabling environment for terrorists to operate and underscores the various ways that extremists benefit from this environment.

Type: Analysis

Fragility & ResilienceViolent Extremism