Question And Answer
Publications
Articles, publications, books, tools and multimedia features from the U.S. Institute of Peace provide the latest news, analysis, research findings, practitioner guides and reports, all related to the conflict zones and issues that are at the center of the Institute’s work to prevent and reduce violent conflict.
Central America: To Slow Refugees’ Flight, Reduce the Violence
The flow of asylum seekers from Central America’s Northern Triangle to the U.S. border stems from intense violence fueled by corruption, drug trafficking, gang culture and poverty, specialists on the struggling region said.
Nigeria’s Worst Violence Is Not Boko Haram
As Nigeria works to stabilize from years of warfare in its north, the deadliest threat is not the Boko Haram extremist movement, but escalating battles between farming and herding communities over scarce land and water. Bloodshed has increased since January, as armed groups have attacked and...
Amid Rising Sahel Violence, Burkina Faso Builds a Response
A perfect storm of violence is breaking upon Africa’s Sahel. Since late 2018, communal conflicts—many over access to food, water or productive land—have produced thousands of deadly attacks. Across the region, nearly 4,800 people died in conflicts from November to March, according to the violence-monitoring group ACLED. The greatest surge in bloodshed is in Burkina Faso, where communal militias or religious extremists killed 500 people over five months. But amid the dire headlines, governments and civic groups in Burkina Faso and other Sahel countries cite progress in stabilizing communities with a basic step that simply has seldom been undertaken: broad, local dialogues among community groups, police forces and officials. Community leaders and government officials say they are now expanding those dialogues to improve national security policies to help counter the tide of violence.
Afghanistan Still Has a Chance to Improve This Election
As the United States, the Afghan government and the Taliban maneuver toward a peace process for the country, the strength of the current Afghan government and political system will be affected by the credibility, in Afghans’ eyes, of the presidential election set for September 28. Yet the credibility of Afghan elections is weakened by unresolved allegations of criminal fraud—especially against the nation’s former top election officials—in last year’s parliamentary balloting. With just 53 days remaining before the presidential vote, time is now short—but Afghan authorities still can take steps to improve the prospects for an election that citizens might see as credible and legitimate.
As Africa Battles Sexual Violence, a Nigerian City Shows How
When civic leaders and officials in Jos, Nigeria, launched an initiative in 2017 to calm repeated bloodshed in the city, a series of dialogue forums with residents revealed a chilling pattern of hidden violence in their midst: sexual assault. Girls and women recounted rapes and attacks for which justice was impossible, often because authorities were unresponsive. The women faced a problem common to their sisters across Africa: national laws against sexual violence were having little effect on the ground. But the dialogues have wrought a change. In May, police in Jos opened the city’s first unit dedicated to investigating sexual and gender crimes.
Months After Protests, Nigeria Needs Police Accountability
In Nigeria and more than a dozen nations—the United States, Brazil and Japan are others—public protests erupted in the past year against police brutality. Across the globe, police violence traumatizes the marginalized, spares the powerful and remains unaddressed until the abuse is illuminated to broad public view. While brutality is typically rooted among a minority of officers, it persists because weak systems of police accountability offer impunity, even to repeat offenders. In Nigeria, as in other countries, the solution will require building strong accountability mechanisms—both within police agencies and externally, in the communities they serve.
Despite Post-Election Violence, Niger Achieves Democratic Breakthrough
Niger’s presidential election has ushered in the West African nation’s first-ever democratic transition of power. As some international observers have heralded the success of these elections, accusations of irregularities have led to massive protests and government repression, including a 10-day internet shutdown. Hundreds of people have been arrested in the capital, Niamey, while police have clashed with protesters in several other cities. USIP’s Nourdine Harouna Abdou explains what happened in the first- and second-round votes and what the elections mean for peace and security in Niger.
Nigeria Needs Justice, Not Payoffs, to Build Peace
When gunmen stormed a Nigerian government high school last week, kidnapping dozens of students for ransom, this fourth mass kidnapping in three months underscored that Nigeria’s response so far is not reducing the violence and insecurity spreading across the country’s north. That response has been largely ad hoc, a mix of federal military actions, state officials negotiating with the criminal gangs and, allegedly, the payment of ransoms. A more effective response will require better coordination among federal and state authorities, the inclusion of civil society in a broad strategy, and support from the international community.
How Missing Data Can Make the Global Fragility Strategy Work
As glaring inequalities in the global recovery from COVID-19 become clearer, the U.N. has warned of growing risks of political tensions and conflict in many countries. This poses a daunting challenge to U.S. foreign policy and presents a test for the new Global Fragility Strategy (GFS), which aims to reduce state fragility and break cycles of violence in critical regions. What the GFS lacks, however, is a clear “theory of success” that explains why and how proposed actions will lead to desired outcomes in fragile states. A new capacity-based approach is needed to identify fragile states with high potential for effective engagement, particularly security sector reform (SSR).
A Global Democratic Renaissance or a More Volatile World?
With a staggering array of immediate crises facing the world — from the COVID pandemic to a global increase in extremist violence — it sometimes feels difficult, perhaps even impossible, to look beyond the current moment and envision what the world will look in the coming decades. However, looming demographic, economic, environmental and technological shifts are already starting to affect the global geopolitical environment — not only worsening our current crises, but inciting new ones should we fail to put in place long-term strategies to address them.