This analysis summarizes and reflects on the following research: Arriola, L. R., Dow, A. D., Matanok, A. M., & Mattes, M. (2021). Policing institutions and post-conflict peace. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 65(10), 1738-1763. DOI: 10.1177/00220027211013088
Talking Points
- Police fragmentation, measured by the number of autonomous police forces in a country, results in a higher risk of conflict recurrence in post-conflict countries.
- Police fragmentation is also “consistently associated with worse human rights outcomes and more government violence against civilians.”
- Political leaders in post-conflict countries may fragment policing institutions to minimize the threat of government overthrow, resulting in poor coordination and information sharing among different police forces.
- The lack of coordination and state oversight creates the opportunity for police to abuse “the coercive power of the state for their own ends,” leading to “greater discretion in the use of violence…against the civilian population.”
Key Insight for Informing Practice
- Tacitly accepting that police are the preferred non-military security actor engrains a focus on conventional militarized security instead of (1) broadening the understanding of what makes us secure and (2) realizing the effectiveness of unarmed, nonviolent approaches to security to end cycles of violence.
Summary
In countries transitioning from war to peace, police are a key security actor. During this transition, countries demilitarize their politics, namely by restoring civilian police forces that act “as the main providers of internal security.” Leonardo A. Arriola, David A. Dow, Aila M. Matanok, and Michaela Mattes examine how differences in the institution of policing affect outcomes for internal peace and security in post-conflict countries. They theorize that police fragmentation, measured by the number of autonomous police forces in a country, influences conflict recurrence. To test this theory, the authors collected original data on the design of police forces in over 100 developing countries between 2000 and 2014. They find that fragmented policing increases the risk of conflict recurrence and is associated with police violence against civilians.
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Conflict recurrence: Refers to the resumption of armed violence between existing or new actors in a post-war/post-conflict context. According to the Uppsala Conflict Data Program, “135 different countries have experienced conflict recurrence, and the pattern is deepening. Recurring conflict is symptomatic of unaddressed grievances, and lasting peace will not be achieved until these issues are addressed.” Gates, S., Nygård, H. M., & Trappeniers, E. (2016). Conflict recurrence, conflict trends, 2. Oslo: PRIO. Retrieved December 14, 2022, from https://www.prio.org/publications/9056 |
By focusing on the institution of policing in post-conflict settings, the authors offer a theoretical explanation for why police fragmentation contributes to negative outcomes for long-term peace. Many countries have various types of police, like “national police, provincial police, border police, transport police, gendarmeries, among others.” Political leaders in post-conflict settings may be uniquely incentivized to create additional policing units to minimize the likelihood of being forcibly removed from power. Creating multiple policing units means that no one unit can amass enough power to overthrow the government, and multiple units will compete against each other for resources and influence. This strategy, however, disincentivizes information-sharing and coordination among different types of police and incentivizes “shirking [by the police] by simply choosing to exert less effort than they would otherwise.” Further, the lack of state coordination and oversight creates the opportunity for police to abuse “the coercive power of the state for their own ends,” leading to “greater discretion in the use of violence…against the civilian population.” In the precarious post-conflict/power-war setting, this can “reignit[e] old grievances against the state or creat[e] new ones,” thus influencing the likelihood of conflict recurrence.
The authors run a series of statistical tests on the relationship between policing institutions and conflict recurrence based on original data from 2000 to 2014. They find a strong statistical relationship between police fragmentation and conflict recurrence. With each additional police force added, there is an 88% higher risk of conflict recurrence at any time over that time period. When adding data from measures of physical integrity rights, civilian deaths, and political terror scales, they also show that police fragmentation is “consistently associated with worse human rights outcomes and more government violence against civilians.”
In summary, this research “presents evidence that the fragmentation of policing can increase the risk of violence breaking out as well as the lethality of policing.” While this paper is “the first to provide empirical evidence” on how differences in policing institutions result in differences in post-conflict outcomes, they caution that these results cannot capture how broader security sector reforms affect outcomes for peace in post-conflict countries but rather provide specific insights on policing institutions.
Informing Practice
Why does peace after war fail? This is a question that has been debated within the peace and security research community for decades—with critical real-world application. Specifically, this question often refers to the problem of conflict recurrence. In many countries with histories of civil wars or other types of long-term political violence (rebellions, insurgencies, etc.), a peace agreement is reached through tremendous effort only to fall apart a few years later. This research offers another piece of the complex puzzle to help explain why peace might fail by focusing on the role of police in upholding law and order. Yet, if police in this context are employing violence against civilians, reigniting old grievances, or creating new ones, then it calls into question their ability to provide security at all.
Tacitly accepting that police are the preferred non-military security actor engrains a focus on militarized security, with its emphasis on the use of violence, force, or domination, instead of (1) broadening the understanding of what makes us secure and (2) realizing the effectiveness of unarmed, nonviolent approaches to security to end cycles of violence. The Peace Science Digest’s most recent special issue focused on “nonviolent, civilian-led strategies for protection and violence prevention” and demonstrated how demilitarized approaches to security were more effective at sustaining peace.
As part of this special issue, Nonviolent Peaceforce expanded on the definition of security in “Thinking about ‘Safety’ and ‘Security’”:
Due to a broader context of militarism, “security” has become closely associated with military and/or armed approaches to defense and protection. Abolitionist thinker Mariame Kaba defines “security” as a “function of the weaponized state.” For her and fellow abolitionists, “safety” means something else, because you cannot have safety without strong, empathic relationships with others.
Nonviolent Peaceforce further notes that the concept of human security, namely its focus on the protection of human well-being from a range of conventional and non-conventional threats, “challeng[es] us to think of ‘security’ as much more closely aligned with common understandings of ‘safety’.”
Cultivating strong relationships among various stakeholders in a conflict context, including armed actors, is one critical way that civilian-led protection and violence prevention strategies work. Others include addressing unmet needs (like a lack of access to healthcare, education, sanitation, or economic opportunities; or exposure to environmental hazards, or discriminatory policies and practices), analyzing power relations, or employing existing norms and values to encourage peaceful behavior (see, for example, ”Existing Peace Systems Demonstrate Peaceful Intergroup and International Relationships Are Possible” examining prominent features of peace systems). All of these strategies are peacebuilding practices that interrupt violence and address grievances, rather than entrenching adversarial relationships (i.e., between the police and armed groups) that create the opportunity for more violence. [KC]
Questions
- What kind of security sector reform or other policy changes happen when we broaden our understanding of security to include “safety” and human security?
Continued Reading
Gates, S., Nygård, H. M., & Trappeniers, E. (2016). Conflict recurrence, conflict trends, 2. Oslo: PRIO. Retrieved December 14, 2022, from https://www.prio.org/publications/9056
Peace Science Digest. (2022). Special issue: Nonviolent approaches to security. Retrieved December 9, 2022, from https://warpreventioninitiative.org/peace-science-digest/special-issue-nonviolent-approaches-to-security/
Peace Science Digest. (2021). Existing peace systems demonstrate peaceful intergroup and international relationships are possible. Retrieved December 9, 2022, from https://warpreventioninitiative.org/peace-science-digest/existing-peace-systems-demonstrate-peaceful-intergroup-and-international-relationships-are-possible/
Organizations
Nonviolent Peaceforce: https://nonviolentpeaceforce.org
Keywords: demilitarizing security, post-war, post-conflict, police, conflict, conflict recurrence
Photo credit: Wikimedia Commons
