Daley, Patricia. "Challenges to peace: conflict resolution in the great lakes region of Africa". Third World Quarterly, Vol.27, No.2 (2006): 303-319.

Daley, Patricia. "Challenges to peace: conflict resolution in the great lakes region of Africa". Third World Quarterly, Vol.27, No.2 (2006): 303-319.

• Since 1960, there have been 11 wars in Zaire, 5 in Burundi, and 2 in Rwanda, as well as constant low-scale violence in the great lakes region. Over 4 million people have died in these conflict, and another 4 million have been displaced. These conflicts, including the Rwandan Genocide and the Second Congo War, featured intervention by international and African forces (303).
• Despite the deployment of a number of peacekeeping missions to the region -- to Rwanda in 1993, to Burundi in 2000, and to Zaire in 2000 -- peace has not been restored to the great lakes region. The author argues that this failure is because peace-builders assume that the violence is 'primitive', whereas it is extremely modern, and that liberalization is the solution (304).
• Both Rwanda and Burundi experienced first German and then Belgian colonial rule, during which the imagined ethnicities of Hutu and Tutsi emerged into a rigid system of racial discrimination. From the end of the Tutsi monarch onwards, Rwanda was run but Hutu, while key institutions and sectors remained dominated by the Tutsi. This erupted in genocidal violence against the Tutsi in 1994, followed by reprisal attacks between rival ethnic militias (305-306).
• Low-scale violence between the Hutu and Tutsi has been present in Burundi from the 1960s onwards, erupting in genocidal violence killing tens to hundreds of thousands in 1972 and 1988. Violence is often perpetrated by or against the Tutsi-dominated police and military, and conflict has forced many communities to fend for themselves (306).
• After gaining independence from exceptional brutal colonization under the Belgians, the Democratic Republic of Congo [DRC], was beset by a civil war between the government and Belgian-backed separatists in Katanga intensified by support to different factions by Cold War powers. The Western-backed Dictator, President Mobutu, exploited the country's wealth until overthrow in 1997 by Laurent-Desire Kabila, supported by Rwanda and Uganda. President Kabila's refusal to support Rwandan and Ugandan interests in eastern Zaire led to another international war between Rwandan and Ugandan-backed rebel groups and the proxy forces of President Kabila, Angola, Namibia, and Zimbabwe. All countries involved were given financial and commerical incentives to participate in the conflict (306-307).
• The poor track record of international peacemaking efforts in Africa can be attributed to the unwillingness of the African Union [AU] to agree to interference in its member states, lack of funds and inadequate logistics preventing African states from effectively running peacekeeping missions in the continent, and the complicity of many international organizations and powerful countries in supporting brutal regimes or funding conflicts (309-310).
• Most peace agreements in the great lakes regimes attempt to create power-sharing agreements, where both the government and the rebels are given equal access to governmental positions and the military, with further inclusion to follow through competitive democratic elections (310-311).
• These agreements have rarely been successful, with the 1993 Arusha Peace Accords in particular falling to stop or sanction genocide several months afterwards. They have often been shoddily constructed and negotiated based on foreign objectives, rather than the actual concerns of warring parties. Moreover, no enforcement mechanisms actual exist, so fighting just resumes (311-312).
• Most peacemakers and diplomats blame the failure of peace accords on the belligerence of 'spoilers' who profit from conflict. The power-sharing approach generally advocated as a solution is equally to blame, because it encourages factionalism and allows military leaders to demand political representation of privileges by threatening war (312-313).
• Important segments of the population necessary to actual peace-building and reconstruction were often excluded from negotiations. Women were barely represented, and civil society groups or church associations are almost never represented during the creation of peace agreements (314-315).
• Greater participation of these groups in peace negotiations of post-conflict government is absolutely necessary if peace is to be achieved in the great lakes region (316-317).
• International media, academics, and observers tend to place too much emphasis on issues of ethnicity in explaining warfare in Zaire and Burundi. Although ethnicity has been deployed as a rhetorical tactic in these conflicts, it is not always present, and rarely is in the dominant identity in conflict (314).
• The imposition of austerity measures and liberalization of social services under pressure by international organizations has negatively affected the chances for peace in the great lakes region. Increasing poverty and declining access to state services are prompting more people to join armed groups (315).
• This suggests that a state-centric, economic plan is needed to rectify inequalities in the great lakes region and promote peace, similar to the Marshall Plan, but significant obstacles exist to its implementation. Mainly, the state cannot be relied on in Central Africa, because it has been so complicit in crimes against humanity (316).