By all necessary means? Emerging powers and the use of force in peacekeeping (original) (raw)
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Brazil’s involvement in peacekeeping operations: the new defence-securityforeign policy nexus
Brazil's involvement in peacekeeping operations: the new defence-security-foreign policy nexus This report addresses Brazilian involvement in peacekeeping operations (PKOs) as a challenging learning process in the context of post-cold war UN-led interventions. The Brazilian Ministry of Defence has tried to design a " Brazilian way " of performing in PKOs that has been tested by Brazil's command of the UN Support Mission for Haiti (MINUSTAH) since 2004 and of the UN Organisation Stabilisation Mission in the DRC in 2013, and by its participation in the UN Interim Force in Lebanon since 2010. The report discusses the international and domestic impacts of this experience. Brazil's military interface with UN headquarters has notably increased, as has the perception of the country's armed forces as an operative part of its presence in global security arenas. Also, the lessons learned in the pacification of Haiti have spilled over into the domestic security realm, with the Peace and Pacification Units currently in place in a number of favelas in Rio benefitting from methods first experimented with in Port-au-Prince. Although the armed forces are keen to continue their involvement in PKOs, the country has decreased its contributions to UN peacekeeping. Current figures are partly explained by the withdrawal of MINUSTAH, but they also reflect domestic economic and political difficulties.
Harnessing the Blue Helmet Enterprise: Brazil, MINUSTAH and the projection of a peacekeeping profile
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The present study looks at the Brazilian engagement at the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) and seeks to bring insight into the growing participation of an emerging power in peacekeeping. To that end, both conceptual and practical implications of normative behavior in international relations are debated and peacekeeping is seen as a barometer to assess Brazil’s global posture. Accordingly, this thesis argues how the country has projected, through MINUSTAH, a distinguished and more proactive peacekeeping profile, and analyzes to which extent this profile has shaped, challenged or endorsed existing rules and practices. Exploring both how peacekeeping becomes discursively articulated by Brazil at the United Nations and what practical meanings it acquires on the ground in Haiti, it is demonstrated that the bluehelmet enterprise offers, at the same time, platforms for Brazil to demonstrate international commitment and capacity, as well as means for the country to become activist in themes it would otherwise have little influence on. The study draws upon social constructivist insights in International Relations, placing particular emphasis on the role of norms in multilateral processes, and argues that peacekeeping is constructed, shaped and re-shaped by normative underpinnings, shared principals and perceptions of appropriate behavior at the global stage. This thesis presents the results of fieldwork conducted in Rio de Janeiro, New York and Port-auPrince in late 2015 and early 2016, and adopts a qualitative research design where primary empirical data is combined with secondary sources and theoretical insights. It concludes that Brazil’s peacekeeping profile, while not set in stone, reflects a balancing act where the country, ambitioning to strengthen its global standing, seeks to demonstrate its belonging and adaptation to the international environment within which it acts; but also to challenge and participate more vigorously in the normative casting of the still Western-dominated realms of peace and security governance. Through the illustrative case of the Brazilian peacekeeping engagement in Haiti, this thesis attempts to contribute to the yet limited academic debate on emerging powers’ posture in collective security and conflict resolution arrangements. The study can be of interest to scholars of international relations, peace operations and Brazilian foreign policy.
International Peacekeeping, 2019
Brazil has been the largest troop contributor and provided all force commanders to the UN Stabilisation Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH, 2004–2017). As the military embraced a leading role in UN peacekeeping’s turn towards peace-enforcement, Brazil’s governments have increasingly relied on soldiers in public security – occasionally even portraying these operations as a sort of ‘peacekeeping at home’. Yet how has Brazil’s participation in MINUSTAH affected internal military operations? I argue that narratives of the military’s effectiveness in Haiti have been used to legitimise the growing scope of internal public security missions. Drawing on data from a questionnaire-based survey, interviews and focus groups with soldiers and officers, this paper argues that the experience in Haiti has fuelled troops’ demands for rules of engagement that resemble those in UN peacekeeping. Given the armed forces’ increasing bargaining power in Brazil’s politics, the military leadership has been able to successfully lobby in favour of changing parts of the legal framework for internal operations. Lessons from the ‘robust turn’ have been used to promote more coercive internal missions of Brazil’s armed forces. Yet it is impossible to fully reconcile the content of the military’s demands with the rule of law in a democracy.
2016
Over the last decade, Brazil has taken a more substantial role in international peace and security, and has become increasingly involved in UN peace operations. Particularly through its participation in Haiti, leading the military component of the UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH), Brazil has underscored its growing engagement in shaping, challenging and adding to conventional practices of conflict management and peace processes. Now, the prospective withdrawal of MINUSTAH, coupled with a current domestic scenario in Brazil of political and economic instability, raises a number of questions about the future of Brazil’s participation and role in peacekeeping. To contribute to critical and well-informed conversations on the challenges and potentials of Brazil’s engagement in peacekeeping amid turbulent landscapes at home and internationally, this policy brief revisits the country’s evolving role and strategic use of peacekeeping, and reflects upon its implementation in light of the normative developments brought by the current international process to review UN peace operations. The brief concludes that a continued peacekeeping presence, despite current difficulties, remains desirable for Brazil.
Journal of International Peacekeeping
This article explores the provision of assistance for United Nations (UN) peacekeeping through the lens of South-South cooperation and considerations of expertise and international status. More specifically, the article analyses recent attempts by the Brazilian Peace Operations Joint Training Center (ccopab) in sharing Brazil’s accumulated expertise from the 13 years of engagement in the UN Mission in Haiti (minustah) with other Global South countries. While the article contributes to the understanding of how Brazil tries to renegotiate its peripheral position in the domain of peacekeeping, it also interrogates how this new authoritative position is, nevertheless, permeated by ambiguities and limitations.
Review of International Studies, 2022
International organisations reflect global power configurations and as such, are deemed to reproduce global inequalities. Nevertheless, they also represent opportunities for the Global South to challenge the global stratification of power, for instance by providing personnel to international agencies and bureaucracies. This article examines the role of leadership personnel from the Global South in implementing robust peacekeeping mandates. Given that states from the Global South have often been hesitant to support the use of force internationally, can leadership positions in peace operations help these states to influence norms at the implementation level? We develop a conceptual understanding of individuals' role in implementing norms and apply the framework to military force commanders from Brazil, India, and Rwanda. The analysis demonstrates that appointments provide an opportunity for norm contestation, but do not necessarily guarantee such influence. Under certain circumstances, we find that military force commanders can actually undermine their governments' preferences. However, the relation between force commanders' practices and their country of origin's policy stance is complex and influenced by a variety of different factors that merit further investigation.
The BRICS and the future of peacekeeping operations
Clingendael Monitor 2014: Peacekeeping operations in a changing world, 2014
The Netherlands takes part in peacekeeping operations for reasons ranging from those of principle (maintaining the international legal order) to those based on economic (trade, raw materials) and security (the nation’s own physical security) considerations. As an open society, the Netherlands is by definition vulnerable to international developments, which means that contributing to stability and security and upholding core principles that facilitate and regulate international business are matters of national interest. In a world of increasingly globalised challenges, it is therefore necessary for the Netherlands to contribute to stability and security in distant places in order to protect itself to the greatest extent possible against the adverse effects of conflict and instability. At the same time, however, the Netherlands’ resources are limited. To adequately and effectively safeguard Dutch interests in a world of continuously changing threats, the Netherlands must set priorities and, of fundamental importance, cooperate with partners in multilateral and other contexts. This study has already been published in Dutch as part of the larger Clingendael Strategic Monitor 2014 (Een wankele wereldorde: Clingendael Strategische Monitor 2014, edited by Jan Rood) in the context of the Clingendael Strategic Monitor Project. A Clingendael Monitor is published yearly and is commissioned by the Dutch government.
Regional Security Mechanisms and Peacekeeping Operations From a Latin American Perspective
In a matter of a decade (2000-2010) the number of Latin American military personnel involved in worldwide peacekeeping operations (PKO) grew from 700 to 7.500, from which almost 5,000 are now stationed in Haiti. As the single U.N. peace mission in the Americas, the Haiti operation is also the first in which the majority of peacekeepers come from Latin American countries. In addition to its contribution to conflict management, the mission is also relevant for being one in which actors -who share several common traits but also diverge in many others -are developing higher levels of regional cooperation to deal with a regional problem. Moreover, with their decade-long military presence in Haiti, the actors are taking advantage of the experience to create novel mechanisms of regional security in Latin America. Having as starting point the involvement of the Latin American military in the Haitian PKO, this paper assesses the scope of the initiatives taken more recently by governments in ...
Brazil's rising profile in United Nations peacekeeping operations since the end of the cold war
2014
Brazil’s engagement in United Nations (UN)-mandated peacekeeping operations dates from 1956. Since then the country has participated in 46 of 65 UN peacekeeping operations, deploying 11,669 personnel in total. Yet until 2004-05, with the UN’s peacekeeping mission in Haiti, Brazilian contributions to such operations were mainly symbolic, military based and concentrated in Portuguese-speaking countries. Recent changes in the size, type and geographical distribution of Brazil’s participation in peace operations echo the reorientation of the country’s foreign policy in its search for a more globalised political influence, especially under Lula da Silva’s presidency. In particular, peacekeeping under UN aegis has enabled Brazil to showcase its perceived added value in terms of its expertise on stabilisation, track record on development and conflict mediation, and advocacy for the Global South. Aspiring to become a world power, Brazil has assumed a role in peace and security that is more ...
Weiss Kuele (2019) The Global South and UN Peace Operations.pdf
The Global South and UN Peace Operations, 2019
The countries of Africa, Asia, and Latin America provide around 92 percent of all military and police personnel for United Nations (UN) peace operations, while contributing about 15 percent of the budget. China—hardly a legitimate representative of the Global South as the world’s second largest economy and a permanent member of the Security Council—inflates the latter number because its financial contribution amounts to over 10 percent of the total. The West thus foots the bill; but since the late 1990s when even traditional peacekeeping became more dangerous, they have been unwilling to send their own personnel where the risks are high and their national interests minimal. One former force commander summarized to one of the authors, “The willing are not capable, and the capable not willing.” In short, the West makes use of “hired help” from developing countries, or what David Malone and Ramesh Thakur dubbed “racism in peacekeeping.”[2] Philip Cunliffe views the North-South rift as a reflection of liberal imperialism.[3] Nonetheless, are troop-contributing countries from the Global South merely victims and passive? If not, why and how have they actively contributed to UN peace operations? Before answering those questions, we provide a brief overview of how and when the UN’s military landscape changed. We conclude by examining the nature of various long-standing reform proposals under consideration that have particular resonance for the Global South.