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Begin New Search Topic Justice Political Geography Africa

1. The role of traditional healers in conflict resolution in Zimbabwe, 1890‒1980

Author:
Takesure Taringana and Amos Zevure
Publication Date:
07-2024
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
African Journal on Conflict Resolution
Institution:
The African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (ACCORD)
Abstract:
This paper analyses the historical role of traditional healers (n’anga/chiremba) in conflict resolution in Zimbabwe. Historically, traditional healers occupied a powerful position in Zimbabwean society. Not only were they healers but they also handled social problems and contributed to peace and reconciliation. However, colonial rule in Zimbabwe (1890‒1980) ushered in a spirited challenge to the authority of traditional healers. They were ridiculed as fraudsters who perpetuated unfounded superstitions. Colonial legal and justice systems replaced traditional conflict resolution institutions that had been manned by traditional healers. Nonetheless, traditional healers continued to exist underground. Notwithstanding that, their role and contribution to peacebuilding remains on the fringe of academic inquiry. The key question that this paper addresses is how and under what conditions traditional healers contributed to conflict resolution at the grassroots level. The paper focuses mostly on records of conflict and violence in court cases, underscoring how witnesses’ evidence brought attention to the role of traditional healers in reconciliation. It demonstrates the various contexts in which traditional healers’ interventions were alluded to but ignored in the state’s attempts to administer justice. By digging up obscured and misrepresented evidence of traditional healers’ practices in conflict resolution in the colonial archive and in-depth interviews, we unravel this understated but most crucial element in the process of conflict resolution in Zimbabwe since 1890.
Topic:
Conflict Resolution, Security, Peace, Justice, Reconciliation, and Tradition
Political Geography:
Africa and Zimbabwe

2. A Way Forward for Justice and Accountability in Ethiopia

Author:
Stephen Rapp, Andrea Gittleman, and Danica Damplo
Publication Date:
11-2023
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Abstract:
This paper proposes a way forward for those who support justice and accountability for mass atrocities in Ethiopia. These options are posed in a rapidly changing policy environment: in the past year Ethiopia was invited to join the BRICS group of nations; countries are seeking to normalize relations with the Ethiopian government after the conflict in Tigray; and brutal conflicts in Sudan and elsewhere have focused international attention away from the situation in Ethiopia. The proposals below list available options which should be seriously considered by policymakers who want to properly address crimes of the past and develop strategies that mitigate ongoing mass atrocity risks to civilians in Ethiopia.
Topic:
Accountability, Justice, Atrocities, Crimes Against Humanity, and Armed Conflict
Political Geography:
Africa and Ethiopia

3. Multiple Doors to Justice in Kenya: Engaging Alternative Justice Systems

Author:
Susan Lee
Publication Date:
12-2023
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Center on International Cooperation (CIC)
Abstract:
People-centered justice means putting people and their justice needs at the center of justice systems and services. This entails broadening the pathways through which justice problems may be solved, improving the quality of peoples’ justice journeys, and investing in justice to prevent as well as resolve justice problems. Designing people-centered justice journeys also requires us to empower people and communities to act to prevent and address injustices while ensuring access to services by simplifying processes, supporting alternative pathways, and tailoring services to needs. This report profiles the development and implementation of Kenya’s Alternative Justice Systems (AJS) Policy to capture and share good practices from this people-centered approach. Through a review of relevant literature and interviews with key stakeholders from government, civil society, and development partners, this paper: Briefly covers historical and sociopolitical context from which the AJS Policy arose; Details the AJS Policy framework; Examines impacts and challenges in the early stages of policy implementation; and Highlights key takeaways for other countries and stakeholders interested in engaging customary and informal justice systems. It further explores Kenya’s experiences to provide governments, judiciaries, development partners, and civil society stakeholders ideas for integrating people-centered justice approaches in their own contexts.
Topic:
Accountability, Justice, Peacebuilding, and Alternative Justice Systems (AJS)
Political Geography:
Kenya and Africa

4. Survivor-Centred Justice for Gender-Based Violence in Complex Situations

Author:
The George Washington University The Global Women's Institute (GWI)
Publication Date:
12-2022
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
The Global Women's Institute (GWI), The George Washington University
Abstract:
The report Survivor-Centred Justice for Gender-Based Violence in Complex Situations is the result of new research conducted by IDLO, in partnership with the Global Women’s Institute at George Washington University, in six countries across the globe with the aim to identify approaches that centre survivors in all efforts to address gender-based violence (GBV) in complex situations. The report is informed by country case studies in Afghanistan, Honduras, Papua New Guinea, the Philippines, South Sudan, and Tunisia, to provide different perspectives of complexity in accessing justice and an analysis of diverse justice mechanisms dealing with GBV in situations of conflict, organized crime, climate disasters, and health emergencies, often intersecting with contexts of legal pluralism and political transition. Research findings show that, in order to be effective, measures and programmes aimed at ensuring access to justice for GBV survivors need to be responsive to women’s specific needs and vulnerabilities, as well as relevant to contextual challenges, while firmly anchored in international gender equality and human rights legal obligations.
Topic:
Gender Issues, Gender Based Violence, Justice, and Group Survival
Political Geography:
Afghanistan, Africa, Middle East, Asia, Philippines, Central America, North America, Tunisia, Honduras, South Sudan, and Papua New Guinea

5. Natural Resource (In)justice, Conflict and Transition Challenges in Africa: Lessons from the Niger Delta

Author:
Luke Amadi
Publication Date:
08-2022
Content Type:
Journal Article
Journal:
Conflict Trends
Institution:
The African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (ACCORD)
Abstract:
The term ‘natural resource (in)justice’ has been used in various contexts by various scholars. Contemporary resource justice scholarship highlights several different areas of debate, including power and inequality in resource access, control, ownership, greening, eco-efficiency, feminist ecology, resource transparency, just transitions,[1] resource equity, resource rights, and fairness with regards to global inequality in North/South natural resource policies.[2] Resource injustice underlines two dynamic and interwoven contexts. First, there is the anthropogenic context, which examines the adverse effects of natural resource extraction on humans, including exclusion, degradation, inequality, and unfair treatment in natural resource allocation. Second, there is the eco-centric context, which explores the adverse effects of natural resource extraction on the ecosystem or the natural environment. The broader terrain within which natural resource justice is being pursued is rapidly changing. With the rise of natural resource justice movements, new ecological threats, the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic, and lethal feedback with deleterious capitalist resource extraction in the global South, resource justice is confronted with new challenges, notably resource conflict. Since the end of the Cold War, there has been a considerable and increasing number of studies on natural resource conflict, including on questions of resource appropriation or what has become known in resource conflict debates as the ‘resource curse’, which points out the paradox of poverty among resource-rich countries.[3] Conflict and poverty are intertwined. In 2013, 471 million people lived in fragile and conflict-affected countries, while 78% of the world’s poor lived in these countries (181 million people).[4] Natural resources – land, water, forests, air – are essential to life on Earth.[5] Natural resource conflict accounts for the incompatibility of goals in natural resource use or appropriation. The rural poor in developing countries remain the most vulnerable, as they directly depend on natural resources for their food and livelihood security, while the livelihoods of 2.5 billion people depend wholly or partly on agriculture.[6] The dynamics of fair and equitable resource allocation in contexts associated with resource injustice are largely unknown. This is true especially where the resource-bearing local population is either marginalised or excluded in decision-making processes regarding natural resources.
Topic:
Environment, Natural Resources, Transitional Justice, Conflict, and Justice
Political Geography:
Africa and Niger Delta

6. Our climate future depends on conflict dynamics in Congo

Author:
Peer Schouten, Judith Verweijen, and Fergus Simpson
Publication Date:
11-2022
Content Type:
Policy Brief
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS)
Abstract:
The Congo Basin rainforest – the second largest on earth – absorbs four percent of global CO2 emissions and constitutes a crucial line of defense against cataclysmic climate change. However, a complex mix of illegal resource exploitation and conflict is currently threatening the rainforest. To curb these threats and their global consequenses, we need to understand the interplay between resources, conflict and environmental protection in Congo.
Topic:
Agriculture, Climate Change, Development, Environment, Poverty, Food, Non State Actors, Armed Forces, Inequality, Fragile States, Violence, Police, and Justice
Political Geography:
Africa and Democratic Republic of the Congo

7. Access to Justice and Public Services: Experiences of Medium, Small and Micro Enterprises (MSMEs) in Ghana

Author:
Marvis Zupork Dome and Daniel Armah-Attoh
Publication Date:
05-2022
Content Type:
Research Paper
Institution:
Ghana Center for Democratic Development
Abstract:
This study undertaken by CDD-Ghana with support from GIZ, sought to understand and document Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) in Ghana’s challenges in accessing justice and other public services. The study sought to unearth MSMEs, particularly those owned by women, to be able to proffer appropriate policy recommendations to improve MSMEs access to justice, rule of law and service delivery. The research team adopted both qualitative and quantitative research approaches. A survey was conducted with 780 MSMEs in three regions (Greater Accra, Ashanti and Northern Regions) across three geographical zones and a total of 40 in-depth interviews with policy makers, policy support/implementing units and service providers.
Topic:
Women, Business, Services, Justice, and Public Service
Political Geography:
Africa and Ghana

8. Freedom, justice, and dignity in movement: Mobility regimes in the Grand Tunis

Author:
Bedirhan Erdem Mutlu
Publication Date:
07-2022
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Arab Reform Initiative (ARI)
Abstract:
Mobility is one of the many areas where Tunisians are still waiting to achieve their revolutionary demands for justice, freedom, and dignity. This paper focuses on the modes of transportation in Grand Tunis to understand the persistence of unjust mobility regimes. It finds that decades of state policies favoring private car ownership coupled with structural and management problems in public transportation have affected the underprivileged communities the most. Therefore, treating the question of movement as social justice issue is key to envisioning viable long-term solutions.
Topic:
Mobility, Justice, Freedom, and Freedom of Movement
Political Geography:
Africa and Tunisia

9. Opportunities for Danish stabilisation policy to engage with climate- and livelihood-related conflict: New approaches to fragility in the Horn of Africa and Sahel

Author:
Peer Schouten
Publication Date:
03-2021
Content Type:
Working Paper
Institution:
Danish Institute for International Studies (DIIS)
Abstract:
The Horn of Africa and the Sahel are among the most fragile regions in the world: poor, lacking basic infrastructure and state presence across much of their respective territories, and both form hotbeds of conflict and political instability compounded by climate change. This DIIS Working Paper focuses on identifying evolving notions of fragility that could strengthen Danish stabilisation efforts in the Horn and Sahel. It foregrounds notions of fragility that move away from a focus on strong state institutions towards the adaptive capacities of populations in the hinterlands of the Horn and the Sahel to deal with conflict and climate variability. The paper gives an overview of this rapidly evolving field and distils key insights, challenges and future options by exploring the question, how can we support people in the Sahel and Horn to re-establish their responsibility for their respective territories and the management of their natural resources? The paper addresses this question by exploring the implications of recent climate change and livelihoods research on how we approach fragility and, by extension, stabilisation. On the basis of such research, the Working Paper advocates a move away from a sector-based understanding of fragility towards a way of working that is more in line with contextual realities, alongside the ‘comprehensive approach’ to stabilisation that Denmark promotes. The key message is that, programmatically, Danish stabilisation efforts across both regions could benefit from a more explicit focus on supporting the variability that dominant livelihood strategies require and that need to be considered if sustainable security and development outcomes are to be achieved. Failing to do this will only serve to marginalise key communities and may drive them further into the arms of radical groups.
Topic:
Security, Foreign Policy, Defense Policy, Climate Change, Democratization, Development, Environment, Radicalization, Fragile States, Violence, Peace, and Justice
Political Geography:
Africa, Europe, Denmark, and Horn of Africa

10. Human Rights Investigations in Ethiopia and Paths Forward for Justice

Author:
Isabelle Turner and Tallan Donine
Publication Date:
11-2021
Content Type:
Special Report
Institution:
Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide, United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Abstract:
On November 19, 2021, the Simon-Skjodt Center for the Prevention of Genocide at the US Holocaust Memorial Museum brought together researchers, international legal experts, and foreign policy practitioners to discuss the evolving crisis in Ethiopia and explore options for justice and accountability. This rapporteur’s report summarizes the key themes and observations raised during the roundtable.
Topic:
Foreign Policy, Human Rights, International Law, Justice, Atrocities, and Investigations
Political Geography:
Africa and Ethiopia