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52. The Technocratic Trajectory and Political Instability of Mauritania, 2003-2011 (Trajectoire technocratique et instabilité politique en Mauritanie, 2003-2011)
- Author:
- Boris Samuel
- Publication Date:
- 10-2011
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- Centre d'Etudes et de Recherches Internationales
- Abstract:
- In 2004 the government of Mauritania admitted that for the past ten years its national macroeconomic and financial data had been falsified. This admission revealed a small part of the fraudulent practices that took place during the Taya era which ended in 2005. But it also showed that the economic management of this "good student" had become ensnared in true "bureaucratic anarchy". Beginning in 2005, when the democratic transition should have enabled the public administration's house to be put in order, reforms were often motivated by a desire to improve the image of the regime and were thus less than effective. Then, following the elections of 2007, and in the midst of financial scandals, the government developed a technocratic approach which alienated the Mauritanian public who perceived a power vacuum. A new coup d'etat occurred during the summer of 2008. The "Rectification Movement" of general Abdel Aziz acquired legitimacy as a result of its fight against terrorism in Sahel. Employing populist rhetoric and adopting the moral high ground in the fight against rampant corruption, the Movement favored lax management of resources and tight, even authoritarian, control of public finances.
- Topic:
- Corruption, Markets, Political Economy, Finance, and State
- Political Geography:
- West Africa and Mauritania
53. Cooperative Migration Policy, Uncooperative Reality: The E.U.'s Impossible "Management" of West African Migration.
- Author:
- Sarah M. Rich
- Publication Date:
- 05-2010
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- Woodrow Wilson School Journal of Public and International Affairs
- Institution:
- Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Princeton University
- Abstract:
- This paper examines the Center for Migration Information and Management (CIGEM), which the European Union opened in Mali in 2008 to dissuade Malians and other West Africans from attempting to migrate to the E.U., among other objectives. After briefly discussing migration theory, this paper examines the current status of Mali-E.U. migration. It proceeds to assess CIGEM's goals and its strategies to dissuade unauthorized migration. The paper argues that CIGEM will fail to affect the flows of migrants from Mali to the E.U. because the center does not address the structural reasons for migration in today's globalized world. The paper ends with a call for a more honest discussion of labor migration realities and recommends that the E.U. develop a circular, temporary labor migration policy.
- Political Geography:
- Africa, West Africa, and Mali
54. Are Borders Barriers? The Impact of International and Internal Ethnic Borders on Agricultural Markets in West Africa
- Author:
- Jenny C. Aker, Michael W. Klein, Stephen A. O'Connell, and Muzhe Yang
- Publication Date:
- 04-2010
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Center for Global Development
- Abstract:
- This paper addresses two important economic issues for Africa: the contribution of national borders and ethnicity to market segmentation and integration between and within countries. Market pair regression analysis provides evidence of higher conditional price dispersion for both a grain and a cash crop between markets separated by the Niger-Nigeria border than between two markets located in the same country. A regression discontinuity analysis also confirms a significant price change at the international border. The international border effect is lower, however, if the cross-border markets share a common ethnicity. Ethnicity is also linked to higher price dispersion within Niger; we find a significant intranational border effect between markets in different ethnic regions of the country. This suggests that ethnic similarities diminishing international border effects could enhance international market integration, and ethnic differences could contribute to intranational market segmentation in sub-Saharan Africa. We provide suggestive evidence that the primary mechanism behind the internal border effect is related to the role of ethnicity in facilitating access to credit in agricultural markets. We argue that the results are not driven by differences in price volatility or observables across borders.
- Topic:
- Agriculture, Economics, Ethnic Conflict, and Markets
- Political Geography:
- Africa, West Africa, and Nigeria
55. Sufism in Northern Nigeria: Force for Counter-Radicalization?
- Author:
- Jonathan N. C. Hill
- Publication Date:
- 05-2010
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Strategic Studies Institute of the U.S. Army War College
- Abstract:
- In light of the ongoing threats issued by Al Qaeda against the United States and its allies, the need to prevent the radicalization of young Muslim men and women remains as pressing as ever. Perhaps nowhere is this task more urgent than in the countries of West Africa. The global expanse of the ongoing war on terror places these territories in the frontline. With large Muslim populations that have hitherto remained mostly impervious to the advances of Islamism, the challenge now confronting the Nigerian government and the international community is ensuring that this remains the case. But in recent years, Islamist groups have been highly active in the region. The aim of this monograph is to assess the potential of Nigeria's Sufi Brotherhoods to act, both individually and collectively, as a force for counter-radicalization, to prevent young people from joining Islamist groups.
- Topic:
- Foreign Policy, Islam, Terrorism, and Sectarianism
- Political Geography:
- United States, West Africa, and Nigeria
56. The Invisible Tide: Towards an International Strategy to Deal with Drug Trafficking Through West Africa
- Author:
- Phil Williams and James Cockayne
- Publication Date:
- 10-2009
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- International Peace Institute
- Abstract:
- An invisible tide is rising on the shores of West Africa, creeping into its slums, its banks, its courts, its barracks, and its government ministries. It is a tide of money, influence, and power, born from the drug trafficking that is sweeping the region. Cocaine produced in Latin America is transported to West Africa, and then on to Europe. From there, the proceeds find their way back to North and South America, fueling further investment and further narco-trafficking. Some of the profits from the trade stay in West Africa, laundered through construction projects and other avenues, and increasingly corrupting politics, society, and security institutions. As the Executive Director of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), Antonio Maria Costa, recently put it: “Drug money is not only buying real estate and flashy cars: it is buying power.”
- Topic:
- Crime and Narcotics Trafficking
- Political Geography:
- Africa and West Africa
57. Conduct and Discipline in Un Peacekeeping Operations: Culture, Political Economy and Gender
- Author:
- Catherine Lutz, Matthew C. Gutmann, and Keith Brown
- Publication Date:
- 10-2009
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Watson Institute for International and Public Affairs at Brown University
- Abstract:
- Systematic patterns of sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA) have emerged around UN peacekeeping missions over the course of many years.1 Reports of abuse by peacekeepers in Cambodia and the Balkans in the 1990s were followed by news of similar problems in West African missions in 2001 and 2002. The Secretary General subsequently issued a 2003 Bulletin outlining a zero-tolerance policy, but the abuse continued. In 2004, peacekeeper misconduct became widely known through mainstream media reports that UN personnel in MONUC, the UN Mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo, had been engaging in sexual exploitation and abuse (SEA) of local women and children. The SEA included, most egregiously, peacekeepers' exchange of UN food supplies or money for sex with young girls and sometimes boys. SEA has been a particular problem in mission areas where extreme poverty and conflict or post-conflict trauma and social dislocation drive local people to sell their bodies, but it has occurred in more developed contexts as well, such as Cyprus and Kosovo. The UN response to these problems has been to establish, in 2005, a Conduct and Discipline Unit with offices in New York and mission areas, charged with addressing the problem in a variety of ways. SEA continues to occur since then, with serious incidents revealed in Sudan, Liberia, Haiti, Cote d'Ivoire, and again in the Congo.
- Topic:
- Conflict Resolution, Corruption, Crime, Gender Issues, Sex Trafficking, and Peacekeeping
- Political Geography:
- United States, New York, Sudan, Kosovo, Cambodia, Haiti, Liberia, West Africa, and Cyprus
58. The refugee, the sovereign and the sea : EU interdiction policies in the Mediterranean
- Author:
- Thomas Gammeltoft-Hansen
- Publication Date:
- 03-2008
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Danish Institute for International Studies
- Abstract:
- This paper starts from the encounter between a European navy vessel and a dinghy carrying boat refugees and other desperate migrants across the Mediterranean or West African Sea towards Europe. It explores the growing trend in the EU of enacting migration control at the high seas or international waters – so-called interdiction. It is argued that these forms of extraterritorial migration control aim at reconquering the efficiency of the sovereign function to control migration, by trying to either deconstruct or shift correlate obligations vis-à-vis refugees and other persecuted persons to third States. In both instances, European States are entering into a sovereignty game, in which creative strategies are developed in order to reassert sovereign power unconstrained by national and international obligations.
- Topic:
- Human Welfare, International Law, Migration, and Sovereignty
- Political Geography:
- Europe and West Africa
59. A Childhood Lost? The Challenges of Successful Disarmament, Demobilisation and Reintegration of Child Soldiers: The Case of West Africa
- Author:
- Kirsten Gislesen
- Publication Date:
- 12-2006
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- Norwegian Institute of International Affairs
- Abstract:
- After a conflict ends, there is a need to disarm, demobilise and reintegrate child soldiers into society. This report examines the challenges of achieving successful disarmament, demobilisation and reintegration (DDR) of child soldiers, with reference to DDR processes in West Africa, and suggests how such problems can be overcome. The challenges posed by the DDR of child soldiers in West Africa are vast and complex. The disarmament and demobilisation phase involves a dilemma between the need to include as many child soldiers as possible in the DDR process (many whom do not carry weapons), with an often-conflicting need to collect as many weapons as possible. In the reintegration phase of DDR come the challenges of rehabilitating former child soldiers, both physically and psychologically; the difficulties of reuniting child soldiers with their families; and the difficulties of creating viable opportunities for demobilised child soldiers in a post-conflict society.
- Topic:
- Conflict Resolution, Arms Control and Proliferation, and Human Welfare
- Political Geography:
- Africa and West Africa
60. La Représentation Du Culte Musulman En France
- Author:
- Alain Boyer
- Publication Date:
- 03-2005
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- French Politics, Culture Society
- Institution:
- Conference Group on French Politics Society
- Abstract:
- Les musulmans se sont installés en France à cause et à la suite des deux guerres mondiales, essentiellement en provenance des pays sous domination française, à la fois comme recrues dans les armées françaises et comme force de travail. Ils ont ensuite participé à la reconstruction et au développement du pays, comme immigration de main d'oeuvre, durant les Trente Glorieuses. Ces flux migratoires se sont poursuivis, après la décolonisation et les indépendances, dans les années 1960. S'ils ont été freinés par l'arrêt de l'immigration en 1973, ils n'en ont pas pour autant totalement cessé, puisque l'on considère que sont entrés, depuis lors, en France, chaque année, environ 100 000 immigrés d'origines diverses. Bien plus, l'arrêt de l'immigration, en rendant très difficile la perspective d'un éventuel retour en France, et le regroupement familial ont concouru à l'installation durable en France de familles immigrées cherchant plus ou moins consciemment à s'intégrer dans la société française. Peu à peu se sont constituées des communautés musulmanes qui ont essayé de négocier, surtout pour obtenir des avantages individuels plus que collectifs, les modalités de leur intégration. Les populations immigrées ont souvent été reléguées dans les zones d'urbanisation récente, l'habitat social et les banlieues des grandes villes et ont été cantonnées, pour la première, et souvent pour la deuxième génération, dans des métiers peu qualifiés directement menacés par le chômage. Les immigrés et leurs enfants appelés à devenir français, dès lors qu'ils étaient nés en France, ont été victimes d'inégalités et d'exclusions par l'école, le travail et le logement.
- Topic:
- Development and Immigration
- Political Geography:
- France and West Africa