Action Plan or Faction Plan? Germany's Eclectic Approach to Conflict Prevention

Abstract

Conflict prevention, more than other fields of international politics and foreign policy, is characterized by a multiplicity of state and non-state actors, giving rise to particularly complex coordination challenges. This article evaluates the extent to which the German response to these challenges, the action plan for civilian conflict prevention, has succeeded in its aim of improving coordination with the ultimate aim to increase policy coherence between different governmental agencies as well as with civil society actors. It finds that although the general approach is indeed promising, the government's lack of commitment prevents it from tapping into the action plan's full potential. Introduction 1Successful conflict prevention above all depends on effective coordination. In any peace operation, a plethora of actors, national ministries, international organizations and NGOs is involved. In the mid-1990s, researchers and practitioners became increasingly aware that these actors' efforts can, if incoherent, lead to unintended negative consequences (contravening the 'do no harm' rule), 2 and that in order to avoid these in conflict-prevention, coordination as the main 1 A previous version of this paper was presented at the research colloquium of the Institute for Development and Peace (INEF), University of Duisburg-Essen. We would like to thank the participants, in particular Tobias Debiel and Angelika Spelten, for helpful comments. We are furthermore grateful to Christian Reisinger as well as the editor and reviewers of International Peacekeeping for providing valuable suggestions.

Foreign policy analysis, globalisation and non-state actors: state-centric after all?

“…Even if all actors can agree on the same goals, their different activities in the field can nevertheless be counterproductive to each other, thus giving rise to difficult coordination challenges, as for instance the literature on civil-military relations in complex peace-building operations can attest (Olsen 2011). Moreover, if policy coordination among the different national ministries and agencies can already be difficult (Bensahel 2007;Jacobs 2012), coordinating with NSAs and IOs is a much greater challenge (Stengel and Weller 2010). At least in part to tackle these problems, governments have started involving NSAs in the policy-making process, including in their decision making.…”

“…Cooperating with them is often the only way to achieve anything, in particular since in conflict or post-conflict regions, foreign powers often run the risk of being seen as occupiers. Thus, a growing number of governments are opening up to NSAs and coordinate their efforts with them (Porteous 2005;Stengel and Weller 2010). For instance, in what Stavridis and Farkas (2012: 8f ) have called a ' "whole of society" approach to security', US government agencies -in particular the Department of Defense -increasingly work with NSAs to increase effectiveness.…”

Experiences May Vary: NATO and Cultural Interoperability in Afghanistan

“…At a later stage, German troops were more formally tasked with identifying development projects, but this also represented a break with military culture. Stengel and Weller (2010) conclude that "for the Bundeswehr development policy still is seen as mainly a tool to increase acceptance among the local populace of the military presence" (p. 100). Drawing on his own experience during deployments in Kunduz, then Lieutenant Colonel Lars Werner (2014, p. 15) wrote that, to a significant degree, PRT Kunduz was unsuccessful if judged against its overall goals: "The PRT was not able to synchronize military action with reconstruction and intelligence.…”

Normative, theoretische und praxeologische Defizite der Friedensforschung am Beispiel der Konfliktprävention

“…Ob diese Beobachtungen für die deutsche FKF in ihrer Gesamtheit zutreffen, möge der Leser aus der Lektüre der anderen Symposiumsbeiträge sowie aus der eigenen Anschauung heraus selbst beurteilen. schen Kontext an der tatkräftigen und erfolgreichen Werbung für die Verabschiedung des »Aktionsplans zivile Krisenprävention« von 2001, bei der Mitwirkung führender Forscher im Beirat und der deutlichen Kritik angesichts seiner mangelnden Umsetzung und politischen Marginalisierung (Debiel/Fischer 2001;Matthies 2000;Stengel/Weller 2010). Eher untypisch für die internationale Forschung ist die überwiegende begriffliche Verengung der deutschen FKF auf zivile Konfliktprävention und die damit einhergehende Ablehnung militärischer Mittel und Akteure als irrelevant oder überwiegend schädlich (Müller 2000;Weller 2008).…”