Institute academics ask what does peace look like after wartime collapse?

As the world grapples with how to manage the fallout from enduring multipolar conflicts and failed states, none less than the largest mass movement of refugees since World War II, Deakin researchers are asking what does a peaceful country with a stable government look like after the conflict has ended.

The question is, as Dr Filip Slaveski from the Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Globalisation said, one which troubles politicians and diplomats but had received little serious research attention.

Dr Slaveski is a co convenor of the Institute's Governance, justice and security research stream. The project is one of several being developed by the stream's researchers.

“Politicians regularly ask what does victory look like but we are asking what does peace look like with a legitimate regime after the chaos of war and economic devastation,” he said.

“A contemporary picture of that is proving elusive, but the need, particularly in respect to the instability in Ukraine, Syria and Iraq is pressing.”

Dr Slaveski along with colleagues, Professor Damien Kingsbury, Dr Anthony Ware and Dr Riccardo Armillei will draw on the lessons learned since World War Two by looking at conflicts in Europe, Asia and North Africa.

Dr Slaveski whose latest research looks at the chaotic reconstruction of former Soviet territories and Soviet-occupied Europe in the wake of the Second World War said in central Asia for example there was no successful example of peace, security and legitimacy.

“Ukraine is unravelling before our eyes,” he said.

“They are caught between the order imposed by the former Soviet Union and the desire to create a stable state of their own.

“In Eastern Europe however the picture is different, particularly in Poland and the Baltic States both of which made a successful return to democracy after the collapse of the Soviet Union.”

Dr Anthony Ware’s research has focussed on Myanmar, particularly as it makes the transition from military dictatorship to democratic nation.

“The factors which have fuelled conflict in Myanmar for the last 70 years are power and structural inequalities between peoples of different ethnicity and religion,” he said.

“There has been a lot of active discrimination, such as a lack of promotion opportunities in the civil service or military for those from ethnic minorities.”

Dr Ware said even if active discrimination was minimised, chauvinistic and paternalistic attitudes by the majority towards ‘less developed’ minorities left large groups of people feeling marginalised, disempowered and disrespected.

“A major problem in Myanmar is that people define themselves primarily by their differences in ethnicity and religious affiliation,” he said.

“A lasting peace will require a greater sense of shared and equal citizenship and rights.”

Professor Fethi Mansouri, Director of the Alfred Deakin Institute for Citizenship and Gobalisation and an expert on migration and the democratic transition of Tunisia said there were three key reasons Tunisia had been the success story of the Arab Spring.

“Tunisia had a vibrant civil society (trade unions, lawyers and doctors unions, the league for human rights), which mediated between various political groups and brokered several rounds of national dialogue that ultimately mitigated political crises,” he said.

“Furthermore, Tunisia’s military played a republican rather a politically partisan role and thus ensured the civil nature of the transition.

“And finally, Tunisia’s political leadership was able to build strong alliances between key players most notably the Islamists, the Centrist secularist including elements of the traditional Left.”

Professor Mansouri said despite its initial success, Tunisia still faced challenges particularly the threats of terrorist acts and the related religious violence as well as the social discontent emanating from a stagnant economy.

“But beyond Tunisia and across the Middle East and North Africa region, we must accept that Arab countries are still a long way from achieving successful  democratic transition,” he said.

“Electoral democracies and semi-authoritarian regimes are likely to emerge elsewhere in the region as the dominant political form in the Middle East, in particular in light of current civil wars raging in Syria and Libya as well as sectarian strife engulfing Yemen and involving a number of other Gulf states.”

Professor Damien Kingsbury who advised the Free Aceh Movement in the Helsinki peace talks, and coordinated election observer missions to Timor-Leste in 2007 and 2012 said peaceful countries were characterised by a well-developed sense of collective unity around the 'national project'.

“Citizens understand themselves to be a bonded political community, even if there are political differences,” he said.

“A large majority of the country’s citizens regard the government as legitimate, its institutions work effectively and efficiently and the borders are stable.”

Professor Kingsbury said while there may be social or economic problems, there was a widespread sense that the country and its people were moving towards something better.

“There may be differences in incomes but there is a type of social contract in place which ensures that no-one is entirely left behind,” he said.

A workshop looking at terrorism, liberty, security and democracy will be held on October 29 at Deakin University.