What Does Peacekeeping Work?

Although in the past, Canada vastly supported the United Nations, a peacekeeping group, Canada’s rank in the UN Peacekeeping contributions chart has decreased from the 20th to the 21st century. Canada used to be ranked 8th in 1990 sending an average of 1000 forces, whether they be police, military experts, or troops. However in comparison to the other countries that provided thousands of Peacekeepers, in the year 2015, Canada was only ranked 68th sending a total average of 116 forces. From the major decrease of Canadian peacekeepers, it is observed that Canada has scaled back their role as a peacekeeping nation, allowing Canada to uncover its peacemaker within. Secondly, United Nations added an online mediation support tool called Peacemakers. Designed for use by peacemaking professionals, the tool consists of peace agreements, knowledge for guidance as well as material involving the United Nations mediation support services. Peacemaker is used to provide information on various topics revolving around peace mission. The UN’s efforts to try to resolve the worldwide conflict are presented through UN Peacemaker. The UN added peacemaker to inform others of peacemaking, showing that it is not just peacekeeping. Thirdly, the United Nations collects money from its members, Canada may be 9th in the top ten providers, however Canada used to

Against a backdrop of an ever increasing number of internal conflicts and the crash of conventional means of conflict resolution to attain a resilient peace in divided societies, this paper presents a two-track approach to peacekeeping and conflict resolution. One track is represented by peacemaking, defined as endeavors at finding a resolution to the issues in conflict at the political leadership level. The other track, peacebuilding, refers to contact proposals at the grassroots level targeting at the enhancement of intergroup relations. After a conversation of role of grassroots peacebuilding in a peace process some groundwork findings on the bond between peacemaking and peacebuilding in two divided societies, Palestine and Israel, will be discussed.

Peacekeeping is a tool for tranquillity among nations ravaged by war. Following World War II, many countries were open to many threats following the decisions made during the conflict and the creation of new types of sophisticated warfare, such as the atomic bomb. The new age of civil wars brought upon many countries to organize a new solution to orchestrate peace known as The United Nations. The United Nations provided a forum for discussion among nations to discuss world problems and economy. Canada was one of the countries that took part in The United Nations as a member state while providing unique ways to stop wars. The end of the Second World War brought a new chapter for the country as it was a leader in maintaining peace all over the

Creating relations between races and ethnicity's has always been vital to the success of the world. The United States and the international community have been, more often than not, late to stop violent acts against humanity. It took decades after the United Nations was created, and after a horrendous genocide in Rwanda, for the International Criminal Court to be created. Despite these two establishments created for international peace and security, crimes against humans rights are still occurring.When human rights are being violated, it is necessary for the U.S. and its allies to intervene in ethnic conflicts. While others may say humanitarian intervention goes against a state’s sovereign authority,it is necessary to protect

Thesis: The role of the United Nations has changed from being primarily an international peacekeeping force to primarily a humanitarian organization.

The topic of the United Nations’ (UN) interventions has been a source of heated dispute by scholars since their intervention in the Korea War in 1951. However there are interventions that garner more controversy than others. The tragedies of the Rwandan Genocide and the Bosnian Genocide have been hailed as some of the greatest failures in the United Nations peacekeeping and intervention missions. The Rwandan and Bosnian genocides brought around a deep, introspective critique within the UN on its role in the prevention of genocides and the protection of citizens at risk that has ultimately proved inconsequential in effectively addressing more contemporary cases of genocide. After these genocidal incidents, the United Nations published reports

It works to create a positive peace through a transformation of conflict. In 1992, United Nations secretary General Boutros-Ghali released his report titled An Agenda for Peace. This document proposed peace building as “Action to identify and solidify peace in order to avoid relapse into conflict,” (Boutros-Ghali 11). While two sides are still in conflict, there is not a chance for communication between sides. Until violent conflict ceases, the two parties will continue to dehumanize one another and decrease the ability to understand one another. However, conflicts cannot always resolve themselves and outside intervention is sometimes needed to avoid a cycle of revenge, which can be a result. “The problem is a well-known bias in human perception, whereby we inflate the value of the wrongs we suffer, and minimize the value of those we ourselves inflict.” (Santa-Barbara 179). Luckily, there are nations such as Canada, with politicians like Lloyd Axworthy, who created the Canadian peace building initiative in 1996. “The initiative suggested a concern for the multidimensional and integrated causes of civil war and thus acknowledged the need to address the economic, social, and political aspects of reconstruction and reconciliation” (Keating 171).

The three main tactics used to combat civil wars and instill peace in an area are peacekeeping, peace enforcement, and counterinsurgency. The first tactic I will address is peacekeeping. Once the two parties of a conflict have agreed to a truce, peacekeepers will come in to guarantee the implementation of the truce and try to maintain peace. The duty of peacekeepers is “not only [to] monitoring troops, but also with human rights monitoring, protecting and delivering humanitarian aid, demobilizing and retraining troops, reforming police forces, protecting civilians, reforming legal systems, assisting in economic reconstruction, and sometimes administering the entire state until a new government can take over. In other words, after civil wars, peacekeepers are often charged not only with military monitoring duties, but with reforming the essential institutions of the state” (Peacekeeping, Peace Enforcement, and UN Reform Lise Morjé Howard, P 1-2). There are three ways that peacekeepers are able to use their power in order to succeed. These three ways include coercion, inducement, and persuasion. Coercion involves a display of power, like swagger, to wield off attacks. Troops use swagger in several scenarios. One of the most common times the use of swagger will occur is during policing, where troops will patrol the area. Since one of the main doctrines of peacekeeping involves not using force, this type of coercion has been deemed useful. Even though the majority of the time

for the purposes of this study, is broadly defined, so it may encompass not only the UN, but also other relevant organizations to the peacekeeping mission, including the soldier’s home state’s military. Peacekeepers may find actions prohibited by the UN as sexual misconduct are culturally acceptable in his or her home state. Cultural beliefs are considered the compendium of acts that are considered acceptable by a group of people on which an individual bases his or her actions. The gendered understanding of sexual misconduct as a value reflects the UN’s official view on sexual relations between peacekeepers and the local population. These relationships reflect a distorted power dynamic that can be damaging to the organization, the victim,

In chapter 35, The main topic was about Robust peacekeeping. Robust peace when UN peacekeepers would only interfere when there was political and operational means to implement. When reading that I pictured just a bunch of wars and fights going on without and enforcement to stop because it didn't seem like a “Big” enough reason. I'm not sure if that is inherently correct description of the reading but if so that seems like a big issue. I think about high school and all the useless drama if no teacher never interfered than major issues would occur. I believe the easiest way to solve a issue is facing the issue as soon as possible. The idea of Robust peacekeeping has been going on for years. Honestly, I’ve never in my life really heard of this.

Peacekeeping operation is led by the Department, and works to create the conditions for lasting peace in a country torn by conflict” (UN Staff, 2003). Military, police and civilian personnel, those who work to deliver security, political and early peacebuilding support consists of peace keeping operation. Currently, there are sixteen peacekeeping operations and one special political mission – the United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (UNAMA) – led by the Department of Peacekeeping Operations(UN Staff, 2013).

Power, morality and ethics, and law are the three categories of activities that mankind has used to achieve this goal. Power is the use of force to accomplish the desired outcome, and when used strategically, it generally is the most proficient way to maintain peace and security. When morals and ethics fail, and international laws are broken, it is the use of power that it used to intervene and stop the violence. The ability to fend off attackers and defend yourself, or to fight for something that is believed to be just with the use of force are clear strengths of power. The United States’ intervention into World War II is a great example of power being used to bring peace. Their aid to the Allied forces helped end the war and also brought one of the most horrific genocides in history to a halt. However, if power is not used in a strategic, controlled manner, it can be very counterproductive. Peacekeeping operations may sometimes be misinterpreted as acts of war and bring more violence to a situation. Also, war and violence do not bid well with many civilians, as they often see death tolls and don’t consider what is to be gained. For example, the United States entered Vietnam with the good intentions of preventing a spread of communist leadership. However, there had been more bloodshed than could have been foreseen, and many Americans opposed the involvement in the war. The US eventually backed out of Vietnam

“Give War a Chance” is an article written by the American economist, historian and military strategist Edward Nicolae Luttwak in 1999, in the American magazine Foreign Affairs. It make an easily understandable “buzz”, since its main assumption is that most kind of peacekeeping or humanitarian operations are, in an objective point of view, a bad thing for the peace, and that it tends, paradoxically, to slower its establishment. We will analyze here the main hypothesis that Luttwak is developing among the article, the first one being the destruction of the legitimacy usually accorded to peacekeeping operations, led by the UN or by other military organizations, and the second one being the obstacle to a durable peace establishment, created

In order to understand the concept behind peacekeeping we have to first look at the history of this UN term and how it got established. The initial kick-off year was 1948 (un.org) when the Security Council deployed troops to the Middle East in order to observe the region. It was the outcome of the creation of the state Israel and the rest of the land piece was given and left over to the Palestinian Arabs. The Arab society and the Arab Nation leaders did not accept this division which caused the conflict. At first the UN sent only observers and peaceful troops to the region

The United Nations, with its rigid moral and political limitations against force, has become a benchmark of peace and a social achievement of modern times. From war torn Europe, the United Nations developed from five major powers with an initial goal to prevent the spread of warfare through peaceful means and to establish and maintain fundamental human rights. Through the past fifty years, this organization has broadened its horizons with auxiliary organizations from peace keeping missions to humanitarian aid, to economic development. However, in a modern example of ethnic cleansing, the UN faces new a new role as a bystander as its power is bypassed by NATO forces. The UN, however, promises to be an