Cultural and Religious Polarization in Modern Conflicts: Implications for Mediation 

Abstract: 

Cultural and religious diversity does not inherently produce violent conflict. It is rather when identities are weaponized and coupled with collective grievances that conflict is most likely to occur. This article asks what causes cultural and religious polarization in contemporary conflicts and how such polarization can be understood in relation to conflict mediation. It seeks to target the social identity, collective victimhood and political mobilization theories, sacred values, intergroup animosity and distrust, and the mediation theories adapted to peace processes, in order to understand how polarization and division of identity in conflict are created and nurtured. There are several factors that can contribute to polarization, including politicized identity, historical grievances, perceived threats, socio-economic injustices, as well as social and political belonging and victimhood. These can complicate the trust-building and compromise-based negotiating process and transform political interests into concerns of identity, dignity, and the collective safety. This article suggests that, in the case of mediation for polarized conflicts, one must resolve the core issues of the conflict and the fragmentation of the population. Therefore, mediation that is successful has to deal with the complex structural conditions of polarization. This can be achieved through the establishment of recognition, trust, and inclusivity through dialogue, and addressing various conditions of injustice.

Keywords: cultural polarization, social identity, intergroup conflict 

Introduction:

Cultural and religious diversity has always been present among human societies. There have always been multiple communities living together with differing belief systems, traditions, and languages. However, the presence of religious diversity does not explain why some societies co-exist peacefully while others experience violent conflict (Köbrich & Hoffmann, 2023). Contemporary views on conflict and identity suggests that cultural and religious diversity becomes significant when it extends into the political sphere or collective grievances and is used to create divisions between the groups of people who are considered insiders and outsiders of a given society.

This transformation is best exemplified through increased social divisions. As social divisions deepen, differences that have the potential to peacefully coexist become increasingly perceived through lenses of “us” and “them”. In these cases, social conflict may indirectly take on cultural or religious dimensions, while grievances can be seen through the historical and lived narratives of the social group. These divisions and social conflicts may be articulated through politics and religion, which can provide meaningful frameworks within which people can articulate their grievances, social conflicts and concerns. Under these conditions, religions and ethnic identities may provide the boundaries and frameworks for articulating conflicts without necessarily constituting their underlying causes (Fox, 2000).

Conflicts that are culturally and religiously polarized cannot be understood as simply conflicts of competing material interests. When politically articulated cultural demands become intertwined with deeply embedded or sacred values, compromise may be understood not simply as a concession, but as a threat to principles central to the identity of the group (Atran & Ginges, 2012). Distrust of each other may severely limit dialogue, while leaders willing to negotiate may be subjected to intense internal pressure not to reach a compromise with the opposing group.

This article, therefore, seeks to answer the following: what causes the phenomenon of cultural and religious polarization in contemporary conflicts, and how can this polarization be understood in relation to conflict mediation? This article argues that cultural and religious polarization should not automatically be understood as a cause of violent conflict. 

Main Corpus:

Varying ethnic and religious identities do not always lead to hostility. Research on ethnic polarization and civil conflict shows that diversity alone does not explain violence, as the political exclusion and mobilization of group identities are also important factors (Cederman et al., 2010). This is a meaningful distinction for considering cultural and religious polarization as diverse identities, beliefs, and traditions can coexist without necessarily creating divisions between groups. However, polarization happens when these diverse identities and beliefs increasingly and deeply structure social and political domains and organize opposing groups. As these distinctions sharpen, perceived threats between groups may produce greater social distance and more negative attitudes toward opposing groups (Renström et al., 2021). Political questions of space, social, and economic resources may correlate with cultural or religious affiliations, which means that the importance of identity is always changing. The political relevance of ethnic identities may therefore vary considerably depending on their relationship to state power and mobilization (Cederman et al., 2010).

Cultural and religious identities are especially tied to conflict when there is a noticeable shift in identities with political and social change. Concerns about inequality and discrimination and issues of political and social insecurity are no longer seen as issues against an individual. They are more and more seen as issues that threaten the entire group (Cederman et al., 2010).

Experiences of discrimination, political exclusion, and violence may also become incorporated into collective narratives of victimhood. These narratives can shape how communities interpret events and their relationships with other groups. When present developments appear to reinforce established memories of injustice or victimization, historical experiences can continue to influence intergroup relations and perceptions of the conflict (Lynch & Joyce, 2018).

Political mobilization can further intensify this process. Research on ethnic and religious identity demonstrates that group identities can provide powerful foundations for collective political action, but their effects depend substantially on context. Research has found, for example, that stronger religious identification can be associated with increased political participation among some communities while discouraging political participation among others (Kopko, 2012; Ocampo et al., 2018). Treating entire religious or cultural communities as politically uniform therefore risks overlooking divisions within them and the circumstances that determine when identity becomes politically salient.

More than dislike or friction, polarization manifests as a transformation of perception. When political, religious, or cultural preferences are increasingly organized around opposing group identities, the distinction between “us” and “them” becomes more prominent. Members of an opposing group may be viewed as less than individuals with different interests and more as representatives of a group whose intentions are viewed with suspicion (Iyengar et al., 2019). In this way polarization can reinforce factionalism and make distrust of the opposing group appear justified or natural (Iyengar et al., 2019).

In more severe conflicts, this distinction can develop into moral exclusion or dehumanization. When individuals perceive members of other groups as undeserving of the same degree of moral consideration as members of their own group, discrimination and harm against those groups may become easier to justify (Opotow, 1990).

In order to describe a situation, the way in which language is expressed matters. If there are ways to describe ethnic, cultural, or religious groups in a manner that makes them appear dangerous or as disloyal, uncooperative members of a fragmented society, this can widen existing societal fractures (Dangerous Speech Project, n.d.). Ultimately, the likelihood of peaceful coexistence becomes further diminished. 

For many social groups, memory of past victimization or violence can also be a unifying feature of collective memory. It can shape relationships long after the actual victimization occurred (Schori-Eyal et al., 2014). Although memory of the past can help social groups understand and empathize with one another, it can also affect the way present events are perceived.

Historical injustices can also make it easier to understand why a group feels threatened. Depending on the history of different social groups, it is also possible that conflicting accounts of who is the victim, who is to blame, and whom the right to claim ownership truly belongs to shape the psyche of each social group. As a result, conflict is no longer understood solely through current events. Past and present become connected, and contemporary political disputes can acquire the symbolic weight of earlier injustices. This can make compromise particularly difficult when concessions are understood not only in terms of their immediate consequences but also through memories of previous losses (Schori-Eyal et al., 2014).

If cultural or religious identity divisions are exploited for political gain, international relations may become even more fractious. Political mobilization can intensify identity-based divisions when organizations compete to represent the interests of an ethnic or cultural group. Research suggests that competition within ethno-political movements can encourage organizations to make increasingly radical political demands in order to distinguish themselves from rivals and strengthen their position within the movement. Such radicalization can, in turn, increase the risk that political disputes escalate into armed conflict (Vogt et al., 2021). 

Once attitudes become more fixated on this issue, the implications of the compromise also become more complex. The act of political compromise is interpreted within the group as abandoning a sacred value, a principle, or a part of collective identity. Under these conditions, conventional attempts to encourage compromise through material incentives may prove ineffective and can even increase opposition to an agreement (Ginges et al., 2007).  

Because some level of separation can be understood in all conflicts, the more pronounced the separation, the more complex the problems related to mediation. Conflicts that touch on cultural or religious identity tend to make parties lose the perception of conflicts as just interest-based. Mediators must therefore work with an environment of distrust, historical grievances, and internal pressures within each group that can make compromise difficult. 

The conflict in Northern Ireland offers an example of how cultural and religious identities can be intertwined with political and national divisions. The Catholic and Protestant identities were historically aligned to the larger political identities of nationalism and unionism, being further alienated by this conflict (Muldoon et al., 2007). This conflict can therefore not be explained as just a conflict between two religious communities. Religious identification was linked with national identity, political affiliation, constitutional status, and the notion of belonging. The conflict even pioneered the creation of opposing narratives of victimhood, where several communities perceived and conceptualized their positions, while also understanding the counter narrative, via the experiences and memories of violence and loss inflicted upon them (Lynch & Joyce, 2018). These narratives reinforced divisions by connecting political disagreements with the memories of past violence and injustices. The Belfast/Good Friday Agreement of 1998 illustrates how addressing such a conflict required more than an agreement on an immediate political dispute (Belfast Agreement, 1998). The case therefore illustrates that, in addressing a polarized conflict, both the polical demands of the warring parties and the relationships that are most important to them must be addressed.

When different communities have been highly polarized for years, particularly when violence forms part of their shared history, establishing mutual trust becomes considerably more difficult. Under such circumstances, the actions and intentions of the opposing group may increasingly be interpreted through existing perceptions of hostility and responsibility (Çelebi et al., 2014). Initiatives intended to reduce tensions may likewise struggle to achieve their purpose when the parties fundamentally distrust one another. The resulting lack of cooperation can reinforce existing distrust and restrict opportunities for meaningful dialogue and reconciliation (Kappmeier et al., 2021).

Parties to a polarized conflict may seek recognition alongside other meaningful outcomes. Following experiences of discrimination, displacement, violence, or exclusion, demands for the recognition of collective suffering and injustice may become particularly significant (Bar-Tal et al., 2009). This becomes more challenging when communities maintain conflicting historical narratives and competing claims to victimhood, particularly when each group perceives its own suffering as insufficiently recognized (De Guissmé & Licata, 2017). Mediation must consequently create opportunities for acknowledgment and recognition while allowing space for competing interpretations of the past (Ben-Josef Hirsch, 2021).

The last point is that mediation requires the parties to recognize both the mediator and the process as legitimate. The perceived impartiality and credibility of the mediator can therefore be particularly important to the acceptance and effectiveness of the mediation process (Smith, 1994). Formal impartiality, therefore, may not be enough. Mediators must establish credibility with the communities involved and demonstrate that the process provides meaningful recognition and participation to each side.

The challenges of polarization do not suggest eliminating identity from mediation. Cultural and religious identities may be significant to the parties involved and may create openings for dialogue and reconciliation. Therefore, mediation that recognizes the importance of identity and of cultural and religious plurality, and the fact that communities are not necessarily homogeneous and that divergent identities are not necessarily contradictory, is likely to be more effective.

Contextualization of conflict and its development is the starting point of sensitive mediation. Understanding historical grievances and their instigators as well as the inequitable distribution of political power, systemic discrimination, relations of power and the varying community articulations of the conflict is all important. Mediators should also identify relevant political, religious, and community actors while recognizing divisions within the groups themselves. A community described as “religious,” “ethnic,” or “cultural” rarely speaks with a single voice. Differences of generation, gender, political affiliation, social position, and interpretation may produce significant variation within apparently unified groups.

Summary:

The analysis demonstrates that cultural and religious diversity does not inherently produce violent conflict. The more notable and more likely source of conflict is the polarized fusion of cultural and/or religious pluralism with identity subsuming politics and the creation of oppositional politics. Historical complexities, perceived and real threats, inequalities and political friction can deepen social divisions to the point that competing claims to political, spatial and resource domination are seen as competing claims to dignity, safety, and survival. 

Conclusion:

Mediation can attempt to solve these issues, but likely won’t be enough given the context of the situation. To address these issues, mediation must be on these two polarized levels. The first concerns the actual issues of the polarized conflict: the politics of representation, security, land, rights and resources, and the politics of institutional arrangement. The second concerns the relationship of the polarized communities and identities. Even if there are some actual and feasible compromises, these will not bring peace and resolution to the conflict if there is polarization sustained by an identity of distrust, competing and polarized perceptions of history, and a sustained, intractable fear of the other side. The mediation should occur within the polarized community as well as the structural components that reinforce the polarization. It is important to recognize differences between relationships and structures, because neither dimension can fully compensate for the absence of the other. With communities in which there is an absence of trust, institutional arrangements are read as confirming and working in line with fears and historical grievances. In addition, unequal or inadequate representation, discrimination, or unstable politics can sustain distrust that mediation seeks to address. The case of Northern Ireland is an example of the relevance of both dimensions. The Belfast Agreement combined constitutional and power-sharing arrangements with commitments to equality, mutual respect, and the recognition of British and Irish identities (Belfast Agreement, 1998). This does not mean that institutional arrangements alone resolve polarized relationships, nor that relationship-building alone resolves structural inequities. Rather, sustainable mediation calls for the consideration of the relationship between the two.

The presence of various communities and religious actors may help reconciliation efforts, but these should not substitute for or lessen the broader engagement and representation efforts. It is not the intention of mediation to remove cultural or religious differences, nor is it required that communities abandon identities that create a sense of belonging, purpose and continuity to successfully resolve conflict. The goal is to design the political and social framework within which those identities are perceived as non-threatening to one another. Having placed together recognition, dialogue, and trust-building alongside substantive negotiation and the kind of institutional reform that fits the context, mediation can help transform relationships where difference has been a cause of division into those in which difference can coexist with compromise and a resolution.

Potential solution:

Mediation can provide space for parties to articulate experiences of injustice, insecurity, and loss. Recognition does not require a mediator to determine which collective narrative is correct. Instead, it allows parties to understand why particular events, symbols, or demands carry significance for the other side. At the same time, mediators should avoid cultural essentialism. Treating individuals primarily as representatives of a fixed religion or culture risks reproducing precisely the rigid boundaries that polarization creates. Recognition should therefore acknowledge both collective identities and diversity within them.

However, dialogue is not sufficient for resolving conflicts supported by structural factors. The Northern Ireland case shows why recognition needs to accompany political and institutional arrangements. The Belfast Agreement did not require the communities involved to abandon their British, Irish, unionist, or nationalist identities. Instead, it implemented political arrangements through power-sharing and the principle of consent, while also recognizing the right of individuals to identify as British, Irish, or both (Belfast Agreement, 1998). This is relevant to the broader argument of this article because one of the aims of mediation is not necessarily to diminish the role of identity. Rather, it is possible to encourage the formation of political arrangements in which multiple identities do not require multiple and mutually exclusive political results. In a polarized conflict, this approach could enable parties to address some substantive issues, without a community feeling like it needs to compromise its identity.

If discrimination, polarized power relations, economic inequality, territorial disputes, or the lack of appropriate mechanisms for the protection of minority rights perpetuate polarization, then the addressing of these factors is also necessary for the settlement. For mediation to be sustainable, there must be a combination of building relationships and institutional changes.  The Northern Ireland case demonstrates why these dimensions cannot easily be separated. Mediation is therefore most effective when these factors are understood as interrelated rather than treated as distinct issues. 

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Water, Power, and Conflict: The Geopolitics of the Grand Ethiopian Reconnaissance Dam (GERD) in the Nile Basin

How to cite this journal: Author, Date of the post, WMO Conflict Insight, Title of the post, ISSN: 2628 6998, https://worldmediation.org/journal/

EDITORIAL NOTE *

This article concerns a live dispute between three states and sets out the positions of each. The projection cited for possible losses of agricultural land in Egypt derives from modelling studies whose results vary widely according to the assumptions made about the rate of filling and about hydrological conditions, and it should be read as one estimate among several rather than as an established finding.

ABSTRACT *

This article examines the dispute over the Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam as a case in the reconciliation of sovereign development rights with downstream water security. It traces the origins of the conflict to the colonial-era agreements of 1902, 1929 and 1959, which allocated the waters of the Nile between Egypt and Sudan while excluding the upstream states from which most of the flow originates, and it sets out the resulting asymmetry between geographic and political power in the basin. The positions of the three principal parties are then examined in turn: Ethiopia’s framing of the dam as an exercise of sovereignty and a route out of energy poverty, Egypt’s treatment of any reduction in flow as an existential and therefore securitised question, and Sudan’s position between the two. The article assesses the institutional record, including the Nile Basin Initiative, the Cooperative Framework Agreement that entered into force in 2024 without Egyptian or Sudanese ratification, and the limits of the Watercourses Convention of 1997, before considering the involvement of the African Union, external powers, and the Gulf states. It closes by proposing data sharing as a sovereignty trade-off, cooperative sovereignty as an alternative to zero-sum framing, deliberately constructed interdependence, and legal innovations that convert general principles into measurable commitments.

KEYWORDS *

Nile Basin, Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, hydro-hegemony, water sovereignty, transboundary governance, Cooperative Framework Agreement, benefit sharing, data sharing, securitisation, African Union, Watercourses Convention, cooperative sovereignty

INTRODUCTION

The Nile Basin and hydro-politics

The Nile River, stretching over 6,600 kilometres and spanning 11 countries, is the world’s longest river and one of the most politically contested transboundary water systems, sustaining hundreds of millions of people. Egypt, the most downstream and most dependent state, has historically dominated hydro-politics in the basin by invoking historic rights secured through the colonial 1929 and 1959 Nile Waters Agreements, which allocated most of the water to Egypt and Sudan while excluding upstream countries from negotiations. This created downstream dominance and allowed Egypt to veto upstream developments. Geographical imbalances, where upstream nations control most of the sources yet lack the means or political freedom to fully develop them, have shaped the basin’s politics. Today, rapid population growth, climate variability, and demands for socio-economic development have transformed the Nile Basin into a contested geopolitical space where interdependence and political competition are intertwined.

Water sovereignty and resource competition

Water sovereignty refers to the rights of states to control the use and distribution of river resources within their territories without external interference, but in shared hydrological systems, this often leads to cross-border impacts. For upstream states like Ethiopia, the ability to harness water resources within their borders is framed as an exercise of sovereign rights to fuel domestic development and address energy shortages. This challenges the historical water sharing in which dominant downstream countries overrode the principle of equitable allocation by prioritising their own stability and growth while constraining the development of less powerful upstream neighbours. As such, historical rights bring bias to sovereignty claims.

Resource competition intensifies under scarcity, as seen in the Nile Basin, where Egypt obtains over 97 per cent of its renewable water externally and views any reduction in flow as a threat to food security, health, and economic stability. Ethiopia, conversely, highlights its developmental needs and historical marginalisation from Nile usage despite being the river’s primary source. This dynamic institutionalises competition, framing water allocation as a zero-sum game where upstream gains are seen as downstream losses. Globally, such competition is exacerbated by population growth, climate change, and scarcity, serving not only as an environmental constraint but also as a political catalyst for asserting sovereign control.

The dam and the politics of power

The Grand Ethiopian Renaissance Dam, initiated by Ethiopia in 2011 after decades of planning, represents a shift in Nile Basin power dynamics. Positioned on the Blue Nile near Sudan’s border and designed to generate over 6,000 MW, it aims to alleviate Ethiopia’s energy poverty and drive economic growth while uniting the country behind a monumental national project. Its unilateral construction, without a binding water-sharing agreement, challenges Egypt’s historical hydro-hegemony and asserts upstream sovereignty, escalating tensions with both Egypt and Sudan. For Ethiopia, the dam symbolises sovereignty and long-denied development rights, while for Egypt, it presents a direct challenge to its dominance over Nile waters.

Negotiations and mediations have so far yielded no binding resolution, and Ethiopia inaugurated the dam on 9 September 2025, with Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed declaring that Ethiopia built the dam to prosper, to electrify the entire region and to change the history of black people, that it is absolutely not to harm its brothers, and that the dam will improve access to electricity for almost half the population, which had no electricity as recently as 2022, and export the surplus to the region.

The staged filling of the reservoir, initially anticipated to take four to seven years depending on hydrological conditions, raises fears of reduced downstream flows, with potential consequences for agriculture, hydropower generation, and domestic consumption. Projections for the filling period indicate potential downstream water deficits for Egypt, including substantial losses of agricultural land. Such impacts make the dam a focal point of regional power politics, with Egypt even signalling military options, underscoring how entrenched sovereignty and security perceptions keep both sides in uncompromising positions.

The problem

The dispute clarifies a broader international dilemma in shared river basins: how to reconcile the upstream state’s sovereign right to develop with the downstream states’ rights to maintain the required water access, and the need for cooperative transboundary governance. Ethiopia positions the dam as an act of legitimate sovereign development and poverty reduction, while Egypt and Sudan view it through the lens of hydro-security risks. The Nile Basin’s historical agreements ignore the realities of modern demographic expansion and climate change and fail to establish an inclusive, equitable governance mechanism acceptable to all riparian states. This creates a legal and political vacuum, making disputes almost inevitable. Efforts to resolve the dispute illustrate the challenges of reconciling unilateral development ambitions with collective basin-wide management. Initiatives such as the Nile Basin Initiative have created forums for technical dialogue and attracted significant international support, yet have not produced binding agreements on contentious issues. Trilateral negotiations, aided by mediators such as the African Union, the United States, and the World Bank, have repeatedly stalled over legal frameworks for dispute settlement, environmental mitigation, and drought management. The enduring challenge remains whether new frameworks can transcend entrenched sovereignty disputes and foster sustainable, cooperative governance.

Analytical lens

This paper applies a multi-dimensional analytical lens combining insights from international relations theory, hydro-hegemony, and conflict transformation to examine the geopolitics of the dam. Drawing from realist and institutional perspectives, it interprets the actions of Ethiopia, Egypt, and Sudan as expressions of sovereignty, security, and national interest within an asymmetrical regional power structure. The concept of hydro-hegemony is used to explain how control over water, narratives, and institutional leverage shape negotiation dynamics, while the conflict transformation framework highlights pathways through which cooperation, trust-building, and shared governance can reorient the dispute from confrontation to interdependence. Collectively, these perspectives provide an integrated understanding of how power, identity, and institutional innovation interact in the Nile Basin, offering insights into how the dam can evolve from a symbol of competition into a catalyst for regional resilience and cooperative sovereignty.

MAIN CORPUS

Historical roots of Nile sovereignty challenges: colonial treaties and historic rights

The foundations of modern Nile sovereignty disputes are rooted in colonial-era treaties that privileged downstream states, particularly Egypt. The first treaty, signed in 1902 between Great Britain and Ethiopia, primarily to establish the borders between Ethiopia and the Sudan, restricted Ethiopia from constructing works on the Blue Nile, Lake Tana, or the Sobat without British consent. In its terms, the Emperor Menelek II engaged himself towards the Government of His Britannic Majesty not to construct or allow to be constructed any work across the Blue Nile, Lake Tsana or the Sobat, which would arrest the flow of their waters into the Nile except in agreement with His Britannic Majesty’s Government and the Government of the Sudan.

The 1929 treaty, negotiated between Britain on behalf of its East African colonies and Egypt, formally recognised Egypt’s historical and natural rights to the Nile and granted it veto power over upstream water projects. This treaty allocated 48 BCM of Nile water to Egypt and 4 BCM to Sudan. The 1959 treaty between Egypt and Sudan went further, expanding Egypt’s share to 55.5 BCM and Sudan’s to 18.5 BCM, accounting for the full measurable river flow, excluding any share for upstream states such as Ethiopia. Egypt and Sudan have long defended these arrangements as the basis of their historic or acquired rights to water, while Ethiopia disputes their legitimacy, arguing that the treaties ignored the fact that over 80 per cent of the Nile’s flow originates in its highlands, a case of sovereignty. All these instruments effectively marginalised upstream riparian states, whose interests were neither represented nor protected. This absence of upstream representation fostered a profound legacy of disagreement over the relevance and fairness of the treaties that still shape basin politics today and remains central to negotiations over the development and operations of the dam.

Upstream and downstream asymmetry of power

The Nile dispute is characterised by a long-time power imbalance between downstream states and upstream states. Based on its almost total reliance on the river, Egypt has long exerted disproportionate hydro-political influence in the basin due to strategic, economic, and geopolitical advantages, leveraging superior military strength, diplomatic alliances, and financial resources to deter upstream developments. This dominance allowed Egypt to enforce its preferred allocation regime, while upstream countries like Ethiopia, though the primary water sources, were constrained by limited technological capacity, external pressures, and economic instability, leaving their water potential largely unrealised. This asymmetry preserved Egypt’s legal and infrastructural control for decades, fuelled perceptions of inequity, and shaped negotiation dynamics, ultimately prompting Ethiopia to counterbalance by developing the dam.

Postcolonial sovereignty struggles and political realignment

The wave of African independence in the 1950s to 1970s brought new sovereign actors into Nile Basin politics. Many upstream states rejected colonial-era treaties as illegitimate impositions that disregarded their territorial rights. Ethiopia maintains that the dam, located entirely within its borders, is within its sovereign rights and that fears of downstream harm are politically driven. Upstream countries advanced the Cooperative Framework Agreement under the Nile Basin Initiative, while Egypt has viewed any change to existing allocations as a threat to national security. Political crises have triggered temporary realignments, with upstream states increasingly cooperating to counterbalance Egyptian and Sudanese dominance. This realignment underscores the broader contest between historic rights and equitable use, causing recurring tensions as downstream states perceive these actions as direct threats to water security and agricultural livelihoods.

Nile Basin Initiative and Cooperative Framework Agreement

The Nile Basin Initiative, established in 1999, was a donor-backed transitional platform for nine riparian states, later ten after South Sudan’s independence in 2011, to foster cooperative dialogue, joint projects, and capacity building while negotiating a permanent legal framework. Its creation was a decisive departure from the fragmented ad hoc institutional arrangements that had previously governed Nile relations. The transitional mandate led to the drafting of the Cooperative Framework Agreement, which set legal principles such as equitable utilisation, prevention of significant harm, data sharing, and joint environmental measures, with plans to establish a Nile River Basin Commission. While upstream states saw the Agreement as recognition of their rights to use Nile waters, downstream states resisted provisions that could alter historical flow allocations. It entered into force on 13 October 2024, after ratification by six states: Burundi, Ethiopia, Rwanda, Tanzania, Uganda, and South Sudan, though Egypt and Sudan withheld ratification due to unresolved disputes. Its implementation will see the Nile River Basin Commission replace the Initiative as a permanent governing body with legally binding authority, signalling a shift in power dynamics towards greater recognition of upstream states’ development rights, yet the absence of Egypt and Sudan highlights enduring sovereignty challenges and the limitations of institutional frameworks without comprehensive political consensus.

Limits of international water law

The 1997 UN International Watercourses Convention promotes equitable and reasonable utilisation while preventing significant harm, reaffirming in Article 10 that no use of an international watercourse enjoys inherent priority, and encouraging conflict resolution through Articles 5 to 7. Its application to the Nile highlights limitations: broad principles allow divergent state interpretations, Egypt stressing harm prevention, Ethiopia advocating equitable use, while weak enforcement leaves compliance reliant on goodwill. Articles 9 to 15 mandate data sharing, prior notification, and consultation, but lack binding authority to halt unilateral projects, fostering mistrust due to unclear data requirements and an inadequate six-month response window for complex projects. Dispute resolution is voluntary, enabling indefinite delays, and in the Nile’s context of entrenched sovereignty claims and power asymmetries, the Convention remains a reference framework rather than a decisive authority, leaving political negotiation as the primary means of managing conflicts.

The dam and national sovereignty: strategic and symbolic value

Since its inception in 2011, Ethiopia has framed the dam as a hydropower project, a tangible economic asset and a manifestation of geopolitical rebalancing in favour of upstream states. Thus it is a strategic symbol of a new Nile governance order. The Ethiopian government has presented it as the first Nile infrastructure designed to deliver mega benefits not only to Ethiopia’s journey for industrialisation and socio-economic transformation, but also beyond national borders. The dam’s position on the Blue Nile, Ethiopia’s most significant watercourse and Egypt’s primary freshwater source, gives it unmatched geopolitical leverage. Symbolically, it embodies Ethiopia’s refusal to accept colonial-era treaties and its determination to forge sovereign development pathways. The dam is indeed seen as a transformative regional asset, promising shared benefits to Sudan and Egypt while redefining power relations in the entire basin. This dual narrative of development and strategic repositioning underlines the dam’s centrality to Ethiopia’s national identity and foreign policy.

Strategically, it is Africa’s largest hydroelectric dam, with an anticipated capacity exceeding 6,000 MW, capable of transforming Ethiopia into a regional energy hub. Beyond its technical dimensions, it functions as a geopolitical lever, redefining the power distribution among Nile Basin states. Symbolically, it embodies a narrative of sovereignty in funding massive infrastructure projects, with the dam financed largely without foreign aid and driven by national contributions from citizens. This makes it a rallying point for Ethiopian unity, transcending political divides in the face of perceived external pressure. For the Ethiopian government, it is also a political tool to consolidate legitimacy domestically while asserting sovereignty internationally.

Egypt: existential dependence and security dilemma

Egypt’s perception of the dam is rooted in existential dependence on the Nile, which provides over 95 per cent of its freshwater supply. Historical allocations, particularly the 1929 and 1959 agreements, are central to Egypt’s claim of historic rights and its insistence on a downstream veto. From Egypt’s standpoint, any upstream control over the Blue Nile directly threatens national survival. Egypt’s concerns focus on the dam’s filling schedule, which it fears could significantly reduce downstream flow during drought years, threatening agriculture, energy production at the Aswan High Dam, and urban water supply. Despite Ethiopia’s assurances, the prospect that the dam could alter seasonal flows feeds Egyptian fears of strategic vulnerability.

This extreme dependency has translated into a foreign policy doctrine that defines Nile water access as a national security red line, one for which Egyptian leaders, such as the former United Nations Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali, have historically signalled a willingness to go to war. This dependence fosters a persistent security dilemma, whereby Ethiopia’s hydroelectric ambitions are interpreted as pre-emptive threats. Egypt has securitised the dam in both domestic and diplomatic discourse, framing it as a risk to water security, agricultural stability, and internal political legitimacy. The same project, viewed as essential for Ethiopia’s sovereignty and development, is perceived by Egypt as a national security risk. The absence of consensus exacerbates mistrust, and Egypt has pursued diplomatic, legal, and, at times, military signalling strategies to defend its access to the Nile.

Sudan’s balancing act

Sudan occupies a unique middle position in the debate, geographically situated between Ethiopia and Egypt, and politically torn between shared benefits and mutual vulnerabilities. It alternately supports Ethiopia’s hydroelectric ambitions and aligns with Egypt’s calls for safeguards on water flow. While Sudan stands to benefit from regulated flows and reduced flooding that could enhance its agricultural output, as well as potential electricity imports, it remains wary of dam safety and the absence of binding coordination mechanisms. Improved flow management could also optimise Sudan’s own hydropower systems. Given Sudan’s growing need for agricultural water and hydropower, engagement with Ethiopia offers tangible benefits. Yet Sudan’s water policy is constrained by both historic legal affiliations with Egypt and the geopolitical imperative to avoid alienating either side.

Khartoum’s balancing act reflects competing domestic and foreign policy priorities as well as long-term strategic vulnerabilities. While Sudan’s functional cooperation with Ethiopia could unlock mutual economic gains, its alignment with Egypt reinforces historic water-sharing alliances and provides leverage in future negotiations. This delicate balancing act, which prevents its complete alignment with either upstream or downstream states, highlights the difficulty of forging a trilateral consensus and illustrates how national sovereignty is shaped not only by hydro-politics but also by domestic regime changes and governance challenges.

Water security as national security

Across the Nile Basin, and more specifically for the three states of Ethiopia, Sudan, and Egypt, water security is increasingly equated with national security, making the dam a focal point of strategic competition. For downstream Egypt, ensuring sustained Nile flows is deemed essential for its water, food and energy nexus security, blending traditional and non-traditional security paradigms, to maintain agricultural productivity and social stability. Any alteration in flow is therefore securitised, triggering responses that go beyond economic or environmental diplomacy. For upstream Ethiopia, the dam represents a pathway to energy independence, industrialisation, enhanced geopolitical leverage, and equates its sovereign right to harness the Blue Nile with its broader developmental security, viewing the dam as a precursor to poverty eradication and political stability. For both countries, securitisation of water resources has been further exacerbated by rapid demographic growth and climate change impacts, which have sharpened the stakes of the dispute, particularly for Egypt. This securitisation transforms negotiations over flow management into matters of national defence and territorial integrity. Both positions ensure that the dispute will remain highly politicised, with compromise requiring not only hydrological agreements but also shifts in entrenched perceptions of sovereignty and security. Due to such national security framing, both states have formed uncompromising positions in negotiations.

Regional and global power dynamics: African institutions and water diplomacy

African institutions have sought to position themselves as central mediating actors, with the African Union in particular framing the dispute as part of its vision for African solutions to African problems. The Union assumed a facilitation role after the collapse of earlier American-brokered talks in 2020, launching high-level mediation from 2020 onwards. However, despite multiple negotiation rounds between 2020 and 2021, particularly after Ethiopia began the first stages of reservoir filling, outcomes have remained inconclusive, constrained by entrenched sovereign positions among the three states. The Union’s aim to contain the dispute within a continental forum and reduce the influence of external geopolitical rivalries over Nile governance faced constraints associated with deep-seated mistrust among the three states, the absence of binding enforcement mechanisms, and the complexities of reconciling historical treaty disputes with modern international water law.

The Nile Basin Initiative has also served as a technical and cooperative framework intended to promote equitable use among the riparian states, and it offers a rare multilateral venue for upstream and downstream states to interact. However, its efforts have been undermined by deep-seated sovereignty disputes, historical mistrust, and the refusal of Egypt and Sudan to sign the Cooperative Framework Agreement. These dynamics limit its ability to act decisively in disputes such as this one, where bilateral or trilateral negotiations tend to supersede multilateral initiatives, revealing the persistent gap between technical cooperation on the one hand and entrenched national positions on the other.

Beyond these, other regional organisations such as the Intergovernmental Authority on Development and the East African Community, though not geographically encompassing all parties, offer additional forums for dialogue, although they lack the legal and enforcement mechanisms necessary to compel compliance. A hybrid arrangement combining African Union political leadership, technical expertise from the Initiative, and sub-regional coordination could help shift water diplomacy from reactive bargaining toward proactive, basin-wide governance.

External powers and strategic stakes

Global powers have historically shaped the Nile Basin’s geopolitics, and the dam has attracted sustained engagement from external powers whose interests extend beyond water security into regional and global geopolitics. Egypt has linked Nile hydro-politics directly to global ideological rivalries by aligning with superpowers when beneficial for large-scale development projects, such as the Aswan High Dam. The United States has historically maintained a special strategic relationship with Egypt, linking security cooperation, military aid, and political support, which has influenced its stance on Nile water negotiations. While the United States offered to mediate between the riparians, Ethiopia perceived bias toward downstream interests, complicating its credibility as a neutral arbiter, which led to failed negotiations and the eventual freezing of substantial aid to Ethiopia.

The European Union has engaged through development cooperation and technical support for basin-wide initiatives but has generally avoided taking sides, preferring to frame its role as supportive of African Union-led negotiations. Its influence has, however, remained limited by the absence of hard leverage over the disputing parties. China’s deep economic presence in Ethiopia, including infrastructure and hydropower development, has been a source of concern for Egypt. In 2021, a visit by the Chinese Foreign Minister to Addis Ababa prompted Cairo to warn that external intervention could add chaos to the crisis. While more indirect in this case due to Ethiopia’s self-financing strategy, China’s role has been substantial in Ethiopia’s broader infrastructure push, strategically avoiding deep political entanglement but embedding its capital and technical expertise into energy, transport, and construction sectors.

Russia’s growing engagement in the Horn, through security partnerships, military agreements, and potential arms deals, adds another layer of complexity, with Ethiopia protecting the dam with air defence systems of foreign origin. The convergence of American, European, Chinese, Russian, and other powers’ interests in the Horn of Africa demonstrates that the dispute is no longer only a regional water dispute but a focal point in the broader competition for geopolitical influence along one of the world’s most strategic waterways. Thus the dispute serves as a strategic platform for external actors pursuing regional leverage and alignment with African partners in a multipolar international system.

Gulf states and regional influence

The Gulf states have emerged as significant actors due to their political ties with Egypt and Sudan and their strategic and economic stakes in the region. Investments in agriculture, ports, and infrastructure across Sudan, Ethiopia, and Eritrea are part of a broader strategy to secure food supplies and logistical hubs for Gulf economies. As the dam promises to regulate Nile flows and improve irrigation reliability in Sudan, Gulf investors view it as a tool to underpin their regional agricultural projects. Riding on this, Ethiopia’s Prime Minister repaired ties with both Riyadh and Abu Dhabi in 2018, securing financial assistance to alleviate Ethiopia’s foreign currency shortages and stabilise its struggling economy. This financial backing increased Gulf leverage in Ethiopia and positioned these states as potential mediators in the dispute.

However, the Arab League, backed by Gulf countries, passed a resolution on 15 June 2021 opposing Ethiopia’s second dam filling without a binding tripartite agreement. This move demonstrates coordinated diplomatic efforts by Arab states in solidarity with Egypt’s position on water security, driven by a blend of food security, investment, and geopolitical interests. These alliances are structured within the wider Red Sea security architecture, in which they seek to secure influence over strategic maritime routes, and their alignment with Egypt allows them to reinforce strategic partnerships important for maritime security, trade routes, and countering rival regional influences. Their deepening involvement thus reflects a recognition that water security and political stability in the Horn of Africa are closely linked to Gulf economic and geopolitical interests.

Global resource competition

The dispute exemplifies how transboundary water issues are increasingly entangled in global hydro-politics and resource competition. It demonstrates a case within a broader global pattern, where transboundary water management intersects with food security, energy production, sovereignty contestations, and geopolitical rivalries. Having been financed through Ethiopian domestic resources due to the reluctance of conventional institutions such as the World Bank, the construction of the dam illustrates how states may bypass traditional financing channels when global power configurations discourage specific projects, demonstrating a dispute where contested resource projects are pursued outside the established global economic order.

The dispute mirrors other global hydro-political conflicts, where upstream development challenges downstream dependency. Like the Mekong, Tigris and Euphrates, or Indus basins, the Nile demonstrates how contested sovereignty, uneven historical agreements, and uneven development trajectories can transform water management into a matter of national security. In this sense, resolving the crisis requires technical agreements and an appreciation of the dam as part of a worldwide web of interconnected hydro-political challenges. By situating it within the frame of global resource competition, it becomes evident that the conflict is not simply about water allocation, but also about shaping the rules of engagement in transboundary environments. Ethiopia’s insistence on African-led mediation can be interpreted as an attempt to resist the securitisation of water disputes within global institutions that often reflect the interests of dominant powers, making the dam part of a larger contest over who governs shared natural resources in this and the following centuries.

In the context of multilateral frameworks such as the Watercourses Convention, which provides guiding principles of equitable and reasonable use but without enforcement mechanisms, their impact remains limited. The challenge remains to transform these established frameworks into binding operational agreements capable of balancing development aspirations with security imperatives across multiple scales of governance, increasing demographic pressures, and climate change impacts.

Pathways beyond sovereignty conflicts: data sharing, transparency, and trust building

In transboundary water disputes such as this one, transparent data sharing can serve as both a technical necessity and a diplomatic bridge. One of the persistent obstacles has been the absence of transparent and timely data exchange, which has amplified Egyptian and Sudanese concerns over downstream water security. Ethiopia’s 2011 invitation to Egypt and Sudan to join an International Panel of Experts to review dam design documents and study their effects mirrored international requirements and represented a significant, though partial, step towards transparency and confidence building. Notwithstanding the transparency issues existing in the period before construction, Ethiopia’s unilateral filling without a comprehensive, binding operational agreement has deepened mistrust, as downstream states fear sudden reductions in flows during drought years. A core lesson from the Central Asian case is that disputes over transboundary rivers are exacerbated by mistrust, ambiguity, and unilateral action, which in turn undermine prospects for cooperation.

The Vietnamese experience under the Procedures for Data and Information Exchange and Sharing shows that structured, multistage data-sharing frameworks can promote mutual transparency and reduce uncertainty. Drawing from the Helmand River Basin case, Loodin and colleagues stress that emotions, national pride, and historical grievances can magnify mistrust when hydrological information is withheld. Here, real-time release schedules, reservoir filling rates, and inflow data could be shared with downstream states through independent or neutral monitoring mechanisms such as the African Union or a panel linked to the United Nations, to facilitate interpretation and dissemination and to reduce political manipulation. Such an approach would reduce the downstream states’ perception of risk. Transparency requires a sovereignty trade-off: Ethiopia might view data release as a strategic concession, while Egypt and Sudan may fear that such data could be manipulated. However, Soliev and Theesfeld show that without such trade-offs, disputing parties remain trapped in an appropriation problem, a tug of war over access and withdrawal rights, instead of progressing towards collective provision of benefits. By framing data sharing as a sovereignty trade-off rather than a loss of control, upstream Ethiopia could gain legitimacy while downstream states receive security assurances.

Furthermore, transparency measures must be embedded in institutional routines rather than ad hoc crisis responses. In Central Asia, agreements without consistent trust-building mechanisms eroded quickly under stress events like drought or energy shortages. Thus, regular trilateral meetings, public disclosure of technical reports, and the inclusion of civil society observers could help ensure that data exchange is perceived as credible and mutually beneficial. Such transparency not only builds trust but also strengthens institutional credibility, especially when systems are accessible to all parties. This approach can build the resilience of agreements against political shocks, making cooperation more sustainable.

Towards cooperative sovereignty: rethinking national interests

The concept of cooperative sovereignty offers an alternative to seeing nationalism as a contest where one country’s gain is another’s loss. Negotiations have often been shaped by zero-sum perceptions of sovereignty, with Egypt viewing the Nile as a lifeline rooted in historical treaties, and Ethiopia asserting its right to develop water resources for hydropower and economic growth. Without inclusive dialogue, this rigid stance creates winner and loser outcomes that undermine compromise, driven by emotion and pride. Cooperative sovereignty reframes the issue: rather than competing over absolute control, riparians collaborate to manage and benefit collectively, in which case states recognise that shared resources require shared management. A shift towards cooperative sovereignty means acknowledging shared vulnerabilities and mutual dependence on the Nile’s long-term health, and asserting that shared prosperity from the Nile can be maximised without undermining core national priorities. The Vietnamese approach illustrates that perceived national benefit protection can coexist with cooperation if the arrangement allows upstream and downstream interests to be met simultaneously. For Ethiopia, reframing the dam not solely as a national project but as a regional water, energy and food security asset could encourage Sudan and Egypt to view it as a shared safeguard rather than a threat.

Rethinking national interests requires recognising shared vulnerabilities, demographic pressures, climate change, hydrological variability, and food and energy insecurity, which threaten all basin states. This view ensures that both upstream and downstream needs are addressed, and sovereignty becomes a shared resource management tool rather than a weapon. This may extend to developing an economic integration strategy centred on electricity exports, ensuring that downstream states acquire a stake in the dam’s efficient operations instead of solely looking at it as flow-diverting infrastructure. Importantly, sabotage and coercive diplomacy, whether political, economic, or physical, are not strategic solutions; rather, they entrench mistrust and risk creating situations from which states cannot retreat without reputational and strategic damage. Threats of force must be excluded as political tools, as these only harden hostility and create irreversible rifts. Instead, sustained political dialogue, joint technical committees, and culturally sensitive mediation can help bridge entrenched positions. Cooperative sovereignty ensures Ethiopia achieves its developmental aims without jeopardising Egyptian and Sudanese water security, creating a durable political settlement. Such rethinking requires high-level political commitment to principled flexibility, where states accept that sovereignty in shared basins is exercised through cooperative mechanisms rather than isolated control.

From competition to regional interdependence

Historically, Nile riparian politics have been dominated by competition, where upstream states’ development projects are viewed as a threat to downstream states. The dam fits this pattern, with Egypt interpreting the project as a unilateral challenge to its historical rights. However, reframing it and other infrastructure projects as a shared regional asset can shift the dynamics from competitive rivalry to mutual dependency. Such regional interdependence, which requires high-level political support, can be cultivated by aligning national development strategies. A trilateral economic zone based on water, energy and food security linkages could incentivise cooperation, ensuring that harming one partner would directly damage the others. The Indus Waters Treaty offers a precedent, proving that functional cooperation can be sustained even in tense geopolitics when mutual benefits surpass political costs.

Transforming competition into interdependence requires identifying complementary needs and strengths, such as Ethiopia’s hydropower potential, Sudan’s agricultural expansion capacity, and Egypt’s investment and technological expertise, all amidst climate change and demographic pressures. Such plans can extend to building joint infrastructure, like cross-border irrigation systems or transmission lines, which cement interdependence physically and economically. This strategic alignment creates a shared stake in regional stability. While power asymmetries and lack of trust can amplify competitive unilateralism, the deliberate creation of interdependencies can be a stabilising factor. This is exemplified in Central Asia, where a new leadership’s emphasis on regional integration achieved tangible results quickly, providing an opportunity to reconsider transboundary water governance on a fundamental level.

Here, building cross-sector linkages in agriculture, trade, and infrastructure between the three states would raise the cost of conflict while increasing the benefits of regional stability. Importantly, advancing this transformation requires political elites to see cooperation not as a vulnerability but as a form of shared resilience. Thus, mechanisms to advance this must target linkages of mutual benefit, such as joint agro-industrial zones powered by the dam’s electricity, or coordinated flood and drought management that benefits all. This means framing interdependence as a pathway to climate adaptation and regional food, energy and water security, in order to manage demographic pressures and regional socio-economic development.

Legal and institutional innovations for transboundary governance

Soliev and Theesfeld note that reliance on broadly defined international water law principles such as equitable and reasonable use and no significant harm can perpetuate disputes due to differing interpretations. This calls for legal innovations that operationalise these principles into concrete, measurable commitments such as seasonal release schedules or rules, drought management procedures, benefit-sharing clauses, and conflict resolution timelines. Such measures would reduce legal ambiguity. Flexible institutions are vital in such an arrangement. A governance framework should therefore incorporate adaptive management clauses, allowing for scientific review and amendment without reopening the entire treaty. This would enable the basin states to respond collectively to climate variability while maintaining stability in allocations.

Lastly, embedding cooperative institutions within regional frameworks, such as the African Union and the Nile Basin Initiative, can provide legitimacy and reduce the dominance of any one riparian state. Political will is a mandatory requirement here, and such institutions should be designed not just to manage conflict but to proactively create shared value, ensuring that cooperative dialogue is sustained. Institutional innovation also means integrating non-state stakeholders such as agricultural cooperatives, civil society groups, and private energy traders into governance structures, a move that broadens legitimacy and diffuses the monopolisation of water governance by central governments alone.

SUMMARY *

The article’s contribution is to hold three positions simultaneously without collapsing any of them. Ethiopia’s claim rests on the fact that most of the water originates in its territory and that the instruments excluding it from any share were concluded by a colonial power on behalf of others. Egypt’s claim rests on near-total dependence on a river it does not control and on arrangements around which a century of agricultural and demographic development has been organised. Sudan’s position is genuinely divided, since regulated flow benefits it and an unregulated upstream reservoir endangers it. Each of these is coherent, which is why the dispute has resisted resolution, and it is the article’s central analytical move to treat the deadlock as a consequence of that coherence rather than of any party’s bad faith. The proposal that follows from it, cooperative sovereignty, is accordingly not a call for concession but a claim that the parties have mistaken what sovereignty over a shared river can consist of.

CONCLUSION

Rethinking sovereignty in resource conflicts

The case demonstrates that strict, unilateral interpretations of sovereignty over shared rivers often exacerbate disputes rather than resolve them. It illustrates that absolute sovereignty over transboundary resources is increasingly untenable in an interconnected, climate-stressed world. While Ethiopia has framed the dam as exercising its sovereign right to develop its resources, Egypt’s long-standing position is that any upstream project that reduces its historical Nile share threatens its national security, thus invoking the no-harm rule. The visible challenge in the interpretation of equitable and reasonable use and no significant harm remains alive. This conflict points to the need to reconceptualise sovereignty not as a rigid shield of unilateral decision-making, but as a framework for shared responsibility, joint planning, and equitable use, consistent with Article 5 of the Watercourses Convention.

Such rethinking is necessary: instead of viewing sovereignty as exclusive control, states must embrace sovereignty as cooperative capacity, where a portion of autonomous decision-making is traded for greater collective regional stability and prosperity. This transforms shared water into a platform for development rather than contention, and is especially relevant here because the dam exists in an ecological and political system that transcends borders. Hydrological impacts, climate variability, and water needs cut across state boundaries, meaning unilateralism generates negative spillovers. A cooperative sovereignty model allows Ethiopia to achieve its development goals through hydropower while ensuring downstream states can meet their water security needs. This is not a loss of control, but a recalibration of sovereignty to fit the interconnected nature of river basins. In practice, this means both Ethiopia and Egypt must consider embedding sovereignty trade-offs in legally binding operational agreements, supported by continental institutions, so that cooperation is protected from internal political changes.

Lessons for international conflict theory

The case offers theoretical lessons, especially in the study of hydro-hegemony and asymmetric bargaining. The first is that material control over the water source, when combined with financial independence, shifts bargaining dynamics. Ethiopia’s ability to fund the dam domestically limited Egypt’s capacity to block the project through financial pressure or conditional aid. Ethiopia’s upstream technical ability and political will altered bargaining leverage, even if Egypt and Sudan retained geopolitical weight and historical claims. This shows that material capabilities, in this case the ability to build and operate infrastructure, can shift negotiation equilibria, and that bargaining outcomes depend on credible commitments, the availability of outside options, and the capacity to absorb short-term costs. This reinforces the principle that altering material power balances can change the scope of possible negotiated outcomes, even in long-standing asymmetries. Theory must therefore integrate infrastructure, technical capacity, and public will as core elements shaping bargaining power in resource disputes.

Second, the dispute demonstrates how cultural narratives and historical grievances can intensify mistrust and complicate negotiations. Ethiopia’s pan-African framing counters Egypt’s invocation of colonial-era treaties and civilisational claims to the Nile. These identity-based narratives are not peripheral; they fundamentally shape the willingness of parties to compromise. Theory must therefore account for symbolic and cultural dimensions, not merely material resource flows, when assessing cooperation potential.

Finally, the case underscores the importance of trust building as a precondition for institutional success. Data sharing and transparency are not merely procedural tools but structural confidence-builders that change how states perceive each other over the long term. Cooperative outcomes in transboundary disputes depend not just on legal rules but on relational trust. Without mutual confidence, even technically sound treaties risk collapse under political strain.

POTENTIAL SOLUTION *

The article’s analysis is thorough and its proposals are sound; what follows concerns the sequence in which they might be attempted, since the moment has changed and the change is favourable in a way the parties have not yet acted on.

The dam is built and filled. That removes from the table the question that made agreement impossible, namely whether it would exist, and leaves only questions on which agreement is available: how it is operated in a drought, what is released and when, what data is exchanged, and what happens if the arrangement is breached. Every one of these is technical, none requires either party to concede its position on the treaties of 1929 and 1959, and all of them are now more urgent for Ethiopia than before, since a dam that generates power needs a functioning grid, regional customers, and a downstream neighbour who is not planning to attack it. The bargaining position that made agreement unnecessary during construction does not survive the transition to operation.

The instrument that fits this situation is a coordinated operation agreement rather than a water-sharing treaty, and the distinction matters. Water sharing requires settling entitlement, which is the question that cannot be settled. Coordinated operation requires only that each side knows what the other will do, and it is what the Indus Waters Treaty achieved: India and Pakistan did not agree about Kashmir, and they agreed about the rivers, by dividing them rather than sharing them, by establishing a permanent commission that has met annually through three wars, and by providing a neutral expert procedure that either side can trigger alone. That last feature is the one most obviously missing here, and it is the one that would matter most, since a dispute mechanism requiring both parties’ consent to operate is a dispute mechanism that will not operate.

Three further observations. The article’s proposal on data sharing is the most immediately achievable and its framing as a sovereignty trade-off is exactly right; the practical form is telemetry transmitted to a neutral body rather than to the other party, which removes the question of whether the recipient will manipulate it, and satellite altimetry now makes reservoir levels externally observable in any case, which means the strategic value of withholding the data has largely gone. Second, the strongest instrument of interdependence available is the one the article mentions only in passing: power purchase agreements. A downstream state that has contracted to buy electricity for twenty years has an interest in the dam functioning and a lever if it does not, and this converts a threat into an asset more directly than any declaration. Third, the entry into force of the Cooperative Framework Agreement without Egypt and Sudan creates an institution whose legitimacy their absence will always qualify; the question of whether the new commission’s design can be adjusted to make accession possible for them is worth more attention than it is receiving, because a basin institution that half the basin’s population does not recognise will not govern the basin.

Finally, one observation for readers of this journal. The article records that mediation was attempted by the United States, by the World Bank, and by the African Union, and that each attempt failed for reasons that were structural rather than personal: the first was not trusted by one party, the second lacked leverage over any party, and the third had legitimacy without instruments. The combination that has worked elsewhere is a convener with standing, a technical secretariat with credibility, and a guarantor whose participation gives each party something it wants and would lose. That combination has not yet been assembled here, and assembling it is a more tractable problem than any of the substantive questions in dispute.

* Added by the WMO Editorial Team

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Supplementary references added by the WMO Editorial Team

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A Matter of Ore & More : An Analysis of Greenland & USA 2025

How to cite this journal: Author, Date of the post, WMO Conflict Insight, Title of the post, ISSN: 2628 6998, https://worldmediation.org/journal/

EDITORIAL NOTE *

This contribution is a conflict analysis report rather than an article, and its structure has been retained. It concerns a dispute that was unresolved at the time of writing in spring 2025, and its assessment of the parties reflects the author’s own perspective; this journal’s editorial position is neutral as between the states concerned. The section on technocracy advances an interpretation of the motives of a serving administration on the basis of one adviser’s family history; it is the author’s own reading and is not presented here as established fact.

ABSTRACT

The following report examines the contemporary conditions and status of the diplomatic and rhetorical conflict between the current presidential administration of the United States, the Kingdom of Denmark, and the affected people of Kalaallit Nunaat, Greenland. It also analyses both the underlying and the evident issues, interests, conflicts, and baseline positions of the parties, in order to understand the drives behind certain intentions as well as the challenges that may prevent or escalate the situation.

KEYWORDS

American exceptionalism, annexation, environment, expansionism, natural resources, presidential administration, rare earth elements, rhetoric, stakeholders, stewardship, technocracy

CONFLICT PROFILE

Primary parties: the United States of America; the Kingdom of Denmark together with Greenland.

Secondary parties and observers: the European Union; Canada; the United Nations.

Duration of dispute: December 2024 to the present, spring 2025 at the time of this report.

Geography: Arctic island, northern hemisphere.

Levels of conflict: interpersonal, economic, intergroup, goal oriented, interstate, expansionist, ecological, resource based.

Interests and positions of the United States: mining of rare earth elements and the amplification of national prestige.

Interests and positions of Denmark: national sovereignty and the long-standing status quo.

Interests and positions of Greenland: autonomy together with environmental and socio-cultural preservation.

Status: still developing; limited implications following the Greenlandic elections.

Potential for escalation: medium to high; rhetoric and stated intention of annexation continue.

Potential for resolution: high, particularly if military assets are engaged as part of a settlement.

MAIN CORPUS

Adjacent cases of the twenty-first century thus far

Conflicts over land or resources have been an inherent human phenomenon since our earliest developments. Such conflicts in the twenty-first century are concentrated in areas of ambiguous autonomy, status, or national alignment, sometimes lacking sufficient international consensus for the formal recognition that would mitigate encroachment by other states. They also differ in the resources desired and in how these play into global market demand.

A first comparison is Hong Kong’s reframed status as a special administrative region, as the People’s Republic of China seeks to benefit from the territory’s property investment, commercial services, and ports (Khederlarian 2020: 31, 108 to 109). A second is Crimea, where the Russian Federation’s complex history with the peninsula stretches back centuries (Khederlarian 2020: 23, 71), the government having long-standing interests in its port cities, its minerals and oil, and its position in the Black Sea. A third is Western Sahara, where Morocco has been operating for phosphate rock, abundant fisheries, and salt (Smith 2018: 10). The situation in Kashmir presents some adjacent circumstances.

The natural resources at question

It is important to step back and assess the physical materials at the heart of this. The world’s largest island contains not only resources traditionally desired on world markets, such as iron ore, oil, zinc, and uranium (Wilson 2016: 31), but also rare earth elements in continuing demand. Four of these, dysprosium, neodymium, praseodymium, and terbium, are needed for the magnets essential to wind turbine generators and advanced vehicle motors (Vaillant 2024). Lithium, niobium, hafnium, and zirconium are key components for batteries and other applications, likely for digital hardware processing.

Another important factor is the difficulty of processing. The first issue is that such deposits are located in environmentally delicate areas: national parks, preserved forest, Arctic areas with melting glacial shelves, and areas with endangered fauna or indigenous communities. The second is that the industrial processing of these minerals emits an extraordinary quantity of greenhouse gases. A number of these circumstances apply to the Greenlandic case.

Power dynamics

Despite a long-term economic and military security alliance through the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the power dynamics here are asymmetrical while rooted in the power of contract.

The United States has taken unilateral approaches or set its own priorities within its international partnerships for a long time, on the view that it must be the primary provider or leader in almost every relevant international endeavour. This is the case with the Alliance and its network of military installations, including in Denmark. While guaranteeing protection and support, this also creates complications when paradigm shifts occur within the American government. There is also the basic circumstance that the American military apparatus is very much larger than that of Denmark, and more experienced after decades of continuous expeditionary operations.

Preliminary build up

The United States established a series of subsidiary treaties and arrangements with various allies in the wake of the Alliance. In the case of Greenland this was achieved in 1951, the parameters being extensive military access for troops and assets in order to counteract any potential Soviet manoeuvres in the polar region.

The foundation for this dispute lies in the American government’s growing priority for exclusive resource access, alongside the renewed emergence of an ultranationalist current on the world stage. Beyond the desire for military access, the government has developed a perceived need to expand its access to vital material components. The need for rare earth elements has been growing since the beginning of the digital age. However, this was greatly amplified by the emergence of the People’s Republic of China as a leader in both obtaining and processing such elements. Seeking these deposits is one key challenge; another is the placement of processing facilities outside the reach of certain American environmental regulations.

It is also important to assess the changing nature of the American federal government. The last decade shows a swing between neoliberal and ultranationalist positions. These swings carry further complications, as official or informal policies towards allies begin to lose their guaranteed longevity. The current administration, carrying this ultranationalist movement, amplifies the resource question with an older school of realism.

The role of technocracy in the current administration’s aspirations

To understand the motivations behind the current administration’s geographic and economic aspirations, one may take into account the background of a key figure. The businessman and adviser Elon Musk has a range of ideas about how the United States should proceed in the twenty-first century, and the author suggests that some of these notions have older antecedents. His grandfather, Joshua Haldeman, was a member of the technocratic movement that emerged in the 1930s.

Like many of the fringe ideologies to emerge from the interwar period, technocrats envisaged a remade social order in which precise social engineering, communications technology, and technical enterprise would be the driving forces, removing politicians and financiers from the provision of goods and services and transferring these to scientific, technical, and engineering concerns (The Technocrat 1937: 3). More strikingly, technocrats advocated that the Technate should encompass all territories from South America to the Arctic, in order to secure the associated natural resources while creating a self-sustaining unit (The Technocrat 1937: 3).

The author’s reading is that aspects of technocracy have merged with anti-globalist elements in the current American leadership, and that the rhetoric concerning Canada and Panama corresponds with the resource and geographic goals of that older movement. In the case of Greenland, on this reading, the aspiration is for rare earth elements and similar mining products needed for processing hardware, advanced missiles, electric vehicles, and consumer electronics. These elements are distributed across the exterior coastline of the island (Thrane, Kalvig and Keulen 2014: 305). Although the United States has had military access to the island since 1941, with revisions in 1951 (Petersen 1998: 2 to 3), the scope has been that of alliance security concerns and never much in economic terms.

The administration states that its interest in Greenland is a matter of defence against Russian and Chinese activity in the Arctic. The author’s contention is that identifying an older ideological current behind the annexation rhetoric may allow the international community to respond more accurately to this dispute.

The United States: unilateralism and exceptionalism

American exceptionalism has taken many forms throughout its existence, from Manifest Destiny in the post-revolutionary republic, to the aftermath of the Spanish-American War, to the victories of the Second World War. In recent decades it has changed again, from the shining city on a hill of the Reagan presidency to the movement of the present day. This sense of national exceptionalism has embedded itself in foreign policy and military engagement in almost every conflict since the Cold War, with American priorities and methods taking precedence over those of allies and partners in what are supposed to be collaborative endeavours.

That said, the American federal apparatus faces various challenges to this self-image, ranging from no longer being perceived as the world’s policeman, to changing trade dynamics in Europe, to attempts at multipolarity by China and Russia (Minasyants 2015: 2 to 6). Exceptionalists are thereby prompted into an amplified survival mentality in order to counteract these perceived declines. Combined with current protectionist economic priorities, American exceptionalism will not easily dissipate in this conflict or in similar ones.

Denmark: balancing self-interest with global mindfulness

The Kingdom of Denmark, like many of its Scandinavian neighbours, is carefully navigating how to maintain its own preferences and values while addressing circumstances outside its control. Trust, supportiveness, community, and contribution to the common good are pivotal values. At the same time, Danes do not wish to lose their identity, metaphorically or geographically. Danish overseas territories have been reduced over the last few centuries to Greenland and the Faroe Islands, and even these are more autonomous than directly administered.

Danish stewardship of Greenland can be seen as more than a matter of cultural legacy or national dignity. An environmental dimension can also be assessed. In the face of climate change, Greenland remains largely untouched, especially in the interior, with its small population. Introducing large-scale, unregulated mining operations would greatly affect the integrity of the island’s ecology while amplifying the climate crisis through increased meltwater into the Arctic and Atlantic oceans. Environmental stewardship is one of the ways in which Denmark contributes to the response to the climate crisis while maintaining national pride.

It is also about being mindful of the precedent that would be set if such annexations were accommodated. One acquisition could lead to another. Danish steadfastness on this issue could mitigate or postpone such goals.

Greenland: weighing future options

Kalaallit Nunaat, the island caught in the middle of all this, consists of a pristine landscape, a mindful people, and a keen desire to forge its own destiny. Combining Scandinavian cultural elements with an Inuit majority, Greenland has been gaining autonomy from Denmark for some time, an example of self-determination conducted slowly and deliberately.

Greenlanders, themselves environmental stewards (Wilson 2016: 24 to 25), are accustomed to a way of life fairly similar to the Danish experience. Under American annexation there is no guarantee that this way of life would be maintained or respected without qualification. Taking into account certain American norms in areas such as working conditions, land development, and healthcare, such annexation would be still less appealing.

In the face of this situation, the elections of 2025 displayed a duality of idealism and pragmatism. Parties inclined towards independence gained the majority while also seeking strong solidarity with Denmark in the present, perhaps with the aim of maintaining mutually beneficial ties in the long term while remaining steadfast against perceived existential threats in the short term.

Any negotiation or political and economic solution for Greenland will have to involve and benefit this stakeholder group. This could include meaningful public engagement and transparency, measures to minimise socio-environmental impact, and provision for non-extractive employment (Wilson 2016: 71 to 73).

Challenges and considerations for stakeholders

Several challenging considerations must be assessed in order to secure any peaceful conclusion. The proverbial rock and hard place would be a slight understatement, particularly where exceptionalism or unilateralism comes into play.

For the administration and those who share its outlook, the chief challenge is to achieve economic access or annexation without military involvement, which would violate a number of treaties, including with Denmark itself, and would draw widespread condemnation, thereby affecting many economic arrangements elsewhere. Maintaining a nineteenth century mentality while using twentieth century methods in a twenty-first century world is not the proper way to proceed. Taking the values and priorities of Greenlanders and of Denmark seriously would be an ethical consideration that would ease tensions.

For the other stakeholders, the chief challenge is how to navigate the situation without further escalation on the one hand or excessive concession on the other. The concurrent prospective mineral agreement between the United States and Ukraine presents a mixture of advantages and disadvantages, and a similar arrangement here would be beneficial to only one side.

In terms of format and convening, an approach engaging multistakeholder or complex multidimensional negotiation, akin to that conducted for environmental protection and internet regulation in the late twentieth century (Lebedeva and Zinovieva 2023: 151), could produce the appropriate composition. The use of digital and technical elements can shape the parameters of negotiation alongside other considerations such as public relations throughout the process, prior situation analysis, and logistical and resource management (Lebedeva and Zinovieva 2023: 152 to 153).

An issue of crisis communication

In delicate situations such as this, where the degree of crisis has not reached its possible peak, deliberate and mindful communication is essential to achieve de-escalation or resolution. The rhetoric thus far does not permit the sustainment of rapport between the nations. Active listening, though lacking, would be an essential step for both the United States and the Kingdom of Denmark to undertake, ensuring that tone, cadence, and pacing do not give further hostile impressions or convey disrespect.

Where the communications take place would make a difference. In terms of neutral locations, suitable options would include Iceland, Canada, or one of the neighbouring Scandinavian countries, so that relevance and convenience are combined with neutrality of space for undistracted dialogue.

Reframing the talking points, not only of the United States but also of Denmark and Greenland, may be necessary in re-establishing historic rapport, so that discourse is not derailed. Prior boldness of tone or wording would then not distract from the objective needs and subjective issues at stake. Reviewing the baseline summaries would allow reflection by every side while possibly revealing intersecting priorities that could generate solutions.

Considerations for this conflict’s mediators

This dispute leans towards a mixed conflict of factual considerations combined with moments of heated feeling among the most affected communities.

It is likely that the administration will de-escalate its annexation rhetoric if it receives a favourable mining or processing agreement within a certain time frame.

It is imperative that mediators craft preliminary language and subsequent written agreements that maintain clear parameters for the negotiations and for an agreed resolution, reaffirm the historic and contemporary partnership between the parties, and do not leave gaps that could become the source of future conflict.

It may be advisable for mediation to be conducted in separate sessions with the parties, with liaison between each side’s positions, interests, and needs before joint sessions are reconvened.

The inclusion of a Greenlandic delegation able to speak for itself would be ethically necessary.

Mediators will have to be mindful of the longevity of any agreement and of the degree of partnership surrounding it. Past attempts at environmentally adjacent mediation through regional organisations or involving questions of access and ownership (Winkler 2024) have demonstrated considerable potential involving non-state actors, but have fallen short in the long term where self-interest prevailed or where breakdowns in dialogue produced later difficulties.

SUMMARY *

The report’s most consequential structural observation is that this is a two-level dispute presented as a one-level one. Sovereignty over Greenland is a matter between Washington and Copenhagen; the future of Greenland is a matter for Greenlanders, whose recent elections returned parties committed both to eventual independence and to present solidarity with Denmark. A negotiation conducted between the two states about the island reproduces the colonial structure that Greenland has spent decades unwinding, and a negotiation that includes Greenlanders as principals changes what can be agreed. The report’s second observation is that the substantive interest at issue, access to rare earth deposits, does not require any change of sovereignty at all, which means the dispute as framed and the dispute as it might be resolved are not the same dispute.

CONCLUSION

At the time of writing, uncertainty still looms. Whether this proves to be a war of rhetoric that dissipates fairly quickly, or develops into something more serious, future readers will know. As the twenty-first century proceeds, older patterns of conflict over fundamental resources will recur, the more so as advanced computing technology develops and the climate crisis worsens. But we have collectively grown more mindful of the world around us, and of the consequences of our words as well as our actions. The best and most ethical paths forward are those travelled together.

Perhaps the resolution lies in selective mining conducted as a multilateral effort inclusive of the Inuit people. Or in greater effort to develop technologies that do not damage the ecology of Greenland or the climate of the world. Or perhaps in waiting until cooler heads prevail. Whichever pathway decision makers choose, the underlying value of mindfulness remains.

POTENTIAL SOLUTION *

The report’s own analysis contains the settlement, and stating it plainly is worth doing: the interest and the demand are not the same thing. Access to rare earth deposits requires licences, capital, infrastructure and a processing route. It does not require sovereignty. Greenland has an established minerals licensing regime, has issued licences to foreign companies, and needs precisely the investment that would develop them. An arrangement providing long-term offtake agreements, equity participation, port and energy infrastructure, and processing capacity elsewhere in the alliance would deliver everything the stated interest requires, and every element of it is already lawful. That such an arrangement has not been pursued suggests either that the stated interest is not the operative one, or that the demand serves a domestic audience for which acquisition is the point. Distinguishing between those two possibilities is the first task of any mediator here, because they call for entirely different processes.

The security dimension similarly admits of arrangements short of the demand. The agreement of 1951 already grants extensive access, and the installation at Pituffik operates under it. Where a state already possesses what it says it needs, a demand for more is a demand for something else, and naming that something else is the precondition for negotiating about it.

Two structural points bear on the report’s recommendations. Greenland’s status under the Self-Government Act of 2009 includes recognition of Greenlanders as a people under international law with a right of self-determination, and control over mineral resources rests with Nuuk rather than Copenhagen. The consequence is not merely that Greenlandic participation would be ethically preferable, as the report puts it, but that an agreement about minerals concluded without Greenland would be legally ineffective. The report’s recommendation is stronger than it claims. And the free, prior and informed consent standard applicable to indigenous peoples in respect of extractive projects on their territories supplies a procedural framework that already exists and that all parties nominally accept.

Two observations on method. The recommendation of shuttle mediation is sound, and the difficulty here is the composition of the table rather than the format: any process must accommodate a party that is simultaneously a stakeholder in its own right and part of a kingdom, which is a familiar problem with familiar solutions, including sub-state delegations with defined competences and agreements structured in separable parts. And the report’s emphasis on crisis communication identifies the real risk in a dispute conducted largely through public statements, since positions taken in public are costly to abandon. Establishing a quiet channel alongside the public one is the standard remedy, and it works only if it exists before the public positions have hardened past the point of retreat.

Finally, one caution about the report’s own strongest passage. The account of technocracy is the most speculative element and the least necessary to the argument. The material interest in rare earth elements, the strategic interest in the Arctic, and the domestic political value of territorial ambition are together sufficient to explain what is observed, and they are demonstrable. An explanation resting on a named individual’s grandfather’s membership of an interwar movement is not demonstrable, and it invites dismissal of the analysis as a whole. Where a conflict analysis reaches for motive, the discipline of the field is to describe what parties do and to ask what they say they want, since those are the things a mediator can work with. The rest is inference, and a party who feels their motives have been assigned rather than asked about is a party who does not come to the table.

* Added by the WMO Editorial Team

REFERENCES

Amonson, Kyle Mark. The Role of America: An Analysis of Multilateralism in the 21st Century. Journal of International Relations 6, no. 1 (2018): 7 to 11.

Eidemiller, Konstantin, Anton Geht, Anni Nikulina, and Regina-Elizaveta Kudriavtceva. The Political Status of Greenland in the 21st Century: The Path from the Colony of the Kingdom of Denmark to the Possible 51st State of the USA. In Proceedings of Topical Issues in International Political Geography, 119 to 132. Cham: Springer International Publishing, 2020.

Khederlarian, Kristina. The Consequences of Annexation on Financial Markets. Claremont Graduate University, 2020.

Lebedeva, Marina M., and Elena S. Zinovieva. International Negotiations in the Digital Age. Vestnik RUDN: International Relations 23, no. 1 (2023): 144 to 156.

Minasyants, Armenak. US Hegemony in the 21st Century: A New Approach. Academia.edu, 2 April 2015. https://www.academia.edu/11776151/US_Hegemony_in_21st_Century_A_New_Approach

Oh, Chang Hoon, Jiyoung Shin, and Shuna Shu Ham Ho. Conflicts between Mining Companies and Communities: Institutional Environments and Conflict Resolution Approaches. Business Ethics, the Environment and Responsibility 32, no. 2 (2023): 638 to 656.

Petersen, Nikolaj. Negotiating the 1951 Greenland Defense Agreement: Theoretical and Empirical Aspects. Scandinavian Political Studies 21, no. 1 (1998): 1 to 28.

Shala, Sebahate. Global (Dis)Order: A Bipolar Plus World in the Making. WMO Conflict Insight, March 2024. ISSN 2628 6998. https://worldmediation.org/journal/

Smith, Jeffrey J. The Taking of the Sahara: The Role of Natural Resources in the Continuing Occupation of Western Sahara. Western Sahara (2018): 23 to 43.

Song, Seongjong. American Exceptionalism at a Crossroads. The Korean Journal of International Studies 13, no. 1 (2015): 239 to 262.

The Technocrat, vol. 3, no. 4, September 1937. Technocracy Inc. Internet Archive. https://archive.org/details/TheTechnocrat-September1937

Thrane, Kristine, Per Kalvig, and Nynke Keulen. REE Deposits and Occurrences in Greenland. In ERES2014: 1st European Rare Earth Resources Conference, Milos, Greece, 2014.

Vaillant, Tom. Greenland's Rare Earths Attract European and U.S. Interest, Signaling Potential Mining Boom. Pulitzer Center, 14 November 2024. https://pulitzercenter.org/stories/greenlands-rare-earths-attract-european-and-us-interest-signaling-potential-mining-boom

Wilson, Emma C. Energy and Minerals in Greenland: Governance, Corporate Responsibility and Social Resilience. Academia.edu, 14 July 2016. https://www.academia.edu/26986195/Energy_and_minerals_in_Greenland_Governance_corporate_responsibility_and_social_resilience

Winkler, Zachariah. Mother Nature Is a Battleground: Patterns in Conflict over Natural Resources. WMO Conflict Insight, December 2024. ISSN 2628 6998. https://worldmediation.org/journal/

Supplementary references added by the WMO Editorial Team

Act on Greenland Self-Government, Act No. 473 of 12 June 2009, and the Mineral Resources Act of Greenland.

Agreement between the Government of the Kingdom of Denmark and the Government of the United States of America concerning the Defense of Greenland, Copenhagen, 27 April 1951, and the Igaliku Agreement of 2004.

United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, 2007, Articles 19 and 32 on free, prior and informed consent.

International Labour Organization Convention No. 169 concerning Indigenous and Tribal Peoples, 1989.

Arctic Council, working group reports on sustainable development and on the protection of the Arctic marine environment, Tromsø.

Nuttall, M. (2017). Climate, Society and Subsurface Politics in Greenland: Under the Great Ice. Routledge, London.

Gad, U. P. (2017). National Identity Politics and Postcolonial Sovereignty Games: Greenland, Denmark, and the European Union. Museum Tusculanum Press, Copenhagen.

Fisher, R., & Ury, W. (2011). Getting to Yes: Negotiating Agreement Without Giving In (3rd edition). Penguin Books, New York, on the distinction between positions and interests.

The Role of Mediation in Post-Conflict Transitional Justice in Achieving Truth, Accountability, and Reparations

How to cite this journal: Author, Date of the post, WMO Conflict Insight, Title of the post, ISSN: 2628 6998, https://worldmediation.org/journal/

EDITORIAL NOTE *

The manuscript reproduced its discussion of the Colombian process twice in consecutive passages; the duplication has been removed. Two references in the bibliography do not correspond to the propositions for which they are cited in the text, and readers are advised to check them at source.

ABSTRACT

Post-conflict societies face the profound challenge of reconstructing political order while addressing legacies of mass violence, systematic human rights violations, and social fracture. This article examines the role of mediation within transitional justice frameworks, arguing that mediation is not merely a procedural mechanism but a transformative political and social process that can, when properly designed and supported, reconcile the tension between peace and accountability. Drawing on scholarly literature and case studies from Rwanda, Colombia, Sierra Leone, and South Africa, the article analyses how mediation contributes to truth-seeking, reparations design, institutional reform, and the prosecution of perpetrators. It further interrogates the normative dilemmas that mediation poses, particularly the trade-offs between amnesty and accountability.

KEYWORDS

Transitional justice, mediation, political order, accountability, reconciliation

INTRODUCTION

The literature on transitional justice has grown substantially since the 1990s, driven by the proliferation of transitional processes across Latin America, Africa, Eastern Europe, and Asia (Kritz 1995; Huntington 1991). Yet the specific role of mediation within these frameworks remains undertheorised. Legal scholarship has tended to focus on the architecture of international criminal law, while peace studies has centred on the dynamics of ceasefires and power-sharing arrangements. This article seeks to contribute to an emerging interdisciplinary conversation that situates mediation at the intersection of law, politics, and social repair.

This article proceeds as follows. Section two provides a conceptual framework situating mediation within transitional justice theory. Section three examines mediation’s contribution to the principal pillars of transitional justice: accountability, truth, reparations, and institutional reform. Section four analyses the normative dilemmas that arise from mediating between peace and justice imperatives. Section five draws on comparative case studies to identify patterns of success and failure. Section six concludes with design principles for effective mediation in transitional contexts.

MAIN CORPUS

Post-conflict transitional justice

The cessation of armed hostilities does not, by itself, generate justice. In the aftermath of mass atrocities, civil war, or authoritarian repression, societies are confronted with a dual imperative: they must construct conditions for sustainable peace while simultaneously reckoning with the past. Transitional justice refers to the set of judicial and non-judicial processes and mechanisms through which societies respond to a legacy of large-scale past abuses (International Center for Transitional Justice 2009). Mediation intersects with each of these mechanisms, functioning as both a procedural enabler and a normative framework for managing competing claims over memory, responsibility, and redress.

Conceptual framework: understanding mediation and transitional justice

Mediation in international conflict resolution is typically understood as facilitated negotiation, a process in which a third party assists disputants to reach a mutually acceptable agreement without imposing a binding decision (Bercovitch and Jackson 2001). In post-conflict transitional contexts, however, mediation takes on additional dimensions. It is not only a conflict management tool but also a mechanism for reconstructing social norms, distributing symbolic and material redress, and producing authoritative accounts of the past.

Transitional justice, meanwhile, has evolved from a narrow preoccupation with criminal prosecution toward a more holistic conception encompassing restorative, reparative, and institutional dimensions (Roht-Arriaza and Mariezcurrena 2006). The four pillars identified in the report of the Secretary-General of 2004, namely prosecution, truth, reparations, and guarantees of non-recurrence, provide a useful taxonomy for assessing mediation’s contributions (United Nations 2004). Each pillar involves negotiation: over the scope of amnesty, the mandate of truth commissions, the form and quantum of reparations, and the pace and content of institutional reforms. Mediation provides structured process for these negotiations.

What is conspicuously absent from this otherwise rich body of work is sustained attention to mediation as a distinct object of analysis. The word mediation appears frequently in the transitional justice literature, but typically as shorthand for the broader category of third-party facilitation, without serious engagement with the theoretical frameworks, professional norms, or practical techniques that the mediation field has developed. Conversely, the mediation literature, with notable exceptions such as Bercovitch and Jackson (2001), Wallensteen (2015), and Cobb (2013), has engaged only sporadically with the distinctive features of post-conflict contexts: the legal obligations that constrain party autonomy, the asymmetric relationships between mediators and parties, the inclusion imperatives imposed by international norms, and the systemic challenge posed by the simultaneous pursuit of peace and accountability.

Pillars of transitional justice

Criminal accountability. One of the most contested areas in which mediation intersects with transitional justice concerns criminal accountability for atrocity crimes. The Rome Statute of 1998 obliges signatory states to prosecute or extradite those responsible for genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes, a framework that significantly constrains the room for mediators to offer blanket amnesties. Yet the practical dynamics of peace negotiations often create pressure to provide immunity incentives to powerful armed actors.

The Colombian peace process between 2012 and 2016, between the government and the FARC-EP guerrilla organisation, offers a paradigmatic illustration of how mediation can navigate this tension. Under the mediation of Cuba and Norway, the parties negotiated the Special Jurisdiction for Peace, a sui generis accountability mechanism that conditions reduced sentences on truth-telling and reparations (Uprimny 2017). It represents a mediated compromise that attempts to satisfy both the demands of international criminal law and the pragmatic imperatives of securing FARC participation in a settlement. Whether it succeeds in producing meaningful accountability remains contested, but it demonstrates the creative potential of mediation to generate innovative institutional forms.

Truth and memory. Truth commissions are perhaps the clearest institutional expression of mediation’s role in transitional justice. They function as structured spaces for the negotiated production of authoritative historical accounts, balancing individual testimony against institutional narrative, and personal suffering against collective memory. The South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, established in 1995 under the chairmanship of Archbishop Desmond Tutu, is widely regarded as the paradigmatic case. By offering amnesty conditional on full disclosure of politically motivated crimes, it mediated between the African National Congress’s preference for truth over trials and the apartheid security establishment’s demand for legal protection (Tutu 1999).

Hayner (2011) documents more than forty truth commissions established since 1974, finding that their effectiveness is significantly shaped by the degree of political independence they enjoy, the breadth of their investigative mandates, and their access to state archives. Mediation contributes to all three dimensions: in the design phase, mediators negotiate commission mandates with parties; during operation, commissioners themselves mediate between survivors, perpetrators, and the state; and in the follow-up phase, mediators may assist governments in implementing commission recommendations.

Reparations. Reparations, encompassing restitution, compensation, rehabilitation, satisfaction, and guarantees of non-repetition, require extensive negotiation over eligibility, form, quantum, and administration. Mediation facilitates these negotiations by creating structured dialogue between victim groups, who may have competing claims, perpetrator states or armed groups, who may deny liability, and international donors, whose financial contributions may be conditional on specific arrangements. The Inter-American Court of Human Rights has developed extensive jurisprudence on reparations that serves as a normative framework for such negotiations, though mediators must often translate these legal standards into politically viable compromises.

Sierra Leone’s experience with the Special Court and the Truth and Reconciliation Commission illustrates the challenges of mediating reparations in resource-poor contexts. Despite the court’s significant prosecutorial achievements, reparations for survivors remained woefully underfunded, partly because the parallel operation of two accountability mechanisms created confusion over institutional responsibilities and partly because the mediation of donor contributions did not adequately prioritise reparative dimensions (Schabas 2004). This case underscores the importance of integrated mediation that addresses accountability and reparations simultaneously rather than sequentially.

Institutional reform. Guarantees of non-recurrence, the fourth pillar of transitional justice, require the reform of institutions that enabled or perpetrated past abuses, including the military, police, judiciary, and civil service. Security sector reform and the disarmament, demobilisation, and reintegration of combatants are the most politically sensitive aspects of post-conflict institutional reform, and mediation plays a central role in facilitating them. Parties to a conflict have powerful incentives to resist institutional reform that diminishes their control over coercive resources, and international mediators must deploy a combination of incentives, guarantees, and procedural safeguards to overcome this resistance.

Rwanda’s post-genocide experience offers an instructive, if cautionary, case. The Gacaca community courts, a mediated hybrid of customary law and formal justice, processed more than 1.9 million cases between 2002 and 2012, providing both accountability and truth at a scale that the International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda could not achieve (Rettig 2008). However, critics argue that the courts, operating under a dominant government, provided insufficient protection for the rights of accused persons and were used instrumentally to consolidate political power rather than to produce genuine reconciliation. The lesson is that mediated institutional reforms must be insulated from political capture if they are to generate legitimate and durable outcomes.

Normative dilemmas: the peace and justice dilemma

The core normative tension in post-conflict transitional justice is the so-called peace and justice dilemma. This refers to the perceived incompatibility between the demands of peace negotiations, which may require offering amnesty or impunity to powerful actors in order to secure their participation in a settlement, and the demands of international criminal law, which obliges states to prosecute those responsible for crimes against humanity, genocide, and war crimes (Snyder and Vinjamuri 2003).

Scholars remain deeply divided on this question. Some argue that accountability is constitutive of peace, because impunity perpetuates cycles of violence (Sikkink 2011). Others maintain that premature prosecutions may destabilise fragile transitions by threatening actors whose cooperation is necessary for security sector reform and democratic consolidation (Huntington 1991). Mediation operates precisely at this fault line. A skilled mediator must manage the expectations of victims who demand justice, perpetrators who seek immunity, international actors who impose legal obligations, and domestic political elites who may prioritise stability over accountability. The quality of mediation in transitional settings is therefore measured not only by whether it produces a peace agreement but by whether that agreement adequately incorporates justice mechanisms that can survive the post-agreement period.

The result is a disciplinary gap that is not merely academic in its consequences: mediators operating in post-conflict settings routinely face dilemmas for which neither the transitional justice literature nor the mediation literature provides adequate guidance.

Amnesty and the limits of compromise

The granting of amnesty is the most divisive normative question in transitional justice mediation. International humanitarian law and customary international law impose obligations to prosecute the most serious international crimes, but peace negotiations frequently produce amnesty arrangements that shield perpetrators from accountability. The Lomé Peace Agreement of 1999, which mediated an end to Sierra Leone’s civil war, included a blanket amnesty for rebel forces including those responsible for systematic amputations, sexual violence, and the recruitment of child soldiers. The Special Representative of the United Nations signed the agreement but appended a reservation stating that the amnesty would not apply to crimes under international humanitarian law, a reservation that proved practically ineffective but normatively significant.

Inclusion and representation

Transitions negotiated exclusively between armed elites tend to produce settlements that reflect elite interests rather than the needs of affected populations, particularly women, minorities, and economically marginalised groups. The gendered dimensions of transitional justice and mediation have received growing scholarly attention. Women experience conflict in differentiated ways, including exposure to sexual violence and reproductive coercion, yet remain systematically underrepresented in formal peace negotiations. This exclusion shapes the design of post-conflict justice frameworks, often resulting in mechanisms that inadequately address gender-based harms and fail to incorporate gender-sensitive reparative approaches (O’Rourke 2013).

Design principles for effective mediation in transitional justice

Drawing on the foregoing analysis, several design principles emerge for mediators operating in post-conflict transitional contexts.

First, mediators could pursue integrated rather than sequential approaches to the pillars of transitional justice, ensuring that accountability, truth, reparations, and institutional reform are addressed in a coordinated and mutually reinforcing manner. Piecemeal approaches that deal with one pillar at a time risk producing agreements that optimise for one dimension at the expense of others.

Second, mediators could build inclusive processes from the outset, not as an afterthought. Women, youth, civil society organisations, and marginalised communities should be structurally incorporated into negotiating processes rather than consulted in parallel tracks that have limited influence over outcomes. This requires mediators to actively challenge the tendency of powerful parties to restrict participation to those with military capacity.

Third, mediators could engage proactively with international legal frameworks rather than treating them as external constraints. The obligations of international criminal law and international humanitarian law define the normative space within which mediation operates and provide important leverage over parties who might otherwise demand sweeping impunity. Mediators who understand this framework can use it creatively to design accountability mechanisms, such as the Colombian Special Jurisdiction for Peace, that satisfy both legal obligations and political imperatives.

Fourth, mediators could invest in capacity-building for post-agreement implementation. Many transitional justice processes fail not at the negotiation stage but at the implementation stage, when political will erodes, resources prove insufficient, or institutional capacity is inadequate. Mediators can contribute to implementation resilience by building monitoring mechanisms, securing multi-year international funding commitments, and establishing clear performance benchmarks against which progress can be assessed.

SUMMARY *

The article’s contribution is to identify a gap between two literatures and to show that the gap has practical consequences. Transitional justice scholarship treats mediation as an unexamined precondition of the mechanisms it studies; mediation scholarship treats the legal obligations that constrain transitional settlements as background. The practitioner who must design a truth commission mandate, negotiate the scope of an amnesty, or sequence security sector reform against prosecutions therefore works without guidance from either. The four cases assembled here identify the variable that distinguishes the more from the less successful, and it is not the ambition of the design but its insulation: the mechanism that survives is the one whose independence from the parties who created it was secured in the agreement rather than assumed afterwards.

CONCLUSION

Mediation in post-conflict transitional justice is an indispensable but deeply contested practice. It operates at the intersection of competing moral imperatives, peace and accountability, stability and justice, elite negotiation and popular participation, and must navigate these tensions without clear templates or guaranteed outcomes. The cases examined in this article demonstrate that mediation can generate innovative institutional forms capable of bridging these imperatives, as in the Colombian Special Jurisdiction for Peace or the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission, but also that poor design, elite capture, or inadequate international support can produce processes that reproduce impunity under the guise of transitional justice.

The design principles set out above offer a partial but grounded answer to the question of what conditions make mediation effective: integration across the four pillars of transitional justice, inclusive process design that reaches beyond armed elites, proactive engagement with international legal frameworks, and sustained investment in post-agreement implementation. These principles do not resolve every normative dilemma that mediators face, nor do they substitute for the political will that remains the precondition of any durable settlement. What they provide is a more precise specification of the variables, such as third-party conduct, process architecture, and institutional design.

In the many active and nascent transitional processes unfolding across the world today, in Myanmar, Ethiopia, Sudan, and Ukraine, mediation choices will shape whether millions of survivors receive acknowledgement, redress, and the assurance that the past will not be repeated. The stakes of getting those choices right are too high to leave the question unanswered.

POTENTIAL SOLUTION *

The article’s framing of the peace and justice dilemma is the point at which the field has moved furthest since the debate it describes, and reporting that movement strengthens the argument.

The empirical question has largely been settled against the position that prosecutions destabilise transitions. The comparative work, notably Sikkink’s and the large-N studies that followed, finds that states which pursued accountability did not experience worse subsequent outcomes and in several respects experienced better ones, with lower recurrence of repression and stronger rule of law. That does not dispose of the dilemma, because the difficulty is not whether prosecutions are compatible with peace in general but whether a particular armed actor will sign an agreement that exposes him personally to trial. The reframing that has proved useful in practice is therefore about sequencing rather than about choosing: nothing in the obligation to prosecute specifies when, and a settlement that defers prosecutions while preserving them, through suspended proceedings, extended limitation periods, or the conditionality the Colombian mechanism employs, satisfies the legal requirement without demanding the concession at the moment it cannot be given.

The article’s treatment of amnesty can be sharpened by the distinction that now governs. Blanket amnesty for international crimes is incompatible with the obligations the author cites and has been so held by regional courts, the Sierra Leonean Special Court among them. Conditional amnesty, granted individually on proof of full disclosure and subject to revocation, is a different instrument, and it is what the South African commission operated and what the Colombian jurisdiction elaborated. Whether the second satisfies the obligation to prosecute is genuinely contested; that it is not the same thing as the first is not.

Two additions on the practical proposals. The integration principle is right and the harder question is which pillar leads, since the sequence has consequences: reparations delivered early build the constituency that later sustains the other mechanisms, while prosecutions pursued first frequently exhaust the political capital available for anything else. And on inclusion, the evidence has become specific enough to be actionable: agreements with women’s substantive participation are significantly more likely to be implemented and to endure, and the mechanism identified is not representation as such but the broader range of issues that reach the table when the participants are not exclusively those who carried weapons.

Finally, one observation about the case the article treats as cautionary. The difficulty with the Gacaca courts was not that they were a hybrid, nor that they were community-based, but that they were established and supervised by one party to the conflict, and no procedural safeguard survives that. The transferable principle is the one the article states and could state more forcefully: what determines whether a transitional mechanism produces justice or its appearance is not its design but who controls it, and that question is settled in the agreement or it is not settled at all.

* Added by the WMO Editorial Team

REFERENCES

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Bercovitch, J., and R. Jackson (2001). Negotiation or Mediation? An Exploration of Factors Affecting the Choice of Conflict Management in International Conflict. Negotiation Journal, 17(1), 59 to 77.

Cobb, S. B. (2013). Speaking of Violence: The Politics and Poetics of Narrative in Conflict Resolution. Oxford University Press, New York.

Duthie, R. (2009). Building Trust and Capacity: Civil Society and Transitional Justice from a Development Perspective. International Center for Transitional Justice.

Hayner, P. B. (2011). Unspeakable Truths: Transitional Justice and the Challenge of Truth Commissions (2nd edition). Routledge, New York.

Huntington, S. P. (1991). The Third Wave: Democratization in the Late Twentieth Century. University of Oklahoma Press, Norman.

International Center for Transitional Justice (2009). What Is Transitional Justice?

Kritz, N. J. (Ed.) (1995). Transitional Justice: How Emerging Democracies Reckon with Former Regimes. United States Institute of Peace Press, Washington D.C.

O’Rourke, C. (2013). Gender Politics in Transitional Justice. Routledge, London.

Rettig, M. (2008). Gacaca: Truth, Justice, and Reconciliation in Postconflict Rwanda? African Studies Review, 51(3), 25 to 50.

Roht-Arriaza, N., and J. Mariezcurrena (Eds.) (2006). Transitional Justice in the Twenty-First Century: Beyond Truth versus Justice. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

Schabas, W. A. (2004). A Synergistic Relationship: The Sierra Leone Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the Special Court for Sierra Leone. Criminal Law Forum, 15, 3 to 54.

Sikkink, K. (2011). The Justice Cascade: How Human Rights Prosecutions Are Changing World Politics. W. W. Norton, New York.

Snyder, J., and L. Vinjamuri (2003). Trials and Errors: Principle and Pragmatism in Strategies of International Justice. International Security, 28(3), 5 to 44.

Tutu, D. (1999). No Future without Forgiveness. Doubleday, New York.

United Nations, Secretary-General (2004). The Rule of Law and Transitional Justice in Conflict and Post-Conflict Societies, S/2004/616.

Uprimny, R. (2017). Transitional Justice and Peace Processes in Colombia. In Beyond the Binary: Securing Peace and Promoting Justice after Conflict. Dejusticia, Bogotá.

Wallensteen, P. (2015). Understanding Conflict Resolution (4th edition). Sage, London.

Supplementary references added by the WMO Editorial Team

Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court, 1998, Preamble and Articles 17 and 53.

Final Agreement for Ending the Conflict and Building a Stable and Lasting Peace, Colombia, 24 November 2016, in particular the Comprehensive System for Truth, Justice, Reparation and Non-Repetition.

Promotion of National Unity and Reconciliation Act, No. 34 of 1995, South Africa.

Peace Agreement between the Government of Sierra Leone and the Revolutionary United Front, Lomé, 7 July 1999, and the Statute of the Special Court for Sierra Leone, 2002, Article 10.

Inter-American Court of Human Rights, Barrios Altos v. Peru, 2001, and Gelman v. Uruguay, 2011, on the incompatibility of blanket amnesties with the American Convention.

United Nations Commission on Human Rights (2005). Updated Set of Principles for the Protection and Promotion of Human Rights through Action to Combat Impunity, E/CN.4/2005/102/Add.1.

Olsen, T. D., Payne, L. A., & Reiter, A. G. (2010). Transitional Justice in Balance: Comparing Processes, Weighing Efficacy. United States Institute of Peace Press, Washington D.C.

Krause, J., Krause, W., & Bränfors, P. (2018). Women’s Participation in Peace Negotiations and the Durability of Peace. International Interactions, 44(6), 985 to 1016.

Can India Unilaterally Exit The Indus Water Treaty? A Legal Analysis Under The Vienna Convention.

How to cite this journal: Author, Date of the post, WMO Conflict Insight, Title of the post, ISSN: 2628 6998, https://worldmediation.org/journal/

EDITORIAL NOTE *

This article assesses the conduct of a state in a live bilateral dispute and reaches critical conclusions about it. The legal analysis and the attribution of responsibility reflect the author’s own perspective; this journal’s editorial position is neutral as between the states concerned. The article was written in 2025 and should be read with that date in mind.

ABSTRACT

This paper explores India’s recent actions to withdraw from certain treaty obligations and assesses whether such unilateral termination is legally permissible. The research finds that international humanitarian law prohibits the weaponization of water resources against civilian populations, highlighting the severe humanitarian consequences of disrupting water flows. Drawing on the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, the paper argues that the Treaty can only be terminated by mutual consent, and that unilateral withdrawal violates international law. It emphasises that material breach or impossibility do not justify exit unless they fundamentally disrupt the Treaty’s purpose, which remains intact. The paper draws comparisons between the Indus Waters Treaty and other international water treaties that include explicit exit clauses, in order to highlight its unique rigidity. Finally, it recommends diplomatic engagement through existing treaty mechanisms, third-party mediation, and treaty modernization to address current challenges, including security concerns and climate change.

KEYWORDS

Indus Waters Treaty, Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, unilateral withdrawal, treaty termination, humanitarian law, water resources, India-Pakistan relations, international dispute resolution, treaty modernization

INTRODUCTION

The Indus Waters Treaty has long been seen as something of a marvel; it is a bright spot in a region often marked by conflict. It was signed in 1960, with the World Bank acting as mediator, and it has survived wars, diplomatic breakdowns, and numerous tense standoffs (World Bank Group 2025b). But India’s recent moves, first requesting modification in 2023 (The Hindu 2023) and then suspending its commitments in 2025 (NDTV 2025), raise a thorny legal question: can a country simply step away from a bilateral treaty that has no exit clause and that requires mutual agreement before obligations may be suspended?

This paper takes a close look at whether India’s position falls within the bounds of customary international law, using the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties as a guide (United Nations 1969). Neither India nor Pakistan has formally acceded to this Convention, but its core principles, encompassing the idea that treaties must be kept in good faith, the manner in which treaty terms are interpreted, and the strict rules around ending or suspending treaties, offer the clearest lens through which this problem can be viewed.

Most literature on the Indus Waters Treaty tends to focus on the politics or on the detail of water sharing itself. But the legal question of whether a country can unilaterally exit a treaty that has no exit clause has yet to be explored. This paper asserts that while international law does allow for withdrawal or suspension in very exceptional situations, the threshold is high, and the reason for withdrawal should not deviate from the original intention of signing the treaty. Leaving the Treaty unilaterally risks stirring political turmoil and, more worryingly, sets a shaky precedent as to how seriously nations should treat their treaty promises.

MAIN CORPUS

Origins and structure of the Indus Waters Treaty

The Indus Waters Treaty was signed on 19 September 1960, following nine years of negotiation, and was mediated by the World Bank under the presidency of Eugene Black (World Bank n.d.). It was praised by many, including President Eisenhower, as a rare diplomatic achievement in a region otherwise entrenched in strife (World Bank Group 2025b).

Under Article III of the Treaty, India was assigned the Eastern Rivers, the Ravi, Beas and Sutlej, whereas Pakistan received the Western Rivers, the Indus, Jhelum and Chenab, although both nations were permitted restricted uses of each other’s rivers (Indus Waters Treaty 1960).

The Treaty includes a Permanent Indus Commission for day-to-day implementation; a three-tiered dispute resolution system, in which questions are addressed by the Commission, differences referred to a Neutral Expert, and disputes escalated to a Court of Arbitration; and a procedural role for the World Bank in the appointment of neutral authorities.

Despite this solid foundation, the Treaty lacks an exit clause or any provision for unilateral withdrawal or suspension by either party.

Evolving tensions between the two countries

India’s move to build hydropower projects on tributaries of the Western Rivers, such as Kishenganga and Ratle, added to existing friction (Permanent Court of Arbitration 2013). Pakistan argued that these projects did not meet the Treaty’s standards, and this sparked proceedings before a Neutral Expert and then a Court of Arbitration (Permanent Court of Arbitration 2013). In 2016 the World Bank paused both processes in order to allow for a diplomatic solution (World Bank 2016), and they resumed in 2022 (World Bank 2022).

Matters deteriorated after India submitted a notification in 2023 requesting that the Treaty be amended (The Hindu 2023). Following the Pahalgam attack, in which 26 people were killed, India announced in April 2025 that it would hold its treaty obligations in abeyance (NDTV 2025). This was the first occasion in almost sixty years on which such a step had been taken. India did not formally terminate the Treaty, but it ceased sending hydrological data and indicated that it would make increasing use of the Western Rivers (NDTV 2025). Pakistan described this as a violation of international law and, potentially, an act of war (Reuters 2025).

Humanitarian and socio-economic impacts

India’s suspension of its obligations under the Treaty has left less of a legal vacuum than a human one. The Indus, Jhelum and Chenab are crucial for Pakistan’s agriculture, since they provide the irrigation necessary for food production. Even minor alterations in their flow can cause substantial reductions in crop production.

India has tightened its control over the Chenab following the attack, which means that Pakistan’s main dams, Mangla and Tarbela, would receive less water (The Economic Times 2025). This has put the sowing season for kharif crops in Punjab and Sindh at risk, since these areas depend on these rivers for irrigation (The Economic Times 2025). More than 80 per cent of Pakistan’s farmland relies on the Indus river system, and any disruption to that system may significantly threaten food security, crop production, and rural livelihoods (Grip Invest 2025).

It is true that international law offers states room to navigate changing circumstances. There are doctrines that permit suspension or reinterpretation of treaty obligations, such as the doctrine of necessity, but only in rare and urgent moments where an essential interest must be protected, and only where doing so does not seriously impair the interests of other states (International Law Commission 2001, Art. 25). But law is not insulated from consequence. These are not choices made only in the rarefied air of diplomatic chambers. Their weight lands in darkened classrooms, in dry taps, in hospital wards running short of power.

The Treaty is a lifeline. If a state chooses to walk away from it, the conversation must extend beyond legality, and must confront the cost borne not by the two governments or their negotiators, but by those who had no say in the drafting and yet live within its flow every day.

Can there be unilateral termination under the Treaty?

One of the Treaty’s most pragmatic features is the tiered dispute resolution mechanism set out in Article IX (Ministry of External Affairs n.d.). It begins with the Permanent Indus Commission and, if needed, proceeds to a Neutral Expert or a Court of Arbitration (World Bank Group 2025). This structure is not merely theoretical; it has been tested. Disagreements over the Baglihar Dam and the Kishenganga project were settled within this framework (Salman 2008). In the Kishenganga case, India’s right to divert water was upheld by the Court of Arbitration in 2013, but only subject to conditions preserving Pakistan’s access (Permanent Court of Arbitration 2013).

Yet a more challenging question now arises: can a country step back from such a treaty unilaterally? Article XII(4) answers this clearly. The Treaty can be terminated only by a duly ratified treaty concluded between the two governments (Ministry of External Affairs n.d.). In other words, mutual consent is non-negotiable. The Vienna Convention, reflecting customary international law, echoes this view: parties are to be held to their obligations even when tempers run high (United Nations 1969, Arts. 26, 54 to 56).

Weaponizing water: a violation of international humanitarian law

The Geneva Conventions forbid the use of water supply as a weapon against civilians, and essential resources such as water therefore cannot be weaponized in response to violence. Cutting off or damming rivers that supply civilian populations raises grave humanitarian law issues. International humanitarian law explicitly forbids the starvation of civilians as a method of warfare, including by targeting essential water resources (ICRC 1949). Under Additional Protocol I of 1977 it is prohibited to attack, destroy, remove or render useless objects indispensable to the survival of the civilian population, such as drinking water installations and supplies, where this is done for the specific purpose of denying their sustenance value to the civilian population (ICRC 1977a). The same prohibition appears in Protocol II for non-international armed conflicts (ICRC 1977b). Any deliberate reduction of water flows intended to punish Pakistan’s civilian population would therefore engage this prohibition.

Unpacking the Vienna Convention: the high bar for treaty exit

To understand the legal standing of the Treaty, it is necessary to return to first principles, specifically to the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties, which provides the governing framework for how treaties are understood, interpreted, and, in rare cases, brought to an end (United Nations 1969).

The principle of pacta sunt servanda. Article 26 lays down the principle of pacta sunt servanda: every treaty in force must be performed in good faith. Good faith here is not a sentimental appeal; it is a legal obligation that anchors the stability of international relations (United Nations 1969, Art. 26). Article 31 then adds texture, requiring that a treaty be read holistically in the light of its text, context, object and purpose (United Nations 1969, Art. 31). For the Indus Waters Treaty that purpose is clear: a stable, long-term system of water sharing between two states that otherwise share little trust. This approach aligns with the principle that treaties must be interpreted in good faith, having regard to their text, context, and overarching objectives (Villiger 2009).

The Treaty can only be terminated by mutual agreement. If one asks under what circumstances such a treaty could be terminated, the Vienna framework offers answers but sets the bar deliberately high. Article 54 allows a treaty to be ended either in conformity with its own provisions or by consent of all the parties (United Nations 1969, Art. 54). Article XII(4) of the Treaty permits termination only through a new, mutually agreed treaty. In simpler terms, there is no lawful scope for one party to walk away unilaterally (Ministry of External Affairs n.d.). Article 56 allows withdrawal only where such an intention can be established from the nature of the treaty or was intended by the parties at the time of its conclusion (United Nations 1969, Art. 56). Since the Treaty contains a specific and binding provision governing its termination, Article 56 cannot be invoked as a route to unilateral exit. To do so would circumvent both the express language of the Treaty and the framework set by the Convention.

Material breach and the myth of impossibility. The temptation to argue material breach under Article 60 as a ground for exit must also be met with caution (United Nations 1969, Art. 60). A treaty may be suspended or terminated where the other party has fundamentally violated its core provisions. But the violation must be internal to the treaty itself. A tenuous link between a state and acts of terrorism, in the absence of clear and direct evidence, does not amount to a breach of the Indus Waters Treaty unless it can be shown to interfere directly with the Treaty’s implementation (Villiger 2009). The International Court of Justice in the Gabčíkovo-Nagymaros case made clear that even grave violations may justify countermeasures but not unilateral termination of a treaty; the obligation endures (International Court of Justice 1997, paras. 106 to 109). Likewise, Article 61 and its bar of permanent impossibility finds little application here: the rivers flow, the infrastructure stands, and the Treaty’s object remains intact (United Nations 1969, Art. 61). Even severe environmental change does not amount to the disappearance or destruction of an object indispensable for the execution of the treaty.

The doctrine of rebus sic stantibus. Article 62 addresses a fundamental change of circumstances (United Nations 1969, Art. 62). Such a change must be both unforeseen and must have radically transformed the extent of obligations still to be performed (Shekhawat and Shekhawat 2022). The threshold is exacting: not all change is fundamental, and not all fundamental change justifies exit. The International Court of Justice has been clear that Article 62 is not a loophole, rejecting Hungary’s claim of fundamental change of circumstances and holding that the provision must be interpreted restrictively (International Court of Justice 1997, paras. 104 to 114). Where a treaty contains no agreed terms for denunciation or withdrawal, it may be terminated only on the grounds set out in the Convention.

Article 62 is not a convenient exit route for states looking to escape inconvenient commitments. The provision sits within a broader architecture of customary international law built on the understanding that treaties are not ephemeral promises but the scaffolding of international order. To unravel one casually is to pull at threads that hold many others together. The law therefore demands more than mere dissatisfaction; it demands disruption so fundamental that the treaty in its original form simply cannot survive. That threshold, as the Court reminds us, is high, and deliberately so.

A comparative perspective: what other treaties teach us about exit

If the Indus Waters Treaty feels like a relic of a bygone diplomatic era, that is because in many ways it is. Negotiated in the late 1950s under the shadow of partition and Cold War realpolitik, it lacks the treaty architecture that many later agreements have incorporated, particularly with regard to exit, review, and recalibration (World Bank n.d.).

Under Article X of the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, exit is permitted where extraordinary events have jeopardised the supreme interests of a state party (United Nations Office for Disarmament Affairs n.d.). When North Korea invoked this clause in 2003, whatever the political controversy, the mechanism itself illustrates what a lawful withdrawal provision looks like.

Similarly, the Nile Basin Cooperative Framework Agreement of 2010, a multilateral arrangement over transboundary waters, includes clear provisions allowing any party to exit on notice (Nile Basin States 2010). The structure is orderly and the process transparent. There is room for disagreement, but also a route to disengagement.

By contrast, the Indus Waters Treaty contains no such clause (Ministry of External Affairs n.d.). It is silent on how it might end, and under Article 54 of the Vienna Convention that silence is meaningful (United Nations 1969, Art. 54). A treaty that does not provide for unilateral termination can be ended only by mutual consent or in accordance with its own terms. In this case Article XII(4) reinforces the point: the Treaty continues unless both India and Pakistan agree to amend or terminate it.

Turning to other bilateral water treaties, the Ganga Waters Treaty of 1996 between India and Bangladesh is finite, lasting thirty years, and contains built-in review mechanisms (Haque 2025). That period expires in 2026, and both countries are already preparing for renegotiation. By contrast the Indus Waters Treaty has no review period, no renegotiation clause, and no sunset provision. It is a permanent fixture, and permanence in international law means predictability but also rigidity.

Another example is the United States and Mexico Water Treaty of 1944. Like the Indus Waters Treaty it contains no withdrawal clause (United States and Mexico 1944). Yet despite numerous disputes over allocation from the Colorado River, both countries have relied heavily on their technical commission, using negotiation to update operational protocols through instruments known as Minutes (International Boundary and Water Commission 2023; United States Department of State 2017), and have avoided collapse. This shows that even treaties with no legal exit are not doomed to irrelevance; they endure through political will rather than through legal loopholes.

This establishes that under modern treaty law, no state can unilaterally withdraw from a bilateral water-sharing agreement such as the Indus Waters Treaty without breaching international law.

Recommendations and way forward

First and foremost, India and Pakistan should make the most of the tools already in place in the Treaty, especially the Permanent Indus Commission. The Commission was established to provide a direct line of communication between the two countries, giving them a forum in which to discuss and settle issues of water sharing, security, or data before they escalate. Both countries can ensure that problems are handled lawfully and peacefully by referring unresolved concerns to a Neutral Expert or to arbitration, as the Treaty provides (Climate Diplomacy n.d.). This approach helps maintain trust and lowers the chances of tension turning into conflict.

Re-engaging impartial third-party mediation is another route. The World Bank was crucial in negotiating the Treaty and has continued to play a role in the settlement of disputes (World Bank n.d.). It is an institution with a defined procedural function that can help facilitate dialogue (Gupta 2018). Bringing the World Bank or another respected international body back to the table could foster a more constructive environment in which technical and security concerns can be addressed together. Such mediation offers solutions that take account of the needs and concerns of both sides, promoting cooperation instead of confrontation.

Lastly, the Treaty needs to be reviewed and modified to meet the needs of the twenty-first century. The original agreement, signed more than sixty years ago, does not address current problems such as climate change, groundwater management, or water sharing in emergencies during floods and droughts. Both countries would benefit from working together on updated arrangements that take these issues into account. Viewing this process as a necessary and practical update rather than as a threat to the Treaty could help build trust between the two sides and ensure that the Treaty remains a strong foundation for peace and cooperation.

SUMMARY *

The article’s analytical contribution is to separate two questions that public debate has run together. Whether India has a grievance and whether India has a lawful route out of the Treaty are different matters, and the second is answered by the instrument itself: Article XII(4) provides for termination only by a subsequent ratified treaty, and the Vienna Convention’s grounds for exit, material breach, impossibility, and fundamental change, are each shown here to be unavailable on the facts, since the alleged breach lies outside the treaty relationship, the rivers continue to flow, and the object of the agreement is undisturbed. The comparative section then turns the finding around: the absence of an exit clause is treated by the author as a defect of an older drafting era, and the American and Mexican example is offered to show that such treaties survive through institutional practice rather than through legal escape routes.

CONCLUSION

The Indus Waters Treaty has endured decades of political upheaval, conflict, and prolonged diplomatic impasse between India and Pakistan (World Bank n.d.). This endurance is not merely coincidental; it is attributable to a legal structure capable of managing stress and channelling dialogue rather than discord. Legally, there is limited scope to justify a unilateral withdrawal. Article XII(4) stipulates that any termination must be agreed by both parties (Ministry of External Affairs n.d.).

The Vienna Convention supports this position, favouring stability and continuity over unforeseen withdrawal (United Nations 1969). The law generally favours the preservation of agreements over their dissolution, even in the presence of significant grievance, and it maintains stability rather than permitting abrupt change, particularly amid political upheaval (Villiger 2009). States cannot withdraw from agreements solely because of unrelated disputes, even where those disputes concern critical security matters (United Nations 1969, Arts. 56 to 62).

However, it would be imprudent to assume that the arrangement is without flaws. Significant changes have occurred since 1960, encompassing the environment, water usage, and international relations (Nahar 2025). Where change is necessary, it must also adhere to the law. This may entail modifying the responsibilities of the Permanent Indus Commission or examining technical regulations for addressing climate-related risks (Eco-Business 2023). This would not undermine the agreement; it would enhance its usefulness and responsiveness.

The Treaty transcends mere water management. It is a legal framework predicated on the notion that even adversarial nations can reach consensus on matters vital to their survival. That conviction remains valid, but it should not be upheld by disregarding the Treaty. Rather, the parties should work within it in order to adjust to new circumstances.

POTENTIAL SOLUTION *

The legal analysis is sound and one distinction would sharpen it considerably, because it is the distinction on which the Indian position actually rests.

India has not purported to terminate the Treaty. It has declared it to be held in abeyance, a term that appears nowhere in the Treaty and nowhere in the Vienna Convention, and this is deliberate. Termination and suspension are governed by Articles 54 to 62 and are unavailable here for the reasons the author gives. Abeyance is a claim of a different kind: that performance is withheld pending a response to a grievance, which in legal terms is closer to a countermeasure under the law of state responsibility than to any doctrine of treaty law. That framing matters because countermeasures have their own conditions, which are exacting and which the article’s own materials establish are not met here: they must respond to an internationally wrongful act by the target state, be proportionate, be reversible, be directed at inducing compliance rather than at punishment, and must not derogate from obligations for the protection of fundamental human rights or from obligations of a humanitarian character. Water supply to a civilian population engages the last of these directly.

The second point is practical and cuts against the alarm in much commentary. India cannot presently do what the suspension threatens. Storing or diverting the Western Rivers at scale would require reservoir capacity and diversion infrastructure that does not exist, and building it would take a decade or more and would be technically difficult in the terrain concerned. What suspension does achieve immediately is the withholding of hydrological data, and that has consequences of its own: flood warning in the Pakistani basin depends on it, which means the measure’s first effect falls on civilian safety rather than on any government. Naming this precisely is more useful than the general warning about weaponisation, because it identifies a specific harm with a specific and cheap remedy, namely the resumption of data sharing, which no security argument requires withholding.

Two additions on the way forward. The dispute over Kishenganga and Ratle was, before the suspension, in an unusual procedural posture, with a Neutral Expert and a Court of Arbitration seized of overlapping questions at the same time, a situation the Treaty’s drafters did not anticipate and which has fuelled Indian complaints that the mechanism no longer works as intended. That complaint is not frivolous, and a settlement of the procedural question would remove one of the stated reasons for the notification of 2023. And the modernisation the article recommends has an obvious model in the instrument it cites: the Minutes procedure under the treaty of 1944 allows two states to update operational arrangements without reopening the treaty, through a standing technical commission with authority to agree binding supplements. The Permanent Indus Commission could be given a comparable mandate, and that reform requires no amendment to the substantive allocation on which neither party will move.

Finally, a word about what this journal takes from the case. The Treaty has held for sixty-five years across three wars because it removed a category of dispute from politics and placed it in the hands of engineers who met twice a year regardless of what else was happening. Its rigidity, which the author identifies as a defect, is also the reason it survived, since a treaty with an exit clause offers a route that a government under domestic pressure will eventually be urged to take. The lesson for those designing agreements between hostile parties is uncomfortable and worth stating: the provisions that make an agreement easy to leave make it easier to abandon, and the provisions that make it durable are the ones that will be resented.

* Added by the WMO Editorial Team

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Supplementary references added by the WMO Editorial Team

Articles on Responsibility of States for Internationally Wrongful Acts, International Law Commission, 2001, Articles 22 and 49 to 54 on countermeasures, and Article 50(1)(b) and (c) on obligations not affected by countermeasures.

Convention on the Law of the Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses, 1997, Articles 5 to 7 on equitable utilisation and the obligation not to cause significant harm.

Convention on the Protection and Use of Transboundary Watercourses and International Lakes, Helsinki, 1992, as amended to permit global accession.

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Wolf, A. T. (2007). Shared Waters: Conflict and Cooperation. Annual Review of Environment and Resources, 32, 241 to 269.

Zawahri, N. A. (2009). India, Pakistan and Cooperation along the Indus River System. Water Policy, 11(1), 1 to 20.

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Building a Transborder Social Identity within BRICS+ and a Fragmented Multilateral World

How to cite this journal: Author, Date of the post, WMO Conflict Insight, Title of the post, ISSN: 2628 6998, https://worldmediation.org/journal/

ABSTRACT

This editorial discusses the ongoing difficulties and future challenges that BRICS nations face on their way to a meaningful political impact and supplementary relevance on a global level. More often than not, stakeholders and decision-makers ignore crucial and fundamental necessities that societies require in order to enable and initiate a sustainable and lasting process of growth. Potentially, politicians in charge may be aware of the importance of such anthropological pieces of the puzzle and should accordingly put them on their agenda. Reality seems to prove that the general focus is widely placed on targeting and canvassing short-term financial turnovers and outcomes related to the balancing or unbalancing of global impact only. Forecasting the failure of such progress, this text offers a more convenient strategy for finding one’s position within the global community, based on mutual respect, shared responsibility, and a holistic approach to peacebuilding.

KEYWORDS

Social identity, global alliance, political divergence, multilateral fragmentation, global stability, sustainable world order, holistic peacebuilding

INTRODUCTION

Starting off our journey, I would like to create a common ground of understanding by having a brief look at the status quo of the BRICS community in the year 2025. Being initially a group of interest, the geopolitical relevance of Brazil, Russia, India, and China was discussed by the Goldman Sachs researcher Jim O’Neill in 2001 (O’Neill 2001), thereby introducing the term and the notion of the BRIC states (Mostafa 2013). It makes sense to mention that South Africa was accepted as the first additional member in 2010 (Harrison 2018). South Africa thereby formed the fifth member of the alliance, occasioned the name change to the common term BRICS, and complemented the group in a meaningful geopolitical way (Erdmann 2024b).

By reviewing the economic history of the group’s members, we can see that all these states underwent crucial economic changes and faced challenging financial situations in the late twentieth century (EFSAS 2023). Awareness of the members’ natural resources, the increasing level of global consumption, the improvement of pricing strategies, and the expanding interlinkage of world trade later established overall economic stability (EFSAS 2023) within these states. Nowadays this group finds itself in an economically comfortable situation (Erdmann 2024a), controlling a meaningful quantity of the world’s natural resources and holding a key role in global trade (Iqbal 2021).

Being still a purely economically oriented alliance, the group could not be more diverse in a multitude of aspects. Potentially this, and the complexity of the alliance in itself, is one reason why it took the group 24 years to grow from the initial four states to a more significant number of members (Glogowski 2024). Even though the number of states interested in partnering with BRICS extends this number by far, we may still find a lack of a focused and determined agenda explaining what BRICS actually stands for. The currently available communiqués look like lists of interests stated by the broad quantity of members and partners, while every country intends to get its individual points onto the paper. In particular, the vague formulation of an agenda bears many uncertain aspects that can turn out to be uncomfortable for countries finding themselves in this specific economic alliance. While being part of BRICS, many of these members strengthen their independence and stability by trading with potential opponents of the group (Erdmann 2024b). This inconsistency and contradiction give birth to an inner instability that prevents BRICS from building the solid and impactful global force that it might be looking for, namely an entity that strongly leads or manages the world economy and world politics at the same time, based on its all-embracing network and its holdings of fundamental natural resources.

MAIN CORPUS

A hyper-diverse global alliance called BRICS

The subject of our analysis often presents itself as a fast-growing economic unity that stands up in order to challenge the potentially existing Western financial and trade order, and to reorganise it towards a much-needed balance, or towards leading it into the opposite extreme. Even though such a balancing and unbalancing process, depending on one’s perspective, takes place continuously, we are now having a look at the uniqueness of the M.U.M. model (Erdmann 2024b). This model describes the ongoing shift between multipolarism and unipolarism and back again, as it presents itself at the beginning of this millennium. In my previous article on the dynamics of polarized pluralism, I already explained and outlined the nature of this phenomenon, while the present text extends the previous dynamics in global reach and impact.

Being aware of the picture that potentially underlies a specific strategic plan, and that is therefore projected towards the public, we also want to paint a picture based on our own research and our own understanding of this situation, which is highly interlinked with the world community. Basically, we are talking about a global alliance that stretches over four continents, currently counts nine full member countries, and has recently accepted thirteen partner countries (Norton 2024). In order to identify even more complexity, we need to say that its members are spread over four continents, while economic partnership with selected members of BRICS spans all five.

The fact that BRICS finds itself completely decentralised often turns out to be an impactful selling point, while it could also materialise as the weakest point in the portfolio. Sharing a mutual interest in common economic growth, the alliance includes a broad quantity of languages, cultures, political systems, and diverse trade partners, and above all a wide range of economic competencies and capabilities (Solomon 2022) among its members, although this last point may not apply to all partners, as many of them suffer considerable economic instability. This level of diversity turns the alliance into a highly heterogeneous group (BpB 2023), and perhaps into the most diverse group that has ever existed in modern history on a global scale. The ongoing strategic expansion of BRICS forms part of the alliance’s goal of raising its economic power and its global relevance based on natural resources (Tseen Fu 2024). A closer but unreflected view may suggest that the goal of the alliance is simply to create a trade network of producers and consumers excluding what may be labelled as Western countries. A protracted exclusion from the so-called Western world order makes members of the alliance strike back by continuously admitting new members, propagating inclusiveness (Tseen Fu 2024), and increasing the level of country-based diversity to a more extensive and questionable degree.

My article on BRICS and the art of growing from within already discussed the extraordinary challenge for a transcontinental and inter-political alliance to grow in a sound and sustainable way (Erdmann 2024a), especially when potentially authoritarian regimes and opposing economic relations are compressed into one group. Nonetheless, besides already being extraordinarily diverse, BRICS continues to extend the number of its members and partners and thereby raises the level of internal complexity. A brief look at some of the core members of BRICS, namely China and India, shows how two almost historic rivals find themselves placed in one alliance while remaining highly competitive opponents on a multitude of levels. Interestingly enough, Russia takes over the role of a mediator in order to bring such members closer together (Baunov 2024). Four of the recently admitted members are likewise involved in complex disputes. Saudi Arabia and Iran are engaged in a long-term dispute over regional predominance and political integrity (Desta 2011), while Egypt and Ethiopia find themselves in an ongoing contention over natural resources, namely the dispute over the waters of the Nile (BpB 2023).

A baseless iceberg?

Considering the ambitious growth and the overall target of BRICS, namely to be the rebalancing tool in world economics, we may wonder where this vision and motivation actually come from. The worldwide economic playing field offers a multitude of alliances for countries to join, to participate in actively, and through which to create lasting benefits. Forming part of the G20 and BRICS at the same time is such an ambivalent example that it raises many questions. All founding members of BRICS, including South Africa, are members of the G20, while they identified the need not only to join a more Western-run alliance but also to be part of an opposing one that challenges the economic stability of several member states of the former. Such a contradiction does not support one’s credibility in having a clear vision, but more likely creates uncertainty on a global scale, a feature that mankind currently does not need at all, and potentially turns out to be a very poor political strategy that supports fragmentation instead of unification.

The more we examine the peak of the iceberg, namely the image of BRICS that is communicated to the broad public, the more complex and confusing the setting of this potential alliance becomes. Step by step, we may discover what looks like a bottomless construct that is lost in its own complexity. You may see that I even challenge the term alliance as such, which traditionally identifies a group of countries or parties that share one common goal or interest (Cambridge 2025). The previously mentioned communiqués and the global economic interlinkages of the group’s members suggest interests pointing in all possible political directions, while some look for economic growth, others target financial stability, still others try to enrich their global network, and finally some aim to appear as challenging as possible towards potential Western opponents (Baunov 2024). This seems to be the new identity of a Russian-led BRICS, namely a focus on the number of members and potentially less on the realistic, productive impact that new partners may provide. Adding new members to BRICS while continuing to fight in Ukraine may also serve as a wider legitimation for the Russian leadership to proceed in this political direction.

Nobody can deny that joining BRICS as a member or partner in these times serves as a political message towards the global community. Such countries should be well aware of the meaning of this symbolic act, namely that they support what BRICS members commonly stand for. Here, a potentially anti-Western perspective (Baunov 2024) may serve as a common point of interest, while most members remain involved in trading with a multitude of Western countries. Generally, we can observe that joining a group incorporates or requires two fundamental points, namely that each member supports the overall group target and supports what individual peer members stand for. This simple fact perfectly underlines the level of contradiction in which BRICS finds itself, especially with reference to dual memberships in alliances that are for and against the Western order. Whether it be the potentially anti-Western course, the unclear overall target of BRICS, or the Russian prominence in constantly inviting new members (Baunov 2024), this uncertainty does not attract everyone. It is worth noting that Argentina declined to join and that the position of Saudi Arabia remains unclear, as no official confirmation of accession can be identified (Baunov 2024). The fact that Russia, on the basis of its activism, placed itself in a leading position within BRICS made the character of the group change from an initially cooperative alliance targeting mutual development into something closer to an instrument of unpredictable anti-Western messaging, losing itself in the baseless complexity of a self-focused worldview and partial global interests.

Even though such a global partnership has the potential to float solidly like an iceberg, its opacity beneath the surface extends to such a degree that its baselessness starts creating downforce instead of supporting the whole superstructure. The fundamental question may be what measures need to be taken to turn the currently existing construct into a globally responsible, well-respected alliance that supports peace, mutual respect, and socio-economic growth, if this is the goal at all.

Ordo ab chao

Considering that BRICS is currently more a rag rug of nations longing for sustainable economic growth and wealth management, we may commonly agree that there is no access to wealth without prior management. Such management needs to initiate or create the path towards wealth that may be taken by all members, partners, and applicants in the same way. In order to begin building such a path, we need to understand how to build a supportive order that enables the individual, whether a single person or a nation, to understand how it defines itself and where this conceptual structure comes from.

Here we need to face one specific reality, namely that the level of diversity that BRICS covers surpasses that of existing regional or continental alliances and unions by far. In this way BRICS may not be compared, on the basis of its complexity of cultures, languages, religions, and economic necessities, to any other existing union, such as the European Union, the African Union, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, or the Union of South American Nations. Currently we do not see indications supporting the understanding that BRICS needs to grow from within (Erdmann 2024a) in order to become sound, to grow in a sustainable way, and to build a lasting global value for mankind. In the meantime, the focus may be placed on growing by number, on the basis that more and more members and partners are accepted, promising them credibility and legitimacy (Adams 2023).

Having such widespread diversity as a foundation, we may understand that what is needed is a common creed or a transborder identity that reconciles differences and harmonises diversity in an all-embracing way. The term identity offers us a very complex nature and a rich scale of interpretations. As soon as consciousness is sharpened and the individual realises their own existence, the quest for an identity is born. Identity is a multilayered word that is of importance on an individual level, a group level, a regional level, a national level, a continental level, and that may reach its climax on a global level, including ethnicities, languages, creeds, and cultures. Even though we may identify a multitude of different sorts of identity, they all seem to have one common denominator, namely the quest for a harmonic and organised aspect.

Accordingly, we may imagine that it is a very tricky project to create or build a truly transborder identity, since what is needed is something that people can believe in, that connects them, and that motivates them to start speaking of themselves as a sound community. What we are looking for is the still missing central piece of the puzzle that completes the artwork and that gives a higher meaning to angles, visions, and perspectives. This piece could turn chaos into order and provide BRICS with the opportunity to stop being a potentially unpredictable challenger to the existing global construct. BRICS could leave this image behind and start growing solidly within itself and within the global community, in order to become a cornerstone for global balance, peace, and harmony. This missing link, or transborder identity, can only be identified and developed by the community of BRICS itself (Yzerbyt 1997), and starts with the discernment that only merged pieces complete the picture, or that all countries are needed to build a lasting global community.

SUMMARY

The argument advanced here moves from a diagnosis to a proposal that is deliberately larger than its subject. The diagnosis is that BRICS has grown by addition rather than from within, that its members hold interests which point in incompatible directions, and that an association defined chiefly by what it is not cannot supply the coherence that its stated ambitions require. The proposal is that what such a grouping lacks is not a better communiqué but a shared identity, and that identity cannot be manufactured from above because it forms among people rather than between governments. The final turn is the one that distinguishes this text from a policy assessment: if the difficulty is that alliances define themselves by exclusion, then the remedy cannot be a better alliance, and the author accordingly declines to offer BRICS a strategy and offers instead the observation that the only membership large enough to solve the problem is one that no one has to be admitted to.

CONCLUSION

In order to be able to build a transborder identity that truly combines a highly diverse membership, we need to understand the uniqueness of the common goal and the specific challenges of the setting in question. Traditionally a group identifies itself as such on the basis of a common language, dialect, culture, history, or tradition (Akuche 2016). Obviously, not all members of the wider BRICS circle are different, but they are potentially diverse. Some of them share languages but not dialects; others share religions but not their traditions within them. Here we can clearly see that diversity is not the same as fragmentation, which is more likely the counterpart of unity. Having stated at the beginning that the high level of diversity among the nations involved may be the weak spot of BRICS, we find ourselves at the point of turning a fragile ornament into the truss of a superstructure. This means that if it proves possible to build an identity among BRICS members, it should also be realistic to build an even stronger one, namely the identity of a global community, incorporating those previously mentioned.

We may have learned so far that building a transborder identity is an extensive task, especially as setting a foundation of common understanding begins with each person and targets the overall conformity of the sum of diverse individuals wishing to label themselves as members of the group. Here we may challenge the traditional concepts of strategic economic growth, and the methods accordingly based on building inclusive and exclusive alliances such as the G20, the G7, BRICS, and NATO. The question that we need to analyse for ourselves is whether such an exclusive mindset still meets the necessities of today’s global and multilateral world.

My reflection and analysis reveal to me that exclusive behaviour often turns out to be a strong indication of an advanced level of fear of loss or disadvantage. On the basis of our general global connectivity, referring to individuals, companies, organisations, and countries, I strongly doubt that building, separating, and fragmenting economic borders supports global growth. Accordingly, such labelling supports exclusiveness, which in itself is often a door opener for fragmentation and extremism (Erdmann 2024c). What mankind potentially needs in a time of economic and social insecurity is a common creed that binds all humans together at the bottom of their hearts, a creed that is so fundamental that it touches and supports basic human necessities, namely stability, peace, and harmony. If we do not build harmony at the grassroots level of the individual and their family, we have no space in which to develop a sound identity that surpasses borders and embraces the wealth of mankind.

You may already sense where this will possibly take us. BRICS, but more likely mankind itself, needs to create the consciousness of a global community, and more specifically the awareness that exclusiveness and fragmentation do not support real stability and global growth in the long term. In order to initiate such a process we need politicians who act like responsible adults and who understand that owning the biggest piece of the cake does not automatically grant satisfaction. On the basis of what has been written so far, we may all imagine a world without the trade associations and unions mentioned above, and we may envision that what we more likely need is a common level of true responsibility towards the planet Earth and towards mankind, far beyond self-centred and ignorant behaviour that rests on and reproduces chaotic circumstances in the human mindset and on the surface that we walk on.

Therefore BRICS, and again mankind in general, needs an agenda that clearly communicates, in a reasonable and realistic way, shared values that offer tranquillity on a global level and enable mankind to develop a common identity, not as individuals but as a global community. It is crucial here to emphasise the importance of a name, and not to place an excluding name in the front row, such as BRICS, the G20, or the G7. Now it is humankind that counts first, it is humankind that needs to turn into a global community of mutual respect and responsibility, it is humankind that needs to connect and grow from within, and it is humankind that does not need a name in order to differ, because it already has a name that binds all of us together, namely citizens of the world.

POTENTIAL SOLUTION *

The central claim here, that an association without a shared identity cannot become more than the sum of its transactions, is well made and can be tested against what the group has actually built, which strengthens the argument in one direction and qualifies it in another.

The qualification first. Some of what BRICS has produced does not depend on shared identity at all. The New Development Bank lends, the contingent reserve arrangement exists, and the arrangements for settlement in national currencies have expanded, in each case because the members had a convergent interest in reducing dependence on a single financial system rather than because they agreed about anything else. This is the pattern the functionalist literature describes: cooperation in narrow technical domains proceeds among parties who share nothing else, and it sometimes generates the trust that broader cooperation requires. Judged as a coalition of convenience with limited objectives, the record is more substantial than the framing of an incoherent alliance suggests.

The support comes at the point where the ambition exceeds that. A common currency, a coordinated political position, or collective action against a third party each require members to accept costs for the group, and that is precisely what identity supplies and what interest alone does not. The author’s diagnosis therefore holds for everything BRICS says it wants to become, and the internal disputes he lists, between two members over a border, between two over regional primacy, and between two over a river, are the concrete form of the difficulty.

Two additions belong here. The observation that members trade extensively with those the group defines itself against is accurate and it points somewhere the text does not go: it is evidence that the anti-Western framing is a rhetorical register rather than an operating principle, and the states concerned have been explicit that they seek additional options rather than an alternative bloc. Read that way, the incoherence the author identifies is less a failure of the alliance than an accurate representation of what its members want, which is not to choose. And the difficulty of building identity in a heterogeneous grouping has been studied in the case the text sets aside as incomparable: the European experience suggests that shared identity followed decades of functional integration rather than preceding it, that it remains contested, and that the institutions which produced it were courts, parliaments, exchange programmes and a common market rather than declarations.

Finally, the closing turn deserves to be taken as seriously as it is meant. The argument that exclusive groupings reproduce the fragmentation they are formed to protect against is the same argument this journal makes about identity at every other scale, and its consistency is the point. It also carries the difficulty that every universalist proposal carries: an identity that excludes no one motivates no one, and the practical work therefore lies not in replacing particular loyalties but in nesting them, so that a person can be a citizen of a place and of the world without the first requiring the second to be false. That is the dual identity finding from the intergroup literature, and it is the mechanism by which the aspiration in the final paragraph could become something other than an aspiration.

*Added by the WMO Editorial Team

REFERENCES

Adams, Mubarak (2023) BRICS and the New World Order: Implications for the Existing World Order. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/371804604_BRICS_AND_THE_NEW_WORLD_ORDER_IMPLICATIONS_FOR_THE_EXISTING_WORLD_ORDER

Akuche, Andre Ben Moses (2016) Nation Building and the Impediments of Building the Nigerian Nation. https://www.academia.edu/31350929/Nation_Building_and_the_Impediments_of_Building_the_Nigerian_Nation

Baunov, Alexander (2024) New Identity of BRICS. Carnegie Endowment. https://carnegieendowment.org/russia-eurasia/politika/2024/10/brics-russia-global-power-opposition?lang=en

Bundeszentrale für politische Bildung (2023) Erweiterung der BRICS Gruppe. https://www.bpb.de/kurz-knapp/hintergrund-aktuell/540816/erweiterung-der-brics-gruppe/

Cambridge Dictionary (2025) Alliance. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/de/worterbuch/englisch/alliance

Desta, Teddy (2011) The Iran Saudi Arabia Power Struggle. https://www.academia.edu/42105879/The_Iran_Saudi_Arabia_Power_Struggle

EFSAS (2023) The BRICS: Origins, Evolution and 2023 Expansion. https://www.efsas.org/publications/study-papers/the-brics-origins-evolution-and-expansion/

Erdmann, Daniel (2024a) BRICS: Minus x Minus = Plus? About the Art and Challenges of Growing from Within. WMO Conflict Insight. ISSN 2628 6998. https://worldmediation.org/brics-minus-x-minus-plus-about-the-art-and-challenges-of-growing-from-within/

Erdmann, Daniel (2024b) The Dynamics of Polarized Pluralism: On the Benefits, Challenges, and Threats of a Constantly Changing Fragmented World Order. WMO Conflict Insight. ISSN 2628 6998. https://worldmediation.org/the-dynamics-of-polarized-pluralism-on-the-benefits-challenges-and-threats-of-a-constantly-changing-fragmented-world-order/

Erdmann, Daniel (2024c) Personal Identity and Peacebuilding: A Critical Reflection. WMO Conflict Insight. ISSN 2628 6998. https://worldmediation.org/personal-identity-and-peace-building/

Glogowski, Aleksander (2024) India, Pakistan and BRICS after the 2024 Kazan Summit. https://www.academia.edu/125302884/India_Pakistan_and_BRICS_after_the_2024_Kazan_summit

Harrison, Philip (2018) South Africa in the BRICS. https://www.academia.edu/116590774/South_Africa_in_the_BRICS

Iqbal, Badar Alam (2021) BRICS as a Driver of Global Economic Growth and Development. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/09749101211067096

Mostafa, Mahmood (2013) The Rise of the BRICS and Their Challenge to the G7. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/271724885_The_rise_of_the_BRICS_and_their_challenge_to_the_G7

Norton, Ben (2024) BRICS Keeps Growing in a Multipolar World. https://geopoliticaleconomy.com/2024/10/26/brics-13-partner-countries-summit-kazan-russia/

O’Neill, Jim (2001) Building Better Global Economic BRICs. Goldman Sachs. https://www.goldmansachs.com/insights/goldman-sachs-research/building-better

Solomon, Mussie (2022) BRICS Plus and Its Major Impacts on Poor Members. https://www.academia.edu/124839172/BRICS_and_its_Major_Impacts_on_Poor_Members

Tseen Fu, Brice Lee (2024) Legitimacy through Diversity: China’s Leadership in the BRICS Plus Expansion for Global Balance. https://www.academia.edu/122725632/Legitimacy_through_Diversity_Chinas_Leadership_in_the_BRICS_Expansion_for_Global_Balance

Yzerbyt, Vincent (1997) Building a European Identity. https://www.academia.edu/84255502/Building_a_European_identity

Further reading added by the WMO Editorial Team

Agreement on the New Development Bank, Fortaleza, 15 July 2014, and the Treaty for the Establishment of a BRICS Contingent Reserve Arrangement, 2014.

Kazan Declaration of the XVI BRICS Summit, 23 October 2024.

Haas, E. B. (1958). The Uniting of Europe: Political, Social and Economic Forces 1950 to 1957. Stanford University Press, Stanford.

Acharya, A. (2018). Constructing Global Order: Agency and Change in World Politics. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

Stuenkel, O. (2020). The BRICS and the Future of Global Order (2nd edition). Lexington Books, Lanham.

Gaertner, S. L., & Dovidio, J. F. (2000). Reducing Intergroup Bias: The Common Ingroup Identity Model. Psychology Press, Philadelphia.

Risse, T. (2010). A Community of Europeans? Transnational Identities and Public Spheres. Cornell University Press, Ithaca.

Mother Nature Is A Battleground: Patterns In Conflict Over Natural Resources

The role of natural resources in driving international conflict has been a consistent feature of human history, influencing economic stability, political power, and global security. This paper examines a series of case studies involving a range of resource-related conflicts, highlighting the drivers and variables involved in disputes over various types of resources to examine conflict patterns over resource security and distribution. From disputes over the Mekong River and South China Sea, to Venezuela’s claims over Guyanese territory and oil, and exploitation of peoples and nations of the global south, these cases underscore how resources transcend national boundaries, intertwining economic necessity with geopolitical strategies. The analysis also explores the dual role of mediation, showing how cooperative frameworks like the Mekong River Commission and the Suez Canal agreement have successfully mitigated tensions, while other attempts, constrained by power imbalances or unilateral actions, have fallen short. Through these examples, the paper illustrates that the success of mediation depends on balancing incentives, addressing structural inequalities, and fostering mutual assurance among stakeholders. In most cases, protectionist policies and geopolitical rivalries overshadow altruistic cooperation, reinforcing polarization and deepening global divides. Yet, when evenly matched parties engage in dialogue, there remains potential for equitable resolutions that prioritize sustainability and shared prosperity. The findings emphasize that resolving resource-driven conflicts requires diplomatic innovation and a commitment to addressing the underlying power dynamics that shape access and control.

Keywords: Natural Resources, Trade Policy, Exploitation, Climate Change, War, Diplomacy, Water, Oil, Agriculture, China, Venezuela, Egypt, Congo, Taiwan.

Introduction: Why Fight?

Natural resources have historically been a catalyst for many international conflicts, as states compete for access to vital materials such as water, minerals, oil, and agricultural goods. The control over these resources can directly influence a nation’s economic stability, security, and political influence, making them critical drivers of both cooperation and conflict. Resources like rivers, oil, and fisheries, which often transcend borders, are particularly contentious as they are vital for sustaining economies and populations. Since the dawn of civilization, natural resources have been weaponized in conflict, such as the poisoning of wells, burning of crops, or salting the earth. This reflects how even our earliest societies understood the value of natural resources and their impact of the sustainability and strength of a nation. The same is true to this day, though now resource wars are fought not just on the battlefield (though that still remains ever present) but also fought diplomatically and politically, ever changing as power dynamic shift and aliances bend, every nation looking out for their own interest over others, as resources insecurity seemingly approaches from all directions. Imbalances in resources remain central to war aims, as nations must weigh the cost and benefit to gaining control over, access to, and loss of resources as tools of leverage over both advisories and allies alike. When these resources are scarce or unequally distributed, tensions can rise between neighboring states, leading to disputes that often require mediation to prevent an escalation to violence. Here, we will explore specific cases of conflict over different types of natural resources, what those resources mean to the nations involved, the domestic and international dynamics at play, and how mediation has succeeded or failed to resolve disputes. Success in mediation is frequently tied to the willingness of states to share and compromise, which is too often tied to power imbalances.

Conflict Over Rivers: The Case of the Mekong

Rivers fill many roles, both culturally, economically, and politically. They are often the crux of communities, where major settlements and cities grow around a major source of fresh drinking water. These waters often serve as cultural resources as well, where communities gather for events and hold historical and religious significance to the communities they sustain. Of course, rivers are major sources of food for many and act as crucial trade routes, sustaining economies on both local and regional scales. They often serve as borders as well, both internally to a nation and broader international divides, due to the naturally defensible barrier rivers create militarily. This underscores just how multi-faceted and vital rivers can be to a nation. The Mekong River is one of the largest rivers in the world and a crucial water source for several Southeast Asian countries, including China, Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam; it also serves as a natural border between many of these nations. The river provides essential water for agriculture, fishing, and electricity through the use of hydroelectric dams, supporting hundreds of millions of people across the region. However, conflicts have arisen due to China’s construction of dams along the upper reaches of the Mekong, which have disrupted water flow and harmed the agricultural and fishing sectors of its southeast neighbors (Eyler 2020). China’s control over the river’s headwaters has given it significant influence over the river’s flow, heightening tensions with countries reliant on the river for survival.

Mediation has been attempted through regional organizations such as the Mekong River Commission (MRC), which includes Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and Vietnam, established as a result of the Mekong River Treaty, which acts as a forum for these nations to communicate and collaborate with one another over the use of the river (Jacobs 2002). The MRC also facilitates negotiations and discussions to promote sustainable river management. In some cases, mediation has successfully created temporary agreements on water sharing and dam operation schedules, reducing the immediate risk of conflict. These agreements demonstrate how regional cooperation, supported by multilateral dialogue, can mitigate tensions over shared resources. In many ways this mirrors other efforts in river use mediation, such as the Colorado River Compact in the United States (US), which involves partnerships between states in the American Southwest, First Nations tribes in the region, and even Mexico. This compact has mitigated the economic tensions between communities and legal jurisdictions as climate change threatens water security in the region, though challenges remain. Another case in successful river management can be seen in the International Commission for the Protection of the Danube River, which is a framework that establishes various organizations to monitor and collaborate over the Danube River in Eastern and Central Europe, which continues to strive for equitable usage of the waters and environmental sustainability.
However, mediation over the Mekong has often fallen short of achieving long-term solutions, particularly due to the lack of involvement by China, who have routinely declined to participate in the MRC. Unlike the other examples of successful mediation over river usage, there is outsized influence over the Mekong by China which has characterized the MRC as a threat to its sovereignty over the headwaters in its territory in response to criticism over the intense construction of dams within its borders, including 11 major dams with more planned, and not counting the nearly 430 minor dams (Eyler 2020). China likely views the Mekong as a strategic bargaining chip when engaging with its junior neighbors to down river, which renders the MRC political disadvantageous from its geostrategic position (Tran 2021). The regime is overlooking the advantages gained by cooperating with its neighbors, which we will explore in the following section. China’s geographic advantage, combined with its economic and political influence, has limited the effectiveness of the MRC, and undermines the organization’s ability to enforce agreements or hold Beijing accountable for its actions.

Conflict Over Maritime Waters: The South China Sea Dispute

Maritime waters are often another source of conflict, not only in regards to food sources and marine exports, but also the intrinsic territorial claims that come with access and ownership over these coastal waters. Territorial and fishing rights in the South China Sea have long been a source of conflict, as China, the Philippines, Vietnam, Malaysia, and other nations compete for access to the region’s rich fishing grounds. The South China Sea is also strategically important, as it is home to significant oil and gas reserves, and vital shipping routes pass through its waters. Like rivers, marine resources are multifaceted and thus very contentious. China’s expansive claims, demarcated by their ‘nine-dash line’, has sparked disputes over fishing rights with neighboring countries (Gao and Jia 2013). The Nine-Dash Line policy was invented whole-cloth by China to give themselves dominion over the sea arbitrarily and has no international recognition or historical validity; to the contrary, it violates international law, which demarcates the ownership over international water (Darmawan 2021). Chinese fishing fleets, often supported by the country’s navy, have clashed with vessels from other nations, exacerbating tensions in an already volatile region. This tension is greatest between China and the Philippines, who have come into direct conflict over some of the many small islands and atolls that dot the sea, some of which both countries (or more) lay claim to, and would expand their respective Exclusive Economic Zones considerably (De Castro 2015). Private fishing vessels too, under the guise of this conflict, have been documented attacking rival fishing vessels and murdering fishermen from other nations to reduce competition, or in response to piracy in the region. This is not to say the other involved nations do not come into conflict with one another and share disputes, but by large, China has sought dominance over the region and has played a pivotal role in escalating the conflict. In contrast, an example of successful mediation over maritime waters includes the plethora of treaties regarding both the Gulf of Mexico and the Mediterranean, which while their resources are mired in various interests from many nations; these interests arguably more numerous and complex than that of the South China Sea, yet are shared with relative equitability and peace through dialogue and diplomatic cooperation.

Mediation efforts over the South China Sea, largely led by regional organizations such as the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), have sought to de-escalate conflicts and negotiate disputes diplomatically and equitably. The 2002 Declaration on the Conduct of Parties in the South China Sea was a major effort to create a peaceful resolution and cooperation framework. It outlined principles for behavior in the contested waters, including refraining from actions that could escalate tensions (Thao 2003). ASEAN, along with pressure from the international community, has attempted to bring the conflicting parties to the negotiating table and establish legal frameworks for resource sharing. Despite these efforts, mediation has largely failed to resolve conflict in the South China Sea, and in fact altercations has continued to escalate. China’s growing military and economic power, along with its disregard for the 2016 Permanent Court of Arbitration ruling, which invalidated its claims in the region, has undermined diplomatic efforts. The lack of enforcement mechanisms and China’s refusal to accept third-party rulings have left ASEAN and other mediating organs with limited influence (Kipgen 2018). As a result, fishing conflicts continue, with Chinese vessels routinely intruding into the territorial waters of neighboring countries, leading to skirmishes.

This conflict mirrors that of the Mekong previously discussed, where China has sought to leverage its outsized influence to pressure junior neighbors into policy decisions that overtly favor China. This has arguably worked towards China’s increased detriment, as many of their neighboring countries have pivoted away from China, seeing it as an existential threat to resources and economic security, and instead turned to the US, which has increasingly partnered with Southeast Asian and Indonesian countries to reaffirm its interest in the region and defend international law, routinely patrolling the South China Sea as a show of force, and supporting nations like Vietnam, Thailand, Taiwan, and the Philippines economically and militarily. Indeed, the US has capitalized on these conflicts itself through its Pivot to Asia policy established during the Obama administration to further counter Chinese global influence. These countries likewise are leveraging their partnership with the US and other Western nations to push back against China’s outsized influence and bring them closer to the bargaining table (Beeson 2004).

Conflict Over Oil: Venezuela and Guyana

Oil is one of the most in-demand resources and has defined our modern world in many ways. Petroleum products are used in the creation of fuels and plastics, which are used in tens of thousands of products used in every industry around the world. The US is typically criticized for instigating oil wars, primarily in the Middle East, where it has become a hegemonic force, deploying Western-based private oil interests to secure and capitalize on the rich oil reserves in the region. Many nations have completely defined the economies of their oil resources, as seen in many Arab states. The Middle East is the typical focal point for discussion over oil conflict; other areas of the world also come into conflict over these fossil fuels, such as the Arctic, where drilling rights are often contended and environmental interests are often hotly debated. The eastern Mediterranean is often argued over by coastal nations, particularly Turkey, Greece, Cyprus, and Israel. The dispute between Venezuela and Guyana over oil-rich maritime territory in the Essequibo region has been ongoing for decades but has recently flared into a political conflict. Venezuela claims sovereignty over the region of Guyana, which has recently been discovered to have rich offshore oil reserves, while Guyana maintains its territorial integrity. The conflict intensified as oil exploration activities by oil companies heightened the stakes for both nations, leading to diplomatic tensions and military posturing. Venezuela went as far as to hold a ‘referendum’ to officially annex the territory this year, though a referendum in an authoritarian / illiberal nation is somewhat of an oxymoron. They have also engaged in military mobilizations, though like the referendum, this is simply posturing to leverage against Guyana, as no action has been taken to materialize its territorial claims (Wilkinson 2024).

Mediation efforts, primarily led by the US and regional organizations such as the Organization of American States (OAS), have aimed to resolve the dispute peacefully. The United Nations (UN) Secretary General has appointed personal representatives to facilitate dialogue, and the International Court of Justice (ICJ) has been involved in assessing legal claims (ICJ 2023). One may argue that these attempts at dialogue have prevented an escalation in the conflict, but it appears more likely that security guarantees and naval exercises between Guyana and the US has been the leading deterrent for any escalation by Venezuela. This reflects the strategic control the US holds over the Caribbean and Gulf of Mexico at large, as it has used its partnerships with the Bahamas and Antilles island chain nations to encircle both Venezuela and its close ally Cuba, greatly limiting their ability exert economic or military influence in the region (Plummer 2011).

The primary failure of mediation has been the inability to produce a lasting settlement that satisfies both Venezuela’s territorial claims and Guyana’s rights to oil exploration. Venezuela’s political instability and domestic crises have made sustained diplomatic engagement both difficult and easier, depending on the perspective one takes. On the one hand, the economic weakening of the authoritarian state has reduced its ability to escalate the conflict, which bodes well for the international community the US has fostered in the region to prevent such conflicts. On the other hand, one could argue that the weakening of Venezuela has pushed it into further isolation and conflict, incentivizing leadership to make increasingly rash decisions as they have “less to lose” on the international stage. Though admittedly, there is no reason to assume that Venezuela would suddenly relinquish its long-standing claims over Guyanan territory if it were in a better economic and military state. As things stand, while mediation has maintained peace, it has failed to bring about a resolution, leaving the conflict in a state of diplomatic limbo, as has more-or-less been the case for decades now.

Conflict Over Agricultural: Congo’s Rubber Atrocities

Agricultural goods come in a wide variety, typically domesticated horticultural products, which vary from nation to nation based on variables involving climate, soil conditions, and demand from local and international customers. Considerable farmland is reserved for the cultivation of these crops, with nations even incentivizing production with special tax laws, land use zoning, and subsidies designed to benefit producers. These products range from staple foods such as fruit and nuts, grains and cereals, livestock feed and spices, textile products such as cotton, and products like soy, corn syrup, palm oil, and more used in a vast array of products. Not only do these products sustain domestic populations, but serve as major exports. A major modern example of conflict involving agriculture can be seen in the Russian invasion of Ukraine. While there are many overlapping drivers of this conflict, a major one is the control over the vast farmlands in eastern Ukraine, described as one of the ‘breadbaskets’ of the world, a great deal of grain exports from Ukraine sustain African and Middle Eastern countries. Blockades imposed by Russia on grain shipments in the Black Sea, combined with attacks on ports, caused a real threat of famine in many regions. A great deal of tension during the conflict has been over Black Sea grain shipments being able to leave Ukrainian ports, particularly Odessa, which has been under fire by Russia in their attempt to maintain control over the Black Sea and force concessions from Ukraine and its western partners.

Here we will focus on a much older conflict over rubber harvesting in the Congo ‘Free’ State during the late 19th and early 20th century. This is one of the most infamous examples of resource exploitation and cruelty in modern history. Under the control of King Leopold II of Belgium, the Congo was subjected to brutal labor conditions as local populations were forced to harvest rubber from the trees of the region. Millions of Congolese were enslaved, murdered, worked to death, or mutilated by the horrible regime implemented by Belgian authorities, using the indigenous Congolese to harvest rubber from their homeland (Stanard 2013). This shares some parallels with the Banana Republics that the US had installed in some Central and South American countries, where the high demand for Bananas proved so profitable that it allowed corporate and government interests to interfere with the governance of their junior neighbors and install political regimes that prioritized exports. Local communities were exploited and subjugated in order to secure production, even resulting in labor activists losing their lives at the hands of militias serving at the behest of political and commercial leaders.

The Congo Reform Association, an early international NGO, played a pivotal role in raising awareness and pressuring Belgium to reform its colonial administration. Through extensive documentation of the atrocities and ad campaigns, the association garnered widespread support for its cause (Clay 2016). Ultimately, this pressure forced the Belgian government to take control of the Congo from King Leopold in 1908, ending the worst of the abuses. While the Congo Reform Association’s efforts succeeded in ending the immediate atrocities, they failed to address the systemic exploitation and colonial oppression that persisted in the Congo. The reforms imposed by Belgium did little to improve the long-term well-being of the Congolese people, as many of those who enacted said abuse retained their positions and faced no repercussions. But it paved the way to the Congo’s independence, as part of Europe’s larger exit from Africa.

There are similarities between the Congo Reform Association’s methods and the approach many modern activist groups engage in, particularly when it comes to media engagement and high-profile endorsements from cultural icons and political leadership. For example, the Kony 2012 movement pivoted an international spotlight onto the crisis of child soldiers and human rights abuses by the Lord’s Resistance Army, ironically continuing the legacy of horrific abuse in the Congo region, force attention to a cause through outrage which the developed world may otherwise ignore (Cukic 2024). Other organizations advocate for communities that are under threat or exploited by cartels and companies in order to maintain control over major global exports, such as cocoa beans, mangos, and avocados (literal cash crops). This demonstrates the roles NGOs and private organizations can play in resolving resource-driven conflicts and how public pressure, particularly in regard to human rights abuses, can be used to resolve conflict through reputational damage.

Conflict Over Trade Routes: The Suez Crisis

Trade routes act as the circulatory system of the global economy, getting resources where they need to go, and allowing nations to capitalize on surpluses of natural resources. A threat to a trade route, such as an embargo, piracy, or conflict near a choke-point, can render a country’s natural resources economically mute if it can not deliver goods to international partners. A trade route may itself be seen as a natural, geographical resource, and nations certainly see it as such when it comes to conflict. We have seen these types of tensions rise recently in various conflicts, including the Houthi attacks on vessels in the Red Sea, Ethiopia’s military posturing to Eritrea for port access, and Russia’s threat to Ukrainian grain shipments through the Black Sea discussed earlier, just to mention a few. The focus here is on the Suez Crisis of 1956, which provides a key example of conflict over access to one of the most vital trade routes in the world. Following WWI and the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, the United Kingdom (UK) administered the Suez Canal directly (Morewood 2016). After Europe’s colonial exodus from Africa, the newly independent Egyptian government gained limited control over the canal. When Egyptian President Gamal Nasser nationalized the Suez Canal, a critical trade route for Europe’s oil supply, the UK, France, and Israel launched a joint military intervention to regain control. The conflict risked spiraling into a larger war, as the canal was and is of immense strategic importance for global trade.

This joint military incursion was launched against Egypt, with a handful of skirmishes leaving a few thousand dead, though it had not escalated to full-blown war just yet. Mediation efforts, led by the UN and US, were instrumental in resolving the conflict. The US pressured its allies to reverse their military intervention, even going as far as to threaten full sanctions against Israel, as they facilitated dialogue on the control and regulations of the canal. Former US President Eisenhower adamantly opposed any move that could be seen as colonial (Skardon 2010). Meanwhile, the Soviet Union supported Nasser’s position as they competed with the US for arms trade with Egypt, threatening to send troops to support Egypt which poised them as allies to the Arab world at large, as the conflict had become a symbol of Arab struggle against western occupation, particularly given the recent establishment of the modern nation of Israel, and subsequent conflicts. Ultimately, US diplomacy proved successful with the adoption of UN Resolution 997 (ES-I), which formally called for troop withdrawals, among other agreements regarding the administration and access to the Suez Canal (UN 2024). The successful mediation prevented further escalation and ensured that the canal remained open for international trade while still under Egyptian control, yet further solidified Arab and Jewish divisions, as the assault by Israel and subsequent victory by Nasser, was hailed in the Arab world as a triumph. This division opened the doors for Soviet influence in Arab countries and the Mediterranean, particularly Egypt.

Conflict Over “Unnatural” Resources: Mediation Between Taiwan and China

There is something to say about man-made, or ‘unnatural’, resources, which functionally fill the same economic roles as many natural resources. While the differentiation between “natural” and “unnatural” are ultimately arbitrary, the distinction here has some relevance as it helps us contextualize the dynamics pertaining to the resources discussed. Many man-made products are not necessarily determined by a nation’s climate or geography, but are a result of a nation (or private interest therein) adapting its industry to fulfill a need. Yet in some cases, a man-made product is more-or-less unique to the nation producing it, and thus can be thought of as a ‘natural’ byproduct of a nation’s cultural-commercial behavior and industrial investments. A prime example of this can be seen in the microchip and semiconductor industry of Taiwan, who produce the premier types of these technologies for global consumption, heavily used in artificial intelligence and computing, and even everyday products such as refrigerators and vehicles. This resource is desperately needed in China, as sanctions led by the US and European Union (EU) have kept this technology largely out of reach. This is done to stifle China’s technological growth as fears that the authoritarian regime will exploit these emerging technologies, as evident in China’s abuse of AI technology to pursue a surveillance state within its borders, as demonstrated in its use in oppressing the Uyghur peoples (Healy 2021). This blockade has strategic significance as well, as it has prevented Chinese allies from obtaining these technologies, as seen in Russia following recent conflicts. While mediation between Taiwan and China over trade, particularly in electronics and machine parts, has been a key factor in maintaining the status quo between the two nations (Chen 2009), and as has been seen, the weakening of these agreements has resulted in conflict. Taiwan has leveraged this manufacturing resource when engaging in trade agreements with China. This economic interdependence has, to some extent, moderated Chinese aggression and allowed for a complex relationship of both rivalry and cooperation, but also applies pressure to China in its retaliatory military posturing and claims of sovereignty over Taiwan.

As Taiwan seeks to diversify its trade partners, particularly with the US and Europe, tensions with China have escalated. Mediation attempts, largely through unofficial channels, have succeeded in preventing direct conflict but have failed to resolve the underlying political dispute over Taiwan’s sovereignty. Taiwan continues to strengthen its military and economic ties with the West, even building semiconductor manufacturing centers in the US (Ngo 2024). This continued pull from China risks further economic and military escalation, highlighting how economic partnerships and dependencies promote peace and how the absence of such relationships may create a vacuum for conflict. While mediation attempts have been successful in the past in establishing various trade agreements, including a free-trade relationship, as tensions have increased these agreements have been frozen or discontinued, including China exiting the Economic Cooperation Framework Agreement after the election of current president of Taiwan, and pro-independence politician, Lai Ching-te in 2024 (Kang 2024). This is not to say that a nation should yield its sovereignty over its resources and products in response to military threats, but it remains important to acknowledge the response to trade policy (or any policy) by partners and adversaries alike.

What More Is There To Say?

Success in mediation, in terms of resolving conflict over natural resources, appears to largely depend on mutual assurance coupled with a balance in incentives to engage in agreements. Nations with little incentive to engage in resource sharing or those who can leverage a resource against partners rarely appear to engage in meaningful dialogue willingly. This drives junior partners to seek leverage through alliances and collective pressure. When it comes to natural resources, protectionist policies appear to outweigh sentiment for altruistic cooperation, values that all nations preach but rarely engage with when it comes to their own interests. More often than not, approaches relating to realism and securitization, usually involving military posturing, result in forced agreements. Too often, junior parties in these disputes rely on the existing superpowers, which are happy to intervene in the dispute to further their aims and reinforce hegemony against opposing world leaders, demonstrating a tendency to favor the polarization of the global community rather than seeking pathways that seek multi-polar, pluralistic collaboration (Erdmann 2024). In terms of natural resources, which are intrinsically tied to the viability of a nation, it sadly appears that parties in conflict usually default to taking advantage of the situation in the absence of incentives to pursue an equitable agreement. There are, of course, examples of entirely diplomatic resource sharing, but these appear more or less constrained to parties that hold relatively equal power between one another. Power, it seems, is always exploited.

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Ethnic Enmity: Case Studies of Ethnic Division, Escalation, and Violence

How to cite this journal: Author, Date of the post, WMO Conflict Insight, Title of the post, ISSN: 2628 6998, https://worldmediation.org/journal/

EDITORIAL NOTE *

This article surveys several contested conflicts. The historical accounts, the characterisation of the parties and the attribution of responsibility reflect the author’s own perspective; this journal’s editorial position is neutral as between the parties concerned.

ABSTRACT *

This article examines the role of race and ethnicity in international conflict and asks what distinguishes successful from unsuccessful mediation in such cases. After considering how racial and ethnic categories are constructed and how in-group preference operates, the author surveys five cases: the genocide committed against the Tutsi in Rwanda and its continuation into the Congo wars; the Bosnian war and the settlement reached at Dayton; the conflict between Turkey and the Kurds; the Israeli Palestinian conflict; and the persecution of the Rohingya in Myanmar, with comparative reference to India, Sri Lanka and Bangladesh. The author’s central claim is that mediation succeeds where it establishes governing frameworks that redistribute power and allow populations to coexist under conditions of relative security, and fails where it addresses symptoms while leaving the underlying distribution of power untouched, or where one party seeks the elimination rather than the accommodation of the other.

KEYWORDS

Race, ethnicity, conflict, division, genocide, exploitation, mediation, Bosnia, Israel, Palestine, Rwanda, Myanmar

INTRODUCTION

Race and ethnicity have long been at the heart of international conflicts; from our ancient ancestors engaging in clan-based feuds to modern-day ethnic conflicts, racial divisions often lead to violence and civil unrest. These conflicts also interplay with a variety of other variables that influence conflict, such as resource distribution, cultural suppression, colonization, and economic inequality, which are collectively referred to as systemic racism (Banaji, Fiske and Massey 2021). Typically, one group is often seen as superior to another, leading to inequality and systemic oppression. Race and ethnicity are powerful social constructs that influence perceptions of who belongs and who does not, and these divisions can be weaponized by political elites to mobilize groups for power or survival. In many cases, third-party interventions, either by nations or non-governmental organisations, are necessary to mediate these conflicts, though success depends heavily on the willingness of conflicting parties to acknowledge their shared humanity and address the underlying causes of division. All too often, the resentment between ethnic divides creates frameworks of demonization of peoples; we see this all the time, even outside of war. Across the globe, there are neighbouring cultures and peoples, and in almost every situation, we find entrenched racial divisions to varying degrees. It is the work of the international community to bridge divides and prevent racism from escalating into violence. Here, we will assess cases of ethnic or racial conflicts and how mediation failed or succeeded in resolving the conflict, to see if we can identify any pattern or shared thread in regard to these issues.

MAIN CORPUS

Perceptions of race and ethnicity

Humans perceive race and ethnicity through both cultural and biological lenses. Though modern science has rejected the notion of biologically distinct races, race is instead a set of arbitrary cultural categories humans craft based on natural gradients in human phenotypes, but also informed by culture, religion, nationality, and history, both real and folk history. From a biological standpoint, human beings are remarkably similar, with genetic differences among individuals being far less significant than people tend to assume. For example, in the United States, African Americans are genetically closer to European Americans than to any single continental African population. Regardless of this fact, humans tend to divide people into folk taxonomies even though the bulk of African American populations have been present in America and engaged in gene flow with the overall population much longer than later waves of European migration to the continent (Edgar 2009). However, socially constructed ideas of race persist, as humans have a natural disposition towards forming in-groups and out-groups, and tend to unconsciously favour familiarity, possessing a tendency to be cautious of unfamiliar peoples. These behaviours are derived from instincts to maintain the survival of oneself and one’s own familial group (Lewis and Bates 2010). This is not to say these instincts or behaviours are justified; to the contrary, they are one of the root causes of conflict and violence and a leading source of human suffering. To think otherwise would be an appeal to nature, a fallacy too often employed when discussing humans and their relation to the natural world (LaBossiere 2010). For the purpose of discussion here, I will focus on the cultural forces at play and their relation to the psychological framework humans operate from when engaging in conflict and race.

Cultural perceptions of race are typically based on visible characteristics, such as skin colour or facial features, but these characteristics are given meaning through historical and social contexts. Ethnicity, by contrast, tends to be defined by shared cultural traits like language, religion, and ancestry. Both tend to overlap to varying degrees, as one’s heritage tends to inform one’s culture and to affect physical characteristics. Likewise, divisions between races often lead to increased divisions in culture due to decreased societal interaction between groups, as well as the systemic pressures typically placed on one group as compared to the privileges enjoyed by the other, which further exacerbates cultural and genetic divides (Erk and Anderson 2009; Brondolo et al. 2012). Race and ethnicity are also markers of identity and belonging, leading to the creation of in-groups and out-groups. Ethnic conflicts arise when these divisions are politicized, often by leaders seeking to consolidate power by appealing to nationalist or racial ideologies. As seen in many international conflicts, these identities can be manipulated to justify violence and exclusion, even when the underlying cultural and biological differences between groups are minimal. The perception of difference is tied to grievances and perceived threats and thus becomes the catalyst for conflict.

Conflict in Rwanda: Hutu and Tutsi

The genocide committed against the Tutsi in Rwanda in 1994 is one of the most tragic examples of how racial and ethnic tensions can escalate into mass violence in recent history. Prior to contact with European peoples, the peoples of Rwanda had a social hierarchy in which the categories of Hutu and Tutsi were associated with occupation, cattle ownership and status. In practice they came to be viewed as distinct groups by many Rwandans in terms of perceived heritage (Blench 1999, 41 to 60). When Belgium administered the region from the First World War onward, this division was further exacerbated by the introduction of racial pseudo-scientific narratives describing the Tutsi as of superior descent and the Hutu as of inferior stock (Fornace 2009). While these specific myths originated with European colonisers, they attached themselves to a pre-existing hierarchical system which separated groups on the basis of background and perceived purity. The creation myths of both groups reflect these differences as well, as some accounts describe the origins of Hutu and Tutsi as brothers from a shared father, while others hold one group to have existed prior to the other, mirroring and likely influenced by the prevailing power dynamic (Vansina 1985).

Post-independence, division in Rwanda continued to deepen as political leaders sought to capitalize on the distinction between Hutu and Tutsi. By the 1990s, the Hutu-dominated government began a campaign of propaganda that dehumanized the Tutsi, describing them as cockroaches to be eradicated. After the assassination of Burundian President Ndadaye, mass violence took place in Burundi, a chilling foreshadowing of what was to come. Months later, the aeroplane carrying Rwandan President Habyarimana and the new president of Burundi, Ntaryamira, was shot down, though responsibility for the attack remains disputed to this day. What had happened in Burundi then began in neighbouring Rwanda (Stanton 2004). Despite several international efforts at mediation, including the presence of UN peacekeepers, the genocide unfolded with horrifying speed, resulting in the deaths of an estimated 800,000 Tutsi and moderate Hutu within the span of 100 days (Maron 2019). Mediation attempts failed due to several factors, including the lack of international political will to intervene decisively and the slow response of the UN to recognize the scale of the atrocities. Additionally, the deep-seated hatred cultivated between the groups made peaceful negotiation nearly impossible. Mediation failed because the political and military forces driving the genocide were uninterested in compromise; they sought total elimination of the Tutsi population (Caplan 2012, 446 to 475). Indeed, as Hutu combatants and civilians fled into Zaire, now the Democratic Republic of the Congo, armed elements of the former government mounted incursions across the border. This is an example of when diplomacy is virtually impossible, as the international community showed no will to intervene militarily, and in an already impoverished country overcome by internal conflict, economic sanctions would have been of little consequence. There was no leverage to push against the atrocities, as the conflict devolved into total war between the government forces and the Rwandan Patriotic Front, which defeated the government during the civil war in the midst of the genocide.

The Rwandan Patriotic Front took control of Rwanda and drove out the forces responsible for the genocide. Large numbers of Hutu civilians fled into the Democratic Republic of the Congo. These events were among the catalysts for the First and Second Congo Wars. Today, the Rwandan government has been reported by United Nations expert groups to support M23, an armed group operating in eastern Congo, a charge the government denies. Prior to the genocide, the Arusha Accords were signed between the competing political factions in Rwanda, intended to mediate tensions before violence erupted (Beloff and Lakin 2019). These accords failed spectacularly, as the power-sharing stipulations only heightened tensions between the signatories, and without enforcement mechanisms they were quickly abandoned. The accords sought to treat the symptoms of a fatal illness that permeated Rwandan politics and culture. The entrenchment of generalized sentiment between the respective out-groups had become ingrained. This demonstrates the capacity for humans to demonize groups over which they hold political power, escalating to violence and the destruction of minority communities when the minority group is framed as a threat to the in-group. This perceived threat need not be violent; it can be economic, cultural, or even genetic, as racial purity is typically emphasized during such conflicts.

Conflict in the Balkans: Serbs and Bosniaks

The Bosnian genocide, part of the broader Yugoslav wars of the 1990s, exemplifies how ethnic tensions can escalate into mass atrocities when exacerbated by nationalist fervour and state-sponsored violence. Following the breakup of Yugoslavia, Serb nationalist forces sought to create a Greater Serbia by eliminating or expelling Bosniak Muslims and Croat populations from Bosnian territory (Blagojevic 2009). This process, known as ethnic cleansing, was rooted in historical grievances between the various ethnic groups, particularly the portrayal of Bosniaks as foreign because of their Muslim identity. This is made all the more terrible in view of the mass killing of Serbs during the Second World War. To clarify, Bosniak refers to the ethnic group, while Bosnian more generally refers to all people living in the country of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

International mediation was attempted during the conflict, most notably through the Dayton Accords, brokered by the United States in 1995. The accords succeeded in ending the large-scale violence by creating a power-sharing arrangement between the warring ethnic groups, effectively dividing Bosnia into two entities: one controlled by Bosnian Serbs and the other a federation of Bosniaks and Croats, together forming the modern state of Bosnia and Herzegovina (Belloni 2001; U.S. Department of State Archive 2001). While the Dayton Accords succeeded in stopping the war, they have been criticized for failing to resolve the deeper ethnic tensions, as the agreement essentially froze the conflict rather than creating a pathway for long-term reconciliation. Despite the success of mediation in halting the violence, the structural divisions imposed by Dayton institutionalized ethnic divisions territorially and governmentally rather than fostering integration and cooperation. These criticisms may, to invert a phrase, be missing the trees for the forest. While it would be preferable to eradicate racism and have people live in harmony, in practice one cannot make someone suddenly love a person who may be responsible for killing their family, and vice versa. What the Dayton Accords accomplished was focusing on the immediate needs of the people in the context of realities on the ground instead of aspirations. The result is a multicultural state that is politically stable, has recovered economically, and has provided the breathing room for these once-warring groups to integrate gradually on their own terms and at their own pace. The guardrails erected by the accords established a framework for Serbs and Bosniaks to see each other more as an in-group than as separate out-groups, though of course they remain distinct ethnicities, reducing tension and the potential for conflict (Clarke-Habibi 2005).

This is not to say things are perfect, but while regional and foreign influences continue to disrupt the Balkans, as is the legacy of the region given the historical borders between Europe and the Ottomans and the subsequent collapse of Yugoslavia, it has proven a bridge between these groups. In some ways it is reminiscent of Czechoslovakia, a multicultural state divided between Czechs and Slovaks, which maintained cultural and political cohesion under Communist rule. Yet after the collapse of that regime, ethnic divisions began to grow as the distinct groups vied for political influence. Instead of allowing this to escalate into violent conflict, the country peacefully split into two states which now better represent the interests of their respective populations without the threat of one subjugating the other. This has similarities to the dissolution of the union of Serbia and Montenegro, which was also a relatively peaceful and gradual process. In contrast, Kosovo, which had a majority Albanian population, went through war before obtaining independence, as Serbia saw it as a strategic threat by an out-group (Macek-Macková 2011). Whether Bosnia and Herzegovina takes the same trajectory and formally splits remains to be seen, as a rise in nationalism, promoted in part by neighbouring Serbia, has prompted cultural and political unrest. But as of now, this appears unlikely.

Outside the Balkans, we are reminded of how ethnic tensions between India and its Sikh population have been managed, a case of both success and major failure. Sikh nationalists have sought, and some still seek, their own sovereign nation in north-western India, which they call Khalistan. In order to provide Sikhs with political power and influence without dividing the nation, Sikhs held a prominent role in the military, which provided cultural and political assurance. This arrangement was a carryover from British rule in India, when Sikhs were recruited in disproportionate numbers into the colonial army, a sadly ironic parallel to their treatment by later Indian governments. Obviously, this system was not perfect, as demonstrated by the conflict between the Indian state and Punjab insurgents in the 1980s and 1990s, the subsequent assassination of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, and the retaliatory violence targeting Sikh communities. To this day, these tensions have affected India’s diplomatic relations, as Canadian authorities alleged Indian involvement in the killing of a Sikh separatist leader in Canada in 2023, and further allegations followed in the United States, leading Canada to expel Indian diplomats (Biswas 2024). Regardless of these tensions, Sikhs remain prominent in the Indian military, and while calls for separatism are still present, the movement is largely peaceful, with much political support going to Sikh politicians associated with the Khalistan cause (Takkar 2024).

Conflict in Turkey: Turks and Kurds

The conflict between Turkey and the Kurdish people has its roots in the Kurdish struggle for autonomy and recognition. After the First World War, the Ottoman Empire was partitioned by the Allied powers, and the Treaty of Sèvres envisaged Kurdish autonomy. That provision was never implemented, and the Treaty of Lausanne of 1923 established the Turkish republic without it. Since then, the Kurds have been a stateless people, the regions they inhabit split across Turkey, Iraq, Syria, and Iran. In Turkey, the government’s refusal to recognize Kurdish identity and grant political and cultural rights led to decades of conflict, with the Kurdistan Workers’ Party engaging in armed struggle against the Turkish state. The Turkish government’s portrayal of Kurds as a separatist threat has exacerbated tensions, often leading to harsh crackdowns on Kurdish communities. Turkey has also conducted military operations in northern Syria in areas under Kurdish control. This conflict has been compared to the historical tensions between the Ottoman state and the Armenians, particularly in the context of the destruction of the Armenian population from 1915, when Ottoman authorities killed and deported the Armenian population of Anatolia. Just as Armenians were portrayed as a threat to Turkish national identity, Kurds have been marginalized and vilified in a similar way (Kasbarian and Öktem 2014).

Mediation attempts have been inconsistent and largely unsuccessful, as Turkey has refused to recognize the PKK as a legitimate representative of Kurdish interests, framing the conflict as one of terrorism rather than ethnic self-defence. While the European Union has pressured Turkey to grant more rights to Kurds as part of its accession process, these attempts have met resistance from Turkish nationalists. The failure of mediation stems from the deep mistrust between the Turkish government and Kurdish groups, as well as the reluctance of the Turkish state to acknowledge the legitimacy of Kurdish demands for autonomy. In the absence of mediation, the United States and its allies have militarily supported Kurdish forces in Syria and Iraq, arguably taking advantage of their position to create geostrategic leverage, given the Kurdish hold of territory between four states, and as part of broader Middle East policy (Hama 2020). This has been to the Kurds’ benefit, as they have consolidated military and economic power in the region and are able to defend and advocate for themselves, achieving many of the attributes of statehood aside from international recognition. This demonstrates how victimized groups can be supported to defend themselves and how this can be used to apply pressure to out-groups who are then obliged to engage with them rather than seek to eliminate them, as happened with the Armenians.

Conflict in Israel: Israelis and Palestinians

The conflict between Israel and Palestine is one of the most enduring and complex ethnic and national conflicts in modern history. Though the region’s contested history extends over many centuries, involving numerous invasions and successive regimes, we will focus here on the modern conflict rooted in the establishment of Israel in 1948 and the subsequent displacement of Palestinians. This conflict has been fuelled by competing national identities and religious claims to the land. Over the decades, divisions between Jewish Israelis and Arab Palestinians have deepened, with both sides portraying the other as an existential threat to their survival. Numerous mediation efforts have been attempted, most notably the Oslo Accords of the 1990s, which sought to create a framework for peace by establishing the Palestinian Authority and laying the groundwork for a two-state solution. While the accords were initially hailed as a breakthrough, they ultimately failed to resolve the core issues, such as the status of Jerusalem, the right of return for Palestinian refugees, and the continued expansion of Israeli settlements in the West Bank (Alkidwa 2019). The Abraham Accords later sought to normalise relations between Israel and several Arab states, and while mentioning aspirations for peace and Palestinian sovereignty, no concrete commitments followed. Given the escalation of the conflict since 2023 and the scale of civilian casualties, these accords leave the Palestinian question without a clear resolution (Goldstein 2022).

The two-state solution sought by most in the international community mirrors the arrangement in Bosnia and Herzegovina at first glance, but I argue that the strict division of the two into distinct nations removes most incentives for Israel and Palestine to find investments in one another, and may in fact incentivize conflict as the two nationally distinct populations compete for influence and space in the region. The two remain perpetually out-groups to one another with little room for the unification of identities, as can be gradually seen in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Mediation in the Israeli Palestinian conflict has been hampered by the unequal balance of power between the two sides. While third parties, including the United States and the United Nations, have played roles in facilitating dialogue, they have been unable to compel either side to make the compromises necessary for lasting peace. As in the other examples, both sides portray each other as existential threats, the same zero-sum sentiment seen time and again. The phrase from the river to the sea has been used by some Palestinian groups and is widely understood by Israelis as denying Israel’s existence; formulations invoking Israeli sovereignty over the same territory have also been used by Israeli political figures.

Conflict in Myanmar: Buddhists and Rohingya

The conflict between Buddhists and Muslims in Myanmar, particularly the persecution of the Rohingya Muslim minority, has escalated into one of the worst and most underreported humanitarian crises of the 21st century. Tensions between the majority Buddhist population and the Rohingya have long existed, but they intensified following decades of discrimination and denial of citizenship to the Rohingya. The Myanmar military, along with extremist Buddhist nationalists, has portrayed the Rohingya as outsiders and a threat to national culture and security, leading to widespread violence, displacement, and findings of ethnic cleansing and genocidal intent by United Nations bodies (Zarni and Cowley 2014). This parallels the Islamophobia seen across the globe and demonstrates that no religious tradition, even one like Buddhism with a stereotypically peaceful perception in Western culture, prevents its followers from succumbing to prejudice and extremism. The same can be seen in Hinduism, another tradition stereotypically seen as peaceful, which has extremist factions (Malji 2020). It is a mistake to think that a particular religious framework can somehow reduce conflict; assuming otherwise often promotes sentiments of religious supremacy, which ironically lends itself to conflict. As in the other examples discussed, this conflict too is deeply rooted in ethnic and religious divisions, with the Rohingya portrayed as both ethnically and religiously inferior to the Buddhist majority. Human rights organizations have documented extensive abuses, including mass killings, sexual violence, confinement in camps, and the displacement of over a million Rohingya to refugee camps in Bangladesh (Human Rights Watch 2020). In some ways this recalls China’s internment of Uyghur Muslims, the removal of Islamic religious and cultural practice from communities in Xinjiang, and reported practices of sexual violence and forced sterilisation (Associated Press 2020). These cases may demonstrate a larger pattern of growing Islamophobia in Asia.

The rise of the Arakan Rohingya Salvation Army, a militant group formed in response to the persecution of the Rohingya, further escalated tensions, as the Myanmar government used the presence of armed resistance to justify its military crackdown. The military coup and ongoing civil war have allowed the group to establish itself within the conflict. Its reach has extended into Bangladesh, which itself has a history of ethnic conflict between the Muslim majority and various minority groups (Siddiqui 2024). Following recent upheaval in Bangladesh, targeted violence against non-Muslims, particularly Hindu civilians, has been reported. The group has operated within Rohingya refugee camps in Bangladesh at the border with Myanmar to recruit and extort the displaced people there (International Institute for Strategic Studies 2024; Amnesty International 2018). There is some overlap between this and the ethnic conflicts of the nearby Assam region of India, where migration has stirred concern among smaller ethnic communities who fear cultural replacement (Krusch 2024). This further demonstrates how the ostracization of a group often leads to reprisals of violence not only against perceived perpetrators but against civilians who may be ethnically or religiously associated with them.

International mediation efforts have been largely unsuccessful, despite involvement by the United Nations and pressure from countries such as the United States, India, and China, which of course have geostrategic interests in the region. The Myanmar government’s refusal to acknowledge the Rohingya as citizens or grant them basic rights has made mediation difficult. Moreover, the ongoing civil war has further complicated the situation, as the military remains deeply entrenched in the political system and resistant to outside influence. Like Turkey and many other states, actors push to consolidate national identity around ethnic uniformity instead of expanding their idea of national identity to include marginalized communities. In Sri Lanka, similar patterns can be observed, where Tamil minority communities have been marginalised following the civil war against the Sinhalese majority, and where Muslim communities have also been the target of discrimination and violence (Kursch 2024). As things stand in Myanmar, the ongoing civil war has taken up all available attention, and perhaps understandably, as no realistic resolution to the oppression of the Rohingya can be achieved until the conflict between the parties responsible for governance is settled.

SUMMARY *

The comparison the article draws produces a finding that runs against a good deal of contemporary practice. Where a settlement acknowledged group identity and built institutions around it, as at Dayton, large scale violence ended and has not resumed for three decades; where a settlement assumed that identities could be set aside in favour of shared institutions, as at Arusha, it collapsed within months. The author’s explanation is that people who have recently been at war do not first reconcile and then coexist but coexist first, under guarantees they trust, and reconcile slowly or not at all. From this follows the article’s most contested claim, namely that partition into separate states may entrench hostility rather than resolve it, since two sovereign entities have no shared institutions in which any common identity might eventually form.

CONCLUSION

Demonstrated here is a pattern in which the ostracization of one group by another routinely leads towards violence, as dominant ethnic or racial groups attempt to expel or destroy a minority group in response to instability, whether economic or political. This often leads to the radicalization of the oppressed group, which results both in acts of political defiance and self-defence and in acts of terrorism and extremism, which in turn retroactively appear to justify the persecutor’s sentiment and validate extremist factions, bringing that sentiment further into the mainstream and perpetuating the cycle of hatred and violence. Given the human tendency to divide one another into groups on cultural, religious, linguistic, and racial grounds, coupled with behaviours that prioritize perceived in-groups, concrete measures must be taken in order to prevent ethnic conflict beyond aspirations for peace and unity. Not even the experience of genocide prevents a victimized group from committing atrocities in turn, and it may be observed that victimization can give groups a disposition towards escalatory behaviour, as inherited trauma may make them prone to heightened protectionism and entrenched grievance.

As shown, there is evidence that the establishment of equitable governing frameworks can help alleviate the power imbalance between groups while reducing perceived threats, as populations are allowed to acclimatize to other cultures and peoples in an environment of relative peace and mutual benefit. The precursors to ethnic and racial violence are usually clear, yet preventative measures are rarely taken, in order to maintain dominance in government, as leverage against a minority group, or as political gamesmanship. Incentives must be placed upon states that subject peoples to inequitable treatment, which not only pose threats to their respective domestic stability but, as shown, routinely spill over into neighbouring states as prejudice crosses cultural and national borders. Rarely will these states engage in such mediation domestically, as too often politicians benefit from such divisions, capitalizing on them for short-term political gain. The international community must encourage these arrangements of power-sharing through diplomatic means, although this is easier said than done, as no multicultural state is entirely innocent when it comes to the equitable treatment of minority populations. Hopefully, as the world becomes more aware of the systemic challenges to multiculturalism, and as the value of pluralism becomes more widely recognised, these issues will be engaged with more seriously, resulting in meaningful change.

POTENTIAL SOLUTION *

The comparison between Arusha and Dayton is the most productive element here and it repays a closer look, because the difference between them is not principally about how each treated identity.

Arusha was signed by parties still contesting power, with a peacekeeping force whose mandate did not permit it to enforce anything, and with the extremist faction that would carry out the genocide excluded from and opposed to the agreement. Dayton was signed after a change in the military balance, after months of intensive great power engagement, and it arrived with sixty thousand troops under a mandate to use force, a High Representative with authority to impose legislation, and the sustained commitment of the states that had brokered it. The lesson most reliably supported by the pair is therefore about implementation: agreements survive where the guarantor can and will act on breach, and collapse where it cannot. Institutional design matters, and it matters less than whether anyone stands behind the design.

That said, the article’s substantive point about consociational arrangements has considerable support in the literature and deserves stating carefully. Power sharing does reduce the immediate risk of renewed war, and it does tend to entrench the categories it recognises, so that voting, appointment and public employment run along ethnic lines and politicians have a standing incentive to keep them salient. Bosnia illustrates both halves: three decades without war, and a political system in which nationalist parties are structurally advantaged and citizens who decline to declare an affiliation are excluded from the highest offices, a position the European Court of Human Rights found discriminatory in Sejdić and Finci. The design question is therefore not whether to recognise identity but whether to build in a route out, through sunset provisions, review mechanisms and electoral rules that reward cross group appeal, and Northern Ireland’s arrangements provide a comparison worth studying alongside Bosnia’s.

On the Israeli Palestinian case, the article’s argument that separation removes the incentive to invest in one another is a real position in the debate and it has a counterargument the article does not address. Consociational arrangements presuppose that both communities accept a shared state; where neither does, and where one community would be a demographic majority in it, the proposal is understood by the other as a demand for its dissolution. That is why the single state options canvassed in the literature divide sharply between one with equal rights and one without, and why confederal models, two states with shared institutions, open movement and joint arrangements in Jerusalem, have attracted attention as an attempt to hold both the article’s insight and the parties’ insistence on self determination. Naming that literature strengthens the argument considerably.

Two further points bear on the article’s practical conclusion. Its recommendation that the international community impose power sharing arrangements runs against everything the record shows about ownership: imposed constitutions are implemented reluctantly, litigated endlessly and abandoned when the guarantor’s attention moves, and the leverage available in practice is conditionality, accession processes and the withholding of legitimacy rather than imposition. And the article’s opening claim that in-group preference is a natural disposition, which it rightly declines to treat as a justification, has an evidential corollary worth adding: the categories that matter vary enormously across societies and change within a generation, which means the disposition to form groups is far less informative than the political work that determines which line becomes the one that matters. It is that work, and not human nature, that the measures the author recommends are actually aimed at.

* Added by the WMO Editorial Team

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Supplementary references added by the WMO Editorial Team

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The Necessity For Regulation Of Faith-Based Organizations In Rwanda

How to cite this journal: Author, Date of the post, WMO Conflict Insight, Title of the post, ISSN: 2628 6998, https://worldmediation.org/journal/

EDITORIAL NOTE *

The author of this article works at the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees; the views expressed here are his own and do not reflect the official position, past, present or future, of the United Nations or of UNHCR. The article defends state regulation of religious organisations in a particular national context; the assessment of that policy reflects the author’s own perspective, and this journal’s editorial position is neutral.

ABSTRACT *

This article defends state regulation of faith based organisations in Rwanda as a justified exception to the separation of church and state. The author begins from the constitutional guarantee of religious freedom and the limitations placed on it, and then examines the role of the churches before and during the genocide committed against the Tutsi in 1994, alongside their subsequent contribution to reconstruction and reconciliation. The growth of prayer houses from ten recognised churches at independence to some fifteen thousand by 2018 is examined, together with the reasons for it, including disillusionment with the established churches and the search for support that smaller congregations offered. The law of 2018 is then set out in detail: the requirements for legal personality, the qualifications required of preachers, restrictions on political activity and on the content of preaching, financial supervision and its relation to money laundering, and the powers of the Rwanda Governance Board and local authorities to warn, suspend leadership and revoke legal personality. The author identifies gaps in the law, particularly concerning the collection of offerings and prophetic practice, and recommends review of the monitoring system.

KEYWORDS *

Rwanda, faith based organisations, religious freedom, regulation, genocide against the Tutsi, Rwanda Governance Board, separation of church and state, preacher qualifications, money laundering, prayer houses, public order, reconciliation

INTRODUCTION

A topic like the necessity of regulation of faith-based organizations in Rwanda can be a hot debate between the conservatives who perceive that regulation as a state’s interference with religious freedom and those who advocate for the state’s intervention to safeguard public security and maximize the interests of the public. The 19th century marked a significant separation between the Church and the state; the Church refrained from exercising the power of the state, and the principle of separation of state and Church was spread in different corners of the world. The Constitution of the Republic of Rwanda grants freedom of religion and worship in public. On the other side, the Church created a dark image in Rwandan history by playing a leading role in separating the Rwandans, creating hatred based on imagined and subjective ethnic classes, and creating and spreading the genocide ideology. The regrettable result was the genocide that ravaged the lives of more than a million Tutsi in less than a hundred days in 1994. After 1994, the government of Rwanda strived for the country’s reconstruction, promoting unity and reconciliation among Rwandans. Since then, many faith-based organizations have been established, more than 15,000 prayer houses by 2024, thus welcoming different followers.

The increase of these faith-based organizations has not been free from intra-church conflicts originating from mismanagement of resources, discrimination among the followers, favoritism, and robbery based on misinterpretation of the scriptures, to name a few. In 2018, a law empowered the Rwanda Governance Board to govern all faith-based organizations, from registration and issuing legal personality to monitoring their compliance with applicable laws and sanctioning accordingly. Since then, many churches have been closed for various reasons, including those mentioned above and the lack of adequate infrastructure and safety. Against this backdrop, I argue that the state’s intervention in institutional religion as an exception to the principle of separation of Church and state is necessary to ensure peace, security, and public order.

In doing so, I will briefly overview the historical development of religions in Rwanda, the necessity and scope of regulation of faith-based organizations, the challenges, and the way forward.

MAIN CORPUS

An overview of the historical development of religion in Rwanda

Before I discuss the necessity of regulation of faith-based organizations in depth, it is critical to give an overview of the history of religion in Rwanda. In this discussion, I reflect on the fundamental principles governing religious freedom and its role in the genocide perpetrated against the Tutsi in 1994 and in the post-genocide era.

Freedom of religion as a fundamental right under Rwandan law

The Constitution of the Republic of Rwanda is the supreme law in Rwanda; it establishes binding principles and fundamental rights entitled to people that other laws must implement. One is freedom of conscience and religion, granted to all Rwandans. Article 37 of Rwanda’s Constitution specifies that “Freedom of thought, conscience, religion, worship and public manifestation thereof is guaranteed by the State in accordance with the law.” However, Article 41 conditions and limits the way rights and freedoms are exercised. It reads: “In exercising rights and freedoms, everyone is subject only to limitations provided for by the law aimed at ensuring recognition of and respect for other people’s rights and freedom, as well as public morals and public order.”

Separation of politics and religion

Rwanda is a secular country that grants freedom of conscience and religion, as I discussed above, once legal requirements are fulfilled. Rwanda’s Constitution requires politics and religion to remain separate and warns against basing themselves on discrimination. The law governing faith-based organizations clarifies that no organization, umbrella, forum of umbrellas, or ministry is allowed to engage in political activities to gain political power, organize debates to support political organizations or candidates, register, or use any other means to support candidates for any public office. Conversely, Article 14 recognizes that an organization, an umbrella, a forum of umbrellas, or a ministry can partner for development with government institutions.

As I introduced earlier, I reiterate that these conditions and limitations in the Constitution suffice to recall the negative legacy that churches and political parties left in Rwanda. They created and spread hatred and discrimination among Rwandans as a long-term basis for the genocide that killed more than one million Tutsi in less than a hundred days in 1994. On a positive note, churches played another role in the country’s reconstruction, forgiveness, and promotion of unity and reconciliation among Rwandans after the genocide, as I will briefly discuss below. That catastrophic experience obligates Rwanda to take preventive measures in all aspects.

A double-sided role of religion in the genocide committed against the Tutsi in 1994

Religious teachings played a double-sided role in the genocide committed against the Tutsi in 1994: they played a lamentable role in the planning and executing of the genocide, and they contributed to the country’s reconstruction through different social and economic development programmes, promoting unity and reconciliation among Rwandans. I will briefly discuss these two sides of the coin in the sub-sections below.

The role of churches in the planning and execution of the genocide

Aside from Islam, which was also marginalized, churches played a lamentable role in the planning and execution of the genocide committed against the Tutsi in Rwanda in 1994. Churches had promoted the killing of innocent Rwandans by favoring some ethnic classes to the detriment of others, played ethnic politics themselves by placing leaders in the regime, creating and spreading hatred among Rwandans, and actively supported the commission of the genocide. In that process, sending a message of ethnic discrimination became a significant focus of church teaching, while the church leaders had close ties with the political leaders of the time. Pope Francis recognized the religious role in the planning and commission of the genocide when he asked forgiveness for acts of some Catholic priests and nuns who had surrendered to hatred and violence while participating in the genocide. I agree that his courage in asking forgiveness also expressed the desire to recognize the failings of that period, which unfortunately disfigured the face of the Church, and may contribute to a purification of memory and promote, in hope and renewed trust, a future of peace. It is worth noticing how some individual members of religious groups demonstrated courage to protect civilians, sometimes at significant risk to themselves. Conversely, I am convinced that what churches ought to do in societies, regardless of other factors, is to help heal and rebuild the broken hearts of the community and of Christians as a whole.

The contribution of faith-based organizations in Rwanda’s reconstruction post-genocide

When considering faith-based organizations’ contribution to Rwanda’s reconstruction and development post-genocide, I echo Nwazuni’s argument that religion is considered the oldest institution contributing to society’s well-being. Since religion gives followers hope where there appears to be none, it makes it possible for followers to have hope for the future because its teachings relieve the pains people encounter today. After the genocide committed against the Tutsi in 1994, religious groups and associations contributed to greater understanding and tolerance by participating in interfaith meetings, organizing activities under the auspices of religious umbrella organizations or interfaith groups, and collaborating on public awareness campaigns and community development projects. These teachings helped some perpetrators understand and ask for forgiveness and helped survivors to forgive. The positive result has been unity and reconciliation among Rwandans, which supported other social and developmental programmes.

I agree with Court that if the interests of both Church and state were inextricably bound up with one another as a factor that was to play a fateful role during the post-independence period when the Church supported Hutu ethno-nationalism, and Church and politics became intertwined in preparing and committing genocide against the Tutsi in 1994, it should play a corresponding role in repairing what was broken after the genocide. Court reiterates Denis’ view that interpreting Rwandan history through the lens of ethnicity was integral to the politics of the missionaries and the institutional Catholic Church, which, rather than challenging the ideology of Hutu ethno-nationalism, supported the leadership of the two Republics after independence.

A reflective discussion on the increasing number of prayer houses in Rwanda post-genocide

Since Rwandan independence in 1962, the number of recognized churches has increased from ten churches in 1962 to 350 churches in 2012 and 15,000 prayer houses when the law regulating faith-based organizations was enacted in 2018. I can associate this rapidly increasing number of prayer houses with different factors, but I will emphasize the following.

First, religion and prayer contain words of comfort for people like Rwandans who were affected by the genocide committed against the Tutsi in Rwanda in 1994. Kubai discussed post-genocide Rwanda and the changing religious landscape and asserted that one of the reasons why many Rwandans left their traditional churches for new ones is a feeling of betrayal and disillusionment with the official Church. Some have said that they left the mainline churches because those churches did not try to protect those in danger.

Second, Rwanda is developing economically at a rapid pace, which engenders inevitable challenges for many people, such as stress, anxiety and pressure. Therefore, religious preaching and prayer deliver messages of hope and strength during these difficult moments. Kubai recounts expressions of some genocide survivors who moved to the new churches because these churches address individual members’ problems. In the face of grinding poverty, some churches are said to support their members spiritually, socially, and materially. These encourage their members to participate in the national reconciliation and political process and preach forgiveness as a religious requirement.

Third, after the genocide committed against the Tutsi in 1994, many Rwandans who had been in exile for a long time returned to their motherland. Rwandan business policy, security, cooperation, and strategic diplomatic relations with countries around the globe opened doors for many investors, visitors, and residents. Religion is a substantial part of the cultural aspect of a country. In that way, these newcomers introduced different kinds of worship from their countries of origin, implying an increase in prayer houses.

I conclude the discussion on these factors by agreeing with Kubai that the fast growth of these smaller worship groups is due to their rhetoric of hope, healing, and reconciliation, and their being more readily available to individual members. These worship groups provide spiritual and emotional therapeutic support for genocide survivors more than the larger and more traditional churches.

The growth of worship groups post-genocide: a matter for legislation

In the sections above, I discussed the double-sided role of religion prior to, during, and after the genocide in Rwanda, and particularly the extreme increase in the number of worship groups post-genocide and the followers’ reasons for joining these groups. Without being cynical, I argue that this rapid increase was a concern and a matter for legislation in a country that has a negative experience of genocide. Therefore, if there is a concern, there must be ways to address it. More particularly, a critical thinker can question the messages delivered to followers in these worship groups, given the memory of genocide ideology propagated by churches, the capacity of religious leaders and preachers, and security for the followers and the public.

The necessity and scope of regulation of faith-based organizations in Rwanda

In this section, I will discuss the country’s intervention to address the concerns of the growth and operation of worship groups introduced above. Mainly, I will discuss the intervention in enacting a law governing faith-based organizations. I will limit my discussion to the requirements it imposes to register such an organization, requirements for being a preacher, limitations on religious activities, monitoring of the financial aspect, and conflict resolution. These are the main factors on which the Rwanda Governance Board and local administrative entities based their decisions when closing several prayer houses, and continue to do so.

Legal requirements for a faith-based organization

The Rwandan legislator did not make any exception as to the type of religion of the faith-based organizations concerned by the present law, nor did it define religion. Instead, it included in its list of concepts the followers of a faith-based organization as members who founded an organization and others who can join the organization after its establishment.

The current law sets the requirements and procedures for applying for legal personality or registering a faith-based organization. In this context, I must recall that religion as an institution must observe laws applicable to the country in which it operates. Additionally, it is a legal person whose existence depends on legal personality issued by the competent organ. That legal personality empowers it to enjoy legal rights like any other person, but also creates obligations. The entities concerned are the constituents of a faith-based organization, namely an organization, ministry, branch, umbrella, and forum of umbrellas.

The law governing faith-based organizations makes obtaining legal personality a sine qua non condition for an organization, an umbrella, a forum of umbrellas, or a ministry that intends to start activities. It empowers the Rwanda Governance Board to issue legal personality and monitor the functioning of these bodies. As I insisted above, the legal personality is a determining factor of the existence of that legal person. Articles 17 to 33 detail the requirements for application for legal personality, rights, and obligations, and emphasize the requirements for being a preacher.

The following are required documents for application for legal personality: an application letter addressed to the Board; notarized statutes governing its organization; the address of its head office and the names of its legal representative and deputy, their duties, complete address, and criminal records; a document certifying that the legal representative and deputy were appointed following its statutes; a brief notarized statement explaining its doctrine; a notarized declaration by the legal representatives of consent to the responsibilities assigned to them; notarized minutes of the general assembly that established the organization and approved its statutes. On this point, I must invoke Article Four of the same law, requiring that the statutes must not be inconsistent with the provisions of other laws. Other requirements include appointed members of its organs, a notarized document describing the organization’s annual action plan and source of funding, a document indicating that the building or meeting space meets the requirements for buildings in the area of operation, a letter issued by district authorities agreeing to collaborate with the organization, a partnership document issued by an umbrella organization of the organization’s choosing, and proof of payment of a non-refundable application fee.

Particular requirements for being a preacher

Article 22 of the law governing faith-based organizations in Rwanda details the requirements for being a preacher in Rwanda as follows: be of majority age, which in Rwandan law is 18 years; be a person of integrity; fulfil the requirements of an organization for being a preacher at that level; possess a statement testifying that an organization authorizes him or her to be a preacher; not have been definitively sentenced to a principal penalty of imprisonment equal to or exceeding six months which was never removed by amnesty or rehabilitation; and not have been definitively convicted of the crime of genocide, genocide ideology, discrimination or sectarianism. A further point of this Article conditions academic and religious qualification by requiring the preacher to possess a degree from a higher learning institution or another degree with a valid certificate in religious studies or related matters delivered by a recognized institution. The law states that persons required to hold an academic degree shall have five years from the date of the law’s enactment to comply with the requirement.

Concerning the place of sermons, Article 23 clarifies that religious sermons are delivered in designated facilities that meet the requirements of the law. It stresses that if an organization intends to organize a special public gathering, it seeks authorization from the competent authority. The Rwandan legislator has been sensitive about the content of preaching and prohibits an organization, an umbrella, a forum of umbrellas, or a ministry from jeopardizing, in its faith, practices, and preaching, the unity of Rwandans, peace, and security. The legislator prohibits them from jeopardizing public order, health, good morals, good conduct, freedom, and the fundamental rights of others, or causing noise pollution. However, I note that the Rwandan legislator has not addressed the issue of the abuse of sacrifices and tithes, the strategies of collecting sacrifices and contributions from believers, and messages about the imminent end of the world, or the non-fulfilment of civil obligations such as community service, taking the oath on the national flag, elections, or approaching catastrophic events. These messages cause anxiety and frustration among followers and make them resistant to developmental activities.

Monitoring the financial status of a faith-based organization

When discussing the power of the Board to monitor the financial status of a faith-based organization, I must first introduce the provisions of Article Four of the law, which grants them financial autonomy: “Without prejudice to provisions of other laws, every organization, umbrella, forum of umbrellas or ministry enjoys administrative and financial autonomy. However, when necessary, the Board can conduct financial and asset audits of any organization, umbrella, forum of umbrellas, or ministry.”

The regulation of lucrative activities

The current law allows faith-based organizations to engage in profit-generating activities but requires that revenues from those activities be used solely in activities related to the organization’s mission. On this point, I must recall that religious activities are exempt from taxes even though they generate profits. The concern here is determining how revenues are used solely in activities related to the mission: does it suffice if the competent organ within the organization approves? I have earlier raised the issue of mismanagement by these organs. In the same context, the Rwandan legislator empowered the Board, the province, and the district to be informed through annual reports about the annual plan of activities, budget, and budget execution. However, I observe that the Rwandan legislator left the role of these local administrative institutions unclear in respect of these reports. Therefore, the legislator should have clarified their power to approve, rectify, or reject them.

Strategic prevention of related financial crimes

First, I must recall that financial crime such as money laundering is a process by which a large amount of illegally obtained money, from drug trafficking, terrorist activity, or other serious crimes, is made to appear to have originated from a legitimate source. Experience with churches and money laundering in Nigeria suffices to alert any legislator to monitor the financial transactions of churches and worship groups. Some perpetrators of money laundering operated with some church leaders in Nigeria by using them as agents and partners in the illicit enterprise, and thus the churches became facilitating agents for asset concealment. In this process, the perpetrators purchased multiple houses using the names of friends and churches, gave assets to churches on secret trust agreements while proclaiming such assets to be anonymous donations and gifts, established private educational institutions in the name of unsuspecting business persons, or entered into anonymous joint ventures with others to establish some. The Rwandan legislator sought to prevent such illicit financial transactions by establishing a monitoring process for financial support, budget planning, and execution.

In doing so, the current law provides that any financial support is deposited into the account of an organization, umbrella, forum of umbrellas, or ministry opened at an accredited bank or financial institution in Rwanda. I can deduce that this system allows the monetary operator to monitor the source of financial support and the destination of any transaction. Equally, it prohibits an organization, an umbrella, a forum of umbrellas, or a ministry from receiving support from any individual or organization involved in terrorism or other criminal activities.

The necessity to address the issue of abuse of worship

Ngabonziza discussed the exaggerated increase in the number of churches in Rwanda, especially in Kigali City. He asserts that this increase resulted in abuse of the religious freedom provided for by the Constitution. What was more surprising was that some churches met in tents or houses that could not accommodate crowds, and noise pollution from night-time gatherings was a concern. As a solution, Article 23 of the law requires religious sermons to be delivered in designated facilities that meet the requirements of the law. If an organization intends to organize a special public gathering, it seeks authorization from the competent authority, particularly from the Board; this includes preaching through the media.

In another study, Gasana and Habamenshi raised the issue of increasing poverty among religious believers, while religious leaders promoted a culture of operating miracles and prophecies as Christians continued to sink deeper into debt than ever before. Regrettably, church leaders could gain profits from believers’ sacrifices, an act that the researchers qualified as an abuse of prophecy. They criticized these miracles as being used to prove that a particular brand of religion is trustworthy or that a particular religious leader is an authentic representative of God. Such practices consist of abuse of prophecy and misinterpretation of the scriptures associated with robbery through prophecies.

Preachers, who should help comfort believers’ emotions during difficult moments, instead sought to profit from them. Some of the methods they used consisted of imposing heavy offertories in the form of sacrifices, obligatory payment of a tenth of an advance of thanksgiving, or other sorts of gifts to the prophet to receive the prophetic message, the prophet being considered a messenger of God. I can infer that such practices would amount to a crisis in churches if the state did not intervene. Therefore, the intervention of Rwandan law governing faith-based organizations was conclusive in addressing these issues of abuse of worship and preventing exploitation exercised by religious leaders against their followers. The Rwandan Penal Code is clear in the punishment of such acts.

While recognizing that an organization, umbrella, forum of umbrellas, or ministry is free to determine the criteria for membership concerning its doctrine and practices, the law restricts it from using coercive or fraudulent means to recruit followers or members, and members have the right to leave.

Power of local administration and sanctions

The law on faith-based organizations empowers local administrative entities to enforce the law and make decisions accordingly. Through the decentralization and collaboration system, the district can request explanations from an organization, an umbrella, a forum of umbrellas, or a ministry operating in that district that did not fulfil its responsibilities. This district’s commitment to collaboration, a letter issued by district authorities agreeing to collaborate with the organization, is among the documents submitted to the Board when applying for legal personality. This power is ordinarily entrusted to the Rwanda Governance Board. If these explanations are unsatisfactory, if an organization fails to provide explanations, or if it commits the same mistakes about which it was warned, the Board can warn it in writing.

The sanctions to impose on defaulting organizations include suspension or dismissal of administration members, which the Board does when the organization’s own organs fail to take action, or revocation of legal personality. This punitive intervention is done in the interests of the organization. One leading example is the Board’s decision to dissolve the entire leadership of the Association des Églises de Pentecôte au Rwanda on 4 October 2020, after years of wrangling, infighting, and allegations of mismanaging the church’s funds. The concerned leadership included the general assembly, the board of directors, the executive committee, and the arbitration committee. The Board dissolved that leadership because these problems had been present for some time and the leadership had not taken steps to resolve them. Governance and functioning within the organization continued to be marred by divisionism, disturbing the members’ peace.

A severe sanction is when the Board revokes the legal personality of an organization, an umbrella, a forum of umbrellas, or a ministry. It happens if the entity no longer fulfils one or many of the requirements that served as a basis for being issued with legal personality. It can also happen when one or many provisions that served as a basis for issuing legal personality are found to be false. Revoking legal personality can amount to total closure.

Recently, an extreme decision to shut down more than 5,600 places of worship over failure to meet the conditions required by law signifies Rwandan rigour in regulating faith-based organizations and ensuring the enforcement of laws in place. Many of these had no address and, according to some claims, were prone to indoctrinating their followers and exploiting congregants.

Intervention in intra-religious conflict resolution

The law governing faith-based organizations empowers organizations to resolve internal conflicts, requiring that they have organs in charge of conflict resolution, and to seek support and intervention from immediately superior organs. The case is referred to the Board only if the claiming party is unsatisfied with the decision taken by the forum of umbrellas. Though an organization, an umbrella, a forum of umbrellas, or a ministry can be dissolved after approval by its supreme organ based on its statutes, the decision is communicated to the Board before implementation. I observe that the law has remained silent on the power of the Board over such a decision, or whether the Board can revoke it.

SUMMARY *

The article’s argument rests on a historical claim with a legal consequence. If religious institutions were among the instruments through which the genocide was prepared and carried out, then the state’s interest in what is preached within them is not an ordinary regulatory interest but a security one, and the general presumption against interference gives way. From this the author derives the case for the framework of 2018 and for its enforcement, including the closure of thousands of places of worship. The article is not uncritical of that framework: it identifies the tithe, the practice of prophecy and the collection of offerings as the areas where exploitation actually occurs and where the law is silent, and it notes the unresolved question of what powers local authorities hold over the reports submitted to them.

CONCLUSION

When discussing the necessity of regulating faith-based organizations in Rwanda, a straightforward view would conclude that every regulation potentially interferes with religious freedom. In contrast, a more objective view is that it is helpful to set limits on religious freedom to protect public security, morals, and order. While the primary goal of religion and religious teaching is to help believers prepare themselves for the ultimate goal through the love of God and the love of their neighbours, a few religious bodies that have existed in Rwanda since independence in 1962 moved in the opposite direction. Religion and politics were intertwined, while religious teaching became a means to create and spread hatred, discrimination, divisionism, genocide ideology, and its execution. The result was the genocide committed in 1994, which killed more than one million Tutsi in less than a hundred days. After 1994, religious groups and prayer houses increased as former Rwandan refugees returned home and different people moved to Rwanda for various purposes while contributing to the creation of new groups. Rwandans abandoned their former religions to join new ones or to belong to none. The main reasons were a sense of betrayal by former religious leaders or by their acts prior to and during the genocide. Others expected to receive emotional, psychological, and financial support from these religious groups.

Undoubtedly, that high increase of religious groups is not free from criticism: many religious groups lacked the infrastructure required to host their members, religious teachings were abused as some preachers and self-styled prophets used them as devices for financial gain from their poor followers, and conflicts within religious groups increased. This religious crisis necessitated the legislator’s intervention to set clear and binding guidelines for establishing, registering, operating, and managing faith-based organizations in 2018 and to empower the Rwanda Governance Board to implement the law. Since then, the organization and functioning of faith-based organizations have been harmonized and regular monitoring processes have been carried out, while many religious groups that did not fulfil legal requirements were closed and various religious leaders and preachers were suspended or removed. In the present paper, I supported the necessity for the state’s intervention in religious activities as an exception to the principle of separation of Church and state. I must emphasize that the state is responsible for the security of citizens and must use all possible means to fulfil that responsibility. Finally, I recommend reviewing the existing monitoring system to evaluate the content of the spiritual messages delivered to believers in different religious groups. While recognizing that this is a significant challenge in regulating faith-based organizations, I reiterate that religious teachings and spiritual messages should emphasize the love of God and the love of neighbours instead of the malpractices of some religious groups, leaders, and preachers, especially the abuse of the meaning and value of sacrifices and the tithe, of revelation and miracles, and the issue of night prayers in prayer houses.

POTENTIAL SOLUTION *

The article makes a serious case and it can be tested against the standard that governs this question in international law, which is more demanding than either side of the debate the author describes.

Freedom of religion has two components. The freedom to hold a belief is absolute and admits no limitation. The freedom to manifest it may be limited, but only where the limitation is prescribed by law, pursues one of the enumerated aims of public safety, order, health, morals or the rights of others, and is necessary and proportionate to that aim. Rwanda’s constitutional formulation reproduces this structure. The consequence is that the debate is not between regulation and freedom but about whether particular measures meet the test, and each measure has to be assessed separately rather than justified by the aim in general.

Applied that way, the measures the article describes fall into distinguishable groups. Requirements concerning building safety, capacity and noise are ordinary public safety regulation, apply to secular gatherings equally, and are unproblematic. The prohibition on preaching that incites ethnic hatred is not merely permitted but required, since the Genocide Convention obliges states to prevent incitement and the international tribunal’s judgments established that such speech preceded and enabled the killing. Financial transparency obligations likewise apply to associations generally.

The educational qualification for preachers is where the analysis becomes harder, and it is worth stating the difficulty plainly rather than assuming it away. A degree requirement bears unevenly on traditions with formal seminary structures and those without, and it can operate in practice to advantage established churches over newer congregations, which are precisely the ones the article identifies as having grown because people left the established churches. That does not make it unlawful; it means the justification has to be specific to the harm, and the harm the author actually documents concerns exploitation and dangerous teaching rather than the absence of a degree. The narrower measures that address the documented harm directly, and which the article rightly notes the law omits, are financial disclosure to congregations, a complaints route for members, and rules on the solicitation of offerings.

Two further observations. Prior authorisation as a condition of worship has been examined by human rights bodies in a number of jurisdictions, and the consistent finding is that registration is acceptable where it is declaratory and objection is possible only on defined grounds, and problematic where a discretionary authority decides which groups may exist. Where thousands of congregations are closed in a short period, the questions that determine which of these is happening are procedural: was notice given, was time allowed to comply, was there an appeal to an independent body, and were the criteria published in advance. The article does not address these, and they are what a defender of the policy would most usefully establish.

Finally, the article’s own conclusion contains the point at which caution is most warranted. Reviewing the content of spiritual messages is a substantially different undertaking from regulating buildings or accounts, and the state that acquires the power to assess doctrine has acquired something it will be asked to use again. The history the author recounts is precisely why this is difficult: the churches were captured by the politics of their day, and the remedy proposed places the assessment of religious teaching in the hands of the state. The safer route, and the one this journal would recommend, runs through the religious communities themselves: umbrella bodies with genuine authority to set standards, internal complaint mechanisms, and interfaith structures that address abuse from within, supported by the state and not administered by it. That preserves the protection while leaving the content of belief where the constitutional guarantee places it.

* Added by the WMO Editorial Team

REFERENCES

Balmer, Crispian. “Pope Francis Asks for Forgiveness for Church’s Role in Rwanda Genocide.” Reuters, March 20, 2017. https://www.reuters.com/article/world/pope-asks-forgiveness-for-church-role-in-rwanda-genocide-idUSKBN16R1DI/. Accessed 12 August 2024.

Court, Anthony. “Can the Rwandan Catholic Church Overcome Its History of Politicization? A Reply to Philippe Denis.” Journal for the Study of Religion 32, no. 2 (2019). http://dx.doi.org/10.17159/2413-3027/2019/v32n2a2.

Gasana, Sebastien, and Védaste Habamenshi. “The Problematic of Today’s Spectacular Counterfeit Miracles, Tongues, Healing and Prophecies Assimilated as Gifts of the Holy Spirit: Experience of Christian Churches in Rwanda.” Vol. 8, no. 4 (November 4, 2018): 59 to 81.

Kamanzi, Nicole M. “RGB Dissolves ADEPR Church Leadership.” Igihe, October 4, 2020. https://en.igihe.com/news/article/rgb-dissolves-adepr-church-leadership. Accessed 12 August 2024.

Kingston, Kato. “Concealment of Illegally Obtained Assets in Nigeria: Revisiting the Role of the Churches in Money Laundering.” African Journal of International and Comparative Law 28 (February 1, 2020): 106 to 121. https://doi.org/10.3366/ajicl.2020.0304.

Kubai, Anne. “Post-Genocide Rwanda: The Changing Religious Landscape.” Exchange 36, no. 2 (2007): 198 to 214. https://doi.org/10.1163/157254307X176606.

Kumar, Vandana Ajay. “Money Laundering: Concept, Significance and Its Impact.” European Journal of Business and Management 4, no. 2 (2012): 113 to 119.

Longman, Timothy. Christianity and Genocide in Rwanda. African Studies. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2009. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511642043.

Ngabonziza, Dan. “New Law on Religious Institutions Due Next Week.” KT Press, July 15, 2018. https://www.ktpress.rw/2018/07/new-law-on-religious-institutions-due-next-week/. Accessed 13 August 2024.

Nwazuni, Osajie J. “Religious Leaders as Agents of Peace and Security for Sustainable Development in Nigeria.” UJAH 21, no. 4, Special Edition (2021): 260 to 273. http://dx.doi.org/10.4314/ujah.v21i4.15.

Nzwili, Patrick. “Rwanda Government Shuts More than 5,000 Churches over Code Violations.” Religion News Service, published in The Baptist Paper, August 9, 2024. https://thebaptistpaper.org/rwanda-government-shuts-more-than-5000-churches-over-code-violations/.

Official Gazette. Constitution of the Republic of Rwanda, as Revised in 2023, Special Issue of 04/08/2023 (2023).

Official Gazette. Law Determining Offences and Penalties in General, Special Issue of 27/09/2018 (2018).

Official Gazette. Law Determining the Organisation and Functioning of Faith-Based Organisations, no. 37 bis (2018).

Supplementary references added by the WMO Editorial Team

International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, 1966, Article 18, and General Comment No. 22 of the Human Rights Committee on freedom of thought, conscience and religion.

African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights, 1981, Article 8.

Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, 1948, Articles I and III(c).

International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda, Prosecutor v. Nahimana, Barayagwiza and Ngeze (Media Case), Judgment, 3 December 2003.

Organization for Security and Co operation in Europe and Venice Commission (2014). Guidelines on the Legal Personality of Religious or Belief Communities, Warsaw and Venice.

Reports of the United Nations Special Rapporteur on freedom of religion or belief, in particular on registration requirements for religious communities.

Longman, T. (2010). Christianity and Genocide in Rwanda. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge.

Denis, P. (2020). Church and State in Rwanda: A Contested History. Journal for the Study of Religion, 33(1).

How good people turn evil – the Rwandan Genocide

How to cite this journal: Author, Date of the post, WMO Conflict Insight, Title of the post, ISSN: 2628 6998, https://worldmediation.org/journal/

EDITORIAL NOTE *

This article concerns the genocide committed against the Tutsi in Rwanda in 1994. That genocide is an established historical and legal fact. The article addresses the question of why ordinary people participated in it, and the explanations it examines are offered as analysis and not as extenuation.

ABSTRACT

The following article explores the Rwandan genocide, highlighting the involvement of “ordinary” people in mass killings. Drawing on historical context and perpetrator testimonies, it reveals complex motivations behind genocide. It emphasizes the need for vigilant civil societies and robust institutions like the rule of law to prevent future atrocities.

KEYWORDS *

Genocide, Rwanda, Tutsi, perpetrators, ordinary people, obedience, social dynamics, early warning signs, atrocity prevention, Gacaca, testimony, rule of law

INTRODUCTION

Humans are generally good, at least, that is what most people want to believe. This view is mirrored in the thoughts of countless philosophers like John Locke. Most people cannot imagine using violence against other human beings. Or at least, most people want to believe that. We want to have a positive self-image; we want to believe that we are intrinsically good people. That includes living peacefully with our neighbours. However, history is full of examples of humans persecuting other social groups who are knowingly harmed by others: the support of broad German society for the concentration camps in the Third Reich (Goeschel and Wachsmann 2010) or the violence against the Rohingya (OHCHR 2023). One historical example is even more shocking: in the genocide committed against the Tutsi in Rwanda in 1994, “normal” people got involved in brutal violence, turning against and killing their neighbours and friends. How is such an escalation in genocides possible? What makes good people turn evil?

MAIN CORPUS

Causes of and motivations behind genocide

Genocides are a complex phenomenon and are never monocausal. Even though a common belief is that the main root of these atrocities is a deep-seated hatred amongst social groups, Straus (2016) contradicts that, as “deep social divisions, ethnic conflict, distrust between ethnic, regional, or religious groups, and the existence of prejudice and stereotypes, are fairly common globally”, while genocides, on the other hand, are relatively uncommon. He lists instability and conflict, ideology, and previous discrimination and violence as causal factors. These findings show that most people are not intrinsically motivated by their emotions to participate in a genocide. Rather, there seems to be a strategy behind it. This is supported by the fact that there are early warning signs, which of course are not bullet-proof, but can alert the international community (ibid.; USHMM w.D.a). These signs include tension and polarization, apocalyptic public rhetoric, labelling civilian groups as the “enemy”, and removing moderates from leadership or public service.

Naturally, there is no genocide without perpetrators. But how does a person become a perpetrator? Literature suggests that a specific percentage of every society are perpetrators, at least in theory (Baum 2008). While some sources put this percentage at 2 to 15 per cent, others put it at 15 to 20 per cent. Whatever the exact number may be, this social research suggests that in every society, there are people who do not share the same empathy and compassion towards other people as the majority of society. After committing an atrocity, those perpetrators do not feel remorse or guilt.

Hutu against Tutsi: the Rwandan genocide

After gaining independence in 1962, “Rwanda’s population was composed of three ethnic groups: Hutu, Tutsi, and Twa” (USHMM w.D.b). The Hutu population, being the majority, was in power, and Tutsi had been discriminated against from the 1960s on. During this period, there were already incidents of mass violence against Tutsi, and many had to flee the country. A turning point in the long-term conflict between both groups was when “a Tutsi rebel force invaded Rwanda from the north” in 1990 (ibid.). Hutu extremists became radicalized when the war between the government and rebels reached a stalemate, leading to a peace agreement that foresaw a government with power shared between Hutu and Tutsi. When Rwandan President Habyarimana was killed when his aircraft was shot down, Hutu extremists took advantage of the convoluted circumstances. Violence spread when the extremists killed moderate Hutu who stood in their way of promoting genocide against the Tutsi. Tutsi and suspected Tutsi were killed in major massacres when seeking refuge in churches, schools, and government buildings, as well as in their own homes. Actual numbers of the death toll vary; according to the USHMM (w.D.b), “as many as one million people, mostly Tutsis, were slaughtered in 100 days”, while other scholarly sources put the death toll lower. Straus (2004) puts the number at “at least 500,000 civilians”.

The genocide against the Tutsi is not only extremely shocking due to the high death toll in a short time but also because of the broad involvement of “ordinary” citizens. In the Gacaca system, a community court system implemented especially for the reconciliation process, more than 1.2 million cases were tried (USHMM w.D.b). How could that many people become involved in the mass killings?

Rwandan perpetrators

The violence of the Rwandan genocide puzzles scholars. “Neighbors are not supposed to kill neighbors, let alone commit genocide against them”, Fujii (2010) states. Not only is the killing of kith and kin on that scale very uncommon, but the question also arises why rural civilians became perpetrators when peace would have gained them more than violence (ibid.).

Straus (2016) focuses on emotions as a motivation behind participation in the genocide. He talks about a period of “emotional momentum”. In interviews and in the courts after the genocide, perpetrators gave two main motivations. One was built on this emotional momentum: many perpetrators allegedly were afraid because of the unrest and violence before the genocide. In fear for their lives, “they chose to take part in the violence” (Straus 2016). At the same time, they feared repercussions from the authorities, which had planned the genocide, if they did not take part in the violence.

However, Fujii (2010) gives a different explanation. According to her field study, there is little evidence that supports a strong hatred among Hutu against Tutsi. She also dismisses fear as the motivator for participation. Instead, she uses the social interaction argument. Most of the perpetrators who did not have any military training before the genocide and who only killed rather than planned the atrocities, “Joiners” in Fujii’s terms, seemed to have killed people who had been accused of something. Social dynamics were at the centre of changing behaviour. “Even the most active Joiners did not act the same offstage as on” (ibid.). Another important factor was group identity and strength in numbers; the creation of new groups produced more killings, which in turn created more and stronger groups. A vicious cycle started.

But who exactly were the perpetrators or “Joiners”? Reviewing certain testimonies shows different personality types. In the testimony of Jean de Dieu Twahirwa, a convicted perpetrator of the Rwandan genocide, he confesses to killing three Tutsi in a massacre at a Catholic church (Aegis Trust 2020). When asked about his motivations, he confirms what Straus (2016) and Fujii (2010) already stated: it was the “leaders” who motivated him and other perpetrators in the mass killings. “They really motivated us to get involved in the killings,” he said (Aegis Trust 2020). His feelings towards Tutsi seem to have been dualistic even during the genocide. On the one hand, he felt threatened by the Tutsi and believed they wanted to suppress Hutu; on the other hand, he said that he felt sad when he saw his former classmates being killed at the Catholic church. After the incident at the church, he claimed to have fled Rwanda, and he did not take part in any other killings. Even after the genocide, he stated he needed to confess to his crimes to relieve himself of the guilt and to ask for forgiveness.

Twahirwa’s motivations, following the orders of authorities, are mirrored by other testimonies. The Rwandan genocide “was sponsored and conceived from above by a small group of powerful extremists in President Habyarimana’s regime. These mighty few objected to the power-sharing terms of a recently signed peace agreement between Habyarimana and the RPF. Through genocide, they sought to maintain their monopoly on power” (Fujii 2010).

Were the “Joiners” then only used as instruments by the elite who planned the genocide? It is worth looking at some other testimonies as well. For example, the testimonies of members of a group of farmers in Kibungo who killed some 50,000 of their Tutsi neighbours, about 85 per cent of the Tutsi population in that region (Baum 2008). One of the perpetrators states: “Some offenders claim that we changed into wild animals, that we were blinded by ferocity, that is a trick to sidetrack the truth” (ibid.). Even while confessing, there is a total lack of remorse for the atrocities committed.

Learnings from the past

The various perpetrator groups involved in the genocide against the Tutsi should give us pause for thought, and we must learn different lessons from their involvement. It is worrying that there are people in our society who feel less empathy than the majority of society. At the same time, the involvement of people who themselves feel and express empathy and remorse shows that it is not only the people who are categorized as ‘perpetrators’ by academia who become perpetrators themselves but also people outside this group. This means that in certain situations, people can also become perpetrators who would never expect it of themselves.

The fact that ordinary people without a prior history of extraordinary violent behaviour can become perpetrators involved in genocide or other atrocities is troubling. These findings are in line with the findings of Holocaust research (Hale 2020) and the results of experiments like the Milgram experiment (Miller 2014). We have to acknowledge that individuals who are not inherently violent can still be driven to commit horrific acts under the influence of fear, social dynamics, and authoritative manipulation. This understanding compels us to recognize the potential for atrocity in any society and thus gives us an approach to global genocide and mass atrocity prevention. By acknowledging that genocides are not solely the product of deep-seated ethnic hatred but rather the culmination of strategic manipulation and social pressures, international efforts can focus on early intervention strategies.

SUMMARY *

The article’s central tension lies between two explanations it presents without collapsing them into one. If a fixed proportion of any population lacks ordinary empathy, then perpetrators are a distinct category and the question is how they come to be released. If, as the research on Rwanda largely finds, participation was driven by fear, authority and the dynamics of groups formed in the moment, then the category dissolves and the relevant question becomes what conditions convert neighbours into killers. The author declines to choose, and the testimonies assembled here support that reluctance: one man describes sorrow at the killing of his former classmates and a need to confess; others, decades later, insist that they were not blinded by anything and knew exactly what they were doing. The preventive conclusion drawn holds in either case, since it concerns conditions rather than persons.

CONCLUSION

Particularly in this day and age, when politics and social media fuel emotions and especially hatred, we need a vigilant civil society that closely monitors these developments, exposes abuses, and takes a stand against them. And precisely because all people can become potential perpetrators, we need institutions such as the rule of law to protect minorities from the arbitrariness of others.

POTENTIAL SOLUTION *

The article’s most important move is its refusal to settle on a single explanation, and the reason that refusal is correct deserves stating. Research on Rwanda has converged on the finding that participation was heterogeneous: the small group that planned the genocide, the local officials who organised it, the militia who led the killing, and the very large number who joined, hesitated, complied, fled or resisted were not one population and did not act for one reason. The most consistent finding across the field studies, which the article’s own sources support, is that participation was better predicted by local social ties, by the presence of an authority figure willing to give orders, and by whether one’s neighbours were participating, than by anything about the individual. That is what makes the conclusion generalisable, and it is also why the figure of a fixed percentage of latent perpetrators should be treated with caution: it locates the danger in a type of person, when the evidence locates it in a type of situation.

Two additions strengthen the preventive argument. The article names early warning signs, and the record shows that in this case they were seen. Dehumanising broadcasts, lists of names, the distribution of machetes and the organisation of militias were all reported before April 1994, including in a cable from the force commander of the United Nations mission in January. The independent inquiry commissioned afterwards concluded that the failure lay not in information but in the will to act on it. Prevention research has therefore shifted from improving detection toward the harder question of what makes decision makers respond, and the answers identified, standing capacity, pre agreed triggers, and political costs for inaction, are institutional rather than analytical.

The second concerns what actually stopped participation where it was stopped. Alongside the perpetrators, Rwanda produced a substantial number of people who hid neighbours at mortal risk to themselves, and the research on rescuers across atrocities finds that they were not distinguished by exceptional moral conviction but by circumstance: prior close relationships across the dividing line, membership of a group with its own authority structure that did not endorse the killing, and, above all, being asked. If ordinary people become perpetrators through social dynamics, they also become rescuers through them, and prevention that builds cross community ties in ordinary times is acting on the same mechanism from the other direction.

Finally, the article’s turn to the present deserves to be made specific, because the comparison is closer than a general warning about social media suggests. The role of Radio Télévision Libre des Mille Collines is among the most studied features of this genocide, and its function was less to create hatred than to identify targets, signal that killing was sanctioned, and let each listener know that others were participating. That is precisely the function that platform amplification performs now, and the finding matters for how it is addressed: what proved dangerous was not the expression of prejudice but the coordination of action and the manufacture of the impression that everyone was already doing it. The conclusion is a demanding one and follows from the article’s own argument. If atrocity is a matter of situation rather than character, then no society can regard itself as exempt, and the institutions the author names, an independent judiciary, protected minorities, a press that is not an instrument, exist to hold at the point where individual conscience has repeatedly been shown to give way.

* Added by the WMO Editorial Team

REFERENCES

Aegis Trust (2020) Testimony of Jean de Dieu Twahirwa, Genocide Perpetrator. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MslanLXzx6Y

Baum, S. (2008) The Psychology of Genocide: Perpetrators, Bystanders, and Rescuers. Cambridge and New York: Cambridge University Press.

Fujii, L. A. (2009) Killing Neighbors: Webs of Violence in Rwanda. Ithaca and London: Cornell University Press.

Goeschel, C. and Wachsmann, N. (2010) Before Auschwitz: The Formation of the Nazi Concentration Camps, 1933 to 1939. Journal of Contemporary History 45(3), 515 to 534.

Hale, R. (2020) ‘They Were Just Following Orders’: Relationships between Milgram’s Obedience Experiments and Conceptions of Holocaust Perpetration. In: Foster, S., Pearce, A. and Pettigrew, A. (eds.) Holocaust Education: Contemporary Challenges and Controversies. UCL Press.

Miller, A. G. (2014) The Explanatory Value of Milgram’s Obedience Experiments: A Contemporary Appraisal. Journal of Social Issues 70(3), 558 to 573.

OHCHR (2023) UN Expert Demands Accountability for the Rohingya and an End to ‘Paralysis of Indifference’.

Straus, S. (2004) How Many Perpetrators Were There in the Rwandan Genocide? An Estimate. Journal of Genocide Research 6(1), 85 to 98.

Straus, S. (2016) Fundamentals of Genocide and Mass Atrocity Prevention. Washington, D.C.: United States Holocaust Memorial Museum.

USHMM (w.D.a) What Have We Learned about the Risk Factors and Warning Signs of Genocide?

USHMM (w.D.b) The Rwanda Genocide.

Supplementary references added by the WMO Editorial Team

Report of the Independent Inquiry into the Actions of the United Nations during the 1994 Genocide in Rwanda, United Nations, 15 December 1999.

Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide, 1948.

United Nations Office on Genocide Prevention (2014). Framework of Analysis for Atrocity Crimes: A Tool for Prevention, New York.

Straus, S. (2006). The Order of Genocide: Race, Power, and War in Rwanda. Cornell University Press, Ithaca.

Des Forges, A. (1999). Leave None to Tell the Story: Genocide in Rwanda. Human Rights Watch, New York.

Yanagizawa Drott, D. (2014). Propaganda and Conflict: Evidence from the Rwandan Genocide. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 129(4), 1947 to 1994.

McDoom, O. S. (2013). Antisocial Capital: A Profile of Rwandan Genocide Perpetrators’ Social Networks. Journal of Conflict Resolution, 58(5), 865 to 893.

Monroe, K. R. (2011). Ethics in an Age of Terror and Genocide: Identity and Moral Choice. Princeton University Press, Princeton.