Humanitarian Intervention and Conflict Resolution in West Africa

The end of the Cold War has been characterised by a wave of violent civil wars that have produced unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe and suffering. Although mostly intra-state, these conflicts have spread across borders and threatened international peace and security through mass refugee flow, proliferation of light arms and the rise of local mercenary groups. One of the most affected areas is the West African sub-region which has been home to some of Africa's most brutal and intractable conflicts for more than a decade.Kabia locates these operations within an expanded post-Cold War conceptualisation of humanitarian intervention and examines the organisation's capacity in protecting civilians at risk in civil conflicts and facilitating the processes of peacemaking and post-war peacebuilding aimed at preventing a relapse into conflict. By using the empirical case of ECOWAS, this book examines the challenges posed by complex political emergencies (CPEs) to humanitarian intervention. It traces the evolution of ECOWAS from an economic integration project to that of a security organisation and examines the challenges inherent in such a transition.