Hostname: page-component-7c8c6479df-94d59 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-03-28T17:39:18.426Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false

United Nations peace operations as international practices: Revisiting the UN mission’s armed raids against gangs in Haiti

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  22 June 2018

Lou Pingeot*
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, McGill University
*
*Corresponding author. Email: lou.pingeot@mail.mcgill.ca

Abstract

This article develops an International Practice Theory (IPT) approach to United Nations peace operations through the study of the UN Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH). MINUSTAH saw the introduction of new practices within the context of a UN peace operation, namely the use of joint military-police forces to conduct offensive action against armed groups that were labelled as ‘gangs’. While more objectivist problem-solving approaches would argue that the UN mission was simply adapting to the situation on the ground, an IPT lens reveals that there was considerable struggle to integrate these new practices within the repertoire of peacekeeping. The article argues for the benefits of applying an IPT lens to peace operations while proposing to develop theoretical and methodological approaches that have been less prominent in IPT. Theoretically, it posits that IPT can better articulate practice and discourse by paying more attention to what actors say about what they do.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
© British International Studies Association 2018 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 Bellamy, Alex J., ‘The “next stage” in peace operations theory?’, International Peacekeeping, 11:1 (2004), pp. 1738 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

2 See, for example, Cunliffe, Philip, ‘Still the spectre at the feast: Comparisons between peacekeeping and imperialism in peacekeeping studies today’, International Peacekeeping, 19:4 (2012), pp. 426442 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

3 Autesserre, Séverine, Peaceland: Conflict Resolution and the Everyday Politics of International Intervention (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2014)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

4 Ibid., p. 9.

5 For a definition of habitus, see, for example, Goetze, Catherine, The Distinction of Peace: A Social Analysis of Peacebuilding (Ann Arbor, MI: University of Michigan Press, 2017), pp. 2728 Google Scholar: ‘The particular force of social fields is to keep all actors inside the field through their interiorization of the “rules of the game”. This interiorization, the dispositions that make actors act in a manner that is appropriate to their position in the field and to the field itself, is called habitus. Hence, the reason why peacebuilders do not change their behavior is simply that practices, habits, and behavior do not change easily once they are normalized as habitus.’

6 See, for example, Betts, Anne Fetherston and Carolyn Nordstrom, ‘Overcoming habitus in conflict management: UN peacekeeping and war zone ethnography’, Peace & Change, 20:1 (1995), pp. 94119 Google Scholar; Pouligny, Beatrice, Peace Operations Seen from Below: UN Missions and Local People (Bloomfield, CT: Kumarian Press, 2006)Google Scholar; Jacob Sending, Ole, Why Peacebuilders Fail to Secure Ownership and be Sensitive to Context (Oslo: NUPI Working Paper, 2009)Google Scholar; Goetze, Catherine and de Guevera, Berit Bliesemann, ‘The “statebuilding habitus”: UN staff and the cultural dimension of liberal intervention in Kosovo’, in Berit Bliesemann de Guevara (ed.), Statebuilding and State-Formation: The Political Sociology of Intervention (London and New York, NY: Routledge, 2012), pp. 198213 Google Scholar.

7 See, for example, Kaldor, Mary, New and Old Wars: Organized Violence in a Global Era (Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press, 1999)Google Scholar.

8 The diplomatic cables released by Wikileaks are instructive in that regard. See Kim Ives and Ansel Herz, ‘Wikileaks Haiti: The Aristide Files’, The Nation, available at: {https://www.thenation.com/article/wikileaks-haiti-aristide-files/} accessed 30 January 2018.

9 United Nations, Security Council Resolution 1542 (New York, NY: UN, 30 April 2004).

10 United Nations, Handbook on United Nations Multidimensional Peacekeeping Operations (New York, NY: UN, 2003)Google Scholar.

11 Cockayne, James, ‘Winning Haiti’s protection competition: Organized crime and peace operations past, present and future’, International Peacekeeping, 16:1 (2009), pp. 7799 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Dorn, Walter A., ‘Intelligence-led peacekeeping: The United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (Minustah), 2006–07’, Intelligence and National Security, 24:6 (2009), pp. 805835 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Lynch, Colum, ‘UN peacekeeping more assertive, creating risk for civilians’, Washington Post (15 August 2005), p. A10 Google Scholar.

12 See Dorn, ‘Intelligence-led peacekeeping’, p. 818 for a list of raids in 2007.

13 Friesendorf, Cornelius and Penksa, Susan E., ‘Militarized law enforcement in peace operations: EUFOR in Bosnia and Herzegovina’, International Peacekeeping, 15:5 (2008), pp. 677694 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

14 Manwaring, Max G., Street Gangs: The New Urban Insurgency (Carlisle, PA: Strategic Studies Institute, 2005)Google Scholar.

15 Manwaring, Max G., ‘Gangs and coups d’streets in the new world disorder: Protean insurgents in post-modern war’, Global Crime, 7:3–4 (2006), pp. 505543 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

16 Sanderson, Thomas M., ‘Transnational terror and organized crime: Blurring the lines’, SAIS Review of International Affairs, 24:1 (2004), pp. 4961 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

17 John de Boer and Louise Bosetti, ‘The Crime-Conflict “Nexus”: State of the Evidence’, United Nations University Centre for Policy Research Occasional Paper, No. 5 (July 2015).

18 Kemp, Walter, Shaw, Mark, and Boutellis, Arthur, The Elephant in the Room: How Can Peace Operations Deal with Organized Crime (New York, NY: International Peace Institute, 2013)Google Scholar.

19 Rodgers, Dennis and Muggah, Robert, ‘Gangs as non-state armed groups: the Central American case’, Contemporary Security Policy, 30:2 (2009), p. 313 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

20 Hazen, Jennifer M., ‘Understanding gangs as armed groups’, International Review of the Red Cross, 92:878 (2010), pp. 369386 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

21 Ibid., p. 381.

22 Rodgers and Muggah, ‘Gangs as non-state armed groups’ on Mara Salvatrucha.

23 Cockayne, James and Lupel, Adam, ‘Introduction: Rethinking the relationship between peace operations and organized crime’, International Peacekeeping, 16:1 (2009), p. 8 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

24 Cockayne, James and Lupel, Adam, ‘Conclusion: From iron fist to invisible hand: Peace operations, organized crime and intelligent international law enforcement’, International Peacekeeping, 16:1 (2009), pp. 151168 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

25 Cockayne and Lupel, ‘Introduction’, p. 5.

26 Muggah, Robert, ‘The transnational gang: Challenging the conventional narrative’, in Timothy M. Shaw, Andrew J. Grant, and Scarlett Cornelissen (eds), The Ashgate Research Companion to Regionalisms (Burlington, VT: Ashgate, 2011), p. 342 Google Scholar.

27 Call, Charles T., ‘The fallacy of the “failed state”’, Third World Quarterly, 29:8 (2008), pp. 14911507 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

28 Rodgers and Muggah, ‘Gangs as non-state armed groups’, p. 313.

29 Bhatia, Michael, ‘Fighting words: Naming terrorists, bandits, rebels and other violent actors’, Third World Quarterly, 26:1 (2005), p. 6 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

30 Schmidt, Hans, The United States Occupation of Haiti, 1915–1934 (New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press, 1995)Google Scholar.

31 Andreas, Peter, ‘Symbiosis between peace operations and illicit business in Bosnia’, International Peacekeeping, 16:1 (2009), p. 43 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

32 Kaldor, New and Old Wars; Collier, Paul and Hoeffler, Anke, ‘Greed and grievance in civil war’, Oxford Economic Papers, 56:4 (2004), pp. 563595 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For a critique, see Kalyvas, Stathis N., ‘“New” and “old” civil wars: a valid distinction?’, World Politics, 54:1 (2001), pp. 99118 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

33 Goetze, Catherine, ‘Warlords and states: a contemporary myth of the international system’, in Berit Bliesemann de Guevara (ed.), Myth and Narrative in International Politics: Interpretive Approaches to the Study of IR (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016)Google Scholar.

34 Bellamy, ‘The “next stage” in peace operations theory?’, p. 27.

35 Adler, Emanuel and Pouliot, Vincent, ‘International practices’, International Theory, 3:11 (2011), pp. 67 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

36 Neumann, Iver B., ‘Returning practice to the linguistic turn: the case of diplomacy’, Millennium: Journal of International Studies, 31:3 (2002), p. 636 Google Scholar.

37 Cited in Neumann, ‘Returning practice to the linguistic turn’, p. 633.

38 Ibid., p. 637.

39 Wagenaar, Hendrik, Meaning in Action: Interpretation and Dialogue in Policy Analysis (London; New York, NY: Routledge, 2015), p. 211 Google Scholar.

40 Bueger, Christian, ‘Practice, pirates and coast guards: the grand narrative of Somali piracy’, Third World Quarterly, 34:10 (2013), pp. 1812, 1820 CrossRefGoogle Scholar. Bueger, however, often uses ‘narrative’ and ‘story’ interchangeably.

41 Ibid., p. 628.

42 Pouliot, Vincent, ‘Methodology’, in Rebecca Adler-Nissen (ed.), Bourdieu in International Relations: Rethinking Key Concepts in IR (New York, NY: Routledge, 2013), p. 49 Google Scholar.

43 Celikates, Robin, ‘From critical social theory to a social theory of critique: On the critique of ideology after the pragmatic turn’, Constellations, 13:1 (2006), pp. 2140 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Martin-Mazé, Médéric, ‘Returning struggles to the practice turn: How were Bourdieu and Boltanski lost in (some) translations and what to do about it?’, International Political Sociology, 11:2 (2017), pp. 203220 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

44 Celikates, ‘From critical social theory to a social theory of critique’, p. 26.

45 Bueger, Christian and Gadinger, Frank, International Practice Theory: New Perspectives (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014), p. 52 Google Scholar.

46 Ibid., p. 82.

47 Neumann, ‘Returning practice to the linguistic turn’, p. 637.

48 According to the Innovations for Successful Societies website, ‘ISS enables practitioners to tell their unique stories’, available at: {http://successfulsocieties.princeton.edu/about} accessed 27 September 2017.

49 Bueger and Gadinger, International Practice Theory, p. 90.

50 Hynes, Samuel, The Soldiers’ Tale: Bearing Witness to a Modern War (London: Penguin, 1998), p. 16 Google Scholar.

51 Hynes, The Soldiers’ Tale.

52 Duncanson, Claire, Forces for Good? Military Masculinities and Peacebuilding in Afghanistan and Iraq (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013), pp. 5354 Google Scholar.

53 Lewis, David, ‘Commodifying development experience: Deconstructing development as gift in the development blockbuster’, Anthropological Forum, 24:4 (2014), p. 445 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

54 Langellier, Kristin M., ‘Personal narratives: Perspectives on theory and research’, Text and Performance Quarterly, 9:4 (1989), p. 261 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

55 Prior, Lindsay, ‘Repositioning documents in social research’, Sociology, 9:4 (2008), pp. 821836 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

56 Jackson, Patrick T., ‘Making sense of making sense’, in Dvora Yanow and Peregrine Schwartz-Shea (eds), Interpretation and Method: Empirical Research Methods and the Interpretive Turn (New York, NY: Routledge, 2006), pp. 264280 Google Scholar.

57 Kohler-Riessman, Catherine, ‘Analysis of personal narratives’, in Anne E. Fortune, William J. Reid, and Robert Miller (eds), Qualitative Research in Social Work (New York, NY: Columbia University Press, 2013), pp. 168191 Google Scholar.

58 As de Certeau points out, ‘there is a strange disparity between the way of treating practices and that of treating discourses. Whereas the first way records the “truth” about operating, the second way decodes the “lies” of speech.’ Cited in Neumann, ‘Returning practice to the linguistic turn’, p. 633.

59 Wagenaar, Meaning in Action, p. 214.

60 Jackson, ‘Making sense of making sense’, p. 273.

61 United Nations, Security Council Resolution 1702 (New York, NY: UN, 2006)Google Scholar.

62 Aldunate, Eduardo, Backpacks Full of Hope: The UN Mission in Haiti (Waterloo, ON: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2010), p. 127 Google Scholar.

63 Schuberth, Moritz, ‘A transformation from political to criminal violence? Politics, organised crime and the shifting functions of Haiti’s urban armed groups’, Conflict, Security & Development, 15:2 (2015), p. 177 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

64 Di Razza, Namie, L’ONU en Haïti depuis 2004: Ambitions et Déconvenues des Opérations de Paix Multidimensionnelles (Paris: L’Harmattan, 2010), pp. 5762 Google Scholar.

65 As recounted in Aldunate, Backpacks Full of Hope, pp. 28–9.

66 Gabriel Valdés, Juan, ‘Uso De La Fuerza, Elecciones Y Desafíos De La Minustah’, Revista Fuerzas Armadas y Sociedad, 19:1 (2005), p. 5 Google Scholar. All translations by author.

67 Aldunate, Backpacks Full of Hope, p. 21.

68 Sanchez Mariño, Horacio, ‘La Campaña De Haiti: Una Experienca Sudamericana’, in Fabian Bosoer and Fabian C. Calle (eds), 2010: Una Agenda Para La Region (Buenos Aires: Taeda Editora, 2007), p. 55 Google Scholar.

69 Ibid., p. 431.

70 Valdés, ‘Uso De La Fuerza’, p. 13.

71 Le Chevallier, Gerard, ‘The “MINUSTAH Experience”’, in Jorge Heine and Andrew S. Thompson (eds), Fixing Haiti: MINUSTAH and Beyond (New York, NY: United Nations University Press, 2013), p. 118 Google Scholar.

72 Beer, David, ‘Haiti: the gangs of Cité Soleil’, in Michelle Hughes and Michael Miklaucic (eds), Impunity: Countering Illicit Power in War and Transition (Washington, DC: Center for Complex Operations, 2016), p. 77 Google Scholar.

73 Heleno Ribeiro Pereira, ‘O Componente Militar da Missao’, p. 13.

74 Vianna Braga, Carlos Chagas, ‘MINUSTAH and the security environment in Haiti: Brazil and South American cooperation in the field’, International Peacekeeping, 17:5 (2010), p. 714 Google Scholar.

75 Heleno Ribeiro Pereira, ‘O Componente Militar da Missao’, p. 13.

76 Beer, ‘Haiti: the gangs of Cité Soleil’, p. 84.

77 Aldunate, Backpacks Full of Hope, p. 22.

78 Ibid., p. 142.

79 Dumas, John Reginald P., An Encounter with Haiti: Notes of a Special Adviser (Port of Spain: Medianet Limited, 2008), p. 139 Google Scholar. Incidentally, the fact that Brazilian FC Heleno was clearly reluctant to use force suggests that the idea that MINUSTAH engaged in militarised raids against gangs because Brazilian peacekeepers were in charge and had a history of such raids in Brazil is at best incomplete. Some observers argue that it was actually Brazilian troops’ experience within MINUSTAH that provided the impetus for use of military action in the favelas of Rio de Janeiro ahead of the Olympic Games. See Siman Gomes, Maíra, ‘Analysing interventionism beyond conventional foreign policy rationales: the engagement of Brazil in the United Nations Stabilization Mission in Haiti (Minustah)’, Cambridge Review of International Affairs, 29:3 (2016), pp. 852869 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

80 See Valdés, ‘Uso De La Fuerza’, p. 11.

81 Aldunate, Eduardo, Moral and Political Grounds for the UN Mission in Haiti (Madrid: FRIDE, 2008), p. 11 Google Scholar; Kim Ives, ‘WikiLeaks points to US meddling in Haiti’, Guardian, available at: {https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/cifamerica/2011/jan/21/haiti-wikileaks} accessed 4 February 2018.

82 Aldunate, Backpacks Full of Hope, pp. 105, 56.

83 Ibid., p. 142.

84 Augusto Heleno Ribeiro Pereira, ‘O Componente Militar da Missao das Nacoes Unidas para a Estabilizacao do Haiti’, Military Review, January–February (2007), p. 12. See also Valdés, ‘Uso De La Fuerza’, p. 133.

85 Johnstone, Ian, ‘Dilemmas of robust peace operations’, in Center on International Cooperation (ed.), Annual Review of Global Peace Operations (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner), p. 5 Google Scholar.

86 Aldunate, Backpacks Full of Hope, p. 109.

87 Beer, ‘Haiti: the gangs of Cité Soleil’, p. 81.

88 Beer, ‘Haiti: the gangs of Cité Soleil’; Cockayne, ‘Winning Haiti’s protection competition’; Cockayne, James, ‘The futility of force? Strategic lessons for dealing with unconventional armed groups from the UN’s war on Haiti’s gangs’, Journal of Strategic Studies, 37:5 (2014), pp. 736769 CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Dorn, ‘Intelligence-led peacekeeping’; Dziedzic, Michael and Perito, Robert M., Haiti: Confronting the Gangs of Port-Au-Prince (Washington, DC: United States Institute of Peace, 2008)Google Scholar.

89 Cockayne, ‘The futility of force?’, p. 745.

90 De Coning, Cedric, Coherence and Coordination in United Nations Peacebuilding and Integrated Missions: A Norwegian Perspective (Oslo: NUPI, 2007)Google Scholar; Hänggi, Heiner and Scherrer, Vincenza, Security Sector Reform and UN Integrated Missions: Experience from Burundi, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Haiti, and Kosovo (Geneva: Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces, 2008)Google Scholar.

91 See also Muggah, Robert, ‘Great expectations: (Dis)integrated DDR in Sudan and Haiti’, Humanitarian Exchange Magazine, 37 (March 2007), pp. 2527 Google Scholar; Muggah, Robert, ‘The effects of stabilisation on humanitarian action in Haiti’, Disasters, 34:S3 (2010), pp. 120 CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed.

92 Aldunate, Backpacks Full of Hope, p. 49.

93 Ibid., p. 69.

94 Beer, ‘Haiti: the gangs of Cité Soleil’, p. 82.

95 Ibid., p. 84.

96 United Nations, Security Council Resolution 1608 (New York, NY: United Nations, 2005)Google Scholar.

97 Beer, ‘Haiti: the gangs of Cité Soleil’, p. 84.

98 Durch, William J. and Ker, Michelle, Police in UN Peacekeeping: Improving Selection, Recruitment, and Deployment (New York, NY: International Peace Institute, 2013), p. 7 Google Scholar.

99 Aldunate, Backpacks Full of Hope, p. 68.

100 Beer, ‘Haiti: the gangs of Cité Soleil’, p. 89.

101 Beer, David, Interview by Arthur Boutellis (Princeton, NJ: Bobst Center for Peace and Justice, Princeton University, 2008)Google Scholar.

102 Muir, Graham, Interview by Arthur Boutellis (Princeton, NJ: Bobst Center for Peace and Justice, Princeton University, 2008), p. 17 Google Scholar.

103 Kwasi Agordzo, Benjamin, ‘Filling the “security gap” in post-conflict situations: Could formed police units make a difference?’, International Peacekeeping, 16:2 (2009), pp. 287294 Google Scholar.

104 Hills, Alice, ‘The inherent limits of military forces in policing peace operations’, International Peacekeeping, 8:3 (2001)CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Hill, Stephen M., Beger, Randall R., and Zanetti, John M., ‘Plugging the security gap or springing a leak: Questioning the growth of paramilitary policing in US domestic and foreign policy’, Democracy and Security, 3:3 (2007), pp. 301321 CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

105 Muir, Interview by Arthur Boutellis, p. 8.

106 Dorn, ‘Intelligence-led peacekeeping’, p. 817.

107 See, for instance, Aldunate, Backpacks Full of Hope, p. 143.

108 Dorn, ‘Intelligence-led peacekeeping’, p. 806.

109 Cockayne, ‘The futility of force?’; Dorn, ‘Intelligence-led peacekeeping’.

110 Beer, ‘Haiti: the gangs of Cité Soleil’, p. 85.

111 Dorn, ‘Intelligence-led peacekeeping’, p. 822.

112 Dorn, ‘Intelligence-led peacekeeping’; Dziedzic and Perito, Haiti: Confronting the Gangs of Port-Au-Prince.

113 Dorn, ‘Intelligence-led peacekeeping’, p. 819.

114 Dorn, ‘Intelligence-led peacekeeping’; Dziedzic and Perito, Haiti: Confronting the Gangs of Port-Au-Prince.

115 Beer, ‘Haiti: the gangs of Cité Soleil’, p. 93.

116 Ibid., p. 94. See also International Crisis Group, Consolidating Stability in Haiti, Latin America/Caribbean Report (Brussels: International Crisis Group, 2007), p. 3 Google Scholar.

117 The absence of a comprehensive law enforcement strategy was one of Friesendorf and Penska’s (‘Militarized law enforcement in peace operations’) key findings in their analysis on EUFOR’s actions against organised crime in Bosnia.

118 Cockayne, ‘Winning Haiti’s protection competition’, pp. 90–1. See also Cockayne, ‘The futility of force?’, p. 737.

119 Guéhenno, Jean-Marie, The Fog of Peace: A Memoir of International Peacekeeping in the 21st Century (Washington, DC: Brookings Institution Press, 2015), p. 260 Google Scholar.

120 Molloy, Desmond, Disarmament, Demobilization, and Reintegration: Theory and Practice (Boulder, CO: Kumarian Press, 2017), p. 74 Google Scholar.

121 Guéhenno, The Fog of Peace, p. 262.

122 Goetze, The Distinction of Peace, p. 3.

123 Wagenaar, Meaning in Action, p. 214.

124 Paddon Rhoads, Emily, Taking Sides in Peacekeeping: Impartiality and the Future of the United Nations (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2016)CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

125 Berdal, Mats, ‘The state of UN peacekeeping: Lessons from Congo’, Journal of Strategic Studies, 1:30 (2016), p. 6 Google Scholar.

126 Lipsky, Michael, Street-level Bureaucracy: Dilemmas of the Individual in Public Services (New York, NY: Russell Sage Foundation, 1980)Google Scholar.

127 See, for example, the documentary by Siobhán Willis and Cahal McLaughlin, prod. and dir., It Stays with you: Use of Force by UN Peacekeepers in Haiti (2017).