‘Building peace from the outside’: The role of the EU in the Democratic Republic of the Congo

• The European Union (EU) is increasingly aspiring to be a global peace and security actor. Using the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) as a test-case for analysing the EU‘s security and peace-building engagements and interventions, this paper reveals that the EU‘s coherence and effectiveness as an actor in peace-building and security sector reform is severely compromised by the Union‘s bureaucratic and organizational complexity. The EU‘s institutional set-up provokes institutional divisions as well as overlapping competencies. In addition, personality-driven policies as well as mistrust and enviousness lead to ―institution-wrangling‖ which impedes a successful implementation of European policies. As a result the EU continues to lack a coherent strategy for peace-building and security sector reform in the DRC, despite the large budget expended. The poorly defined strategy is closely related to the ‗external nature‘ of the intervention and the EU‘s failure to develop the links and relationship to those intervened upon. The analysis concludes that the EU is more concerned with establishing symbolic presence and political representation rather than real achievements and genuine peace-building on the ground.

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Annan samhällsvetenskap -- Tvärvetenskapliga studier (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Other Social Sciences -- Social Sciences Interdisciplinary (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

Freds- och utvecklingsforskning

Peace and development research

European Union

Peacebuilding

Conflict

Denocratic Republic of the Congo

Publikations- och innehållstyp

kon (ämneskategori)

ref (ämneskategori)