Peace Agreements and Civil Wars in Africa: Insurgent Motivations, ...

The incumbent government enjoys international recognition and has a seat at the UN, membership in regional organizations, foreign allies, trade relationships with foreign governments, armies, and access to resources. In contrast, insurgents have to fight for all these.³⁶ A consequence of this disparity in status and resources is that negotiation to end the war is extremely difficult because a basic requirement for a stable agreement is that it is best negotiated under conditions of equality. Indeed, successful agreements are only reached when the adversaries have some form of mutual veto power over outcomes.³⁷

The problems arising from the legitimacy of the adversaries complicate reaching negotiated agreements in three other ways. As Zartman points out, these are related to, first, the fact that there is no room for compromise on the part of the insurgents. Recognition is both the top and the bottom line. Second, there is no room for trade-offs, which is a key element in negotiations. The insurgent goals and commitment are integral and indivisible, and the insurgents have little to lose but their rebellion.³⁸ Last is the issue of representative spokespersons. This is usually a key precondition for starting negotiations. The government and insurgents contest each other’s spokespersons. The government contests the insurgents’ spokesmen’s position, while the insurgents contest the government’s right to speak for the whole country.³⁹

Civil Wars Are Complex

The complexity of civil wars makes them difficult to be settled through negotiations. As a general rule, civil wars take a long time to end. As they drag on, they spawn multiple groups, becoming more complex. A measure of complexity in civil wars is the number of internal and external parties involved in the fighting.⁴⁰ Empirical evidence shows that the number of parties involved in the same conflicts (as supporters of government or opposition) remained very high in the 1990s.⁴¹ This affects the parties’ ability to end the conflicts through negotiated settlements. This is especially severe in regional security complexes, defined by Barry Buzan as groups of states whose primary security concerns link together enough that their national securities cannot be realistically considered apart from one another.⁴²