Skip to main content

Advertisement

SpringerLink
Log in

Reconceptualizing Mass Atrocity Prevention: Understanding Risk and Resilience in Zambia

  • Published:
International Journal of Politics, Culture, and Society Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

In the scholarly research on genocide and other mass atrocities, very little is known about why such violence does not occur, particularly in places where risk exists. This is despite the general consensus in comparative genocide studies that long-term risk is a necessary but not sufficient factor in the perpetration of such atrocities. In other words, risk factors can plausibly exist without escalating into mass violence. This article seeks to redress this neglect by providing an analysis of the relationship between risk and resilience in Zambia. Zambia stands out amongst its neighbours for its absence of mass atrocities, yet it has contended with three preconditions commonly associated with such violence—ethnolinguistic tensions, limited democracy and economic inequality. Using a new analytical approach which explores not only the structural causes of mass atrocities but also domestic strategies that have had a protective effect in relation to such risk, this paper argues that understanding the sources of resilience in countries like Zambia not only provides valuable insights into the effective long-term prevention of mass atrocities but also challenges widely accepted assumptions inherent in the concept of long-term prevention.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Similar content being viewed by others

Notes

  1. Mass atrocities refer to the following crimes: genocide, crimes against humanity, war crimes and ethnic cleansing.

  2. In relation to mass atrocities, two recent exceptions to this are worth noting: Mayersen and McLoughlin (2011); and Strauss (2012), ‘Retreating from the brink: theorizing mass violence and the dynamics of restraint’, Perspectives in Politics, 10, 2 (June 2012), pp. 343–362.

  3. Because the link between root causes and mass atrocities is tenuous, in this article I will shift from using the term root causes, in favour of ‘preconditions’, a term which I believe more accurately reflects the ambiguity of their causal relationship with mass atrocities.

  4. Titled ‘Responsibility to protect: state responsibility and prevention’ (2013), this report was produced by the Secretary-General for the purpose of exploring the dimension of state responsibility in protecting their populations from mass atrocity crimes.

  5. Three authors have explored Zambia’s ‘exceptionalism’ in terms of its avoidance of civil war: P. J. Burnell (2005), J. DiJohn (2010), and S. Lindemann (2010). This article distinguishes itself from these sources in two ways: first, it focuses on risk specifically related to mass atrocities, and second, it argues that risk mitigation is a product of both inclusive leadership and civil society activism, whereas these three sources focus principally on the behaviour of elites.

  6. For atrocities in Angola, see Harff (2004: 60); for atrocities in Mozambique, see Finnegan (1992); an account of recent atrocities in Zimbabwe can be found in Godwin (2011); a detailed account of atrocities committed in the DRC, post-1994 can be found in Prunier (2011).

  7. Now known as Namibia.

  8. Lozi is the language spoken in Western Province, formerly known as Barotseland.

  9. As demonstrated by the PITF.

  10. This can be found on Zambia’s coat of arms.

References

  • Annan, K. (2001). Prevention of armed conflict. A/55/985-S/2001/574.

  • Annan, K. (2006). Progress report on the prevention of armed conflict. A/60/891.

  • Ban Ki-moon. (2008). Report of the Secretary-General on the implementation of Security Council Resolution 1625 (2005) on conflict prevention, particularly in Africa. S/2008/18.

  • Ban Ki-moon. (2009). Implementing the responsibility to protect. A/63/677.

  • Ban Ki-moon. (2013). Responsibility to protect: state responsibility and prevention. A/67/929-S/2013/399. Retrieved from http://www.un.org/en/ga/search/view_doc.asp?symbol=A/67/929.

  • Bartlett, D. M. C. (2000). Civil society and democracy: a Zambian case study. Journal of Southern African Studies, 26(3), 429–446.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Bartoli, A., Ogata, T., & Stanton, G. H. (2009). Emerging paradigms in genocide prevention. Genocide prevention. Bern: Federal Department of Foreign Affairs, Confederation of Switzerland.

    Google Scholar 

  • BBC News. 2006. Zambia vote count sparks violence. Retrieved from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/5396884.stm (1 October 2006).

  • BBC News. 2011. Zambia election: Sata wins presidential race. Retrieved from http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-15029463.

  • Bratton, M. (1992). Zambia starts over. Journal of Democracy, 3(2), 81–94.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Burdette, M. M. (1988). Zambia: between two worlds. Boulder: Westview Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Burnell, P. (2002). Zambia’s 2001 elections: the tyranny of small decisions, ‘non-decisions’ and ‘not decisions’. Third World Quarterly, 23(6), 1103–1120.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Burnell, P. (2003). Legislative-executive relations in Zambia: parliamentary reform on the agenda. Journal of Contemporary African Studies, 21(1), 47–68.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Burnell, P. (2005). From low-conflict polity to democratic civil peace: explaining Zambian exceptionalism. African Studies, 64(2), 107–133.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Central Statistics Office, Zambia. (2006). Poverty in Zambia 1991–2006. Retrieved from http://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/za.html.

  • DiJohn, J. (2010). State resilience against the odds: an analytical narrative on the construction and maintenance of political order in Zambia since 1960. Working Paper no. 75’,—Crisis States Working Papers Series No. 2. London: Development Studies Institute.

    Google Scholar 

  • Emigh, R. J. (1997). The power of negative thinking: the use of negative case methodology in the development of sociological theory. Theory and Society, 26, 649–684.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Fein, H. (1979). Accounting for genocide. New York: The Free Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Finnegan, W. (1992). A complicated war: the harrowing of Mozambique. Berkeley: University of California Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Freedom House. (2013a). Freedom House concerned about electoral violence in Zambia. Retrieved from http://www.freedomhouse.org/article/freddom-house-concerned-about-electoral-violence-zambia.

  • Freedom House. (2013b). Zambia 2013. Retrieved from http://www.freedomhouse.org/report/freedom-world/2013/zambia.

  • Gertzel, C. (1984). Western Province: tradition, economic deprivation and political alienation. In C. Gertzel, C. Baylies, & M. Szeftel (Eds.), The Dynamics of the one-party state in Zambia (pp. 206–236). Manchester: Manchester University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Godwin, P. (2011). The fear: Robert Mugabe and the martyrdom of Zimbabwe. London: Little Brown and Co.

    Google Scholar 

  • Goldstone, J. A., & Ulfelder, J. (2004). How to construct stable democracies. The Washington Quarterly, 28(1), 9–20.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Good, K. (1986). The reproduction of weakness in the state and agriculture: Zambian experience. African Affairs, 85(339), 239–265.

    Google Scholar 

  • Government of Zambia. (2011). Report of the Committee of National Security and Foreign Affairs for the First Session of the Eleventh National Assembly Appointed on Friday 21st October 2011. Lusaka: Government of Zambia.

    Google Scholar 

  • Gurr, T. R. (1998). A risk assessment model of ethnopolitical rebellion. In J. L. Davies & T. R. Gurr (Eds.), Preventive measures: building risk assessment and crisis early warning systems (pp. 15–26). Lanham: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers.

    Google Scholar 

  • Hamburg, D. & Vance, C. R. (1997). Preventing deadly conflict—final report. Washington D.C: Carnegie Commission on Preventing Deadly Conflict. Retrieved from http://www.wilsoncenter.org/subsites/ccpdc/pubs/rept97/finfr.htm.

  • Harff, B. (2003). No lessons learned from the Holocaust? The American Political Science Review, 97(1), 57–73.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Hewitt, J. J. (2012). The peace and conflict instability ledger: ranking states on future risk. In J. J. Hewitt, J. Wilkenfeld, T. G. Gurr, & B. Heldt (Eds.), Peace and conflict 2012 (pp. 4–17). College Park: CIDCM, University of Maryland.

    Google Scholar 

  • Irin News. (2011). Zambia: poverty fuels secession bid by Western Province. Retrieved from http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportID=91721.

  • Kaunda, K. (1967). A humanist in Africa. London: Longmans.

    Google Scholar 

  • Krain, M. (1997). State-sponsored mass murder: the onset and severity of genocides and politicides. The Journal of Conflict Resolution, 41(3), 331–360.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Krain, M. (2000). Democracy, internal war, and state-sponsored mass murder. Human Rights Review, 1(3), 1–24.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Kuper, L. (1981). Genocide: Its political use in the twentieth century. New Haven: Yale University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Larmer, M. (2009). Zambia since 1990: paradoxes of democratic transition. In Abdul Raufu Mustafa and Lindsay Whitfield (Eds.), Turning points in African democracy. Cumbria: James Currey

  • Larmer, M., & Fraser, A. (2007). Of cabbages and King Cobra: populist politics and Zambia’s 2006 election. African Affairs, 106(425), 611–637.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Lindemann, S. (2010). Inclusive elite bargains and civil war avoidance: the case of Zambia, Working Paper no. 77. Crisis States Working Papers Series No. 2. London: Development Studies Institute.

    Google Scholar 

  • Mayersen, D., & McLoughlin, S. (2011). Risk and resilience to mass atrocities in Africa: an examination of Rwanda and Botswana. Journal of Genocide Research, 13(3), 247–269.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • McLoughlin, S. and Mayersen, D. (2013). Reconsidering root causes: a new framework for the structural prevention of genocide and mass atrocities. In Ingeleare, B., Parmentier, S., Haers, J., & Segeart, B. (Eds.), Genocide, risk and resilience: An interdisciplinary approach. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.

  • Meredith, M. (2006). The state of Africa: a history of fifty years of independence. London: Free Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Minorities at Risk. (2006). Assessment for Lozi in Zambia. Retrieved from http://www.cidcm.umd.edu/mar/assessment.asp?groupId=55102.

  • Minority Rights Group International. (2010). Zambia overview. Retrieved from http://www.minorityrights.org/3922/zambia/zambia-overview.html.

  • Molteno, R. (1974). Cleavage and conflict in Zambian politics: a study in sectionalism. In Tordoff, W. (Ed.), Politics in Zambia. Manchester: Manchester University Press

  • O’Bannon, B. R. (2012). Monitoring the frog in Africa: conflict early warning with structural data. Global Responsibility to Protect, 4(4), 449–474.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Office of the Special Adviser for the Prevention of Genocide. (2012). Analysis framework. Retrieved from http://www.un.org/en/preventgenocide/adviser/pdf/osapg_analysis_framework.pdf.

  • Phiri, B. J. (2006). A political history of Zambia: from the colonial period to the 3rd Republic. Trenton: Africa World Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Posner, D. N. (2005). Institutions and ethnic politics in Africa. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

    Book  Google Scholar 

  • Posner, D. N. (2007). Regime change and ethnic cleavages in Africa. Comparative Political Studies, 40(11), 5–24.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Posner, D. N., & Simon, D. J. (2002). Economic conditions and incumbent support in Africa’s new democracies: evidence from Zambia. Comparative Political Studies, 35(3), 313–336.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Prunier, G. (2011). Africa’s world war: Congo, the Rwandan genocide and the making of a continental catastrophe. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Rakner, L. (2003). Political and economic liberalization in Zambia 1991–2001. Stockholm: The Nordic Africa Institute.

    Google Scholar 

  • Semelin, J. (2007). Purify and destroy: the political uses of massacre and genocide. London: C. Hurst & Co.

    Google Scholar 

  • Simon, D. J. (2005). Democracy unrealized: Zambia’s Third Republic under Frederick Chiluba. In L. A. Villalon & P. Von Doepp (Eds.), The fate of Africa’s democratic experiments (pp. 199–220). Bloomington: Indiana University Press.

    Google Scholar 

  • Sishuwa, S. (2012). Understanding the Barotseland question. The Post Online. Retrieved from http://www.postzambia.com/Joomla/post-read_article.php?articleId=24887.

  • Stanton, G. (1996). The eight stages of genocide. Retrieved from http://www.genocidewatch.org/images/8StagesBriefingpaper.pdf.

  • Stewart, F. (2008). Horizontal inequalities and conflict: an introduction and some hypotheses. In F. Stewart (Ed.), Horizontal inequalities and conflict: understanding group violence in multiethnic societies (pp. 3–24). New York: Palgrave Macmillan.

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  • Strauss, S. (2012). Retreating from the brink: theorizing mass violence and the dynamics of restraint. Perspectives in Politics, 10(2), 343–362.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • UNHCR. (2011). Zambia: poverty fuels secession bid by Western Province. Retrieved from http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportID=91721.

  • Van Donge, J. K. (2009). The plundering of Zambian resources by Frederick Chiluba and his friends: a case study of the interaction between national politics and the international drive towards good governance. African Affairs, 108(430), 69–90.

    Article  Google Scholar 

  • Venter, A., & Olivier, M. (1993). Human rights in Africa: Nyerere and Kaunda. International Journal on World Peace, 10(1), 21–33.

    Google Scholar 

  • Wills, A. J. (1985). An introduction to the history of Central Africa: Zambia, Malawi, and Zimbabwe. Oxford: Oxford University Press.

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Griffith Asia Institute, Nathan Campus, Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia

    Stephen McLoughlin

Authors
  1. Stephen McLoughlin
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Stephen McLoughlin.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

McLoughlin, S. Reconceptualizing Mass Atrocity Prevention: Understanding Risk and Resilience in Zambia. Int J Polit Cult Soc 27, 427–441 (2014). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10767-014-9175-x

Download citation

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10767-014-9175-x

Keywords

Search

Navigation