In this book, the authors analyse and offer some insights into the history of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The story is told within the context of its conflicts, with an exploration of the complex and multilayered conflict causes and the attempts to resolve the conflict based on liberal peacebuilding. The book delves into an examination of gender relations in the country with insight into the gendered dimensions of conflict in the DRC and how liberal peace failed to resolve the conflict because of hidden agendas and interests by the West and other emerging powers as a typical replica of what has been ongoing in many conflict-laden countries / societies. The book is divided into two major parts. The first part, as noted above, delves into and dwells on the historicity and ontology of the conflict. The second part focuses on the various attempts at peacemaking that have taken place in the country, with emphasis on how liberal peace has failed to resolve the conflict. The book analyses various peacemaking strategies that have been employed and the role of women (or lack thereof) in peacemaking and peacebuilding processes; and finally, the failures, strengths, and weaknesses of international intervention strategies.

Essay from the year 2016 in the subject Sociology - Political Sociology, Majorities, Minorities, grade: A, Sciences Po., Paris, course: Gender and Conflict, language: English, abstract: Although the contemporary WPS framework, and more specifically resolution 1325, have enforced the role and presence of women in peace and security issues, the outcomes have been ineffective and insufficient in countries such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where authentic progress and implementation of true gender equality is needed the most. The present WPS framework is promising, but it seems to serve the interest of the global military-diplomatic establishment rather than concretely seek to change reality for women and men striving for conflict resolution and peacebuilding.

'Everyday resistance, peacebuilding and state-making' addresses debates on the liberal peace and the policies of peacebuilding through a theoretical and empirical study of resistance in peacebuilding contexts. Examining the case of 'Africa's World War' in the DRC, it locates resistance in the experiences of war, peacebuilding and state-making by exploring discourses, violence and everyday forms of survival as quotidian acts that attempt to challenge or mitigate such experiences. The analysis of resistance offers a possibility to bring the historical and sociological aspects of both peacebuilding and the case of the DRC, providing new nuanced understanding on these processes and the particular case. The book also makes a significant contribution to the theorisation of resistance in International Relations.--Publisher's website.

The Trouble with the Congo suggests a new explanation for international peacebuilding failures in civil wars. Drawing from more than 330 interviews and a year and a half of field research, it develops a case study of the international intervention during the Democratic Republic of the Congo's unsuccessful transition from war to peace and democracy (2003-2006). Grassroots rivalries over land, resources, and political power motivated widespread violence. However, a dominant peacebuilding culture shaped the intervention strategy in a way that precluded action on local conflicts, ultimately dooming the international efforts to end the deadliest conflict since World War II. Most international actors interpreted continued fighting as the consequence of national and regional tensions alone. UN staff and diplomats viewed intervention at the macro levels as their only legitimate responsibility. The dominant culture constructed local peacebuilding as such an unimportant, unfamiliar, and unmanageable task that neither shocking events nor resistance from select individuals could convince international actors to reevaluate their understanding of violence and intervention.

Gender and Peacebuilding offers a comprehensive and up to date analysis of how and why gender matters in contemporary peace operations. It draws on a wide range of examples from across the world to offer a nuanced account of the UN's attempts to mainstream gender into peace operations via Security Council Resolution 1325, and assesses the successes and failures of this effort to enhance the participation and protection of women and girls in peacebuilding operations. In presenting this mixed picture of progress and ongoing challenges, the book argues for bold steps forward that will enable peacebuilding to contest the current neoliberal order, address structural inequalities, and bring about feminist visions of peace and security. It is only by focusing attention on the economic empowerment of women and its ability to temper the dangers of neo-liberalism in post-conflict contexts that feminists can hope to achieve these aims. Timely, critical and engaged, this book provides an invaluable guide to the issues for students of peace and conflict studies, and sets the agenda for future scholarship and advocacy.

Violence affects the economy of production and the ecology of reproduction— the production of economic goods and services and the generational reproduction of workers, the regeneration of the capacity to work and maintenance of workers on a daily basis, and the renewal of culture and society through community relations and the education of children Gender and the Political Economy of Conflict in Africa explores the persistence of violence in conflict zones in Africa using a political economy framework. This framework employs an analysis of violence on both edges of the spectrum—a macro-economic analysis of violence against workers and a micro-political analysis of the violence in women’s reproductive lives. These analyses come together to create a new explanation of why violence persists, a new political economy of violence against women, and a new theoretical understanding of the relation between production and reproduction. Three case studies are discussed: the Democratic Republic of the Congo (violence in an era of conflict), Sierra Leone (violence post-conflict), and Tanzania (which has not seen armed conflict on the mainland). This book fills a significant gap on the political economy of war and women/gender for advanced undergraduate and postgraduate students as well as researchers in African Studies, Gender Studies, and Peace and Conflict Studies.

The Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) has been called the ’worst place in the world’ for women, with reports of widespread and horrific incidents of rape and sexual violence and almost complete impunity for the perpetrators of such violence. However, despite the high profile media reporting on sexual violence in the DRC, and the widely publicized responses of the international community, there is still very little real analysis of the real situation of women in the country. This book provides such detailed analysis of gender relations in the DRC, and goes beyond the usual explanations of sexual violence as a product of conflict, to examine the complex and socially constructed gender norms and roles which underlie incidences of violence. The book benefits from a comprehensive account of men’s and women’s roles in conflict, violence, peace building and reconstruction, and evaluates the impacts of national and international political responses. In doing so, this book provides valuable new evidence and analysis of the complex and multilayered conflicts in the DRC.