Summary

Preventive diplomacy, coined by Dag Hammarskjold, was more recently adopted by Boutros Boutros Ghali, and has become popular in the discourse and practice of international relations. It is conceived as a framework in which disputes are prevented from escalating into conflicts and violence; violent conflict is prevented from spreading; and political solutions are sought. In the African context, it is widely held that conflict resolution is crucial to the emancipation of the African peoples from socio-economic enslavement. However examples such as the war in Cote d'Ivoire, Liberia, Sierra Leone, DRC, the coup in Central African Republic and the incapacity of SADC to respond to crises such as those in Malawi and Zimbabwe, testify to the failure of quiet diplomacy on the continent. This book attempts to provide, from a pan-Africanist perspective, an overview of lessons learned from past interventions with an eye to future policy. Chapters cover the Sierra Leone civil war and the international intervention; the Sudanese conflict within the context of identity conflicts; the DRC, international remedial action and the failings of the peace process; Angola, the phases of the conflicts and elusive peace; and Mozambique and examples of the experiences of successes and failures of preventive diplomacy.