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Palgrave Macmillan

Peacebuilding and Natural Resource Governance After Armed Conflict

Sierra Leone and Liberia

  • Book
  • © 2019

Overview

Authors:
  1. Michael D. Beevers

    1. Department of Environmental Studies, Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA, USA

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  • Features two in-depth case studies of natural resource governance in post-conflict Liberia and Sierra Leone
  • Provides a robust explanation for why peacebuilding interventions related to natural resources often fail to meet expectations
  • Contends that governing natural resources for peace must work to enhance people’s human security

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Table of contents (8 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-xiii
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  2. Introduction

    • Michael D. Beevers
    Pages 1-15

  3. Natural Resources, Armed Conflict and Peacebuilding

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 17-17
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    2. International Peacebuilding: Origins, Development and Strategies

      • Michael D. Beevers
      Pages 19-37

    3. Natural Resources: A Catalyst for Conflict and Peace?

      • Michael D. Beevers
      Pages 39-61

  4. Conflict, Forests and Peacebuilding in Liberia

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 63-64
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    2. From Settlement and State Consolidation to Civil War and “Conflict Timber”

      • Michael D. Beevers
      Pages 65-86

    3. International Intervention and Post-Conflict Forest Governance

      • Michael D. Beevers
      Pages 87-120

  5. Conflict, Diamonds, Minerals and Peacebuilding in Sierra Leone

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 121-122
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    2. Colonialization and One-Party Rule to Civil War and “Conflict Diamonds”

      • Michael D. Beevers
      Pages 123-144

    3. International Intervention to Govern Diamonds and Minerals

      • Michael D. Beevers
      Pages 145-180

  6. Transforming Conflict Resources into Peace Resources in Liberia and Sierra Leone

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 181-181
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    2. The Limits of Securing and Marketizing Natural Resources and a Way Forward

      • Michael D. Beevers
      Pages 183-219

  7. Back Matter

    Pages 221-225
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Keywords

About this book

This book argues that a set of persuasive narratives about the links between natural resource, armed conflict and peacebuilding have strongly influenced the natural resource interventions pursued by international peacebuilders. The author shows how international peacebuilders active in Liberia and Sierra Leone pursued a collective strategy to transform “conflict resources” into “peace resources” vis-à-vis a policy agenda that promoted “securitization” and “marketization” of natural resources. However, the exclusive focus on securitization and marketization have been counterproductive for peacebuilding since these interventions render invisible issues connected to land ownership, environmental protection and sustainable livelihoods and mirror pre-war governing arrangements in which corruption, exclusion and exploitation took root. Natural resource governance  and peacebuilding must go beyond narrow debates about securitization and marketization, and instead be a catalyst for trust–building and cooperation that has a local focus, and pursues an inclusive agenda that not only serves the cause of peace, but the cause of people.

Reviews

“At the turn of the last century, high-value natural resources like diamonds and timber helped fund devastating wars in Liberia and Sierra Leone. Many academics and practitioners concluded that effective peacebuilding would require the reform of these sectors. In a carefully conceived study based on years of fieldwork, Michael Beevers argues that the peacebuilding community embraced, emphasized and operationalized this idea in ways that simplified a complex reality, concentrated power in the state, and marginalized alternative views and competing priorities. The ironic end result, Beevers claims, is that the tensions and disagreements that preceded the outbreak of violent conflict have, in some cases, been ignored, and, in other cases, been restored. Beevers makes a significant contribution to the evolving concept of environmental peacebuilding.” (Richard Matthew, University of California, Irvine, USA)“With this meticulously researched book, Michael Beevers threads the needle to make substantial contributions to both scholarship and practice. His case analysis of post-conflict Liberia and Sierra Leone advances evolving theory around environmental peacebuilding, taking tangible steps beyond the field’s early deductive days. At the same time, his explication of dominant post-conflict natural resource management approaches reveals specific shortcomings that should help shape future efforts.” (Geoffrey Dabelko, Ohio University and the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, USA)

“Drawing from thorough research in Sierra Leone and Liberia, Michael Beevers offers an insightful critique of the dangerous oversimplification of ‘conflict resources’ and ‘greed war’ narratives. An important contribution to the peacebuilding literature.” (Philippe Le Billon, University of British Columbia, Canada)

Authors and Affiliations

  • Department of Environmental Studies, Dickinson College, Carlisle, PA, USA

    Michael D. Beevers

About the author

Michael D. Beevers is Assistant Professor of Environmental and International Studies at Dickinson College, USA.

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