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Resource-Induced Conflicts, Part I: Petro-violence in the Niger Delta

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By: Obi, Cyril and Siri Aas Rustad

 

Since the turn of the century, petro-violence has brought the oil-producing Niger Delta to the forefront of international energy and security concerns for strategic, socio-economic, historical and political reasons. However, the root causes of this conflict lie in decades of marginalisation of the region’s inhabitants, pollution and the highly centralised state control of oil revenues.[1] Over five decades of oil production has largely contributed to the enrichment of international oil companies and national and local elites, while at the same time leading to the disempowerment and impoverishment of the local population through direct dispossession, repression, and pollution of the air, lands and waters.[2]

The turn to violent resistance in the early 2000s took place in the context of prolonged military rule, marginalisation, and repression of community protests. Militias, riding on the back of widespread frustration about the ineffectiveness of prior non-violent protests, resorted to violence. The attacks on oil installations and the kidnapping of expatriate oil workers were initially intended to gain attention and support for their cause. Subsequently, however, the activities of some militias began to acquire other characteristics and goals that went beyond demands for resource control.[3]

While some scholars point to greed and personal enrichment as the motivation for violent conflict[4], there is a growing quantitative literature pointing to resource-related grievances as the main explanation of the statistical correlation between oil in particular and violent conflict. Østby, Nordås, and Rød (2009) find that regions with high level of group inequalities, combined with resource endowment, have a higher risk of conflict, while Rustad (2016), in a study of the Niger Delta, concludes that those who believe their region to be worse off than others are more likely to support violence. Similarly, Must and Rustad (2016) observe that a perception of unfair treatment also increases the likelihood of supporting the use of violence. The case of the Niger Delta brings some of these issues to the fore.

The petro-violence in the Niger Delta is closely linked to revenue sharing between the Nigerian state and oil-producing areas, control over the resources, as well as feelings of exclusion, marginalisation and exploitation endured by ethnic minority groups compared to larger groups on national level, such as the Ogoni and Ijaw communities. Perhaps most relevant are the ways in which the high stakes involved have fed into a vicious cycle of exploitation, protest, repression, resistance, militarisation and the descent into a volatile mix of insurgent violence and criminality[5]. Both these processes place great strain on the relationship between the local and the national levels.

The Niger Delta is a vast coastal plain in the southernmost part of Nigeria, with an estimated population of 31 million people. Traditionally, the local people earned their livelihood as farmers, fishers, and traders of items linked to the principal subsistence economies. At the same time, the region is also home to over 75% of Nigeria’s petroleum production and exports, including oil multinationals, state and local oil companies, oil service companies, ‘thousands of kilometers of oil pipelines, ten export terminals, four refineries and a massive liquefied natural gas (LNG) sector’.[6] The great challenge to forging a balanced relationship between the local and national level is the coexistence of a vast petro industry alongside the local grievances related to the subsistence livelihoods of the population.

At the national level, oil accounts for over 70% of government revenues[7] and 90% of merchandise export earnings[8], making it the fiscal basis of both state and federal power, as well as economic development. Thus, at the local level there is the strong feeling among ethnic oil minorities that the non-oil producing ethnic majority groups (Igbo, Yoruba and Hausa-Fulani), which dominate the federal government, also control the oil wealth, while those who produce the oil suffer from neglect, exploitation, and pollution.

Marginalisation

The feelings of marginalisation among the ethnic minorities in the Niger Delta compared to the larger national ethnic majorities gained momentum in the wake of Nigeria’s independence from British rule in 1960. In 1966, there was an attempt at secession by a group of ethnic Ijaw youth, the Niger Delta Volunteer Force (NDVF) led by Isaac Adaka Boro, who wanted to create a Niger Delta republic that would ensure Ijaw self-determination, and ownership and control of the oil in its territory.[9] The attempted secession failed. Instead, Colonel Odumegwu Ojukwu led the Biafran secession, ostensibly to fight for Igbo self-determination against perceived northern domination, but also to assert control over the Niger Delta oil fields. Boro joined the federal war against Biafra, to repel Biafran claims to oilfields in Ijaw territory. This struggle over oil riches in the 1960s, both amongst various ethnic groups within the Niger Delta, and between the ethnic minorities and the federal government, underline the grievances and claims that feature in many of the struggles witnessed today.

Several developments during and after the Biafran civil war had implications on the agitation for minority rights in the Niger Delta. The first was that the oil from the region became the main source of national revenues and export earnings. Secondly, the federal military government had seized control of oil through Decree No. 51/Petroleum Act of 1969. Specifically, it provided that “the entire ownership and control of all petroleum in, under or upon any lands…shall be vested in the state [Federal Government]”[10]. In section 2, the Act granted the federal oil minister “the sole right to grant oil mining leases to oil companies”. This legislation expropriated oil from the Niger Delta much to the chagrin of the ethnic minorities of the region, who had hoped that the individual states would own the oil within their respective territories. This meant a loss of power over the oil resources by local people and the loss of compensation for the full value of appropriated land. It also meant that multinational corporations (MNCs) could directly get oil and land leases from the government without recourse to local communities.

These feelings of exclusion, dispossession and disappointment were further reinforced by the progressive downward revision of the derivation principle for revenue allocation (i.e. the share of the revenues being returned to the producing state) from 50% in 1966 to 1.5% in the mid-1990s. While this level was raised to 13% following the return of democracy in 1999, the relationship between the Niger Delta and the federal government worsened when demands from the oil-producing states for an increase to 25% were blocked by the northern elites.[11]

Protests and militants

However, what followed was a systematic repression of Ogoni protests, including military raids on Ogoni villages, and arrests of suspected MOSOP cadres and sympathizers. This culminated in a trial, widely held as flawed, where Saro-Wiwa and eight MOSOP members were found guilty of the murder of four pro-government Ogoni leaders. In spite of worldwide pleas for clemency, they were executed in 1995.[12]

The return to democracy in 1999 also had negative ramifications for the human rights and pro-democracy movement. Politicians of the Niger Delta tapped into the groundswell of popular anger among the large number of unemployed or alienated youth in the region, frustrated over the lack of local jobs within the oil industry.[13] Some of these youths became ready tools of politicians, feeding into a spiral of local violence in the 1999 and 2003 elections. By 2006 these violent outbursts, combined with communal conflicts, politics of local resistance, and the struggle for resource control, evolved into a full-fledged insurgency. Although initially rooted in the militarization and coming together of youth groups and their protests at several levels, the insurgency quickly took on other agendas and dimensions. The complex conflict that raged in the Niger Delta involved broad militant alliances like the militant group Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta (MEND), linked to the ethnic minority group Ijaw. This insurgent faction combined lethal attacks and sabotage of oil installations with the effective use of global media to publicize its campaign of fighting for the control of oil revenues by indigenes of the Niger Delta.[14]

Amnesty

Rising domestic and international concerns surrounding the conflict, alongside the inability of the government’s military Joint Task Force in reining in MEND – which had successfully managed to shut down a third of Nigeria’s oil production – formed the basis of a Presidential Amnesty granted to the Niger Delta militants in 2009. The aim was to restore security by ending the disruption of oil production and exports, which had contributed to the loss of oil revenues and profits, and offer the battle-weary militias an opportunity to partake in state patronage and assistance programs. The offer to ‘drop their guns in exchange for peace’ was accepted by the main militia leaders, while a faction of MEND remained opposed to the Amnesty. Consequently, there was a remarkable reduction in the level of violence between 2010-2011.

Over time, however, the region has been once again engulfed by violence; a trend mainly caused by ex-combatants who have either turned to criminality, or have engaged in protests over their perceived exclusion from the benefits of the Amnesty. Their behaviour can be traced back to several factors. The first was the election of President Muhammadu Buhari from north-central Nigeria in 2015. After taking office, Buhari reorganized the Amnesty program and fired the leadership appointed by former President Goodluck Jonathan, while reviewing and reducing the funding of the program. Secondly, speculations emerged on the alleged expiry of the Amnesty program at the end of 2017. These rumours arose, in part, due to on-going investigations of corruption in the program, as well as the allegations (raised by some ex-militia leaders) that the new President is hostile to the interest of the region and seeks to perpetuate northern domination of regional oil resources. Thirdly, Nigeria felt the negative impact caused by the crash of global oil prices on its oil-dependent economy and fiscal federalism. The stakes of gaining access to shrinking oil revenues in the midst of an economic recession led to intensified struggles.

The foregoing broadly defines the context within which a new group, the Niger Delta Avengers (NDA), emerged after over five years of relative peace in the Niger Delta, attacking MNCs’ oil installations in early 2016. While the Amnesty succeeded in buying some respite for a few years, it failed to address the underlying causes of the violent conflict. The local population still feels marginalised and the federal government retains control over the region’s natural resources. While the establishment of the Amnesty was a window of opportunity for the federal government to deal with the Niger Delta crisis, it seems that this window is about to close.[15] If the root causes continue to be left unsolved, and the old and new protagonists of the conflict see the struggle for power over oil in zero-sum ways, the oil-rich region could be engulfed by another wave of violence in the near future.

 

 

 

Siri Aas Rustad is a senior researcher at the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO). She has extensive experience with research on natural resource management, conflict, peace and the extractive industry both in Africa and Latin America.

Dr. Cyril Obi is a program director at the Social Science Research Council (SSRC) and leads the African Peacebuilding Network (APN) program. Dr. Obi is well published, and is a member of the editorial boards of many international journals. He is also a research associate of the Department of Political Sciences, University of Pretoria, South Africa, and a visiting scholar to the Institute of African Studies (IAS), Columbia University, New York.

 

This article was based on:

Obi, Cyril and Siri Aas Rustad (2011a), “The Complex Politics of an Insurgency?” in Oil and Insurgency in the Niger Delta: Managing the Complex Politics of Petroviolence edited by Cyril Obi and Siri Aas Rustad. Zed Books. London

 

 

Notes:

[1] Obi, Cyril (2014). “Oil and Conflict in Nigeria’s Niger Delta Region: Between the Barrrel and the Trigger”, The Extractive Industries and Society, 1: 147-153; Obi, Cyril Obi (2016), “Understanding the Resource Curse Effect: Instability and Violent Conflict in Africa”, in Pamela Aall (ed.), Minding the Gap: African Conflict Management in a Time of Change, Ontario: CIGI.; Watts, Michael J. and Ibaba Samuel Ibaba (2011), “Turbulent Oil: Conflict and Insecurity in the Niger Delta”, African Security, Vol. 4, Issue 1.

[2] Obi, Cyril (2010), “Oil Extraction, Dispossession, Resistance and Conflict in Nigeria’s Oil-Rich Niger Delta,”, Canadian Journal of Development Studies, Vol. 30, Issue 1-2.; Nwajiaku-Dahou, Kathryn (2012), “Then political economy of oil and Insurgency ‘rebellion’, Review of African Political Economy, Vol. 39, Vol. 39, Issue 132.; Agbiboa, Daniel (2013), “Have we heard the Movement for the Emancipation Last? Oil, environmental insecurity, and the impact of the amnesty programme on the Niger Delta and the empowerment of violence” Review of African Political Economy, Vol. 40, Issue 137.

[3] Boås, Morten (2011), “Mend Me’ the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta and the empowerment of violence” in Oil and Insurgency in the Niger Delta: Managing the Complex Politics of Petroviolence edited by Cyril Obi and Siri Aas Rustad. Zed Books. London; Ikelegbe, Augustine (2011), “Popular and Criminal Violence as instruments of struggle in the Niger Delta Region” in Oil and Insurgency in the Niger Delta: Managing the Complex Politics of Petroviolence edited by Cyril Obi and Siri Aas Rustad. Zed Books. London

[4] Collier, Paul and Anke Hoeffler (2004), ‘Greed and grievance in civil wars’, Oxford Economic Papers 56:663–595.

[5] Obi, Cyril and Siri Aas Rustad (2011b), “Is the window of opportunity closing for the Niger Delta?” in Oil and Insurgency in the Niger Delta: Managing the Complex Politics of Petroviolence edited by Cyril Obi and Siri Aas Rustad. Zed Books. London

[6] Watts, Michael (2007), “Petro-Insurgency or Criminal Syndicate? Conflict and Violence in the Niger Delta,” Review of African Political Economy, vol. 34, no. 114, p. 639.

[7] http://www.resourcegovernance.org/our-work/country/nigeria

[8] http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/TX.VAL.FUEL.ZS.UN?locations=NG&view=chart

[9] Obi (2010), ‘Oil Extraction, Dispossession, Resistance and Conflict in Nigeria’s Oil-Rich Niger Delta’, p. 225

[10] http://www.lexadin.nl/wlg/legis/nofr/oeur/arch/nig/petroleumact.pdf

[11] Ukiwo, Ukoha (2011), “The Nigerian State, Oil and the Niger Delta Crisis” in Oil and Insurgency in the Niger Delta: Managing the Complex Politics of Petroviolence edited by Cyril Obi and Siri Aas Rustad. Zed Books. London

[12] Obi, Cyril (1997) “Globalization and Local Resistance: The Case of Ogoni versus Shell”, New Political Economy, Vol. 2, Issue 1.; Obi (2010), ‘Oil Extraction, Dispossession, Resistance and Conflict in Nigeria’s Oil-Rich Niger Delta’

[13] Ukoha (2011), “The Nigerian State, Oil and the Niger Delta Crisis”

[14] Rustad, Siri Aas (2016), “Socioeconomic Inequalities and Attitudes Towards Violence: A Test with New Survey Data in the Niger Delta”. International Interactions 42(1): 106-139

[15] Obi and Rustad (2011b), “Is the window of opportunity closing for the Niger Delta?”

Image Credit: Socialist Youth League of Norway (Sosialistisk Ungdom (SU)), Flikr, https://c2.staticflickr.com/4/3607/4560583670_991d50ea04_b.jpg, (April 6 2010)

 

Resource-Induced Conflicts, Part I: Resource Wars

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By: Jasper Humphreys

1991 picture of a United States Navy Grumman F-14A Tomcat from Fighter Squadron 114 (VF-114) Aardvarks. Courtesy of Lt. Steve Gozzo, USN - U.S. DefenseImagery photo VIRIN: DN-SC-93-03891

Fighting over resources has been going on since Mankind started trading with one another, even though the phrase ‘resource wars’ is a modern invention.

With the period known as the Bronze Age emerging roughly six thousand years ago, the outlines of what today we regard as ‘resource wars’ became apparent: globalisation, the ‘pull’ factor of technology, improving communications, commercial sophistication, empire-building, and of course, the ability to fight.

Bronze is an alloy made principally from copper and tin. Its strength and durability characteristics made it perfect for forging swords, axes and shields. Thus revolutionising warfare from club-wielding skirmishes to mass kinetic encounters that sometimes led to death and occasionally, annihilation. However, not every country is blessed with copper and tin. In such instances, the only option available is to rob these resources by force from other political, and potentially unfriendly powers. This added an additional layer of complexity to the logistics and strategy of the plundering army, as exiting the land with the booty would prove as difficult as entering the forbidden territory in the first place. The discovery of bronze allowed armies to grow and become more heavily armed (including the use of cavalry), made possible through involving complex logistics alongside good leadership.

Nothing has changed since those ancient times about the two simple identities of ‘resource wars’: they are either i) about plundering and grabbing, or ii) about holding on with force to what you already have. It is here that the problems associated with ‘resource wars’ emerge, stemming from both identifying the motivation of the parties involved and how to devise an appropriate response to end hostilities.

Until the modern era, economists generally saw a large amount of natural resources as being an advantage; that view changed in the 1980’s as new scholarship sparked by Jeffrey Sachs and Andrew Warner focused on what was labelled the ‘natural resource curse’: this suggested that actually having an abundance of natural resources created a negative impact, as it could lead to slower growth, undemocratic regimes and violent civil conflict; all part of ‘resource wars’.[1]

It was this thinking that prompted moves to ban the trade of resources originating from conflict zones, highlighted in ‘blood diamonds’, ‘blood ivory’ and so on. This new research also highlighted the concept of ‘resource dependency’. This is when a country relies on one or two resources for its income, with obvious contemporary examples being Saudi Arabia and its oil and Botswana and its diamonds.[2]

When looking at resources as a cause of civil wars, several important debates can be identified. Firstly, ‘greed or grievance’, heavily associated with Paul Collier who saw ‘greed’ as one form of motivation for the fighters who pursued economic gain, while working on the assumption that the rewards of joining a fight were much greater than if they did not join the fight. ‘Grievance’, however, was a stronger motivation for Collier, who reckoned that people were much more motivated to fight over issues of identity like ethnicity or religion than being driven solely by ‘greed’.[3] However, others view the ‘resource curse’ totally differently, seeing greater resource wealth as lowering the probability of conflict and not leading to civil war.[4]

The alternative debate centres on the theory that poor environmental conditions forces people to fight to satisfy their basic survival needs, such as cutting down timber, poaching or plundering as an economic resource. This link between ‘environmental scarcity’ theory and conflict is most heavily associated with Thomas Homer-Dixon and the Toronto School. Sometimes referred to as ‘environmental conflicts’, where these conflicts typologies originate from human-made disturbances so great that the environment is unable naturally regenerate. Examples include fighting over water that is diminishing due to the construction of a dam upstream, or having land overgrazed to such an extent that competition (over its use?) leads to fighting.[5]

Conflicts that involve natural resources and are caused by physical, geopolitical or socio-economic problems are not environmental conflicts. They are actually traditional conflicts over resource distribution. In the same way, conflicts over agricultural land can only be called an ‘environmental conflict’ if the land is under contest because of soil erosion, climate-change, or other environmental degradation. Otherwise they are simply ‘contests of territory’ like any war or conflict that we commonly think of. So far, so confusing. To provide some analytical rigour, the phrase ‘resource wars’ is restricted to only inter-state conflicts; while distinguishing between the types of resources. A ‘resource’ is defined as being those elements that are key to human survival. Water, soil, air and eco-systems are defined as Resources-Life, while oil and gas are Resources-Strategic; the latter being the realm of traditional geo-strategic ‘high politics’. Here the price is controlled not only by supply/demand, but also by the additional costs relating to the environmental and securitisation impact of changes in the supply, such as the costs tied to the distribution of water in the Jordan Valley.

By contrast, those conflicts linked to resources that are not considered as part of ‘high politics’ might be given another description - ‘commodity conflicts’. Here the identity of a ‘commodity’ lies in that it is controlled by market-forces that are accompanied by a sliding-scale of ‘conflict-risk’ that ranges from high (cocaine, coltan, diamonds) to mid-low (copper, gold, rhino horn) to very low (coffee, tea). Additionally, it is important to make a distinction between the illegal and legal forms of ‘commodity conflicts’: in the former category they would be defined as ‘lootable’ and the latter as ‘extractible’. The basic profile of ‘commodity conflicts’ is that they have been:

 

> Localised

> Based on extractive/ ‘lootable’ commodities.

> Violent in short bursts, sometimes over long periods.

> Difficult for outside forces to quell.

> Often linked to power struggles within the ruling elite.

 

To provide even greater clarity, another category in the resource-conflict spectrum could be referred to as ‘environmental confrontations’. This gathers in the wider spectrum of conflict that has some element of the environment at its core, which range from over-fishing, riparian access, to animal rights, wildlife poaching, illegal timber-felling and environmental campaigns of all types.

Finally, there is a fourth category. This is the most problematic as it contains elements of both resources and commodities, and so makes devising a response especially difficult. It covers five broad issues:

 

> Food security: food is both a commodity and a resource. For example, the cocoa commodity market was targeted in 2010 by British financier Anthony Ward by developing a hoarding strategy; meanwhile the British investment fund, African Century, are looking to develop fish and chicken farms to provide a major source of food in southern Africa.

> New sources of energy.

> Land sales/rights: land is a resource that is both publicly and privately owned and is often sold as commodity.

> Drugs trade: drugs are a commodity controlled by market-forces for which the suppliers use drug-users as a resource to be exploited, with ramifications of national and global importance.

> Flora and fauna: both are a commodity and a resource (for firewood and eating).

 

Throughout post-Biblical history wars within the category of Resources-Life have never occurred, and follow the logic that these resources are so crucial that even though war theoretically could rapidly escalate, in practice it is in the interest of all parties to negotiate rather than to fight. This is borne out in the story of the so-called ‘water wars’, both past and present, where disagreements and confrontations have not erupted into fighting, and from which emerges a school of thought that sees negotiations over water access creating a ‘neutral’ zone from which wider antagonisms can be discussed, such as in the Middle East.[6]

Regarding conflicts within the category of Resources-Strategic, the two Gulf Wars illustrated the sharp limits to American geo-strategic endurance when its oil supplies in the Middle East were threatened; it was a similar perception from the earlier Soviet invasion of Afghanistan that gave rise to the 1980 Carter Doctrine of ‘red-lines’ in the sands of the Middle East.[7] Furthermore, there was a surge in ‘commodity conflicts’ after the post- Cold War euphoria had ebbed and ushered in a new wave of ethnic conflicts with unprecedented dimension and geographical spread. These conflicts, predominately in the global South, often witnessed an overlap between criminal ‘lootability’ and long-standing ethnic or religious grievances; ‘blood diamonds’, ‘conflict minerals’, gold and illegal timber extraction all helped to fuel conflict. In the post-colonial dawn, groups have battled each other for power within the realm of modern globalisation; combining new technological developments in communications and transportation, with market forces and the ‘shadow economy’ of undeclared and illegal trading.

And the future. The iron rule of the commercial market-place means that some resources and commodities fade due to lack of demand and the rise of others. Who today would think of fighting to control the spice and fur trades as in the past? Instead, today’s insatiable need for tantalum capacitors inside mobile-phones and other electronic devices has put a premium on coltan (short for columbite-tantalite). The fact that coltan is found in both developed countries such as Canada, and under-developed countries such as the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), has led to the emergence of parallel extractible/regulated and lootable/unregulated markets – buyers make their choice, it’s a free market.

The wide range of ‘lootable’ resources has caused an entwining with the ever-growing ‘shadow’ economy of transnational criminal networks, especially in countries and areas that have been ‘wasted’. These ‘wastelands’ can either occur through conflict, such as in the DRC, or severe deprivation, as in parts of Mexico and much of Central America. The absence of an effective and centralized authority in these ‘wastelands’ makes them, in the view of political geographer, Derek Gregory, ‘pre-constituted as fallen, violated and damaged, always and everywhere potential targets for a colonising capitalist modernity.’ Furthermore, the state’s monopoly of violence may have collapsed, meaning for Gregory that ‘non state actors (warlords, local and ethnic militia) are able to establish alternative, territorially restricted forms of centralised violence.’[8]

 

 

Jasper Humphreys is Director of External Affairs of the Marjan Centre for the Study of War and the Non-Human Sphere in the Department of War Studies, King’s College: this centre is unique in studying the overlap of conflict and biodiversity. Formerly, he was a journalist with over thirty years of experience, writing for various national newspapers.

 

 

 

Notes:

[1] Jeffrey D. Sachs/Andrew M. Warner, ‘Natural resource abundance and economic growth’, working paper Center for International Development and Harvard Institute for International Development, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1997, accessed 15 December 2011.

[2] Kenneth Good; ‘Diamonds, Dispossession and Democracy in Botswana’, Boydell and Brewer, Rochester, New York, 2008

[3] Paul Collier/Anke Hoeffler, ‘On economic causes of civil war’, Oxford Economic Papers 50(4),1998.

[4] Christa N. Brunnschweiler/Erwin H. Bulte, ‘Natural resources and violent conflict: resource abundance, dependence, and the onset of civil wars’, Oxford Economic Papers 61, 2009, pp.651-674.

[5] Thomas Homer-Dixon, Environment, scarcity, and violence (Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1999).

[6] Tony Allan; ‘The Middle East Water Question: Hydropolitics and the Global Economy’, I.B Tauris, London, 2012

[7] Andrew J. Bacevich, ‘The Carter doctrine at 30’, World Affairs, 1 April 2010.

[8] Derek Gregory, ‘War and Peace’, Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers, 35, 2010, p. 166.

Image Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuwaiti_oil_fires#/media/File:F-14A_VF-114_over_burning_Kuwaiti_oil_well_1991.JPEG

Resource-Induced Conflicts: Introduction to the Series

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By: Annabelle Vuille

istock_000020867570large

 

In 2001, Michael T. Klare published his ground breaking work Resource Wars: The New Landscape of Global Conflict. In it, he argued that humanity’s growing dependence on a finite supply of critical resources – from oil and minerals, to water and land – at a time when demand for such resources was expected to soar, meant that our future would increasingly be characterised by what he termed ‘resource conflicts’; that is, armed conflicts or civil strife revolving ‘to a significant degree, over the pursuit or possession of critical materials.’[1] Today, this analysis seems prescient.

According to the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), at least 40% of all internal conflicts recorded over the past 60 years, including at least 18 violent conflicts since the 1990s have been fuelled by issues relating to the exploitation and control of either scarce or ‘high value’ commodities. With the world population expected to exceed 9 billion by 2050, and the effects of climate change and environmental degradation placing increased pressure on commodity supplies, it is highly likely that the new fault line underlying world politics will be natural resources: who has them, who needs them, and which actors have the necessary means to secure them. While natural resources can foment war both between states – such as the ongoing petroleum clash between the Angolan and Congolese government in the Cabinda region, or the Spratly Islands dispute in the South China Sea – and within states – as is the case in both Iraq and Yemen, where disagreements over resource-wealth sharing have caused ethnic fragmentation and civil strife – it is the latter that will be the focus of this Strife series.

Since the turn of the century, there has been a growing body of literature dealing with the link between intrastate conflict and natural resources. The contentious issue on the matter is whether armed conflicts within a state are linked to an abundance or scarcity of resources, commonly referred to as the ‘resource curse’. Proponents argue that an abundance of natural resources leads to economic underperformance, fuels corruption, and creates socio-political ills that may lead to civil strife. Contrastingly, critics point to other countries such as Norway, Botswana and Chile, as examples of peaceful states possessing significant resource endowments. [2]-[3] However, although scholars remain divided on the salience of the resource-curse theory, there is common consensus that while resources may not be the sole cause of conflict, stresses related to their exploitation can have a significant impact on civil strife. From inciting initial acts of violence, financing or sustaining conflict by providing the revenues necessary to purchase arms and secure loyalties, to undermining peace building efforts due to concerns over disenfranchisement and loss of income – natural resources can be implicated in all phases of the conflict cycle.[4]

Over the coming weeks, Strife will be featuring a five-part series on the role of natural resources in triggering, escalating, or sustaining violent conflict within states. Jasper Humphreys will start by surveying the theoretical underpinnings and debates surrounding ‘resource wars’, and subsequently offer insights into where and over which resources future violent conflict might ensue. The three subsequent pieces will provide an insight into current cases of ‘resource conflicts’. Sourojeet Chakraborty will discuss the drawbacks of fracking for shale exploration, how these effects have led to public uprisings from the U.S. and the UK to Algeria, and offer an assessment of what energy companies might do to alleviate such tensions. Siri Camilla Rustad and Cyril Obi will take a closer look at petro-violence in the Niger Delta, the evolution and causes of the conflict, and offer insights into why the Amnesty granted to the Niger Delta militants in 2009 ultimately failed. Dr. Charles Schmitz will use the case of Yemen to argue that though linking natural resource scarcity or abundance to conflict has an attractive conceptual simplicity, the roots of conflict are far more complex. Social relations—economy, politics, social institutions—mediate the relationships between the natural environment and people and bear far more responsibility for scarcity, abundance, and conflict than simple Malthusian equations. Finally, Päivi Lujala will place ‘resource conflicts’ into the context of peacebuilding and discuss the ways in which increased transparency in contract formulation, ownership schemes, and revenue flows may prevent resource-rich states from sliding back into violence.

With soaring global population growth, and the subsequent rise in the demand for resources – from oil and gas, to water and livestock – there is significant potential that the coming decades will experience an intensification of civil strife and conflict over resources. In this five-part series Strife hopes to provide a deeper understanding of the dynamics shaping such conflicts and the means available to states and non-state actors to address their root cause and (hopefully) create a sustainable road to peace.

 

 

Annabelle Vuille is currently based in Switzerland and in her final year of the MA programme in International Relations and Contemporary War at the Department of War Studies at King’s College London. Having studied International Business in Rome, she is specifically interested in applying her economic background to the sphere of conflict and security. Her main research interest is the interplay between geopolitics and energy security, particularly in the maritime domain.

 

 

 

Notes:

[1] Klare, Michael (2001), Resource Wars: The Changing Landscape of Global Conflict (New York, United States: Henry Holt), p. 23.

[2] Wright, Gavin and Czelusta, Jesse (2004), ‘Why Economies Slow: The Myth of the Resource Curse’, Challenge, Vol. 47, No. 2, pp. 6-38.; Varisco, Andrea (2010), ‘A Study on the Inter-Relation between Armed Conflict and Natural Resources and its implications for Conflict Resolution and Peacebuilding’, Journal of Peace, Conflict and Development, Vol. 15, pp. 38-58.

[3] Michael L. Ross, “The political economy of the Resource Curse”, World Politics 51, no.2 (1999): pp. 297-322 explains the so-called Dutch Disease effect, Indra De Soysa, “The Resource Curse: Are Civil Wars Driven by Rapacity or Paucity?”, in Greed and Grievances: Economic Agendas in Civil Wars, ed. Mats R. Berdal and David M. Malone (Boulder: Lynne Rienner Press, 2000) pp. 113-136 introduces the concept of ‘honey pots’. See also Philippe Le Billon, “The political ecology of war: Natural Resources and Armed Conflicts”, Political Geography, 20 (2001): p. 564.

[4] United Nations Environment Programme (2009), From Conflict to Peacebuilding: The Role of Natural Resources and the Environment (Nairobi, Kenya: United Nations Environment Programme).

Image Source: http://tantec.no/TantecNorgeAS/produkter/iptv/content/photogallery_8925791b-a11d-4323-8228-c5e02616d6f4/images/1353664924198/istock_000020867570large.jpg

Transboundary rivers and climate change: Testing times for hydro-diplomacy to attain and maintain cooperation

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EDITORS NOTE: This is the third article in a four-part series which explores the role of water in human conflict and politics. The series marks (though is not affiliated with) World Water Day 2016, a UN initiative to promote awareness of water issues. More information on World Water Day can be found here. The first and second articles in the series can be found here, and here, respectively.

By: Professor Ashok Swain

The_Aral_sea_is_drying_up._Bay_of_Zhalanash,_Ship_Cemetery,_Aralsk,_Kazakhstan
Source: Wikimedia

Water is a basic condition for life and it also plays a fundamental role in human development. The global water crisis is of such magnitude that it is growing into an issue of global common concern. This perspective puts the focus on transboundary rivers: approximately half of global fresh water is available through 276 international basins around the world. Overall, 145 countries have territories that include at least one shared river basin. However, national politics complicates the policies towards the enhanced “river basin management” of such shared rivers. Thus, while dealing with the management of the transboundary rivers, political issues are often overshadowed by integrated water resources management (IWRM) terminology that has contributed to a failure of achieving global water governance .[1]

The management of transboundary rivers in different parts of the world cannot follow a particular golden principle of the value of water — its demand and supply varies from one basin to another.[2] Thus, it can be safely argued that “one-shot approach of management within the context of IWRM is far too simplistic to be useful, or applicable” for sustainable management of international rivers.[3] In spite of its huge significance for global peace and development, the available knowledge on how to manage transboundary waters is quite weak.[4] Moreover, the existing knowledge and institutions on governance of international rivers are becoming increasingly volatile because of greater demand and a decreased supply of fresh water. Adding further to the problem, the threat of global climate change has started undermining the on-going regimes and institutions of water sharing and management of transboundary rivers.[5]

The Climate Change and Transboundary Water

The controversy over the science of global warming and the procedures adopted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in collecting data fails to undermine the decades of climate research confirming the overall global climate change. Doubts and denial have given way to debates about the scale and impact of climate change, particularly in the developing countries. Agricultural production in the Southern hemisphere may become highly vulnerable to climate change, given the other multiple stresses that affect food systems in these regions. Moreover, some countries and societies are better in formulating adaptation strategies for land- and water-use practices that buffers them against the negative consequences of climate change. To address the adverse effects of climate change, the effectiveness and coping abilities of existing institutions also matter. Within this context, there is a general recognition that the developing countries will be the hardest hit by the impacts of climate change, as they tend to depend more on the natural environment for their livelihoods and have limited coping mechanisms and adaptive capacity.

While the exact impact of climate change is not yet known, it will have a clear bearing upon access to shared water resources as it affects hydrological cycles at all geographical scales, from global to local. Some regions will become much drier, some wetter. Variations in precipitation are already leading to more and severe droughts and floods, changes in the groundwater recharge, high evaporation from fresh water systems, and alteration in river runoff. Increasing number of high and untimely floods will threaten the safety of dams and other water infrastructure projects; severe droughts will drastically reduce water supply, irrigation and hydropower generation. Climate change is thus set to make water management challenges more complicated in terms of providing safe drinking water, adequate sanitation, improved food production, and in generating hydropower and ecosystem protection. Moreover, climate change may have a serious impact on overall availability of river water flow in international basins. Some parts of the basin will experience higher flows and others lower flows placing significant strain on existing agreements and structures for the management of shared water resources — whether at local, national or international level – and thereby increasing the need for serious conflict management institutions and practices. As can be seen, the ongoing climatic changes will make it impossible for a ‘business as usual’ approach, which emphasizes building large projects to increase water supply in managing shared river systems. Increased freshwater variability will introduce a greater uncertainty, which can pose serious new challenges to the on-going practices of water sharing and management in transboundary river basins.

New challenges for hydro-diplomacy

The influence of hydro diplomacy has helped several disputing countries to not only agree on their portions of shared river water, but also to look other areas of cooperation.[6] In 1994, water played a critical role in the signing of a peace agreement between Israel and Jordan. India and Pakistan, in spite of more than six decades of bitter rivalry, have only had lasting cooperation over the sharing of Indus River water resources. Thus, international rivers are not only expected to induce riparian conflict, its water resource can also bring engagement and cooperation in the basin. Many competing riparian countries in the South, most notably the basin countries of the Mekong, Amur, Jordan, Syr Darya, Ganges, Mahakali, Nile, Komati, Limpopo, Okavango, Orange, and Zambezi rivers have signed sharing arrangements in the 1990s. The signing of these river agreements had brought a fundamental shift over the possible impact of shared water on riparian relations, a likely phase of cooperation rather than conflict. Hydro-diplomacy is still being endorsed to take precedence over state-centric politics and decision-making over international water resources.[7]

Most of these recently concluded river agreements have been possible as the riparian countries saw advantages in cooperating to pursue further development of shared water resource to meet their growing demand. In some cases like the Nile, Mekong, Jordan and Zambezi rivers, diplomatic pressures and financial aid and grants from the international community had also facilitated the success of hydro-diplomacy. However, these river water agreements are in grave danger if they fail to receive institutional support for proper water management at the basin level.

Global climate change has added increased uncertainties to the smooth functioning and survival of these recent transboundary water agreements. As Arnell argues, climate change may affect both the demand and supply sides of the balance.[8] With increasing temperatures, sizeable reductions in precipitation, and the melting of glacial sources of major river systems, less water supplies will be available to the agricultural sector. Climate change will not only decrease the supply of river water, it may also enhance its demand in domestic, irrigation, industrial and ecological use. Thus, climate change induced scarcity and uncertainly of shared water resource in the arid and semi-arid regions can possibly limit the potential of hydro-diplomacy. It is true that the projected impacts of global climate change over fresh water supply might be huge and dramatic, but in a transboundary basin, the effects on the runoff might vary depending on the location. This further enhances the uncertainties and anxieties over the water availability in the shared river systems. Most of the existing river agreements do have provisions to meet near-term shortfalls in the river flow. However, climate change can potentially bring long-term changes to water availability, which requires water regimes and institutions to be flexible and robust enough to cope with the emerging situation.

Climate induced changes in water supply might demand comprehensive adjustments in the on-going water sharing arrangement of shared rivers. The institutions overseeing water sharing must be adaptable enough in re-allocating fluctuating water flow for various sectors. Thus, the task of hydro-diplomacy amid climate change entails both getting the disputing riparian countries to sign river sharing agreements but also to ensure these countries support establishing regimes and institutions which will have the provisions for information sharing, conflict management mechanisms, and flexibility to adjust to the runoff variations in the long term. Moreover, mitigating or adaptive actions at bilateral or even sub-basin levels to address the impacts of climate change in a transboundary river basin are unlikely to achieve the objective of sustainable peace and cooperation over shared water resources. The emerging and unprecedented situation demands basin countries to cooperate and act collectively and jointly. In the face of global climate change, a successful basin-based initiative is required to facilitate better integration of demand and supply and to promote meaningful participatory processes. Business as usual for hydro-diplomacy and a singular focus upon bilateral negotiation and arrangements is no longer an option in the transboundary river basins.

Responding to new challenges

The unfolding effects of climate change will further increase water scarcity, in the form of long-lasting drought and seasonal variation. People need a responsive state to attend to their basic need for water. When climate change makes it difficult for the state to meet demand for water, conflicts over a narrowing resource base are less readily resolved; instability and violent conflict within states may feed instability and conflict between states within the basin. Efficient and good water management in the face of climate change is also part of peace-building effort – both in preventing countries from returning to armed conflict, and in helping avoid relapse after a period of violence. Despite the risk that climate change induced water scarcity poses to social wellbeing and economic growth, in most countries there has been alarmingly little progress towards managing freshwater sustainably. Significant economic and political resources are needed to develop technologies and infrastructure that provide better water management at the basin, national, and transboundary level.

To reach agreement on meeting the competing and fluctuating demands for water in a transboundary basin is, in fact, not an easy task. Hydro-diplomacy thus needs to adopt a total resource view where river water is seen as a key input for development and growth in the basin. The challenges are not only limited to the technical and economic sectors, but also include crucial water sector reform, which is political in nature. Moreover, the task of hydro-diplomacy will not be anymore limited to basin-based regimes and institutions, but also entails achieving effective water governance in the face of climate change and influencing the supporting pathways from local, national and international policies and practices.

In the past, river-sharing issues could be effectively covered by a few negotiators trained specifically to deal with water issues. But today, hydro-diplomacy needs to involve itself not only in an increasing range of fields (such as energy generation, food production, human rights, and health issues) but also hydro-diplomacy should also reflect sufficient knowledge about possible impacts of climate change (such as precipitation pattern, glacier melting, temperature increase, rising sea water encroaching fresh water system). Many developing riparian countries, not only have to survive with the existing power asymmetry vis-à-vis regional powers in the basins, they also suffer from a lack of competent ‘hydro-diplomats’ who can address climate change issues while carrying out negotiation over shared water resources.

Hydro-diplomacy is needed to acquaint itself well with increasingly diversified climate change policy processes. River water negotiators are required to have sufficient knowledge of the climate change phenomenon and the possible impact of climate change on human, society, country and region. They also need to have an overview of the existing and emerging schools of thought regarding climate change and its impact on water availability and demand. It is also crucial to identify and classify important actors and groupings and their positions on climate change and water management issues. Moreover, hydro-diplomacy must have overview of increasing legal and policy documents, which are coming out by international and regional organizations on the impact of climate change on water resources and possible mitigation and adaption measures.

 

 

Ashok Swain is a professor of peace and conflict research, and the director of the Research School of the International Center for Water Cooperation at Uppsala University in Sweden

 

 

 

[1] Conca, Ken 2006. Governing Water. Massachusetts: MIT Press.

[2] Swain, Ashok 2004. Managing Water Conflict: Asia, Africa and the Middle East. London: Routledge

[3] Varis, O., C. Tortajada, and A.K. Biswa. 2008. Management of Tranboundary Rivers and Lakes. Berlin: Springer.

[4] Earle, A., A. Jägerskog, and J. Öjendal, eds. 2010. Transboundary Water Management: Principles and Practice: London: Earthscan.

[5] Earle, A, A. E. Cascao, S. Hansson, A. Jägerskog, A. Swain, and J. Öjendal, 2015. Transboundary Water Management and the Climate Change Debate: London: Routledge.

[6] Conca, Ken, and Geoffrey D. Dabelko, eds. 2002. Environmental Peacemaking. Washington, Baltimore and London: Woodrow wilson Centre Press and The Johns Hopkins University Press.

[7] Pohl, B, A. Carius, K. Conca, G. D. Dabelko, A. Kramer, D. Michel, S. Schmeier, A. Swain and A. Wolf, 2014. The Rise of Hydro-Diplomacy. Strengthening foreign policy for transboundary waters: Berlin: Adelphi.

[8] Arnell, Nigel W. 1999. Climate Change and Global Water Resources. Global Environmental Change 9:31-49.