Jason Franks

Liberal Hubris? Virtual Peace in Cambodia

The article examines the nature of the peace that exists in Cambodia by critiquing the ‘liberal peace’ framework. The authors claim that, despite the best efforts of international donors and the NGO community, liberal peacebuilding in Cambodia has so far failed in many of its key aims. The liberal peacebuilding project in Cambodia has been modified by a combination of local political, economic and social dynamics, international failings, and the broader theoretical failings of the liberal peacebuilding process. There have been some important successes, but serious doubts remain as to whether this project has been or can be successful, not least because of the ontological problem of whether the liberal peace is at all transferable. This raises the question of what type of peace has actually been built. The authors argue that the result of international efforts so far is little more than a virtual liberal peace.

Liberal Peacebuilding in Timor Leste: The Emperor's New Clothes?

A critical examination of the effort to build a liberal peace since 1999 in East Timor illustrates that to a large degree the liberal peace model has failed the East Timorese people. There are two aspects to this: the first is the failure to construct a social contract between society and its institutions of governance. This is related to the broader issue of the social legitimacy of, and contract with, international actors derived from society and its complex groupings. The second is the failure, at least in the transitional period, to respond to the experiences of everyday life and welfare requirements of the new states citizens.

Coopting Liberal Peace-building Untying the Gordian Knot in Kosovo

The liberal peace framework aims to regulate, govern and empower the individual in a democratic and pluralist milieu. Yet liberal peace-building, even on the scale and depth employed in the international governance of Kosovo, is susceptible to local cooption, particularly where one group can adopt the language of the liberal peace and has strong support and credibility from the international community. This has led to a focus on achieving statehood for Kosovan Albanians, the marginalization of other identity groups and their agendas, and consequently the undermining of the pluralist goals of peace-building with the implicit cooperation of liberal peace-builders. Given Serb opposition to statehood for Kosovo, there is a danger that liberal peace-building will encourage the partition of Kosovo rather than create a pluralist polity. The article illustrates the susceptibility of liberal peace-building to local cooption.

Between partition and pluralism: the Bosnian jigsaw and an ‘ambivalent peace’

This article argues that the attempted creation of a liberal state in Bosnia and Herzegovina by various international actors has failed to generate legitimacy among the local population. While the Dayton agreements institutionalized ethnic divisions, the post‐Dayton reconstruction process was dominated by Western liberal discourses that have tended to marginalize local voices. Thereby, a conservative version of the liberal peace has been institutionalized, based on top‐down mechanisms that mobilized public support only when war elites could co‐opt the international agendas. Instead of creating inclusive structures within society, international authorities have become central mechanisms of governance in Bosnia without being accountable to the population. Alongside further fragmentation of society, this has undermined the development of democratic structures and a true engagement with the historical and societal context in which peace‐building programmes are deployed. Both civil society development and economic liberalization have been externally driven, hence provoking local resistance and undermining a sustainable peace process. The authors argue that such an approach is not conducive to an emancipatory version of the liberal peace, which would be based on local consent and would genuinely engage with people’s welfare.

The impact of orthodox terrorism discourses on the liberal peace: internalisation, resistance, or hybridisation?

This article examines the relationship between orthodox terrorism discourses and liberal peacebuilding, particularly where states are being reconstituted after a conflict. Drawing upon fieldwork in Sri Lanka, Palestine, Kashmir, Nepal, and Northern Ireland, our findings suggest that conflicts in which orthodox terrorism theory is deployed to explain violence are those in which there is little interest (by all parties) in dealing with root causes or achieving mutual compromise. This is so even though the liberal peace is commonly a claimed aspiration for most parties, apart from the most radical of non-state actors or authoritarian of states. They effectively reify both terrorism and state securitisation. The aspired to internalisation of the liberal peace framework has instead been supplanted by the politics of state securitisation and violent resistance. Liberal peacebuilding has become a nominal exercise in constructing virtually liberal states in which the security and integrity of core groups are partially maintained by orthodox terrorism praxis. To counter these dynamics, critical positions need to engage with agendas beyond liberal or cosmopolitan frameworks.