Sven Chojnacki

The logic of security markets: Security governance in failed states

This article presents a theoretical framework with which to discuss how non-state modes of security governance evolve in the context of state failure and/or collapse. To address this issue, we present the logic of security markets, which assumes that the evolution of security governance by non-state groups in failed states is a function of both resource availability and the strategies that armed groups apply to extract resources from the civilian population. Axiomatically, we expect that in the short term the central purpose for the use of force is survival and achieving the ability to finance one’s capabilities to use force, although ultimately this also includes the seizure and control of territory. The main argument is that the changing competitive conditions in security markets – which we measure in terms of the total number of violent groups and their organizational design, size and strength – explain the rationales behind the decisions of armed groups either to use violence against the civilian population or to invest in the provision of security.

Peacebuilding: am Scheideweg – oder in der Sackgasse?

Peacebuilding: At a Crossroads – or at a Dead End? Abstract: We present a critical overview of the current debate on the use, scope, and effectiveness of peace building. Most notably, we analyze to what extent recent academic publications sufficiently reflect problematic aspects of current practices. The focus is on developments in the research on peace building concerning strategies, which have been and still are being implemented by political institutions and actors in the field: Local ownership and the coordination and integration of various peace building actors. We arrive at the conclusion that it is worthwhile practically as well as analytically necessary to give up concepts of social engeneering steering and alternatively develop ways to systematically cope with the lack of knowledge.

Overcoming the Material/Social Divide: Conflict Studies from the Perspective of Spatial Theory

In conflict studies it has become a trend to link space and conflict theoretically as well as empirically (see e.g. Raleigh et al. 2010; Stephenne et al. 2009; Wucherpfennig et al. 2011). So far, however, few substantial arguments have been made that consider how the relationship between space and conflict can enhance our understanding of conflicts. One challenge is that the landscape of theoretical narratives and empirical studies is rather fragmented along the line of different disciplines. Social geographers, political scientists, conflict researchers and development scholars alike suggest that we broaden our understanding of space in order to reflect on the conditions, dynamics and effects of conflict more precisely, without much engagement between these disciplines. One central question discussed in these different bodies of literature is whether space is an external, material condition that influences human action, or whether a different understanding of space is required.