Transformation of the United Nations Peacekeeping in the post-Cold War Era: The Case of Somalia and Beyond

Abstract

Although the United Nations Charter does not articulate peacekeeping missions, the peacekeeping has become one of the most important instruments of the UN to maintain international peace and security. During the Cold War period, peacekeeping forces were deployed between parties after the cease-fire was reached. Peacekeepers were mainly responsible for monitoring and maintaining the ceasefire and creating buffer zones between warring parties. With the end of Cold War, peacekeeping has evolved in response to more complex and dangerous conflicts. In this period, peacekeepers not only assumed a task of keeping the peace but also took part in the peacemaking, peace-enforcement, and peace-building processes. As a result, traditional peacekeeping changed dramatically. A new generation of the UN peacekeeping missions has begun to appear and the organization has moved beyond its traditional peacekeeping principles which are the consent of warring parties, non-use of force except in self-defense and impartiality. The post-Cold War UN peacekeeping missions have required more forceful and interventionist response to conflicts that broke out after the Cold War. It has shifted and expanded its mandates and objectives. This thesis elucidates the transition from traditional peacekeeping to second-generation peacekeeping or multidimensional peacekeeping, and investigates the reasons behind this transformation of the UN peacekeeping during early post-Cold War era. The research analyses this transformation through UN’s intervention in Somalia. The Somalia case was one of the significant interventions of the UN after the end of Cold War that affected and shaped the evolution of peacekeeping. It can also be considered as test case for the practice of the concepts of the peace-building and peace-enforcement which were proposed by Secretary-General Boutros Boutros-Ghali. Briefly, the thesis seeks to depict the transformations of the UN peacekeeping undergone after the Cold War and investigates the reform efforts immediate after the Cold War. This thesis also focuses on the Brahimi Report published in 1999 after the failure of the UN in the 1990s. With the Brahimi Report, concrete and effective recommendations were put forward to strengthen the peacekeeping capacities and to establish successful operations.