Conflict in Melanesia : Themes and Lessons

Dinnen, Sinclair ; Porter, Doug ; Sage, Caroline

World Bank, Washington, DC

关键词: ABUSE;    ABUSES;    ACCOUNTABILITY;    ADOPTION;    AGGRESSION;   

RP-ID  :  62025

学科分类：社会科学、人文和艺术（综合）

来源: World Bank Open Knowledge Repository

【 摘 要 】

This case study examines contemporaryexperiences of conflict in four contexts: Papua New Guinea,with particular reference to the island of Bougainville andthe Highlands region; Solomon Islands; and Vanuatu. We findcommon themes in these experiences, despite the regionsfamous sociolinguistic diversity, fragmented geography andvaried experience of globalization. Melanesia offersdistinctive lessons about how conflict may be understood,promoted and avoided. The paper is organized in two broadparts. The first part is contextual. It provides a briefaccount of conflict and violence in social life before andafter colonization. It then tracks, largely chronologically,through the local, national and transnational dimensions ofcontemporary conflict, how it was avoided, how it haschanged, and how it has been managed in different contexts.Particular attention is given to global and regionalinfluences, and to how governments, local people, andexternal security, development and commercial actors, haveworked to mitigate and, at times, exacerbate conflict. Thesecond part of the case study is more analytical. It stepsback from the particulars to address themes and propositionsin the overall conceptual framing of World DevelopmentReport (WDR) 2011 about the nature of conflict, and theunderlying stresses and interests that may render it morelikely. Part two draws lessons from the histories andcontexts discussed in part one. The report organizes thesearound three themes that reflect views shared with us bypeople during consultations. The first highlights the needto recognize conflict as an inherent part of social changeand thus the need to distinguish between socially generativesocial contest, and forms of conflict that are corrosive anddestructive. The second examines how the ways people'see' and understand the world directly shapessystems of regulation and 'the rules of the game'and thus directly affect responses to conflict. The thirdtheme argues that capable and legitimate institutions toregulate social contest requires not just capable stateinstitutions, but as much, relationships with local andinternational agents and organizations operating below andabove the state.