Introduction

The acknowledgement of gender issues through the Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda marked a watershed moment for women’s rights. Despite this, the Responsibility to Protect (R2P) framework remains gender-blind. I argue that R2P and the WPS agenda share overlapping commitments and mutually beneficial and reinforcing protection mandates. Through three intersecting commitments – prevention and early warning systems, gender protection in peacekeeping, and women’s participation in post-conflict reconstruction – careful alignment between R2P and the WPS agenda could overcome this silence and move towards achieving more sustainable security.

The Responsibility to Protect and Women Peace and Security

Systematic human rights atrocities perpetrated against individuals based on their ethnicity, gender, and race have framed contemporary political discourses. With the international community’s inability to collectively respond to prevent mass atrocities and other severe humanitarian emergencies, former United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Kofi Annan spearheaded the challenge to create a norm permitting states to intervene in another sovereign state in the event of ‘gross and systematic violations of human rights that affect every precept of our common humanity’. Spurred on by  failures of the international community to prevent genocides in Rwanda (1994) and Srebrenica (1995), the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty (ICISS) was established in September 2000 to address how and when the international community should act to prevent genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity. The report entitled “The Responsibility to Protect” (R2P) was released in December 2001. The unanimous adoption of R2P at the World Summit in 2005 established its prominence as a normative framework within the international community. The use of R2P as rhetorical backdrop to the Libyan intervention in 2011 via UNSC Resolutions 1970 and 1973 and the inaction in responding to the crisis in Syria demonstrates the prevalence of R2P in international discourse. Furthermore, R2P is interwoven with existing international principles, obligations, and peacebuilding initiatives. UN Secretary-General Ban Ki Moon asserts that R2P rests upon three interrelated, central pillars – responsibilities of the state to protect its population from mass atrocities; international capacity building to ensure states meet their protection responsibilities and prevent mass atrocities; and collective and timely responses through diplomatic, humanitarian and political means with coercive military action as a last resort.

The Women, Peace and Security (WPS) agenda gained traction on the international peace and security platform following the adoption of UN Security Council Resolution 1325 in October 2000. The WPS agenda is the most comprehensive articulation of women’s rights and gender issues in international peace and security. It establishes a nexus between conflict prevention and women’s rights, highlighting the relationship between gender inequality and conflict. Resulting from the Fourth World Conference on Women in 1995 in Beijing, and the pivotal Beijing Platform for Action which named ‘Women and Armed Conflict’ as one of twelve areas of critical concern, the NGO Working Group on Women, Peace and Security was formed to advocate a UNSC Resolution focused on women’s unique contribution and experiences of conflict. Through lobbying and advocacy, the NGO Working Group played a vital role in drafting the resolution and through UN Resolution 1325 successfully complicated the popular narratives that stereotyped women as either victims or inclusive peacebuilders. UN Resolution 1325 directs policymakers to consider all of women’s experiences in conflict and links women’s rights to international peace and security. The adoption of an additional seven resolutions builds upon 1325 and make up the WPS agenda. It rests upon a four-pillar mandate; prevention of violence and derogation of rights; protection from violence; participation in peacebuilding and post-conflict reconstruction; and relief and recovery. Laura Shepherd and Jacqui True broaden ‘relief and recovery’, to include identifying the structural social, political and economic conditions required for sustainable and lasting peace. Specifically the WPS agenda addresses sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV) in conflict, measures to ensure women’s participation in decision-making processes and post-conflict programs, gender mainstreaming in UN activities and peacekeeping operations, and gender-sensitive prevention frameworks. The WPS agenda provides basis for international engagement with gender issues. With R2P, the WPS shares a commitment to improve human security and revealing and preventing women’s human rights abuses through international engagement. Disappointingly, despite both frameworks emerging sharing similar underpinnings, R2P and its community continue to fail to address gender issues encompassed within the WPS agenda.

R2P did not embrace the central messages of Resolution 1325 nor were points of synergies explored where there was a lack of dialogue and acknowledgement towards gender issues. From the outset, gender was excluded from the original formulation of R2P with only one of the 12 commissioners being a woman and only seven of 2000 sources consulted including gender. Women within the original R2P document were framed in terms of vulnerable populations in need of protection. ‘Women’ were mentioned three times only in reference to ‘rape and sexual violence’, which was mentioned seven times, where SGBV falls under crimes against humanity, war crimes and ethnic cleansing. No reference was made of women being active participants and agents in conflict prevention, protection and post-conflict reconstruction. This is despite the transformative possibilities of including aspects of the WPS agenda. R2P disregards WPS as a paradigm for conflict prevention and its centrality to peace and security. Here, as discussed below, three common intersecting commitments could overcome this disconnect.

Intersecting Commitments

• Prevention and early warning systems

The inclusion of gender issues into existing early-warning frameworks and systems may illuminate potential and/or existing R2P situations. Studying macro- and micro-level changes to women’s lives reveals the escalation of violence and derogation of individual rights in hyper-masculinised and militarised societies. Gender-sensitive indicators include average levels of female education, impunity towards SGBV, increased kidnappings, sex work, female heads of households and domestic violence. Moreover, gender-sensitive indicators are not synonymous with women-sensitive indicators, but can monitor aggression and militarisation within a society, such as the persecution of men that do not take up arms. UN Women implemented several context-specific programs that have resulted in a comprehensive how-to guide of 85 gender-sensitive indicators that provide a holistic early warning system. Furthermore, through empirical analysis Sara Davies and Jacqui True found strong connections between systemic gender inequality and discrimination and the use of SGBV in conflict and non-conflict settings.

Despite the benefits of including gender-sensitive indicators, gaps in women’s participation in early-warning initiatives have not been overcome. The UN Office of the Special Adviser on the Prevention of Genocide and the Responsibility to Protect have not addressed the role of gender inequality or gendered violence in early warning systems. A recent framework of analysis on the prevention of R2P crimes continues to situate women in the narrative of ‘vulnerable population’ with children and the elderly, and in regards to sexual violence and reproductive rights. This is despite, as Davies and True argue, systemic and structural gender inequality is a potential early warning factor for preventing mass SGBV.

Since gender inequality increases the likelihood of R2P crimes any strategy of prevention must address gender norms that oppress and marginalise women. Gender-sensitive indicators highlight structural political, economic and social inequalities that maintain gender inequality in a given society that impacts post-conflict reconstruction and conflict protection.

• Gender-sensitive Protection in Peacekeeping Operations

The protection pillar of WPS stresses the full involvement and participation of women in the maintenance and promotion of international peace and security. This includes gender mainstreaming in all peacekeeping missions and the addition of gender units and advisers. Providing an official female presence in conflict areas, refugee and Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs) camps is essential to improve access and support for local women to communicate in an official capacity. Women can approach each other more easily in female-only settings where women may be prohibited to talk to male strangers. Moreover, SGBV is more likely to be reported between women. However, as of February 2016, only 3.34 per cent of military and 9 per cent of police were female. Although there is at least one female in every peacekeeping force, the number varies from 1 woman out of 17 deployed in the UN mission in Afghanistan to 799 women out of 17,453 deployed in the UN-African Union Mission in Darfur. Of 105,315 deployed peacekeepers, women only comprise 4.05 per cent. Although numbers have improved since the adoption of UN Resolution 1325, increases have been marginal and reflect the low number of women included in UN peace building efforts.

Furthermore, implementation of gender-sensitive protection needs to move beyond the ‘add women and stir’ policy. Rather, WPS knowledge needs to be utilised in peacekeeping operations and wider UN peacebuilding efforts. For instance, the assumption that men are heads of households and therefore assistance being distributed to mainly men does not reflect post-conflict realities. Women are often widowed during and after conflict and adopt non-traditional roles such as heads of households. Since post-conflict programs and assistance does not recognise this, women are forced to take drastic measures to support their family and may take part in exploitive aspects of peacekeeping economies, like the sex industry. The misconception could be countered through gender units, gender-awareness training on more than an ad hoc basis and extensive comprehension of WPS.

• Women’s participation in post-conflict reconstruction.

The post-conflict phase is complex with many overlaps where the WPS agenda would assist states and the international community in post-conflict responsibilities. However, here I will focus on women’s participation in peace processes. Women’s involvement in peace processes is mentioned in every resolution of the WPS agenda. Evidence suggests that the inclusion of women at the peace table as witnesses, signatories, negotiators and mediators makes it 35 per cent more likely a peace agreement will last. Nevertheless, women’s quality participation in official capacities remains insufficient. Women and gender provisions have slowly started to be incorporated into peace agreements with a textual increase since the passing of Resolution 1325.

However, by essentialising women as mothers, caregivers and victims, women are excluded from peace negotiations where, ironically, the cessation of hostilities is reliant on those who took up arms. I am not arguing that women are better peacemakers, but that their participation is vital to ensure that their experiences of conflict are acknowledged. Around the world, women lobby for participation to ensure their needs and security concerns are addressed. In Somalia, the Sixth Clan was formed in response to the five traditional Somali clans failure to include women in negotiating teams. Asha Hagi Elmi became the representative of the Sixth Clan in 2000 and in peace talks in 2002, becoming the first female signatory to a peace agreement in 2004. Peace processes must include women as more than lip service to inclusivity.

Conflict transition provides a chance to create a more equal society by transforming the gendered relationships and identities that contributed to the production of violence. Women’s participation is essential to represent half the population during peace negotiations, to ensure explicit inclusion of women’s rights and gender provisions, and could have major implications for women’s social, political and economic status, and involvement in wider post-conflict initiatives. It is imperative that women are involved during that critical post-conflict transition to be enabled to affect positive changes.

Conclusion

Despite these areas of common engagement, R2P remains silent towards analysis and discourse surrounding the WPS platform. Both frameworks emerged at similar times and share central tenets of prevention, participation and protection, however women’s involvement in R2P has been grossly deficient. I have briefly demonstrated here, and examine in depth elsewhere, three areas of common engagement between R2P and the WPS agenda. I identify three common intersecting commitments – prevention and early warning frameworks, protection and gender-sensitive peacekeeping, and women’s participation in peace processes. Implementing gender-sensitive policies, legislations and programs will highlight the different lived experiences of men and women and the insecurities that arise during conflict and post-conflict reconstruction. R2P has much to gain from the WPS agenda and vice versa, where alliance with R2P and its community could aid the WPS agenda in addressing major gaps in its implementation. Alignment, both practical and normative, could provide an inclusive and holistic protection platform and encourage sustainable peace.

Sarah Hewitt is a PhD candidate at Monash University, Australia with the Monash Gender, Peace and Security Centre. Her article,  ‘Overcoming the Gender gap: The Possibilities of Alignment between the Responsibility to Protect and the Women, Peace and Security Agenda’, was recently published in the Global Responsibility to Protect Journal. Sarah has also posted on Protection Gateway.

In an important year for the Women, Peace and Security agenda, women’s civil society organising is increasingly being impacted by global and national counter-terrorism regimes.

2015 is a key year for women peace activists around the world. United Nations Security Council members will convene a high-level review in October 2015 to assess progress at the global, regional and national levels in implementing Security Council Resolution (UNSCR) 1325, renew commitments, and address obstacles and constraints.

Fifteen years since UNSCR 1325 was passed, there are still a lot of challenges to overcome. However, women peacemakers and activists are as resilient as ever. They continue to push the Women, Peace and Security agenda’s important message forward, in environments that can be risky, unsupportive, or outright hostile.

However, this resilience is closely tied to the existence of a vibrant civil society space. It is therefore important to assess new challenges to the building of peace and women’s rights posed by counter-terrorism measures.  This assessment must overcome the hesitancy that many peacemakers feel about discussing their experiences openly, fearing damage to their reputation as well as other repercussions.

To this end, in early 2015 the Women Peacemakers Program (WPP), together with Human Security Collective (HSC) contacted a selection of partners in ten countries to gain insight into the multiple ways the counter-terrorism agenda is affecting their work for peace and women’s rights.  This article is based on the perspectives of the respondents from a range of countries worldwide, who were guaranteed anonymity.

Global framework

Post 9/11 counter-terrorism measures have impacted on civil society’s operational and political space in several ways. Legislation, although enacted at the national level, is enacted within, and responsive to, a global framework of measures. Terrorist listing regimes and partner vetting systems may hinder peace work in a variety of complex ways.

One of the most significant areas for peace organizations is the framework that governs the prevention of terrorism financing through the non-profit sector. The Financial Action Task Force (FATF), a highly influential global consortium established in 1989 by the G7, has developed specific recommendations for non-profit organizations (Recommendation 8 – Best Practices: Combating the Abuse of Non-Profit Organisations) in its Anti Money Laundering/Countering Financing of Terrorism standard. This standard assumes that non-profits are vulnerable to abuse for terrorism financing. To date, over 180 countries have endorsed the standard and as such are subject to a peer evaluation by the FATF every 6 to 7 years. Receiving a low FATF rating immediately influences a country’s international financial standing.

In recent years, a number of countries have started to use the FATF standard, and specifically Recommendation 8, as a pretext to clamp down on civil society space. Although countries often deny that it is the case, evidence is growing that upcoming FATF evaluations can have a preemptive chilling effect on civil society space. This is a direct result of governments’ desire to show the FATF that they are capable of preventing terrorist financing abuse through their non-profit sectors. In addition, some states are starting to pass more restrictive non-profit laws after an FATF evaluation – as if the evaluation itself serves to legitimize the drafting of such laws.

Shrinking space

The WPP research indicates that as a result of these mechanisms, a growing number of women activists around the world are experiencing growing pressures on their capacity to undertake peace and human rights activism, including restrictive NGO legislation, suffocating financial regulations, intimidating surveillance practices and exhaustive reporting requirements.

Many women peace activists engage in civil society work that is critical and political. They often operate in high-risk settings, where they face repercussions because of the very nature of their activist work, which challenges established notions and bastions of patriarchal power. Several respondents reported that their governments are trying to control, limit, or stop critical civil society work through the development and passing of new NGO legislation. This new legislation is impacting on their space to operate, for example by putting restrictions on receiving funding support. As one activist from the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) region shared:

The Rights and Liberties Committee at the Constitution Drafting Assembly has released their suggestion for the Constitution… namely that local civil society should be banned from receiving any foreign government funds.

A women’s organisation based in South Asia observed a difference between the difficulties experienced by various organisations:

There is enough funding for service delivery organizations and those who follow right wing politicians. However, there is no funding for the rights-based organizations, or for those that work towards alternatives.

Some respondents described nationwide campaigns of invasive NGO inspections undertaken by national governments, using harassment tactics such as personal intimidation and threatening activists with the closing down of their organizations. One respondent reported:

When I received a grant from one (domestic) Foundation, I was getting calls from the intelligence bureau and had to supply them with three-years of audited statements, a list of Governing Board Members and staff members. […] They visited my home three times, to ask me questions.

Some women’s groups also faced demanding reporting requirements because of government regulations:

In some locations, all civil society organizations have to submit a copy of their annual report to the police, armed forces, and intelligence offices of the state.

Better safe than sorry?

Aside from the general worsening atmosphere for political or rights-based peace work in many contexts, the FATF standard has also had a great impact on the financial service industry, particularly on banks. Banks can be sanctioned when not abiding by the FATF standard, which may include the withdrawal of their banking license, freezing of assets, or hefty fines.

There is a growing body of evidence that shows that banks’ risk averse behavior has resulted in the withdrawal of bank services to civil society active in conflict areas. As a result of this “better safe than sorry” attitude of the banks, a growing number of civil society organizations are experiencing great difficulties in making or receiving money transfers. Over the years, many donors have become cautious  with grants. Some donors are avoiding partners in high risk, terrorist prone areas, and a number of others are tightening their own due diligence.

Women’s peace organizations more easily fall prey to these restrictions. This is partly because women’s organizations usually operate on small budgets, which means they often do not have the leverage to negotiate a solution with their banks, which big donor organizations and charities are often still able to do. Several respondents mentioned facing challenges with their banks, ranging from delays in receiving their funds to banks requesting additional project information before releasing the funds. Some activists reported that certain banks would no longer release foreign funds to their organizations or had refused to provide their organization with a bank account. One activist reported that another organization in her network had had its account closed by the bank. A respondent from the MENA region shared:

Sometimes we are facing difficulties during the money transfer process, it takes a long time for us to receive the funds, and some correspondent banks reject the amount. Recently a new system has been introduced: there is a limit on the amount we can withdraw on a weekly basis from the bank. This means we cannot pay all our organizational expenses on time, such as staff salary, rent, activity expenses… Everyone is calling us for their money, and we have to promise them that we will pay them next week… Sometimes we are taking loans from other people just to cover our expenses.

In addition, several reported that direct access to funding is getting more difficult. This is partly due to donors increasingly prefering to channel funds via large organizations capable of producing grant proposals according to their demanding guidelines, as well as able to absorb rigorous reporting and auditing requirements. An organization based in Europe reported significantly increased pressures on human resources regarding donor reporting. Staff found themselves working overtime to meet the requirements of this related additional bureacracy, and on some occasions had to seek external advice.

Cumulative effect

Increasingly, these complex and time-consuming requirements are clashing with the reality on the ground: that many women’s organizations are operating on very modest budgets with a combination of limited paid staff capacity and/or volunteer efforts, in a demanding environment that is at best challenging and at worst highly insecure and hostile.

As such, counter-terrorism measures – whether subtly or bluntly – are having an impact on a number of levels that, in combination, restrict civil society space. As one respondent, whose organization had been severely impacted, summarized:

We face an increase in expenditure (because we want to avoid targeting, we now travel in groups, which is more costly); increased surveillance of our movement and programs (officials are asking for reports and bank advices, including that of our personal bank accounts); postponing or cancelling of some of our programs or keeping low profile for some time; mental unrest of our members; impact on the reputation of our organization as our work was projected as “anti-national”, which has affected the outreach of our member organizations. Also, a few partner organizations have left the network fearing repercussions by the government.

The cumulative effect of the range of pressures is that the enabling space for women’s civil society work is shrinking and therefore progressive and pioneering work for inclusive development, peace and women’s rights becomes frustrated. The implications for broader security concerns are worrying. When alternative civil society voices and constructive seeds of change are not provided with the soil to take root, threats to the daily security of people and communities are given free reign. As such, opportunities for actors looking to exploit these vulnerabilities increase.

It is important for civil society to come together to exchange experiences as well as document and monitor the impact counter-terrorism measures are having on their peace and human rights work, in order to engage in collective advocacy. It is equally important for the Women, Peace and Security community to engage with the different counter-terrorism measures and stakeholders. Conversely, it is crucial to raise awareness about the importance of safeguarding critical civil society space worldwide so that women’s voices and actions for peace and human rights can continue to change the world for the better.

Isabelle Geuskens serves as Executive Director of the Women’s Peacemakers Program (WPP), a Dutch NGO that works for the nonviolent resolution of conflict, and the inclusion of women’s voice and leadership in nonviolent conflict resolution processes. In early 2015 the WPP, together with Human Security Collective (HSC), contacted a selection of partners in the field, to gain insight into the multiple ways the counter-terrorism agenda is affecting their work for peace and women’s rights. The findings are summarised in WPP’s Policy Brief: Counterterrorism Measures and their Effects on the Implementation of the Women, Peace and Security Agenda.

Featured Image: Women’s group in Badakhshan, Afghanistan. Source: Flickr | Canada in Afghanistan

by Wim Zwijnenburg

This article is part of the Remote Control Warfare series, a collaboration with Remote Control, a project of the Network for Social Change hosted by Oxford Research Group.

While the US and its allies have had a monopoly on drone technology until recently, the uptake of military and civilian drones by a much wider range of state and non-state actors shows that this playing field is quickly levelling. Current international agreements on arms control and use lack efficacy in responding to the legal, ethical, strategic and political problems with military drone proliferation. The huge expansion of this technology must push the international community to adopt strong norms on the use of drones on the battlefield.

Media outlets around the world reported on a new Islamic State (IS) video in August, which made use of a quad copter surveillance drone to film a military base near Raqqa, Syria. ‘Drones and Da’ash: a new terror threat’, headlines suggested. But that’s old news. Drones have been operated by non-state armed groups for years. Indeed, IS had already put up a drone-filmed video in February 2014 of a convoy with armoured vehicles, SUVs and trucks in Fallujah, and Hezbollah has been investing in their drone arsenal since before the 2006 Lebanon war.

The revival of Russian military power poses certain challenges to NATO and the West. Russia’s military developments are best understood as a continuation of longer-term factors in the country’s history. 

Throughout the 1990s and up until the announcement of a systematic programme of military modernisation in 2008, the Russian armed forces fell into a state of serious decline. Their shortcomings were painfully demonstrated during the two Chechen wars, where they struggled to defeat an opponent that was vastly inferior numerically and technologically. In the eyes of the world, Russia had lost its status as a global military actor, because it seemed clear that its ability to project military power beyond its borders had become distinctly limited. This international image was overhauled almost overnight in the aftermath of the Crimea annexation in spring 2014 and in the wake of the ongoing air campaign over Syria.

Today Russia is again seen as a serious military player. The interventions in Ukraine and Syria have led to fears in the West that the process of Russian military modernisation is motivated by an about-turn in foreign policy that includes an ever increasing military adventurism and expansionism. However, it is likely that Russia’s reasons for rebuilding conventional military capabilities are more complex than this. Rather than signifying a clear break with the past instigated by President Putin, recent developments in the Russian military are a continuation of longer-term factors in the country’s history, and foreign and defence policy. Within this context, Russia’s ‘military revival’ was inevitable and hardly surprising.

The thawing of the Cold War and Russia’s military decline and revival

Russia’s self-perception as a great power and its desire to be granted this status by the international community dates back centuries and this did not cease with the end of the Cold War. Having a large and powerful military has always been key to Russia’s great power ambitions. It was central to the making of the Tsarist empire and a strong military, above all else, elevated the Soviet Union to the status of a superpower. Against this background, the period of neglect of the Russian armed forces throughout the 1990s was uncharacteristic and should have come as more of a surprise than the more recent modernisation efforts. The lack of military reforms during the 1990s was not the result of a conscious decision on the part of the political leadership to give up on the aspirations of being a global military power, or the belief that a strong military was no longer necessary. On the contrary, Russian great power ambitions, including the maintenance of a military able to project power on a global level date back to the early 1990s. It was a combination of political and financial factors that prevented these ambitions from becoming reality.

The first Russian military doctrine published in 1993 envisaged significant cuts to armed force levels and emphasised the need to develop conventional forces able to deal with local conflicts, which appeared to be the most immediate concern at the time. However, the idea that a global conventional deterrent was no longer desirable or required was never a consensus view. In fact, the 1993 doctrine already reflected serious ambitions to maintain a globally competitive conventional deterrent. The ambition for parity in conventional military power was reiterated in the 2000 military doctrine, which explicitly reoriented priorities away from the focus on small-wars type scenarios and towards the need for the creation of Russian conventional forces with global reach.

Between 2000 and 2008 the Russian economy grew by an average of almost 7 percent per year, a rate of growth that was matched by similar annual increases in the defence budget. This meant that, following years of economic turmoil during the 1990s when even a relatively high percentage of GDP – an average of four percent –  spent on defence was insufficient to sustain the military on a reasonable level, Russia’s long-standing ambition to rebuild a military fit for a great power had finally become affordable. Relinquishing armed strength and accepting the resulting loss of great power status was never an option that was seriously entertained in Russia. From this point of view, the revival of the Russian military was only a matter of time.

The idea that the revival of Russian conventional military capabilities in recent years can only be motivated by the political leadership’s intention to engage in ever more aggressive, expansionist and offensive military action also requires further contextualisation. Such a view represents a one-sided understanding of why countries, as a rule, maintain powerful armed forces. As Robert Art wrote in 1996, ‘to focus only on the physical use of military power is to miss most of what most states do most of the time with the military power at their disposal’. In other words, countries do not only have militaries to fight offensive wars, but also to deter, coerce, compel, reassure or dissuade other actors. International prestige is another important motivation for states to maintain powerful militaries. Given the centrality of the military in Russia’s self-perception as a great power this factor is particularly salient for understanding the motivations behind its recent military revival.

After years of decay, during which the West had written off Russia as a serious global military competitor, conspicuous displays of military power and brinkmanship, coupled with the interventions in Crimea and Syria, have been an effective way of rapidly enhancing the international image of Russia’s newly modernised military. Such a use of military power for ‘swaggering’, which according to Art can has historically helped countries to gain ‘prestige on the cheap’ has already yielded impressive results. Although Russia’s relative military power is still severely lacking in comparison to the US and NATO, international reactions to recent displays of its revived armed forces have arguably enhanced its global image to an extent that far exceeds its material capabilities. The international community is again viewing Russian military power as a serious competitor, as Russia has already achieved one of its long-standing objectives. International recognition as a great power has been a central aim of Russian foreign policy throughout history. Now that the country is yet again seen as a global military power it has gained such recognition, at least in part, but based on fear, rather than on respect.

The future of Russia’s power projection

Better military capabilities mean that the Russian leadership today has more opportunity to resort to the use of force. The air campaign in Syria, for example, would simply not have been possible ten years ago, even if the willingness to launch an intervention of this kind had been there. It is unlikely, however, that better capabilities will cause the country’s leaders to lose sight of the fact that the utility of military force is limited and not suited for the achievement of all foreign policy objectives.

Nonetheless, developments in Russian defence and foreign policy are a concern and a difficult challenge to international security. With the Crimea annexation, Russia demonstrated its willingness to use military force for territorial expansion for the first time in post-Cold war history. This has understandably led to growing fears, especially amongst its neighbours, about Russian intentions and the potential for further expansionist moves. Russia’s interventions in Ukraine and in Syria have also led to tensions with the West that are incomparable in scale and scope to problems in the recent past.

There are limited options available to the West and to the international community to stop the Russian military modernisation process, bar the imposition of sanctions banning the export of defence technology and dual-use equipment into Russia, which the US and EU have already put into place. It will also be difficult, as it has been in the past, to prevent Russia from using military force as an instrument of foreign policy in certain situations in the future.

There are choices to be made, then, on deciding how to respond to these developments. When it comes to dealing with Russian military interventions, the West can only lead by example in using military force as a last resort and within the parameters of international law, and condemn Russia in the strongest terms when it does not do the same.

It is clear that Russian military actions in Ukraine and Syria have already had serious consequences for the country’s international image. As complete isolation is not in Russia’s interest and it continues craving respect as a Great Power from the global community, there is some hope that international repercussions and condemnation will be a factor in its future decisions to use military force. There are also choices to be made about how to respond to aggressive Russian military posturing vis-à-vis NATO and other neighbouring states.

For the time being, NATO has chosen the path of an uncompromisingly tough stance, strengthening its presence alongside its eastern borders in an attempt to demonstrate unity and resolve and to deter any potential military aggression. While these measures are likely to reassure NATO member states in eastern and central Europe, their potential long-term consequences, like a renewed arms race and increasing dangers of escalation, should not be ignored.

It is already obvious that Russia is not interpreting NATO’s actions in the spirit intended, as defensive measures aimed at reassuring NATO members close to its borders. Instead, Russia has taken these moves as an opportunity for further ‘swaggering’ and showing off its military power, stepping up its own activities and presence in the region.

It is not yet clear how Russia’s relations with NATO and with the West will evolve under the next US administration headed by Donald Trump. Although some analysts have argued that the new US president is good news for Russia, such a conclusion remains at least questionable or is at least premature.

If the US will indeed steer towards a more isolationist stance, it is possible that criticism of Russian military brinkmanship in the Baltic region and beyond, and violations of international law during military conflicts where this does not directly impinge onto US interests, will diminish. Such a turn of events would certainly be welcomed in Moscow, where the country’s full sovereignty to use military force as a foreign policy instrument is seen as centrally important.

At the same time, it is by no means certain that the US will abandon its position as an important actor in European and international security and it is unlikely that the new US administration will be happy to concede this role to Russia, in effect abandoning its preeminent position in the international system. It is beyond doubt that Donald Trump’s presidency will confront Russia with a serious degree of uncertainty and unpredictability, much more so than the election of Hilary Clinton would have done. The extent to which this unpredictability — including the potential for harsher US reactions towards Russian military adventurism and an increased risk of escalation — will influence Russian foreign policy decision-making is a question for the future.

Bettina Renz is an associate professor at the University of Nottingham’s School of Politics and International Relations. She has published widely on Russian defence and security policy.

As the price of oil goes down, the pace of freedom goes up… As the price of oil goes up, the pace of freedom goes down…” So says New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman, who argues that the first law of ‘petropolitics’ is that the price of oil and the pace of freedom are inversely correlated in countries “totally dependent on oil” for economic growth. Friedman’s attempt to link economic oil dependency and political freedom is an interesting one, which could go some way towards explaining why many of the world’s top oil-exporting countries are governed by heavy-handed authoritarian regimes. However, the correlation between recent oil price spikes and anti-authoritarian action – particularly in the Arab Spring – challenges Friedman’s assessment.

Rather than being driven by drops in oil revenues for authoritarian regimes, popular unrest and armed resistance  in countries such as Libya may in fact be correlated with the price of oil remaining high. Inward pressure caused by oil price spikes on petroleum-fuelled supply chains for basic commodities can exacerbate already harsh living conditions, galvanising rebel factions to form a unified anti-authoritarian front against a regime that can no longer ensure price stability for essential goods. This seems true of the 2011 uprising in Egypt (the world’s largest wheat importer), as bread prices rose drastically following the doubling of global wheat prices between June 2010 and February 2011. The impact of high oil prices on the production, shipping and distribution of staple commodities such as corn and wheat – both of which saw severe price escalations of near 40% in 2008 – can lead to social unrest and, in the case of Egypt, the toppling of an authoritarian regime.

High oil prices mean freedom on the rise?

Since December 2010, when mass protests began gathering steam in Tunisia, oil prices have remained consistently high, hovering at $82 per barrel. Is it a coincidence that in September 2011, when rebels overtook the coastal town of Bani Walid, one of Colonel Gaddafi’s last strongholds, oil was just above $82 per barrel and the FAO food price index had reached a ten-year high? While oil revenues may be a temporary source of political stability for some authoritarian regimes, the pressure of increasing price volatility on supply chains, due to scarcity in supply, can convert to instability downstream as oil prices have a compounding impact on food prices. Indeed, in December 2010 just a week before the self-immolation of Tunisian food vendor Mohamed Bouazizi, New England Complex Systems Institute a Cambridge-based organisation comprised of faculty from Harvard, MIT and Brandeis, warned the US government that global food prices were about to cross a socially dangerous threshold. If anti-authoritarian action is any indication of freedom ‘on the rise’ then high oil prices in oil-dependent states are at least one major factor.

Of those countries mentioned in the International Energy Agency’s 2011 list of top oil exporters, ten out of fifteen are classed by Freedom House as ‘Not Free’. Freedom House, ‘an independent watchdog organisation dedicated to the expansion of freedom around the world’, base their rankings on two broad categories: political rights and civil liberties. The former they define by a country’s electoral process, degree of political pluralism and level of participation/ functioning of government; the latter by degree of freedom of expression and belief, associational and organisational rights, rule of law, and personal autonomy and individual rights. The irony, according to Friedman, is that Western dependence on oil imports from countries which are ‘Not Free’ has channelled revenues to authoritarian regimes that oppose freedom. This paradox undermines Western credibility as champions of democracy. In a post-9/11 world, where militant extremists reportedly seek safe harbour in oil-exporting states like Saudi Arabia, the consequences of Western oil dependency undermine the West’s long-term security goals. But, when it comes to Friedman’s equation for ‘petropolitics’, the reverse may actually be true. Recent events such as the Arab Spring demonstrate that as the price of oil rises, impacting staple commodity prices, so too does the need for change – change that is blocked by Western dependence on remaining regimes.

Bottom-of-the-barrel security

Western countries reliant on fossil fuel imports from nations ruled by authoritarian regimes are suffering from a crisis of legitimacy – a crisis which could render us more insecure in the long term. In Algeria, where the Arab Spring has not resulted in full on revolution, violent extremists recently made their presence felt at the ‘In Amenas’ gas plant, brutally murdering 37 expatriate workers. The plant, which is jointly operated by BP, Norway’s Statoil and Algerian state oil and gas company Sonatrach, is a major supply source for Western markets. Algeria is responsible for roughly 12.2 billion barrels of crude oil reserves. 85% of Algeria’s oil exports are destined for European and North American markets. Under the leadership of Abdelaziz Bouteflika, whose five year executive terms are renewable indefinitely, Algeria certainly does not rate highly on the list of Freedom House ‘Freedom Ratings’. Military and intelligence services strictly monitor and interfere with open elections. But the Arab Spring may not ever reach Algeria precisely because of the stability brought to the country by a Western-funded heavy-handed regime, which goes to great lengths to protect the general population from militant Islamist extremists and pro-democracy activists alike. Saudi Arabia and UAE are governed by similarly oppressive regimes; regimes which subvert democracy in favour of ‘stability’. Both supply oil and gas to the West. Both benefit from revenues gained through Western dependence in spite of their heavy-handedness.

Interests versus values

The Arab Spring has been full of unfortunate surprises linking former and current administrations to corrupt leaders. Photos of a smiling Tony Blair, getting up close and personal with much maligned Colonel Gaddafi, were a hit in the mainstream press as well as online following the collapse of his regime. Not long before that, the Bush Family’s close ties to the Saudi royal family did little to lend credence to their Middle East pro-democracy campaigns in the early 90s and 2000s.

Germany is in a similarly awkward position as the the largest energy consumer in Europe, with oil making up 38% of Europe’s overall consumption in 2011. Germany is Russian state-controlled energy giant Gazprom’s biggest European customer with 34% of total sales volume of Russian ‘blue fuel’ destined for German markets last year. There was therefore more than a hint of hypocrisy in Angela Merkel’s recent remarks during a visit by Vladimir Putin to a trade fair in Hanover that Russia ‘needs more NGOs’. The statement was made in regards to a Russian law passed last year requiring all NGOs that receive overseas funding to register as  ‘foreign agents’. Topless Ukrainian activists from the pro women’s rights group ‘Femen’ made their presence felt at the trade fair, drawing attention to  Russia’s crackdown on civil society groups and independent media organisations. Russia’s authoritarianism is a key element of the Putin government, but the issue arguably receives little mainstream coverage in the West compared to the Middle East.

Germany and, by extension, Europe’s de facto dependence on Gazprom to meet their energy needs provides yet another example of why Western countries need to seek develop a more sustainable energy security strategy. It is difficult to legitimately champion broad concerns about upholding civil protections, when some of your largest business partners engage in the shadowy practice of denying basic freedoms to their own citizens.

Renewable energy… and freedom?

In light of the above we can welcome new approaches to energy security, which are aimed at reducing dependence on fossil fuel imports from authoritarian states. The Obama Administration’s ‘All of the Above’ energy strategy, as well as the pragmatism which the European Union, led by Germany, has shown in pushing forward a low carbon agenda are both steps in the right direction. Obama has pledged to double American energy efficiency by 2030, setting aside $2 billion over 10 years to support research into ‘a range of cost-effective technologies’, including electric vehicles, domestically-sourced biofuels, fuel cells, and domestically-produced natural gas. The plan also includes scope for reducing oil imports, while boosting renewable electricity generation from wind, solar and geothermal sources. Although Obama’s plan is far from low carbon, it shows promise. By comparison the UK Government, which at one time pledged to be the ‘greenest government ever’, has attempted to push forward its nationwide low carbon transition through the establishment of a Green Investment Bank. However, fairly recent public squabbles in the UK between Ed Davey, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change and Chancellor George Osborne the UK’s finance minister, have called that agenda into question.

Friedman’s claim of an inverse correlation between high oil prices and authoritarianism is flawed. But his point about ‘petropolitics’ is still crucial to security, not only because he tries to link oil price fluctuations to authoritarian politics, but also because he highlights how Western dependence on foreign oil provides significant revenue streams on which remaining authoritarian governments can rely. It is also important to point out that as the global price of oil becomes more volatile due to price instability (see: ‘peaky behaviour’) the economic stability of authoritarian regimes that have consolidated their power bases around fossil fuels will almost certainly erode. Moreover, as the impact of oil prices continue to destabilise staple commodity prices, authoritarian regimes will almost certainly come under increasing pressure from their own populations to step down. Western countries that have formed dubious partnerships with these regimes in order to meet their energy security needs will risk further embarrassment when these regimes are toppled by the inevitable anti-authoritarian movements. Western leaders might then stand by and wait to pick a winner – a dubious strategy at best – in order to ensure that supply shipments are not further destabilised. But is this sustainable?

Renewable energy is not the most obvious factor for bolstering the strength of nations. But it is fast becoming clear that Western dependency on fossil fuel imports from countries governed by heavy-handed regimes cannot go on. The International Energy Agency has recently announced that power generation from renewable sources worldwide will exceed that from gas and be twice that from nuclear by 2016. That’s a positive sign. As for oil, we will have to wait and see. But if the restoration of Western legitimacy as champions of the “free world” is a top priority for Western leaders, then more support for domestic renewable energy growth is essential.

Phillip Bruner is Founder of the Green Investment Forum and a guest lecturer in global political economy at the University of Edinburgh

Image source: United Nations Photo

Following President Rouhani’s success in last August’s election, relations between the United States and Tehran have improved substantially, partly because of the election result but also because the Obama administration has a more positive view of Iran. There is no guarantee that the US election in 2016 will result in an administration sympathetic to further progress. This element of uncertainty will be factored into the policy-making process of the Rouhani administration. Even so, prospects for a negotiated settlement to the nuclear issue are the best they have been for a decade and it follows that if an agreement is concluded, this is likely to have a pronounced effect on Iranian foreign policy as it finds itself in a more positive international environment.

The Ahmadinejad Legacy

The flamboyance and the sometimes inflammatory rhetoric of the Ahmadinejad administration (2005-13) disguised a pragmatic foreign policy that combined a degree of confrontation on the nuclear issue with the enhancing of contacts with many countries across the global south, including left-leaning states in Latin America and numerous states in sub-Saharan Africa. It also sought to maintain reasonable links with Russia and China while limiting links with the West. While acceptable to much of the “Iranian street”, it was at odds with the liking of elements of western culture by young Iranians and the nuclear issue was deeply problematic in terms of the impact of sanctions.

While much is made of their role in bringing Rouhani to power and then to the negotiating table, the reality is rather different. Sanctions were effective, in part, because of the parallel impact of internal economic mismanagement by the Ahmadinejad government. Thus, if the Rouhani government improves the management of the economy then even the modest sanctions relief already promised will combine to enable the government to benefit through early respite from recent economic woes.

One other key factor is that Iran’s standing in the region, including the Arab world, has been damaged by its support for the Assad regime in Syria. Under Ahmadinejad, Iran saw the Assad regime as a strong and necessary ally, especially in combination with the Maliki government in Iraq. But as the war in Syria has worsened, and as the violence in Iraq degenerates towards a civil war, many states blame Iran. Regional powers such as Saudi Arabia and Egypt hold Iran partly responsible for the violent suppression of the Sunni majority in Syria, and states beyond the region believe Iran bears some responsibility not just for that but also for the possible spread of the war to Lebanon.

Conservative Strategy

Rouhani’s victory was singularly impressive in that he gained an absolute majority on the first ballot against four relatively conservative opponents on a 72% poll turnout. While this has given him considerable authority, most power still lies with the Supreme Leader. However, Ayatollah Khamenei has to be aware of the popularity of Rouhani, a matter made more difficult for him by Rouhani’s preference for avoiding a personality cult. While the election gave Rouhani a clear mandate for negotiating with the US, conservative elements are regrouping.

For these elements a particular concern is the election of the Assembly of Experts – the parliamentary upper house, which selects the Supreme Leader – that are due in September this year. Their fear is of a buoyant Rouhani government that will damage conservative prospects still further following last year’s reversals. It appears to be for this reason that they have sought to persuade the Supreme Leader to expand the negotiating team at the Syria peace talks in Geneva to include more hard-line elements and to have a Majlis (parliamentary) oversight body for the whole process. This would be dominated by conservatives. Rouhani’s Deputy Foreign Minister, Seyed Abbas Araqchi, has stated officially that the negotiating group remains accountable to the Supreme National Security Council, not a Majlis body, but there are reports of more members recently being appointed to the group.

What this means is that the Rouhani government will have a strong interest in developing policies that are attractive to the domestic constituency as soon as possible. The emphasis will undoubtedly be on the nuclear issue and getting further sanctions relief which, in combination with better economic management, could ensure palpable improvements in the economy and consequent political popularity. This, though, is not enough and liberalising economic reforms such as removal of subsidies may even exacerbate short-term economic difficulties. It follows that the Rouhani government will be looking closely at ways of increasing Iran’s standing in the region and beyond.

Developing Foreign Policy: Iran in the world

A key aspect of the Iranian outlook is a belief in Persia’s very proud history, one that extends over thousands rather than hundreds of years, and the consequent belief that Iran has not been realising its potential as one of the world’s potential great powers. This view of historic greatness transcends religion, even if Iran sees itself also as the centre of the Shi’a Muslim world. Iran has a population of 80 million, a little less than Egypt at 85 million and Turkey at 81 million. Egypt has formidable internal problems and a weak non-oil-based economy; Turkey is far stronger in terms of economy, even if it, too, lacks significant fossil fuel reserves. Since its 2013 counter-revolution, Egypt is also increasingly reliant on Saudi Arabia, Iran’s greatest rival for influence in the Gulf and wider Middle East.

Iran has all the problems of a near-moribund economy but has remarkable potential for development given that it has close to 10% of world oil reserves and 15% of gas reserves. The latter is largely shared with Qatar because of the huge reserves under the Gulf. There have so far been few problems of delineating boundaries – indeed relations with Qatar remain quite good despite major differences on other issues such as Syria, where Qatar, with Turkey, strongly backs the anti-Assad rebellion.

Asia or Europe?

The issue for Iran relates largely to where it seeks to develop its economic and political alliances. To the immediate east the borders with Afghanistan and Pakistan are hugely significant, especially in the case of Afghanistan where opium and refined heroin smuggling across the border has cost the lives of hundreds of Iranian border guards. Iran has close links with the north-west parts of Afghanistan and has no liking for the Taliban. It is suspicious of Pakistan because of radical Sunni Islamist elements within the state, its long-term support for the Taliban, close security ties to Saudi Arabia and the precarious security predicament of the Pakistani Shi’a community, but still seeks to improve relations, not least through exporting gas. The originally planned Iran-Pakistan-India pipeline is going ahead as far as Pakistan. Iran will further increase its links with Afghanistan, where it has greatly increased aid in recent years, especially to projects in the north-west of the country.

India and China are both significant importers of Iranian oil and gas and China has been particularly useful to Iran in two respects. One has been long-term investment in the development of new oil and gas fields, and it remains much appreciated that China persisted with this when relations with the US were at their lowest. The other has been China’s supply of carefully selected weapons, especially shore-based anti-ship cruise missiles. Iran will maintain close links with China, but will not eschew improved relations with India, seeing it as a useful counter-balance to Pakistan.

The links with southern and eastern Asia will remain highly significant in terms of Iranian foreign policy but it is already clear that a priority will be to improve relations with neighbouring Turkey, already demonstrated by the meeting between Foreign Ministers Mohammad Javad Zarif and Ahmet Davutoglu in Tehran last November. In spite of considerable differences over Syria, the countries have good relations in other respects, and Turkey’s past role in trying to defuse the nuclear issue remains appreciated. Trade relations between Iran and Turkey have expanded greatly in the past decade.

It is highly likely that Iran will seek a much closer relationship with Turkey, seeing the two countries together comprising an axis of influence linking Europe and Asia. The Turkish attitude to this is likely to be very positive, seeing it as a useful factor in increasing Turkey’s significance for the European Union. This does mean that the Rouhani government has an added interest in seeing a scaling down of the Syrian War. It is probable that a Turkey/Iran connection is more important to Tehran than the much vaunted Lebanon/Syria/Iraq/Iran “Shi’a crescent”.

The rivalry with Saudi Arabia remains pervasive and is a crucial proxy element in the Syrian conflict but Rouhani’s personal links with Saudi diplomats in the past, combined with Iran’s need to see the war scaled down, means that even here there may be potential for progress. Further improving relations with the US will be a priority but the Rouhani government recognises the risk of sudden changes in US leadership in less than three years time. This means that European links remain useful but Iran does not look to the west to ensure its standing in the world. Turkey, China and India are more significant and this will remain as long as Rouhani is in power. Of these, Turkey is probably the most important.

Implications

Rouhani has barely a year all told to build on the considerable support he gathered last year, and this is against a background of entrenched conservative and theocratic elements that will work hard to limit his capacity. While he will give ground on nuclear issues and may work towards a Syrian settlement, if Iran is allowed to participate in Geneva ll, there is a risk that this can be presented by his opponents as a sign of weakness. Economic progress might blunt this but an additional way forward is to engage in a much more active foreign policy. One consequence of such a shift to the north and east is that Iran may not see Europe as important to its interests to the extent that Europe sees Iran. This is a reflection of more general global changes, bringing its own challenges.

Paul Rogers is Global Security Consultant to Oxford Research Group, for which he writes monthly security briefings.  He is Professor of Peace Studies at the University of Bradford and author of numerous books including ‘Beyond Terror’. Paul writes a weekly column for openDemocracy  and tweets regularly at @ProfPRogers.

Featured image: President Rouhani delivers remarks at the Hilton Hotel in New York City, September 2013. Source: Asia Society (Flickr)