three important tasks. First, it describes how the political and economic crises of the 1970s and 1980s, which were rooted in colonial and Cold War policies, ushered in a new wave of external involvement in the 1990s. Second, it shows how the outside powers that responded to this instability had additional tools at their disposal. Post–World War II institutions and legal frameworks threw into question longstanding views concerning state sovereignty and international law. Postwar conventions and interpretations advanced new rationales for foreign intrusion into the affairs of nation-states that threatened regional stability and civilians’ lives. The paradigms of response to instability/responsibility to protect and the war on terror—put to use after the Cold War—emerged from this intellectual ferment. Third, the chapter investigates Western misconceptions about Islam that underpinned the war on terror and had devastating effects on millions of Muslims worldwide.
Africa after the Cold War
The roots of many problems afflicting Africa today lie in its colonial and Cold War past. Distinctions in power and privilege and conflicts over natural resources have long been a part of human history; in Africa, these phenomena predated the colonial period. However, the plundering of riches through unequal exchange was embedded in colonial economic practices, and colonial-era ethnic and regional hierarchies—sometimes built on preexisting distinctions—often assumed new potency after independence. Internal corruption, economic mismanagement, and pyramids of privilege resulted in unstable societies marked by huge disparities in wealth and power. Money and weapons distributed by Cold War patrons entrenched power differentials and rendered local conflicts deadlier than those of previous eras. The end of the Cold War introduced a new set of problems with roots in this troubled past.
The Cold War drew to a close in the late 1980s and early 1990s, when the Soviet Union collapsed economically and politically. African conflict zones that were once Cold War battlegrounds were increasingly ignored, and dictators who were no longer useful to their Cold War patrons were rapidly abandoned. Across the continent, nations suffered the consequences of depleted resources, enormous debts, dysfunctional states, and regional wars over the spoils. Weapons left over from the Cold War poured into volatile regions and fueled new competition for riches and power. Countries already weakened by economic and political crises descended into violent conflicts that often transcended international borders. In some cases, popular movements or armed insurrections ousted dictators who had lost the support of outside powers. However, because war and repression had stymied organized political opposition in many countries, warlords and other opportunists often moved into the power vacuums. Unscrupulous leaders manipulated ethnicity to strengthen their drive for power and privilege, sometimes unleashing ethnically based terror.
During the first post–Cold War decade, foreign intervention assumed a new character. Many Western nations that had been implicated in African conflicts during the Cold War turned their attention elsewhere. The United States, as the self-proclaimed Cold War victor, showed little interest in direct military intervention and severely reduced its economic assistance as well. However, in keeping with its call for African solutions for African problems, Washington initiated new programs to bolster African military capabilities and others that focused on free market economic development and trade. Recognizing that Africa’s enormous external debts, often incurred by Cold War clients, and the HIV/AIDS pandemic contributed to political and economic instability, the United States also introduced programs to address these problems. The policy shift meant that most military interventions during the 1990s were conducted by African countries—sometimes to reestablish regional peace and security, but in other cases to support proxy forces that granted access to their neighbors’ resources.
Although extracontinental powers were less likely to intervene unilaterally during the 1990s, multilateral intervention by both African and non-African powers intensified and took shape under new auspices. The UN, the Organization of African Unity (OAU), and various subregional bodies intervened in response to instability—to broker, monitor, and enforce peace accords and to facilitate humanitarian relief operations. Peacekeeping and humanitarian interventions were viewed positively by many African constituencies, although disparities in power meant that African agents had little authority over external forces once implanted on African soil. In a striking deviation from Cold War trends, critics castigated the international community for not acting quickly or boldly enough—as in the case of the Rwandan genocide in 1994, the Liberian civil war that ended in 2003, and the Darfur conflict in Sudan that began in 2003. The UN Security Council, in particular, was criticized for its refusal to thwart the Rwandan genocide and to act more forcefully in Darfur. Under pressure from human rights and humanitarian lobbies and from African civil societies, the UN General Assembly passed a resolution in 2005 that held countries responsible for protecting their citizens from “genocide, war crimes, ethnic cleansing and crimes against humanity.” Sometimes called the R2P resolution, the General Assembly action granted the international community the right to intervene through UN Security Council–sanctioned operations if governments failed to fulfill their “responsibility to protect” (R2P).1
Appeals for humanitarian intervention in African affairs increased during the first decade of the twenty-first century; military intervention for other ends also intensified. The ongoing struggle to secure energy and other strategic resources and the onset of the war on terror brought renewed attention to the continent. Heightened foreign military presence, external support for repressive regimes, and disreputable alliances purportedly intended to root out terror resulted in new forms of foreign intervention in Africa. The continent, its people, and its resources again became the object of internal and external struggles in which local concerns were frequently subordinated to foreign interests.
Paradigm 1: Response to Instability and the Responsibility to Protect
The political, economic, and social upheavals that characterized the late Cold War and early post–Cold War periods resulted in severe instability in numerous African states and regions. Foreign powers and multilateral institutions took note when domestic turmoil was perceived to jeopardize international peace and security. In most instances, their involvement entailed brokering, monitoring, and enforcing peace agreements. Diplomatic and military interventions were often justified on the grounds that outside actors had both the right and the responsibility to guarantee international peace and security if individual states failed to do so. In such cases, intervention was authorized under Chapters VI, VII, or VIII of the United Nations Charter, adopted in 1945.2 In instances where large civilian populations were at risk and refugee flows heightened regional tensions, the response to instability was bolstered by newer claims that the international community had a responsibility to protect civilian lives. In such cases, intervention was justified by the 2005 UN General Assembly resolution, mentioned above, that bestowed on the international community the responsibility to protect civilians when their governments were unable or unwilling to do so.
Post–Cold War intervention in African affairs saw increased involvement by multinational bodies that drew on changing notions concerning the right to intervene. Since the mid-1990s, when the international community largely ignored appeals to thwart the Rwandan genocide, growing constituencies in Africa and the West have called for humanitarian interventions to end human rights abuses and protect civilians, with or without the consent of the states in question. Such interventions might include military force, sanctions, or the forcible delivery of humanitarian aid. Although the notion of humanitarian intervention has gained support, it remains controversial. External interference in a state’s domestic affairs challenges a premise of international law, national sovereignty, that has held sway for more than three and a half centuries.
The contemporary system of international law emerged from the 1648 Peace of Westphalia, a series of treaties that concluded the Thirty Years’ War in Europe and laid the foundations for the modern nation-state. Enshrined in the treaties is the principle of national sovereignty, which granted
