Paper short abstract:

This paper argues that struggles over stable and fluid ordering in the local arena shape security during and after conflict. It compares nine conflict and post-conflict cases in three African states to investigate ordering through statebuilding, non-state alternatives and international intervention.

Paper long abstract:

In this paper I investigate the ordering struggles that shape local security arenas in the Central African Republic, Somaliland, and South Sudan. The research unveils key factors that escalate and subdue violence during and after conflict. I first compare how actors in nine localities make use of the different natures of the inner and outer parts of the security arena. I then analyse the struggles between fluid and stable ordering along the core dimensions of statebuilding, non-state institutions, and international intervention. Five field trips over three years to nine arenas within three African countries grant detailed knowledge of the security arenas and crucial comparative insights. The arenas range from pre- to in- to post-conflict environments and changed between phases over time. Differences across and even within the investigated localities are compared through the concept of a security arena: Within a non-demarcated space, actors create constellations based on their interactions around security, understood here as the issue of durable physical integrity. Security is the outcome of actors' struggles between fluid and stable ordering within the arena. Insecurity arises through confrontations over what aspects of the arena should be ordered stably and what parts fluidly. Actors pursue the establishment of more fluid or more stable ordering due to the distinct possibilities and assurances each lends. In stable orders, institutions, channels, and hierarchies are fixed. In fluid orders, relations among actors are deliberately left open to constant negotiation. Thus, while stable ordering lends more predictability, fluid ordering creates more modifiability.