Causes of African Internal Conflict
CAUSES OF AFRICAN INTERNAL CONFLITS
The 1990s saw no diminution in the number of conflicts in Africa, and most forecasts predicted further increase. While Africa has had its share of inter-state wars, the majority of its conflicts were internal, and these internal conflicts appear to be increasing, as elsewhere. A tragic factor in this is that the civilian populations bear the brunt of the casualties in such conflicts, estimated at some 80-90 per cent of total casualties across the world. These conflicts cause not only casualties and refugees but contribute vastly to the spread of disease, malnutrition and starvation, social and economic decline and moral deterioration.
The Horn of Africa, which includes Sudan, contains today about all the problems that are on the world’s agenda: ethnic, religious and border conflicts, civil war, high military expenditure, migration and refugees, famine and the break-up of states. It is a region where the Cold War played itself out, and still deserves a lot of world attention. Robert Kaplan described West Africa as a region that “is becoming the symbol of worldwide demographic, environmental and societal stress, in which criminal anarchy emerges as the real “strategic danger.”
Events in Liberia, before the election of Charles Taylor and Sierra Leone, before the restoration of the elected government of Tejan Kabbah confirmed this assertion. South Africa’s racial discrimination still rears its ugly head from time to time. North Africa still grapples with Islamic Fundamentalism. Although there are fundamentalist movements and trends in Israel, USA and India, that of North Africa, particularly Algeria, tends to defy any solution as events there have proved since 1992.
The causes of conflicts in Africa are many and they frequently recur, including major causes of potential tensions and conflicts, which could perhaps be summarized and classified below.
1 COUP
Violent and undemocratic change of government by the military is one of
The 1990s saw no diminution in the number of conflicts in Africa, and most forecasts predicted further increase. While Africa has had its share of inter-state wars, the majority of its conflicts were internal, and these internal conflicts appear to be increasing, as elsewhere. A tragic factor in this is that the civilian populations bear the brunt of the casualties in such conflicts, estimated at some 80-90 per cent of total casualties across the world. These conflicts cause not only casualties and refugees but contribute vastly to the spread of disease, malnutrition and starvation, social and economic decline and moral deterioration.
The Horn of Africa, which includes Sudan, contains today about all the problems that are on the world’s agenda: ethnic, religious and border conflicts, civil war, high military expenditure, migration and refugees, famine and the break-up of states. It is a region where the Cold War played itself out, and still deserves a lot of world attention. Robert Kaplan described West Africa as a region that “is becoming the symbol of worldwide demographic, environmental and societal stress, in which criminal anarchy emerges as the real “strategic danger.”
Events in Liberia, before the election of Charles Taylor and Sierra Leone, before the restoration of the elected government of Tejan Kabbah confirmed this assertion. South Africa’s racial discrimination still rears its ugly head from time to time. North Africa still grapples with Islamic Fundamentalism. Although there are fundamentalist movements and trends in Israel, USA and India, that of North Africa, particularly Algeria, tends to defy any solution as events there have proved since 1992.
The causes of conflicts in Africa are many and they frequently recur, including major causes of potential tensions and conflicts, which could perhaps be summarized and classified below.
1 COUP
Violent and undemocratic change of government by the military is one of