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Global Governance & Africa: Rising from the Vacuous Muddle of

Political Chic & Seasoned Disingenuousness: Peace, Security and Development

Background notes: address to the African Union African Union, Nov. 21, 2012

Costantinos BT Costantinos, PhD Professor of Public Policy, School of Graduate Studies, AAU

Chair, African Union Board, AU Convention on PCC

Summary

With the end of the Cold War, the market economy appears to have triumphed. Universally worshiped Western ideals have become the prerequisite for any nation, seeking acceptance by the international community or assistance from international financial institutions. Their widespread adoption has been said to herald the end of history or, at least, the final victory of Western civilisa-tion. Nonetheless, the 2008 crisis that has swept through the US and Europe has had a universal im-pact, hence, Capitalism, which is all built on debt, is not immune of crises, undergoing transfor-mation through three different stages ranging from triumph, stagnation and reinvention. The qualitative methodology employed an independent assessment of Global Governance trajectories with a view to design improved innovations and models in Global Public Management. Findings point to the fact that current discussions and analyses of global governance are generally are marked by several limitations that escape the discourse on global governance. Pluralistic global rule institutionalises uncertain-ty but succeed if and when all political actors accept this uncertainty as opposed to the rigidities of nonconformity. Fur-ther, social capital is crucial to human security deepening but sounds a more sceptical note and dep-recates the carnival air surrounding much of the debate on its midwifery of human security; because the complexities of African associational life are less neat and seamier, than much of the literature cares to admit. Creating and economic society and legal empowerment of the poor seek to generate new policy recom-mendations that will reduce human insecurity through secure, enforceable property and labour rights, within an ena-bling environment that expands legal business opportunity and access to justice.

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1. Introduction

Peace is a state of harmony characterized by the lack of violent conflict and the freedom from fear of violence. Commonly understood as the absence of hostility, peace also suggests the existence of healthy or newly healed interpersonal or international relationships, prosperity in matters of social or economic welfare, the establishment of equality, and a working political order that serves the true interests of all. In international relations, peacetime is not only the absence of war or violent conflict, but also the presence of positive and respectful cultural and economic relationships. Human securi-ty, a post-Cold War concept, is a multi-disciplinary understanding of security involving a number of research fields: development studies, international relations, strategic studies and human rights.

Nevertheless, from Darfur to the jungles of the River Zaire, from the Eritrean plateau to South Sudan, from trouble Somalia to the genocidal communities of Rwanda and Burundi, from the vio-lent cities and borders of Kenya to Northern Uganda; new faces and forces of vulnerability and pov-erty haunt the Greater Africa of Africa. Conflicts, corruption, disasters, poverty and pandemics now threaten the sub-region with a calamity unforeseen even during the Great African Famine of the 1980s. While many proposals for remedial action have been formulated for such vulnerability and pov-erty that haunt the sub-region, real commitment to collaborative processes at inter organisational levels has always been limited. Mobilising the action required has also remained a daunting challenge, as many practical and structural constraints militate against commitment by individual groups to inter organisa-tional initiatives nationally and regionally.

The tragedy, which took such a heavy toll of life over the past years, has highlighted the funda-mental weakness of the peace, security and development strategies. Many conventional and precon-ceived notions have been questioned and new ideas proposed. Efforts have also been made to im-prove one‘s understanding of vulnerabilities, to estimate the risks resulting there from more accu-rately and to make adequate preventive measures against insecurity, ahead of time. In this sense, the traditional role of humanitarian and development agencies has been harshly, even cruelly, tested.

The need for collective learning about responses, and the responsibility to those whose suffering provided the basis for that learning will never be more urgent than it is now. Unfortunately, such lessons, which may be learned through the shocks administered by an uncompromising reality, are rarely translated quickly into personal or organisational memories and the inherent will to change. The reasons for this are sometimes rooted in human inertia, weakness, and self-interest. They are equally often the products of a genuine confusion about how to act most effectively in an environ-ment that seems to be growing more complex. To every human problem in Africa, there is always a solution that is smart, simple and immoral. Important stakeholders tend to have a linear way of thinking that is inadequate to unravel the many complex inter-relationships underlying people‘s inse-curity. It is neither popular nor scientific. The need for the fundamental change on how the global community deals with the internecine crises must change since places such as Darfur, Somalia, Northern Uganda…, to name a few, have become a new insignia of ‗bestiality‘.

It must take, within the premises of Human Security, the Responsibility to Protect (R2P). and the Right to Assistance (R2A)., encourage appropriate action for promoting and managing an enabling environment for human development, mainstreaming peace, security a developmental response in the drive for popular participation – people acting as citizens of a political society, reinforcing own-ership of security and ensuring livelihood continuity. Hence, there is the dire need to advocate for the peace, security and development that need to be staged simultaneously for a practical and para-digmatic development of internal models of human welfare in Africa. The purpose and the contents of this lecture is to propose means that are designed to develop strategies for strengthening the ca-pacity to mobilise nations and civil societies to direct policies and programmes to address the com-pelling and evolving implications of human insecurity; so that it does not further reverse human and social capital development in the sub-Region.

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2. Backgrounder

With the end of the Cold War, the market economy appears to have triumphed. Universally worshiped Western society ideals have become the prerequisite for any nation, seeking acceptance by the international community or assistance from international financial institutions. Their wide-spread adoption has been said to herald the end of history or, at least, the final victory of Western civilisation. Wherever Western values are not already in place, people seem to be willing to die to achieve them. In addition, the main mission of Western diplomacy seems to be their export, at least as long as doing so serves Western interests.

Writing in Foreign Policy magazine, John B. Judis and Leo Panitch say that Western civilisation's most ardent modem champions could perhaps be forgiven for displaying what their earliest forerun-ners called hubris. Developed after centuries of evolution and preserved in the 20th century through one virtual and two world wars, Western values are today considered the building blocks of econom-ic prosperity, individual freedom and driving force behind humankind's greatest victories (At-tali, 1997). Nevertheless, the irrationality built into the basic logic of capitalist markets is once again becoming self-evident, with the spiralling crises in North America and Europe. Trying just to stay afloat, each factory and firm lays off workers and tries to pay less to those kept on. Undermining job security has the effect of undercutting demand throughout the economy (Panitch, 2009). With an increasingly polarised workforce, threatened debt defaults, ageing populations and competitiveness from abroad, aren't Western societies in decline, not only economically but also in terms of value and social cohesion?

Western societies or agglomerations of people chasing material personal interests gave power to people with psy-chotic personalities... have, largely, exploited their natural resource base materials, which earlier formed the manu-facturing base, and competitive ability given the technology endowment and advantage. Today, they depend on im-ported raw materials for their manufacturing. Undoubtedly, this has increased the cost of production and conse-quently lowered profits and competitiveness. The ageing populations have also worked against nations, as, in some cases, they have to depend on imported skilled labour at a higher cost than was ever anticipated to run their econ-omies. Western societies have to innovate seriously, if they are to turn things around by way of reducing the debt burdens and increasing profitability of industries (Ibid: 2).

Problems of mal governance and a civil society rendered decadent in this process notwith-standing, it is easy to follow the current trend within the international community and advocate global governance as a desirable form of progress paradigm that promotes crit ical global coali-tion of states. Nor is it difficult to make normative judgements about how Africans should be-have if global governance is to grow into a positive agent of change. Nevertheless, it is not so easy to conceptualise global governance as a working process, which is balanced against strate-gy, to determine what makes for real, as opposed to vacuously formal process. As a way of con-tributing to the overcoming or lessening of these difficulties, we may theorise global govern-ance as the dynamic interaction of strategy and process.

At pivotal moments in history, shifting the principles of the political game has been a vital gesticulation of or-ganised state capture, propounding to impel a new social order out of latent concerns, as well as develop the means to alter the grammar of politics. If democracy means rule by the people for the people, it has broken down. All we have today is rule by national and transnational elites, marked by periodic social eruptions that fail to add up to anything transformative. The elites bounce back regrouped, the protestors are silenced or appeased and electoral vic-tories promising radical change end up captured by stakes. The Arab Spring has yet to bring spring to the masses; the uprisings around the world against financial capitalism and austerity have only served to strengthen ties be-tween banks, international financial institutions and the powerful states. The millions of people crushed by the current economic crisis and its handling by the authorities are told that their sacrifice is needed for a return to bet-ter times, while reforming governments trying to protect the less well-off rely on the approval of lenders, rating agen-cies, the media and powerful states. These failures of democracy are worldwide, a feature also of so-called ‗mature

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democracies‘. States are not doing much of the governing, while those supposed to be acting on their behalf are do-ing nothing of the sort. The consequence is growing social misery and injustice (Amin, 2012:2).

Left to its own momentum, this state of affairs will end in more authoritarianism or in revolu-tionary breakdown. ―A safer option would be to renew the democratic contract, clearly of little in-terest to self-serving elites (and parochial movements) but presumably of some attraction to political forces committed to the fair and equal society. What does the official left have to say on democracy, equality, justice or the good society in Europe, nothing! It is as though it accepts the fracture of the democratic contract, the reduction of politics to electoral posturing and populist appeasement, the inevitability (perhaps the thrill) of sitting at the table where elites and their ideologues gather, in hope of small crumbs of social reform. In the process, it has become deadened, devoid of a vision of society beyond the status quo, detached from the subjects, trials and tribulations of everyday life, oblivious to political struggle and organisation beyond the rituals of corporatist management‖ (Ibid).

Today the picture of prosperity is also changing fast. Stories of African migrants struggling to find a route to Europe contrast with recent reports that Europeans are struggling to find working permits in Africa.i Though largely still the recipient of foreign direct investment, Africa is gobbling up distressed assets in the West.ii Already larger than official development assistance by a substantial margin, remittances are now flowing to Europe from Africa. Underscoring these trends is reduced dependency on multilaterals (China alone lends more to Africa than the World Bank) and research estimates that BRIC-Africa trade increased ten-fold in the past 10 years. Even as a major western newspaper openly wonders how Africa will ‗join the larger world on its own terms,‘ across virtually all indicators, evidence suggests it is doing so largely on its own terms. If the West is stuck in low-growth and political paralysis, while Africa enjoys an economic renaissance, a more pressing question for Western observers might be when will the West join Africa (Pence, 2012).

3. Methodology, hypothesis and research questions

The qualitative methodology employed by the researcher sought to meet the requirement of an independent assessment of Global Governance trajectories with a view to design improved innova-tions and models in Global Governance and Public Management. The knowledge gap this research addresses are predicated on advancing innovative paradigms for Global Governance under the ru-bric of changing social and economic conditions of the emerging South. Hence, the research ques-tions augur on:

What are the principles, policies and mechanisms of democratic global governance?

What are the respective roles of developed countries, developing countries and emerging economies in global po-litical governance and how should the responsibilities of all global players be balanced?

What are the trade-offs between representativeness and efficiency?

Does Global Governance enter societies as an external ideology, constructing and deploying its concepts in ster-ile abstraction from local beliefs and values?

Does it come into play in total opposition to or in cooperation with national values and do states equate this with production of broad-based concepts and goals, which should govern their aims?

Pluralistic national political regimes and more equitable global governance structures provide opportunities for all nations to participate evolving solutions to challenges such as terrorism that have come to shape the global political landscape in response to people's need fight injustice and dominance… In the struggle over establishment of global rules of economic & political engagement, do 'big' states equate this with production of broad-based concepts, norms & goals, which should temper their aim of global rule? This brings up the fundamental weaknesses of these crises of global governance paradigms are not in the answers they provide but in the new questions they engender and challenge us with!

4. Challenges to Global Governance

The 2008 crisis that has swept through the US and Europe has had a universal impact, hence, Capitalism, which is all built on debt, is not immune of crises, undergoing transformation through

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three different stages ranging from triumph, stagnation and reinvention. Reducing debt burden or de-leveraging has a slowing down effect on the global economy without which the capitalist system cannot function well.iii The problem is that the physical footprint of greed and irresponsibility is now part of global governance at a planetary scale, impossible to be dismissed as an undesired but necessary outcome of efficient Capitalism. Probably, the real way out of this down spiral will be a more humble and compassion-ate Western society. What emerges from these comments is that there appears to be agreement about the fact that the crisis comes from attitudes adopted, interests, greed, selfishness and irresponsibility. On the corporatist mass-hypnosis argument, the most dangerous aspect and although there are no formal dictators here in our Western countries, it is indubitable that wild advertising rules do an excellent job in shaping thinking and opportunity. There is a big problem with negotiations involved in trying to combine different interests, transformation and reinvention and not mere stimu-lus packages (Hatalli, 1997:5).

Greed is now part of global governance with irresponsible politicians leading the pack on behalf of corporate ‗interests‘ that compromise even planetary resources... Corrupt Global Governance In-stitutions: Moral, ethical and fiduciary bankruptcy, administratively corrupt, nepotism and discrimi-nation...). Summarised, the changes in global governance are

global governance has been hijacked by the corporate world, they are not accountable to any national jurisdiction, they are not regulated by international covenants;

Financial institutions have become ungovernable;

Credit rating agencies have become the new shenanigans;

Global UN treaties are not respected by industrialised nations; e.g., Environmental Protocols such as Rio+20, where developed nations stood up for their corporate sponsors;

global governance is being shaped in G20, G8 and BRICS meetings

Economic globalisation has taken precedence over global political alliances still based on containment rather than collective security!

4.1. Analytical limitations in global governing institutions and process:

Current discussions and analyses of global governance are generally are marked by several limita-tions that escape the discourse on global governance. These include a tendency to narrow global governance thought and practice to the terms and categories of immediate, not very well considered political, economic and social action, naïve realism, as it were. They are equally the result of inattention to problems of articulation or production of global governance systems and process within real poli-tics rather than simply as formal or abstract possibilities; ambiguity as to whether civil society is the agent or object of global governance and a nearly exclusive concern in certain institutional perspec-tives on global governance with generic attributes and characteristics of global governance organisa-tions and consequent neglect of analysis in terms of specific strategies and performances of organi-sations and inadequate treatment of the role of global governance agencies and of relations between global and indigenous aspects or dimensions of global governance...

4.2. Paradigmatic shifts towards a democratic global governance :

Pluralistic global rule institutionalises uncertainty but succeed if and when all political actors ac-cept this uncertainty as opposed to the rigidities of nonconformity. Hence the author submits that global governance paradigmatic shifts can be explained with reference to two institutional factors: Global political organisations and Global political rules. The central hypothesis is that the relative strength of global political organisations determines the rules of the game that are installed. Global Governance requires plural set of organisations that promote and protect rules of peaceful participa-tion in global affairs & market competition to ensure popular participation and intellectual curiosity.

Over seventy bankrupt organisations play leading roles during different phases of global govern-ance. One can hypothesise that the absence or weakness of certain kinds of organisations explains why global governance stalls at certain key junctures. Essentially, these norms and procedures would have to become fully assimilated by a majority of the players within a system. Global governance will

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commonly be characterised by a number of distinctive and shared additional elements, including concepts and rules of universal government, national and cultural values, traditions of discourse and arguments and modes of representation of specific interests, needs and issues. These elements, or complexes of elements, will tend to assume varying forms and enter into shifting relations of com-petition, co-operation and hegemony during political reform. Generally, the broader the ranges of ideological elements at play, the more varied and uncertain ideological relations are the greater are the possibilities for process openness and transparency that exists. For example, super-state multina-tionals range their activities and influence across the network extensively while others are localised. Hence, with all the multiplicity of not very well co-ordinated, global mechanisms it has been difficult to maintain a sense of global governance direction, in both a strategic and process sense.

4.2.1. Human Security & Development:

The 1994 HDR, a milestone publication in the field of human security, introduces a new con-cept of human security, which equates security with people rather than territories, with development rather than arms; ensuring "freedom from want" and "freedom from fear" for all persons is the best path to tackle the problem of global insecurity refers to an emerging paradigm for understanding global vulnerabilities whose proponents challenge the notion of national security by arguing that the proper referent for security should be the individual rather. It examines both the national and global concerns of human security and seeks to deal with these concerns through a new paradigm of SHD, capturing the potential peace dividend, a new form of development co-operation and a restructured system of global institutions. Increasing human security entails: investing in human development, not in arms; engaging policy makers to address the emerging peace dividend; giving the UN a clear mandate to promote and sustain development; enlarging the concept of development co-operation so that it includes all flows, not just aid; agreeing that 20% of national budgets and 20% of aid be used for SHD and establishing an Economic Security Council (UNDP, 1994). Human security holds that a people-centred view of security is necessary for global stability; and is now frequently referred to in a wide variety of global policy discussions. In the 2005 World Summit outcome document, the UN GA committed itself to discussing and defining the notion of human security (UN, 2005).

4.2.2. Freedom from fear vs. freedom from want:

While the ―HDR originally argued that human security requires attention to both freedoms from fear and from want; divisions have gradually emerged over the proper scope of that protection and over the appropriate mechanisms for responding to these threats. The Freedom from Fear School seeks to limit the practice of human security to protecting individuals from violent conflicts. This approach argues that limiting the focus to violence is a realistic and manageable approach towards human security. Emergency assistance, conflict prevention and resolution, peace-building are the main concerns of this approach. On the other hand, according to UNDP 1994, Freedom from Want School focuses on the basic idea that violence, poverty, inequality, diseases, and environmental deg-radation are inseparable concepts in addressing the root of human insecurity. Different from Freedom from Fear, it expands the focus beyond violence with emphasis on development and security goals. In reality both should serve as an important impetus to global action, nevertheless, attempts to imple-ment this human security agenda have led to the emergence of these two major schools of thought. iv UNDP's definition of human security argues that the scope of global security should be expanded to include threats in economic, food, health, environmental, personal and community securities.

4.2.3. Human vs. State Security:

State security is about a state's ability to defend itself against external aggression and threats; us-ing deterrence strategies; under the rubrics of the values of international security predominance and the ascension of the nation-states. While political theory asserts variants of state security, the funda-mental trait of security focus is on the primacy of the state: shielding boundaries, people, institutions and values. Human security shifts the focus to protecting well-being of individuals and responding to ordinary people's needs in dealing with sources of threats, expanding the scope of protection to

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inter alia environment, diseases and economic deprivation. It not only protects, but also empowers people and societies; hence its realisation, involves a broader participation of all stakeholders, includ-ing people who could contribute by identifying and realising solutions to insecurity (Lippmann, W, 1943). Hence human security and national security are not mutually exclusive concepts; neither can be attained independently.

4.2.4. Threats to human security – poverty nexus:

The region‘s poverty is a real threat to human security and the plundering of public wealth di-rectly hampers development and undermines trust in democracy and its institutions. Africa loses bil-lions of dollars to corrupt practices. Besides actual and potential external threats of force projection (inva-sion).; external threats of destabilisation and terrorism; potential sources of conflict with neighbours such as un-demarcated borders; contested natural resource control; violent crime and banditry associated with proliferation of light weapons; potential social unrest associated with economic recession; ethnic, religious and regional cleavages and the incapacity of governance structures to manage disputes peacefully; insufficiently institutionalised constitutional or-der; weak governance institutions and corruption; human trafficking and mass distress migration and epidemics and their impact on institutions and capacities are threats to peace…(de Wal, 2005).

The proliferation of small arms and light weapons—the real weapons of mass destruction id an-other threat. Better control and tracking of supply needs a global treaty regulating the small arms trade.v Arms control is also an important priority linked with the Freedom from Fear agenda. The global threat of terrorism is an important test case for the human security agenda as the human secu-rity approach would assuage the paucity in conventional counter terrorist measures (Elworthy & Rifkind, 2005), which include inter alia, sanctions or military force against a nation but not a specific target, detention without trial, body searches and night raids, that threaten to erode the very civil lib-erties it seeks to protect (Fekete, 2002). Human security also emphasises the protection of human rights and respect for the rule of law (Amnesty International, 2005). In many countries, some coun-ter-terrorist measures violate human rights (Human Rights News, 2004) that serve to intensify the threat of terrorism. Human security argues that a failure to respect human rights in one state may undermine international effort to co-operate to combat terrorism (Kaldor, 2005), thus more effort should be invested in the effective inclusion of human rights protection and the needs to address physical, psychological and political dimensions. The psychological aspect highlights that the vio-lence of a state military response simply begets further violence, provokes and consolidates support for those groups. Instead, sustainable victory in such conflict situations means ―to win a battle for the society, for its mind sets and psychologies, to address sources of grievance and anxiety, and to shore up institutions of governance‖.

Human security has long been argued that the scope of global security should be expanded to in-clude the threat of infectious disease. The primary goal of human security is the protection of indi-viduals, and infectious diseases such as HIV/AIDS, SARS, are among the most serious threats to individuals around the world. Given the trans-national nature of infectious disease, the traditional unilateral, state-centred policy approaches to these threats by infectious diseases is ineffective over the long run. Therefore, adopting a people-centred human security model with its emphasis on pre-vention, individual empowerment, and treatment strategies delivered by an array of global actors is possibly a pioneering approach to deal with the increasing diversity of contagious diseases (Kaldor, 2005). Human security proponents argue that by focusing on health burdens faced by local commu-nities and individuals, policy responses will be able to address the roots causes of insecurity and vul-nerability (Commission on human security, 2003).

Environmental degradation and extreme climates has direct impacts on human security as it means humans are prone to more natural disasters and are faced with decreasing resources. In addi-tion, as the earth‘s climate changes more rapidly, an increase in violent conflict is likely (Homer-Dixon, 1991) due to resource scarcity and an exacerbated North-South disparity. Water and energy, for example, are essential resources which have led to military and political turmoil worldwide

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(Chalecki, 2005). Altered resource availability causing food shortages results in political disputes, ethnic tensions and civil unrests, which in turn is the basis for regional conflicts that eventually goes global (IPCC, 2007). Furthermore, vulnerability to climate changes can be exacerbated by other non-climate factors such as HIV/AIDS, poverty, unequal access to resources and economic globalisation (Perry, 2007) making human security all the more susceptible.

5. Building social capital as a foundation for human security:

5.1. Social Capital as a vehicle to human security

There is a vast and growing, if recent, literature on associational life in the sub-region. Much of this literature is an important and much needed corrective to the afro-pessimism prevailing in policy circles in the West. Having despaired of revamping the supposedly derelict state, researchers and some policy makers have averted their gaze to social movements and groups, optimistic that these, if re-invigorated, may organically lead to stronger and more democratic states in the continent. Where-as these movements were once perceived as the touchstone of democratic transition and consolida-tion, their brief has been widened. Researchers and policy makers alike see them as the harbingers of development and the solution to the deep poverty that afflicts the continent. Can these movements and groups, loosely termed social capital, carry the large brief cut out for them? Given the predatory nature of the state, shouldn't studies focus as decisively on the state as a continuing variable in the increasing erosion of social capital?

Social capital is crucial to human security deepening but sounds a more sceptical note and dep-recates the carnival air surrounding much of the debate on its midwifery of human security; because the complexities of African associational life are less neat and seamier, than much of the literature cares to admit. Admittedly, the issues usually raised are broad domain of enquiries. However, given the issue at hand and people affected, an attempt must be made to answer them as a pre-requisite to providing an understanding to the unfolding insecurity and struggles for the expansion of democrat-ic space. In its initial application, little distinction was done to differentiate civil society from society. If anything, civil society was perceived as a way of conceiving society when the latter is politically ac-tive. To some, society by nature is in a state of perpetual warfare; hence, it is the task of the state to impose order. Nevertheless, what emerges out of this position is the establishment of ―order‖ through total subjection of individuals to unlimited power.

On the other hand there is a school of thought that seeks equilibrium between the unlimited power of the state and individual rights. It is here that the idea of a constitutional state comes to the fore (Keane, 1988a). It posits that it is the state‘s responsibility to settle conflict in the society. Society becomes civil when it seeks to define and establish legitimate political authority. Notably, the processes of establishing norms that define legitimacy are also an aspect of ―civil society‖. To crown this, is the process by which the dominant class create and protects its hegemonic grip on the state, while allowing the same to be presented to subordinate classes as legitimate. Conventionally, civil society is defined spatially as the political space between the house-hold and the state. It takes a more organisational and instrumentalist view and thus sees civil society in terms of an arena of negotiation and organisation. It is where individuals attempt to constitute themselves in arrangements through which they can advance their interests. It thus comprises a set of associations‘ authority structures and collective activities, which group population together in different ways. Neverthe-less, organisational and instrumental definitions tend to ignore relational aspects of civil society (Keller E, 1997).

Today, continuing conflict and human rights abuses, poverty and inequality that are the root causes of individual vulnerability, and the fact that two-thirds of the global population seemed to have gained little from the economic gains of globalisation, (Financial Times, 1996) has led human security advocates to simultaneously challenge and draw from the practice of conventional devel-opment (Thomas, 2001). Hence, security and development are deeply interconnected as imbalanced development that results in inequity is an important source of conflict: (Stewart, 2004). Human secu-rity, therefore, forms an important part of people‘s well-being, and is therefore an objective of de-velopment – after all, SHD is enlargement of human choices that is naturally compromised by lack of hu-

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man security that has adverse consequences on development. There are three main policy actions related to poverty and inequality that promote human security (Lippmann, 1943): promoting sus-tainable livelihoods and social protection (Thomas, 2001), protecting children and women and pre-paredness, prevention and humanitarian response (Thomas & Tow, 2002).

5.2. The African Union Challenges

5.2.1. The AU Commission

The AU Commission is a vital organ of the AU, which plays the role of initiating and facilitating the development of common policies and norms, coordinating the policies of member countries and promoting integration, democracy and peace and security. It is indeed the engine on which the Un-ion depends not only for its effective functioning, but also for its ability to achieve its objectives as set out in the Constitutive Act. No matter how smart or energetic a chairperson is; neither the ur-gent nor the important matters listed here can be addressed efficaciously without an able AUC.

―Despite its vital role, the AU Commission‘s budget performance and human resource capacity remains shockingly dismal.vi Due to lack of progressive follow-up and total absence of sanctions on leadership, departments with the lowest rate of execution almost always request for an allocation of more funds each year. This reveals the lack of accountability mainly at the leadership level of the AU Commission. The poor performance of the AU originates directly from the bad governance within the AU Commission.vii Another area of important reform re-lates to the implementation of norms set by the AU. All global and regional governance institutions like the AU have four functions: norm setting, norm-diffusion, norm-implementation and supervision. In the past one decade, the AU focused on policy formulation. On an average, a treaty formulation (from drafting to adoption at the AU Summit) costs $1,000,000. If this amount were utilised for the implementation of existing treaties at national and regional levels, it would have significantly enhanced the impact of the AU on the lives of many Africans.

On the other hand, Mahoso, 2011, states that despite that long and proud history, successor governments and the inter-governmental organisations purporting to represent organised pan-Africanism on the continent have failed to consolidate the movement‘s gains, to build on such gains and to claim new frontiers in the 21st century. Therefore, the weaknesses of the African Union (AU) can be grouped into three important areas. First is the tendency of leaders to be deflected from strategic prima-ry concerns of the people to paper rights, which are tertiary and not central.viii The second weakness is the ideological confusion and incoherence of African leadership. Discredit an economic theory and you discredit its at-tendant politics. It is not possible to pursue sustainable economic development programmes without coherent and sustainable ideas. The AU lacks such coherent ideas right now. The third weakness is the tendency to neglect and even fear the building of strategic indigenous institutions in all sectors. Instead, African states under the OAU and AU have tended to rely on donor sponsorship for formulating and building institutions, which turn out to be African in name only.

5.2.2. The African Union, NEPAD, UNECA, UNDP, UNFPA, UNICEF, UNEP…

All these have regional bodies that address virtually a mirror image of programmes that all im-plement without even having to talk to each other, let alone synergise their activities. These agencies have in recent years taken a large number of initiatives aimed directly or indirectly at helping Africa develop and democratise its way out of economic chaos and political instability. Indeed, growing external involvement in African projects of democratisation and economic recovery has resulted in increasingly challenging problems of conceptualising and understanding the role and function of in-ternational agencies. The growth of foreign interventions seems in marked contrast to the limited thought and effort exerted by them to put the interventions in coherent theoretical or strategic per-spective. What is the overall rationality of the great traffic of international programmes and projects of democratisation and development in Africa, the proliferating activities that seem to show little regard for economy of co-ordination? How far and in what ways do agencies, programmes, mecha-nisms, forms of knowledge and technical assistance feed on one another in helping Africa? The im-portant issues that these questions suggest are not sufficiently addressed, or even raised, in much of the current discussion.

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6. Mainstreaming development and peace in the vision and mission of the AU

6.1. the vision and mission of the AU

The vision of the African Union is that of ―An integrated, prosperous and peaceful Africa, driven by its own citizens and representing a dynamic force in global arena.‖ This vision of a new, forward looking, dy-namic and integrated Africa will be fully realized through relentless struggle on several fronts and as a long-term endeavour. The Objectives of the AU are

achieving greater unity and solidarity between nations and peoples of Africa,

defend the sovereignty, peace, security and independence of its Member States

defend African common positions, accelerate the political and socio-economic integration of the continent and coordinate and harmonise existing and future policies of the RECs for the attainment of the objectives of the Union;

The AU has instituted several organs to accomplish this vision. The organs of the AU are the Assembly, The Executive Council, The Permanent Representatives' Committee, The Commission, Peace and Security Council (PSC)., Pan-African Parliament, ECOSOCC, The Anti-Corruption Board, The Court of Justice, The Specialized Technical Committees and the Financial Institutions. The Commission is the key organ playing a central role in the day-to-day management of the Un-ion. Among others, it represents the Union and defends its interests; elaborates draft common po-sitions of the Union; prepares strategic plans and studies for the consideration of the Executive Council; elaborates, promotes, coordinates and harmonizes the programmes and policies of the Union with those of the RECs; ensures the mainstreaming of women in programmes of the AU.

6.2. Mainstreaming human development, security and peace

As a region of young people; whose visions of human development and human security are de-fined by the tenacity to achieve the Compact defined by the MDGs, the youth are right to aspire to forms of transformational development in terms of equity, a healthy population, an educated, fully engaged and employed youth with a solid family structure. Nonetheless, the reality is of one of mar-ginalisation, demanding radical developmental and demographic reconfiguration of nations. The later breeds despondency, desperation, intolerance, and of course belligerence; so much so that political forces in every corner have mobilised the youth for violent ends, often to the detriment of their livelihoods. The unfolding human tragedy, its impact on human development and its consequences on politics are indeed too ghastly to con-template.

Situation Analysis

National and regional Human Security and Peace Strategic Frameworks

National and Regional Peace Operational Plans

Sustained Implementation of Hu-man Security Norms and Activities

Monitoring, Strategic Information Management

Evaluation

Decentralised Management of Human Security Initiatives

Governance and Rule of Law

Institutional arrangements

Response Analysis

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Whereas, the challenge simply stated, underpins the need to connect to the energies of the youth, they have instead, for so many years were encouraged to look to outsiders to provide the means and processes of change. They have been discouraged from mobilising for local actions and for their own development, finding themselves in positions of unequal power, making it very tempt-ing for many in politics to dictate conditions and terms of relationships on them. While the concept of mainstreaming has been with us for decades, its application to the area of peace and development is more recent and represents somewhat uncharted waters. Mainstreaming, within this context, is an essential approach for expanding multi-sectoral responses and is not an intervention per se; as it constitutes a range of practical strategies for scaling up responses and addressing the developmental impacts globally and regionally. Through mainstreaming, governments, CSOs, private sector entities, etc., have the comparative advantage to support specific aspects of national processes. Based on cur-rent experience and aimed at guiding mainstreaming development and peace at different levels, five simple principles have emerged that attempt to provide a comprehensive framework to analyse where and when to introduce mainstreaming peace and security and development: Entry pointsix, Frameworksx, Advocacyxi, Partnershipxii and Domainsxiii

6.3. Creating an economic society and legal empowerment of the poor

Creating and economic society and legal empowerment of the poor seek to generate new policy recommen-dations that will reduce human insecurity through secure, enforceable property and labour rights, within an enabling environment that expands legal business opportunity and access to justice. Hence, the discussion questions that arise here for the Au Peace & Security Council are

What reforms are necessary to develop transparent legal and institutional arrangements in which the poor have confidence, can access justice, and which will generally contribute to a culture of fairness, equity and rule of law?

How can dispute resolution mechanisms support poor people‘s access to rights in affordable and appropriate ways?

How can public administration contribute to transparency and increase public trust in the economic system?

How can countries create an inclusive enabling system of rights, obligations and enforcements surrounding the right to property and other assets that addresses the interests of marginalized groups?

How can a decent work agenda be advanced, both within the informal and formal economies? How can the costs of working informally, or decent work deficits, be reduced?

How can labour laws protect the rights of the poor without impeding economic growth & business competitiveness?

How can the entrepreneurial innovation and creativity in the informal economy be channelled into the creation of decent jobs within the formal economy? How can opportunities for establishing businesses be enhanced so that the poor face fewer barriers to involvement in the formal economic system?

What are the specific needs and problems faced by those who conduct business in the informal economy?

How do complex business regulations or inefficient institutions prevent the poor from creating businesses or engag-ing in economic activities in the formal sector? What incentives can be created to increase access to finance?

How can the poor, as key stakeholders, be directly involved in the reform process?

One would submit that states have greatly expanded in the last few decades, especially in terms of the number of public employees and the share of public consumption in the government budget. Nevertheless, this growth has not usually been accompanied by a concomitant improvement in the capacity of its leaders to provide the vision and the ability of the state to extend authority through-out the territory to deliver public services. With few exceptions, nations have failed to win popular legitimacy-possessing relatively few authentic, social organisations that can articulate and aggregate social interests and civic leadership on education remain generally non-existent or at best, weak.

Governance becomes ‗good‘, when it operates in accordance with legal and ethical principal as conceived by society. In other words, good governance is a normative concept by which society seeks to provide guides and directions to it through standards and norms embedded in the govern-ance idea. The urge to steer state and society according to defined rules and procedures, and ensur-ing that governance in all its ramifications serves the interest of the greatest number of people in

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society through a collective and participatory endeavour. Good governance has eight major charac-teristics. It is participatory, consensus oriented, accountable, transparent, responsive, effective and efficient, equitable and inclusive and follows rule of law. Good governance requires mediation of the different interests in society to reach a broad consensus in society on what is the best interest of the whole community and how this can be achieved.

Public officials should account for the use of the public trust and transparent on their activities by clearly explaining their policy goals in conducting the government business. Hence, the practice of accountability, responsiveness, the rule of law, transparency, equitable and inclusiveness and effectiveness and efficiency signify the supervisory of the public will over the private interests and tries to ensure that the former is supreme in every activity and conducts of public official. Such political practice constitutes one of the pillars for democratic governance, in which the impartial delivery of the public service is practiced by adopting the principles of good governance that allow the establishment of politically neutral civil service. Hence, the widespread incidence of human insecurity is di-rectly attributable to basic weaknesses of political leadership, rules and political institutions.

6.4. Priming Public Policy on Democratising Global Governance:

Global Governance is the exercise of political, economic and administrative authority to manage inter-governmental affairs. It is the complex mechanisms, processes and institutions, through which states and citizen‘s groups articulate their interests, exercise their legal rights and obligations and mediate their differences. Sound global governance is, inter alia, participatory, transparent, account-able, effective and equitable and promotes the rule of law; that encompasses but also transcends the state to include civil society and multinationals: states create enabling political & legal milieu, busi-nesses generate jobs, income and trade relations and CSOs mobilise society for economic, social and political activities. Nevertheless, because each domain of governance has weaknesses as well as strengths, a key objective of support for sound governance is constructive engagement among them that exists in the context of globalisation. In response to the acceleration of interdependence on a worldwide scale, both between human societies and between humankind and the biosphere, world governance designates regulations intended for the global scale.

James Rosenau (1992:7) defined global governance an order that lacks a centralised authority with the capacity to enforce decisions on a global scale, a purposive order that exists for the management of interde-pendence in the absence of a global state. His definition is very broad and has relatively little to say about who or what makes decisions, or precisely how enforcement takes place. Inis Claude (1962) differentiated between three heuristic ways to manage power in international relations – balance of power systems, col-lective security arrangements and world government… ranging from the least formally institutionalised arrangement, collective security arrangements to the most formally institutionalised (world government). Each of the ideal types he sketched provides a basis for global governance of security affairs. They each entail an inter-subjectively recognised, pur-posive order at the global level, which shapes and defines actor expectations. Each is a system of authoritative rule or rules that functions and operates at the global level. They differ primarily according to their degrees of formal institu-tionalisation (Biersteker, 2009).

Hegemony can be provided by a single state or by a relatively small group of states, such as the G-8 or G-20, which have adapted and extended the system originally developed under US hegemo-ny over the course of the past 60 years. Nonetheless, hegemony is only one basis for this intermedi-ate form of global governance between independent states and a world state; (Ibid) as can be seen from the unfavourable global economic outlook that represents the main threat to prospects in Global Governance. Specific risk factors include a reduction of trade credit, declining commodity prices and contracting demand for the region's exports, in addition to falling remittances, aid, FDI and tourism receipts. Any significant slowdown in the pace of expansion in China—a crucial economic partner for Sub-Saharan Africa in terms of trade, aid and investment flows—would be of particular concern. Furthermore, the medium-term outlook for the region remains positive. Growth will be supported by rising external inflows (capital and investment, from Asian sources) and high commodity prices. Economic reform programmes will continue, boosting the role of the private sector in the economy (Economist Intelligence Unit, 2012)

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7. Reforming global governance:

The Global State is an elusive ideology-agency nexus that distinguishes it from nation states. Ideo-logically, its foundation is conjured up in ensuring high rates of global interaction in wealth accumu-lation and security. Such a global state establishes its principle of legitimacy in its ability to promote ecologically sustained global development and human security. Within current projects of political reform, global governance is either conventionalised or sterilised on terrain of theory and often vac-uously formalised on the ground of practice. It enters local politics and society in relatively abstract and plain form, yet is expected to land itself to immediate and vital socio-political experience. In or-der to promote good global governance, should all nations have the same political, economic and social and cultural regimes and security framework...?

Emergence of BRICs led by China as a global wealth hub: Will this mean martial capability will be mean-ingless? US dominance will wither away? Financial markets will be regulated more? Developing nations will find their place global governance? The answer lies in building alliance of cultures & civilisations; reforming the Security Council and merging UN Peace Keeping Operations, NATO and other regional security group-ings and global action to make poverty history; resolution of the Middle East crises and democratising the Af-ro-Arab axis and global norms, rules and institutions of finance regulation.

Building on global prosperity: The World has become a better place to live, human development is progressing at unprecedented rate, the world is at peace never seen since WWII & the Cold War, human security is ris-ing: women's & children's rights and the Right to Protect, environmental consciousness is developing rapidly... and the world now has the power to limit the remit of super-state corporations;

Who should act: The UNGA, G8, G20, G77, BRICS... China, Regional & sub-regional political bodies and nations and peoples... there is a consensus on the rules of the game, whether these rule are embodied in le-gal texts, or in less formal but no less real customs of politics as it is practised, is must.

Indeed, there is no more compelling raison d'être nor a mission-objective so utterly entrenched in the preservation and, even advancement of human-kind, than good governance and leadership that can lead a social league to relate cogently to an epidemic of ignorance that has spun out of control. Let this stand as an open invitation to the emerging Somali government and the regional actors in the Africa to foster the rule of law and good governance that will ulti-mately lead to envisioning a democratic society rising from the vacuous muddle of political chic & seasoned disingenu-ousness of societies and polities.

The article presented the challenges, threats and opportunities for enhancing global governing institutions such as the United Nations (UN), World Bank (WB), International Monetary Fund (IMF), World Trade Organisation (WTO), etc. Within current projects of global governance reform, global enlightenment and shared values are either conventionalised or sterilised on terrain of theory and often vacuously formalised on the ground of practice and enter society in relatively abstract, syncretic and plain form, yet are expected to land on immediate and vital Southern polity's socio-

political experience. It suggests itself and seems within reach; only to elude, and appears readily

practicable only to resist realisation. The lecture has discussed public sector human qualities for development, real-time strategy development, divestiture, safety nets and loans, food aid in security-challenged nations and private sector-led knowledge management, entrepreneurship, credit and capi-tal markets and employment that will in turn be a harbinger of peace and development.

The central hypothesis in human security and development is that the relative strength of politi-cal organisations determines the rules of the political game that are installed. It requires a plural set of political organisations, which promote and protect rules of peaceful political participation and competition. Together, institutions (plural organisations plus rules of accountability) ensure control of the state executive. In taking an insti-tutional perspective, we assume that actors in the political system express preferences through or-ganisations and that these organisations vary in strength according to their resource base.

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References and endnotes

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Kaldor, M, ‗The red zone‘ in R Belcher (Ed)., Re-imagining Security, London: British Council, 2004 cited in Elworthy & Rifkind's Hearts and Minds: human security Approaches to Political Violence, UK: DEMOS, 2005

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i According to NYU‟s Development Research Institute, between 2006 and 2009 the number of visas issued for

Portuguese entering Angola increased from 156 to 23,000. In 2012, there were nearly 100,000 Portuguese living in Angola, more than triple the number of Angolans living in Portugal. No longer seeing the US as their best oppor-tunity for professional development, waves of Nigerian-Americans vie for top spots in the new Lagos offices of JPMorgan, McKinsey and Blackrock. Reverse innovation, a concept describing inventions that are adopted first in the developing world, is creeping into western corporate boardrooms (and publishing houses).. Plans to develop a „Silicon Savannah„ in East Africa build on widely successful innovations emerging out of the banking and telecom sectors and now being rolled out in US and European markets. Images of Joseph Conrad‟s Dark Continent are re-ceding as the broadband industry turns to Africa for global growth and sustained demand. African policy innova-tions, too, offer lessons to Europe‟s troubled economic union. A recent review of the health of the West African Eco-nomic Union by the IMF suggested Europe might learn something from how Africa‟s economic unions have fared.

ii Gatwick, the United Kingdom’s second largest airport, was recently purchased by a Nigerian and Isabel dos Santos is the new majority shareholder in Portugal’s leading pay-TV and Internet provider Zon Multimedia.

iii If everyone reduces debt, then who are they going to lend to? On the other hand excessive reliance on debt fi-nancing produces extreme volatility, and high risk of defaults, which destabilises economy. It is about time to bring in close examination to current system and to provide a modified one (or transformation).. The deep cause of all West-ern Civilisation problems is of moral nature. These are societies promoting selfishness and individual accomplish-ment through power and domination. Some may argue that - in general terms - this may be the case since the time of Odysseus (or at least for the last few hundreds of years, since the raise of the Enlightenment)..

iv UNDP’s HDR‟ 94 pioneered these http://hdr.undp.org/reports/global/1994/en/pdf/hdr_1994_ch2.pdf, v UN Department for Disarmament Affairs, http://disarmament.un.org:8080/cab/salw.html, vi In 2011, the AU approved $263,814,748. However, the actual expenditure of the AU stands at 63% of the total

approved budget. This indicates the low absorption capacity of the AU, and conceals even deeper problems. The AU Commission, in particular, takes 78% of the budget. , its absorption capacity remains depressingly low at 50%. Of the AU programmes funds available, the execution rate remains very low at 39%, while 92% of the operational budget is utilised as salary, travel and allowances expenses. Some departments such as the Department of Social Affairs are “struggling between execution rates of 15% and 25%.” In the same manner, critical human resource ca-pacity limitation characterises the AU. The AU Commission currently has 691 staff members, which is 48% less than the full complement approved almost six years ago. The turnover of staff, particularly new recruits, at the level of professional and division heads is 40%. For almost eight years, the Department of Social Affairs functioned with less than 30% of its full staff complement that was approved in 2003, relaying on short-term consultants.

vii Consequently, the AU has more than 200 well-advanced legislative and policy frameworks, including demo-cratic constitutional governance. It has 43 treaties & conventions of which nine are yet to enter into force.

viii To appreciate this weakness we can look at the Rwandan crisis of 1994 and the Somali crisis of 1991. In both cases, the political and humanitarian crisis was triggered through the destruction of the economic base sustaining people’s livelihoods and the state. However, few analyses of these crises even dwell on the real causes. Rather they emphasise the moral and social symptoms of economic collapse but not the causes of that collapse. The same weak-ness is reflected in the failure by Africans to anticipate the worldwide human effects of the so-called global financial crisis. The loss of real resources to developing countries in terms of negative net transfers, higher interest rates, unequal competition in restricted access to Northern markets in 1990 amounted to US$ 500 billion or equivalent to the value of seven Marshall Plans. Despite the much talk about MDGs, neither the UN nor the AU has made the lives of the majority a priority. Mobilising national assets to meet the basic needs of the whole people can be the most solid foundation for sustainable economic growth.

ix underscores the importance of developing a clearly defined and focused entry point or theme for mainstream-ing peace and development in order to maintain the critical focus necessary to make an impact.

x national policies or strategic frameworks should be the frame of reference and efforts should be located within existing structures.

xi advocacy, sensitisation and capacity building should place mainstreaming in a better position as it cannot de-velop of its own accord.

xii highlights the importance of developing strategic partnerships based upon comparative advantage, cost effec-tiveness and collaboration.

xiii the internal domain, where national risks and vulnerabilities are addressed and the external domain, where the nations undertake interventions based on its mandate and capacities in support of local or national strategic ef-forts. Mainstreaming here focuses attention on the opportunities that are addressed by consciously formulating poli-cies that inform day-to-day practice, thus contributing to human protection, peace and development and the deepen-ing understanding of the multi-dimensional impact. In the external domain, human security is mainstreamed into the core mandate, activities and business of the protagonists based on available capacities. Strategies informed by this understanding and internalisation of issues will influence what is done externally.