Knowing but not knowing: conflict, development and denial

Analysis

Knowing but not knowing:conflict, development anddenialMartha Caddell and Helen Yanacopulos

Drawing on case study material from Uganda

and Nepal, this paper highlights the tension

between what is ‘known’ and what is ‘done’ by

practitioners working in the arena of conflict

and development. It explores the forms of

knowledge given conceptual and practical

influence and the development interventions

that are consequently sanctioned or sidelined.

Examining Stanley Cohen’s work on atrocities

and suffering, the paper considers the

explanatory potential of the concepts of

denial and acknowledgement in the context

of conflict and development. It argues that

this approach opens conceptual and practical

space in which to address the interplay

between personal experiences of conflict

contexts and institutional barriers to

communication and changed practice.

Introduction

We always knew about the gap between knowledge and acknowledgment, the

split between what you know and what you do. Those who remind us of this

message now are just seen as irritating.1

ISSN 1467-8802 print/ISSN 1478-1174 online/06/040557-23 q 2006 International Policy Institute

DOI: 10.1080/14678800601066561

Helen Yanacopulos, Senior Lecturer in International Politics and Development at The Open University, UK. Her

teaching and research focuses on various intersections between the fields of International Politics and

Development, including political networks, political engagement in Development, and Conflict and

Development.

Martha Caddell, Lecturer in Development Studies at The Open University, UK. She has published articles and

book chapters on various aspects of social development in Nepal. Her areas of research include donor responses

to conflict, education in the context of war and violent conflict, and schooling and the promotion of citisenship.

Conflict, Security & Development 6:4 December 2006

Questioning the relationship between knowledge and action may well seem deeply

unfashionable, if not irresponsible, where there is a practical imperative to support

humanitarian and development efforts in conflict situations. Surely, the need is to do

something to assist, not debate the finer points of the social construction of knowledge.

However, there is much to be gained from pausing for reflection before acting. Indeed, as a

UNDP handbook for humanitarian action advocated, interveners would do well to follow

the adage ‘Don’t just do something, stand there’.2 By extension, we would argue, there is a

need, whilst ‘standing there’ to consider what and whose knowledge is given practical and

conceptual influence and the development interventions that are consequently sanctioned

or sidelined.

Two brief examples highlight the tensions between knowledge and acknowledgment at

the interface of conflict and development. These examples illustrate ‘denial’ at a particular

point in time—when there is a denial of conflict or of development, of the different

complexities of a situation and of the multiple layers of politics. The first illustration of this

comes from Uganda. In an interview, Mr Komakech, a human rights monitor with

HURIFO (Human Rights Focus) in Gulu, Northern Uganda, suggested that:

Uganda appears to have a dual image internationally. The image of the more

stable South is projected internationally, at the expense of the conflict in the

North. Perhaps this is why the international community has not realised the

magnitude of the humanitarian emergency in the North.3

The other illustration is from Nepal, where a forestry advisor working for an

international NGO explained how his work brought him in frequent contact with anti-

government Maoist insurgents, limiting the geographical area the project was able to

operate in and the activities they were able to engage in. Despite these concerns and fears

for the security of project staff, he continued to write reports to colleagues in Kathmandu

and the agency’s central office highlighting the successes being enjoyed by the project and

encouraging continued funding for the initiative.4

Why is there this disjuncture? These two examples highlight the central concern of this

paper—the tension between what is ‘known’ and what is ‘done’; the recognition at a

personal level of conflict and its formal acknowledgment in policy and planning processes

of donor organisations. To explore this concern, we introduce the motif of denial—and its

converse, acknowledgement—as a conceptual tool to explore those personal, interpersonal

558 Martha Caddell and Helen Yanacopulos

and institutional practices that inform action in the arena of conflict and development.

As a motif it provides analytical leverage on several fronts, highlighting silences as well as

voice and focusing attention on the multiple layers of knowledge (re)construction that

inform development practice. We draw here on Stanley Cohen’s work on suffering and

atrocities to explore the explanatory potential of the concept of denial for the arena of

conflict and development.5 The practical importance of this is that interventions are

clearly affected by such denial—and often decisions can be made which are counter-

productive and address only one element of a complex situation.

This focus leads us into slightly different territory to that explored by much of the

literature on conflict and development. Considerable effort has been made from across

disciplines to explore the interconnections between these two terms and examine ways of

better framing action in the field.6 Terms such as peace-building, post-conflict

reconstruction, conflict transformation, conflict prevention, and human security have

been introduced to explain the changing landscape of development intervention in conflict

contexts, and acknowledge the range of new actors operating in the field such as the

military and private security firms. The development of frameworks such as human

security models have, for example, offered ways to conceptualise interventions in ways that

bridge the duality of conflict—peace contexts and humanitarian—development assistance.

Recently, stronger links have been made between conflict, security and development. For

example, in the UK the Global Conflict Prevention Pools bring together the Ministry of

Defence, the Department for International Development, and the Foreign and

Commonwealth Office in a move towards a more ‘joined-up government’.

Whilst these arenas of debate are conceptually interesting—and have considerable

relevance for the promotion of innovative practice, the road traversed by the development

community over the last 60 years is littered with innovative frameworks and fashionable

concepts introduced to ‘solve’ the problems that plague development practice.

Consequently, the position we develop here is deliberately tangential. While we

acknowledge the insights that these approaches offer in terms of engaging with the

multiplicity of new actors now contributing to development efforts, we stress the ongoing

need to explore personal and institutional barriers to more reflective and engaged policy

and practice.

The paper begins with a brief introduction to the two cases we draw on in our analysis,

Uganda and Nepal, both during the period 2000–2005 when there was an acute

disjuncture in the ways that external agencies were presenting and addressing conflict and

Knowing but not knowing 559

development. We then explore the potential of the concepts of denial and

acknowledgement before turning to a more detailed study of how knowledge about

conflict is (re)constructed, and silenced, in the interactions between individuals and

organisations in the field. In doing so, we argue that this approach opens conceptual and

practical space in which to address the interplay between personal experiences of conflict

contexts and institutional barriers to communication and changed practice.

While this line of discussion may well, as Cohen notes, seem ‘irritating’, this certainly

does not lessen its importance. Indeed, we argue, it is only through raising some awkward

questions that changed practice may emerge. By interrogating situations such as those in

Nepal and Uganda, we hope that interventions can be more reflective of the wider contexts

in which they are operating. Therefore, this paper is not prescriptive in what a successful

intervention would look like; the aim is to move towards a more circumspect and reflective

set of interventions, which work around joined up thinking of external interveners.

At the Interface of Conflict and Development: Ugandaand Nepal

The paper is grounded in a discussion of two cases to highlight conceptual and

institutional tensions that arise at the interface of conflict and development at a particular

point in time in Uganda and Nepal. In exploring these cases, we analyse the texts of

development, exploring the representation of conflict and development presented in

policy and programme documentation. This analysis was developed through interview-

based fieldwork and discussions with development practitioners and advisors working in

and on these two countries.7

Uganda and Nepal have striking parallels. Both countries have been the object of

considerable external intervention and financing and have emerged as development

‘playgrounds’, arenas for the experimentation with tools for planning and intervention.

The perception of Nepal as a poor but politically neutral country, informed much of the

imagery guiding intervention in the post-1950s period. Its relative isolation and

subsequent ‘opening’ to the rest of the world in 1951 led the country to be presented by

development agencies as an ideal ‘development laboratory’; a ‘textbook opportunity’ for

intervention; a ‘blank slate’ that had been ‘unexposed to the modern world’.8 Uganda, too,

has emerged as a development ‘darling’, a site for the implementation of new debt relief


measures and a model of how the HIV/AIDS pandemic could be addressed. It has been

heralded as an example of relative development success amidst a slew of depressing African

development statistics. It merits visits from American presidents and is frequently

mentioned as a country that is promoting ‘better macro-economic management and

liberalisation’.9 Only when President Museveni changed Uganda’s constitution in order to

run for a third term, and jailed his main opponent, did some donors cut their assistance,

thus tainting Uganda’s image.10

However, such images sit uncomfortably with another face of these countries—that of

armed conflict. The Acholi districts of Northern Uganda have been engulfed in a cyclical

pattern of violence, bloodshed and displacement since 1987, when the Lords Resistance

Army launched a war against Museveni’s government. Whilst there has been some

improvement in peoples’ lives in the south, it seems that rarely are these improvements

occurring in the northern parts of the country. In Nepal the ‘People’s War’ launched by the

Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) (‘the Maoists’) in 1996, has spread geographically and

grown in intensity over the past nine years. In large swathes of the country development

efforts have been constrained or curtailed, through direct targeting by the Maoists or

indirectly because of blockades and the escalating conflict in rural areas. Conflict and

development are intertwined on both the Ugandan and Nepali landscape. Indeed, the

failure of past development efforts has been highlighted as a significant contributing

factors to the initiation of the wars. As Seddon and Hussein argue, ‘it is in response to

Nepal’s failed development, poor governance and the inadequacies of the development

policies of successive governments as regards fulfilment of basic needs and assurance of

social justice’ that the Maoists claim to have initiated the ‘People’s War’.11 However, the

extent to which this interrelationship is officially recognised and engaged with by

development agencies is at best partial.

For many agencies, the separation remained almost absolute during this time. As Jan

Egland, the UN Emergency Relief Coordinator, noted at the time, there appeared to be a

‘conspiracy of silence’ around the conflict in the north of Uganda.12 Despite a level of

displacement higher than that in Darfur, the recognition of this in the policy and

programme documentation of development-oriented agencies remains limited. The

spatial separation of the conflict in Uganda contributed to the conceptual and practical

division between conflict/humanitarian modes of operation and the development focused

efforts. A similar pattern has also been evident in Nepal, with spatial distancing being

maintained by a number of agencies by the withdrawal or relocation of projects that


cannot continue to operate in certain localities. Other agencies, however, have attempted

to engage more directly with the interconnections. DfID, for example, made efforts to

undertake conflict assessment integrating risk assessment and a ‘Do No Harm’ based

analysis of programmes.13

Conceptually, there has been a great deal of thinking around the nexus between conflict

and development. This is best outlined by Peter Uvin who has summarised seven different

approaches in describing this nexus.14 The first is that development reduces conflict. If we

increase development, we decrease the incidence of conflict; this has been the prevailing

view within the development community. The second is that donors impose

conditionality to reduce military expenditures; that donors put pressure on recipient

governments to reduce the incidence of internal conflict. The third is that post-conflict

assistance will decrease the likelihood of returning to war and investment should be made

in justice/reconciliation, demobilisation and reintegration of combatants. ‘Do no harm’ is

the fourth approach which aims to minimise the potentially harmful effects of aid in

conflict situations, and this was a revelation to many that aid could potentially contribute

to the perpetuation of a conflict.15 The fifth approach is conflict prevention; that

development can stop a conflict from escalating to violence. The sixth is the idea of human

security, which has emerged over the last decade and brings together freedom from want

(development related) and freedom from fear (conflict related), linking them under one

umbrella concept.16 Finally, the seventh approach is the ‘Political Economy’ approach to

conflict, which emphasises the global forces that are at work to perpetuate conflict.17

The problem with bringing together conceptions of conflict and development is that

there is no unifying theory. What the above approaches attempt to do is to bring together

thinking around conflict and development, yet part of the problem with doing this is that

development can frequently both cause and prevent (violent) conflict, and violent conflict

can frequently cause and prevent development. Two concepts have emerged which are

encouraging in this field – peacebuilding and conflict transformation.18 Both terms relate

to reducing the conditions of the restarting of violence and address underlying conditions

that have led to violence.

Whilst it is encouraging that there have been attempts to bring together conflict and

development, the layers of denial and acknowledgment are still evident. Focusing on broad

organisational statements about conflict and development masks the multiple tiers and

forms of engagement with this interface at a practical and conceptual level. Another shift

has been the grouping of conflict, security and development, which again appears like


a positive move towards more ‘joined up thinking’. However, frequently this shift is driven

by the ‘war on terror’ and a focus on terrorism. If the aim were the war on terror, we would

argue that denial is further continued in that the impetus is on security at the sacrifice of

development. Duffield and Waddell outline these tensions and trade-offs of competing

agendas between development and security,19 and we would continue this line of

argument in emphasising that decisions will always favour security over development,

which cannot but perpetuate the disjuncture.

In the next section, we introduce the theme of acknowledgement and denial as an

analytical tool to help unpack the interplay between conflict and development. In doing so

we open space to understand better the interplay between representations of countries and

contexts, institutional practices, and the legitimating of particular actions and activities by

development agencies.

Knowing but not knowing: denial as a conceptual tool

In attempting to understand how external agencies are responding to conflict, there is

some mileage in engaging with the narratives of development and conflict that are

produced that and in turn inform intervention strategies. As noted above, conceptual

discussions around conflict and development have situated development intervention

more firmly within the conflict landscape and this has begun to influence the analytical

tools used by some agencies and the forms of intervention prioritised.20 In part, then,

consideration of the conflict/development interface has proffered opportunities to reframe

intervention strategies, focusing attention on the interveners as well as the conflict

landscape in which they operate. Yet, the opening up of more complex relationships and

intertwining of development and conflict concerns remains partial. The ‘silence of

tradition’ in which development discussion takes place remains and calls for the

uncloaking of the assumptions made by planners still need to be heeded.21 Questions that

require interrogation in relation to these texts, therefore, should include how the causes of

conflict are presented, what vision of development are promoted, and, perhaps most

crucially, what is omitted in such constructions?

As will become clear in the case study material that follows, we cannot speak of a

monolithic, undifferentiated response to conflict. Different agencies, and individuals, have

engaged with the conflict in a multiplicity of ways leading to different, and at times


divergent, responses in terms of action. Further, the focus on frameworks for integrating

approaches to conflict and development work does not allow sufficient conceptual space to

explore the multiple contexts and relationships that shape and frame actions—from

decision-making at field level to communication with country offices and the production

of policy frameworks within agencies’ headquarters. Nor does it open up that complex

grey area between personal engagement in a context, the texts prepared, and the action

taken. This is particularly salient in the context of war and armed conflict where the risks

(personal and institutional) are particularly clear and the consequences of actions (and

inaction) more visible.22

It is here that we introduce the concept of denial and explore what advantage it gives in

opening up discussion of institutional practices, communication and development-

oriented action in conflict-affected areas. In particular, we highlight its potential for

developing a nuanced engagement with multiple layers of knowledge, communication and

action that characterise development interventions and an understanding of why, despite

evident knowledge of the conflict situations in Uganda and Nepal during the period 2000–

2005, there was a limited response from development agencies in terms of shifting

modalities and practice.23

The concept of denial has been extensively used to explore atrocities and human rights

abuses, the actions and responses of perpetrators, victims and observers.24 Stanley Cohen’s

work, States of Denial, provides a comprehensive discussion of the personal and political

dynamics of denial and clearly establishes the importance of considering the ‘twilight

between knowing and not knowing’, the gap between knowledge and action. However, can

this analysis of atrocities and suffering offer anything to our understanding of

development practice in the context of war? Cohen himself touches on the issue of external

intervention in relation to bystander nations’ responsibility to intervene in Bosnia and

Rwanda. There is also, however, considerable conceptual mileage to be had from applying

this line of analysis to the multiplicity of interactions which inform development practice

in conflict zones.

So what, then, do we mean by denial? To deny is not necessarily a deliberate or cynical

act of lying, although certainly it can be. Strategies of disinformation, ‘spin’ and cover-up

are often sanctioned practices of organisations. Nevertheless, denial can also be a more

subtle process of ‘turning a blind eye, burying one’s head in the sand and not wanting to

know’ (p. 6). What is the key, however, is that in processes of denial some information is

always registered. Indeed, ‘this paradox or doubleness—knowing and not knowing—is the


heart of the concept’ (p. 22). The value of such a framework for the analysis of

development practice is in its recognition of the complex relationship between knowing

about or understanding what is going on, formal or official acknowledgement of it, and

action taken as a result. It is not necessarily that practitioners are ignorant of what is going

on around them, as the example of the forest officer in the introduction highlighted.

Rather, the dynamics of interaction between personal recognition and engagement with

conflict and the institutional processes and priorities that frame responses require

investigation.

Cohen provides a three-fold typology in relation to what exactly is being denied,

focusing on literal, interpretive and implicatory denial. We briefly sketch these in relative

abstraction here and we will return to them more substantively in the discussion of the

Uganda and Nepal cases. First, Cohen introduces the concept of literal denial, a situation

where a fact or knowledge of a fact is denied. This is well illustrated in a country

information briefing about Uganda produced by UNICEF in 2005. The potential of the

country as a tourist destination perceived to be the ‘Pearl of Africa’, its ‘unique attractions’

such as mountain gorillas, its stable government and rapid social development are all

highlighted.25 No mention was made of the war. Such refusal to acknowledge facts may be

made, Cohen argues, in good or bad faith—through genuine ignorance, blatant lying or

some more strategic rationalisation (p. 7).

Second, there are examples where the fact that something happened is not denied, but

rather it is taken to mean something different from what seems apparent to others,

interpretive denial (p. 7). Here euphemisms play an important role—it was not a ‘civil war’

in Nepal, it was an insurgency. It was not civilians who were killed, but ‘Maoist

sympathisers’. The political and practical difficulties associatedwith recognising the severity

of the armed conflict and engaging with the concept of war has led to somewhat hazy

discussions by theWorld Bank of ‘the situation in Northern Uganda’, and reports on how to

operate in ‘difficult circumstances’ in Nepal.26 By reclassifying events, the need for action is

diminished, allowing agencies to continue with projects or programmes inways that do not

require engagement with the consequences of fully acknowledging the scale of conflict. The

events did take place, but their meaning and significance is cast in a different light.

Finally, the concept of implicatory denial is used by Cohen to refer to occasions when

‘there is no attempt to dent either the facts or its conventional interpretation. What are

denied or minimised are the psychological, political or moral implications that

conventionally follow’ (p. 8). Such rationalisation does not constitute ‘a refusal to


acknowledge reality, but a denial of its significance or implications’ (p. 8). Therefore,

when, in Nepal, a bilateral agency’s forestry project office and vehicles were damaged as a

result of a Maoist bomb, the attack was rationalised away and dismissed as a problem by

staff who saw this as a ‘mistake’ on the part of the Maoists, who must, they felt, have

intended to target the government offices next door. Consequently, no further action was

deemed necessary by the agency.

Denial, then, does not imply simply ‘not knowing’, but rather the selective

acknowledgment of relationships and interactions. The interplay of different ways of

‘knowing’ and engaging with knowledge facilitate particular (and often divergent)

actions (p. 113). Thus, the question arises: how do individuals and organisations come

to understand conflict and how does that interrelate with what they are able to act on

in particular contexts? In situations where development and conflict work is occuring in

the same country, how does the peculiar interplay of denial and acknowledgement of

events at personal and institutional levels manifest? To ground this argument and

further develop this analysis, we turn now to a more detailed engagement with the two

case studies.

Exploring the silences: the partial acknowledging ofconflict

How, then, were the conflicts in Nepal and Uganda acknowledged by external agencies and

what implications did these various representations have for sanctioned actions? In this

section, we explore three key areas: how conflict is acknowledged and represented,

the institutional dynamics which sustain (and are sustained by) this presentation, and the

enduring silence around the position of development intervention as embedded in the

conflict landscape.

Exploring representations

The discursive forms frequently employed in development texts more generally were also

evident in agency representations of Uganda and Nepal during this period.27 The key

raison d’etre of the development text is to construct a basis for intervention by the donor

agency, to justify the need for a particular form of assistance in a specific context. In doing


so, planning must appear to be based on a rational process, a process that requires agencies

give the impression of having considered all significant factors that could potentially affect

programme implementation.28 The need for rational planning requires a particular

lexicon and set of tropes to be employed—what Williams refers to as ‘devspeak’.29

Pressures from within organisations—directly and in the form of the ‘silent traditions’—

shape what can be said, and how contexts and proposed actions are framed.30 The

representations of conflict in Uganda and Nepal must then, be considered in this broader

light of the demarcating of possible actions.

A dominant imagery in both contexts remains the separation of conflict and

development; and the consequent divorcing of development activity from practical and

political sensitivities of operating in the context of de facto civil war. The spatial distancing

in Uganda has led to clear divisions in approach, with the stability in the south of the

country the focal point of the ‘context setting’ paragraphs in policy and strategy

documents. Here Cohen’s concept of ‘literal denial’ can be applied, with the conflict in the

north of the country erased from the discursive presentation of the ‘country context’—and

thus the arena of development intervention.31 In Nepal, the intensity and geographical

reach of the conflict meant that it was increasingly difficult for agencies to avoid discussion

of the conflict in some form. Nevertheless, here euphemisms abound; and clear examples

of interpretive and implicatory denial are evident. Many agencies continued to interpret

the conflict in such a way as to allow it to be divorced from the development agenda and to

deny the implications, which specific acts of violence and general escalations in the armed

conflict had for their work.

There was, for example, little formal recognition by donors to Nepal’s education sector

of the impact of the insurgency on schooling. The core documentation for a multi-agency

supported initiative highlights the use of euphemism and the distancing of conflict from

development interventions. Prepared by the government and endorsed by the contributing

agencies, it notes that:

The ongoing insurgency has affected the education sector in various ways. The

operation of many schools has been disrupted by the conflict and many students

and teachers have been killed, kidnapped, tortured and victimised in other

ways directly or indirectly. Hence, identifying the needs of the victims and

providing them with appropriate support so that children’s education is not

hampered is a priority area. More importantly, ensuring that schools are


functioning well, that they are free of politics and violence, and that children

are getting quality education are the current challenges.32

In this case, limited analysis of the causes and course of the war foreclosed the possibility

of addressing the broader relationship between education and the conflict and of seeking

out more innovative ways to operate to deliver services and potentially diffuse the conflict.

Focusing on security is a reflex that reinforces this perception of the separation of

conflict and development. The violence and lack of security is seen as hindering the

projects, but also frees agencies from any need to focus on their own operating approaches.

As Leopold notes in relation to Uganda, the ‘UNHCR became increasingly concerned with

the security of expatriates, as it became less able to protect the refugees’.33 It is the external

environment, not the development intervention that is cast as problematic.

This is further evident in contexts where agencies attempted to engage more directly

with the conflict and the implication for action. In Nepal, for example, DfID had seen

Nepal, in many respects, as an opportunity to advance their institutional thinking and

practice in the area of conflict.34 Extensive ‘knowledge’ about the conflict was generated

through the preparation of reports on the causes and the use of risk management and ‘do

no harm’ related analysis of existing programmes. Here, there is a clear attempt to

rationally engage with the conflict and ‘grasp the object of its planning in its entirety’ as a

precursor to effective intervention.35 In the case of DfID’s analysis, the implications for

action was cast in terms of reiterating development goals and commitments to pro-poor

activity which led to efforts to reframe priority areas and service-delivery frameworks.

Here development is clearly being cast as part of the problem as well as part of the solution,

a point we will return to later in our analysis.

A multiplicity of forms of acknowledgement is also evident at the level of individual

field workers. In Nepal, for field staff, there are variable levels of concern about and

engagement with the escalation of violence. For example, some cope with the threat of

escalating political upheaval and conflict by looking back to the (far shorter and less

violent) 1990 ‘movement for the restoration of democracy’ and the way organisations were

able to continue to operate throughout this upheaval. Other agency staff highlighted how

they worked in conflict-affected African countries where they felt the levels of violence and

direct personal risk were much greater, and used this as a basis for mitigating the relative

lack of engagement and organisational inaction in the face of the ‘People’s War’. At a

broader level, there also appears to be divergence of perspectives between those staff that


were brought in as ‘conflict advisors’ or who arrived in the country recently compared

with those who were involved in development efforts in Nepal over a longer period of time.

Here individual willingness to acknowledge the extent to which Nepal was in a state of civil

war or constituted a ‘failing state’ can be markedly different and potentially led to

divergent views on the appropriate path of development intervention being held. The

different professional lexicons and frameworks for understanding and acting led to

particular areas of conceptual silences among these sets of professionals.

It is also important to consider how presentations of conflict and rationales for

intervention are influenced by broader cultural and political narratives. In the case of

Nepal, as one practitioner interviewed noted, the process of acknowledging conflict within

the development community has been hampered by the prevalence of ‘Shangri-la-itis’. The

‘poor but happy’ vision of Nepal, which has saturated popular and, largely, development

imaginations has acted as a barrier to the recognition of the socio-political schisms and

conflict in the country.36 In contrast, as is hinted at by the practitioners’ attitudes discussed

above, conflict in sub-Saharan African contexts is cast in a more naturalised light—a

position that similarly constrains action.37 In the case of Uganda, the ‘conflict’ face sits well

with what Ignatieff calls the ‘chaos narrative’, the widely held belief that large sections of

the globe, particularly most of Africa, ‘have collapsed into a meaningless disorder, upon

which no coherent pattern can be discerned’.38 This lack of coherence leaves little space for

the avowedly rational engagement of the development text. Rather, as Ignatieff continues,

‘the ‘chaos narrative’ de-motivates: it is an anti-narrative, a story that claims there is not

story to tell and therefore no reason to get involved’.39

Exploring organisational dynamics

Highlighting what is included, and what remains silent, in the representation of conflict in

Nepal and Uganda focuses attention on the divide between conceptual advances (such as

human security debates) and practice within agencies.40 Consideration must be given,

then, to the intra and inter-organisational dynamics that contribute to processes of denial

and act as barriers to open communication and change practice. Through this section of

the paper we focus attention on three areas in particular—institutional mandates,

partnerships for change, and pressures to demonstrate success.

Forms of intervention activity are framed by mandates and agreements with ‘host’

governments. The humanitarian/development divide engaged with and reviewed so


extensively at a conceptual level remains deeply rooted in mandates and it continues to

inform practice.41 For example, in Nepal, operational mandates were all, with the

exception of the ICRC, focused on development modalities. The World Food Programme’s

Food for Work initiative was working in areas where, in other circumstances, people could

qualify for emergency food aid. However, the official agreement reached with the

government was for distribution to be linked to performance of work activities and not

connected to any ‘emergency’ response. For any organisation, shifting to a humanitarian

mode of operation would bring the agency-government relationship under further strain

as it would require the assertion of organisational neutrality and the direct recognition of

two political forces within the country. For a number of bi-laterals such a move would also

require a shift in broader foreign policy and the reframing of country-to-country relations.

Further, some agencies do not have the institutional mandate or capacity to operate within

a conflict framework, with intervention based on partnership-focused bi-lateral

relations.42 In such cases, agencies would have had to withdraw from Nepal if it was

decided that development efforts could no longer be justified.

We also found similar concerns in Uganda. Particular mandates negotiated with

governments and other agencies meant that they frequently had a built in imperative

to remain silent about particular concerns, through literal or subtler forms of

interpretive denial. For example, much World Bank literature emphasised Uganda’s

economic ‘success’, highlighting how rapid growth had been reducing poverty,

stabilised prices, and increased investor confidence more than anywhere else in

Africa.43 Conflict did not fit neatly with this image. Indeed, in this same document the

conflict is only mentioned in one phrase that referred to ‘the situation in Northern

Uganda’ without going into any detail about it, or the impact this conflict was having

on the region.

As well as focusing attention on the mandates, priorities and operating styles of

individual organisations and intra-organisational relations, operating in the context of an

ongoing conflict also resulted in the reframing of inter-organisational partnerships. A key

dilemma for agencies to grapple with is which partnerships are to be prioritised, and which

reshaped, because of a conflict, with the relationship with government a particularly

difficult one to negotiate. With the global trend towards sector-wide approaches and direct

budgetary support, government and donor development agendas and activities have

become increasingly intertwined. Yet, in the context of an ongoing civil war, the key

development partner, the state, is also a party in the war.


In Nepal, ongoing party political instability caused particular tensions in donor-

government relationships. The suspension of parliament and indefinite postponement of

elections were criticised by the international community and statements urging the

timely reintroduction of both local and national elected bodies were made. However,

there were few moves in that direction. Indeed, the de facto royal coup of 1 February

2005 further entrenched power in the hands of the Palace and set back any hopes of a

return to multi-party democracy in the short to medium term. This lack of progress

towards the reinstatement of elected government had considerable implications for the

large number of development initiatives supporting decentralisation efforts, capacity

building and ‘good governance’. Donors working in these areas were finding it

increasingly difficult to justify their efforts. Bilateral donors that prioritised partnerships

with government, sector-wide approaches and budgetary support were having difficulty

squaring this agenda with the growing evidence of human rights abuses perpetrated by

the state and the lack of government service-delivery structures at the local level. Here

we see clear examples of interpretive and implicatory denial in action. While concerns

about the downward spiral of human rights abuses and erosion of democratic

institutions may be voiced privately, the official discourse and parameters of action of

organisations do not offer scope for formal acknowledgement of these tensions.

Processes of institutional denial are implicitly sanctioned to enable the continued

operation in the country.

To conclude this section, we consider how pressures to demonstrate success contribute

to processes of denial and curtail open communication within and between organisations.

An example from northern Uganda highlights this. Two months after a school had closed

down because of rebel attacks on personnel and property (including the rape of

schoolgirls), a job was advertised (under the auspices of an international NGO) for a

teacher to re-open the school. The job focussed on the need for ‘gender-aware

participatory approach’ and the integration of the school with the national Ugandan

school system. ‘Only one throwaway line suggested that experience working in difficult

situations would be an advantage’.44 Here the organisational goals and priorities are fore

grounded—participation, gender awareness and coordination with the state—at the

expense of recognition of and sensitivity to the conflict context. This framing of the

‘problem’ the advisor would have to address has important implications for the knowledge

and skills prioritised in project development and, over the longer term, for how progress

reports and indicators of success would have to be presented.


Linked to this, a key barrier to communication within organisations remains; concerns

that if the full extent of the conflict (and the limited capacity of development efforts to

deliver their proposed outcomes) is acknowledged, then jobs at all levels could be lost. In

the early years of the conflict in Nepal, this was most strongly felt at the level of field-based

staff, who were reluctant to pass on information as it could lead to the withdrawal or

relocation of the intervention. More recently, similar concerns also emerged among central

level staff, with some anxiety about the implications of agencies withdrawing from Nepal

or the staffing implications of a shift to a humanitarian model of operation. The duality of

the relationship between practice and sanctioned knowledge is highlighted here: actions

and practices influenced how conflict is constructed and in turn, the interventions

privileged. Thus, attention must not focus on ‘knowledge’ as something that needs to be

gained or increased, but rather as a dynamic process of interactions and encounters that

sustains particular perspectives on a conflict.

Thus, while individuals within an organisation may take a stand and speak out about a

conflict, these concerns may not be translated into the policy and the action of the

organisation. A particularly stark illustration of this can be seen within UNICEF’s

reference to Uganda as the ‘Pearl of Africa’ in their country information file and, in formal

presentations of their work within Uganda.45 In contrast, Carol Bellamy, the Executive

Director of UNICEF stated that

The word needs to wake up to the enormity of the crisis in northern

Uganda . . . . It is a moral outrage . . . . I cannot find any other part of the world

that is having an emergency on the scale of Uganda that is getting such little

international attention.46

The distinction between what is known and what is officially acknowledged and acted

upon is stark. Barriers arise from the inflexibility of organisational goals and structures.

Dealing with the rapidly changing context and the implications this has for interventions

requires quick responses and a level of flexibility that is not always available. The ability to

make decisions and provide guidance requires an engaged management—and a

willingness to make difficult choices, which could take the project outside the approved

programme framework. Frequently, however, pressure from within broader organisational

hierarchies to ‘get the job done’, to disburse funds and show progress towards targets,

constrains such creative approaches to intervention and action.


Exploring the paradox: development as problem, development as solution

The mantra that echoes through debates on conflict and development, the claim that

‘development is part of the problem, development must be part of the solution’, underpins

the final set of silences we explore—the silences which remain around the place of

development interventions on the conflict landscape.47 This refrain contrasts sharply with

much of the debate which circulated in the 1990s around discourses of development,

where development texts were analysed on the basis that ‘development is always the cure,

never the cause’ of inequality, disquiet or chaos.48 This does indeed appear to be a

significant shift, with development now recognised as a feature on the landscape, not

simply an invisible, external intervention. Yet, the form and extent of acknowledgement

remains partial, with only selective recognition of the historical and political position of

intervention in relation to instability and conflict.

Certainly, in both Nepal and Uganda, it became increasingly difficult for the separation

of conflict from development to be sustained. The highly skewed, dual representation of

Uganda was under scrutiny by academics and by practitioners (as Carol Bellamy’s

statement indicates).49 Disparities in poverty levels and the level of displacement

attributed to the conflict increasingly featured in analyses of the Ugandan context;50

further, there was an increasing recognition of the lack of international development and

humanitarian engagement with the conflict in the North. The war also constrained the

government resources that could be used for development efforts.51 The ability of some

agencies, and the Ugandan government, to continue to herald the country as a

development success story, an optimistic case in a slew of depressing development

statistics, became difficult to maintain. The conflict became more and more difficult to

ignore, particularly as some agencies were ‘breaking the code’ of denial and the increasing

media interest in the conflict.

In Nepal, this acknowledgement of development as part of the ‘problem’ was being

made even more starkly. There has been increasing recognition that development

intervention could itself be part of the cause of the conflict, and not simply a casualty of

instability (with analysis notably and directly following the frameworks for analysis

developed by Goodhand).52 The economic and socio-political disparities between

Kathmandu and rural areas, particularly the west of the country have been highlighted by a

number of analysts as a contributing factor, a point which was taken up by those agencies

who have engaged in conflict analysis (e.g. DfID, USAID). As one practitioner


acknowledged succinctly, the inequality of development over the past 15 years can be

considered as an almost criminal act. ‘How could we allow the government to miss the

development needs of the mid and Far West? It is now difficult for agencies to complain or

put pressure for change as we were part of this’.53 In response, DfID, for example,

developed this line of analysis by assessing how specific programmes and operating styles

contribute to the sustaining or diffusing of conflict and have attempted to introduce more

conflict sensitive modes of operation. In an effort to counter disparities between

Kathmandu and the rest of Nepal, less emphasis was placed on workshops and capacity

building efforts and more on direct delivery of services to the rural poor, particularly in

areas most affected by the conflict.

Here again Cohen’s work offers some conceptual insight and explanatory advantage.

Commensurate with the recognition of different forms and gradations of denial, there are

different degrees of acknowledgement. There is no simple corollary between knowledge

and action, but multiple ways in which processes of acknowledgement and denial are

engaged. Strategies of partial acknowledgment, notably those of temporal containment

and self-correction are particularly evident in how agencies engaged with the conflict in

both northern Uganda and Nepal.54 Recognition is made that some of their past practices

were indeed questionable and may well have contributed to the underlying causes or

longer-term sustaining of the conflict. However, alongside such self-criticism there is an

implicit assertion that these practices have now been (or can be) amended and alternative

approaches introduced.

Nevertheless, such partial acknowledgment can also serve to mask further other areas of

silence. For example, in conflict assessments and other studies aimed at identifying the

underlying causes and development implications of conflicts we see a similar pattern of

knowledge re(construction) as is evident in development texts more broadly. Filling gaps

in understanding is seen as the precursor to devising appropriate interventions to solve

identified problems. Pressure to be seen to be responding to crisis may lead to the over

statement of the impact and influence of external agencies. Indeed, the introduction of

new models of action and indicators of success may lead to further pressure on individuals

within organisations to mis-represent the situation and the impact of their efforts.

We cannot help but think that a degree of hubris is apparent in this approach.

Agencies—and the potential or actual impact of their actions—remain at the centre of

donor discussions. The broader politics of the conflict and consequently the relative

(in)significance of development intervention on the conflict landscapes remain under


acknowledged. Here a challenge laid down by Goodhand and Hulme is worth reiterating,

‘those who seek to intervene will need to be truly humble and avoid making the

exaggerated claims about saving lives and “bringing peace” that the logframes of their

financial sponsors often encourage’.55 There is a need to be more circumspect about the

position of intervention in the broader political landscape of any conflict and to address

more thoroughly the implications this has for policy and approaches to action. The

interconnection between organisational pressures, sanctioned knowledge and prioritised

frameworks for action needs to be further opened to scrutiny and a more modest approach

to intervention considered.

Conclusion

The explanatory advantage provided by Cohen’s framing of the concept of denial and

acknowledgement has opened up potentially useful routes into the investigation of

development responses to conflict. Introducing this framework for understanding the

interconnections between what is understood and known, what is formally acknowledged,

and that which is acted upon offers conceptual and practical space to explore the interplay

between personal experiences and understanding of conflict contexts and institutional

barriers to communication and changed practice. This multiplicity of layers of experience

and action also captures the complexity of factors that contribute to the silencing (or

partial acknowledgement) of dimensions of conflict.

As the cases of Nepal and Uganda demonstrate, processes of denial operate at a number

of levels and in diverse ways. For example, individuals may respond to their experience of

working in conflict by censoring what they tell friends, family and colleagues about their

work out of concern not to cause them worry. Other practitioners, such as those working

in the forestry office bombed in Nepal, may actually be unaware (or unwilling to

acknowledge) the extent of the risks they face. Further, the concern that job losses or cuts

to programmes may follow from any disclosure of the full extent of security concerns has

also been noted as a factor contributing to silence about the full extent of conflict. This

silencing process is further accentuated by the shift from the personal, emotional and

experiential dimensions of working in conflict situations to the technical, more distanced

and rational language of programme reports and policy documentation. Institutional

pressures to demonstrate success, to be seen to be acting within certain parameters and


frameworks, may well militate against broader and more open discussion of practical and

political dynamics of the conflict.

Such an analysis highlights the need to move beyond calls for more informed analysis

of conflict contexts that pervades much of the literature in the field. Certainly, there is a

need for organisational responses to be informed by understandings about the causes

and course of conflict. The development of new frameworks for understanding and

operating in conflict, such as human security, peace building and conflict

transformation models, do deserve to be engaged. However, alongside this, attention

must also be paid to what knowledge about conflict and development is prioritised by

these approaches and the implications this has for the forms of action that are

sanctioned.

AcknowledgementsWe are grateful to participants at the DSA Conflict and Human Security Study Group Workshop,November 2004 for their comments on an earlier version of this paper. We also thank the anonymousreferees for their helpful comments and insights.

Endnotes1. Cohen, States of Denial, 279.

2. Minnear and Weiss, Humanitarian Action in Times of

War.

3. Liu Institute, ‘Responding to the Crisis in Northern

Uganda Conflict and Development Program’, 1.

4. Caddell personal communication, November 2003.

5. Cohen, States of Denial, 2001.

6. For example, Uvin, ‘The Development/Peacebuilding

Nexus’; and El Bushra, ‘Transforming power relations’.

7. Caddell’s fieldwork in Nepal was supported by an ESRC

Postdoctoral Fellowship in2003 and a grant fromtheOpen

University Technology Faculty Research Fund in 2004.

8. Fujikura, ‘Technologies of Improvement, Locations of

Culture’.

9. DfID, ‘Uganda: Country Strategy Paper, 1999’, 3. Only

when President Museveni changed Uganda’s consti-

tution in order to run for a third term, and jailed his

main opponent, did some donors cut their assistance

and has Uganda’s image been tainted.

10. De Renzio, ‘The primacy of domestic politics and the

dilemmas of aid’, 1.

11. Seddon and Hussein ‘The Consequences of Conflict’, 4.

12. Jan Egland, ‘UN raises alarm on northern Uganda crisis’.

13. DfID, ‘Country Profiles, Uganda, 2004’.

14. Uvin, ‘The Development/Peacebuilding Nexus’, 6–21.

15. Mary B. Anderson, in Do No Harm wrote about the

potentially negative effect of aid, and Mark Duffield

incorporates this view in Global Governance and the

New Wars. Anderson, Do No Harm; Duffield, Global

Governance and the New Wars.

16. For more on human security, see Paris, ‘Human

Security: Paradigm Shift or Hot Air?’, Tehranian, Worlds

Apart, and Thomas, Governance, Development and

Human Security. It is important to note that there has

been a shift in the thinking around human security, as

is outlined by Duffield and Waddell, ‘Securing Humans

in a Dangerous World’, 19. They state: ‘The war on

terrorism has problematised this particular govern-

mental model of human security. Rather than

prioritising the security of people living within

ineffective states (a key manoeuvre in human security)

the security of “homeland” populations has moved


centre-stage. In a radically interdependent world,

defending metropolitan livelihood systems and essential

infrastructures, in short, its way of life, is premised

upon securing the same in the global “borderland”.

Compared to earlier more universalistic notions of

human security, the particular species life to be secured

is now more narrowly defined in terms of its potential

for terrorism.’

17. For more on the political economy approach, see le

Billon ‘The political economy of war’, Hoogvelt,

‘Intervention as management of exclusion’ and Stewart,’

Horizontal inequalities’.

18. For a further discussion of peacebuilding, see Good-

hand, ‘Preparing to intervene’ and for a further

discussion of conflict transformation see El Bushra,

‘Transforming Power Relations’.

19. Duffield and Waddell, ‘Securing Humans’, 16.

20. See Goodhand, ‘Preparing to intervene’, DfID, ‘Country

Profiles, Uganda, 2004’, Smith and Vaux, ‘Education,

Conflict and International Development’.

21. Crewe, ‘The Silent Traditions of Developing Cooks’, 59.

22. For discussion of silence and complicity in conflict see,

Hammond, ‘Four Layers of Silence’, and Pettigrew and

Schneiderman, ‘Women and the Maobaadi’.

23. Van Duijn, ‘In a State of Denial’.

24. For example, Goleman, Vital lies, simple truths;

Clarkson, The Bystander; Bauman, Modernity and the

Holocaust; and Charny, Holding on to Humanity.

25. UNICEF, ‘At a Glance: Uganda’

26. With respect toUganda, seeWorld Bank, ‘TheWorld Bank

Group in Uganda: Country Brief 2003’, 4. With respect to

Nepal, see ECECO, ‘Education inDifficult Circumstances’.

27. Grillo and Stirrat, Discourses of Development.

28. Mitchell, ‘The Object of Development’, 149.

29. Williams, ‘Modernising Malthus’.

30. Crewe, ‘The Silent Traditions’; Kaufman, ‘Watching the

Developers: A Partial Ethnography’, 30.

31. Liu Institute, ‘Responding to the Crisis’; Yanacopulos, ‘A

Think Piece in Dilemmas in Conflict and Development’;

and Shaw, ‘Two Africas? Two Ugandas?’.

32. HMG, Education for All, 14.

33. Leopold, ‘Trying to Hold Things Together’ 94–108; and

Van Duijn ‘In a State of Denial’.

34. Their first ‘conflict assessment’ was initiated in June

2000 and a conflict advisor appointed in October 2001.

35. Mitchell, ‘The Object of Development’, 149.

36. Gellner, ‘Introduction: The Transformation of the

Nepalese State’, 4.

37. See Hoogevelt, ‘Intervention as management of exclusion’.

38. Ignatieff, quoted in Hard Choices. Moral Dilemmas in

Humanitarian Intervention, 289.

39. Ibid., 289.

40. Macrae and Harmer, ‘Beyond the continuum’, 2, argue

that the nature of human security has been altered

through the ‘war on terror’. ‘While the language of

counter-terrorism is largely new, many of the precepts

on which such engagement is premised draw squarely on

first generation thinking regarding the links between aid

and conflict. This continuity of approach enables the

“war on terror” to be framed within a wider agenda of

human security.’

41. For example, El Bushra, ‘Transforming power relations;

Uvin, ‘The Development/Peacebuilding Nexus’, Thomas,

Global Governance, Development and Human Security;

and Paris, ‘Human Security’.

42. DANIDA, for example, is constrained in its activities due

to the prioritisation of state-focused interventions as

Nepal is categorised as a ‘partnership’ country.

43. World Bank, ‘The World Bank Group’, 4.

44. Leopold, ‘Trying to Hold Things Together’, 94–108.

45. UNICEF, ‘At a Glance’.

46. Bellamy, ‘UNICEF Press Release 2004’.

47. For example, Smith and Vaux, ‘Education, Conflict and

International Development’.

48. Crush, Power of Development, 10; Mitchell, ‘The Object

of Development’; and Grillo and Stirrat, Discourses of

Development.

49. Yanacopulos, ‘AThink Piece’ in Dilemmas in Conflict and

Development; and Shaw, ‘Two Africas? Two Ugandas?’

50. Refugee Law Project, ‘Behind the Violence’.

51. USAID, ‘Uganda, Annual Report FY 2003’, 6.

52. Goodhand, ‘Preparing to intervene’.

53. Caddell personal interview, March 2004.

54. Cohen, States of Denial, 114, is referring to governments

acknowledging human rights abuses. While the case of

development agencies is not such an extreme scenario,

the processes of acknowledgement are similar.

55. Goodhand and Hulme, ‘FromWars to Complex Political

Emergencies’, 24.

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Knowing but not knowing: conflict, development and denial

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