ANALYTICAL ESSAY

Understanding Why and How CiviliansResort to Self-Protection in Armed Conflict

Betcy Jose

University of Colorado Denver

and

Peace A. Medie

University of Ghana

The absence and limitations of civilian protection efforts havecontributed to civilians in conflict zones adopting a variety of strategiesto protect themselves from physical violence. These self-protectionefforts have sometimes saved individuals and communities from violenceand engendered a level of security. Nonetheless, the civilian protectionliterature and community have largely underestimated the importanceof these self-protection strategies. This article traces the growth of thecivilian protection regime and interrogates the absence of civilian self-protection therein. It reviews the emerging self-protection literature andoffers a typology of civilian self-protection strategies. Additionally, thisarticle sheds light on how self-protection strategies might underminecivilian protection, particularly when they contribute to civilian targetingduring armed conflict. It also proposes ways in which this typology canbe extended to foster theory building and can inform traditional civilianprotection efforts.

We survived before you and we will survive after you. (Brookings Institute 2010)

Since the end of the Cold War, the international community has displayedincreased willingness to protect civilians from threats to physical security1 duringarmed conflict. Often, yet not exclusively, these threats stem from the inaction orinvolvement of the states in which these civilians reside. The primary obligation toprotect civilians falls on these states; it is when they fail this duty that the interna-tional community may engage in civilian protection. Yet, these humanitarianactivities have not always been successful. What are some of the reasons for this?And when global efforts are ineffective or nonexistent, how do civilians protect

1While civilians experience many different kinds of violence and the violations of the entire suit of their humanrights, we focus our discussion on how civilians protect themselves from physical violence. We chose to focus on thistype of harm because the literatures around the issue of civilian self-protection prioritize this kind of harm.Moreover, in an effort to clarify the UN’s Protection of Civilians thematic focus, the Department of PeacekeepingOperations and Department of Field Support created a three-tier system in which tier two centers on protectingcivilians from physical harm (DPKO/DFS 2010; see also Slim and Bonick (2005) and Heitz (2009).

Jose, Betcy and Peace A. Medie. (2015) Understanding Why and How Civilians Resort to Self-Protection in Armed Conflict.International Studies Review, doi: 10.1111/misr.12254© 2015 International Studies Association

International Studies Review (2015) 0, 1–21

themselves? These questions are pertinent to the current global context, as ampleevidence exists demonstrating civilian vulnerability during armed conflicts. Civil-ians are increasingly subjected to physical harms in the post–Cold War era, withwarring factions (state and nonstate) attacking them indiscriminately as well asdeliberately.2 Studies have also revealed that attacks against civilians are gendered,affecting men and women differently (Stern 2005).The ongoing Syrian conflict illustrates this reality. The current death count

exceeds 220,000 Syrians. Among the dead are civilian victims of deliberateattacks by both Assad’s forces and the multitude of armed groups which opposehim. These include civilians who are not involved in the struggle to determinethe political leadership of Syria. Reflecting the gendered nature of this violence,men have been targeted for execution, while women have fled the country enmasse to escape the physical and sexual violence that threatens them (Tran2013).Moved to act in response to widespread attacks against civilians, the United

Nations and the global humanitarian sector made commitments to civilian pro-tection. While some of these efforts have managed some level of success, incon-sistency and inadequacy taint the global community’s general record.Consequently, research has revealed that civilians often take the lead in theirown protection (Birch 2008; Megret 2009; Baines and Paddon 2012). We con-ceptualize civilian self-protection (CSP) as activities undertaken during armedconflict (international or non-international) to preserve physical integrity inwhich the primary decision maker is a civilian or group of civilians. As discussedbelow, direct threats to civilians’ physical security may emanate from innumer-able sources, state and nonstate, foreign and domestic. Yet, the common bondin this query is that the main locus of decision making for ensuring physicalintegrity resides with civilians. Thus, this conceptualization of self-protectionemphasizes the agency or control (Clark-Kazak 2014) civilians possess inresponding to immediate threats, however limited it may be. While a civilian’sself-protective response may be suboptimal or extremely constrained, it is still hisor her decision to make. As Alex J. Bellamy and Paul D. Williams find,

(e)xternal actors often overlook the fact that populations in danger usually take(often quite effective) measures to protect themselves. External actors are seldompresent in large numbers in the eye of an emergency when most of the killingand displacement is actually underway. Typically, international assistance arrivesafter the peak of the violence. In the inevitable gap between a crisis erupting andoutside help arriving (if it does at all), civilians have to make provision for theirown protection by escaping violence, protecting their property, and reducingthreats. (2009:20)

Scholarly and practitioner attention to CSP is burgeoning, but limited, suchthat civilian-initiated protection efforts are inadequately understood. This gapcan be partially attributed to the way civilian protection is conceptualized andpracticed within the international humanitarian sector. Within this community,the discussion of civilian protection is often framed as an activity done to civiliansby others, as opposed to an activity done by civilians themselves. As a result,recognition of civilians’ agency in self-protection and civilian participation inplanning their own protection factor less prominently in practitioner and schol-arly analyses. Even international human rights law and international humanitar-ian law, bodies of law arguably created for the sake of civilian protection, fallremarkably silent on civilian-initiated protection (South, Perhult, and Carstensen2010:7).

2 Chesterman (2001); Hammes (2004); Downes (2008); United Nations Assistance Mission in Afghanistan (2010).

2 Civilian Self-Protection

This article aims to take stock of what we know about civilian protectionand CSP in the extant literature. It argues that the notion of civilian agencyin protection efforts is an under-examined concept within that literature. Thisis the case even though civilians have always self-protected. Rather, the focusin these discussions tends to center more on “traditional” protection provi-ders. These include states, international organizations, and non-governmentalorganizations. Consequently, we argue that civilians are “new” actors in thestudy and practice of civilian protection and require further examination. Wealso argue that while civilian protection efforts should not be abandoned, tobe effective they will need to reflect a deep appreciation of CSP. We proposea typology of CSP that is based on a review of the literature and on inter-views we conducted with refugees in Botswana and Ghana. This typology isbased on self-protection strategies utilized by civilians we encountered in ourresearch and on a review of the emerging literature. We developed this typol-ogy to enable the creation of a conceptual framework for better understand-ing CSP and its implications on conflict dynamics. The next section tracesthe development of the norm of external actors engaging in civilian protec-tion in the post–Cold War era, while the third section discusses conceptualand organizational debates and challenges that have characterized the theoriz-ing and practice of civilian protection, in general, and CSP in particular.These two sections help make the case for why civilians engage in self-protec-tion and why it is surprising that scholars and practitioners have not devotedmore time to studying it. These discussions support our claim that CSP is alacuna in the scholarly and research agendas that needs to be furtheraddressed. We then present a typology of CSP strategies, based on our casestudies and a review of the nascent literature, and conclude with suggestionsfor how this literature can be advanced and how CSP strategies can informtraditional protection efforts.

Conceptual Evolution of Post–Cold War Civilian Protection

News stories abound of civilians subjected to physical violence during armedconflict. The global community possesses various resources which enables it torender assistance to these threatened civilians. For instance, the internationalcommunity may draw upon public support to fuel civilian protection efforts:“concerned” communities may respond to civilian suffering with calls toresponsible parties to halt these attacks and to other entities to do more toprotect civilians. International law serves as another tool. Both internationalhuman rights law and international humanitarian law encapsulate long-stand-ing norms regarding civilian protection during armed conflict. Additionally,states have amassed enough political will to engage in civilian protection viaSecurity Council resolutions containing civilian protection mandates (Bellamyand Williams 2009).This increased attention to the civilian experience during armed conflict par-

tially reflects the emergence of a human security framework. A human securityapproach prioritizes the interests of individuals as compared to a traditionalsecurity approach which focuses on state interests. It is not a coincidence thatthe salience of this approach increased with the rise in so-called new wars. Kal-dor (2006:9) uses the term “new wars” to describe conflicts in which belligerents(state and nonstate) intentionally target civilians and in which large-scale humanrights violations occur. This perceived change in armed conflict dynamics ush-ered in the era of humanitarian intervention as well as the emergence of the“responsibility to protect” doctrine (Badescu and Bergholm 2009). Additionally,

Betcy Jose and Peace A. Medie 3

the Protection of Civilians thematic concept arose in the 1990s within the UN,spurred by Boutros Boutros-Ghali’s “Agenda for Peace” (Carpenter 2005; Wills2009; Hultman 2013).Yet, despite the increasing attention to human security issues, the interna-

tional community has not engaged in civilian protection everywhere civiliansare threatened with physical harm, necessitating acts of self-protection. Andeven when the international community has intervened, its efforts have notalways been effective. Myriad reasons exist for this state of affairs. The nextsection explores some of the more salient ones identified by scholars andpractitioners.

How Armed Conflict and External Actors Contribute to the Need for CivilianSelf-Protection

External actors often have to consider whether or not to engage in protectionactivities when civilians cannot receive protection during armed conflict fromtheir own governments or are harmed by government actors. However, prob-lems arise in the protection offered by these external actors. These problemsare often rooted in and guided by global conceptual and normative debates.They are also shaped by the interests and capabilities of these traditionalactors. These problems must be considered as policymakers and practitionersdetermine how they can effectively support CSP. An effective way to supportCSP is to realistically consider what assistance traditional actors can offer inlight of the limitations of their efforts, or the ways in which their effortsmight contribute to the need for self-protection, as discussed in the remain-der of this section.

State and Nonstate Armed Groups

Both state and nonstate armed groups commit harmful acts against civilians,intentionally and unintentionally. A robust literature analyzing the threats civil-ians face provides enormous insight into the precarious and dangerous experi-ence they endure during armed conflict. Eck and Hultman (2007) find thatboth rebel groups and state armed forces engage in one-sided violence, that is,violence deliberately aimed at civilians.3 Luke N. Condra and Jacob N. Shapiro’sresearch explores the impact of collateral damage on civilians in armed conflict(2012). These threats have also contributed to the discussion and initiation ofcivilian protection efforts undertaken by external actors.

Lack of Conceptual Clarity

While external actors have engaged in efforts to protect civilians from the harmsthey face during armed conflict, these efforts have not always been successful.One reason for problematic civilian protection by external actors is that the con-cept of protection itself is contested (Lie and de Carvalho 2009). One arena forcontestation is international law. As mentioned above, various regimes in inter-national law enable the international community to protect civilians duringarmed conflict. International humanitarian law (IHL) protects civilians fromintentional targeting during armed conflict, international refugee law (IRL) pro-tects those who flee to another state for fear of persecution because their owngovernment cannot or will not protect them, and international human rights law

3See also Valentino, Huth, and Balch-Lindsay (2004); Humphreys and Weinstein (2006); Bae and Ott (2008);Downes (2008); Condra and Shapiro (2012).

4 Civilian Self-Protection

(IHRL) requires governments to offer certain protections during wartime andpeacetime4 (Ferris and Stark 2010:2–3). These various legal sources encapsulatediffering notions of civilian protection: one which focuses on protection fromphysical violence and a more expansive view which emphasizes the full range ofhuman rights of affected individuals. For adherents of this broader understand-ing of civilian protection, it is not enough to keep people alive without assuringtheir rights to medical care, food, education, shelter, water, livelihoods, anddignity (Ferris and Stark 2010:4).These different views on protection are not necessarily harmonious. The first

view, which characterizes IHL’s approach to protection, is far narrower than thehuman rights approach captured by the second view. In one sense, it requires farless investment of time and resources by external actors. The latter, and broaderview, casts a wider net for civilian protection but can be difficult to implement(Bonwick 2006:271). For instance, Article 48 of the 1977 Additional Protocol I tothe 1949 Geneva Conventions, as part of IHL, declares that the basic rule of thistreaty is that civilians are immune from intentional attacks, where attacks aredefined as “acts of violence against the adversary. . .” (Article 49, 1977 AdditionalProtocol I). Thus, IHL primarily protects civilians from physical harm. Yet sinceIHRL treaties like the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and CulturalRights have no clauses suspending their application during states of emergency(like an armed conflict), presumably rights like the right to education andemployment are to be preserved during an armed conflict (Chinkin 2008).Both perspectives find advocates among various global actors and even within

the same organization, making it difficult to secure consensus on protection policydesign and implementation (Bellamy and Williams 2009). The issue is furthercomplicated by the fact that the positions actors hold within and between organiza-tions influence their understanding of civilian protection, providing another spacefor conceptual differences to emerge (Holt 2005; Bellamy and Williams 2009).The situation becomes even more problematic when the acting organization hasno formal definition of civilian protection. According to Damian Lilly (2012:630),among the various international organizations engaging in civilian protection,only the African Union has adopted an official definition of civilian protection.This lack of clarity not only impedes civilian protection at the conceptual level,

it impedes civilian protection at the operational level (Williams 2013). Jon Har-ald Sande Lie and Benjamin de Carvalho (2009) argue that policies adopted bythe headquarters of an organization often get modified, intentionally and unin-tentionally, as they pass down the chain to the field offices that implement thosepolicies. Thus, by the time they reach the actors who engage in the actual pro-tection of civilians, any clarity about who to protect and what protection entailscan be lost (Lie and de Carvalho 2009). Communication difficulties or therequirement that field staff get clearance from headquarters before acting alsocontributes to challenges with civilian protection (Nasu 2009:216–217). Addition-ally, concerns about overstepping the bounds of unclear United Nations SecurityCouncil (UNSC) mandates can lead to conservative decision making regardingcivilian protection (Breakey and Dekker 2014).

The Macro-Political Structure’s Impact on State Behavior

Disagreements between nonstate actors engaging in civilian protection are notthe only way conceptual and operational differences negatively affect threatened

4Specific examples of IHL include the 1949 Geneva Conventions and their 1977 Additional Protocols as well ascustomary international law. IHRL treaties include the International Covenant for Civil and Political Rights and theInternational Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights. IRL includes the 1951 Refugee Convention andits protocol.

Betcy Jose and Peace A. Medie 5

civilians. The macro-political structure of global power and norms enables thesedifferences to impact states’ decisions on civilian protection. Tensions betweenhumanitarian norms and sovereignty norms play an important role in theseconundrums. Furthermore, decisions about whether civilian protection shouldbe neutral or partial further complicate matters. While scholars and practitionersmay tout the utility and appeal in espousing humanitarian principles like neu-trality and impartiality (ICRC 2009), it is difficult for states to implement themin practice. Civilian protection may require, or result in, states taking sides in aconflict. For instance, the NATO intervention in Libya marked the first time theUNSC authorized a military mission to protect civilians without state consent(Bellamy and Williams 2009; Lilly 2012:628). While the UNSC’s mandate for thatoperation was neutral on its face, some states felt its execution was not. This per-ception would impact subsequent state considerations of civilian protectionissues, such as in the Syrian conflict. A combination of state interests and arobust norm of non-intervention have prevented the UNSC from authorizingcivilian protection operations there.Yet, even when states are willing to participate in civilian protection, non-

humanitarian interests can impact its effectiveness.5 For instance, states mightmake nominal troop contributions to reap the reputational benefits of participat-ing in a UN peacekeeping operation rather than a larger contribution whichmight be more costly to them. This is so, despite research showing that suffi-ciently supplied peacekeeping operations can effectively protect civilians (Evans2008; Hultman, Kathman, and Shannon 2013). Instead, under-resourced mis-sions then have to place various types of limitations on their protection activities(Williams 2013:289). Additionally, according to a 2014 UN report, troop-con-tributing countries are reluctant to allow their soldiers to use UNSC authorizedforce to protect civilians for fear of endangering those soldiers’ lives (Lapointe2014:13; see also Luxmoore 2014 for an example of peacekeeper inaction in theCentral African Republic).However, not every situation which calls for civilian protection appears on the

global radar. A multitude of factors, tied to the global political structure inwhich states operate, contribute to missing humanitarian crises on the UNSC’sagenda. For every Syria or Libya the UNSC discusses, there is a Colombia, Kyr-gyzstan, India, Pakistan, Thailand, the Philippines, or Turkey where civilian harmis overlooked (Oxfam 2011). For instance, in 2010, Pakistan was second to Iraqin number of civilian casualties, yet did not appear on the UNSC’s agenda whileIraq prominently did (Oxfam 2011). The failure of state governments and theinternational community to protect civilians has led to what Melissa T. Labonte(2011:987) terms “double manifest failure.” Thus, not only does ineffective civil-ian protection (by state and external actors) give rise to CSP, nonexistent civilianprotection does as well.

Neutrality and Nonstate Actors

A related challenge to protection efforts stems from the philosophical bases drivingnonstate actors involved in civilian protection (Ferris and Stark 2010:5). Are theywilling to engage in political action or have they made a commitment to neutralityand impartiality? For some organizations like the International Committee for theRed Cross (ICRC), neutrality forms the core of their operational mandate. TheICRC engages any relevant actor in a conflict situation because it feels doing so isthe most effective way to provide protection (International Committee for the RedCross 2009). This neutrality can be a double-edged sword when it enables short-termprotection at the expense of long-term protection. A non-discrimination policy may

5Slim (2004); Bellamy and Williams (2009); Labonte (2011); Sengupta (2014).

6 Civilian Self-Protection

provide organizations access to threatened groups, and this access may in fact ren-der these groups safe temporarily. However, this access often merely postpones thedanger, which reappears when these organizations leave the affected areas. Further-more, since access is contingent on the whims of the parties in control, organiza-tions have to play complex diplomatic games to prevent the denial of that access(Forsythe 2007). This means that organizations often refuse to identify the perpetra-tors of human insecurity, and they do not publicly pursue political avenues whichmay providemore durable protection.Other actors, like the International Criminal Court (ICC) and Human Rights

Watch (HRW), will call rights violators to account. However, that approach isnot without its challenges. The objective of these measures is to halt the killingby reducing any sense of impunity for massive human rights violations. However,in the face of such measures, governments like Sudan can close up the space inwhich protection efforts occur by expelling those involved in such efforts, endan-gering those dependent on this protection (Human Rights Watch 2008). InColombia, a respondent from a UN agency stated that FARC denied it access tocivilian populations in certain areas of Colombia because “[the UN agency]painted an unflattering image of FARC in a widely disseminated report” (Inter-view with Jose, Bogot�a, 2011).

External Actors as Perpetrators of Violence

External actors like peacekeepers and other humanitarian workers may be dis-patched to conflict zones to protect civilians from physical violence. Yet, theycan also be perpetrators of that violence. The UN has been repeatedly mired incontroversies regarding peacekeepers’ sexual misconduct and abuse in theDemocratic Republic of Congo, Bosnia, Liberia, and Cambodia, among otherplaces (Lacey 2004; Ndulo 2009). A September 2014 report accused Burundianand Ugandan peacekeepers serving with the African Union Mission in Somaliaof sexually abusing and exploiting Somali women and girls (Human RightsWatch 2014b). Peacekeepers have also been accused of enforced disappearances.For instance, Human Rights Watch investigated allegations that African Union(AU) peacekeepers participated in the disappearance of 11 people shortly afterone AU peacekeeper was killed by the anti-balaka militia group in the CentralAfrican Republic (Human Rights Watch 2014a). Peacekeeper abuse is so prob-lematic that the Open Society Institute, in an effort to motivate significant policychange, released a series of reports in 2014 detailing the extent to which civilianpopulations are victimized by those sent to protect them (Integrated RegionalInformation Networks 2014).

Gender

An additional challenge for protection efforts are the diverse gender impacts oncivilians and the insufficient attention to this experience (Mertus and Benjamin2000; Moser and Clark 2001). Gender shapes the entire cycle of warfare, fromthe outbreak of hostilities to the efforts to protect civilians. The earlier exampleof the gendered dimensions of physical violence in the Syrian conflict illustratesthis point. The rape of women stigmatizes the female victims and also signals tomales their inability to protect the women, eroding trust, a fundamental compo-nent of a functional society. Men are often killed because gender norms gener-ally equate maleness with belligerency. The differences in threats to men andwomen’s physical security stem partly from gendered ideas about men andwomen’s social roles (Kinsella 2004; Sjoberg 2006).However, because gender concepts are context bound, they can vary quite sig-

nificantly even within geographically proximate situations (Gardam and Charles-

Betcy Jose and Peace A. Medie 7

worth 2000). For instance, during field research with National Union for theTotal Independence of Angola (UNITA) fighters on a separate project, the firstauthor found that women wearing pants in a village were more likely to be killedthan women who dressed more consistently with local gender norms (e.g., bywearing dresses). This is because this violation of social norms served as an indi-cator of a woman’s belligerency (Interview with Jose, Dukwi, 2009). The associa-tion of attire and belligerency stemmed from female fighters being forced towear pants during active service. However, belligerents from a nearby conflictclaimed that while women were afforded greater protections, they would bekilled if they acted in threatening ways, rather than because of what they wore(Interview with Jose, Dukwi, 2009). Thus, in a similar region, belligerents abidedby differing gender norms which may have varyingly impacted the female civil-ians they encountered.Add to the mix that the drafters and implementers of protection policies may

possess different gendered views from those in operation in battle zones, andthe picture becomes very complicated very quickly. In this way, the complex nat-ure in which gender interacts with harm in armed conflict contributes to prob-lems with protection, especially when humanitarian actors do not possessunderstandings of these local dynamics. For instance, the UNSC authorized itspeacekeeping mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), MONUC, touse force to protect civilians, with special attention to protecting women andchildren (MONUC 2000). Yet, even with this heightened focus on protectingwomen, female refugees are insufficiently protected from rape and/or deathwhile collecting firewood, an activity conducted mainly by women. Furthermore,this focus on women and children may leave other victims of physical violencevulnerable. In the case of rapes in the DRC, while many of the victims haveindeed been women and children, as many as 10 percent of the rape victimsseen by the American Bar Association’s sexual violence clinic in Goma were men(Gettelman 2009, 2011). This is consistent with Charli Carpenter’s (2006) find-ing that humanitarian efforts concentrate on protecting women and childrenbut neglect vulnerable male civilians.

Overlooking Civilian Agency and Local Communities as “New Actors” inProtection

The discussion above reveals that a variety of actors and situations contributes tothe need for CSP. Yet, practitioners and scholars inadequately appreciate theroles civilians play in their own protection.6 However, people caught in the midstof warfare are not simply helpless victims.7 They are also agents of their ownsecurity when the international community is unable or unwilling to help them.That is what makes the insufficient attention in the scholarly and practitioner

literatures to CSP puzzling (Baines and Paddon 2012; Levine 2013). Given thereality that civilians do engage in self-protection and the problematic protectionrecord of traditional actors (Rolfe 2011), one would expect an established andmore extensive investigation of self-protection in the scholarly and practitionerliteratures. Instead,

. . .scholars tend to assign only a limited set of roles to [civilians], most commonlythe roles of victim, passive subject, or threat, or treat them as irrelevant to politi-cal processes in order that they remain nonpoliticized. (Wagnsson et al. 2010:2)

6Bruderlein (2000); Bellamy and Williams (2009); Megret (2009); Wagnsson, Hellman, and Holmberg (2010).7Bruderlein (2000); Bellamy and Williams (2009); Megret (2009); Wagnsson et al. (2010).

8 Civilian Self-Protection

One reason civilians (individually or collectively) feature less prominently inthe civilian protection enterprise can be traced back to the theoretical underpin-nings of protection policies. Much of global protection discourse is dominatedby neoliberalism and neorealism (Wagnsson et al. 2010:5). These state-centrictheories elevate the role played by the state as a human security provider. How-ever, primary responsibility for the violation of rights often lies in the hands ofstates. The influence of these theories results in a limited view of who are theinstrumental players during armed conflict. Policymakers and scholars guided bythese theoretical perspectives overlook civilians who may well play a crucial rolein their own protection. They may also overestimate the ability of state actors toameliorate the plight of those in harm’s way (Wagnsson et al. 2010). Theorieson global governance suffer less from the weaknesses of neorealism and neolib-eralism, but civilians also escape their attention because of their focus on tradi-tional protection actors. The priority given to these actors enables them todetermine which protection issues to focus on and how to implement protectionpolicies, often without input from the populations they are striving to serve(Harrell-Bond 2002).Critics of this approach argue that not only does it neglect the agencies of

local populations, but, more cynically, might be more self-serving than humani-tarian (South et al. 2010:6). Together, these gaps in the literatures as well as inpolicy formulation and implementation underscore the need for a reneweddiscussion on civilian protection in conflict situations. In essence, the spotlightneeds to be shed on these “new actors” in order to better understand how toengage in more effective protection efforts.Despite this long-held inattention to civilian agency in armed conflict, the situ-

ation is improving. Scholars and practitioners have recently begun inquiries intoCSP. According to this developing research agenda, populations in conflict zonesoften adopt a variety of periodically successful strategies to protect themselvesfrom violence. In the next section, we discuss the emerging CSP literature andpresent a typology of strategies through which self-protection can be studied.

Civilian Self-Protection Strategies

The historical record evidences myriad efforts civilians undertook to protectthemselves and others in the face of inaction or inability by external actors.Megret (2009:582) provides some examples:

[G]entile families hiding Jewish children; Danes ferrying Jews to Sweden; Hutusprotecting Tutsis; Arab civilians bringing assistance and even rising against thedeportation of Kurds during Anfal.

There is evidence that civilians in ongoing armed conflicts also render theirown security. According to Peace Brigades International,

. . .instead of becoming part of the millions of Colombia’s internally displacedpopulation, [a] community of small farmers came together in 1997 andembarked on a pioneer experiment in the region of Urab�a (northwest Colom-bia): the Peace Community of San Jos�e de Apartad�o, a community that declaredthemselves neutral in the armed conflict and rejected the presence of all armedgroups on their land. (Peace Brigades International Colombia 2012)

2012 marked the fifteenth year in which this peace community has engaged inthese efforts.These examples form part of the growing literature on CSP in conflict set-

tings. This literature, which consists largely of qualitative case studies, has notonly provided descriptions of self-protection strategies, but also explanations for

Betcy Jose and Peace A. Medie 9

why civilians adopt certain strategies and the conditions under which theseadopted strategies successfully provide protection from violence. There is,however, the need for a common typology that encompasses all forms of self-protection strategies, where a typology is a group of categories that is coordi-nated (Collier, Laporte, and Seawright 2008). The self-protection strategies inour typology incorporate three core elements: (i) actions taken to protectagainst immediate, direct threats to physical integrity imposed by belligerents ortraditional protection actors; (ii) primarily selected and employed by civilians;and (iii) employed during an armed conflict.8 Such a typology would enable theproduction of cumulative knowledge on CSP and would enhance comparisonacross studies. It would also facilitate the generation of a conceptual frameworkfor CSP, which identifies the main variables or constructs and the relationsbetween them (Ramful 2011:8), ultimately assisting with theory building. Itsusage would also limit the extent to which multiple labels are applied to identi-cal self-protection strategies and, thus, enable scholars to build on the works ofothers. We have, therefore, developed a Typology of Civilian Self-Protection Strategies,which is based largely on an analysis of the literature but also draws on inter-views conducted by the authors in Botswana and Ghana.The first author conducted interviews in the Dukwi refugee camp in Botswana

in 2009. These interviews were conducted as part of a separate study on viola-tions of the civilian immunity norm and included 36 interviews with refugeesfrom the DRC, Angola, Somalia, Zimbabwe, and Sudan. The second authorinterviewed about 34 men and women who had fled Cote d’Ivoire during thecivil conflict that followed the country’s 2010 elections and were residing in theAmpain refugee camp in Ghana in 2011, for a study of their self-protectionstrategies. The participants were randomly selected and the author conductedsemi-structured interviews with them in order to elicit information on the self-protection measures they had adopted since the beginning of the crises in 2010.These case studies inform our typology, which aims to facilitate the productionof cumulative knowledge and theory building.In this typology, we group self-protection strategies into three categories: (i)

non-engagement, (ii) nonviolent engagement, and (iii) violent engagement.Non-engagement describes strategies in which civilians do not interact with bel-ligerents or traditional protection actors who pose a threat to them. In this sce-nario, civilians’ attempts at survival, though necessitated by the actions ofwarring factions and/or other harmful actors, do not directly involve theseactors. An example of this strategy is flight, usually to a location that civiliansexpect to be safer. Nonviolent engagement, on the other hand, entails someinteraction with one or more actors who may harm them. Strategies within thiscategory include negotiation and tax paying and exclude the use of violence bycivilians. This use of violence describes violent engagement, which is the thirdcategory of self-protection strategies within the typology. It includes both orga-nized and spontaneous acts of violence by civilians or by actors who seek toprotect these civilians from physical threats. These strategies can be used non-collectively or collectively where “non-collective” describes an individual or a fam-ily unit, while “collective” refers to a group that includes two or more familyunits or individuals. Furthermore, depending on the kind of threats they faceand their capabilities, civilians can adopt strategies from all three categories(non-engagement, nonviolent engagement, and violent engagement) at variousperiods within a single conflict or simultaneously. For example, civilians who flee

8While civilians may engage in many different kinds of activities during armed conflict, our focus lies specificallyon efforts taken by civilians for the primary purpose of simply and immediately protecting themselves from direct,physical threats. Thus, we do not include in this study civilian acts of a more political nature, such as rebellions oruprisings, which strive for achieving broader political goals.

10 Civilian Self-Protection

violence to seek refuge (non-engagement) could encounter belligerents en routeand be forced to negotiate with them (nonviolent engagement). Civilians’selection of self-protection strategies is, therefore, often fluid and conditionalupon factors over which they mostly have minimal control. We discuss thesedynamics below (Figure 1).

Non-EngagementCivilians sometimes do not interact with the members of warring factions ortraditional protection actors when trying to protect themselves from violence.Non-engagement strategies can be adopted for various reasons that includeknowledge of the belligerents’ pattern of targeting civilians (Interviews withMedie, Ampain, May 2011). Several studies have noted the use of flight—a formof non-engagement—by civilians in conflict settings.9 Some men and women inCote d’Ivoire fled the advancing rebel force to Ghana (Interviews with Medie,Ampain, May 2011). However, civilians’ decision to flee was conditional upon

Non-Engagement

Nonviolent Engagement

Violent Engagement

Flight Taking shelter Silence Strategic movement

Appealing (verbal/nonverbal) Negotiating Toll/Tax-paying Neutrality Girlfriending Providing labor Peaceful resistance Acting as an informant

Creating self-protection militias Joining armed groups Supporting armed groups

Non-collective/Collective

Non-Collective/Collective

FIG 1. Typology of Civilian Self-Protection Strategies

9Alther (2006); Stites (2006); Bellamy and Williams (2009); Steele (2009); Barrs (2010); Corbett (2011); Bainesand Paddon (2012); South (2012); Adhikari (2013).

Betcy Jose and Peace A. Medie 11

several factors, including their ability to pay the fare to be transported to Ghana(Interviews with Medie, Ampain, May 2011). Reflecting gender dynamics, refu-gees from various conflicts recounted instances of men leaving their villages fornearby larger towns upon news of an armed group’s advance (Interviews withJose, Dukwi, 2009). The reason given was that armed groups often assumed malevillagers were belligerents, and if these men were not already members of thatarmed group, they must be fighting for its opponent. Thus, the men would fleeto nearby towns where they could more easily blend in and be safe. Nubians inSouth Kordofan in Sudan fled government forces into the Nuba mountains dur-ing the war between the Sudan People’s Liberation Army/Movement (SPLA/M)and the Government of Sudan that raged from 1986 to 2005 (Corbett 2011).There were an estimated 400,000 people seeking refuge in the mountains in theyear 2000. According to the author, their knowledge of the area rendered thisstrategy effective (Corbett 2011). Adhikari (2013) in his study of Nepal statesthat the threat of violence and the actual experience of violence increased thelikelihood of displacement. However, people’s decision to flee was not onlydetermined by these factors but also by economic, social, political, and physicalones. He found that people were less likely to leave where there were employ-ment opportunities available, while destruction of property and the unavailabilityof employment led people to flee. He also found that physical characteristics ofthe area, operationalized as the presence of a motorable road, increased theprobability that people would flee and that political affiliation also affected thedecision to flee the site of conflict. Baines and Paddon (2012:238) also describehow “tens of thousands of children and youth” would flee to urban centers toescape rebel attacks and abduction during the height of the Ugandan civil war.They argue that Ugandan civilians’ access to local knowledge was critical to theiruse of self-protection strategies and state that forcible relocation into campscaused them to lose access to this “vital” information and, consequently, weak-ened their ability to self-protect (2012:241). In Kitgum in northern Uganda,people moved strategically to protect themselves from violence (Stites 2006).Women travelled in groups to collect firewood and foods and men did the samewhen making charcoal.10 South et al. (2012:7) discuss how Karen civilians in theconflict-affected zones of southeast Burma use silence as a self-protection strat-egy. They state that “one of the most effective protection strategies is to stayquiet and avoid attracting attention.”In most cases, civilians rely on a combination of self-protection strategies. This

might be a combination of strategies within the non-engagement category or theuse of strategies from two or all three categories. For example, Baines and Pad-don (2012) explain that Ugandan civilians who fled their homes to escape theLord Resistance Army (LRA) constructed shelters in the bush and depended onlocal communication networks and warning calls to alert each other to imminentattacks. They, therefore, employed two forms of non-engagement strategies. Onthe other hand, Ivoirians who fled their homes encountered roadblocksmounted by rebels and militias with whom they had to plead and in most casesto whom they paid tolls in order to safely advance (Interviews with Medie,Ampain, May 2011). Therefore, although they began with a strategy of non-engagement, they were compelled by the context to engage with belligerents.Furthermore, the success of their engagement with belligerents at checkpointswas dependent on several factors, including their gender, ethnicity, religiousaffiliation, professions, and ability to pay tolls to combatants (Interviews withMedie, Ampain, May 2011). For example, those identified as students risked

10Strategic movement differs from flight in that the former entails movement from one location to another toaccess basic necessities after which the individual or group returns to the original location while the latter involvesmovement to avoid violence.

12 Civilian Self-Protection

torture and death at the hands of rebels because some student groups hadsupported President Laurent Gbagbo. Their experiences demonstrate that themove from non-engagement to engagement, while a product of their agency, isoften necessitated by the context and beyond the control of most civilians.

Nonviolent EngagementStudies have revealed that civilians in their bid to self-protect interact with bel-ligerents in diverse ways. As described above, civilians in Cote d’Ivoire pleadedwith rebels and paid tolls to cross checkpoints. South et al. (2012) describe howKaren civilians had to pay taxes and in some cases provide labor to armedgroups operating in the region. Karen civilians also relied on community leadersto persuade armed actors to limit or cease abuses (South et al. 2012). Theauthors explain that the villagers’ relationships with these leaders, with armedactors, and with other villagers and the information at their disposal influencedthe type of self-protection strategy adopted. Baines and Paddon (2012:236)describe the use of neutrality, a strategy that “entailed masking any allegiance toeither side and seeking protection in non-combatant status.” To achieve this,civilians had to adopt language and actions that convinced the rebels that theywere not loyal to government soldiers and vice versa. They also describe civilians’collaboration with rebels “in order to maximize protection without joining as afull-time fighter or laborer” (2012:240).11 It involved civilians acting as infor-mants for the LRA. Civilians also cooperated with the rebels by running errandsfor them and adopting some of their norms, which included not working on Fri-days and Sundays (the LRA’s days of rest) (2012:240). These strategies wereadopted to avoid being killed by LRA forces. Scholars have highlighted otherprotection strategies that require cooperation with combatants.Based on his narrative of a Liberian woman’s navigation of that country’s war,

Mats Utas (2005) has proposed the concept of victimcy to describe how somewomen protected themselves from violence and survived. Victimcy, which theauthor describes as “the agency of self-staging as a victim of war” (2005:408),included the practice of “girlfriending,” where women entered into sexual rela-tionships with rebel fighters to ensure their survival. Birch (2008) also describeswomen’s use of survival sex during Liberia’s civil war. She explains, “The bestscenario for a young woman was to be in a relationship with a ‘big man’ in thewar (i.e., a high ranked officer), guaranteeing her full protection, food, and theprotection of her family and their property” (2008:55). Both of these authorsargue that women are not only victims of war but also have some agency thataids their survival during the war.Others have noted the roles of communities and community groups in CSP

(Pedro 2003; Alther 2006; Kaplan 2013). Kaplan (2013) describes how the Peas-ant Worker Association of the Carare River (ATCC), a local institution createdby civilians in the Middle Magdalena region of Colombia, protected civiliansfrom violence by armed groups by resolving disputes between the two parties.He argues that civilians in the cases in which the ATCC intervened were lesslikely to be killed. Kaplan identifies three conditions that determined the successof the ATCC in protecting civilians in Colombia: “an institutional process to dealwith denunciations, a shift in civilian preferences to abide by neutrality and notaid armed actors, and ‘favorable’ preferences of armed actors (and favorablepolicies to ‘sweeten’ the deal)” (2013:360). Civilian groups also rely on resistanceto prevent violence. Cort�es Pedro (2003) describes Colombians’ use of “peacefulresistance” when under attack. This included gathering and waving white flagsand organizing hundreds of men and women into voluntary guards who “exer-cise unarmed control of anybody trespassing on Indian territory” (2003:34).

11Baines and Paddon (2012) categorize these strategies as “accommodation.”

Betcy Jose and Peace A. Medie 13

However, peaceful resistance has often not been an alternative for many peoplecaught in violent conflicts.

Violent EngagementThis has been observed in conflicts where civilians employ violence againstarmed state and nonstate actors in self-defense. They create group militia, joinexisting fighting forces, or support them in exchange for protection. Examplesabound of civilians participating in armed violence. Interviewees stated thatyouth in some Abidjan neighborhoods established self-defense groups to protecttheir communities from the advancing rebel force (Interviews with Medie,Ampain, May 2011). Hunter groups in Sierra Leone became the Civilian DefenseForce (CDF) to protect their communities against the rebel force, the Revolu-tionary United Front (RUF), during the country’s 1991–2002 civil war (Hoffman2007). Men formed armed groups in Darfur to protect their communities (Bel-lamy and Williams 2009), and in the Kitgum district of northern Uganda, armedmen and adolescent males were part of a force that provided protection to vil-lagers (Stites 2006).In some cases, civilians join existing warring factions in a bid to protect them-

selves and their communities from violence: “In 1998–99, for example, manyKosovar Albanians joined the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA) simply as a way ofprotecting their properties and families” (Bellamy and Williams 2009:21). Andwhile others might not join fighting forces, they can support them throughmeans such as funding. For example, Nuba women supported the Sudan Peo-ple’s Liberation Army’s (SPLA) soldiers with food and water (Corbett 2011). It isnot unusual for these forms of violent engagement to evolve into political move-ments and rebellions. However, what these examples have in common is thatthey began as civilians’ attempts at self-protection.We have developed a typology of CSP that is based on a review of the liter-

ature and on information that we gathered during interviews with refugees inBotswana and Ghana. The literature and case studies show that civilians oftenadopt similar strategies, regardless of the conflicts and regions studied. Theact of fleeing is one such strategy that is common across conflicts. On theother hand, the literature demonstrates that this and other strategies are notadopted uniformly by civilians within as well as across conflicts. It shows thataspects of each conflict, including the geographical setting, the interests andideals of warring factions, and the economic opportunities available to civil-ians, can influence the decision to adopt a strategy and where the interestsand ideals of warring factions are concerned, the eventual success of the strat-egy. It also shows that self-protection strategies are interconnected and areoften employed together by individual and groups in the course of a singleconflict.Self-protection can also affect how threatening armed groups perceive

civilians, contributing to the one-sided violence mentioned above. For instance,one type of nonviolent engagement we have discussed is intelligence gathering.Civilians may agree to spy on an armed group’s opponent as a means of protect-ing themselves from that group’s physical violence. Yet, this self-protection strat-egy might lead to violence against civilians by the opponent group whichconsiders such a strategy threatening to its survival. As a former soldier with theZimbabwean army told the first author:

Yes, and then for the civilian people is like usually they are so unlucky that somany things happen in war like information spying. . . You find that some diebecause they are suspected that they are passing on information. (Interview withJose, Dukwi, 2009)

14 Civilian Self-Protection

Fleeing, a type of non-engagement strategy, can also make civilians morevulnerable to attacks. Reflecting the impact of gender norms, men who flee tonearby towns are vulnerable to these attacks.Indeed, it is important to recognize the limitations of CSP strategies. Not only

are they sometimes insufficient to prevent violence but they can also heightencivilians’ vulnerability to violence and other forms of threats to their survival andwell-being. Birch (2008) has described the negative consequences of survival sexon women in the DRC and Liberia and on their communities. A refugee fromthe DRC described how his father, a pastor, was killed because he acted as amediator between rebel and government forces (Interview with Jose, Dukwi,2009). These risks are particularly salient when violent protection strategies areadopted. Sarosi and Sombatpoonsiri (2011:389) have found that “firearms prolif-eration and the creation of civilian militias in Southern Thailand are contribut-ing negatively to the conflict dynamics as they exacerbate ethno-religiouspolarization and communal violence.” In Abidjan, members of self-defensegroups harassed community members for money and eventually began to attackthe people they claimed to protect (Interviews with Medie, Ampain, May 2011).And according to South et al.:

. . .while self-protection strategies may be crucial for survival, they rarely providethe degree of safety, security, and dignity that people need. Furthermore, somelocal protection activities expose people to further risk. Thus, vital as it is, localagency cannot be regarded as a substitute for the protection responsibilities ofnational authorities or – when that fails – international actors. (2012:iii)

Our review of the literature and development of the typology is important forthe study and practice of civilian protection. By reviewing multiple studies, wehave demonstrated the extensive use of self-protection strategies and have identi-fied commonalities in CSP across conflicts. Furthermore, our typology offers athematic grouping of strategies that can serve as a foundation for a conceptualframework of CSP and can facilitate a more cumulative approach to the study ofthis phenomenon. We can begin developing a conceptual framework when westart asking and answering questions such as: “Under what conditions do nonvio-lent engagement strategies succeed in protecting civilians from violence?” Andwe can build more effectively on the works of other scholars when we begin toadopt common labels to describe identical self-protection strategies across casesand when we place these strategies into common categories. Our typology is, ofcourse, subject to revision as the literature reveals new strategies and studies giveus new insight into extant strategies. Finally, the discussion in the first two sec-tions of this article shows that CSP should be taken into consideration in theplanning and execution of humanitarian interventions.

Civilian Self-Protection and Peacekeeping

The literature reviewed and case studies presented have shown that CSP effortscan and do protect from violence and this knowledge should inform humanitar-ian interventions. Peacekeepers can bolster CSP strategies by generating andfacilitating the spread of vital information, providing and facilitating the distribu-tion of resources, and coordinating communication. However, in order to dothis, peacekeeping missions need to acknowledge CSP, something they currentlydo insufficiently. For example, Resolution 2162 (2014), the mandate of theUnited Nations Mission in Cote d’Ivoire (UNOCI), states: “To protect, withoutprejudice to the primary responsibility of the Ivorian authorities, the civilianpopulation from threat of physical violence, within its capabilities and areas of

Betcy Jose and Peace A. Medie 15

deployment. . .” (6). A recognition of the agency of civilians, however, remainsmissing from the UN’s Operational Concept on the Protection of Civiliansin Conflict (PoC) and from the specific mandates of UN-led peacekeepingoperations such as UNOCI. This omission is also the case for African Union(AU) peacekeeping missions, despite PoC being a core component of the AU’speace and security architecture.There is, therefore, a need for both the AU and the UN to recognize the

prevalence and importance of CSP efforts. This requires that peacekeeping,beginning with the development of mission-specific protection strategies, shouldbe informed by CSP. And although it is impossible to propose a blanketapproach for how peacekeeping can interact with CSP, the discussion abovehighlights some generalities.

Information

The literature reviewed as well as our own research show that timely and accu-rate information is critical for CSP. Civilians need information on imminentthreats, survival strategies, the location and availability of basic necessities, etc.Not only is this information needed to select a strategy, but to successfully exe-cute the selected strategy. For example, Ivorian refugees spoke about fleeingone location to another, based on information that they had received about therelative safety of the second location (Interviews with Medie, Ampain, May2011). The interviews also showed that the absence of key information delayedor prevented the adoption of certain self-protection strategies. For example,interviewees said that they delayed in leaving Cote d’Ivoire because they did notknow that there was a refugee camp across the border in Ghana. Uncertaintyabout where they would go and how they would survive upon arrival was, there-fore, prohibitive.Civilians have traditionally relied on word-of-mouth, but new technology such

as mobile phones and platforms such as Twitter have enhanced the generationand dissemination of such information. Peacekeeping missions can contribute tothese efforts by helping civilians spread existing information produced by localwarning systems and by generating and disseminating information of their own.For example, the AU’s Continental Early Warning System has the potential totrack imminent threats to civilians, after which peacekeepers can alert civiliansto these threats. Among other things, Williams (2013) proposes the distributionof alert devices and mobile phones and reports that the UN has attempted todevelop such mechanisms in its missions in the DRC and South Sudan. The chal-lenge is in acquiring accurate information and delivering it in a timely mannerto those who need it and not to those who can use it to further imperil lives.12

The literature also shows us that in addition to information, civilians requirebasic necessities to survive during the execution of self-protection strategies.

Basic Needs and Resources

Another way in which peacekeepers can enhance self-protection is in providingor facilitating the distribution of the resources needed to self-protect. Self-protec-tion often requires tools, equipment, and provisions that most civilians will nothave access to or have enough of. This includes a safe place of refuge for thoseon the move, a means of displacement, food and shelter for those who arehiding, medications, etc. The facilitation of the provision of humanitarian aid isalready an element of existing PoC mandates. There is, however, a need torecognize that this aid does not only meet basic needs but enables civilians to

12Consultation with community leaders could help ensure that information reaches the right people.

16 Civilian Self-Protection

avoid violence. For example, people in hiding require food that can last over anextended period of time without refrigeration and that can be easily and quicklyprepared. Similarly, people who are fleeing violence on foot would benefit fromfood that can be easily transported. The types of survival strategies being adoptedshould, therefore, be taken into consideration when deciding on what kind ofhumanitarian aid to distribute and how and when to distribute it. Peacekeepers’role in ensuring that this aid reaches affected populations is also key to ensuringthe success of self-protection efforts. The provision of humanitarian aid is alreadyan important part of intervention, but its ability to support self-protection has yetto be recognized. In this way, humanitarianism becomes more than the provisionof temporary assistance; it becomes a means of preventing violence.

Preparedness

Peacekeepers can help civilians prepare for imminent threats. Williams (2013)argues that this preparation should include investment in local livelihoods asmost fatalities are caused by the lack of food, health services, and other basicneeds. Preparedness also includes developing a flight plan, securing and hidingvaluables, and keeping identification and travel documents at hand or hiding ordestroying them where they could be used as a means of targeting by belliger-ents. This preparation could be based on practices that have been successfullyused by civilians in settings with shared characteristics or could be developed bypeacekeepers and civilians after an assessment of the conditions on the ground.There is also a need for clarity in PoC mandates on the distinction between

combatants and non-combatants. Not only is this important for deciding onwhom to protect but it also important in deciding on whom to support, be it inthe dissemination of information, the provision of basic needs and resources,and in preparing for attacks. Indeed, we argued in the beginning of this articlethat factors such as a lack of conceptual clarity, gender, and the macro-politicalstructure have hindered the protection of civilians by the international commu-nity. It is, therefore, important that organizations such as the UN and the AUtake CSP into consideration and develop customized means to support it whenplanning and executing peacekeeping missions. The resources of these missionshave the potential to significantly enhance CSP and when they are withheld, theycan hinder these efforts. Furthermore, peacekeeping that does not factor in CSPrisks undermining the diverse efforts that civilians make to survive violence.

Conclusion

Civilian self-protection is common and necessary during armed conflicts. Thisarticle has discussed the normative and political factors that explain the needfor CSP and noted the gap in the scholarly literature on the topic. It has pre-sented a typology, which is based on a review of the growing literature on CSPand on fieldwork conducted in Botswana and Ghana by the authors. It has alsooffered suggestions for how the literature can be further developed and mademore relevant for humanitarian agencies that design and implement civilian pro-tection initiatives, and how peacekeeping missions can support CSP. In this way,this article hopes to help galvanize much needed attention, both in terms ofhow we can understand the resort to CSP and how to support these efforts.

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