No Place Like Home? Postdeployment Reintegration Challenges Facing South African Peacekeepers

2019 ◽  
pp. 0095327X1989471 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lindy Heinecken ◽  
Nina Wilén
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Home Environment ◽  
Democratic Republic Of Congo ◽  
Internal Factors ◽  
Relational Turbulence ◽  
Family Reintegration ◽  
Military Support ◽  
Military Institution ◽  
Peacekeeping Missions ◽  
The Military

This study focuses on soldiers returning from peacekeeping missions and the challenges they experience adapting to the home environment in the postdeployment phase. The article focuses on South African peacekeepers returning from missions in Darfur/Sudan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Burundi. Interviews with 50 South African peacekeepers on the challenges they face in terms of their homecoming, family reintegration, and military support were conducted. Overall, the study found that both external military factors such as deployment length and nature of mission, and internal factors specific to the soldier affected reintegration. We highlight three major findings of our study: Firstly, our analysis show that peacekeepers across gender, rank, and race identify the absence from their children as a major challenge. Secondly, while relational turbulence characterized by ambivalence and concerns about infidelity was prevalent among all, there was a clear difference in the answers between the male and female peacekeepers. Thirdly, a large majority voiced the need for more support from the military institution for their families, before, during, and after deployment.

Are Women ‘Really’ Making a Unique Contribution to Peacekeeping?

2015 ◽  
Vol 19 (3-4) ◽  
pp. 227-248 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lindy Heinecken
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Democratic Republic ◽  
Democratic Republic Of Congo ◽  
Local Population ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Unique Contribution ◽  
Operational Effectiveness ◽  
Peacekeeping Operations ◽  
Performance Pressure ◽  
The Military

This article examines the factors that inhibit the ability of female peacekeepers to make a unique contribution to peacekeeping operations based on their gender. The debates are examined in relation to the claims made about their ability to enhance operational effectiveness and reach out to the local population as women, compared to the actual experiences of South African peacekeepers’ deployed in the Democratic Republic of Congo (drc) and in Darfur/Sudan. The argument is made that factors stemming from both the military and operational context affect the optimal utilization of women in various ways. As most national armed forces tend to draw their peacekeeping troops from the infantry, women come under tremendous performance pressure when deployed and are obliged to assimilate masculine values in order to be recognised as ‘good’ soldiers. It is argued that this, coupled with the hyper-masculine peacekeeping environment which is hostile to women, undermines their optimal utilization, as well as their ability to infuse a more gendered approach in peacekeeping.

scholarly journals SOUTH AFRICA’S PARTICIPATION IN THE CENTRAL AFRICAN REPUBLIC AND DEMOCRATIC REPUBLIC OF CONGO PEACE MISS IONS: A COMPARISON

Politeia ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 33 (2) ◽  
pp. 4-27
Author(s):  
Rialize Ferreira
Keyword(s):  
South African ◽  
Central African Republic ◽  
Democratic Republic ◽  
Democratic Republic Of Congo ◽  
Republic Of Congo ◽  
Asymmetric Warfare ◽  
Un Security Council ◽  
Peacekeeping Missions ◽  
African Missions ◽  
National Defence

After the peacekeeping tragedy in the Central African Republic (CAR) in March 2013, South Africa’s participation in peacekeeping missions on the African continent is under investigation. Military personnel of the South African National Defence Force recently took part in both conventional and unconventional, asymmetric warfare in two peace missions, one in the CAR and one in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). In the CAR a unilateral military agreement between states existed, while in the DRC a United Nations (UN) mandate for multilateral offensive peacekeeping was authorised. The rationale for South Africa’s participation in African missions is important while the country is serving as a non-permanent member of the UN Security Council. Its role as one of the leading nations in Africa to deploy peacekeepers is central to its foreign policy. The article focuses on contrasting operations, and diverse challenges such as the authorisation of mandates, funding, logistics and shortcomings in asymmetric training for irregular “new wars” where peacekeepers are required to protect civilians in countries to which they owe little allegiance. Lessons learnt from the widely differing operational experiences in these recent peace missions are discussed.

Ethnic Factors in the Evolution of the South African Military

1975 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 21-28
Author(s):  
Cynthia H. Enloe
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Political Institution ◽  
The Political ◽  
The South ◽  
Scant Attention ◽  
Ethnic Factors ◽  
The Military

Virtually all of the literature concerning the politics of South Africa analyzes the dynamics of that system within the frameworks of racism, authoritarianism, and repression. Yet, strangely, the political institution which is necessarily the bulwark of such a system—the military—has attracted scant attention except in terms of strategy and armaments.

Liebenberg, Ian, Jorge Risquet and Vladimir Shubin (eds), A Far-away War: Angola, 1975-1989. Stellenbosch: Sun Press 2015, 207 pp.

2020 ◽  
Vol 38 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan F Mutton
Keyword(s):  
South Africa ◽  
South African ◽  
Southern Africa ◽  
Deputy Director ◽  
Reference Book ◽  
40Th Anniversary ◽  
Military Academy ◽  
Military Studies ◽  
The Military ◽  
Extensive Bibliography

This publication, which consists of an Introduction and eight chapters by different authors, appeared at the time of the 40th anniversary of the entry of South Africa into the Angolan war. It is short but packed with useful information and well-documented with photos, geographical and combat maps, an extensive bibliography of 35 pages, political cartoons and posters,historical surveys and statistics. Edited by the South African Ian Liebenberg (Director of the Centre for Military Studies at the Military Academy in Stellenbosch), the Cuban Jorge Risquet (who participated in the 1988 Angolan peace talks), and the Russian Vladimir Shubin (former Deputy Director of the Institute for African Studies at the Russian Academy of Science), A Far-Away War sheds new light on this prolonged conflict, focusing on the involvement of South-Africa, Cuba, Russia and East-Germany.In doing so, it opens new perspectives and widens the understanding of the struggle for liberation in Southern Africa, not only for the average history and politics reader but also, as a very useful reference book, for the more advanced researcher and academic.

Are Military and Medical Ethics Necessarily Incompatible? A Canadian Case Study

2016 ◽  
Vol 44 (4) ◽  
pp. 639-651 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christiane Rochon ◽  
Bryn Williams-Jones
Keyword(s):  
Medical Ethics ◽  
Code Of Ethics ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
Codes Of Ethics ◽  
Core Values ◽  
Dual Loyalty ◽  
Canadian Armed Forces ◽  
Military Institution ◽  
The Military ◽  
Military Physicians

Military physicians are often perceived to be in a position of ‘dual loyalty’ because they have responsibilities towards their patients but also towards their employer, the military institution. Further, they have to ascribe to and are bound by two distinct codes of ethics (i.e., medical and military), each with its own set of values and duties, that could at first glance be considered to be very different or even incompatible. How, then, can military physicians reconcile these two codes of ethics and their distinct professional/institutional values, and assume their responsibilities towards both their patients and the military institution? To clarify this situation, and to show how such a reconciliation might be possible, we compared the history and content of two national professional codes of ethics: the Defence Ethics of the Canadian Armed Forces and the Code of Ethics of the Canadian Medical Association. Interestingly, even if the medical code is more focused on duties and responsibility while the military code is more focused on core values and is supported by a comprehensive ethical training program, they also have many elements in common. Further, both are based on the same core values of loyalty and integrity, and they are broad in scope but are relatively flexible in application. While there are still important sources of tension between and limits within these two codes of ethics, there are fewer differences than may appear at first glance because the core values and principles of military and medical ethics are not so different.

The Democratic Republic of Congo

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Arthur J. Boutellis
Keyword(s):  
Democratic Republic ◽  
Democratic Republic Of Congo ◽  
Responsibility To Protect ◽  
Republic Of Congo ◽  
Un Peacekeeping ◽  
Primary Responsibility ◽  
Host Government ◽  
Intensive Approach ◽  
Peacekeeping Missions ◽  
To Receive

Authorized in the wake of the Srebrenica massacre and Rwandan genocide, the United Nations peacekeeping mission in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) was the first of two UN peacekeeping missions to receive an explicit protection of civilians (POC) mandate in 2000. This chapter discusses the challenges the UN mission faced in implementing this POC mandate over 15 years of existence. It analyses how lessons from early protection crises led the mission to develop a series of innovative tools for a better peacekeeping response, up to the establishment of the Force Intervention Brigade (FIB) in 2013. This chapter concludes with some lessons including the need for a shift from a largely UN-centric and troop-intensive approach to physical protection to a greater focus on strengthening national protection capacities as part of a broader political/stabilization strategy, which encourages and empowers the host government to shoulder its primary responsibility to protect its citizens.

scholarly journals Bringing the Military Back in: Military Expenditures and Economic Growth 1990 to 2003

2008 ◽  
pp. 142-172 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey Kentor ◽  
Edward Kick
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
National Development ◽  
Military Spending ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Less Developed Countries ◽  
Least Developed Countries ◽  
Military Organizations ◽  
Military Expenditures ◽  
Military Institution ◽  
The Military

After the “peace bonus” era, global military expenditures have escalated sharply despite some worldwide declines in military personnel. Theories on the economic impacts of the military institution and escalated military spending greatly differ and include arguments that they either improve domestic economic performance or crowd out growth-inducing processes. Empirical findings on this matter are inconclusive, in part due to a failure to disentangle the various dimensions of military expenditures. We further suggest that modern sociology's relative inattention to such issues has contributed to these shortcomings. We explore a new dimension of military spending that clarifies this issue—military expenditures per soldier —which captures the capital intensiveness of a country’s military organization. Our cross-national panel regression and causal analyses of developed and less developed countries from 1990 to 2003 show that military expenditures per soldier inhibit the growth of per capita GDP, net of control variables, with the most pronounced effects in least developed countries. These expenditures inhibit national development in part by slowing the expansion of the labor force. Labor-intensive militaries may provide a pathway for upward mobility, but comparatively capital-intensive military organizations limit entry opportunities for unskilled and under- or unemployed people. Deep investments in military hardware also reduce the investment capital available for more economically productive opportunities. We also find that arms imports have a positive effect on economic growth, but only in less developed countries.

scholarly journals Military History and Strategic Studies as Imperatives for National Security Development in Nigeria

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 188-200
Author(s):  
Chiemela Godwin Wambu ◽  
Amaechi Ehimatie
Keyword(s):  
National Security ◽  
Military Personnel ◽  
International System ◽  
Historical Analysis ◽  
Military History ◽  
Security Policies ◽  
Primary Sources ◽  
Military Institution ◽  
The Military ◽  
Strategic Studies

Nigerian military history is an aspect of Nigerian history that reconstructs the philosophies, beliefs, life and times of military personnel in relation to time and place. On the other hand, strategic studies involve a study of the security policies and political conduct of states in their interaction within the international system. Since it is the military institution that implements these security policies, itself central to the objectives of states in international politics, it is logical  to view military history and strategic studies as pivotal to the securitydevelopment of the Nigerian nation as it is for every other nation. Given this understanding, this study attempts to situate Nigerian military history and strategic studies as imperatives for national security development in Nigeria. To achieve its goal, the paper employs mostly secondary and but a few primary sources subjected to content historical analysis from which it was deduced that military history and strategic studies are important for the advancement of security development in Nigeria. Keywords: Military, Strategic Studies, History, Security

scholarly journals MANAGING THE FORMATION OF NAVAL PENTATLON TEAM OF THE “MIRCEA CEL BĂTRÂN” NAVAL ACADEMY

2020 ◽  
pp. 533-542
Keyword(s):  
Motor Skills ◽  
Selection Process ◽  
Performance Criterion ◽  
Training System ◽  
Military Students ◽  
Naval Academy ◽  
Research Subjects ◽  
Military Institution ◽  
The Military ◽  
Selection Of

The research addresses the selection process for the naval pentathlon team of the Naval Academy. Hypothesis: The motor performance criterion in the selection of athletes is not enough, and the performance in training and competitions can be improved if athletes’ attitude towards and motivation for performance are added to the selection. Subjects: The basis for selecting the research subjects were military students who had already passed a first stage of selection when being admitted to the military institution. Methods: Bibliographical study, pedagogical observation, experiment, questionnaire survey, mathematical and statistical method, graphical method. The first stage was oriented towards the selection of a group of 30 subjects (out of 200) using psychomotor performance as a criterion, and the second stage was focused on selecting the representative team of the Naval Academy by means of two opinion questionnaires meant to reveal the subjects’ attitude towards and motivation for performance and competition. Results: We identified the group of 15 athletes who met the conditions of having good motor skills and an optimal attitude towards the preparation for performance within a rigorously planned training system, with coaching sessions designed to facilitate the maximisation of their performance. Conclusion: The selection process will be oriented towards the subjects with specific motor skills in swimming, running and utilitarian routes, but also with real potential for training – improvement of these skills and development of good exercise capacity, all this facilitated by a proper attitude and motivation.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document