The Political Economy of Peacebuilding: a Critical Theory Perspective

The ideology of the liberal peace has propelled the political economies of war-torn societies into a scheme of global convergence towards “market liberalisation”. This orthodoxy was an uncontestable assumption underlying external economic assistance. However, the project faltered under its inherent contradictions and because it ignored the socio-economic problems confronting war-torn societies, even aggravating them by increasing the vulnerability of populations to poverty and shadow economic activity. Although revisionists have embarked on a mission to boost the UN’s peacebuilding capacity and also rescue the Millennium Development Goals, the basic assumptions of the liberal peace are not challenged and potential alternatives are overlooked. How far are external agencies dictating the pattern of economic transformation in societies emerging from conflict? From current practice in a variety of situations, and from proposed reforms to peacebuilding and development, the answer seems to be: “as far as the eye can see!” The hubris of peacebuilders keys the political economy of wartorn societies into a map captioned “the liberal peace project;” that, in its economic dimension, requires convergence towards “market liberalisation.” This became an aggressively promoted orthodoxy, with variations, derived from the late 1990s Washington Consensus on the logically correct path of development for undeveloped states. Perhaps not treated as a high priority in stabilising peace per se (the vanguard of which has been allocated to fostering security, rule of law and democratic forms), neoliberal economic policies were nevertheless barely-contested assumptions underlying external economic reconstruction assistance and management in war-torn societies. This article interrogates the current, and proposed revisions of, political economy as it affects peacebuilding from a critical theory perspective in international relations. This perspective concerns the power of post-industrial capitalism and the agency behind globalisation ideology. Certainly, there is considerable disagreement among critical authors about the ontology of so-called market democracy, the power of its non-state networks and agencies vis-à-vis states, and the pre-eminence of a fundamentalist version 24 The Political Economy of Peacebuilding of neoliberalism (its passing having been identified by John Ralston Saul, 2005). Theorists from rather disparate standpoints have grappled with the problematique of global capitalism (Cox, 2002; Van der Pijl, 1998; Baumann, 2000; Murphy, 2005; Hardt and Negri, 2000). They have in common, however, a concern to construct an inclusive and emancipatory concept of political economy, an approach that can also be applied to peacebuilding. In applying a critical approach, this analysis focuses on the politics of the economic projects within the liberal peace framework, drawing examples from south-east Europe. First, it deals with the orthodox rationale of the political economy of peacebuilding. Next, the article notes the virtual death of the Washington Consensus and identifies a millennial revisionist agenda that emerged internationally during the course of 2004–05. This interrogation, then, allows reflection about the objectification of wartorn societies as well as reflection on the essentialist rationale of the political economy of peacebuilding and its dysfunctional and normative/ethical contradictions. The article contends that, although the depiction of an aggressive, undifferentiated liberal peacebuilding has been refined, the millennial revisionist project ultimately fails to address these contradictions. An inclusive/emancipatory participation of local actors and structural diversity in political economies indicates alternative options to the revisionist ideology that is embedded in a liberal structuring of global political economy. The Economic Peacebuilding Rationale The rationale for determining rules and frameworks for the development of societies that will release them from so-called “conflict traps” (Collier et al., 2003) attributes economic dysfunctionalism to societies, in their pre-conflict, conflict and postconflict stages, rather than to any dysfunctional economic precepts, structures and conditionalities generated by expressions of capitalist power and “global governance.” A key aspect of the “liberal peace” thus promotes a form of economic control and regulation to establish market correctives in societies that have been resistant to conventional marketisation imperatives (Paris, 1997; Duffield, 2001; Richmond, 2005). Although its modern version derives from the 1989 Washington Consensus (to which Kofi Annan subsequently acceded on behalf of the United Nations) the project has not been revolutionary. Its antecedents can be traced to Cobdenite teachings concerning the peaceful benefits of free trade, though it was not so much “free” as imposed by the hegemon, the UK and its powerful navy. Nevertheless, the ideology survived the First World War, and only in the Second did it give way to a system of international management on Keynesian lines. Even so, poverty reduction was conceived as serving the security interests of the most powerful. Robert McNamara’s “war on poverty” at the World Bank in 1972 was driven by the notion that the poor went communist (George, 1994: 48-57). Subsequent pressure on the US dollar in the Vietnam War and the collapse