Academic literature on the topic 'South Sudan – Politics and government – 2011-'

AbstractSince mid-December 2013, thousands of people have been killed in armed conflict in South Sudan. The fighting is entrenched in a power struggle between the main political contenders ahead of elections which were scheduled for 2015. This article examines the violence in South Sudan since the North–South war ended with a focus on the consequences of the introduction of electoral politics. Our research contributes to the literature on state-building and peace-building in war-torn societies, by exploring how the extreme levels of violence are linked to three groups of factors. First, the stakes involved in being part of the government are extremely high, since it is the only way to secure political and economic influence. Second, the actors involved in political life are dominated by individuals who held positions within the rebel groups, which increases the risk of political differences turning violent. Third, the institutions important for a legitimate electoral process, and which work to prevent violence, are weak or non-existent.

AbstractThis article examines South Sudan's experiment in creating a secular state out of the ashes of the professedly Islamic republic from which it seceded in 2011. South Sudanese political actors presented secularism as a means of redeeming the nation from decades of religious excess in which the government conflated political imperative with theological ambition, claiming to save the nation from its woes through the unifying force of Islam. However, secularism as an alternative soteriology—one that contended that it is only through political nonalignment in regards to religion that the public could be saved from the problems that plagued its predecessor—quickly became an object of contention itself, read by many South Sudanese to be anything but neutral. This article interrogates the secular promise of mediating religious diversity through exploring the tensions that have arisen in its fulfillment at the birth of the world's newest republic.

South Sudan’s independence in July 2011 came with a euphoric promise to break with the Sudan’s culturaldomination, epitomised by the latter’s education system. Yet, despite the introduction of the national curriculum,South Sudan, as a part of the modern Sudan for decades, is struggling to rid itself of the colonial education system.This article examines the persistence of foreign education in post-independence South Sudan. The complexities ofthe foreign education are intertwined with the concurrent political and economic upheavals that have bedevilled theworld’s youngest nation. The national curriculum is encumbered by government underfunding ofeducation-associated with a poorly performing economy exacerbated by conflict. Underinvestment in education haswider implications for the provision of learning resources and teacher training. South Sudan’s continuous reliance onforeign schooling curricula implies that its education system is not yet ‘free’ and independent. Most importantly, inthe context of the renewed conflict, the lack of the national curriculum is critical for South Sudan’s nation-buildingagenda. The evidence in this article has implications for improving educational policy and practice in South Sudanand other similar post-conflict African countries.

In the 2010s, the issue of separatism in Africa gained special significance in connection with the emergence in 2011 of a new state – the Republic of South Sudan (RSS), where a military and political conflict has continued throughout the entire period of independent development, accompanied by massive casualties among the civilian population. The situation in the RSS underscores the weakness of secessionism as a tool for solving the problems of national identity, socio-economic development and political marginalization, and also raises the question of whether separatism in Africa is able to lead to stability, an improvement in living standards and an increase in the level of security of citizens of breakaway territories. The present paper examines the historical background of separatism in South Cameroon and of organizations and armed groups fighting for the separation of the region from the Republic of Cameroon and for the independence of the self-declared Republic of Ambazonia. Currently, the country is engulfed in a military and political conflict, the parties to which are the central (Francophone) government and the Anglophone secessionist movements, which include dozens of armed groups with varying goals and interests and which fight among themselves for influence on local communities, resources, and the right to represent Cameroon’s Anglophone minority in the international arena. In fact, South Cameroon is now in a state of war of all against all. The situation in South Cameroon is compounded by the fact that President Paul Biya’s government simultaneously has to fend off attacks by Boko Haram terrorists in the far north of the country and deal with a socio-economic crisis, which is accompanied by rising unemployment, which, in turn, allows insurgents to expand their ranks with relative ease. The authors note, however, that the separatists do not enjoy the support of the world community and, unlike many other African rebel movements, receive hardly any financial or military-technical assistance from outside, which dooms their armed struggle and increases the consequence of a peaceful agreement with the government.

Prime Minister Shinzo Abe's troubles in 2018 owe much to Japan's resilient liberal media. Between 2011 and 2017, the media was mostly on its back foot, losing credibility over its initial coverage about the Fukushima nuclear accident and withstanding heavy-handed efforts by Abe's government to pressure and intimidate the media into self-censorship (Kingston 2018a). Since early 2017, however, the liberal Asahi newspaper led the way in exposing two cronyism scandals involving private-school projects linked to Abe. It also exposed a series of cases revolving around information disclosure practices that revealed a culture of deception aimed at avoiding government accountability. These included a cover-up at the Defense Ministry regarding a Peace Keeping Operation (PKO) in South Sudan that violated legal constraints imposed by the Diet, and revelations about doctored data used to support Abe's proposed labor reforms. In these and other cases, the government's lack of transparency and mishandling of documents drew sharp public criticism. The press played its role of informing the public about these apparent transgressions while highlighting the arrogance of power that has undermined public trust in Abe; 80 percent do not believe his self-exonerating explanations about the cronyism scandals (Bloomberg 2018). Nonetheless, in September 2018 he won reelection to a third term as Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) president and is set to become Japan's longest serving prime minister. Popular support, however, is tepid, as monthly polls since 2013 by Japan's national broadcasting organization (NHK) indicate that about 50 percent of the public supports him due to a lack of alternatives rather than his virtues as a leader (about 15 percent) or the appeal of his policies (about 15 percent). Despite mixed reviews in the press, he has won a series of elections, and in politics that is what counts (Kingston 2018b).

AbstractGovernments in South Sudan have long built their authority on their ability to fashion changing regimes of revenge and compensation, war and peace. Governments’ capture of these regimes has resulted in the secularization of compensation despite the ongoing spiritual consequences of lethal violence. This article explores these issues by focusing on the western Dinka of Greater Gogrial. In recent years, they have been closely linked to the highest levels of government through familial networks and comradeship. Violent revenge among the western Dinka is best understood not as revealing the absence of institutions of government, but as a consequence of the projection of government power over the details of local, normative codes and sanctions. In this age of post-state violence with automatic weapons, oil-wealthy elites and ambiguous rights, government authority and intention have often been erratic. As government authority now backs up these regimes of compensation and revenge, governments’ shifting nature has reshaped their meaning. In the last decade, the declining political space for peace and the disruption of the cattle economy has undermined the current value of compensation and its ability to appease the spiritual and moral demands for revenge. It has even distorted regimes to the extent that children become legitimate targets for revenge. The article is informed by archival sources and based on ethnographic research among the western Dinka (South Sudan) between 2010 and 2013, and further research in South Sudan until 2015.

In December 2013, civil conflict erupted between the Government of the Republic of South Sudan and opposition forces due to political infighting among the country’s political and military elites. On March 3, 2015, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) adopted Resolution 2206 pursuant to its powers under Article 41 of Chapter VII of the Charter of the United Nations. Resolution 2206 provides for targeted sanctions against specific individuals and entities deemed “responsible for or complicit in, or [as] having engaged in, directly or indirectly, actions or policies that threaten the peace, security or stability of South Sudan.” The stated purpose of the targeted sanctions, which consist of a travel ban and asset freeze for designated individuals and entities, is to “support the search for an inclusive and sustainable peace in South Sudan.”

This paper explores the major causes, processes and consequences of natural resource conflicts between tribes across the Sudan – South Sudan border region, with the main emphasis on the Abyei territory. Data for the study have been gathered from primary and secondary sources. The research revealed that the conflict over ownership of Abyei’s renewable and non-renewable resources has evolved as a contentious issue between Sudan and South Sudan. The situation was complicated by the relationship of the Humr Misseriya and Ngok Dinka and their governments, respectively. Moreover, lack of agreement about who should be considered a resident of Abyei derailed a referendum on the territory’s status. The government of Sudan and Humr Misseriya have not yet accepted all proposals and agreements for resolving the conflict. Despite the fact that there are new and positive political developments between the two countries, mainly in 2019–2020, these have not been extended to the settlement of the final status of Abyei. For a durable peace in the Abyei region and its environment, both governments need to work toward realising mutual benefits based on the agreed principles and proposals stipulated in the Abyei Protocol of 2004–2005 and the African Union High-Level Implementation Panel of 2012.

The conflict in South Sudan became the only viable violent way of expressing underlying discontentment with the style of governance adopted by the incumbent government and unresolved issues from the 1991 split which occurred when Dr. Riak Machar, one of the Sudan People’s Liberation Movement/Army (splm/a) leaders at the time, now turned rebel leader, fell out with Dr. John Garang, the chairman of the splm/a. The split, notably referred to as the “Nassir split”, led communities from both the Dinka and Nuer tribes to turn against each other. The referendum, a consequence of a Comprehensive Peace Agreement (cpa) between the government in Khartoum, Sudan, and the splm/a, led to an overwhelming vote for secession, later paving way for the subsequent independence of South Sudan in 2011. The existing tension took on a violent expression. The article analyses occurrences the splm/a command pursued on a secessionist agenda in the 21 years of armed struggle and the attainment of independence on the 9 July 2011. It further denotes the insurgents’ pursuit of armed confrontation and the government’s response to the belligerents’ actions, while providing a genesis of the belligerence and laws governing non–international armed conflicts.

AbstractSouthern Sudan's past crises have mobilised consistent flows of humanitarian assistance. Recalling the humanitarian catastrophes and international interventions of the 1990s–2000s, the war that exploded in South Sudan in 2013 has been no exception. This paper shows that the SPLM/A political elite promptly incorporated these flows of external resources into its extraverted strategies of state-building. Similar to the current situation, it did so by appropriating not only material assets but also discourses, playing the ‘fragile state’ card and raising fears of governance failure and state collapse. This paper analyses two specific aspects of international support to Southern Sudan in the 1990s–2000s: the political legitimisation of the movement through the negotiation of relief delivery, and direct support to rebel local government structures. These two aspects contributed to the creation of a state that substantially overlapped with the SPLM/A structure, thanks to the movement's capacity to capitalise on external resources, a subject worth analysing in future research.