Description
How does complexity theory problematise the current understanding of conflict management practices by different actors? Complexity theory, which originated in physical and biological sciences, has hitherto been used in critical peacebuilding literature as a way to explain the limited transformative power of Western interveners (Bargués et al., 2023). However, in affirming that ‘peace is a process constituted by its entanglements with further processes’ (Torrent, 2023:73) which takes place in a (dis)order where challenges are interrelated and human and non-human entities come into being through relations, it provides a useful tool to problematise rigid categorical boundaries. In line with this school of thought, in the peacebuilding milieu, no actor can reasonably determine a priori the results, goals, and consequences of its engagement, and their action will be necessarily subjected to the same ‘actual reality’. Thus, we argue that international efforts are seldomly alternatives and more often built in a cumulative, complementary or parallel way, as dynamics on the ground flatten differences and face practitioners with a similar set of circumstances which are addressed by drawing on the same (pragmatic) toolbox. In a descriptive fashion, I will prove this point by reconstructing international engagement in three paradigmatic cases of connivance between actors and conflict management initiatives during the last two decades: the CAR, Mali, and Somalia. I will make sense of international efforts succession, integration and duplication using the interpretative framework provided by complexity theories. The study problematizes current understandings of conflict management practices and calls for a more realist (i.e., close to reality) stance
