ISS International Conference, Nairobi BY INVITATION ONLY: Can the Horn of Africa Achieve its Economic Potential?
Date: 2012-03-20 to 2012-03-22
Venue: , ISS Nairobi
, Kenya
Seeking
modalities that may enable progress
Presented by the Conflict Prevention and Risk Analysis Division
The greater Horn of Africa - including
Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan and Uganda- is
a region of great geo-strategic importance. Endowed with an abundance of natural resources, the
Horn is also adjacent to two crucial international
maritime trade routes, the Indian Ocean and the Red Sea, which enables it to
enter a lucrative international economic arena. It is endowed with valuable
mineral resources, massive livestock reserves, and the potential to develop as
the breadbasket of Eastern Africa and the Middle East. It has massive developmental challenges to
address before it can attain its proper future, and is presently plagued with
various internal and external security threats.
Unfortunately, the Horn
is a region in crisis and faced
with
multiple threats to security. The region is typified by weak governance
structures that have undermined human security and promoted inter and intra
state violent struggles. Ranging from the political turmoil in Somalia, political tensions in Kenya, 21-year
unresolved situation between Sudan and South Sudan, interstate animosity
between Ethiopia and Eritrea, Eritrea and Djibouti, the Horn seems to be in a
perpetual web of conflicts that are immeasurable in terms of human and economic
costs. Poor political
relations in the region means that military rather than economic considerations
tend to dominate national security debates. The region
is also not helped by ecological systems that are undermined by cyclical
drought and climate change. This has contributed to the displacement of large
numbers of people across national borders.
What explains these disruptive
socio-political occurrences? Is it a mere accident that the region is violently torn
apart from within or can this be explained by structural weaknesses in
institutions? What is the current status of normative,
institutional and legal policy frameworks for responding to conflict and
insecurity in the region? At a basic level, why is it increasingly becoming
difficult to contain conflict and insecurity using current state formations and
regional security architectures?
This
international Conference will explore these among other issues with the aim of
identifying drivers, dynamics and implications of the conflicts in the region.
It will also qualitatively explore corrective frameworks at all levels for the
conflicts and human insecurity.
The
core objectives of the conference are to:
- Contribute to the understanding and the solutions of
the issues in the Horn in a holistic and integrated manner.
- Create the space for co-operation by indicating in the
recommendations the gaps that need to bridge and the work that still needs
to be done in the Horn.
- Introduce non-traditional stakeholders, specifically
those in the commercial private sector as a means of highlighting the
value of development in peace efforts.
On
the third and last day of the Conference, there will be a closed-door session
in which the outcomes and expectations of the policy recommendations will be
revised and finally adopted.
Please note that discussions
occur under ISS Rules. Participants are free to use
the information received, but neither the identity nor the affiliation of the
speaker(s), nor that of any other participant, may be revealed without his/her
express permission.
