Chapter 14. International Administration, the Light Footprint and
A. UN Involvement, Planning and the Nature of the Transitional
The analysis conducted did reveal many inconsistencies and deficiencies in UN- led administrations. Several critical issues have not or have been insufficiently addressed in the cases of Kosovo and East Timor. Lack of planning at the UN level, especially with regard to the deployment of CIVPOL officers and inter- national staff, is to certain extent inherent in international administrations, and should be addressed at the UN level. In East Timor, the early planning of the withdrawal of the mission and the programmed independence resulted in the reluctance of the international administration to address certain issues.
The need for adequate planning is equally one of the main conclusions of the Brahimi report:
The struggles of the United Nations to set up and manage those operations are part of the backdrop to the narratives on rapid deployment and on Headquarters staffing and structure in the present report. [. . .] No other operations must set and enforce the law, establish customs services and regulations, set and collect business and personal taxes, attract foreign investment, adjudicate property disputes and liabilities for war damage, reconstruct and operate all public utilities, create a banking system, run schools and pay teachers and collect the garbage – in a war damaged society, using voluntary contributions, because the assessed mission budget, even for such “transitional administration” missions, does not fund local administration itself. In addition to such tasks, these missions must also try to rebuild civil society
1277 Chopra, supra note 10, p. 29.
and promote respect for human rights, in places where grievance is widespread and grudges run deep.1278
The Brahimi report further states that, “if the Secretariat anticipates future transi- tional administrations as the rule rather than the exception, then a dedicated and distinct responsibility centre for those tasks must be created somewhere within the United Nations system.”1279 The lack of knowledge about the local environment, including minority issues in Kosovo, and the need to protect minorities from revenge killings are equally evidence of insufficient preparation. The prerequisite of serious planning is essential in the security sector in particular. As noted by the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty:
complaints are regularly heard from military officers around the world that in interventions and their aftermath they are all too often given functions for which they are not trained and which are more appropriate to police. The simple answer is that civilian police are really only able to operate in countries where functioning systems of law and courts exist. Although the presence of some police in any military operation may be necessary from the start, including for the purpose of training local police, there is probably little alternative to the current practice of deploying largely military forces at the start, but as conditions improve and governmental institutions are rebuilt, phasing in a civilian police presence.1280
In Afghanistan, the UN was not directly involved in the administration or governance of the territory. Although UNAMA’s role has not always been very clear, the mission, through its influence, proved to be quite efficient with regard to the political process. However, this approach was certainly apposite to the UN’s assistance mandate to the Afghan Transitional and Interim Authority, but the long-term objectives for the creation of viable democratic institutions was not guaranteed and lies solely in the hands of the Afghan authorities. This was intended, as the Special Representative of the Secretary-General, Lakhdar Bra- himi, was convinced that Afghan leadership was the key to the success of the reconstruction process.1281 The fact that Afghanistan was a large sovereign State while Kosovo’s and East Timor’s international status was uncertain during the international administration undoubtedly played a role in defining the approach towards reconstruction. The same can be said with regard to Iraq although, in that case, the United States’ role and expectations have led to a more compre- hensive mandate than in Afghanistan.
Nevertheless, and although it may be too early to draw conclusions from this
‘light footprint’ and ‘lead nation’ approach, especially compared to UNTAET,
1278 Paras. 76–77, Brahimi Report, supra note 175.
1279 Ibid., para. 78.
1280 International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, supra note 17, para. 5.11.
1281 See Chesterman, supra note 131, p. 3.
which was concluded at the same time as the beginning of the political transition in Afghanistan, the establishment of a democratic society in Afghanistan still has a long way to go. Relying principally on local actors is probably an efficient way of improving local ownership of the process, but the effectiveness of this approach has not always proved very successful. This can be exemplified by the slow progress in economic reconstruction, which was seriously underestimated by the international community. While it is generally acknowledge that inter- national donors have not been as generous as in the other cases, the concept of
‘lead countries’, leading to involvement in a selected number of programmes, has contributed to the low achievement in Afghan economic reconstruction, as there was in fact no economic strategy aimed at sustainable economic growth.
Arguably, the centralisation of authority in an international entity could have remedied this. Another area in which the approach failed was the reform of the justice sector. Numerous institutions were in charge of parts of the judicial reconstruction process – the Minister of Justice, the Supreme Court headed by the Chief Justice and the Attorney General’s Office. The Judicial Reform Com- mission’s task was limited to making reform proposals and the UN was mandated only to serve as an advisor. There were similar considerations with regard to the DDR programme and the training of the Afghan police forces which has been clearly insufficient to create of functioning police and military forces, capable of maintaining security.
The failure of the United States adequately to prepare a post-conflict scenario is at the heart of the problems Iraq is facing today. Paul Wolfowitz, the former Deputy Secretary of State, admitted that the US – quite erroneously – compared post-conflict Iraq to the liberation of France.1282 As noted by the International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, “if military intervention is to be contemplated, the need for a post-intervention strategy is also of paramount importance”.1283 The prospect of a smooth transfer was completely flawed, and could have been avoided with adequate planning, taking into account the experi- ences from other post-conflict reconstruction efforts in the past. The lack of plan- ning is perhaps more obvious in the security sector. The abovementioned decision taken by the military commander to completely disband the Iraqi military forces and the Ministry of Defence, in conjunction with the short-staffed military which was unprepared to take over policing activity, provides sufficient evidence. The excessive centralisation of power in the CPA administrator1284 equally gave rise
1282 Kouchner, supra note 568, p. 428.
1283 International Commission on Intervention and State Sovereignty, supra note 17, para. 5.3.
1284 See for a critique Stapel, O., ‘Experiences with democracy building in the Local Governance Project in Iraq’, in Musch, A. (ed.), Post-Conflict reconstruction of local government (The Hague:
VNG International, 2005), p. 28.
to suspicion in the Iraqi people.1285 This has in addition been amplified by the intrusive and highly questionable measures taken in the economic sector, such as the ‘foreign investment’ order. This is however equally due to the fact that this authority was exercised by occupying powers instead of a neutral international organisation. The question here is thus whether such operations can only be undertaken by a body which has international legitimacy. The violent attacks on UNAMI’s headquarters question whether full UN administration would have been more acceptable to the Iraqi population. In addition, the existing Iraqi institutions and the availability of qualified Iraqi people, in contrast to the other three cases examined did not require such centralisation of power within the occupier. The failure to include Iraqis during the transitional period was detrimental to the much-needed legitimacy of the foreign presence. An advisory Governing Council was established only three months after the arrival of CPA administrator Bremer, and was composed of a majority of exiled political lead- ers who also lacked the necessary legitimacy among the population. The need to create such a body in order to legitimise the interim structures for the Iraqi people was not part of Ambassador Bremer’s structural design, but required the interference of the then Special Representative Vieira de Melo.1286 The creation of national interim institutions to consent to the measures adopted by the CPA, and therefore to add a perception of legitimacy to the CPA’s activities did not provide adequate capacity-building within the Iraqi institutions, nor could it
‘legitimise’ the CPA’s role in the reconstruction process. Close cooperation with the national institutions would have been productive if it had been effective, based on a clear mandate and division of tasks between the international and national authorities.
Inherent characteristics of the states and territories in question play an important role in achieving sustainable success in several areas. Starting from scratch can in certain cases be easier to handle than reforming existing struc- tures, as witnessed in Afghanistan and Iraq. In addition, the size of the states of Afghanistan and Iraq surely contributed to slower progress in various areas, due to a more limited security presence, the difficulty in eradicating parallel structures and the lack of implementation power outside the secure areas. In addition, the fact that Afghanistan and Iraq were sovereign states probably hin- dered the creation of a purely international administration in these territories.
However, we need to admit that effective implementation of necessary reforms can be achieved only by an effective administration and institutions, which was obviously not available in Afghanistan, or in Iraq after the CPA’s dissolution. In addition, we consider that in these cases fragmented or partial approaches were
1285 Diamond, L., ‘What Went Wrong in Iraq’, in Fukuyama, supra note 543, p. 186.
1286 Dodge, supra note 647, p. 33.
detrimental to the whole reconstruction process, emphasising the necessity of having all-inclusive mandates.