IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/iob/dpaper/2022.02.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Structuration of armed mobilisation in eastern DRC’s Kahuzi-Biega National Park

Author

Listed:
  • O’Leary Simpson, Fergus
  • Lwaboshi, Romain
  • Ikobo, Yves
  • Mulume, Papy

Abstract

This discussion paper contributes to ongoing debates over militarised conservation and armed mobilisation surrounding protected areas situated in violent environments. Presenting evidence from wartorn eastern Democratic Republic of Congo’s Kahuzi-Biega National Park, it shows how fortress conservation and its militarised enforcement have no doubt contributed to at least one major incident of violent resistance over recent years, but are by no means the main source of armed group mobilisation in and around the park. Drawing inspiration from structuration theory, it shows how socio-structural features of the landscape in which the park is embedded have led to a state of seemingly perpetual armed group mobilisation and violence. Individual agents can either serve to reproduce or reshape the social structure through the unintended consequences of their actions, thus setting off a self-reinforcing feedback loop. We conclude that although militarised conservation interacts with the structuration of mobilisation in the Kahuzi-Biega landscape, it is probably not integral to it.

Suggested Citation

  • O’Leary Simpson, Fergus & Lwaboshi, Romain & Ikobo, Yves & Mulume, Papy, 2022. "Structuration of armed mobilisation in eastern DRC’s Kahuzi-Biega National Park," IOB Discussion Papers 2022.02, Universiteit Antwerpen, Institute of Development Policy (IOB).
    • Handle: RePEc:iob:dpaper:2022.02
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://medialibrary.uantwerpen.be/files/8518/f25da85f-3585-42ef-9477-1d80d431bfd0.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Roderick Neumann, 1997. "Primitive Ideas: Protected Area Buffer Zones and the Politics of Land in Africa," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 28(3), pages 559-582, July.
    2. Elizabeth Lunstrum, 2014. "Green Militarization: Anti-Poaching Efforts and the Spatial Contours of Kruger National Park," Annals of the American Association of Geographers, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 104(4), pages 816-832, July.
    3. Elizabeth Lunstrum, 2018. "Capitalism, Wealth, and Conservation in the Age of Security: The Vitalization of the State," Annals of the American Association of Geographers, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 108(4), pages 1022-1037, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Esther Marijnen, 2018. "Public Authority and Conservation in Areas of Armed Conflict: Virunga National Park as a ‘State within a State’ in Eastern Congo," Development and Change, International Institute of Social Studies, vol. 49(3), pages 790-814, May.
    2. Schetter, Conrad & Mkutu, Kennedy & Müller-Koné, Marie, 2022. "Frontier NGOs: Conservancies, control, and violence in northern Kenya," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 151(C).
    3. Strong, Michael & Silva, Julie A., 2021. "‘We would like this place to be a town’: The benefits and challenges of rural development near protected areas," World Development Perspectives, Elsevier, vol. 24(C).
    4. Sjöstedt, Martin & Sundström, Aksel & Jagers, Sverker C. & Ntuli, Herbert, 2022. "Governance through community policing: What makes citizens report poaching of wildlife to state officials?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 160(C).
    5. Muok, Benard Oula & Mosberg, Marianne & Eriksen, Siri Ellen Hallstrøm & Ong'ech, Dennis Onyango, 2021. "The politics of forest governance in a changing climate: Political reforms, conflict and socio-environmental changes in Laikipia, Kenya," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 132(C).
    6. Ide, Tobias, 2020. "The dark side of environmental peacebuilding," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 127(C).
    7. Evangelia Apostolopoulou & John D Pantis, 2010. "Development Plans versus Conservation: Explanation of Emergent Conflicts and State Political Handling," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 42(4), pages 982-1000, April.
    8. Chambers, Josephine M. & Massarella, Kate & Fletcher, Robert, 2022. "The right to fail? Problematizing failure discourse in international conservation," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 150(C).
    9. Siewe Siewe & Jacqueline M. Vadjunec & Beth Caniglia, 2017. "The Politics of Land Use in the Korup National Park," Land, MDPI, vol. 6(1), pages 1-22, January.
    10. Sjöstedt, Martin & Linell, Amanda, 2021. "Cooperation and coercion: The quest for quasi-voluntary compliance in the governance of African commons," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 139(C).
    11. David Hulme & Marshall Murphree, 1999. "Communities, wildlife and the 'new conservation' in Africa," Journal of International Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 11(2), pages 277-285.
    12. Diaz, Stephanie G. & DeAngelis, Donald L. & Gaines, Michael S. & Purdon, Andrew & Mole, Michael A. & van Aarde, Rudi J., 2021. "Development and validation of a spatially-explicit agent-based model for space utilization by African savanna elephants (Loxodonta africana) based on determinants of movement," Ecological Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 447(C).
    13. Gonzalez-Duarte, Columba, 2021. "Butterflies, organized crime, and “sad trees”: A critique of the Monarch Butterfly Biosphere Reserve Program in a context of rural violence," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 142(C).
    14. Petursson, Jon Geir & Vedeld, Paul & Sassen, Marieke, 2013. "An institutional analysis of deforestation processes in protected areas: The case of the transboundary Mt. Elgon, Uganda and Kenya," Forest Policy and Economics, Elsevier, vol. 26(C), pages 22-33.
    15. Kitonsa, H. & Kruglikov, S. V., 2018. "Significance of drone technology for achievement of the United Nations sustainable development goals," R-Economy, Ural Federal University, Graduate School of Economics and Management, vol. 4(3), pages 115-120.
    16. Bram Büscher, 2016. "‘Rhino poaching is out of control!’ Violence, race and the politics of hysteria in online conservation," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 48(5), pages 979-998, May.
    17. Aidan Keane & Heather Gurd & Dickson Kaelo & Mohammed Y Said & Jan de Leeuw & J Marcus Rowcliffe & Katherine Homewood, 2016. "Gender Differentiated Preferences for a Community-Based Conservation Initiative," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 11(3), pages 1-15, March.
    18. Michel Notelid & Anneli Ekblom, 2021. "Household Vulnerability and Transformability in Limpopo National Park," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(5), pages 1-22, March.
    19. Alan Collins & Caroline Cox & Juniours Marire, 2020. "On the judicial annulment of the ‘domestic’ trade moratorium in South African rhinoceros horn: a law and economics perspective," European Journal of Law and Economics, Springer, vol. 49(3), pages 361-372, June.
    20. Massé, Francis & Margulies, Jared D., 2020. "The geopolitical ecology of conservation: The emergence of illegal wildlife trade as national security interest and the re-shaping of US foreign conservation assistance," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 132(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:iob:dpaper:2022.02. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Hans De Backer (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/iobuabe.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.