Published August 8, 2012 | By Tierney Anderson

Though the economy is slowly recovering and the 2009 ZANU-PF and Movement for Democratic Change (MDC) power-sharing agreement following the 2008 post-election violence has tenuously held, Zimbabwe remains a highly unstable country. Political violence, human rights abuses by government and police, and widespread unemployment have left Zimbabwe in a state of deep insecurity. Ministries in the unity government are split between ZANU-PF and the MDC, making reforms challenging. Intimidation and arbitrary arrests of opposition leaders, internal rifts within ZANU-PF, and rising tensions in the lead-up to elections continue to undermine the unity government.

Published July 19, 2012 | By Tierney Anderson and Amelia Whitehead

In recent years, Indonesia has been an success story with significant economic growth and political reform. Indonesia successfully survived the global financial crisis by boosting the output of industrial production and exports, resulting in continued GDP growth.

In order to sustain its economic growth and democratic development, Indonesia needs to address some of the key challenges that continues to hinder its progress. These challenges include infrastructure development, unemployment, corruption, violence against religious minorities and education.

Published June 18, 2012 | By J. Messner, N. Haken, K. Hendry, P. Taft, K. Lawrence, T. Anderson, R. Jaeger, N. Manning, F. Umaña, A. Whitehead

The Failed States Index, produced by The Fund for Peace, is a critical tool in highlighting not only the normal pressures that all states experience, but also in identifying when those pressures are pushing a state towards the brink of failure. By highlighting pertinent issues in weak and failing states, The Failed States Index—and the social science framework and software application upon which it is built—makes political risk assessment and early warning of conflict accessible to policy-makers and the public at large.

Published June 18, 2012 | By T. Anderson, R. Jaeger, F. Umaña, N. Manning, A. Whitehead.

1. Somalia As the situation in Somalia continued to deteriorate in 2011, the country remains at the top of the Failed States Index for the fifth year in succession. Ten out of twelve of Somalia’s indicators scores were above 9.0 on a scale of 10. Indeed, the Refugees and IDPs as well as the Security Apparatus indicator scores remain at the highest possible level of 10.0. The absence of a permanent national government for twenty years was aggravated in 2011 by an upsurge of violence, massive human rights abuses and natural disasters. Worsened social conditions have added to political instability which led to mass displacement and impoverishment. Somalia also continues to be a relentless headache for international shipping, with the unrelenting activities of Somali pirates deep into the Indian Ocean. Despite attempts by external actors such as the African Union and neighboring Kenya to intervene in the conflict, terrorist activity by al-Shabaab and general unabating lawlessness has hampered such efforts.
—Raphaël Jaeger

Published June 11, 2012 | By K. Lawrence, N. Haken, P. Taft, T. Anderson, S. Levine

The year 2011 was an illuminating period with respect to pressures and resilience in Liberia. Early in the year, Liberia experienced significant social pressures from abroad as neighboring Cote d’Ivoire descended into a major political crisis sending thousands of refugees into Nimba and Grand Gedeh counties. Then, internally, Liberia experienced heightened political pressure as the election season peaked in November. Despite this dangerous confluence of conflict drivers and triggers, there were no major outbreaks of violence during the year. Liberia was able to weather external shocks and internal pressure, reinforcing the notion that the country has come a long way since 2004. This report takes a look at Nimba and Montserrado counties within the broader national context, in terms of pressures and resilience throughout 2011 and beyond. It draws on data generated by local civil society networks, from automated content analysis data (from a sample of 28,634 news articles), and a qualitative review of the data, informed by field visits and desktop research.

Published December 20, 2011 | By Amangeldi Djumanaliev and Tierney Anderson

In recent years, Uganda’s human rights record and anti-corruption initiatives have been applauded, though further implementation of these initiatives is needed. President Yoweri Museveni, in power since 1986, was re-elected to a fourth term in office in 2011 with an overwhelming victory. Opposition candidates staged public protests, including a “Walk-to-Work” campaign, protesting over the rising cost of food, fuel, and government corruption. Government security forces responded with overwhelming force, firing at unarmed civilians and using tear gas to arrest protesters. This heavy-handed response to the protests and subsequent rioting has been criticized domestically and internationally. Meanwhile, the government continues to struggle with both political instability and economic decline. The recent deployment of 100 American military advisors to Uganda could help defeat the Lord’s Resistance Army, finally ending the two decade long war in the North and allowing for the safe return of thousands of IDPs.

Published November 30, 2011 | By Annie Janus and Tierney Anderson

Niger has faced severe drought and famine on multiple occasions, notably in 1974, 1995, 2005 and 2010. In the past such events often coincided with political upheaval, and 2010 was no different. After extending his term past constitutional limits, the then-president was overthrown in a military coup in February 2010. Although progress remains highly tenuous, there have been some positive signs: The military committee immediately acknowledged the ongoing famine, utilized food stores and embraced international aid and assistance. A new constitution was approved and internationally supervised free and fair elections were held in March of 2011. Despite democratic progress, northern Niger remains locked in a low level insurgency, whose local tribesman are affiliated with Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb.

Published November 23, 2011 | By Tierney Anderson and Ed Nagle

Corruption and inequality is rampant throughout Guinea. Despite having at least 25% of the world’s known bauxite reserves (aluminum ore), substantial high quality iron ore, gold and uranium, Guinea remains one of the poorest, least developed countries in the world. After over 50 years of repression and dictatorship, Guinea held its first widely recognized free presidential elections in late 2010, which were absent of major violence. However, there are continuing political and ethnic tensions over the upcoming December legislative elections. Infrastructure and government institutions have historically been, and currently remain, woefully underdeveloped and are a major challenge for the new administration. The newly elected president, Alpha Condé, has taken steps to reform the mining code (Guinea’s major source of revenue) to prevent and punish corruption and reform the security sector. President Condé has also promised to rebuild Guinea’s transportation infrastructure and improve access to electricity and potable water.

Published October 28, 2011 | By Nate Haken, Tierney Anderson, Julie Andrus, Erin Crandell

Nigeria’s election in April 2011 represented a huge step forward with respect to democratization. However, there was significant resistance on the part of vested interests, which led to an escalation of many conflict risk factors at the local and national levels in the subsequent five months. Nigerian stakeholders in government, civil society, and private sectors must not rest on their laurels after this relatively successful election. Doing so would risk losing all that has been gained.

This report compiles the incidents and issues documented by civil society representatives in the UNLocK Nigeria early warning network from April -September 2011, with a particular focus on the state and local government area levels of Akwa Ibom, Rivers, Bayelsa, and Kaduna. There is a two month period of overlap between this report and the last, which covered December 2010-May 2011. The reason for this overlap is that UNLocK participants met in September for a workshop, adding considerably to the data compiled on events in April and May. Rather than archive that newly collected data, we wanted to include it in this report for a fuller picture of the landscape as perceived by the early warning network.

Published October 4, 2011
By Nate Haken, Tierney Anderson, Julie Andrus, Erin Crandell
Publication CUUGR1125
Report available in PDF and Flash formats

In February, Ugandans reelected President Museveni to a fifth term in office by a landslide. A few weeks after the election, massive protests over the government’s management of the economy broke out in cities across the country and sometimes turned violent. Since then, the protests have subsided, but food prices remain high and segments of the population still feel politically disenfranchised. This context poses a challenge to continued progress for democracy and human rights in Uganda.

This report is a summary of incidents and issues from May to August 2011, with a special focus on pastoral conflict in Karamoja and land conflict in Acholi, as reported by a network of local civil society representatives who have been using FFP’s Conflict Assessment System Tool (CAST) since 2008. The project engages local civil society for better conflict assessment, early warning, and prevention.