The African Peace and Security Architecture (APSA) includes the three central instruments conflict prevention, conflict management and peace building of the African Union (AU), the Regional Economic Communities (RECs) as well as the Regional Mechanism (RMs).

Background

The APSA evolved in the late 1990s, when the African continent was confronted with severe crises such as the civil war in Somalia, which was ongoing since 1991, and the genocide in Rwanda 1994. At the same time, the statutes of the Organisation of African Unity (OAU) did not allow an intervention in the inner affairs of another state. In order to be able to intervene in situations of severe human rights violations, the member states of the OAU decided to establish the African Union (AU) in 2002. Two years later, the decision to establish the APSA was taken. The signature of the constitutive act of the AU marked a turning point of inner-African relations. Article 4 (h) and (j) of the constitutive act allows AU member states to intervene in a third state even against the will of the respective government in case of

crimes against humanity Crimes against humanity are certain serious crimes committed as part of a large-scale attack against civilians. Unlike war crimes, crimes against humanity can be committed during both peace and war and against a state's own nationals as well as ...

, such as

war crime A war crime is a violation of the laws of war that gives rise to individual criminal responsibility for actions by combatants in action, such as intentionally killing civilians or intentionally killing prisoners of war, torture, taking hostage ...

s and

genocide Genocide is violence that targets individuals because of their membership of a group and aims at the destruction of a people. Raphael Lemkin, who first coined the term, defined genocide as "the destruction of a nation or of an ethnic group" by ...

. Therefore, the AU constitutive act is the first treaty under international law, which includes the right to militarily intervene in a third state based on humanitarian reasons, which is today often called a

humanitarian intervention Humanitarian intervention is the Use of force in international law, use or threat of military force by a state (or states) across borders with the intent of ending severe and widespread human rights violations in a state which has not given permi ...

. This normative shift increased when the founding protocol of the

Peace and Security Council The Peace and Security Council (PSC) is the organ of the African Union in charge of enforcing union decisions. It is patterned somewhat after the United Nations Security Council. The PSC is also the main pillar of the African Peace and Security ...

(PSC) of the AU came into effect December 26, 2003. The protocol defines a broad agenda for peace and security, including central elements such as conflict prevention, early warning,

preventive diplomacy Preventive diplomacy is action to prevent disputes from arising between parties, to prevent existing disputes from escalating into conflicts and to limit the spread of the latter when they occur. Since the end of the Cold War the international co ...

conflict management Conflict management is the process of limiting the negative aspects of conflict while increasing the positive aspects of conflict in the workplace. The aim of conflict management is to enhance learning and group outcomes, including effectivene ...

peacemaking Peacemaking is a practical conflict transformation focused upon establishing equitable power relationships robust enough to forestall future conflict, often including the establishment of means of agreeing on ethical decisions within a communit ...

and

peacebuilding Peacebuilding is an activity that aims to resolve injustice in nonviolent ways and to transform the cultural and structural conditions that generate deadly or destructive conflict. It revolves around developing constructive personal, group, and ...

as well as support for and development of democratic policies, humanitarian actions and

. Consequently, the PSC founding protocol can be seen as the basis for the APSA. It is the aim of the APSA to provide the AU, the RECs and the RMs with all the instruments necessary to fulfil the tasks and mandate relating from the constitutive act of the AU and the founding protocol of the PSC.

Structure

The structure of the APSA is based on the protocol relating to the establishment of the Peace and Security Council of the African Union (PSC Protocol, 2002). Article 2 names the following five pillars of the APSA, including institutions and decision-making processes: -the Peace and Security Council (PSC), which is the central organ of the AU -the Panel of the Wise (PoW) -the Continental Early Warning System (CEWS) -the African Standby Force (ASF) -the Peace Fund The AU claims that its mandate in the area of peace and security is valid for the whole African continent. In addition to this, several

Regional Economic Communities The Regional Economic Communities (RECs) in Africa group together individual countries in subregions for the purposes of achieving greater economic integration. They are described as the "building blocks" of the African UnionAU and are also central ...

(RECs) and Regional Mechanisms (RMs) are part of the APSA. The cooperation between the RECs and the AU is guided by the principles of subsidiarity, of complementarity and of the comparative advantages. The operationalisation of the APSA Instruments was intended to be finished until the end of 2015. However, the status of the instruments varies strongly depending on the individual instruments and organisation.

International Support

The APSA is strongly dependent on external sources financially. In 2015, 95% of the total AU budget was financed by external partners (EU, EU member states, Japan and China). In 2016, external financing was estimated to amount to 52% of the budget; however, the detailed budget plan is not known yet.

Challenges

Evaluated by the • 2010 APSA Assessment • 2015 APSA Assess

Criticism

• strong dependency on external sources of funding

Literature

*Ulf Engel, João Gomes Porto (Ed.): Africa's New Peace and Security Architecture. Promoting Norms, Institutionalizing Solutions. Ashgate, Farnham 2010. *Ulf Engel, João Gomes Porto (Ed.): Towards an African Peace and Security Regime. Ashgate, Farnham 2013. *European Union (Ed.): The African Peace and Security Architecture: Still under construction. Brüssel 2014. *Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung (Hrsg.): The African Peace and Security Architecture.The African Peace and Security Architecture: A Handbook
/ref> A Handbook. Addis Abeba 2014.

References

African Union Organizations established in 2002 Peacekeeping