Abstracts Political Science

The Efficacy of Multi-Track Diplomacy in Resolving Intrastate and Internationalised Conflicts in Africa: The Case of the 2007/2008 Post-Election Violence in Kenya

by KEPHA NATOLOOKA

Since the end of the Cold War, Africa has been and continues to be afflicted by many violent intrastate and internationalised conflicts. As a result, this has attracted many national and international actors who have adopted and used Multi-Track Diplomacy (MTD) anticipating it would enable them effectively resolve the conflicts. Since its inception in the early 1990s, MTD has been used as a predominant approach to conflict resolution worldwide. In Africa, it has been used to resolve intrastate and internationalised conflicts in over twenty-six countries. Yet, despite its worldwide application, the approach has generally not succeeded in Africa because in all African countries where it has been applied, it either failed outright to resolve the conflicts or the conflicts which were thought to have successfully been resolved under its framework have reoccurred. Against this backdrop, this thesis investigates why the application of MTD, as a predominant approach to conflict resolution, has not succeeded in bringing about the effective resolution of intrastate and internationalised conflicts in Africa. Using a case study of the 2007/2008 post-election violence in Kenya which can be interpreted to have been resolved under the MTD framework by the official protagonists involved in the mediation process, the thesis seeks to prove that the failure of the MTD approach to effectively resolve the 2007/2008 post-election violence in Kenya and other intrastate and internationalised conflicts in Africa is because MTD is based on assumptions and propositions which are unsuitable to African settings and it does not adequately consider Africa’s local conditions and local actors in its conflict resolution activities and processes. The thesis, using Kenya as a case study, advocates for the adoption of the Conflict Transformative Peacebuilding Approach (CTPA) as a substitute to MTD in resolving intrastate and internationalised conflicts in Africa. This is because CTPA is seen to provide an organic framework that not only offers a holistic explanation for the sources of conflict but puts Africa’s local conditions and actors at the nucleus of peacebuilding efforts. The originality of the thesis lies in its study (i) to investigate and prove why and how, MTD is an approach whose application in resolving the 2007/2008 post-election violence in Kenya was bound to fail in bringing about sustainable peace, and (ii) to justify why the adoption of CTPA as a substitute to MTD in resolving the 2007/2008 post-election violence in Kenya in particular, and other intrastate and internationalised conflicts in Africa in general, would seem pertinent.