POL20011 Conflict Resolution
Assignment 2 Virtual collection—Part 1
Word/time limit: 200 (+/- 10%)
Weighting: 10%
Due date:5pm AEDT Friday13 December 2018
After you have read this information, head over to theAssignment 2 Q&Adiscussion board to ask any questions and see what your peersare saying about this assignment.
Assignment details
In your designated team discussion,your team will have built a virtual collection of representations of conflict. When you have agreed that the discussion is complete, each team will then post the link to theCompleted virtual collectionsdiscussion board so it can be evaluated by others.
For this component of Assignment 2, you should include twoexamples from your team discussion that represents a conflict (or conflict more broadly). These examples can be made up from a combination of art forms e.g. by using images, music, literature, film and/or television and dance.
You must also include a 200 word summary that describes why you chose these two examples and how they link to the concepts and theories covered in the unit so far.
Supporting resources
Study resources(Links to an external site.)Links to an external site.in the Student Portalcontains a range of toolsto help you with teamwork and assignments, including:
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Tips for successful teamwork(Links to an external site.)Links to an external site..
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Dealing with team conflict(Links to an external site.)Links to an external site..
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Missing team members(Links to an external site.)Links to an external site..
Discussion Questions
Good afternoon
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Where does the conflict in Nigeria sit on the measures of conflict as defined by both the Correlates of War Project (COW) and the Uppsala Conflict Data Project (UCDP)?
Conceived as an inventory of conflicts between states (based on the Westphalian principle of state sovereignty) COW now includes internal conflicts such as in Nigeria which satisfies the COW criteria:
1. minimum of two parties, one of which is a government
2. 1000 military and civilian casualties per year.
UCDP is less concerned with counting interstate conflicts than the use of violence (Wallensteen 2006). It's primary criteria are:
1. at least one state or government; and
2. intensity of conflict measured by two thresholds of battle related deaths (Wallensteen 2006). Nigeria fits into the category of war, i.e., in excess of 1000 battle-related deaths per year.
As pointed out by Wallensteen the UCPD also requires that the conflict has an issue - incompatibility - which exists in multiple dimensions in Nigeria and leads to the next question.
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How does it align to Collier and Hoeffler's 'greed or grievance' model?
Nigeria has many characteristics which might resonate with the notion of grievance but Collier and Hoeffler (2004) see most of these as insignificant. They identify five key factors for the causes of such civil wars:
1. Primary commodity exports (oil in Nigeria's case) generating financial wealth;
2. low average income ($6000 = 129th in the world despite a GDP of $1.7 trillion = 23rd in the world) and education (particularly in the north);
3. Large and dispersed population - grievances increase with population (Nigeria has the world's 7th largest population (190+million) and a rugged hinterland).
4. Ethnic dominance (Nigeria has distinct ethnic populations in the populous, Christian south, and the predominantly muslim interior); and
5. Opportunity for rebellion (all of the above plus the externally-fuelled Boko Haram insurgency).
The situation in Nigeria is exacerbated by historical factors such as colonialism with its irrational boundaries and the British administrative system of indirect rule; domestic slavery; the presence of multi-nationals such as Shell (not to mention the environmental damage from oil operations); deteriorating agricultural sector (Nigeria now imports food); and massive corruption. On the bright side, a number of countries and NGOs are committed to assist in peacekeeping and the Nigerian government has a number of initiatives including: a national counter-terrorism strategy; a safe schools program (different ideology to ours!); a victim support fund; and on-going attempts at negotiated settlement of conflict (Okerere, 2015).
(For a really interesting observation on 19th Century Nigeria, try Mungo Park'sTravels in the Interior Districts of Africa).
References:
Collier, P & Hoeffler, A 2004, 'Greed and grievance in civil war',Oxford Economic Papers,vol. 56, pp. 563-595. doin:10.1093/oep/gpf064.
Okerere, C 2015, 'Nigeria',Counter Terrorist Trends and Analyses,vol. 7, no. 1, pp. 100-104.https://www-jstor-org.ezproxy.lib.swin.edu.au/stable/26351329(Links to an external site.)Links to an external site..
Wallensteen, P 2006,Understanding Conflict Resolution: War, Peace and the Global System3rd edn, SAGE Publications.