High-Value Natural Resources and Post-Conflict Peacebuilding

For most post-conflict countries, the transition to peace is daunting. In countries with high-value natural resources – including oil, gas, diamonds, other minerals, and timber –the stakes are unusually high and peacebuilding is especially challenging. Resource-rich post-conflict countries face both unique problems and opportunities. They enter peacebuilding with an advantage that distinguishes them from other war-torn societies: access to natural resources that can yield substantial revenues for alleviating poverty, compensating victims, creating jobs, and rebuilding the country and the economy. Evidence shows, however, that this opportunity is often wasted. Resource-rich countries do not have a better record in sustaining peace. In fact, resource-related conflicts are more likely to relapse.

Focusing on the relationship between high-value natural resources and peacebuilding in post-conflict settings, this book identifies opportunities and strategies for converting resource revenues to a peaceful future. Its thirty chapters draw on the experiences of forty-one researchers and practitioners – as well as the broader literature – and cover a range of key issues, including resource extraction, revenue sharing and allocation, and institution building. The book provides a concise theoretical and practical framework that policy makers, researchers, practitioners, and students can use to understand and address the complex interplay between the management of high-value resources and peace.
High-Value Natural Resources and Post-Conflict Peacebuilding is part of a global initiative led by the Environmental Law Institute (ELI), the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP), the University of Tokyo, and McGill University to identify and analyze lessons in natural resource management and post-conflict peacebuilding. The project has generated six edited books of case studies and analyses, with contributions from practitioners, policy makers, and researchers. Other books in the series address land; water; livelihoods; assessing and restoring natural resources; and governance.

Päivi Lujala is Associate Professor at the Department of Geography, Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU) and a senior research associate at the Department of Economics, NTNU and the Centre for the Study of Civil War (CSCW) at the Peace Research Institute Oslo (PRIO).
Siri Aas Rustad is a researcher at CSCW, PRIO, and a Ph.D. candidate in political science at the Department of Sociology and Political Science, NTNU.

1.High-value natural resources: A blessing or a curse for peace? Päivi Lujala and Siri Aas Rustad Part 1: Introduction 2.Bankrupting peace spoilers: Can peacekeepers curtail belligerents’ access to resource revenues? Philippe Le Billon 3.Mitigating risks and realizing opportunities: Environmental and social standards for foreign direct investment in high-value natural resources Jill Shankleman 4.Reopening and developing mines in post-conflict settings: The challenge of company-community relations Volker Boege and Daniel M. Franks 5.Diamonds in war, diamonds for peace: Diamond sector management and kimberlite mining in Sierra Leone Kazumi Kawamoto 6.Assigned corporate social responsibility in a rentier state: The case of Angola Arne Wiig and Ivar Kolstad Part 2: Commodity and revenue tracking Introduction 7.The Kimberley Process at ten: Reflections on a decade of efforts to end the trade in conflict diamonds J. Andrew Grant 8. The Kimberley Process Certification Scheme: A model negotiation? Clive Wright 9.The Kimberley Process Certification Scheme: The primary safeguard for the diamond industry Andrew Bone 10.A more formal engagement: A constructive critique of certification as a means of preventing conflict and building peace Harrison Mitchell 11.Addressing the roots of Liberia’s conflict through the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative Eddie Rich and T. Negbalee Warner 12.Excluding illegal timber and improving forest governance: The European Union’s Forest Law Enforcement, Governance and Trade initiative Duncan Brack Part 3: Revenue distribution Introduction 13.Sharing natural resource wealth during war-to-peace transitions Achim Wennmann 14.Horizontal inequality, decentralizing the distribution of natural resource revenues, and peace Michael L. Ross, Päivi Lujala, and Siri Aas Rustad 15.The Diamond Area Community Development Fund: Micropolitics and community-led development in post-war Sierra Leone Roy Maconachie 16.Direct distribution of natural resource revenues as a policy for peacebuilding Martin E. Sandbu Part 4: Allocation and institution building Introduction 17.High-value natural resources, development, and conflict: Channels of causation Paul Collier and Anke Hoeffler 18.Petroleum blues: The political economy of resources and conflict in Chad John A. Gould and Matthew S. Winters 19.Forest resources and peacebuilding: Preliminary lessons from Liberia and Sierra Leone Michael D. Beevers 20.An inescapable curse? Resource management, violent conflict, and peacebuilding in the Niger Delta Annegret Mähler 21.The legal framework for managing oil in post-conflict Iraq: A pattern of abuse and violence over natural resources Mishkat Al Moumin 22.The capitalist civil peace: Some theory and empirical evidence Indra de Soysa Part 5: Livelihoods introduction 23.Counternarcotics efforts and Afghan poppy farmers: Finding the right approach David M. Catarious Jr. and Alison Russell 24. The Janus nature of opium poppy: A view from the field Adam Pain 25.Peace through sustainable forest management in Asia: The USAID Forest Conflict Initiative Jennifer Wallace and Ken Conca 26.Women in the artisanal and small-scale mining sector of the Democratic Republic of the Congo Karen Hayes and Rachel Perks 27.Forest user groups and peacebuilding in Nepal Binod Chapagain and Tina Sanio 28.Lurking beneath the surface: Oil, environmental degradation, and armed conflict in Sudan Luke A. Patey