We take you on a discovery of the root causes of African conflicts; the attempts by continental organizations such as the Organization of African Unity to resolve these conflicts; the reasons for the inability of the OAU/AU to succeed in conflict resolution; the root causes of the Burundi Conflict; the Burundi Peace process as a reflection of how conflicts are resolved in Africa and why we think it does not lead to sustainable peace which we term “negative peace.”
Burundi’s Negative Peace explores the largely unknown area of negative peace in Africa and specifically Burundi in the wake of the manner in which conflicts are resolved throughout the continent. The use of mediation among warring parties, the implementation of ceasefire agreements, the establishment of a transitional government and the organization of elections has been the conflict resolution trajectory that has been religiously applied in resolving African conflicts.
What then is the missing link? The authors fervently believe that the above mentioned techniques do not lead to sustainable peace. In fact it leads to negative peace which is not peace at all. The peace studies’ theorist, Galtung, decreed that “Peace is not the absence of violence, but peace of mind.”
