THE IMPACT OF YOUTH ON PEACE BUILDING AND POST-CONFLICT DEVELOPMENT IN SOUTH-SUDAN

RESEARCH PROPOSITION

South-Sudan ranks as the second youngest country in the world behind Bougainville. Before the ascension to independence the country was in consistent civil war with Sudan, its breakout country. There is already scholarly evidence of the role of the youths of South-Sudan driving independence as cited in the literature review of this work. Their role involved participating in the war as arm carriers and also being a voice at conferences and pact signing missions leading to independence in 2011.

Like it faced numerous wars in Sudan, South-Sudan as a young nation it has plunged into war. With over 73% of the population according to the UN, under 35 years in the nation that is well drilled in warfare there is less hope for achieving peaceful existence in South-Sudan in the longrun seems unlikely. Yet the youths are still greatly involved in channeling a course of peace like it did during the fight for independence. But while the drive for independence is one with more support and backing from the political elites and administrators, this time the latter is a part of the war in South-Sudan, which poses a challenge to the efforts of the youths.

There is no doubt a major challenge for the youths to surmount because it needs access to scarce resources to achieve its goal of peaceful post-conflict South-Sudan such as funding, media, rehabilitation facilities etcetera which is without the authorization of the political elites. Hence the study to create a link between the youths’ effort at driving a mantra for a post-conflict SouthSudan with scarce resources and how more effective such an effort will be if there is a control of the political space by the youths as well.

ABSTRACT 

This research examines the challenges that the youths in South Sudan face in their efforts towards peacebuilding for a post-conflict developed nation. Using the secondary method of analysis the researcher evaluates specific objectives of the study such as the efforts of the youth in peacebuilding in face of an ongoing conflict in South Sudan, the challenges faced by the youths in their endeavor and how they can access the critical resources to achieve post-conflict development. The findings prove that efforts of the youth in peacebuilding is limited to few activities like being vocal to enlightening the youths involved in the war to embrace a different approach that aims at peacebuilding along ethnic lines, and it will overtime going to be difficult to be sustained, because there is a lack of support mostly at the political level.  This is definitely not an easy escapade considering the lack of support from the political arena, the lack of partnerships at the local level speaks volumes to the challenge of pursing such a grand goal with insufficient resources. The study posits youths have to surmount the challenges of inadequate resources, because one way to hold the youths who have participated as foot soldiers in the conflict is to ensure that their basic needs like food, shelter and clothing are met. It easily keeps then focused on the bigger picture of what can be achieved. Another challenge found is inaccessibility to the traditional media like Radio and television to garner support, but they are under the control of the government who are not going to support the youths.  The study recommends that the youths can pull the change necessary for access to the funding and support needed for peacebuilding for post-conflict development. Since the local media is out of reach, adopting the Arab Spring strategy of deploying social media will prove a veritable method. Although, this could be very slow process since only 2.5% of the total population of South Sudan uses social media, and 1.8% of them are youths. Consistently slow and steady use of the social media platforms will obviously result in international support to the process.

CHAPTER ONE

INTRODUCTION

1.1 BACKGROUND OF THE STUDY

The Horn of Africa has seen some of the longest lasting conflicts in the world dating over five decades (UNPF, 2018). One of the countries in the sub-urban that has sustained such conflict is South Sudan which was born in 2011. Just as the nation is young it also ranks amongst nations with the youngest population in the world with 73.7% of the population below the age of 30 years. Most of these young as the population of the nation, some of those where people were born into war situation and have gone on to be prosecute the war for struggle for of independence against the North Sudan Khartoum in the North. Such situations have meant carrying arms as child soldiers.

Hence it can be considered the most youth population that have gone through war with a very slim short period of peace just after the period of independence in (2011 – 2013). Till date there have been replay of similar scenarios in North Sudan in South-Sudan ranging from inter-ethnic to religious conflicts with the youth who thought they can finally enjoy sustained peace. The escalation of the conflict means that situations have become so difficult for the youth with situations of hardships steaming from unemployment and from without any institutional support either public or private. Most of the youth them have to crawl back into crimes and part of the war crime situation which is easily triggered because of previous engagement from North Sudan. Yet there have been efforts towards the quest for peace by other sets of youth, hence this study to evaluate the efforts of the youths in Southern Sudan at promoting peace movements in the midst of conflict.

1.2 STATEMENT OF THE PROBLEM

Promoting peace after conflict is definitely the easiest endeavor. There are several factors that make the efforts of the youth of South Sudan towards peace an uphill task even if they keep taking steps such as they did from their efforts at masterminding both local and international conferences to oversee the handover of independence from the North. Such issues that have been examined in this study start with exploring the access to resources for pushing the boundaries of peace. Most scholars have described South Sudan as endowed with natural resources thus, attracting foreign powers into the crisis. This makes the efforts of the youth difficult because they are not encouraged by the government. Another critical issue is that war has become part of life to the youth in the country. Having been born into war efforts at rehabilitation is even more difficult. The study will evaluate the efforts and patterns deployed by the youth in ensuring a positive outcome with very little encouragement, from the national elite. While the youth have been very instrumental to the independence and peace in the nation, there is the need to focus on a massive political push in South-Sudan to sustain the peace-building process.

1.3 OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY

The aim of the project is to achieve the aim of the study, it has been broken into smaller objectives as follows:

1. To identify the efforts of the youth in South Sudan regarding in peace building after the conflict.
2. To identify the challenges faced by the marginalized and displaced youth in policy and decision in the peace-building efforts in South Sudan iii. To evaluate what the resources available to the youth in their peace-building efforts

1.4 RESEARCH QUESTIONS

1. What are the efforts of the youth in South Sudan in the peace-building Process?
2. What are the challenges that the youth face in the peace-building efforts in South Sudan? iii. What are the resources available to the youths in their peace-building efforts?

1.5 SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY

Most political studies on youth focus on violence. This study looks at youth and their contribution to peace-building in post-conflict. States. In addition, most such studies examine older states in Africa. This study examines a newly created state that separated from one of the oldest independent states of Africa. The method of collecting data is also novel in the sense that interviews and questionnaires shall be administered to the sample population that live in a foreign country via mail.

1.6 SCOPE AND LIMITATIONS OF THE STUDY

This is a single case study and with a limited scope of time. Single-case studies are not adequate enough to make for generalisations.

1.7 RESEARCH METHODS

Research methodology is of huge importance to any research work being conducted, this being that research methodology enables the researcher to discuss their sources of data, how they are collected, the population of the study, analyzed and organized.

1.7.1 SOURCES OF DATA COLLECTED

The Secondary sources of data will be deployed in this study. For the secondary sources, the researcher focuses on relevant published textbooks to the topic as a well-unpolished thesis to boost the literature review. Information from online surveys is very key to the analysis to be conducted for the study. It conveys enormous information on the population of the study.

1.7.2 METHOD OF DATA ANALYSIS

The qualitative method of data analysis will be employed for analyzing the data gathered using the descriptive method for analyzing information gathered from the secondary sources.

1.8 ORGANIZATION OF CHAPTERS

This study comprises five chapters. Chapter one is the introduction and it is deals with contains the background of the study which is characterized by introduction, the statement of the problem, the research questions, the objectives of the study, the research propositions, the scope and limitation of the study, the research method, the significance of research study, definition of terms and chapter outlines. Chapter two contains a review of related literature and theoretical framework. Chapter three examines the history of South-Sudan. Chapter four contains in-depth analysis of the three specific objectives of the study to provide answers to the three research questions highlighted in section 1.3 of chapter one. While Chapter five is the Conclusion and it contains a summary of the entire work, conclusion, the major findings and a few recommendations.

THE IMPACT OF YOUTH ON PEACE BUILDING AND POST-CONFLICT DEVELOPMENT IN SOUTH-SUDAN