Event Date: April 8, 2019 - 12:00pm to 1:30pm
Location: FSS4006, 120 University Private, Ottawa

Presented by CIPS 

Impartiality is a core norm for United Nations peacekeeping operations. In many contemporary missions, however, peacekeepers take sides and use force in ways that critics argue are at odds with that norm. In Côte d’Ivoire, for example, blue helmets launched air strikes and facilitated the 2011 arrest of President Laurent Gbagbo after he refused to accept defeat in a UN-certified election. According to UN personnel, activities like this are still “impartial.” This description masks radical changes in day-to-day practices and it skims over disagreements about whether norms like impartiality can – or should – be reinterpreted to cope with new challenges. Drawing on evidence from Côte d’Ivoire, this talk tracks the process by which new ways of being “impartial” emerge, spread, and become institutionalized in UN peace operations. I find that new practices emerge through both innovation and improvisation, often in response to crisis. They spread as practitioners move between missions and share practical knowledge with colleagues. Institutionalization remains uneven, but “soft” forms of institutionalization like “best practices” are a way for proponents to routinize patterns of action that remain controversial among member states, UN officials, and other stakeholders.

Marion Laurence is a PhD candidate in the Department of Political Science at the University of Toronto and a Research Fellow with the Centre for International Policy Studies at the University of Ottawa. Her research interests include peacekeeping, peace-building, global security governance, and the political sociology of international organizations.