Although research is generally thought to be grounded in specific epistemic frames of reference, contexts within which studies are conducted vary and need to be considered. What is applicable during a research undertaking in a peaceful
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President Dwight D. Eisenhower was the American War Department mobilization planner in the 1930s (Davidson, 2011).
environment may not work in an unstable environment. Despite these contextual differences, researchers are expected to produce valid and reliable knowledge.
Post-war societies are typically societies in dire straits due to the disruptive effects of the war. There is no doubt that the majority of the inhabitants therein are perceived as vulnerable for a number of reasons. They are faced with a struggling economy and a higher cost of living, and therefore increasingly get anxious about their livelihood. But amidst this collective war-induced wretchedness, there are people who use war as a source of enrichment. Using NGOs he likened with war- profiteers, Lendman (2012) noted that “war is big business. NGOs like corporate predators cash in”.83
For instance, evidence is available that during the Liberian war, top leaders such as warlords massively looted mineral resources. They connived with other interested stakeholders to trade weapons, timber and diamonds, and to create human trafficking networks (Global Witness, 2010; Sherman, 2011). External actors contributed to/masterminded the war for high-level political and economic reasons/gains, be they individuals (e.g. mercenaries), organizations, countries or groups of countries. I call this first set of individuals or corporations that immensely benefited from the war, ‘upper-level war-profiteers’ (van Niekerk, 2002; Soggot, 2002; Campbell, 2002).
For instance, during the disarmament operation in Liberia, there were factional commanders who collected arms from ex-combatants and distributed them to their “family members in order for them to qualify for the disarmament money” (Alusula, 2008:11).
Charles Taylor, one notorious former warlord during the Liberian civil war epitomizes an upper-level war-profiteer. As Singer (2006:56) pointed out:
Within five years, Taylor was the richest warlord in the country, with ‘Taylorland’ pulling in $300 million to $400 million a year in personal income through illegal trading and looting. A decade later Taylor was
83 This is a quote of Lendman (2012) available at http://www.opednews.com/articles/NGOs-
Liberia’s president, demonstrating the potential payoffs of this new strategy of mobilizing force. Through child soldiers, he was able to use a small gang to gain a kingdom.
There were also individuals who considered the war and the post-war social chaos as an avenue to earn their living or make huge amounts of money, or enrich their curriculum vitae although in a disguised manner. It may not have been their original intention to profit from the war, but by virtue of their involvement in the war in any capacity, they derive a certain form or level of profit. Some consciously engaged in benign or illegal activities, although not necessarily criminal, to achieve their aims without necessarily having any links with external profiteers. This second category, which I term ‘midlevel war-profiteers’, comprises local and national criminal syndicates (former fighters), organizations and associations which beyond their debatable humanitarian concern used the war and its outcome as moneymaking business, donors, sex workers, peacekeepers, mediators, diplomats, consultants, researchers and individuals who have gained or are seeking political, economic and diplomatic leverage locally, nationally or internationally as a result of the war.
It must be noted that some of the midlevel war-profiteers might have contributed to the transition of war-affected countries from war to peace in diverse ways; but I contend that the encomia which usually envelop such contributions overshadow the concealed benefits these ‘benevolent actors’ derive from their acts. For instance, it came as no surprise that the president of the Haitian National Commission for Disarmament, Demobilization and Reinsertion, M. Alix Fils- Aimé (in Radio Kiskeya, 2010), accused the United Stabilization Mission in Haiti (MINUSTAH) and NGOs of practising a “crisis business,” and claimed that “foreigners find their interests in our [Haitian] crises and Haiti will never make headway unless its sons resolve to take full control of the country’s destiny” [author’s translation from French].
With regard to this category of war-profiteers, in Liberia, there were individuals who clinched prestigious awards as a reward for their effort in bringing back
peace in the country, although some of them contributed in a way to the war (Liberia’s Nobel Peace Prize winners look to the future, 2011; Nossiter, 2011). Scholars who carried research or published on any aspect of the war in Liberia are also war-profiteers, simply because without the phenomenon called war, there wouldn’t have been any war-related subject for research. With regard to scholars deriving profit from war, and using Sierra Leone as an example, Zack-Williams (2006:121) narrated former child-soldiers’ consciousness of the phenomenon:
By the time I arrived in the field after the civil war in August 2001, I found that many of the former child soldiers had started showing signs of ‘research interrogation fatigue’ — tired of being interrogated about their experiences in the bush by researchers and journalists. A number of them claimed that the researchers’ interest was to further their careers. One former child combatant observed: ‘We feel like animals in the zoo, people come to talk to us, but our plight remains the same’. These concerns raised an added moral dilemma relating not just to the issue of value interference, but to the responsibility of the researcher to the respondents, particularly minors and young people who had experienced both physical and emotional abuse at the hands of the state (and its agents) as well as adjuncts of civil society.
Diplomats who participated in various peace talks or served as advisors in any capacity have reinvigorated the diplomatic networks of their countries of origin, and their own networks. Consultants must have made money, and marketed their consultancy skills for new job opportunities. I contend that there has always been the tendency of considering ‘upper-level war-profiteers’ as the only ones profiting from the war, undermining how things play out on a micro-level. War-profiteering goes beyond monetary gains — it encompasses fame, change in social status; academic, professional and diplomatic achievement to mention a few.
There is a third category of war-profiteers which I call ‘grassroots war-profiteers’. This category comprises inhabitants who have seen a remarkable improvement in their living conditions as a result of the war. According to some of these war- profiteers, the betterment of their living conditions would have been a mirage without the war owing to pre-war entrenched structural inequalities between Americo-Liberians and indigenous population on the one hand, and between indigenous groups on the other hand (Gershoni, 1996; Osaghae, 1996; Weissman,
1996; Mekenkamp, et al., 1999). For instance, in Liberia there were former child- soldiers from poor families before the war who acquired or furthered their formal education as a result of the Disarmament, Demobilization and Rehabilitation and Reintegration (DDRR) process after the war. The following interview excerpts from some Liberian young veterans84 attest to this:
For my own interpretation the DDRR process was good for me, it helped us to go far in school. My parents can say today they have a child who is in high school. I am satisfied with that. (Author’s interview with Enfant, 2010)
I usually tell my friends that if you want to go far in life, the medicine is going to school. So far, I can see myself in school today. I can say that my dreams are fulfilled. (Author’s interview with Martine, 2010) I have decided and my focus is to do peace and conflict studies up to the level that I can do it. My major focus is to work in conflict-prone communities. You see my experience to see how especially communities that experience war where I can interact with ex-coms or combatants or military personnel, people who have experienced war, because I have had an experience of war and I know what it means to fight war. So my major focus of life is now is to become, I mean to learn conflict, to understand conflict from a deeper perspective and know what are the feelings and thinking of the actors of conflicts so that whenever I see a conflict situation, I will not be too much judgmental to it. I will understand the feelings of those that are involved into conflict because one thing I know is that people don’t get into conflict because they want to get into it, their feelings, their interests that can bring people into a conflict situation so my major focus is to do conflict to a higher level. I was just telling Nimi [real name withheld] that I am presently reading sociology as a big foundation and I told him I want to do peace and conflict studies as my Master’s degree and if I can pursue it even to the level at which you are I will be to glad. (Author’s interview with Petit, 2010)
I want to become a doctor because there in the war front, I was serving as a doctor. When people were wounded, or received bullet, I used my own experience to help people. So I decided to do it as a course for myself. (Author’s interview with Enfant, 2010)
In the second category of war-profiteers, I purposely left out a group I call ‘local war scholars’. These were individuals who individually or collectively could carry out some action research, or serve as gatekeepers to assist foreign researchers to
gain access to their research field. Collective action was usually undertaken through humanitarian organizations or associations they set up. They were either civilians or former fighters who perceived their assistance to foreign researchers as a moneymaking avenue.
I acknowledge the fact that local people by virtue of their knowledge of local realities are often used by researchers to gain entry into their community, but my claim here is that in war-torn countries, the craving for money is very high. Profitability from war tends to supersede other considerations. War-affected societies are often infested with opportunistic individuals or groups, be they local, national or international. Such a state of affairs calls into question the credibility and dependability of individuals who ‘volunteer’ to assist researchers.
Another huge concern this raises is that of ‘access to the real research
respondents’. For instance,young veterans (research subjects in the case of this study) were not necessarily clustered together in the post-war society, although there were areas highly concentrated with former fighters such as Santos Street. How can the researcher therefore trace and gain access to the real research subjects? Based on the field experience in Liberia and other war-affected zones, I argue that some factors need to be taken into consideration while negotiating research relationships (Maxwell, 1996) in war-torn countries.
Researchers should be cognisant of the fact that, in general, war-related statistics provided are not fixed statistics and are quite often full of inconsistencies (Peters & Laws, 2003; Wells, 2009), therefore casting doubt on the real dimension of the phenomena under study. Statistics can be provided for various reasons, most importantly in the interest of organizations that do so, and this boils down to the issue of profitability from war mentioned earlier. Every ‘war theatre’ should be perceived by researchers as a huge, attractive and at times untapped political, humanitarian and diplomatic market where complex and controversial deals are made among both local and international actors. So how researchers manoeuvre to ethically collect data appears to be a daunting task. It without doubt requires a painstaking analysis of the terrain in order to identify war-profiteers before building any credible research relationship.
The influence of war-profiteering on fieldwork should be perceived as complex reciprocal relationships characterized by direct or indirect profits including money, fame, and change in social status.
5.4 Access negotiation for data collection in war-torn zones: A multi-