From “Peacekept” to Peacekeeper: Seeking International Status by Narrating New Identities

Abstract

This article examines how post-conflict states attempt to increase international status by transforming their identities from “peacekept” to “peacekeepers.” It focuses on the discursive side of identity construction and increases understanding of how post-conflict troop contributing countries (PCTCC) seek status on the international arena not only by “doing” peacekeeping but also by “narrating” their roles and identities as peacekeepers. A comparative case study of two PCTCC, Burundi and Rwanda, is used to illustrate the argument. By analyzing official discourses from the two cases through a theoretical framework, which combines social identity theory with narrative approaches, it is first argued that PCTCC seek status and a new identity through peacekeeping contribution in part, to underline their sovereignty and safeguard their domestic affairs from outside interference. Second, to successfully seek status, the narratives need to show coherence and be co-constituted by other international actors. The analysis underlines post-conflict states’ agency in identity construction and peacekeeping as an international practice to acquire status and legitimacy in international relations.

Resumen

Este artículo examina cómo los Estados en posconflicto intentan mejorar su estatus internacional cambiando sus identidades de “guardianes de la paz” a “pacificadores”. Se centra en la vertiente discursiva de la construcción de la identidad y permite entender cómo los países en posconflicto que aportan tropas (post-conflict troop contributing countries, PCTCC) buscan conseguir un estatus en la escena internacional no solo “practicando” el mantenimiento de la paz, sino también “narrando” sus funciones e identidades de pacificadores. Para demostrar este argumento se emplea un caso de estudio comparativo de dos PCTCC: Burundi y Ruanda. Al analizar los discursos oficiales de ambos casos a través de un marco teórico que combina la teoría de la identidad social con un enfoque narrativo, se plantea, en primer lugar, que los PCTCC buscan conseguir un estatus y una nueva identidad contribuyendo parcialmente al mantenimiento de la paz para destacar su soberanía y para evitar la interferencia exterior en sus asuntos internos. En segundo lugar, el análisis enfatiza el papel de los Estados en posconflicto en la construcción de su identidad y el mantenimiento de la paz como práctica internacional para adquirir un estatus y legitimidad en las relaciones internacionales.

Résumé

Cet article examine la manière dont les États post-conflit essaient d'améliorer leur statut international en transformant leur identité « peacekept » en « peacekeepers » . Il se concentre sur l'aspect discursif de la construction d'identité et aide à mieux comprendre comment les troupes postconflit contribuant aux pays cherchent à acquérir un statut sur la scène internationale, non seulement en « exerçant » le maintien de la paix, mais aussi en « discourant » sur leurs rôles et leurs identités en tant que « mainteneurs de la paix ». Une étude de cas comparative de deux troupes post-conflit contribuant aux pays, celles du Burundi et du Rwanda, est utilisée pour illustrer le débat. Cette analyse examine les discours officiels issus des deux cas en se basant sur un cadre théorique qui allie théorie de l'identité sociale et approche discursive. Elle soutient d'une part que les troupes post-conflit contribuant aux pays cherchent à acquérir un statut et une nouvelle identité en partie par le biais de leur contribution au maintien de la paix, l'objectif étant de souligner leur souveraineté et de protéger leurs affaires nationales contre les interférences extérieures. Puis, elle souligne d'autre part l'agentivité des États post-conflit dans la construction d'identité et le maintien de la paix, l'exploitation de cette agentivité constituant une pratique internationale visant à acquérir un statut et une légitimité dans les relations internationales.

During the last two decades, peacekeeping has seen an upsurge of troop contributions from Southern states, including relatively recent post-conflict states (Bobrow and Boyer 1997; Cunliffe 2009; Gailbulleov, Sandler, and Shimizu 2009; Albrecht and Haenlein 2015; Kathman and Melin 2017). The reasons for these states’ interest in becoming peacekeepers are various and context-specific (Bellamy and Williams 2013), but it seems clear that their involvement in peacekeeping serves at least two interests: first, the material and financial benefits that come with troop contribution, and second, a new status and identity on the international arena. Previous research has given significant attention to the material benefits associated with peacekeeping contribution, detailing lucrative pre-deployment formations; beneficial deals related to security sector equipment; and important financial influx due to comparatively generous allowances (Bove and Leandro 2011; Firsing 2014; de Waal 2015; Wilén, Ambrosetti, and Birantamije 2015; Jowell 2018).

Considerably less research has examined the construction of a new identity as a peacekeeper for the post-conflict state (Beswick 2010; Fisher 2012, Kühnel-Larsen and Wilén 2018). Yet, for post-conflict states especially, this new engagement in peacekeeping signifies an important symbolic departure from “peacekept” to “peacekeeper” and a will to reenter the international scene as strategic actors in search of a higher status (de Waal, 2015). The discursive aspect of constructing an identity as a peacekeeper is, therefore, crucial to explore in an effort to understand how new peacekeepers seek status not only by “doing” peacekeeping but also by “narrating” their roles and identities as peacekeepers.

In this article, I examine and compare how two post-conflict peacekeepers, Rwanda and Burundi, have attempted to seek status on the international arena by transforming their identities from “peacekept” to “peacekeepers.” I focus on the discursive side of this identity construction and attempt to increase understanding of how post-conflict troop contributing countries (PCTCC) seek status on the international arena by creating new, narratives, which frame their identities as legitimate, sovereign states on the global scene. As such, I showcase post-conflict states’ agency in reconstructing their identities (Somers 1994). Post-conflict states’ focus on peacekeeping troop contribution also allows them to develop and equip their militaries for purposes of peace rather than war. It legitimizes, therefore, states’ focus and investment in the armed forces, while letting them benefit from the moral legitimacy that comes with the role of a peacekeeper.

I put forward two main arguments: First, some PCTCC seek status and a new identity through peacekeeping contribution to showcase their sovereignty and safeguard their domestic affairs from outside interference. Creating a new morally legitimate identity as a “soldier of diplomacy” (Coulon 1998), and a “good regional citizen” (Jourde 2007, 493), makes it more likely that international partners and donors will overlook undemocratic and repressive domestic behavior for example (Victor 2010, 221). Clearly, PCTCC are already sovereign states, yet, to underline a state's sovereignty and legitimacy is more important in instances where the latter could be questioned (Jeffrey 2013, 2), such as in a post-conflict context where the state has been subject to external interventions like peace operations. By changing identity from a peacekept to a peacekeeper, the PCTCC increases its status and makes clear that it is no longer subject to external interference, thereby reaffirming its sovereignty.

Second, post-conflict states attempt to transform their identities from “peacekept” to “peacekeepers” as a status-seeking strategy not only by contributing troops to multilateral peace operations but also by actively promoting their actions discursively to form a new, dominant, national narrative. They do, in other words, show significant agency in their own identity construction (Somers 1994). Essential for the success of this discursive identity transformation from peacekept to peacekeeper are two factors: coherence and co-constitution. A coherent, uncomplicated story line, which builds on elements already familiar to the general public, is essential in enabling a narrative to achieve and maintain prominence (Autesserre 2012, 5). Equally important is that the chosen audiences for the narratives accept and consequently co-constitute them (Jeffrey 2013, 21; Squire et al. 2014, 16). In other words, it is important that international partners accept the narratives and see the new peacekeepers as potential security partners with whom they can sustain a relationship (Fisher 2012; Firsing 2014, 49).

These arguments question, albeit do not invalidate, the “democratic diversionary peacekeeping” (DDP) strand, which suggests that participation in peacekeeping stimulates democracy in peacekeeper-contributing states (see Cunliffe 2018). From a policy perspective, the findings show that when an international organization, such as the UN or the African Union (AU), accepts states’ troop contributions to peace operations, it also confers a certain international legitimacy and status upon that state. Subsequently, external actors may be more reluctant to comment on—or interfere in—the domestic affairs of the troop contributing country (TCC). The new identity also makes it convenient for external actors who do not want to interfere, in spite of media pressure for example, as it gives them a fig leaf behind which they can justify their lack of action. Table 1 illustrates former “peacekept” states, which have become AU/UN peacekeepers after, or while, having hosted a peace operation.

Theoretically, an analytical framework that marries social identity theory and narrative analysis is developed (Tajfel and Turner 1979; Tajfel 1982; Hansen, 2006; Welch Larson and Shevchenko 2010; Andrews, Kinvall, and Monroe 2015). By bringing together analytical concepts such as identity, narrative, and social creativity, the framework enables a better understanding of how state officials promote and integrate new roles as peacekeepers in official narratives in an effort to reconstruct identity and seek status. It also highlights the importance of analyzing status as an important incentive for actions and behavior in global governance (Welch Larson and Shevchenko 2010, 66). The analysis is context-specific, in the sense that contemporary events and developments, both international and national, impact on, and are influenced by, states’ agency. From a theoretical standpoint, the article underlines post-conflict states’ agency and social creativity in constructing dominant narratives, which have an actual impact on behaviors in international relations. In addition, it showcases how post-conflict actors are able to carve out space and status on an international level in spite of unfavorable domestic conditions.

The article draws upon and contributes to three research agendas. First, the article contributes to a growing research strand examining the “boomerang” effects of peacekeeping participation for the contributing state (Beswick 2010; Dwyer 2015; Wilén, Ambrosetti, and Birantamije 2015; Cunliffe 2018). Second, the article contributes to the literature on states’ status-seeking strategies and construction of identities in the international system. This field of research has seen significant development with the increasing popularity of social constructivism (Onuf 1989; Checkel 1999) and includes aspects such as states’ status seeking (Murray 2010; Welch Larson and Shevchenko 2010; Neumann and de Carvalho 2014; Wolforth et al. 2018). However, so far, studies specifically examining how peacekeeping affects states’ identities, status, and recognition on the international arena remain to a large majority individual case studies (Suzuki 2008; Beswick 2010; Kenkel 2010), which indicates a need for a comparative study. Finally, the article draws on and contributes to literature on sovereignty and intervention more generally (Biersteker and Weber 1996; Doty 1996; De Wilde and Werner 2001), but, in particular, it introduces a new perspective to this research by examining the role that peace operations can have, not only on host states’ sovereignty but also on troop contributing states’ sovereignty.

The article is organized in four parts. The first part discusses and draws out complementarities between social identity theory, status-seeking strategies, and narrative analysis, identifying the key concepts constituting the theoretical framework of the study. Thereafter, the second section outlines the different contexts of the two case studies exemplified in discourse excerpts and justifies the case selection. The following two sections focus on coherence and co-constitution in narratives in the drive to redefine a state's identity. In the conclusion, I develop the findings of the article and provide avenues for further research.

I. Using Social Creativity to Construct Identity and Gain Status

This section will construct an analytical framework by combining understandings from narrative analysis about identity construction with status-seeking management strategy from social identity theory. The aim is to show how agency, narratives, identity, audiences, and status-seeking strategies are connected and produce certain understandings about states and the system in which they take part.

Identities are about creating boundaries between groups of people, which is done by processes of positively linking or negatively differentiating (Hansen 2006, 19; Slocum-Bradley 2008, 6). People derive part of their identity from membership in various social groups, with a desire for a positive distinctiveness to be not only different from others but better (Tajfel and Turner 1979; Welch Larson and Shevchencko 2010, 67). Agency is, hence, crucial in the establishment of states’ identities, particularly so in post-conflict states, which often need to assert or solidify a specific claim to the state (Slocum-Bradley 2008, 2). In order to understand how identities are constructed, interpreted, and reinforced, we therefore need to study discourses and narratives as these are constitutive of identities.¹ Narratives are the stories that people construct to make sense of their reality (Andrews, Kinvall, and Monroe 2015, 141). Producing narratives entails selective appropriation, meaning that some events or facts are selected to be more important than others in a particular narrative (Somers 1994, 617). Narratives do not take place in a vacuum—certain actors produce them for particular audiences, who in turn choose to accept or contest them. Therefore, narratives both call on and constitute different political groups or subjects as their audiences (Jeffrey 2013, 21; Squire et al. 2014, 16).

All discourses and narratives are, of course, not accepted; some narratives are contested with counter-narratives (Squire et al. 2014, 32), or confronted with oppositional discourses with new facts, which can destabilize the construction of identities. In addition, most foreign policy makers have limitations on which policies can be promoted and which representations of identities can be articulated (Hansen 2006, 30). Foreign policy makers, therefore, need to use the resources they have (ideational or material) in order to produce and perform states’ identities. Hence, “invoked identities must tie into existing narratives and draw upon the discursive resources available within a given culture” (Slocum-Bradley 2008, 12). One of the key resources for state elites has been geopolitical narratives of the past (Jeffrey 2013, 40). As such, the context is essential in a narrative approach, as it enables the narrative to be understood (Squire et al. 2014, 6, 12). When President Paul Kagame talks about the country's dark past, we understand that he refers to the genocide, as we know the context. We also associate the discourse of Rwanda's genocide with a certain narrative, where some actors are the perpetrators, while others are the victims. This shows that this particular narrative has become dominant and institutionalized (Andrews et al. 2015, 141, 143).

State representatives narrate an identity of the state that is both relational and comparative; hence, it is associated with positive or negative value connotations (Tajfel and Turner 1979, 41). While agency is crucial in the construction of identities, during conflict and/or war, this agency is temporarily undermined by the prevailing circumstances. That is, if there are state representatives attempting to construct a particular identity of a state during war, due to the context, it is highly likely that it will be associated with negative value connotations, in spite of efforts to connect it to more positive connotations. We can, therefore, assume that during conflict, when some states are subject to external peacekeeping interventions, and thus “peacekept,” their belonging to this social category is involuntary. State representatives will most likely strive to either leave this social group or make their existing group more positively distinct once the conflict is over and a stronger agency can be resumed (Tajfel and Turner 1979, 41).

One strategy to achieve a positively distinctive identity and thereby also a different status is social creativity. This strategy entails seeking prestige in a different area than the dominant field, either by reevaluating the meaning of negative characteristics or by finding a new dimension on which their group is superior (Welch Larson and Shevchencko 2010, 73). States that have relatively recently endured internal conflicts are often incapable of competing for status with other groups of states, which are not affected by conflict, on common dimensions such as military resources, economic strength, and technological development. Yet, by hailing their experience of conflict as something valuable for peacekeeping, post-conflict peacekeepers can both re-evaluate the negative connotations of their previous identity, and gain status on the international scene without entering into turf battles with dominant groups of states on other, more common dimensions. At the same time, the state rises from the identity of the “peacekept” to that of a “peacekeeper,” thereby emphasizing its own sovereignty in a similar way to which Campell has identified hierarchies drawn from the paradigm of sovereignty, which establish both the boundaries and the conduct of (inter)national politics, such as order/disorder and stability/anarchy (Campell 1992, 66).

Case Selection, Method, and Material

This article puts forward a theoretical argument that is empirically illustrated with a comparative case study. Burundi and Rwanda have been chosen as the two cases for the comparison. Three reasons are behind the choice of these cases: first, they have both contributed significant numbers of troops to multilateral peace operations following the end of their respective conflicts, constituting what de Waal has termed “new peacekeepers” (de Waal 2015). Since 2004, Rwanda has deployed approximately five thousand troops on an annual basis to the UN missions in Darfur (UNMIS and UNMISS)² and is one of UN's top-ten troop contributing states. Burundi has deployed a similar figure of troops to the AU’s mission in Somalia (AMISOM), since 2007, and is one of the top-troop contributing states to the AU. Second, both countries can be defined as post-conflict and formerly peacekept states. Rwanda's civil war, which ended in genocide in 1994 and approximately eight hundred thousand victims, was subject to a UN peacekeeping operation (UNAMIR)³ arriving in 1993. Burundi's civil war, which lasted 10 years, between 1993 and 2003, resulted in over two hundred thousand victims and prompted both an AU intervention (AMIB)⁴ in 2003 and a UN mission (ONUB)⁵ in 2004.

Third, while the countries share several similarities, their conflict and post-conflict trajectories have been radically different. Both states have roughly the same population figures; they are similar in geographical size and have the same type of colonial heritage (Lemarchand 1970, 2). In addition, they share the same ethnic composition, population density, religion, language, and history and have both experienced ethnically tainted incidents of mass killings throughout the postcolonial period (Uvin 1999, 253). These similarities notwithstanding, the “two-egg twins” (Vandeginste 2014, 2) have had markedly different civil wars and peacebuilding processes. There is, for example, an important difference between genocidal violence, which Rwanda experienced, and other forms of civil war violence, which Burundi experienced. As Ingelaere and Verpoorten explain: “Genocidal violence is a specific form of group-selective violence to the extent that the violence communicates to the victims that the ability of their group to survive and reproduce is to be destroyed” (Ingelaere and Verpoorten 2020, 522). The weight of the Rwandan genocide, in both practical and symbolical terms, should therefore not be underestimated in the comparison.

In spite of these differences, both states have succeeded in underlining their sovereignty in the post-conflict period and have, therefore, avoided external interference. As such, the cases could be understood as being part of a most different system design where the aim is to compare the identity constructions and explain how both states have strategically used their peacekeeping identities to build status and avoid external interference during their post-conflict trajectories. Another PCTCC that also would be interesting to analyze is Ethiopia, which has risen to the very top of UN troop contributors during the past decade and which currently (2021) is experiencing domestic armed conflict, yet given the similarities between Rwanda and Burundi, as mentioned above, I found them to be more relevant for a comparative analysis here.

Narrative research involves working with the existing narrative material and analyzing, categorizing, and interpreting it. Hansen suggests that texts should meet three criteria: one, they are characterized by the clear articulation of identities and policies; two, they are widely read; and three, they have the formal authority to define a political position (Hansen 2006, 83–85). Following these guidelines, I have chosen to analyze Rwanda and Burundi's annual addresses in the UN's General Assembly (UNGA). For the case of Rwanda, I have examined the addresses to the UNGA between the years of 2000 and 2016 (sixteen speeches), while for Burundi I have analyzed UNGA addresses between 2005 and 2016 (twelve speeches). I have only covered the period when the current presidents were in power, hence the different time spans covered by my analysis. In addition, I have analyzed all of Rwanda's statements during its period as a non permanent member of the UN Security Council (UNSC) between 2013 and 2014. I have paid particular attention to thirty-one of those, although all of these are not equally pertinent for the purpose of this study. As Burundi has not been a UNSC member and as the records of the AU Peace and Security Council (PSC) discussions are not public, a similar selection could not be made for Burundi. Instead, I have chosen to focus on twelve official speeches or addresses made by the Burundian government during the period from 2005 to 2018.⁶ Taken together, more than seventy-two speeches are analyzed.

The selection of texts and speeches analyzed for the cases are hence not identical, neither with regard to the context in which they are pronounced nor in terms of number. Yet, they do correspond to Hansen's criteria and they also make it possible to examine intertextuality (Kristeva 1980). This way, it is possible to see how linked narratives stretch across social situations and time (Squire et al. 2014, 12). The choice to mainly analyze discourses made to international audiences is a conscious one, as the aim is to primarily examine how state officials attempt to narrate new identities on the international, rather than the national, scene.

Analyzing the discourses, I have searched for common themes, words and topics and formulations, which assert strong positions about specific issues. In particular, I have paid attention to the wording related to the previous conflict and to troop contributions to peace operations. Within the body of speeches, key texts have emerged in the narrative analysis, which have been frequently quoted and function as nodes (Hansen 2006, 82). These key texts are also the ones that most clearly articulate strong standpoints and marks of identity. Three notable differences between the two cases were identified, namely the context in which they have been produced and reproduced, their coherence, and their co-constituency.

II. Identifying Contexts—Speaking from Where?

This section portrays the context in which the main actors speak in order to provide an understanding of where they come from, what they mean, and how their discourses echo this in various ways. Starting with Rwanda, I select a few key events as especially important for the identity construction: This includes the 1994 genocide, the Rwandan Patriotic Front's (RPF) role in ending the genocide, and Rwanda's involvement in peace operations. For Burundi, I have chosen to focus on the multiplicity of actors involved in the peace process, Burundi's tensions with the UN, and the decision to contribute troops.

Heroes and Victims—Guilt and Genocide in Rwanda

In Rwanda, the genocide that killed approximately eight hundred thousand people in hundred days ended as the RPF defeated the Hutu regime in the summer of 1994. The genocide attracted a lot of international attention while it lasted, yet in spite of the enormous number of casualties and extreme brutality, the international community did not intervene until it was too late (Barnett 1997). The RPF and its leader Paul Kagame were, therefore, able to cement an almost untouchable legitimacy as they took credit for ending the genocide (Wilén 2012).

The genocide has become a source of legitimacy and the victim status a green card to avoid condemnation for Rwanda's internal and external politics. As Mannergren Selimovic notes, “victimhood in itself is a powerful platform from which to make political and moral claims” (Selimovic 2013, 341). Simultaneously, it is used as a tool to remind external actors of their guilt (Reyntjens 2004, 199). Selective commemoration events and state-initiated programs of forgiveness/pardon are frequent and highly mediatized, making it impossible not only to forget but also, in a certain way, to move on (Buckley-Zistely, 2006). The categories “victim” and “hero” thus characterize the narrative that is used both by the Rwandan government and by international actors. This way, Rwanda's government also manages to underscore the passivity of the international community during the genocide. This narrative is visible in and through the Rwandan discourses at the UN and has been repeated on numerous occasions. In his first speech at the UNSC in 1994, Paul Kagame set the precedent and drew the frame for the narrative that was to be developed and built upon during years to come:

The world will never forget the tragedy that struck our country, the worst to befall the human race since the Holocaust. We took our courage in our hands and fought to stop the genocide. Our thanks go to the Rwandese people, who stood almost alone….⁷

The topic of the genocide and the lack of response from the international community is a narrative that was repeated and reinforced in the majority of Rwandan officials’ speeches following 1994:

…in 1994 while the United Nations had a huge political and military presence in Rwanda, it watched without taking action the planning and implementation of genocide.⁸

By repeating this relatively simple narrative, which highlights both the Rwandan peoples’ role in ending the violence and the UN's inability in doing so, the Rwandan leaders have managed to construct a dominant narrative. It has indeed become so established that the texts no longer need to make detailed constructions of identity around the topic in later discourses (Hansen 2006, 44). It does not mean, however, that the narrative is uncontested, yet this narrative enables Rwanda to adopt a dual identity as both a victim and a hero. The Rwandan people are victims of the genocide, yet they are simultaneously the heroes as they, alone, were able to end it. Using social creativity to draw on its negative past, the identity is thus constructed both by the process of positively linking the Rwandan leaders and its people to the notion of heroes and victims and by differentiating Rwanda from the international, passive actors who did not act. The narrative, therefore, enables Rwanda to more easily integrate its new role as a peacekeeper (hero), which saves people in need (victims), in coming discourses.

Rwanda's first troop deployments to Darfur in Sudan fit well into the Rwandan narrative of “victims” and “heroes.” Ten years after the end of the Rwandan genocide, the government decided to deploy 155 troops to the African Union Mission in Sudan (AMIS). A year later, a military observer was sent to the UN mission in Sudan UNMIS (Kühnel-Larsen 2015, 211), and in January 2008 when AMIS was replaced by the hybrid UNAMID, Rwanda's contribution attained an unprecedented peak of 2,984 troops, with 2,656 in Darfur (Beswick 2010, 744). Since then, Rwanda's contribution of troops to international peace operations has only increased, making it the second largest contributor to UN peacekeeping in March 2021 with a total of 6,335 personnel deployed.

Rwanda's first troop contribution arrived just after the US Congress had described the violence in Sudan as genocide, which enabled the Rwandan regime to reinforce and reproduce its narrative as a “hero,” while at the same time underlining the international community's passivity and noncommitment to prevent another genocide (Beswick 2010). Rwanda's troop contribution also made it possible for the Rwandan regime to move from being “peacekept” to being a “peacekeeper,” clearly marking its entrance to not only the peacekeeping arena but the international scene in general:

Rwanda is contributing/…/to all the peace processes underway in our region and other areas of Africa/…/my Government did not hesitate to respond to the appeal of the African Union regarding Darfur and sent a military mission to contribute to the efforts/…/We feel that the international community also needs to engage in some soul-searching…and to re-examine its responses to crisis situations such as the genocide of 1994 in Rwanda.⁹

This extract includes two different positions that reinforce the construction of the Rwandan narrative: first, Rwanda is contributing to peace in the region by sending troops to Darfur, a region that, as mentioned before, has been associated with genocidal violence and, second, there is a condemnation of the international community's lack of response to the genocide in Rwanda. Through this excerpt, there is thus both a process of differentiation from the international community's passivity and an association to the notion of hero through their action.

Multiple Actors and Protracted Peace Process in Burundi

Burundi has had a different conflict and post-conflict trajectory than Rwanda. First, although Burundi has had its own share of mass killings and an early genocide in 1972 (Lemarchand 1996), its internal conflict, which started in 1993, received relatively little media attention. Yet, while Burundi's conflict may not have been mediatized to the same extent as the Rwandan genocide, it soon became the focus for international peacekeeping efforts, much due to the fears of another genocide in the region. While Rwanda became the “donor darling” without the external peacebuilding presence in the country, Burundi, surnamed “aid orphan” (Curtis 2015, 1367), quickly became a laboratory for different external attempts of peacebuilding, starting with regional sanctions, to be followed by the deployment of the AU’s first peace operation and later a UN operation (Boshoff, Vrey, and Rautenbach 2010.

Burundi was also chosen as one of the first two target states for the newly established UN Peacebuilding Commission, providing significant financial assistance to rebuild the state. Yet, the relationship between the government and the UN has remained tense, where the former has repeatedly emphasized its sovereignty in a bid to avoid foreign interference (Wilén 2012). In 2007, the UN was forced to replace the five-thousand six hundred strong peacekeeping mission ONUB (UN Operation in Burundi) by a smaller civilian mission after a demand from the Nkurunziza government. The declaration of four high UN representatives as persona non grata is another example of the edgy relationship between the UN and Burundi (Wilén, Ambrosetti, and Birantamije 2015). This tension has, however, not been manifested in Burundi's speeches at the UNGA until the crisis of 2015, as we will see later. Instead, these discourses picture the Burundi government's efforts to rebuild the country, diminish poverty, and ameliorate health and education but also contain continuous demands for financial support from the international community to realize the goals. In his first speech at the UNGA, President Nkurunziza set the frame for the Burundian narrative:

Our country has just taken an important step in its history…after more than ten years of war and a long transition period, the main actors in the conflict have agreed to bury the hatchet. The highlight of this long process has been the free, pluralist, honest and transparent elections.

…we have already taken the decision to make education for all children at the primary level free, starting with the new school year 2005-2006.

Financial resources are necessary and we know that we can count on the International Community/…/the support of the International Community in this difficult period is crucial.¹⁰

The insistence on the government's effort to increase education opportunities is consistently exemplified by the free education for primary school. The other message is the government's need for financial support from the international community to continue with these efforts, which is repeated in various forms over the coming decade. The identity that the Burundian government is creating is, therefore, more difficult to discern than in the Rwandan case. The Burundian government wants to link itself positively to efforts of peacebuilding and eradicating poverty, but it also needs financial assistance to do this. This is an ambivalent stance. On the one hand, Burundi links itself to progress and wants to emphasize its sovereignty (including its desire to wean itself off foreign presence), while on the other hand it explicitly displays its need of foreign aid and thus its dependency.

Burundi's attempt at constructing an identity took on a new dimension once it became a TCC. Burundi's decision to contribute troops arrived in the middle of its own externally supported Security Sector Reform (SSR) in 2007. The deployment of troops brought many benefits to the Burundian government. Among the most rapid and visible benefits was the possibility to slow down the forced demobilization of soldiers and ex-rebels from the new army. This made it possible for the government to calm down tensions within the army while at the same time it received a welcome financial influx from the soldiers’ allowances (Wilén, Ambrosetti, and Birantamije 2015). However, it was still difficult for the Burundian government to mobilize the label of “peacekeeper” at this point, as Burundi itself was still “peacekept.” The failed implementation of the ceasefire agreement with the last rebel group FNL-PALIPEHUTU had resulted in a fragile security situation, which necessitated the deployment of South African troops to Burundi. Burundi was thus simultaneously a “peacekept” and a “peacekeeping” country but was keen to emphasize its “peacekeeping status” from the start, which is shown in the discourses from 2007 onward:

Burundi has decided to bring a modest contribution to the resolution of certain of these crises by providing/…/military peacekeeping contingents to the peace operations put in place by the African Union in Somalia.¹¹

From 2007, there is thus a new facet of Burundi's identity: that of Burundi as a peacekeeper. Quite rapidly after 2007, Burundi increased the number of troops contributed to AMISOM in Somalia and expanded its contribution to other states. However, contrary to Rwanda who portrays its contribution as a lesson learned from the failure of the international community to intervene, Burundi emphasizes its involvement as both solidarity with other states in crises and as a favor returned to the international community for its support to Burundi:

[T]he willingness of the Burundian people to lend a helping hand to the other suffering people is in proportion to the support that they have obtained themselves to recover peace and security, approximately ten years ago.¹²

There is thus a difference between the approach the two states take. Although both use social creativity to increase their status through troop contribution, Rwanda does this by differentiating itself from the international community's passivity while Burundi positively links its image to the solidarity of the international community. Their different approaches reflect hence their distinct conflict trajectories and relationships with external actors.

III. The Importance of a Coherent Narrative

The importance of an uncomplicated story line, which builds on elements already familiar to the general public, is essential in enabling a narrative achieve and maintain prominence (Autesserre 2012, 5). In other words, coherent, simple narratives are more likely to be reproduced, not only by the main actor but also by the audience(s). This explains why narratives are understood as most powerful when they are seen as natural or given (Andrews, Kinnvall, and Monroe 2015, 143). Certain stories resonate more, in particular those that: “assign the cause of the problems to ‘the deliberate actions of identifiable individuals’; when they include ‘bodily harm to vulnerable individuals’, especially when there is a short and clear causal chain assigning responsibility” (Autesserre 2012, 6).

Rwanda's Coherent and Simple Narrative

Rwanda's leaders have managed to construct a convincing and coherent narrative related to its national identity, which has been reproduced and reinforced by various actors. The narrative contains easily identifiable perpetrators who have caused severe bodily harm to identifiable victims. The ethnic dichotomy between Tutsis and Hutus has reinforced this simplicity and coherence, which the Rwandan government has been keen to maintain: in later discourses qualifying the genocide as a genocide against Tutsis, rather than as a genocide against Tutsis and moderate Hutus (Hintjens 2008, 23–24).¹³ In an address at the UNSC, this was emphasized:

I would like to recall…that genocide was committed against the Tutsi…we believe that the use of such terminology… is of paramount importance, since it contributes to the fight against genocide deniers, who misuse the term “Rwandan genocide” in an attempt to confuse the world as to who were the targets of that genocide.¹⁴

Rwanda's peacekeeping role can, therefore, latch on to a preexisting narrative, which makes it more likely to become dominant (Autesserre 2012, 6). The new peacekeeping role is the proof that Rwanda differentiates itself from the international community—the Other—and actively attempts to stop conflicts and wars (Hansen 2006, 39). Rwanda positively links itself with those who want to take responsibility and prevent conflicts and wars by openly supporting a conditional understanding of sovereignty through its embrace of the responsibility to protect (R2P) doctrine and the notion of protection of civilians (PoC). Rwandan leaders also clearly want to demarcate themselves from UN's passivity:

My Government welcomes the endorsement of the “responsibility to protect”/…/Will there be lengthy academic and legal debates on what constitutes genocide or crimes against humanity, while people die?/…/What is clear to us is that no nation or people should have to face the horrors that we faced 11 years ago. Where a State is unable or unwilling to protect its people, as was the case in Rwanda in 1994, then the responsibility to provide such protection should — and indeed must — shift immediately to the international community.¹⁵

By emphasizing clearly what Rwanda's identity is not—passive and unable to react in the face of horrors like a genocide—while simultaneously linking Rwanda positively to active engagement in peacekeeping, Rwandan leaders make sure to maintain a clear and coherent narrative that is easy to understand, reproduce, and reinforce.

A Less Coherent and More Complex Narrative in Burundi

By contrast, Burundi has struggled to produce a convincing, coherent narrative that engages the audience to reproduce it. While the annual speeches in the UNGA do showcase significant intertextuality—in particular, with regard to the government's efforts at diminishing poverty and improving health care—they are still pale in comparison with the Rwandan discourses. An observation worth mentioning is that while President Kagame has delivered eleven out of the seventeen General Assembly speeches, President Nkurunziza has only held three out of twelve, leaving the others to various ministers and vice presidents. The importance of a national “father figure” should not be underestimated when analyzing the coherence of narratives and the construction of identities.

In the annual UNGA speeches, the Burundian leaders continuously evoke the same topics, which, apart from those mentioned above, are the Burundian government's efforts to create peace, the promotion of women's rights in Burundi, the success of free and fair elections, and demands for more support and financial aid from donors. From 2007 onward, the emphasis is put on Burundi's role as a peacekeeper. These discourses present intertextuality in the sense that they draw upon other texts to establish legitimacy and authority for their constructions of identity and foreign policy (Hansen 2006, 12). Yet, the identity that they construct remains somewhat difficult to grasp, let alone reproduce. While Burundi has also experienced horrible violence, the absence of genocidal violence during the civil war makes it less distinctive from other wars. There are rarely references to the conflict itself, and where Rwandan leaders hammer the message of the horrors in Rwanda and the lack of an external engagement, Burundian leaders continuously start each speech by thanking various international actors for their participation in Burundi's peace process:

Our gratitude goes to the Peacebuilding Commission, BINUB, the EU, the Regional Initiative, South Africa for its efforts to restore peace, now real and we hope irreversible in Burundi.¹⁶

The Burundian identity centers on the narrative of a government, which tries and succeeds at rebuilding a post-conflict state, with considerable foreign aid. As attractive as this identity may be, it lacks emotive strength and, moreover, it lacks negative differentiation. There is hardly any speech that would refer to what Burundi is not, in other words a distinct Other. Whereas in Rwanda, there is a clear differentiation process both vis-à-vis the international community at large and the UN in particular, such a process is absent in the Burundian speeches up until the recent crisis of 2015. The Burundian identity is, therefore, mostly constructed by creating narratives of positive linking to its peacebuilding efforts and, from 2007 onward, to its role as a peacekeeper.

Just as in Rwanda, Burundian leaders at times talk about fighting terrorism and at times about building peace, while referring to the same peace operations—instances where the Burundian government actually does differentiate itself from what it is not:

Fight against terrorism needs to continue with more determination. To match words with deeds, since 2007 Burundi has sent troops to fight terrorism and violent extremism in many parts of the world/…/Our continued presence in Somalia is predicated on the ironclad commitment of Burundi against terrorism, in full solidarity with our brothers and sisters on the continent and beyond.¹⁷

The adoption of the terrorism discourse is strategic and not surprising. Both governments have decided to label its own domestic/border political fight as one against terrorists, which confirms Campell's argument that the processes implicated in a state's identity emphasize the exclusionary practices, the discourses of danger, and the representations of fear (Campell 1992, 70). Yet, while Rwanda insists on the conditionality of sovereignty and the R2P, Burundi emphasizes on the contrary, the importance of sovereignty, even in instances of peace operations. However, the focus is on Burundi’s sovereignty rather than the target state(s) for peace operations. In Nkurunziza's message to the nation a year after the 2015 elections, he made the link between the peacekeeping efforts and sovereignty explicit:

As for the Peacekeeping Missions in other countries, Burundi will continue to respond to appeals by the international community whenever this proves necessary, with dignity and always requesting respect for our sovereignty.¹⁸

For both Burundi and Rwanda, troop contribution to peace operations has thus become essential to their national narratives. However, while Rwanda has a coherent preexisting narrative backing up its involvement, which is further reinforced through Rwanda's commitment to R2P, Burundi's narrative is less coherent, with a strong emphasis on sovereignty when it comes to its own, internal affairs, whereas little is said about other states’ sovereignty. This is most likely linked to Burundi's tense relations with donors and international institutions, which are analyzed in the next section dealing with the co-constituency of narratives.

IV. Constructing Identities Together: The Co-Constituency and Strategic Use of Narratives

Narratives are dialogic, involving an ongoing exchange between narrators and their audiences. The creation of a narrative is, therefore, a co-construction between the narrator, the audiences, and the media in which the narrative appears (Squire et al. 2014, 24). Policy discourses are hence inherently social as they address different audiences to institutionalize their understanding of identities (Hansen 2006, 1). The construction of narratives and identities, therefore, becomes an intersubjective exercise, whereby the narrator needs to choose the appropriate audience that is likely to accept and integrate the narrative as it is—without engaging in opposing or contesting discourses. Narrative construction can also include tangible strategies such as engaging with and lobbying actors in Western states such as journalists, NGO, and policy institute personnel (Fisher 2013, 544). Here again, there is a clear difference between Rwanda and Burundi, where Kagame has become known to Western audiences through a number of interviews and speeches at prestigious institutes in the United States and the United Kingdom (Fisher 2013, 555), while Nkurunziza has remained an anonymous figure for the general Western public, avoiding engaging with the international community at large.

Rwanda: Choosing the Right Audience

Rwandan leaders have constructed a coherent and simple narrative that has been reproduced by academics, media, and international institutions over the past decades. In addition, Rwandan leaders have maintained roughly similar speeches each year at the General Assembly and the UNSC without having to resort to what Hansen has called “reaction on a sliding scale of decreasing responsiveness” (Hansen 2006, 33). In other words, the Rwandan government has never radically changed its discourse despite contradictory empirical practices and contending discourses but has stuck to its main narrative over the years. In particular, Rwandan leaders have been keen to both protect and use its double hero/victim narrative as a strategic tool to distract attention from some of its “less heroic” actions, which have risked destabilizing its new identity (Hansen 2006, 32). Below, I examine three empirical examples of when Rwandan leaders have resorted to its new narrative for strategic reasons, which have resulted in different responses from international community actors.

In July 2008, the UN, pushed by the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) and Spain, tried to convince Rwanda to replace the then UNAMID deputy force commander Karenzi Karake who was accused of war crimes in the DRC committed in the mid-1990s. Rwanda was asked by the UN to nominate another person for the post, but it rejected the UN request and publicly threatened to withdraw its three thousand troops from Sudan in an unsigned memo addressed to the UN (Lynch 2008a). Rwanda's position was supported by the United States and resulted in the UN retreating its demand and even extending Karenzi's tenure (Lynch 2008b; Kühnel-Larsen 2015, 227). Here, Rwandan leaders directed their threat to the UN but addressed the international community at large. An ideal audience, in the shape of the US administration, accepted the discourse and supported the Rwandan government openly, putting pressure on the UN to back down on its demand, which it did. The US administration thus made sure to legitimize Rwanda's threat and thereby helped to reinforce and reproduce the Rwandan narrative.

A second event that destabilized the Rwandan official narrative was the publication of a UN report in 2010, mapping human rights violations perpetuated by, among others, the RPF, in the DRC between 1993 and 2003 (OHCHR 2010). The UN report explicitly exposes the Rwandan regime's responsibility in destabilizing the Great Lakes region through interventions into the DRC, which, as the report documents, entailed massive human rights abuses. In addition, it accuses Kigali of supporting acts of genocide against Hutus in the east of the DRC. Such an international exposure of deliberate wrongdoings is obviously damaging to the Rwandan attempt to gain more status through peacekeeping efforts, especially accusations related to genocidal violence, which destabilize Rwanda's narrative about stopping, rather than supporting, genocide.

Hansen suggests that a government can choose between three different ways to react to such an oppositional discourse: significantly change its policy-identity construction to accommodate the oppositional; acknowledge facts but explain them within the existing discursive framework; or pass by the facts in silence (Hansen 2006, 32). However, none of these categories can account for the Rwandan government's reaction. The Rwandan Foreign Affairs Minister sent a letter to the UN Secretary General in August 2010, stating:

Attempts to take actions on this report – either through its release or leaks in the media – will force us to withdraw from Rwanda's various commitments to the United Nations, especially in the area of peacekeeping (Mushikiwabo 2010).

Once again, Rwandan leaders resorted to their role as a peacekeeper to bargain with the UN and protect its own narrative. This was in line with Kagame's previous strategy regarding the interventions in the Congo, whereby he legitimized the interventions by referring to the international community's failure to act against potential future genocides (Fisher 2013, 555). Somewhat surprisingly, given the overwhelming evidence in the report against RPF, the threat worked again. The UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon flew out to meet with President Kagame on September 7–9 the same year, which resulted in a subsequent delay of the release of the report to October 1, with the possibility for Rwanda to add comments to it (BBC News 2010). In addition, there has not been any follow-up regarding the accusations of genocide and war crimes, proving that although destabilized, Rwanda's strategic use of its narrative worked to protect its new identity (Liégeois and Deltenre 2017, 429).

The third incident relates to the release of the controversial BBC documentary “Rwanda: the untold story” in 2014, which questioned both the number of victims and the ethnic identity of the victims and, to some degree, the perpetrators. It thus risked to further destabilize the simple narrative that Rwandan authorities had worked hard to create and maintain that legitimized the Rwandan government's victim status and helped to distract from its interventions in the DRC. Yet, this time, the BBC documentary came at a sensitive time for Rwanda, as it had been accused of creating and supporting the rebel group M23 in the east of the DRC since 2012. Even Rwanda's key ally, the United States, put pressure on the authorities and withdrew military support, thereby severely shaking Rwanda's status as a peacekeeper in the region (Smith 2013). Rwandan authorities eventually withdrew support from the rebel group, which suffered a military defeat against the DRC and the UN.

In an effort to maintain and protect its narrative from further destabilization, the Rwandan government mobilized significant support from academics and experts and attempted to discredit the documentary makers and the persons interviewed in the program. Simultaneously, it used media to condemn BBC for broadcasting the documentary in the first place (The Guardian 2015). By showing this documentary, the BBC threatened the cohesive conception of Rwanda's (supposedly) collective memories and questioned the Rwandan government's political legitimacy (Andrews, Kinnvall, and Monroe 2015,144). In addition, confirming social identity theory assumptions, the Rwandan government's display of anger was intended to restore its status (Welch Larson and Shevchenko, 2010, 70). While the documentary was broadcast despite Kigali's complaints, the intense media campaign against it sowed doubt about its credibility and managed to, at least partially, protect Rwanda's narrative.

Burundi: Tensions Impede Smooth Co-Constitution

The lack of a coherent Burundian narrative in combination with slow post-conflict reconstruction has made it difficult for international audiences to accept Burundi's new identity as a peacekeeper and grant it a higher status. It is possible to identify a tension in Burundian leaders’ speeches since the mid-2000s between Burundi's heavy dependence on external support and its clear stance against foreign interference in its domestic affairs. This tension has been visible in demands by the Burundian government to change, replace, or decide an ending date for UN missions present in the country and, more recently, its reluctance to accept an AU peace operation and a UN police mission (Wilén and Williams 2018). Yet, in public speeches, the tone has remained cordial and diplomatic up until the crisis starting in 2015.

During the crisis in Burundi that followed the President's bid for a third term in 2015, this tension between the government's narrative of Burundi as an independent country, on the one hand, and the international community's renewed demands for more supervision and interference in Burundi's domestic affairs, on the other, has come to a head. Few international actors have been willing to accept the Burundian administration's narrative, which has led to increasingly assertive discourses on the part of Burundi. For example, in reference to Burundi's Constitutional Court decision that President Nkurunziza's third-term bid was legal, the country's 2015 address to the General Assembly stated, “[e]verybody knows that the interpretation of a state's internal laws, such as the Constitution, falls within the state's jurisdiction. It is also a reflection of the sovereignty of any independent country.”¹⁹ In later discourses, the tone is harsher:

For Burundi to be respected and listened to by the international community, it was not enough that the colonisers went back home. Not at all…we had continue to develop our sovereignty.²⁰

It was not until Burundi used the “peacekeeper card” that it began to convince its own ideal audience, the AU, to support its narrative. At first, in response to the 2015 crisis, the AU’s PSC decided to propose a new form of coercive diplomacy to threaten Nkurunziza's regime in an attempt to kick-start the mediation process and protect civilians caught up in the violence (Williams 2015). The coercive diplomacy consisted of the PSC threatening to launch a five thousand strong peacekeeping force to protect civilians in Burundi and giving Nkurunziza's government ninety-six hours to consent to the operation or face the scenario of the AU deploying the force anyway under Article 4(h) of the AU Constitutive Act.²¹

Nkurunziza's government swiftly rejected the AU's peacekeepers after a rapid parliament debate and claimed that any deployment of foreign troops would “jeopardize the country's sovereignty” (Bloomberg 2015). The parliament even added a statement with reference to Burundi's role as a peacekeeper by saying that Burundi's security forces are “recognized worldwide for their professionalism” (Bloomberg 2015), trying to turn the attention toward the army's capacity to maintain order domestically, rather than the political crisis that was the main reason for the AU's intervention. This was clearly a successful move: the AU backed down from its threat following Burundi's rejection and instead suggested the much less intrusive option of dispatching a high-level delegation to Burundi for consultations.²² Burundi's narrative on sovereignty thus struck a chord with the AU members who accepted it and momentarily co-constituted the Burundian independence narrative, which might be linked to African states’ common colonial history.

If Burundi managed to at least temporarily co-constitute a narrative with the AU as the audience, it proved to be harder with the UN. In the 2016 address to the UNGA, Burundi adopted a new, aggressive “we and them” stance with regard to the reform of the UNSC where “we” referred to African states in general and “them” to other members of the UN:

If more than 70% of the situations under consideration by the Council come from Africa, it is not too much asking that the so-called penholders be some African countries, especially in light of the biased perception of Africa, entertained by some former colonial masters, sitting in the Council.²³

It became clear that Burundi no longer asked for approval from the UN but from the African states, thus attempting to positively link its identity to Africa while distancing it from the UN and the West in general. This was evident in the many complaints that Burundi evoked with regard to the UN and, in particular, with reference to UNSC resolution 2303, which authorized the deployment of 228 police officers to Burundi:

Burundi was shocked by the surprise and non-consensual manner in which it was adopted. While consultations did not lead to approval of the proposal made by the penholder, some members of the Council thought it wise to put Burundi before a fait accompli.²⁴

The tone was particularly harsh at the end of the address where a new reference to Burundi's sovereignty was made:

Foreign interferences in the affairs of Burundi are absolutely not welcome because, even if some still have difficulties to understand it, Burundi flies its flag of a sovereign state, since July 1^st 1962.²⁵

What is perhaps the most interesting in this reaffirmation of Burundi's sovereignty in time of internal turmoil is the continuous emphasis of Burundi's commitment as an international peacekeeper. While Burundi rejects foreign peacekeepers on its own soil, it has no qualms against sending its own peacekeepers to other states. In fact, it has refused to withdraw its peacekeepers although members of the civil society have voiced claims for the return of peacekeepers through social media (Memorandum 2016). In February 2019, when Burundi was asked to withdraw approximately one thousand peacekeepers from AMISOM in line with the overall draw-down plan, the government protested the decision and threatened to withdraw all of its troops from Somalia (Nimubona 2019). This example once again shows the importance that Burundi places in its peacekeeper identity. The reason for this is obvious: in this latest crisis, it becomes evident that the “peacekeeping identity” has been a successful strategy of reinforcing Burundi's sovereignty against external interference.

Concluding Discussion

This article has examined how leaders for post-conflict states have adopted social creativity as a status-seeking strategy to alter their national identities from “peacekept” to “peacekeeper.” The analysis has shown that the adoption of a new identity is significantly easier if there is a preexisting, coherent, and dominant narrative to which the new identity can latch on. Rwanda's preexisting narrative with clear dichotomies between ethnicities, perpetrators versus victims and heroes versus passive actors represents such a case. The integration of its peacekeeping status fits into the narrative of the Rwandan government not only as a hero, but also with its foreign policy support for conditional sovereignty, coined in the concept of the “responsibility to protect.” This narrative has also been co-constituted by diverse audiences, although Rwanda's destabilizing practices in the region have weakened it substantially.

In discursive terms, Rwanda's identity construction is convincing, not only because of its coherent and co-constituted character but moreover because of its endurance over time, space, and in relation to other narratives. Rwandan leaders have made a strong case of linking Rwanda positively to certain images, such as hero and victim, while making sure to differentiate it from others, such as passivity, incorporated in the international community. By showing both what it is and what it is not, Rwanda's leaders narrow down the interpretative space for Rwanda's identity. The leaders’ version of identity is reinforced not only through its reproduction across time and context, but also by the fact that strong audiences, such as the United States and the United Kingdom, have bought into the narratives.

Burundian leaders’ narrative construction has been more complex and incoherent than the Rwandan case. In spite of considerable intertextuality in the discourses analyzed, no story emerges, no particular events are selected as the nodes for a coherent narrative, and no simple time line is offered. Instead, Burundian leaders display a sprawling and tense narrative, which is symbolized by the clash between Burundi's heavy dependency on foreign aid and the leaders’ insistence on Burundi's independence. This tension has become more prominent during the recent crisis. The integration of a new role to its identity has, therefore, been of vital importance to Burundi. By discarding its status as “peacekept” and becoming a “peacekeeper,” Burundi has taken a step toward more independence and less dependence on foreign aid—the troops’ allowances contribute significant financial resources.

The focus on this new role in Burundi's discourses should thus be understood against the background of a state that needs a dominant narrative to constitute its identity. In spite of its incoherent narrative, recent events, including the AU's and the UN's decisions not to intervene in Burundi in spite of the crisis, show that the Burundian government has still managed to use its peacekeeping identity in a strategic way to safeguard its domestic affairs against external interference. Of course, it is impossible to predict the outcome in a counterfactual scenario where Burundi was not a strong troop contributor, yet given the strong emphasis that Burundi's leaders have placed on its peacekeeping role in speeches that simultaneously have emphasized its sovereignty and lack of need for an external intervention, it seems plausible to assume that it has been a crucial factor amounting to safeguarding Burundi's domestic affairs from foreign interference.

Both Rwanda and Burundi have attempted to transform their identities from peacekept to peacekeeper by both “doing” and “narrating” their roles as peacekeepers. Both state leaders have also used their new narratives strategically as bargaining chips on the international arena when under pressure for either past or present transgressions, with varying degrees of success. Rwanda's destabilizing role in the region at large stands in stark tension with its narrative as a peacekeeper, just as Burundi's domestic troubles discredit its peacekeeping identity. These similarities notwithstanding, Rwanda's genocide has made its narrative and new identity resonate stronger with international actors—in part because of the uniqueness of the horrors of a genocide and in part because of the shame associated with the passivity of the international community.

Drawing the findings to a more general level, there are several post-conflict states that have attempted to use social creativity to create a new national identity narrative. Ethiopia, Uganda, and Chad are only a few other examples of post-conflict states that have become troop contributors. They are also governed by rebels-turned-politicians with clear authoritarian undertones and strong resistance against external influence in their internal affairs (Jones, de Oliveira, and Verhoeven 2013; Fisher and Andersen 2015). Similarly, they profit heavily from their new identity and status as peacekeepers—and when it is more convenient—as counterterrorist actors, which are legitimate security partners for international partners and donors (Fisher 2012, 2013; de Waal 2015). However, it is important to underline that all post-conflict peacekeepers are not ruled by authoritarian governments with the aim to reinforce their sovereignty. Sierra Leone is albeit one example of a former “peacekept” state that has become a “peacekeeper” in a democratic political environment (Albrecht and Haenlein 2015).

Theoretically, this analysis has provided a new framework marrying social identity theory with status-seeking strategies and narrative analysis to enable a deeper examination of how post-conflict states exercise agency to create new identities and acquire a higher status. It has, therefore, also contributed to the literature that underlines the African state agency within the international system (see Bayart 2000). The phenomenon of post-conflict states acquiring status and a new identity as peacekeepers is, however, not limited to the African continent. Research on Fiji and Nepal's participation in peacekeeping suggests that these states have also used their new peacekeeping identity as a means to achieve status and leverage in the international arena (see Siegel and Feast 2014; Sotomayor 2014; Adhikari 2020). Likewise, India and Pakistan have hosted UN missions (United Nations Military Observer Group in India and Pakistan (UNMOGIP) and United Nations India-Pakistan Observation Mission (UNIPOM)) due to their border conflicts yet are more known for their heavy troop contributions to UN peace operations. More research is needed on both the material and the discursive aspects that accompany peacekeeping contribution to enable a broader overview and a deeper understanding of the phenomenon of identity transformation from “peacekept” to “peacekeeper.”

UN Documents cited:

United Nations Security Council (1994) S/PV.3481, December 15.

United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) (2000) A/55/PV/4, September 6.

UNGA (2004) A/59/PV.4, September 21.

UNGA (2005) A/60/PV.12, September 18.

UNGA (2005) A/60/PV.6, September 19.

UNGA (2007) A/62/PV.9, September 27.

UNGA (2009) A/64/PV.9, September 26.

UNGA (2012) A/67/PV.13, September 27.

UNGA (2015) A/70/PV.23, October 1.

UNGA (2016) A/71/PV. September 24.

Footnotes

Acknowledgments

The author is very grateful to Jonathan D. Caverley, Philippe Cunliffe, Andrea Filip, Jonathan Fisher, Martin Hall, Marco Jowell, Nicolas Lemay-Hebert, Johanna Mannergren-Selimovic, Kseniya Oksamytna, and participants in many different workshops who have given useful comments on different versions of this article during the past five years.

Notes

Nina Wilén is an Associate Professor at the Department of Political Science at Lund University, Sweden, and the Director for the Africa program at the Egmont Institute of International Relations, Belgium. Her research interests include conflict resolutions and peace processes more generally and more specifically the role of gender and the military in peace processes.

References

Appendix

Selected Burundian Government's speeches in chronological order, all accessed via the website: Droit, pouvoir et paix au Burundi, available at:

https://www.uantwerpen.be/en/projects/centre-des-grands-lacs-afrique/droit-pouvoir-paix-burundi/

Discours présenté par le nouveau Président de la république, son excellence (SE) Pierre Nkurunziza, à l'occasion de son investiture officielle, Bujumbura, August 26, 2005.

Discours du Président Pierre Nkurunziza à l'occasion de la célébration du 58ème anniversaire de la déclaration universelle des droits de l'homme, Bubanza, December 20, 2006.

Discours de SE honorable le président de la république du Burundi à l'occasion de l'inauguration du Bureau Intégré des Nations Unies au Burundi (BINUB), February 20, 2007.

Message à la nation de SE Pierre Nkurunziza au lendemain de la mise en place du gouvernement en début de son second mandat de cinq ans à la tête du Burundi, September 2, 2010.

Discours de SE le Président Pierre Nkurunziza à l'occasion de la remise du prix de la paix “Etoile Rayonnant d'Afrique” lui décerné par la Fondation Internationale de l'Unité, September 14, 2010.

Discours de SE Pierre Nkurunziza au 3ème Sommet Afrique – Monde Arabe, November 20, 2013.

Interview with RFI, ‘N° 1 burundais s'exprime depuis Paris sur les sujets brûlants de l'actualité’, June 5, 2014.

Discours de SE Pierre Nkurunziza, Président de la république à l'occasion de l'ouverture de l'année académique 2014-2015 à l'ISCAM, March 25, 2015.

Memorandum of his excellency Pierre Nkurunziza, President of the Republic of Burundi, on the current situation in Burundi, 13th Extraordinary summit of heads of state, Dar Es Salaam, Tanzania, May 13, 2015.

Discours du 2e Vice Président Dr. Joseph Butore lors de la session à huis-clos du Conseil de Paix et Sécurité de l'UA sur la situation au Burundi, February 2, 2016.

Discours de SE Pierre Nkurunziza, Président de la république à l'occasion de la célébration du 54ème anniversaire de l'indépendance du Burundi, July 1, 2016.

Discours de S.E.M. Pierre Nkurunziza, Président de la République du Burundi après la promulgation de la nouvelle Constitution de la République du Burundi, June 7, 2018.

Nkurunziza P. 2018 Message to the Nation by HE Pierre Nkurunziza on the Occasion of the 1st Anniversary of His Inauguration July 21. Accessed September 21, 2016 http://www.burundi.gov.bi/spip.php?article1357.