Summary of the impact

The analysis and evaluation of the performance of the Aceh Monitoring Mission (AMM) by Dr. Kirsten E. Schulze, an expert on the contemporary history of the Aceh conflict in Indonesia, contributed in four main ways to the improvement of EU peacekeeping missions and the adoption of a human security doctrine. Firstly, changes were made to the composition of peacekeeping missions to achieve a greater gender balance. Secondly, the training and preparation of external civilian security missions were altered with respect to greater gender sensitivity in the field. Thirdly, the AMM evaluation has, alongside other evaluations of European Security and Defence Policy (ESPD) missions, become part of the material studied by practitioners when undertaking training at the European Crisis Management Centre in Finland, which has also prepared a manual based on this research. Finally, and more generally, the research on the AMM (and other evaluations of ESPD missions) has served as the basis for devising a specifically European approach to security within the framework of the human security doctrine outlined in the September 2004 Barcelona Report.

Underpinning research

Research Insights and Outputs:

After the fall of President Suharto in 1998 and the end of 30 years of military rule, Dr. Schulze started working on conflict in Indonesia, including the Aceh conflict 1976-2005 and efforts at resolving it. She has published widely on the Free Aceh Movement (GAM) [1,2], insurgency and counter-insurgency [3], and the transition from conflict to negotiations [4].

In 2005, Schulze was invited by the British Embassy in Jakarta to brief a team from the Technical Assessment Mission preparing the ground for the Aceh Monitoring Mission. Schulze was asked to brief the team on the history of the Aceh conflict, the strategies of GAM and the Indonesian military, and past efforts at resolving the conflict. She was subsequently invited to conduct an evaluation of the AMM by the EU.

Both the research and assessment of the AMM was part of a broader project on `Human Security and European Security and Defence Policy' which focused on the changing nature of security risks and led to proposals for military-civilian capabilities, guided by a set of human security principles. It was carried out from July to September 2006 in Jakarta, London and Brussels. With the exception of six interviews in Aceh in July 2006, the research on the AMM was carried out solely by Schulze.

Schulze's research on the AMM looked at the 2005 Helsinki peace process, the Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between GAM and the Indonesian Government, and the role of the AMM in monitoring the implementation of the MOU. It resulted in four publications [5,6,7,8]. The focus of the analysis was on the decommissioning of GAM weapons, the redeployment of the Indonesian security forces, the reintegration of former combatants, and the monitoring of human rights as well as the drafting of new legislation for the governance of Aceh.

The research findings showed that the AMM performed better with respect to traditional security than human security. The decommissioning of GAM weapons as well as the redeployment of the Indonesian security forces was exemplary. The reintegration of former combatants and human rights monitoring were, however, more challenging. Here the AMM's performance fell short on implementing the principle of the primacy of human rights and following a bottom-up approach to reintegration. The AMM also suffered from weaknesses in the training of its monitoring staff, gender imbalance of the monitoring teams, and gender-insensitivity in its performance in the field. Nevertheless Schulze judged that the AMM successfully achieved most of its aims. This was due to the support of the UK embassy in Jakarta as well as Sweden and Finland during the set-up phase; the leadership and impartiality of the AMM's head of mission, Pieter Feith; the quick amnesty for GAM prisoners; the Commission on Security Arrangements; and the commitment to the peace process of GAM and the Indonesian government.

Key Researcher: Dr Schulze has been at LSE since 1995.

References to the research

Evidence of Quality: Publications in peer-reviewed journals. The larger research project on Human Security was initially funded by the Caixa de Catalunya (£166,667, 2003-2005) and various European Ministries of Foreign Affairs and Defence (£66,440, 2004-2007). It led to two additional academic research grants — an ESRC seminar project involving various British universities including the Defence Academy (£18,335, 2007-2010, awarded to Mary Martin), and an Advanced Grant from the European Research Council for a five year programme on `Security in Transition'. The grant for the research on the AMM was provided by the Finnish Foreign Ministry.

Details of the impact

Dr. Schulze's research has contributed to a shift from a traditional security to a human security approach by the European Union in its external missions. The EU's human security project was initiated by then High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy Javier Solana in 2002. It brought together both practitioners and academics to develop proposals for the design of European security capabilities. In 2004 the human security study group published a report titled `A Human Security Doctrine for Europe' and in 2006 the Finnish foreign ministry asked the group to prepare a report on how the human security doctrine could be taken forward on the EU's agenda during the Finnish Presidency of the EU [A]. For this project, an evaluation of existing ESDP missions, including that of the AMM, was undertaken. Schulze's insight into three decades of conflict in Aceh provided her with the necessary historical understanding of the root causes and the dynamics of the insurgency and thus to comprehensively assess the role of the AMM. Her research and recommendations were presented at two key seminars. The first seminar on `EU Human Security' was organised by the Spanish Ministry of Defence in Madrid on 8 November 2007 and attended by Javier Solana. The second seminar on EU peace keeping missions was organised by the Stiftung Wissenschaft und Politik and the German Ministry of Defence on 29 October 2009. Both of these seminars were designed for practitioners, both government and NGO, with the aim of learning from the case studies such as the AMM and promoting the inclusion of human security principles into policy making. The reports of the human security study group, which draw upon the findings of all ESDP mission evaluations, were published on the ESDP website.

Schulze's research has influenced the broader debate within the EU on external peace keeping missions [B, D, E, F, I]. Indeed the 2007 report by the human security study group titled `A European Way of Security', which presented the findings of all of the ESPD mission evaluations including that of the AMM, saw some of its wording directly included in the Report on the Implementation of European Security Strategy of the European Council in 2008 [G]. This impact matters because a traditional security approach in peace keeping and monitoring missions has shown itself to be too limited as it focuses on the state rather than the individual. Human security, in contrast, advocates a people-centred approach with an emphasis on human rights and development. It views areas of conflict holistically and within the broader context of global stability. The shift towards adopting a human security doctrine by the EU, in particular, has been driven by the need to adopt a security policy that better reflects the peace keeping experience of its member states as well as more generally European values and views on security, human rights and development.

Schulze's research on the AMM also fed directly into both EU policy making and the policies of individual EU member states. Schulze's work had a direct impact on subsequent ESPD missions and EU external policies [I, J] as reflected in the Directorate General for External Policies of the European Parliament's CSDP Mission and Operations: Lessons learned process [C]. Schulze's research as part of the broader human security project also influenced national security strategies. In particular, the Belgian High Command has adopted a human security doctrine. Human security, as proposed by the study group, has also been included in the British stabilisation manual [H]. Overall, Schulze's assessment of the AMM made 12 recommendations for future ESDP to the EU, including: (1) to establish a rapid funding mechanism to finance the rapid response mechanism.; (2), to recruit monitors proficient in the local language in addition to the mission language.; (3) to devise a more culturally-sensitive training program as well as utilising existing programs to identify good trainers; (4) to more clearly define the human rights mandate; (5) to include more specialist staff in future missions such as a human rights adviser and a gender adviser as well as making human rights and gender issues compulsory elements of pre-deployment training; and (6) to consider a stronger role for any future mission in the reintegration process.

Schulze's recommendations to change the composition of peace keeping missions to achieve a greater gender balance and make the training of external missions more gender sensitive were addressed by the EU following the AMM evaluation [I]. It is here that Schulze's background as a historian of the Aceh conflict was particularly important. It allowed her to analyse the impact of the AMM, which had been largely constituted to deal with the decommissioning of weapons and was thus male dominated, upon a society that as result of three decades of conflict during which some 100,000 males were killed, had a large number of female headed households. The AMM, while being able to competently deal with the decommissioning of weapons, was less able to deal with the broader social issues relating to human rights, reintegration, gender relations, and the drafting of the new Law for the Governance of Aceh under the MoU, which ended up contravening EU policy on gender equality.

Finally, Schulze's assessment of the AMM as well her work on the history of the Aceh conflict has become part of the material studied by practitioners when undertaking training at the European Crisis Management Centre in Finland, which has also prepared a manual based on the research [A].

Sources to corroborate the impact

All Sources listed below can also be seen at https://apps.lse.ac.uk/impact/case_study/view/76

A. Training Manual: Human Security in Peacebuilding, 2009 Crisis Management Centre (CMC) Finland.
http://www.cmcfinland.fi/pelastus/cmc/images.nsf/files/123267531F06CC69C22576F2003487F0/$file/CMC_HumanSecurity_2009C.pdf

B. Council of the European Union, Civilian Capabilities Improvement Conference 2007, Ministerial Declaration, Brussels, 19 November 2007.
http://www.consilium.europa.eu/ueDocs/cms_Data/docs/pressData/en/esdp/97166.pdf

C. European Parliament, Directorate General for external policies, Policy Department, CSDP Mission and Operations: Lessons learned processes, 2012, page 61.
http://www.tepsa.eu/download/CSDP%20Missions%20and%20Operations-%20Lessons%20Learned%20Processes%20(DG-%20External%20Policies).pdf

D. European Union, ISS, A strategy of EU foreign policy, 2010, page
22.http://www.iss.europa.eu/uploads/media/A_strategy_for_EU_foreign_policy.pdf

E. European Commission, Proposal for a Decision of the European Parliament and of the Council on a Union Civil Protection Mechanism (Text with EEA relevance) {SEC(2011) 1630 final}{SEC(2011) 1632 final}, See article 17.
http://ec.europa.eu/echo/files/about/COM_2011_proposal-decision-CPMechanism_en.pdf

F. Council of the European Union, Council conclusions on improving civil protection through lessons learnt 3162nd Justice and Home Affairs Council meeting Luxembourg, 26 and 27 April 2012, see point 4.
http://www.consilium.europa.eu/uedocs/cms_data/docs/pressdata/en/jha/129809.pdf

G. Report on the Implementation of the European Security Strategy, Providing Security in a Changing World.
http://www.consilium.europa.eu/ueDocs/cms_Data/docs/pressdata/EN/reports/104630.pdf

H. JDP 3-40: Security and stabilisation, the military contribution.
http://www.gov.uk/government/publications/security-and-stabilisation-the-military-contribution--3

Individuals who can provide corroboration:

I. Former head of the Indonesia, Myanmar, Timor Leste Desk, Directorate General External Relations, European Commission.

J. Office of the High Representative for Common Foreign and Security Policy.