Dessi Bremond's Report

Msc International Relations

(Summer 2016)

Travelling to West Africa

The Royal Holloway Travel Award and the Santander Travel Award gave me the opportunity to undertake research for my master's dissertation in Guinea, Sierra Leone, and the Ivory Coast for one month and a half. I had the chance to travel to West Africa in order to conduct interviews and gather data at the Mano River Union, an intergovernmental institution, aiming at strengthening cooperation between its members. The Mano River Union was funded by Liberia and Sierra Leone in 1973 as a customs union. It was later joined by Guinea (1980) and the Ivory Coast (2008).

Map of the Mano River sub-region:

The Union's mandate has evolved with time and is now concerned not only by economic and social development but also by peace and security. The Union is evolving within heavy structural constraints, limiting its actions and preventing it from being a leader in the region in conflict stabilization. Since 2000, the organization had the institutional tools to be a mediator of internal conflicts. However, the institution had to face disputes between its leaders, intra-regional support of internal conflicts and competition with other peace-building institutions in the sub-region, denying Mano River Union's claim of uniqueness over civil war settlements. My study was done at the macro, meso and microlevel of analysis through interviews, undertaken at the Mano River Union Secretariat, and qualitative content analysis of official documents held at the Secretariat Archives in Freetown, Sierra Leone. The research aims at showing how the Mano River Union contributed to peace building in Africa, and gives a comprehensive account for how the Union's weaknesses affected cooperation between the four countries. The research account for how peace building is constructed in Africa when regional projects such as the Mano River Union have to face internal conflicts and heads of state involvement in one another civil wars.

The Mano River region is particularly known for its difficult context, underdevelopment and numerous civil wars. The sub-region was hit by several civil wars, Liberia from 1989 to 1996 and from 1999 to 2003, Sierra Leone from 1991 to 2002, Ivory Coast from 2002 to 2007 and from 2010 to 2011. Being able to conduct interviews in three of the member states gave the study a unique perspective and allowed me to get away from a Western mind-set to understand the reality on the ground, interviewees' views, opinions, experiences and feelings inside the organization. Interviews offer empirically grounded knowledge as well as first hand testimonies of the functioning of the Mano River Union, which is vital to the study. I was also allowed to watch the Ministerial Council on Security and Terrorism in the Ivory Coast, gathering ministers of Defence, Security, and Foreign Affairs as well as high-ranking officials of the four countries. This incredible experience would not have possible without the help of the Royal Holloway Travel Award and the Santander Travel Award. During this meeting we also went to Grand Bassam, near Abidjan in order to commemorate the 13 of March 2016 attacks.

Pictures of the commemoration in Grand-Bassam:

Finally, travelling to an unfamiliar continent can be challenging but it is extremely rewarding to be able to learn from others. I am grateful for the awards I received as it gave me the opportunity to travel to West Africa, embrace new cultures, new ways of life, and new types of food while understanding politics and international relations of the region.