Externally driven, state-focused peace initiatives often have little success in reducing violence and ending war. As such, understanding the activities and dilemmas of civil society (CS) during war is pivotal. Building on mounting criticism of mainstream peacebuilding as imposing a top-down set of essentially Western, state-centric solutions, a recent ‘local turn’ in peace and conflict studies has argued that peace processes need to be based on local agencies and bottom-up processes. However, much remains unclear about how bottom-up peacebuilding works. In Yemen, the role of CS is shaped and constrained by the complex reality of war. The potential of CS to act as an agent of peace is severely curtailed in circumstances of violent conflict, limiting the space for operation and timeframes for action. Under such circumstances, freedom of expression does not exist and CSOs are largely unable to hold the government and other warring parties accountable for their actions. Local CSOs are critical of international donors, who’s foreign aid money is often encapsulated in a politicized CS. Furthermore, the accountability, transparency and governance of CSOs also represents its own challenges. Distrust among CSOs, between CSOs and political actors, between CSOs and donors, and between CSOs and citizens, is extremely high. It is thus not possible to speak of ‘Yemeni CS’ as a whole or discuss its role in peacebuilding as if it were a singular actor, as much of the literature on these topics suggests. CS in Yemen, therefore, cannot be seen apart from the political conflict; it is part and parcel of it. The ‘civil’ values promoted by donors sit uncomfortably with the political realities in the war-torn country. Even worse, the flexibly of CSOs allows for their misuse by political actors on different sides of the conflict, who create their own CSOs by adopting labels that are fashionable with donors, such as ‘peacebuilding’ and ‘humanitarian aid’, to tap into donor funds.
The results of this study suggest that bottom-up peacebuilding with CS is more difficult than expected and that donors need to seek alternative solutions in conflicted states. Preventing co-optation by the political elite requires ‘deep’ knowledge of local (family-tribal and social class) structures. Such alternative solutions may well entail working with different local counterparts, such as e-activists and traditional and community leaders. The role of these actors has hardly been studied within the Yemeni setting; more knowledge about their activities and potential could benefit efforts to address the drivers and consequences of the war. Approaching CS more like a public sphere, rather than focusing only on established organizations, could help researchers and donors alike to broaden their focus and seek out-of-the-box approaches to the dramatic and complex problems faced by war-torn countries such as Yemen.
Through my expanded research in this field, I found out that humanitarian aid is being used as a weapon of war for power and financial gain, and thus is a contributing factor in the continuation of the conflict. The solution means of restoring donor confidence and dealing with some of the issues is to provide cash aid rather than food aid. When NGOs are unable to distribute food aid successfully, some of the funds could be transferred to cash. This could be more traceable, efficient, and transparent. There are, of course, challenges in adopting cash transfers, such as how transferable the practices in other countries are to countries in conflict. Yemen would make a useful case study if this policy was adopted.
Moosa Elayah
Dr. Moosa Elayah is a Professor (Assistant) in International Development, Peacebuilding and Conflict Studies, Doha Institute for Graduate Studies (Qatar). Investigating the role of the nonviolent actors in a violent situation is his active research agenda, focusing on Yemen, Syria, and Libya but also looking at many examples of other conflicted countries. He is the author of the book “Europe and the MENA Region – Media Reporting, Conflict Resolution, and Peacebuilding” Palgrave Macmillan, Cham, 2022.
 during war is pivotal. Building on mounting criticism of mainstream peacebuilding as imposing a top-down set of essentially Western, state-centric solutions, a recent ‘local turn’ in peace and conflict studies has argued that peace processes need to be based on local agencies and bottom-up processes.){kind=link}