Understanding and addressing ‘non-conflict’ violence is a key challenge for
development. Different types of ‘non-conflict’ violence, such as homicide,
massacres, armed robbery and gender-based violence, which occur outside of
armed conflict contexts involving state or other parties, are not only reflections
of social problems like youth unemployment and gang culture. They should not
be unlinked from political processes. Given the weakness of formal institutions
and the strength of hybrid political orders in most violence-affected settings in
the developing world, the political settlements approach helps to understand
the political factors that underpin and drive ‘non-conflict’ violence; and develop
policy responses that tackle the roots of the problem, not just its symptoms.UK Department for International Developmen

Schultze-Kraft, M

English

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ISSUE 81 • DECEMBER 2014
Understanding and addressing ‘non-conflict’ violence is a key challenge for 
development. Different types of ‘non-conflict’ violence, such as homicide, 
massacres, armed robbery and gender-based violence, which occur outside of 
armed conflict contexts involving state or other parties, are not only reflections 
of social problems like youth unemployment and gang culture. They should not 
be unlinked from political processes. Given the weakness of formal institutions 
and the strength of hybrid political orders in most violence-affected settings in 
the developing world, the political settlements approach helps to understand 
the political factors that underpin and drive ‘non-conflict’ violence; and develop 
policy responses that tackle the roots of the problem, not just its symptoms.
 Mitigating ‘Non-Conflict’ 
Violence by Creating Peaceful 
 Political Settlements
The big challenge: Mitigating 
‘non-conflict’ violence 
Violence mitigation – as different from armed 
conflict prevention/resolution and peace-building – 
is a growing field for research and policy. While war 
and (internal) armed conflict remain big problems 
in some countries, they have ceased to be the most 
important risk of lethal violence faced by many 
people in the developing world. Instead, other forms 
of ‘non-conflict’ and/or crime-related violence, 
such as homicide, ‘drug wars’, armed muggings, 
kidnapping, gang strife, and gender-based violence, 
have seen marked increases, particularly in parts of 
sub-Saharan Africa and South and Central America. 
Recent research highlights the dispersed, persistent 
and globalised nature of this spreading scourge. 
Commonly understood as instrumental for achieving 
private gains for violence entrepreneurs – such as 
warlords, drug traffickers and their political sponsors 
and constituencies – these ‘new’ forms of violence 
appear to be driven less than before by states and 
clearly identifiable non-state groups with political, 
revolutionary and/or social reform agendas, though 
the persistence of such agendas is not ruled out.
In this context, violence mitigation should be 
understood as a long-term process involving both 
formal (state) and informal institutions, and affected 
communities and citizens. Yet, interventions must 
not be based on the premise that ‘new’ forms 
of violence are separate from political processes 
and are mere manifestations of criminality 
or reflections of social problems, however 
entrenched and serious. The political settlements 
approach helps to guide the development of 
policies to mitigate violence and tackle the roots 
of the problem, not just its symptoms.     
Beyond ‘inclusive’ political settlements
Political settlements can be defined as – temporary – 
states of political equilibrium that result from 
processes of formal and informal bargaining, 
compromise and negotiation through which – 
contending – political actors create the institutions 
(i.e. the ‘rules of the game’) that govern society and 
the distribution of power and resources. 
A common assumption is that inclusive political 
settlements enhance the chances for political 
stability and poverty reduction, while exclusionary 
settlements are deemed to engender violence 
and block pro-poor development. The World 
Development Report 2011, for instance, refers to 
the importance of ‘inclusive-enough coalitions’ 
for enabling institutional resilience and stability 
and preventing or mitigating violence. Yet, there 
is mounting evidence that an unqualified notion 
of ‘inclusivity’ is a weak indicator for less violence-
inflected and more peaceful and development-
enhancing political settlements. 
What is needed is clear guidance on the ways in which 
violence ought to be understood as: (1) a constituent 
element of political settlements; (2) a result of the 
particular configuration and functioning of a political 
settlement; and (3) a key element in the process of 
transforming political settlements.
Violence as a constituent element of 
political settlements
Research conducted at the Institute of Development 
Studies (IDS) in four violence-affected African 
countries – Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Egypt and Kenya 
– highlights that a focus on violence in creating and 
sustaining political settlements is crucial. Violence 
plays a pivotal role in processes of formal and 
IDS POLICY BRIEFING ISSUE 81 • DECEMBER 2014 www.ids.ac.uk
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Further reading
Schultze-Kraft, M. and Hinkle, S. 
(2014) Toward Effective Violence 
Mitigation: Transforming Political 
Settlements, IDS Evidence Report 
101, Brighton: IDS 
Credits
This IDS Policy Briefing was written 
by Markus Schultze-Kraft, 
Research Fellow at the Institute 
of Development Studies (IDS). It 
draws on research by Dr Schultze-
Kraft and colleagues working in 
the IDS Addressing and Mitigating 
Violence programme, supported 
with UK aid from the UK 
Department for International 
Development. 
The opinions expressed are those 
of the author and do not 
necessarily reflect the views of 
IDS or the UK government’s 
official policies. 
Readers are encouraged to quote 
and reproduce material from the 
IDS Policy Briefing series. In return, 
IDS requests due acknowledgement 
and quotes to be referenced as 
above.
AG Level 2 Output ID: 405
© Institute of Development Studies, 2014 
ISSN 1479-974X
informal bargaining and compromise 
between political actors through which the 
institutions that govern society and the 
distribution of power and resources are 
created. Citizens themselves shape and 
break political settlements by conferring or 
withdrawing legitimacy to rulers, including 
by taking recourse to violence. 
Long-term and essentially indigenous 
processes of transforming political 
settlements in violence-affected countries and 
societies have to grapple with the (strategic) 
use of violence – or its condoning – by both 
state and non-state actors at the macro (state) 
and micro (citizen) level. The effectiveness 
of violence mitigation efforts hinges on 
the degree to which they are successful at 
taking violence out of the exercise of public 
authority and the social struggle over the 
distribution of resources and wealth. 
Such an approach stands in sharp contrast 
to common (international) peace- and 
state-building interventions that have 
tended to operate on the basis of 
established blueprints for the institutional 
recovery of conflict-ravaged countries. 
More often than not, little attention is 
paid to the question of how political and 
power relationships shape institutions 
and development outcomes – a key and 
particularly challenging issue in violence-
affected countries with weak formal 
institutions and strong (local) patrimonial 
political marketplaces.
Policy recommendations
Recognising that the transformation of political settlements to make them more 
peaceful operates at both the macro and micro levels, the insights from the IDS 
research on these four countries point to the following key policy issues:
External, international interventions
• Outside support for violence mitigation is vulnerable to exacerbating the situation 
in some cases and should therefore aim at lessening the risk factors associated 
with external involvement and interests, such as those of the transnational oil and 
mining companies. Rather than direct intervention this requires initiatives that help both 
local elites and citizen groups to build political settlements that are more peaceful 
and support development as they become less predatory and violence-inflected.
Macro or state-level interventions
• Counter-violence measures should strengthen governance in relation to natural 
resource extraction, protect the electoral/political process from violent interference, 
and bolster accountability from the local through to the central/federal levels of 
government. This would help to reign in corruption, judicial impunity, human rights 
violations and (state-sponsored) criminality, counter-balance patrimonial networks 
and remedy core problems of decentralisation or devolution reforms. 
• Interventions should be designed to operate across and between several fields of 
public policy, e.g. improving education, reducing youth unemployment, increasing 
citizen and human security, and protecting human rights.
• State security interventions should complement and support – not guide, replace 
or undermine – policies around the reintegration of demobilised fighters, militants 
and youth into economic life; building capacity among civil society and community 
and social organisations to meaningfully participate in decision-making processes 
related to local and regional development; enforcing codes of practice for resource 
extraction, such as the Extractives Industries Transparency Initiative; and controlling 
and limiting the possession, trade and use of small arms.
Citizen-centred policies 
• Policy should take systematic account of the perspectives and roles of ordinary 
citizens in forging and transforming social orders and in shaping political 
settlements, and avoid focusing foremost on influencing elite behaviour.
• Issues of justice and ‘taking control of the law’ are of particular importance to citizens 
in violence-affected communities in states with weak formal institutions. Ways to 
address this include: focusing on transitional justice, and incorporating into devolution 
policy a programme of restorative justice enhancing cooperation between formal 
and customary legal institutions (including citizen groups who are empowered to 
tackle ‘innocent killings’), targeting different forms of violence at the local level.
IDS Policy Briefings are published by 
the Institute of Development Studies 
and aim to provide high quality analysis 
and practical recommendations for 
policymakers on important 
development issues. 
To subscribe: 
www.ids.ac.uk/idspolicybriefings
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Mitigating 'Non-Conflict' Violence by Creating Peaceful Political Settlements

https://opendocs.ids.ac.uk/opendocs/bitstream/20.500.12413/5473/1/AGID405_PB81_NonConflictViolence_Online.pdf

Mitigating 'Non-Conflict' Violence by Creating Peaceful Political Settlements

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