Week 4 -Assignment 1---

Running head: THE EFFECTS OF WAR 1

Assignment 1: The Effects of War and Peace on Foreign Aid

Name

Professor

SOC 300: Sociology of Developing Countries

/10/2017

THE EFFECTS OF WAR 2

Introduction

Stewart & Fitzgerald (2000) describes war as to any event that is attributed to vicious

conflicts, containing excess aggression, societal chaos, and high number of deaths. In most

occasions, war is a plan that is offset amid different groups or communities with the aim of

changing their mental hierarchy or material hierarchy of domination, whereas, peace is a situation

that is characterized by absence of hostility, violence, and death. In the year 1994, President

Juvenal Habyarimana, (a Hutu) of Rwanda died, and the Hutu thought it was the Tutsi who killed

the president; therefore they instigated war and massacred over one million innocent Tutsi and

moderate Hutu. The aftermath damages caused was huge that it required foreign assistance to

rebuild the Nation.

The positive and negative Impacts that peace and war, respectively, have on the foreign aid

distribution

Foreign aid sustains a country’s social and economic progression (Understanding

development, 2016). Peace is the steering tool that makes this relation effective. Foreign aid is

associated with exchange terms; they are either vividly or indirectly revealed between the recipient

and the donor nation. In this respect, peace avails confidentiality with between a country and its

donors. Peace exhibits a sense of firm foundation and adherence to law and order within a country.

Distribution of aid resources is efficient where peaceful mechanisms are implemented. Peaceful

environs nurture a sharing conscious among its citizens. When peace reigns, able citizens also

come in handy to provide for the less fortunate and even finance mutually-beneficial projects.

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Rwanda has since surpassed the wrath of 1950s genocide and found stability within the

government. Adoption of financial-terms structural changes that entail moving back of the public

management and privatizing public companies, has placed Rwanda in better position to negotiate

with international financial lenders. Terms and consensus of these negotiations have advocated for

concentration in developing Rwanda’s infrastructure benefiting the aggregate economy and

citizens overcoming the poor living circumstances. Peace reconstruction in Rwanda has fostered

its tourism essence as well. Nonetheless, from a political point of view, donors propose that

necessary economic reforms are needed to stabilize the socio-political situation

Negative effects

War is injurious to nation’s progression since it inhibits all economic and social activities

a countries embarks on (Straus, 2013). A aided nation is at the brink of collapse when war engulfs.

Distraction of infrastructure that encompasses foreign aid is counter-productive. Foreign relation

with international trade partners dissolve on war. Inner facet that thrive the economy, especially

the tourism sector is affected immensely by domestic war. War depicts instability of a nation.

Foreign aiders will not get in any terms with shaky governments. Where foreign aid is already

implemented, on eventualities of war, terms and conditions are dishonored by the stakeholders.

Crippling economy and suffering citizens provoked the international community to quickly

come up with a plan to rebuild Rwanda by giving vast amounts of foreign aid; Rwanda has been

recorded to having highest amount ever of foreign assistance in the sub-Saharan nations. The

international community had guilt that haunted them for failing to prevent the loss of many lives

and appointing of Hutus to the highest positions in government, for example, the President and the

Prime minister were all Hutus. The ethnic conflicts did not disappear with the extermination, and

THE EFFECTS OF WAR 4

that has endangered the fight against poverty (Hagmann & Reyntjens, 2016). Evidence from

available resources has shown that below the economic plans of the government, antagonism is

still prevalent that historically backed ethnic violence and led to genocide. It has contributed to

striking high-income dissimilarities that portray biased plans against the Hutu, from the look of

things it obvious reflect the situations of the late 1950s that sent to exile ancestors of the present

Tutsi Elites.

Leadership initiative

The provision of aid to third world countries has caused the governments to become

complacent and reluctant to help themselves (Thompson, 2007). After getting aids these

governments start to become unruly and retreat economic reform they do very little when it is

helping the people in need. Nonetheless, such governments raise great discontentment and

reproach, with the nation pacifying the benefactors by assuring the aid a new. To ensure peace

stability in Rwanda; Donors like the IMF are working closely with Rwandese leaders to prevent

recurrence of war by advocating for democracy, fighting against tribalism and corruptions. If

democracy is achieved Rwandese would get a chance to elect their leaders through fair and just

elections. Fighting tribalism and corruption will spearhead equal distribution of quality resources

and therefore peace.

Impacts of foreign aid extension on warfare and poverty reduction in Rwanda

It's been many years since the Rwanda genocide, but the country is still experiencing

tyranny. Despite foreign aid tireless fighting to eliminate poverty and poor living conditions, it has

also caused crises between the smaller group, the elite, Tutsis in control while deliberately

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restricting the progression and economic growth of the vastly and more significant population of

the Hutus.

The international community continues to help Rwanda, therefore, deliberately and

involuntarily preferring Tutsis over Hutus. The Tutsi are few in Rwanda are the ones running the

government and occupying the best places in the cities whereas the Hutu who are the majority live

in rural areas. According to Sullivan (2008), the provided aids only reaches the minority group.

It's purported that the on-going president of Rwanda is afraid that his power is endangered by the

Hutus, therefore subjecting the Hutus living in rural areas to poor conditions.

Aid is also viewed as a vessel that creates and ensures long-lasting peace in Rwanda and

many other third countries struggling with war, though the specific process to accomplishing this

has rarely been sure, experts have argued that developed nations and its people are less likely to

fight. For this reason, Rwanda has been handled as an exceptional case by global institutions like

the World Bank and IMF and offers her with individual loans even though it does not meet the

IMF criterion. Rwanda is making immense progress in the process of governance and economic

reforms, and it is sending its army to Congo for peacekeeping missions.

Donor countries usually have their terms they enter an agreement on terms to be followed

by both groups (Hagmann & Reyntjens, 2016). In most cases, the donor country or organization

promises to offer aid depending on the recipient’s devotion and adherence to the promises.

Recipients often pledges to work towards achieving democracy, reduce military expenditures and

fight corruption. Rwanda is not excused from such pledges and contributors have always continued

aiding her both politically and economically.

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Conclusion

To create peace in Rwanda, it's essential to break down a sequence of a long-term elite rule

of the Tutsi and provision of aid. It's evident that the existing government does not concur with

this thought and aid delivery only reaches selected few, while the majority languishing in poverty

causing grudges among communities. The 1994 genocide-scarred Rwanda and a repeat of that

should not be allowed to happen. The current government should make it its duty, to ensure

resources donated by government and foreign donors should include all citizens of Rwanda

regardless of tribe and social status. This way Rwanda will be able to fight poverty and poor living

conditions, and donors also need to revisit its aids and policies to ensure funds reach all the

intended recipients.

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References

Hagmann, T., & Reyntjens, F. (Eds.). (2016). Aid and authoritarianism in Africa: development

without democracy. Zed Books Ltd..

Straus, S. (2013). The order of genocide: Race, power, and war in Rwanda. Cornell University

Press.

Sullivan, A. (2008), Rwanda: a nation with a dark past and tenuous future, The McGill

Tribune, 4 mars.

Stewart, F., & Fitzgerald, V. (Eds.). (2000). War and Underdevelopment: Volume II: Country

Experiences (Vol. 2). Queen Elizabeth House Series

Thompson, A. (Ed.). (2007). The media and the Rwanda genocide. IDRC.

Understanding development (4th ed.). (2016). Asheville, NC: Soomo Learning. Available

from: http://www.webtexts.com.

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