Disarmament, Demobilization, Reintegration, Repatriation and Resettlement (DDRRR) in Zimbabwe, Namibia and South Africa
Date
2006-10-26T10:43:08Z
Authors
Dzineza, Gwinyayi
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Abstract
In the past three decades several African countries including Zimbabwe, Namibia and
South Africa witnessed the disarmament, demobilization and reintegration of troops,
repatriation and resettlement of ex-combatants, refugees and/or internally displaced
people (DDRRR) in a post-conflict setting. DDRRR processes affect and are affected by
post-conflict peace building. However, current research on how DDRRR and peace
building are intertwined and how DDRRR contributes to post-conflict peace building is
still in its infancy.
This thesis is a comparative study of how the nature of armed conflict, conflict
terminating peace agreements and the conceptual, political, socio-economic and
institutional frameworks under which DDRRR occurred influenced and impacted on the
process in Zimbabwe, Namibia and South Africa. The three countries experienced
different but novel DDRRR processes. Britain and the Commonwealth played a pivotal
role in Zimbabwe’s conflict termination and immediate post-liberation struggle DDRRR.
In Namibia, DDRRR was implemented under a United Nations peacekeeping context.
DDRRR was internally originated, locally owned and state-managed in South Africa
from the early 1990s to the present. This was an accompaniment, and also a result, of a
negotiated transition to democracy following no serious military engagement.
Zimbabwe’s DDRRR was implemented during the Cold war era unlike in Namibia and
South Africa.
The study intersects these contextually different DDRRR case studies. It analyses the
country-specific DDRRR programmes and strategies and evaluates their differential
contribution to the broader peace building and reconstruction process. The thesis will
then isolate applicable and practical determinants for successful post-conflict DDRRR for
posterity based on a comparative examination of the three distinct cases.
Description
Faculty of Humanities
School of Social Sciences
0318773x
dzinesag@social.wits.ac.za
Keywords
Disarmament, Clemobization, Repatriation, Resettlement, refugees