Year: 2023 | Month: December | Volume 11 | Issue 2
Causes, Trends, Impacts and Resolutions of Baragoi Conflict-Samburu County Kenya: An Analysis of how the conflict has impacted on gendered identities
Rehema Zaid Obuyi
DOI:10.30954/2454-9525.02.2023.3
Abstract:
The post-cold war era continues to experience high levels of violence and instability. The focus on threats to individuals compels a shift in conflict analysis to integrate multiple perspectives. The protracted violent Samburu and Turkana conflict has been attributed to the proliferation of small arms and light weapons, political incitement, competition over scarce and diminishing water and pastures, celebration of a culture of heroism that elevates the social status of raiders, the decline of the role community elders, marginalisation by successive governments and little presence of state security. Gender relations in Baragoi is extremely unequal, Samburu women face high levels of exclusion, violence and poverty. Women serve as proxy actors in the conflict. Culture and identity continues to play a crucial role in the dynamics of the conflict. The essentialist masculine assumptions of gender roles primarily confine women as victims, war widows, or heroic mothers, which gives little room for Post Conflict Reconstruction and Development (PCRD). In this paper, the author examines how gendered identities have impacted on the causal factors, trends, impact and resolution of the conflict. To sum up the discussion the author proposes remedies to the conflict part of which includes political will to reinforce existing human rights laws and legislations as well as promotion of alternative sources of livelihood.
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