Managing Ethnic Conflict in Darfur: An Analysis of Third-Party Interventions

Abstract

Persistent ethnic conflict in Darfur has been met by third-party interventions with varying degrees of success. This paper seeks to isolate different methods of intervention in order to understand what types are effective in reducing the number of people affected by violence caused by ethnic conflict. Each intervention is separated into three categories based on their nature: humanitarian, militaristic, and diplomatic. These actions are then juxtaposed with data from medical journals that describe the effects of violence, including death by violence, death by disease, and child mortality rates. The success of an intervention is measured by its ability to reduce the number of people negatively affected by the violence. This analysis suggests that diplomatic intervention has a positive effect on reducing the death toll in Darfur, while humanitarian and diplomatic interventions produce ambiguous results. The results are significant in their ability to shed light on effective methods by which to alleviate one of the worst humanitarian crises of the 21st century