Clear all

This report explores the important role chiefs’ courts play in food security and in addressing hunger in South Sudan by reallocating food to vulnerable community members. Their role is particularly important in view of famine and recurrent extreme food insecurity affecting South Sudan. The authors suggest that chief courts potentially offer useful data for famine early warning and responses but also underline that humanitarian actors engaging with chiefs’ courts should do so with a contextually…

Pastoralist conflicts are important global development outcomes, especially in Africa. Analysing relevant literature on this phenomenon, we identify “institutions” as a key but fragmented theme. This blurs a composite understanding of how institutions affect these conflicts and their management. Hence, this article proposes a conceptual framework that brings harmony to this discourse by analysing 172 relevant publications. The framework was then tested using evidence from interviews and policy documents collected on a typical case in…

This Report on the status of implementation of the activities of the Revitalised Agreement on the Resolution of the Conflict in the Republic of South Sudan (R-ARCSS) is prepared pursuant to Chapter VII, Article 7.9 of the R-ARCSS and covers the period 1st October to 31st December 2020. With almost a year into the Transitional Period completed, the Report highlights the decided lack of progresson the Pre-Transitional activities carried over after the initial formation of…

Last year, South Sudan reintroducted 10 subnational states in South Sudan, in place of the 32 states controversially created in 2017. Far from being an obscure matter of administrative organization, the initial, dramatic redivision of territory in the midst of protracted violence and large-scale displacement had a significant impact on representation, as well as social, economic, and political relations throughout the country. In 2018-19, researchers commissioned by USIP sought to better understand the decision-making process…

In this brief Saferworld provides a context update about the current situation in the town of Bentiu – the capital of the oil-rich Unity state. Saferworld presents safety and security challenges identified by communities, authorities and civil society such as revenge killings, cattle raiding, gender-based violence, environmental pollution and unemployment in Bentiu town and Protection of Civilian (PoC) site. Saferworld also provides recommendations for how best to address these challenges for all levels of government and communities to consider. Download

A rebellion in Equatoria, South Sudan’s southernmost region, is undermining the already troubled peace between the main belligerents in its civil war. Mediators should push for a wider compact that accommodates Equatorian grievances and includes the insurgent general in talks about the country’s political future. What’s new? Despite a 2018 deal bringing South Sudan’s main warring parties into a ceasefire and unity government, a rebellion in the southern multi-ethnic Equatoria region fights on. Its leader, Thomas…

Introduction The present report is submitted pursuant to Security Council resolution 2514 (2020), by which the Council extended the mandate of the United Nations Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) to 15 March 2021 and requested the Secretary-General to report on the implementation of the Mission’s mandate every 90 days. The report covers political and security developments, the humanitarian and human rights situation and progress towards the implementation of the Mission’s mandate since the previous report…

Despite civil war and economic crisis, the educational sector in South Sudan has made tentative gains since 2011. This paper explores the everyday governance of schools in South Sudan, and the struggles of teachers to deliver education amid violence and predation and with scarce resources. The paper presents an analysis of policy data on education coupled with the insights of researchers and teachers from seven locations in South Sudan, drawing on interviews and a dialogue…

This report explores the dynamics of local conflict and governance through the recent civil war across South Sudan, using five ‘case study’ locations: Gogrial, Malakal, Leer, Nimule, and Abyei. Evident through this research was that, while public authority – both formal and informal – and political marketplace dynamics, varied considerably across the five research sites, a number of important commonalities also emerged in some or all locations, regarding their evolving roles through the conflict(s) and…

The primary goal of this study was to establish the impacts that FDI has had on South Sudan. Based on the ethnography design, this study’s data collection approach involved a review of secondary data. The location-based approach and the institutional FDI fitness theories are the models that underpin the study. The results of the study are enlightening and intriguing. In addition to establishing that South Sudan has been unable to fully leverage FDI, the study…

Curious to broaden your search to Sudan?
Try our sister facility CSF