Robust or bust? Exploring UN troop contributors’ willingness to accept risk

Why do some Blue Helmets accept risk to protect civilians from violence? To alleviate civilian suffering in armed conflict, United Nations peace operations are mandated to protect civilians from physical violence. In extremis, providing protection will demand the use of military force. Military interventions to save civilians from violent perpetrators may include considerable risk-taking for troops on the ground. Most UN troop contributors are unwilling to take such risks. They commonly shy away from using force altogether, failing to respond when civilians are under threat, or responding too late when civilians already have been attacked. Puzzlingly, despite the overwhelmingly reluctant approach to save strangers from harm, a few countries stand out as less risk averse. Some troop contributors employ pro-active military operations to protect civilians; deploy military capabilities suited to deter or coerce perpetrators of violence; and develop robust guidelines to increase UN troops’ effectiveness in protecting civilians. Interestingly, it seems that “new” troop contributing countries display this trait more strongly. Existing scholarship provides few clues to explain why some of these newcomers accept more risk to deliver on UN peace operations’ key priority. Building on new and unique data we describe UN military protection operations across time and place, highlighting key features of how force is used to protect and what types of threats civilians (and UN troops) have encountered in armed conflicts in Africa. Building on this deeper understanding of risk, we develop an exploratory comparative case study of Rwanda and Mongolia in South Sudan, to “new” contributors to UN peace operations willing to accept significant risk to protect civilians. Based on online interviews with key personnel in Kigali and Ulanbataar, and field work in South Sudan, we identify common traits that seem to induce a more forward-leading approach to protection operations, as well as country specific variations. We end by deriving consequences for future studies of variations amongst troop contributors in how they relate to risk and what this means for the effectiveness of UN military protection operations.