The Stalemate Pattern

This chapter examines the stalemate pattern of counter-peace, which is characterised by frozen conflict, in which violence has been circumscribed and dampened down to a bare minimum but inter-group tensions persist unabated. In this stalemate pattern there is a weak alliance between civil society and international donors and multilateral actors within the IPA. The fragile peace and stalled conflict resolution processes tend to be captured by a range of legal, political, economic, and geopolitical co-dependencies, which are finely balanced but block both progress as well as the collapse of the stalemate. While stalemates have often remained in a state of negative peace for decades, shifting geopolitical power in the emerging multipolar order are threatening further destabilisation.