3071-The political economy of new slavery

Victoria Firmo-Fontan 97
to be delivered to their homes, in breach of their codes of conduct.
As the sanctions for IPTF staff convicted of having violated the United
Nations ‘zero tolerance’ policy are incumbent to their countries of
origins, they greatly differ in consequence, from involving the mere
relocation in another part of BiH for US or Jordanian staff, to being sent
home at once for German officers. 11 IPTF staff are not the only internationals
involved in sustaining the industry: in BiH brothels tend to
cluster around SFOR bases, while in Lebanon they are located within
Christian areas (euphemistically reputed within the UN ‘scene’ as having
an active nightlife) and in Pakistan within internationally friendly areas.
For the ‘internationals’ involved in the industry, blackmail can also be
a way for the nightclub owners to be informed of a forthcoming raid.
Retributive peace
The occurrence of sexual slavery in post-conflict areas is condoned
by the very individuals that should respect and apply human rights
and can therefore relate to the dynamic of retribution and lawlessness
present in this type of environment. Indeed, Bosnia-Herzegovina can be
understood as a society experiencing negative peace, whereby its people
are not fighting any more, but are not ready to share a common future.
In a similar vein, no one is inclined to acknowledge responsibility for
the onset of the war. While putting the blame onto one another for the
war, former combatants interviewed by the author invoke self-defence
when recognizing their role as fighters. In this context, peace can take
various forms, not all geared towards the invalidation of polarizations.
Indeed, the difference between negative and positive peace, the former
exclusively focusing on the absence of armed violence, and the latter
aiming at the formation of what Margalit (1999) identifies as the ‘decent
society’ lies in the polarization of populations in a post-conflict setting.
While pertaining to the ownership of responsibility or collective memory,
the successful elaboration of positive peace seeks to reduce ethnic, gender
and economic polarizations (Firmo-Fontan, 2003a). In a context such as
that of BiH, the non-ownership of collective responsibility for the development
of the conflict, rejecting a blame onto the ‘other’, whether it be
ethnic, foreign or even gendered, has led the country to rebuild itself
under the auspices of division, embodied in the partition of the country
through the Dayton Peace Accords, and illustrated in the division of
gender, classifying women as the dependant, to protect, provide for, control
and at times brutalize, and as the ‘other’, a dehumanized nemesis
trafficked and violated for the self-gratification of the dominant.