almost three-fourths of those end with a military victory by one side or the other. Thus, the peacekeeping
option is still a minority choice in dealing with civil
wars.
Comparisons are made across a number of different goals, focusing on four in particular: promoting
a negotiated settlement, keeping the peace after the
fighting stops, reducing battlefield and civilian casualties, and promoting democratization respectively. All
or several of these are often the core goals of the international community and peace operations in general
in the face of civil conflict. In addition, we briefly note
some other consequences that follow from the choice
to send a peacekeeping force as opposed to choosing
to wait for a decisive outcome to the fighting.
In making our evaluations, we rely on the normative standard reflected in utilitarianism, which
focuses on the outcomes or consequences of actions,
specifically the amount of harm that accrues from
the choices made.5 That is, rather than making an a
priori normative judgment, an assessment is made
based on whether the option chosen (peace operation
or do nothing) achieves the desired goals as weighed
against any negative consequences that might accrue.
Tradeoffs in Peace Operations
Promoting Conflict Resolution
In the context of an ongoing civil war, the first
choice for the United Nations, regional organizations,
and leading states is whether to authorize a peacekeeping operation in advance of some type of formal peace
agreement to halt the fighting; ideally this would also
facilitate a diplomatic settlement to the conflict.
The traditional perspective, reflecting public perceptions and those of sponsoring organizations, re3