The Scourge of Small Arms and Light Weapons In Post-Conflict Societies: A Case Study of South Sudan

Small arms and light weapons have become the new weapons of mass destruction. Their proliferation whether in war or peace time have continued to ham per human activity and development initiatives? The trend is that an end to war means the beginning of a long lasting peace. However, this is far from the truth because the continued availability and proliferation of small arms in post conflict countries has the potential to destroy lives and draw the country back to war. In many post conflict situations, the agenda is usually to disarm especially civilians without tackling issues that forced them to arm in the first place. This has caused a vicious cycle of armament and re-armament. The purpose of this study is to demonstrate that the uncontrolled presence of small arms and light weapons in post conflict South Sudan is having devastating impacts on the country, the neigh boring countries and the international community at large. The major objective of the study is to highlight the importance of tackling the core causes of why civilians arm, the impacts and the need for an integrated national, regional and international approach to the scourge of small arms and light weapons in post-conflict South Sudan. Jonglei state in South Sudan is analyzed as a case study to demonstrate how the proliferation of small arms and light weapons have contrbuted to increased inter-communal violence that has been termed to be genocidal in nature. An over view of domestic, regional and international initiatives aimed at regulating small arms proliferation is examined and how useful they have been in helping the arms situation in post conflict South Sudan. The study concludes that dealing with the problem of small arms and light weapons in post conflict countries need the resolution of the core causes of the conflict and an integrated approach since the problem transcends borders. The study involved mainly secondary collection of data. This entailed collection of information from the university's main library, resource center and internet sources for electronic journals and reports.