Alex de Waal, Crisis in the Horn of Africa

The crisis in the Horn of Africa is a regional security crisis, a humanitarian catastrophe, and represents a far-reaching challenge to multilateral norms. The wars of the region are interlocking and threaten the disintegration of Ethiopia, a state of 110 million people. The famine in Tigray, the worst in the world for nearly 40 years, is a shocking reminder that starvation is a weapon of war, which we seem reluctant to confront. The norms, principles and institutions for peace and humanitarian action at the African Union and United Nations have been found wanting. It has been a high priority for the Biden Administration, which appreciates the severity of the conflict and its likely repercussions across the entirety of the Red Sea arena—from the Persian Gulf to the Nile Valley—but has struggled to build a consensus for how to respond.

Alex de Waal is executive director of the World Peace Foundation, Research Professor at the Fletcher School, Tufts University, and Professorial Fellow at the London School of Economics. He has worked on the Horn of Africa and on humanitarian issues since the 1980s as a researcher and practitioner. He initiated the UN Commission on HIV/AIDS and Governance in Africa and was director of the AIDS, Security and Conflict Initiative and was a senior advisor to the African Union High Level Panel on Sudan and South Sudan. De Waal’s recent books include The Real Politics of the Horn of Africa: Money, War and the Business of Power (Polity 2015), Mass Starvation: The history and future of famine (Polity 2018), and New Pandemics, Old Politics: 200 years of the war on disease and its alternatives (Polity 2021).