Working Paper 23
The present paper is based on fieldwork conducted in Juba in November 2013, at a time of relative stability for the young country, compared to the events which were soon to follow. As the world knows, that stability—which was certainly already shaky at the time of our visit—completely broke down shortly thereafter, in the form of a political crisis within the governing Sudan People’s Liberation Movement (SPLM) that quickly ballooned into violence engulfing a part of the country in December 2013. The dynamics of this crisis – on-going at the time of this writing –have been extensively discussed and dissected in publications and media fora, including commentary by SLRC team members, and therefore are not addressed here. Instead, this paper presents a perspective on another crisis that long preceded the violent conflict that began in December 2013: the situation in Pibor County in southern Jonglei State, where tensions between different ethnic groups, armed non-state actors, and the national military have mixed explosively for years.
