Policing actors and development assistance: Germany's cooperation with Tunisia in the context of police forces

Abstract

Guided by the Security Sector Reform the German police forces pursue their support abroad to establish and strengthen legitimate police counterparts through equipping and training in conjunction with the promotion of rule of law, good governance and respect of human rights. This master thesis aims to analyse and discuss to what extent the police play a role in development assistance. The examined data comprises literature reviews of case studies and official governmental papers as well as expert interviews with officials of the Federal Criminal Police Office, the Federal Police and the German Police University. On basis of a case study about the training and equipment assistance provided by the German police forces to the Tunisian counterparts in the context of Security Sector Reform will be analysed police cooperation, capacity-building and development assistance. The analysis focuses on the one hand on the rhetoric of the Federal Government and the German police actors since the 2011 uprising and in particular after the terrorist attacks in 2015, while on the other hand on the specific practice and the measures of the Federal Criminal Police Office and the Federal Police in 2019 and 2020 in Tunisia. By this twofold approach, I argue that despite the very ambitious aims of the German police to contribute to sustainable development in Tunisia, the police lack in translating their rhetoric into practice. The interrelatedness between providing security and supporting sustainable development by the police is widely acknowledged, however, it is argued that the police partly neglect the developmental aspects and favour of technical and operational skills and tools, especially in regards to the focal points border management and cross-border threats. The Federal Government has created in the context of the Security Sector Reform the interministerial approach to facilitate cooperativeness and close exchange between different sectors and agents. The instruments and tools allocated to the Federal Criminal Police Office and the Federal Police have to be extended through the direct collaboration with complementary actors to foster rule of law, good governance, human rights and civil society oversight mechanisms. By including a wider range of humanitarian and economic actors and sectors the German police can better achieve their ambitious goals of supporting other countries’ police forces as well as sustainable development on the ground rather than to counteract with prioritising operational and technical capacities and resources over institutional structures such as accountability, transparency and democratic oversight. By facilitating a cross-departmental response and a comprehensive approach, the German police can exert favourable effects on the local development in Tunisia.

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A master thesis from Aalborg University

Policing actors and development assistance: Germany's cooperation with Tunisia in the context of police forces