Post Architecture: Sudan’s Competitive Marketplace of Transition Management

The Sudanese transition is increasingly entangled in a number of competing mediation and facilitation initiatives of limited reach and influence. This competition provides favourable conditions for various splits within the actor groups, both on the side of the military regime and the side of the armed and the civilian opposition. In April 2023, the former has escalated to a point of an open civil war, severely risking the transition process as a whole.

Insistence on one unitary peace process by international mediators and facilitators has resulted in competition between signatories of the Juba Peace Agreement and the political framework agreement. Regional actors’ engagement with the 2021 coup regime has further undermined the prospects for a democratic transition.

As recent events in Sudan demonstrate, the quest for short-term stabilisation can fail, undermining long-term peacebuilding and democratisation and resulting in the outbreak of armed violence. A unitary approach to peace process mediation can create significant stumbling blocks for transitional progress. The reality of the post-architectural transitional landscape requires a principled, pragmatic approach that accepts the multiplicity of complementing and, at times, competing processes.