What it is
The African Union Convention for the Protection and Assistance of Internally Displaced Persons in Africa, known as the Kampala Convention, is a binding regional treaty on internal displacement. It covers prevention, protection, assistance, obligations of states and armed groups, and durable solutions.
Governance function
The convention transforms IDP protection from soft-law guidance into binding regional legal obligation for states parties. It addresses conflict, disasters, development projects, and other causes of internal displacement.
Who is included
Internally displaced persons in states parties, people at risk of displacement, and people seeking return, local integration, or relocation may be covered by the convention's obligations.
Who is left out
People in non-party states, cross-border refugees, and people whose displacement is not recognized or recorded by domestic systems may remain outside effective protection.
Where continuity breaks
Continuity breaks when treaty obligations are not incorporated into national law, when institutions lack budgets, when local authorities lack capacity, or when IDPs cannot access remedies and services.
Why it matters
The Kampala Convention is a benchmark for legal architecture on internal displacement. It shows what stronger legal responsibility can look like, but also why law alone is insufficient without fiscal and administrative absorption. The political economy archetype is binding responsibility with implementation dependency.
Governance coding table
| Political economy archetype | Binding responsibility with implementation dependency |
|---|---|
| Responsibility | States parties carry primary obligations. The African Union, regional bodies, national institutions, armed groups, humanitarian actors, and civil society have supporting or related roles. |
| Eligibility | Eligibility depends on internal displacement status, domestic recognition, treaty incorporation, and national implementation arrangements. |
| Financing | The convention creates obligations but does not itself create a dedicated financing mechanism. Financing depends on national budgets, regional support, donor assistance, and humanitarian or development finance. |
| Data systems | IDP registries, national statistics, humanitarian assessments, disaster and conflict data, and monitoring systems shape implementation. |
| Delivery system | Delivery depends on national and local institutions, humanitarian agencies, social services, disaster systems, protection actors, and durable solutions programmes. |
| Portability | Portability depends on whether IDP documentation, assistance, land claims, civil registration, and service access follow people across displacement, return, relocation, or local integration. |
| Accountability | Accountability may include domestic courts, administrative remedies, African Union mechanisms, human rights bodies, political monitoring, and civil society advocacy. |
| Time horizon | Full displacement cycle: prevention, protection during displacement, assistance, durable solutions, and recovery. |