Biting the Bullet: Interrelating Early Warning to Early Action in the Continental Early Warning System of the African Union

The Continental Early Warning System of the African Union was positioned within the African Peace and Security Architecture as one of its five pillars responsible for generating early warning information for decision-makers. The gap between early warning and early action has been identified in previous studies, but it has not been given full attention and comprehensively discussed. Therefore, the overall aim of the article is to extensively examine the reasons behind the early warning and early action dichotomy and suggest operational and structural ways to close the gap. Data were qualitatively gathered through primary sources such as the African Union reports, communiqués and conference proceedings. Secondary data sources and interviews were used to accentuate the above. The article contributes to the existing literature fragments by documenting and advancing comprehensively, how the Continental Early Warning System faces a weak structural linkage between early warning, decision-makers, and early action. It outlines how the operational aperture between early warning and early action dwarfs and overlooks the contributions of the Continental Early Warning System to the African Peace and Security Architecture and suggests ways to connect early warning to early action in the Continental Early Warning System.