Research and Scholarship
These are peer-reviewed scholarly works or those from well-established scholars in the fields of peacebuilding and conflict resolution. Most are important theoretical contributions to the establishment of evidence around peacemaking and war prevention.
Resource Library
Navigate through our resource library, search for the terms you are interested in and the table will populate automatically with matching results.| Title | Authors | Subject Keywords | Abstract | Link | Country Name |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| The Environment in Warfare-Related Policy Making: The case in Ukraine | Hook, Kristina and Marcantonio, Richard | Environment and conflict | In the chaotic reality of wars and armed conflicts, environmental issues are often downgraded in long lists of policy priorities. We suggest that this reality is partially driven by the simmering and subterraneous aspect of environmental risks; the long-term possibility of environmental degradation may not seize the attention of political decision-makers as intuitively as ongoing violence spikes or political turmoil. However, we also view the policy demotion of environmental risks in warzones as partially predicated on a present lack of empirically-based frameworks that rapidly-but-accurately organize the information saturation of complex crises. Taking into account the need for transferability across various geographic areas, political contexts, and case studies, we have developed a four-part assessment tool to analyze various risks by distinguishing between the environment 1) as a trigger, 2) as degraded, 3) as neglected, or 4) as a mechanism of control. While based on established scholarly findings, we introduce this tool as fulfilling an unmet, foundational policy need. To demonstrate how this tool can rapidly contextualize environmental risks, we also share previously unpublished data on Ukraine’s war-driven ongoing environmental crisis. With 11,000 people killed, 2 million internally displaced persons, and 4.4 million people in dire need of emergency humanitarian assistance (UN OCHA, 2018; UNIAN, 2018b), we conclude that environmental risks pose just as urgent a threat as the ongoing direct violence. Particularly worrying, our framework’s results illustrate how warfare in highly industrialized areas may leave harmful ecological and human security legacies for decades after active warfare concludes. | https://smallwarsjournal.com/jrnl/art/environment-warfare-related-policy-making-case-ukraine | Ukraine |
| New Paths and Policies towards Conflict Prevention: Chinese and Swiss Perspectives | Courtney J. Fung, Björn Gehrmann, Rachel F. Madenyika, Jason G. Tower | Conflict Prevention | This book explores the discourse on conflict prevention and peacebuilding by bringing together researchers from China and Switzerland over a series policy dialogues. The Charter of the United Nations, adopted in the immediate aftermath of World War II, is clear about the fundamental necessity for the international community to act in partnership to prevent violent conflict. Given recent shifts in global power dynamics, there is an apparent need for international policy issues to be addressed in ways that are inclusive of a wider variety of perspectives and approaches. Chinese policy actors are increasingly interested in fostering their own discourse on issues of prevention and peacebuilding, rooted in Chinese experience, and engaging with peers from other contexts. The chapters in this volume explore the rationale for conflict prevention and review prevailing academic and practitioner discourses on fundamental questions such as the rationales for why conflicts should be prevented and whether ‘mainstream approaches’ are still relevant. This book will be of interest to students of peacebuilding, conflict resolution, Chinese politics, and International Relations. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12178 | China |
| Opting out of War: Strategies to Prevent Violent Conflict | Mary B. Anderson, Marshall Wallace | Locally-led Peacemaking Initiatives, Violence Prevention, Governance | This book reports stories of existing capacities and resilience on the part of multiple communities—some quite sizable and significant—that manage to prevent violent conflict when all the incentives that surround them are to become involved, to fight. The stories of thirteen communities show that prevention of violent conflict is possible. Normal people living normal lives have the option to say no to war, and they take it. Normal leaders in systems that already exist can respond to and support their people in non-engagement, and they do. This kind of conflict prevention does not require special training, new leadership, or special funding. It occurs, repeatedly and around the world in different types of conflict. The communities described in this book were successful because they acted with intentionality and planning to set themselves apart from the agendas of the war, for pragmatic rather than ideological reasons. They did not move to avoid interaction with actors in the conflict nor attempt to be irrelevant to the battle. They were not hidden from view by remoteness or because of their insignificance in numbers. The alternate route they chose is not war-prevention, but it does constitute prevention of violent conflict in their contexts. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12809 | Worldwide |
| “Frameworkers” and “Circlers” – Exploring Assumptions in Impact Assessment | Reina C. Neufeldt | Design, Monitoring and Evaluation (DM&E), Humanitarian Engagement, Peacebuilding | This chapter explores two contending constituencies and their arguments about why and how to identify impact in peacebuilding initiatives in practice. The two constituencies, “frameworkers” and “circlers”, involve sets of people who blend across the lines of development and conflict transformation work and possess very different arguments about how to conceptualize and operationalize issues of impact and change in program design, monitoring and evaluation. The differences matter in a practical sense for workers in international and national NGOs because their views often clash during program design, monitoring and evaluation processes, and leave both sides dissatisfied. These differences also hinder people’s ability to talk clearly about impact and change, what matters, how people “know what they know” about impact and change and, therefore, how they do their peacebuilding work. The premise of the chapter is that by unmasking the conceptual debates, peacebuilders can improve their ability to speak about and achieve effectiveness and impact. After outlining the two basic constituencies, frameworkers and circlers, and a review of the current status of peacebuilding monitoring and evaluation, the author examines how tensions between the two approaches provide insights into the underlying issues that need to be addressed. The chapter concludes with examples of ways that peacebuilding or other social change-orientated programs have adapted to bridge the positions in practice and identify practices that can strengthen particular areas that are currently under-developed and can benefit program design. | http://hdl.handle.net/1920/12902 | Worldwide |
| Rising Powers and Peacebuilding: Breaking the Mold? | Charles T. Call and Cedric de Coning (eds.) | Peacebuilding | This edited volume explores what is new and innovative about the peacebuilding approach of key actors (Brazil, India, Indonesia, South Africa, and Turkey) from the Global South. The results of these peacebuilding efforts by rising Global South powers are compared with each other and to approaches by Western donors and international organizations. The case studies explore whether the evidence shows that these approaches provide successful and alternative approaches to peacebuilding. Essentially, the book concludes that there are lessons to be learned from the peacebuilding approaches of these rising powers. Peacebuilding is both defined and applied differently than how Western powers and international agencies generally frame and implement peacebuilding interventions and programming. | https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007%2F978-3-319-60621-7.pdf | Worldwide |
| Transitional Justice and Reconciliation: Theory and Practice | Martina Fischer | Transitional Justice, Reconciliation, Conflict Prevention | This article explores the concept of transitional justice and its role in debates on democratization, nation-building and state reconstruction and its relation to reconciliation, both of which have become increasingly popular. Many researchers and practitioners see reconciliation as a necessary requirement for lasting peace, assuming that once a top-down political settlement has been reached, a bottom-up process should take place, in which unresolved issues of the conflict will be handled in order to prevent questioning of the settlement and a return to violence. In this context, coming to terms with the past is considered a precondition for building peace and future relationships. This chapter reviews the debates on transitional justice and reconciliation in order to assess the practical approaches that stem from these concepts in terms of their relevance for conflict transformation and peacebuilding. It also analyzes the state of research on international criminal justice and truth commissions and highlights the strengths and limits of these approaches. The author also notes that the debates on transitional justice and reconciliation, although they overlap, are not identical, and she outlines the need to see reconciliation as a multi-level process alongside conflict transformation. The chapter concludes by highlighting diverse challenges for research and practice, including a need to focus on the interaction of different actors, levels and mechanisms and to listen to the voices of affected populations. | http://hdl.handle.net/1920/12901 | Worldwide |
| Parallel Tracks or Connected Pieces?: UN Peace Operations, Local Mediation, and Peace Processes | Arthur Boutellis, | mediation, local, peace processes, United Nations | This paper considers how local mediation fits into the broader political strategies of UN peace operations. Building on a series of country case studies published by IPI and the UN Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs’ Mediation Support Unit, it provides preliminary answers to whether, when, where, and how the UN can engage in local mediation efforts. It explores what capacities the UN would need to increase its engagement in local mediation, what role it can play, and how it could better configure itself and engage in partnerships. While this paper does not advocate for UN peace operations to engage more or less in local mediation processes, it concludes that missions ought to assess whether, when, and how short-term investments in local mediation can contribute to longer-term, sustainable conflict resolution. In each case, they should tailor their role based on informed strategic decisions and appropriate partnerships and as part of a broader effort to strengthen and foster greater coherence in national peace processes. | https://www.ipinst.org/2020/12/parallel-tracks-or-connected-pieces-un-peace-operations-local-mediation-and-peace-processes | Worldwide |
| Forced Displacement in Europe and Central Asia | De Berry, Joanna P. and Petrini, Benjamin | Internally Displaced Persons/Refugees | This paper describes forced displacement in the Europe and Central Asia Region (ECA) and the vulnerabilities associated with being a displaced person. It analyzes the development challenges of forced displacement particularly protracted displacement in the region and the prospects for durable solutions. Displaced persons face challenges related to recovery of or access to housing and land, employment and livelihoods, access to services and public goods including health, education, and infrastructure, and accountable and responsive governance. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12769 | Europe |
| Resource Scarcity: Catalyst for Conflict or Cooperation? | Marcelle C. Dawson, Christopher Rosin, Navé Wald | Resources, Conflict Resolution | A common perception of global resource scarcity holds that it is inevitably a catalyst for conflict among nations; yet, paradoxically, incidents of such scarcity underlie some of the most important examples of international cooperation. This volume examines the wider potential for the experience of scarcity to promote cooperation in international relations and diplomacy beyond the traditional bounds of the interests of competitive nation states. The interdisciplinary background of the book’s contributors shifts the focus of the analysis beyond narrow theoretical treatments of international relations and resource diplomacy to broader examinations of the practicalities of cooperation in the context of competition and scarcity. Combining the insights of a range of social scientists with those of experts in the natural and bio-sciences—many of whom work as ‘resource practitioners’ outside the context of universities—the book works through the tensions between ‘thinking/theory’ and ‘doing/practice’, which so often plague the process of social change. These encounters with scarcity draw attention away from the myopic focus on market forces and allocation, and encourage us to recognise more fully the social nature of the tensions and opportunities that are associated with our shared dependence on resources that are not readily accessible to all. The book brings together experts on theorising scarcity and those on the scarcity of specific resources. It begins with a theoretical reframing of both the contested concept of scarcity and the underlying dynamics of resource diplomacy. The authors then outline the current tensions around resource scarcity or degradation and examine existing progress towards cooperative international management of resources. These include food and water scarcity, mineral exploration and exploitation of the oceans. Overall, the contributors propose a more hopeful and positive engagement among the world’s nations as they pursue the economic and social benefits derived from natural resources, while maintaining the ecological processes on which they depend. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12177 | Worldwide |
| Insecurity and Governance Challenges in Southern Libya | Frederic Wehrey | Instability, extremism, governance, international community, | Southern Libya remains a region of endemic instability wracked by communal conflict, a shortage of basic services, rampant smuggling, and fragmented or collapsed institutions. The region has long existed on the periphery of Libya’s politics and international concerns—but that must change. Increasingly, the vacuum of governance in the south has drawn in political actors from northern Libya and outside states. Extremists seeking refuge in the south and migrants being smuggled through the region directly impact the security of Libya, neighboring states like Tunisia, and Europe. | https://carnegieendowment.org/2017/03/30/insecurity-and-governance-challenges-in-southern-libya-pub-68451 | Libya |
| Food Systems in Conflict and Peacebuilding Settings | Caroline Delgado, Vongai Murugani, Kristina Tschunkert | Hunger and violence, Food insecurity | Food security is closely related to peace and stability. Failing food systems and the resultant increasing world hunger are among the most pressing issues of our time. The figures are stark: in 2020, 155 million people were acutely food insecure—an increase of nearly 20 million from the year before. Nearly 30 million people were on the verge of starvation, meaning that they did not know where their next meal would come from. The world is thus far not on track to achieve the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goal (SDG) 2 (Zero Hunger) by 2030. Despite the devastating Covid-19 pandemic, violent conflict remained the main driver of global hunger in 2020. The number of active violent conflicts is on the rise, and they are also becoming increasingly severe and protracted. Conflict has a direct negative impact on food systems, affecting people’s ability to produce, trade and access food. In most armed conflicts of the late 20th and early 21st centuries, conflict actors have used food as a weapon of war and deliberately destroyed food systems, with lasting food insecurity as a principal legacy of war. Moreover, food insecurity may create grievances that can escalate into instability and violent conflict, acting as a channel for individuals or groups to express broader socio-economic and political grievances. Simply put, without a resolution to food insecurity, it will be difficult to build sustainable peace, and without peace, the likelihood of ending global hunger is minimal. The increases in both acute food insecurity and violent conflict demand urgent and decisive action. The objectives of this three-part policy paper series are to emphasize the urgency of addressing the relationship between conflict and food insecurity and to point out existing opportunities to do so. This initial paper aims, firstly, to inform policymakers of the intricate relationships between food security and violent conflict. Secondly, it aims to alert policymakers to the potential ability of sustainable and equitable food systems to contribute to peace, and then highlights the action required to enhance this potential. The paper synthesizes existing research and evidence, concluding with four recommendations. The second paper explores the links in context, detailing how they play out in two specific settings: Venezuela and Yemen. The third paper discusses opportunities and practical steps that can help to break the vicious circle of hunger and conflict. | https://www.sipri.org/publications/2021/other-publications/food-systems-conflict-and-peacebuilding-settings-pathways-and-interconnections | Worldwide |
| From Power Mediation to Dialogue Support? Assessing the European Union's Capabilities for Multi-Track Diplomacy | Karin Goldner-Ebenthal, Veronique Dudouet | Mediation, Dialogue, Multi-Track Diplomacy | This report seeks to answer this question, by assessing EU capabilities for multi-track diplomacy from a ‘whole-of-society’ perspective, as defined in the Horizon 2020-funded project “Whole-of-Society Conflict Prevention and Peacebuilding” (WOSCAP). Multi-track diplomacy (MTD) is defined here as a specific approach to EU foreign policy intervention, with a primary emphasis on diplomatic initiatives aimed at supporting conflict prevention and peacebuilding, primarily through negotiation, mediation/or and dialogue across different levels (Tracks) of engagement within partner countries. MTD is highly compatible with a whole-of-society perspective on conflict prevention and peacebuilding, as it rests on the assumption that transforming complex and multi-dimensional conflicts requires an inclusive approach which does not solely focus on elite bargaining but requires constructive interactions with multiple conflict stakeholders and affected constituencies in order to reach a sustainable settlement. Such an approach thus implies a shift away from a sole reliance on traditional state diplomacy and Track I muscled mediation. It stresses instead the need for coordinated efforts by multiple third-party actors to support dialogue across various levels of society through diversified methods of ‘soft power’ diplomacy, according to the various stages of conflict and peacebuilding. The report will thus analyze the timing, nature and dimensions of EU multi-track diplomacy in war-affected or post-war contexts outside of its borders, in order to assess whether its actual capabilities for dialogue and mediation support match its ambitiously-stated goals with respect to proactive engagement, horizontal coherence and integration, and vertical inclusivity. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12718 | Europe |
| Regional Economic Communities and Peacebuilding in Africa Lessons from ECOWAS and IGAD | Victor Adetula, Redie Bereketeab, Cyril Obi | Peacebuilding, Economics | This book outlines challenges to the effective operation of regional economic communities (RECs) with regards to peacebuilding in Africa. Critically examining these issues from an interdisciplinary perspective, with a focus on comparative analysis of the status, role, and performances of the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) and Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), it examines particular constraints to their effective participation in regional initiatives. Focussing on inadequate technical capabilities, the complicity of state and non-state actors in conflicts within a region, the domestic politics of member states, it additionally addresses related theories and practices of peacekeeping, security, development, and the peacebuilding nexus. It also engages provisioning, regionalism, and regional peacekeeping interventions, the legal and institutional framework of RECs, and civil society and peacebuilding. Fundamentally, the book asks how effective the alliances and partnerships are in promoting regional peace and security and how much they are compromised by the intervention of external powers and actors, exploring new ideas and actions that may strengthen capacities to address the peacebuilding challenges on the continent effectively. This book will be of key interest to scholars and students of African politics and studies, peace and security studies, regionalism studies, policy practitioners in the field of African peacebuilding, and more broadly to international relations. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12175 | Africa |
| Sustainable peace cannot be achieved without women | Bigombe, Betty | Gender, Peacebuiliding | https://www.aljazeera.com/opinions/2020/10/31/sustainable-peace-cannot-be-achieved-without-women/ | Worldwide | |
| Mediation and artificial intelligence: Notes on the future of international conflict resolution | Katharina E. Höne | Digital security, technology, mediation | This report provides an overview of artificial intelligence (AI) in the context of mediation. Over the last few years AI has emerged as a hot topic with regard to its impact on our political, social, and economic lives. The impact of AI on international and diplomatic relations has also been widely acknowledged and discussed. This report focuses more specifically on the practice of mediation. It aims to inform mediation practitioners about the impact of AI on mediation, including its benefits, its challenges, and its risks in relation to peacemaking. It also hints at synergies between the mediation and technology communities and possible avenues of co-operation. | https://www.diplomacy.edu/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Mediation_and_AI.pdf | Worldwide |
| Resisting Corruption along Drug Trafficking Routes: An Analysis of Criminal Justice Bodies in Latin America and West Africa | Andy McDevitt, Jessie Bullock | Corruption, drug trafficking | This radical idea of sending soldiers without guns was condemned by the media because they felt the soldiers would be massacred given the first 14 peace attempts had failed. | https://www.transparency.org/en/publications/resisting-corruption-along-drug-trafficking-routes-an-analysis-of-criminal-justice-bodies-in-latin-america-and-west-africa | Dominican Republic |
| Gender Mainstreaming in Ceasefires: Comparative Data and Examples | Forster Robert, Bell Christine | Peace Agreement, Ceasefire, Gender | This Spotlight addresses the question of whether and how ceasefire agreements in armed conflict address the specific needs and interests of women. It also provides examples of agreements that have integrated gender equality issues and addressed women’s participation. The Spotlight aims to provide both data and examples from past practice for women and gender equality advocates to draw on when seeking to influence ceasefire negotiations. Ceasefires may be agreed in stand-alone documents for example, to create an environment for peace talks, or occur within other peace agreements as a broader peace process unfolds. The authors begin by providing a general overview of ceasefire agreements, followed by an assessment of why it is important that ceasefires should include gender sensitive provisions. Based on their review of what ceasefires tend to include, the authors then set out when and how women have been addressed in ceasefire agreements to-date, and conclude by noting some strategies that have been used by women and gender equality advocates to influence ceasefire agreement provisions. | https://www.politicalsettlements.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/PA-X-Spotlight-Ceasefires-Digital.pdf | Worldwide |
| Conflict Prevention In Fragile Contexts | Harsh Desai | Fragility, Locally-led Peacemaking Initiatives, War Prevention | Prevention is better than cure. The prevention of violent conflict in fragile contexts is cost-effective, it works and it should matter – to Development Assistance Committee (DAC) members and the broader international community – for sustaining peace. The challenge is in translating recent policy commitments to prevention into practice in fragile contexts. Using the OECD multidimensional fragility framework and insights from the International Network on Conflict and Fragility (INCAF), this paper presents lessons on preventing violent conflict that are rooted in a risk and resilience approach and that prioritise country-led and owned responses. It offers DAC members insights on how they can best support conflict prevention in fragile contexts, and it is one of ten working papers contributing to States of Fragility 2020. | https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/docserver/041cbaf0-en.pdf?expires=1651770739&id=id&accname=guest&checksum=B6CDB21DEBC10BC2C9A6B63E6B080257 | Worldwide |
| Adding Up to Peace: The Cumulative Impacts of Peace Initiatives | Diana Chigas and Peter Woodrow | Peace Initiatives, Impact Assessments, Case Studies | This book aims to identify how cumulative impacts in peace practice operate at all levels, in order to provide practical lessons for policymakers, donors and practitioners to develop more effective strategies for greater progress towards peace. This book builds on CDA’s Reflecting on Peace Practice Project (RPP), launched to answer the question: What works—and what doesn’t work—in peacebuilding? It seeks to deepen our understanding of how multiple peacebuilding initiatives in a conflict zone interacted and added up (or didn’t), to result in progress towards larger societal level peace, or Peace Writ Large. The findings are a product of sixteen case studies conducted between 2007 and 2012, gathering the perceptions of both local and international stakeholders. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12748 | Worldwide |
| Promoting Conflict-Sensitive Business Activity during Peacebuilding | Jolyon Ford | Business and peace, Private sector and peacebuilding, Governance and regulation | This paper considers aspects of the relationship between policies promoting private sector investment and growth, and policies consolidating peace. It covers post-conflict transitions where external authorities play a major role. A core contemporary peacebuilding policy assumption is that stimulating economic recovery is vital to sustaining political settlements and social cohesion. Yet how do we respond when policies to stimulate investment and imperatives to consolidate peace lead to contradictory choices? The paper considers framing investment-promotion activities as quasi-regulatory in nature, given that external actors are shaping and influencing private sector impacts on peacebuilding. It reflects on ideas of ‘transitionalism’ as a distinctive policy mindset during exceptional recovery periods. It addresses three questions: (1) what is distinctive about transitional approaches to influencing the ways that business actors may impact peacebuilding (compared with ‘routine’ developmental settings)? (2) What is distinctive about promoting conflict-sensitive business activity and investment, and how might this require different priorities? (3) What is the proper balance in transitional policymaking between attracting investment to capital-starved settings,and requiring investment to be responsible? | https://www.swisspeace.ch/publications/working-papers/ | Worldwide |
| Historical Reconciliation and Protracted Conflicts | EASI Working Group | root causes, reconciliation, protracted conflict | Twenty years after the end of the Cold War, the realization of hopes for a Euro-Atlantic world undivided, prosperous, and at peace remains elusive. There is as yet no sense of common goals between the enlarged Atlantic community of the West and many of the nations that emerged from the Soviet Union. No consensus exists on how the region should develop, what its economic future can be, or how both larger and smaller countries can take advantage of important global trends | https://carnegieendowment.org/2012/02/03/historical-reconciliation-and-protracted-conflicts-pub-46991 | Europe |
| Cost of Conflict: Untold Stories, Georgian- Ossetian Context | Dina Alborova, Susan Allen, Nino Kalandarishvili | Cost of Conflict, Stories, Conflict experiences | This collection brings together personal stories told by people who were directly affected by the conflict and who continue to pay a price for the conflict today. In multilayered analysis of the conflict and of ways of its resolution the analysis of the human dimension is paid much less attention. This subsequently impedes the perception of the complete picture and leads to decisions that neglect the interests of those people who carry the heavy burden of conflicts and wars. | http://isnc.ge/isnc/images/edition/file/edition_19.pdf | Georgia-South Ossetia |
| Designing for Results: Integrating Monitoring and Evaluation in Conflict Transformation Programs | Cheyanne Church and Mark Rogers | Project Evaluation, Conflict Resolution | This manual, produced by Search for Common Ground in partnership with the United States Institute of Peace and the Alliance for Peacebuilding, focuses on the challenges faced by conflict transformation practitioners in their attempts to measure and increase the effectiveness of their work with practical tips and examples from around the world. As an introductory volume and one of the first to focus on the practical application of integrated design, monitoring and evaluation, it seeks to introduce peacebuilding practitioners to the concepts, tools, and methods needed to incorporate better design, monitoring, and evaluation practices into peacebuilding programming. | https://www.dmeforpeace.org/resource/designing-for-results-integrating-monitoring-and-evaluation-in-conflict-transformation-activities/ | Worldwide |
| Youth, Peace and Security: A Programming Handbook | Tammy Smith | Youth, Design, Monitoring and Evaluation (DM&E), Inclusive Peacebuilding | This handbook seeks to contribute to the operational readiness and capacity of United Nations practitioners to implement the youth, peace and security (YPS) agenda. The handbook is intended to be used by country, regional and global teams in the United Nations system, but it can also provide insights and guidance to field practitioners beyond the United Nations, including other international or regional organizations, national counterparts, youth-led and youth-focused organizations, movements and networks, and peacebuilding organizations. It priorities youth-inclusive and youth-sensitive peace and security programming, as a core element of more sustainable and long-lasting peacebuilding efforts. The handbook offers strategic guidance and practical advice on its operational implementation: directions to ensure meaningful youth participation; tools and operational steps for undertaking a youth-sensitive and youth-inclusive conflict analysis; approaches for developing YPS strategic priorities and theories of change; the formulation of YPS outcome statements and indicators; guidance for monitoring YPS projects; exploration on how to evaluate the impact – and not just direct outputs and outcomes – of YPS programming and meaningful youth inclusion; and finally, proposes a series of YPS programming entry points, illustrated by concrete project examples. The handbook is a tool to successfully carry out projects and programmes that are informed by a full understanding of how young people experience and participate in their societies and their interaction with peace and security matters. | https://www.un.org/peacebuilding/sites/www.un.org.peacebuilding/files/documents/yps_programming_handbook.pdf | Worldwide |
| Development Assistance for Peacebuilding | Rachel M. Gisselquist | Development, Peacebuilding | Development assistance to fragile states and conflict-affected areas can be a core component of peacebuilding, providing support for the restoration of government functions, delivery of basic services, the rule of law, and economic revitalization. What has worked, why it has worked, and what is scalable and transferable, are key questions for both development practice and research into how peace is built and the interactive role of domestic and international processes therein. Despite a wealth of research into these questions, significant gaps remain. This volume speaks to these gaps through new analysis of a selected set of well-regarded aid interventions. Drawing on diverse scholarly and policy expertise, eight case study chapters span multiple domains and regions to analyse Afghanistan’s National Solidarity Programme, the Yemen Social Fund for Development, public financial management reform in Sierra Leone, Finn Church Aid’s assistance in Somalia, Liberia’s gender-sensitive police reform, the judicial facilitators programme in Nicaragua, UNICEF’s education projects in Somalia, and World Bank health projects in Timor-Leste. Analysis illustrates the significance of three broad factors in understanding why some aid interventions work better than others: the area of intervention and related degree of engagement with state institutions; local contextual factors such as windows of opportunity and the degree of local support; and programme design and management. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12176 | Worldwide |
| Elections and Conflict Prevention: A Guide to Analysis, Planning and Programming | UNDP Democratic Governance Group | Conflict Prevention, Early Warning, Conflict Mapping, Elections | This guide is designed as a knowledge product for practitioners in the field of governance and electoral assistance. It identifies strategic approaches and forms of programming that can help to anticipate and prevent the types of violent conflict that frequently accompany elections and set back development in emerging democracies or post-war societies. The Guide provides readers with practical options and tools for programming design, early warning and conflict tracking. It presents valuable lessons learned from the previous, extensive experience of UNDP and its partner organizations in the field. The information provided in the Guide reflects UNDP best practice as it relates to the broader framework for UN engagement in electoral assistance. Throughout the Guide, the knowledge gained from research and analysis is paired with perspectives of leading practitioners to show how electoral assistance programming can be adapted to mitigate conflict. The Guide also puts electoral assistance into the broader context of UNDP’s emphasis on democratic governance and conflict prevention, whereby the legitimate, accountable and effective exercise of state authority contributes to the constructive management of social change. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12713 | Worldwide |
| Ukraine Recovery and Peacebuiding Assessment : Analysis of Crisis Impacts and Needs in Eastern Ukraine, Volume 1. Synthesis Report | World Bank, European Union, United Nations | Fragility, Internally Displaced Persons/Refugees | In mid-2014, the Government of Ukraine (GoU) requested technical assistance and financial support from the inter¬national community to assess and plan priority recovery and peacebuilding efforts in the conflict-affected regions of eastern Ukraine. Following these requests, and within the framework of the 2008 Joint Declaration on Post-Crisis Assessments and Recovery Planning, the EU, UN, and WBG agreed to support the government in undertaking a Recovery and Peacebuilding Assessment (RPA). This assessment follows the Post-Conflict Needs Assessment (PCNA) methodology. In view of the continuing conflict in eastern Ukraine, it was decided to undertake an initial rapid assess¬ment as a first phase of activity, which would provide an analytical and programmatic baseline for recovery efforts to inform urgent interventions and provide a basis for scaling up recovery plan¬ning and responses as the situation and needs evolve on the ground. This report summarizes the findings and recommendations of the first phase of the RPA, which was undertaken in the period November 2014 to February 2015. In light of the dynamic and fluid nature of the situation in eastern Ukraine, these findings should be considered as a snapshot in time. In particular, the assessment of infrastructure damage is limited to the damage that occurred on or before November 2014. Furthermore, the number of registered internally displaced persons (IDPs), utilized as a reference to estimate the needs of this affected population, corresponds to the official government estimates as of February 2015. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12753 | Ukraine |
| Diplomacy And Peace In Fragile Contexts | Jonathan Marley, Erik Forsberg | Fragility, Diplomacy, Facilitation | Diplomats and other diplomatic actors serve as the primary political actors in fragile contexts, both for OECD Development Assistance Committee members and the broader international community. They directly contribute to immediate and long-term peace, and their broad political network and knowledge positions them as a nodal point for effective and inclusive humanitarian, development and peace action in fragile contexts. This paper examines three different functions diplomatic actors assume that contribute to peace in fragile contexts: diplomacy as global governance, diplomats as peacebuilders and diplomats as facilitators. This paper is one of ten working papers supporting States of Fragility 2020. It works together with Security actors in fragile contexts, Conflict prevention in fragile contexts, and Peacebuilding in fragile contexts to provide comprehensive background to Chapter 2 on peace in States of Fragility 2020. | https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/docserver/6a684a4b-en.pdf?expires=1651771308&id=id&accname=guest&checksum=03936B557D88A03E1581B672AF6176BC | Worldwide |
| Improving International Support to Peace Processes: The Missing Piece | OECD | Peace Processes, Multi-Track Diplomacy, Inclusive Peacebuilding | Peace processes hold the promise of re-starting non-violent efforts towards creating more equitable, resilient and developed societies. Yet, such processes are politically and psychologically complex, as well as high-risk. Many fail and such failure is harmful, as it reduces confidence and increases cynicism amongst parties to a conflict, citizens and international partners alike. International support can help a peace process to succeed but its nature and quality matter greatly. “The Missing Piece” identifies seven recommendations to improve the quality of support that states and international organizations provide to peace processes. It does this through a thorough analysis of: the characteristics of today’s violent conflicts, the factors that influence the success and failure of a peace process and the current strengths & weaknesses of international support. | https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/docserver/9789264179844-en.pdf?expires=1651771544&id=id&accname=ocid41016750&checksum=7B9783E19C7B55059CDAA78B31B9FC5E | Worldwide |
| Forced Displacement in Europe and Central Asia | De Berry, Joanna P. and Petrini, Benjamin | Internally Displaced Persons/Refugees | This paper describes forced displacement in the Europe and Central Asia Region (ECA) and the vulnerabilities associated with being a displaced person. It analyzes the development challenges of forced displacement particularly protracted displacement in the region and the prospects for durable solutions. Displaced persons face challenges related to recovery of or access to housing and land, employment and livelihoods, access to services and public goods including health, education, and infrastructure, and accountable and responsive governance. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12769 | Asia |
| Prevented Wars, The Role of International Organizational Intervention in Successful Prevention | Margarita Tadevosyan | Third Party, | Recent research has focused on the role of international organizational intervention in preventing large scale wars. The idea of conflict prevention is not new; different scholars have scrutinized different aspects of conflict prevention. At the same time, most existing literature focuses on individual preventive interventions. Recognizing that conflict prevention is an established field both in academic and policy circles, this study provides additional evidence on how conflict prevention can be strengthened and further reinforced by engaging in a systematic analysis of previous cases of preventive engagement by international organizations. The goal of the research was to understand why and how certain interventions led by different international organizations were able to prevent the outbreak of violence and large-scale war and halt the spread of hostilities. This study is a comprehensive review of 18 specific conflict prevention interventions carried out by one of the four large international organizations—the United Nations, the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), Organization of American States (OAS), and the Commonwealth of Nations—between 1990 and 2015. With recognition of this diversity, the analysis sought to uncover and understand patterns that would provide additional evidence on how to prevent future wars and violent conflict. Based on the research findings Dr. Tadevosyan developed a targeted list of recommendations that can help intervening organizations to maximize their impact in preventing the outbreak of deadly violence. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12179 | Worldwide |
| Adding Up to Peace: The Cumulative Impacts of Peace Initiatives | Diana Chigas and Peter Woodrow | Peace Initiatives, Impact Assessments, Case Studies | This book aims to identify how cumulative impacts in peace practice operate at all levels, in order to provide practical lessons for policymakers, donors and practitioners to develop more effective strategies for greater progress towards peace. This book builds on CDA’s Reflecting on Peace Practice Project (RPP), launched to answer the question: What works—and what doesn’t work—in peacebuilding? It seeks to deepen our understanding of how multiple peacebuilding initiatives in a conflict zone interacted and added up (or didn’t), to result in progress towards larger societal level peace, or Peace Writ Large. The findings are a product of sixteen case studies conducted between 2007 and 2012, gathering the perceptions of both local and international stakeholders. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12748 | Worldwide |
| Opening the Black Box : The Contextual Drivers of Social Accountability | Grandvoinnet, Helene & Aslam, Ghazia and Raha, Shomikho | Citizen Action | This publication fills an important knowledge gap by providing guidance on how to assess contextual drivers of social accountability effectiveness. It aims to strategically support citizen engagement at the country level and for a specific issue or problem. The report proposes a novel framing of social accountability as the interplay of constitutive elements: citizen action and state action, supported by three enabling levers: civic mobilization, interface and information. For each of these constitutive elements, the report identifies 'drivers' of contextual effectiveness which take into account a broad range of contextual factors (e.g., social, political and intervention-based, including information and communication technologies). Opening the Black Box offers detailed guidance on how to assess each driver. It also applies the framework at two levels. At the country level, the report looks at 'archetypes' of challenging country contexts, such as regimes with no formal space or full support for citizen-state engagement and fragile and conflict-affected situations. The report also illustrates the use of the framework to analyze specific social accountability interventions through four case studies: Sierra Leone, Pakistan, Yemen, and the Kyrgyz Republic. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12771 | Worldwide |
| On Hybrid Political Orders and Emerging States: State Formation in the Context of ‘Fragility’ | Volker Boege, Anne Brown, Kevin Clements, Anna Nolan | Fragility, Governance, Locally-led Peacemaking Initiatives | This article examines the rationale and underlying assumptions of the mainstream discourse on fragile states. The authors argue that the conventional perception of so-called fragile states as an obstacle to the maintenance of peace and development can be far too short-sighted, as is its corollary, the promotion of conventional state-building along the lines of the western OECD state model as the best means of sustainable development and peace within all societies. Too often, state fragility research and analysis as well as state-building policies are oriented towards the western-style Weberian/Westphalian state. Yet this form of statehood hardly exists in reality beyond the OECD world. Many of the countries in the ‘rest’ of the world are political entities that do not resemble the model western state. This article proposes that these states should not be considered from the perspective of being ‘not yet properly built’ or having ‘already failed again’. Rather than thinking in terms of fragile or failed states, it might be theoretically and practically more fruitful to think in terms of hybrid political orders. Such a re-conceptualization opens new options for conflict prevention and development, as well as for a new type of state-building. Drawing on the examples of East Timor, Bougainville and Somaliland, the report points out the shortcomings of external state-building, and presents some innovative approaches to state-building. | http://hdl.handle.net/1920/12899 | Worldwide |
| Ten Foundations for Gender Inclusive Peacebuilding Practice | Abiosseh Davis | Gender, Inclusive Peacebuilding, Design, Monitoring and Evaluation (DM&E) | The present Peacebuilding in Practice paper lays out the foundations for gender inclusive peacebuilding and is a result of a reflection process that Interpeace took between 2017 and 2019 to examine its implementation of gender programming. It demonstrates lessons learned and recommendations for developing, implementing and evaluating gender inclusive programmes. This Peacebuilding in Practice paper, developed through a consultative process across Interpeace offices as well as on an extensive literature review, aims to strengthen Interpeace’s capacity to bring its unique contribution to building sustainable peace and advancing gender equality. The practice note is intended to be complemented by the development and application of tools and processes that allow for the effective implementation of the ten identified foundations. | https://www.interpeace.org/resource/ten-foundations-for-gender-inclusive-peacebuilding-practice/ | Worldwide |
| Interactive Peacemaking: A People-Centered Approach | Susan H. Allen | Peacemaking, Conflict Resolution, International Relations | This book examines the theory and practice of interactive peacemaking, centering the role of people in making peace. The book presents the theory and practice of peacemaking as found in contemporary processes globally. By putting people at the center of the analysis, it outlines the possibilities of peacemaking by and for the people whose lives are touched by ongoing conflicts. While considering examples from around the world, this book specifically focuses on peacemaking in the Georgian-South Ossetian context. It tells the stories of individuals on both sides of the conflict, and explores why people choose to make peace, and how they work within their societies to encourage this. This book emphasizes theory built from practice and offers methodological guidance on learning from practice in the conflict resolution field. This book will be of much interest to students and practitioners of peacemaking, conflict resolution, South Caucasus politics and International Relations. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12182 | Worldwide |
| Pathways for Peace : Inclusive Approaches to Preventing Violent Conflict | Conflict Prevention, Inclusive Peacebuilding, Economics and Conflict, Diplomacy, Locally-led Peacemaking: Women-led | The resurgence of violent conflict in recent years has caused immense human suffering, at enormous social and economic cost. Violent conflicts today have become complex and protracted, involving more non-state groups and regional and international actors, often linked to global challenges from climate change to transnational organized crime. It is increasingly recognized as an obstacle to achieving the Sustainable Development Goals by 2030. This has given impetus for policy makers at all levels – from local to global – to focus on preventing violent conflict more effectively. Grounded in a shared commitment to this agenda, Pathways for Peace: Inclusive Approaches to Preventing Violent Conflict is a joint United Nations and World Bank study that looks at how development processes can better interact with diplomacy and mediation, security and other tools to prevent conflict from becoming violent. To understand ‘what works,’ it reviews the experience of different countries and institutions to highlight elements that have contributed to peace. Central to these efforts is the need to address grievances around exclusion from access to power, opportunity and security. States hold the primary responsibility for prevention, but to be effective, civil society, the private sector, regional and international organizations must be involved. Enhancing the meaningful participation of women and youth in decision making, as well as long-term policies to address the aspirations of women and young people are fundamental to sustaining peace. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12782 | Worldwide | |
| Some Reflections on the Role of Power in Track II Mediation | Evan Hoffman | Mediation, Track II, Diplomacy, Power | Power is a central feature of both Track I (formal) and Track II (informal) mediation. Power intersects the mediation process at every stage and is deeply embedded in the process, its design and structure, as well as who facilitates it. This paper addresses the question of how to manage these and other power dynamics and what can be done to alter them. Four key insights are presented based on the author’s personal experience undertaking peacemaking and mediation in Canada and overseas over the last twenty years. The four insights are that: (1) Convening power is shaped by the type of process and who is running it; (2) The mediator has procedural power but exercising it might create a reputational cost; (3) Power imbalances are likely to occur and the mediator needs to make a conscious effort to address them; (4) Power, which is often deeply embedded in the social institutions where the conflict is occurring, can be used for either constructive (peaceful) or destructive (violent) purposes and that decision is influenced by leaders from different sectors (political, military, etc.). Based on these four key insights, several recommendations for mediation and peacemaking actors to address power dynamics are developed. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12710 | Worldwide |
| Dissolving conflict. Local peace agreements and armed conflict transitions | Jan Pospisil | Peace Processes, Locally-led Peacemaking Initiatives, Conflict Prevention | The lessening likelihood and the often-sobering outcomes of comprehensive national peace processes directed attention to local peacemaking in recent years. Difficult to distinguish and define, local peace agreements work on a broad range of issues and engage a multitude of diverse actors. Local peace agreements construct a world of peacemaking that contradicts an ordered and levelled understanding of conflict. Instead, they reveal hybrid conflictscapes that are enmeshed in ways analytically hard to distinguish. In such an environment, local peace agreements can employ various functions: they can connect and strategise relationships between actors, mitigate and manage conflict settings, or disconnect localities or communities from the broader conflict landscape. In doing so, they do not necessarily work towards a linear and sequenced resolution of a conflict but towards dissolving it by undermining the conflict’s logics and conditions. | https://peacerep.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Pospisil-2022-Dissolving-conflict.-Local-peace-agreements-and-armed-conflict-transitions.pdf | Worldwide |
| Mapping Business-Peace Interactions: Five Assertions for How Businesses Create Peace | Jason Miklian | Private Sector and Peacebuilding, Economics and Conflict, Diplomacy | The conjunction of business and peace is a growing global phenomenon, but conducted and researched over a vast array of fields and contextual settings. This article provides theoretical order for this disparate material, illustrating cutting-edge research and highlighting the most urgent knowledge gaps to fill. Extracting findings from the business community, international organizations, and the academic community, this article maps these findings into five assertions about how businesses impact upon peace: economic engagement facilitates a peace dividend; encouraging local development facilitates local capacities for peace; importing international norms improves democratic accountability; firms can constrain the drivers or root causes of conflict; and undertaking direct diplomatic efforts with conflict actors builds and/or makes peace. These assertions provide a framework for categorizing and testing prominent business-peace arguments. They also support preliminary arguments that businesses cannot expect to be rewarded as peacebuilders just because they undertake peacebuilding activities, that economic opening only brings as much peace as a local regime will allow, and that truly courageous business-peace choices are rarely made in fragile contexts. This framework can encourage more coherent scholarly findings and more effective business engagements within the complex and challenging realm of peacebuilding. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12775 | Worldwide |
| Localising Responses to Conflict and Crisis in Arab–Muslim Contexts | Sultan Barakat, Mohammad Abunimer | Conflict Resolution, Humanitarian Response, Localization | "The set of articles in this special issue examines specific cases in which outside entities carry out their interventions in Muslim conflict and humanitarian crisis contexts. These interventions vary in their intentions, design, scope, and results. However, these cases all point toward the need for further and more serious consideration of the voices, needs, and values of local actors and communities. " | https://doi.org/10.1177%2F1542316620941766 | Middle East |
| Sustaining Peace in Papua New Guinea: Prevention in Practice | Lesley Connolly and Laurie Mincieli | conflict prevention, partnerships, operations management, processes | This paper examines the implementation of the UN’s peacebuilding and sustaining peace framework in Papua New Guinea, looking at what has been done and what is still needed. It focuses on the four issue areas highlighted in the secretary-general’s 2018 report on peacebuilding and sustaining peace: operational and policy coherence; leadership at the UN country level; partnerships with local and regional actors; and international support. | https://www.ipinst.org/2019/09/sustaining-peace-in-papua-new-guinea-prevention-in-practice | Papua New Guinea |
| Stabilizing Northeast Nigeria After Boko Haram | Saskia Brechenmacher | Instability, governance, locally-led, conflict-prevention | This paper provides an overview of these local-level efforts and the theories of change that undergird them.3 It highlights initial lessons learned by donors and implementers, as well as persistent tensions between local-level program objectives and higher-level political and conflict dynamics. Most stabilization programs were designed with the assumption that the security situation in northeastern Nigeria would continue to improve, thereby facilitating the gradual return of displaced populations and local government. Yet in practice, Nigeria’s overstretched, under-resourced, and corruption-plagued military has struggled to consolidate its gains. Civilians in many parts of the northeast face ongoing threats from both insurgent attacks as well as counterterrorism operations. Rampant corruption and ineffective coordination have hampered the Nigerian government’s civilian response to the crisis, with various federal, state, and local elites benefiting from the continuation of the crisis. Moreover, while international partners stress the need for a regional response to the crisis, the region lacks an effective political infrastructure, and cooperation has been primarily externally driven. The Nigerian case thus exemplifies the difficulties of implementing effective local-level stabilization efforts while working with a host government that lacks political commitment, transparency, and coordination. While local-level programs have shown positive impacts in various areas, they have struggled to gain wider traction—particularly since donors are often working through or dependent on the government to operate. | https://carnegieendowment.org/2019/05/03/stabilizing-northeast-nigeria-after-boko-haram-pub-79042 | Nigeria |
| Assessing International Statebuilding Initiative Effectiveness at Preventing Armed Conflict Recurrence | Elliot Short | Statebuilding | The practice of statebuilding is employed by a broad spectrum of multilateral organisations and national governments as a tool to stabilise fragile states, including those that are recovering from conflict. However, much of the existing literature focuses on weighing up the ethical arguments concerning statebuilding rather than analysing its impact on the societies in which it takes place. This assessment combines data from Fund for Peace’s Fragile States Index, financial data harvested from relevant publicly available databases, and an extensive survey of the academic and policy literature to examine whether statebuilding is an effective means of preventing post-conflict states from relapsing into war. By exploring the cases of Burundi, Chad, Côte d’Ivoire, and Nepal, it demonstrates that although statebuilding can help to achieve this goal, certain conditions and methods are required for it to be effective. When such conditions and methods are absent, donors’ resources are employed to build regimes rather than states and leave the recipient country at risk of returning to conflict. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12168 | Burundi |
| Can We Build Peace from a Distance? The Impact of COVID-19 on the Peacebuilding Sector | Elizabeth Laruni, Kim Toogood, Lucy Holdaway | COVID-19, Lack of contact and peacebuilding | This background paper explores some of the ways in which the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) has disrupted one of the foundation principles of peacebuilding practice: the basic need to bring people together face-to-face. It takes a step back to look at the overall impact on peacebuilding practice when intergroup contact is limited, encouraging an examination of the principles that underpin practice. | https://www.international-alert.org/publications/can-we-build-peace-from-a-distance-impact-covid-19-peacebuilding/ | Worldwide |
| The Role of Development Aid in Conflict Transformation: Facilitating Empowerment Processes and Community Building | Marcie Mersky | Economics and Conflict, Humanitarian Engagement, Locally-led Peacemaking Initiatives | This article examines both the theoretical assumptions and expectations, as well as the practical experiences, of empowerment approaches within the field of development aid, with a particular focus their potential for conflict transformation. The authors build upon the recent discourse in development policy that discusses the extent to which development cooperation can effectively contribute towards crisis prevention and conflict transformation. It attempts to analyze and build from three inter-related approaches: The do-no-harm approach which primarily aims to avoid doing more harm than good, and is vitally concerned with the unintended negative impacts of development aid, which too often tends to aggravate conflict rather than contribute to its resolution; the local capacities for peace approach which seeks to identify potential entry points for conflict transformation through development aid, and recommends that external donor agencies should focus on supporting local capacities for peace; and the discourse on peace and conflict impact assessment approach which stresses the need for a thorough analysis of the conflict context. The article examines these approaches through the practical experience of traditional relief and development projects working on complex emergencies in the field of community development. The authors explore the nexus between conflict transformation on the one hand and participatory and empowerment approaches on the other. They critically assess the potential of common empowerment approaches within community building not only to avoid doing harm but also to make a substantive contribution to conflict transformation at the local level. The empirical base of the chapter lies within participatory research and in the experiences of bilateral and multilateral development cooperation in the war-torn areas of Sri Lanka. The authors explore some common participatory and empowerment approaches within the field of community development, as well as constraints, dilemmas and ambivalences for the facilitation of empowerment processes through development aid within complex emergencies. The authors conclude with future prospects on the potentials, constraints and ambivalence of empowerment approaches and recommend a more political role for development aid in complex emergencies as it engages in more inclusive community building through processes of empowerment and recognition. | http://hdl.handle.net/1920/12900 | Sri Lanka |
| Peace Processes and Their Agreements | Christine Bell, Laura Wise | Peace Process, Multi-Track Diplomacy, Inclusive Peacebuilding | This chapter in Contemporary Peacemaking: Peace Processes, Peacebuilding and Conflict sets out how peace processes unfold and agreements are reached, drawing on a major quantitative and qualitative review of peace agreements in the post-Cold War era. It explores the function that formalized agreement plays in providing an exit from conflict, understanding how different types of agreements addressing diverse issues are used to move forward at various stages of a peace process, and at different levels of conflict. We argue that practices established in 1990 are now at a crossroads pointing to a new global realignment that affects who intervenes, why and to what end, and new forms of conflict. All of these factors challenge established peace process practices and the assumptions that underpin them. We point to “complex conflict systems” requiring multilevel peace processes across inter-related geopolitical, national and local conflicts, and suggest forms of adaptive management which are required to deal with the interactions between these levels. | https://peacerep.org/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/Bell-Wise2022_Chapter_PeaceProcessesAndTheirAgreemen.pdf | Worldwide |
| New Paths and Policies towards Conflict Prevention: Chinese and Swiss Perspectives | Courtney J. Fung, Björn Gehrmann, Rachel F. Madenyika, Jason G. Tower | Conflict Prevention | This book explores the discourse on conflict prevention and peacebuilding by bringing together researchers from China and Switzerland over a series policy dialogues. The Charter of the United Nations, adopted in the immediate aftermath of World War II, is clear about the fundamental necessity for the international community to act in partnership to prevent violent conflict. Given recent shifts in global power dynamics, there is an apparent need for international policy issues to be addressed in ways that are inclusive of a wider variety of perspectives and approaches. Chinese policy actors are increasingly interested in fostering their own discourse on issues of prevention and peacebuilding, rooted in Chinese experience, and engaging with peers from other contexts. The chapters in this volume explore the rationale for conflict prevention and review prevailing academic and practitioner discourses on fundamental questions such as the rationales for why conflicts should be prevented and whether ‘mainstream approaches’ are still relevant. This book will be of interest to students of peacebuilding, conflict resolution, Chinese politics, and International Relations. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12178 | Switzerland |
| Local, National, and International Peacebuilding | Peace Science Digest | Peacebuilding | This report focuses on the “local turn” in peacebuilding, and the importance of locally led initiatives and local knowledge in support of peacebuilding activities. The series of articles in this report look to examine how locally driven decision making can help alleviate post-conflict grievances. The articles tackle the issue of power and how the push for the local turn challenges those traditional power structures that are driven by external actors. As a result, the articles raise important questions on the role of donors, the relationship between international and local peacebuilders, and how those relationships impact long-term outcomes of peacebuilding initiatives. | https://peacesciencedigest.org/special-issue-local-national-and-international-peacebuilding/ | Worldwide |
| Cost of Conflict: Core Dimensions of the Georgian-South Ossetian Context | Dina Alborova, Susan Allen, Nino Kalandarishvili | Cost of conflict, Violence | We, as editors of this volume, have gathered this set of articles in order to provide a range of materials for discussion of the Costs of Conflict in the Georgian-South Ossetian context. From the theoretical perspective, Costs of Conflict can be assessed in many ways, drawing on many different scholarly approaches. The loss of human life is a measure of one of the gravest types of destruction caused by war. When we see the numbers of dead after a war, it is clear that irreversible destruction has changed families who lost loved ones. Another measure is migration. Populations uprooted by fighting or the threat of violence may never return. Or, significant efforts will be required to ease repatriation for those that wish to return once the fighting has ended. These humanitarian measures of death and migration provide a stark picture of the immediate human costs of conflict. However, as we look at the August 2008 war, and the previous fighting in 1989 and the early 1990s, we see that there are other costs to conflict, too, even beyond the tragic loss of life and the uprooted families. | http://activity.scar.gmu.edu/sites/default/files/Cost%20of%20Conflict%20English.pdf | Georgia-South Ossetia |
| Local agreements as a process: the example of local talks in Homs in Syria | Rim Turkmani | Locally-led Peacemaking Initiatives, Peace Agreement, Negotiations | This article sets out why it is important to conceptualise local agreements as a process of talks that have a value in their own right rather than as a discrete event reached on a particular date. Throughout this process the terms of intermittently negotiated agreements are continuously shaped by two competing logics, the logic of violence and peace. Based on detailed empirical evidence covering six years of local talks in the city of Homs and its Al-Waer suburb, the article shows that even if an agreement is not reached, the mere process of local talks could lead to a steep reduction in the level of violence, fatalities and an improvement in the standard of living at a time when talks at higher level fail to deliver such results. The article also challenges the main methods of gathering empirical evidence about local peace agreements and discussed potential policy implications. | https://peacerep.org/publication/local-agreements-as-a-process-local-talks-in-homs-syria/ | Syria |
| Identifying Pathways to Peace: How International Support Can Help Prevent Conflict Recurrence | Karina Mross, Charlotte Fiedler, Jörn Grävingholt | Peacekeeping, Governance, Economics and Conflict | This article provides new evidence on how the international community can effectively foster peace after civil war. It expands the current literature’s narrow focus on either peacekeeping or aggregated aid flows, adopting a comprehensive, yet disaggregated, view on international peacebuilding efforts. We distinguish five areas of peacebuilding support (peacekeeping, nonmilitary security support, support for politics and governance, for socioeconomic development, and for societal conflict transformation) and analyze which types or combinations are particularly effective and in which context. Applying configurational analysis (qualitative comparative analysis) to all thirty-six post-civil war peace episodes between 1990 and 2014, we find that (1) peacekeeping is only one important component of effective post-conflict support, (2) the largest share of peaceful cases can be explained by support for politics and governance, (3) only combined international efforts across all types of support can address difficult contexts, and (4) countries neglected by the international community are highly prone to experiencing conflict recurrence. Three case studies shed light on underlying causal mechanisms | https://doi.org/10.1093/isq/sqab091 | Worldwide |
| UN Support to Local Mediation: Challenges and Opportunities | United Nations: Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs | Mediation, Locally-led Peacemaking Initiatives, Monitoring/Verification: United Nations | This publication by DPPA's Mediation Support Unit outlines various opportunities and challenges related to the UN's involvement in support of local mediation and dialogue processes. The paper draws on insights emanating from a series of field deployments, reflection exercises as well as case studies (detailing local mediation processes in 5 country cases, including Afghanistan, the Central African Republic, Myanmar, the Philippines as well as South Sudan) conducted over the past two years (2018-2020). The paper seeks to deepen understanding of UN engagement at the local level and its strategic relevance to UN peacemaking efforts; distil insights around pursuing linkages between national and local mediation processes; as well as highlight lessons from engagements with traditional peacemaking approaches and the inclusion of women in mediation at local level. Early reflections indicate the need to identify and leverage the UN's comparative advantage; enhance coordination within and beyond the UN; champion the do no harm principle, local capacities and local ownership; as well as strengthen the inclusion of women, youth, indigenous groups, victims, and other, often marginalized groups, in mediation and dialogue processes at local level. | http://dag.un.org/handle/11176/401082 | Worldwide |
| Is Prevention the Answer? | Charles Call, Susanna Campbell | Conflict Prevention, Preventive Diplomacy, Monitoring/Verification: Third Party | Is prevention the answer to escalating violent conflict? Conflict prevention uses carrots and sticks to deter future violence. Its power thus rests on the credibility of policy-makers’ commitment to supply the carrot or stick in a timely manner. Unfortunately, there are several political and bureaucratic barriers that make this unlikely. First, it is difficult for policy-makers to sell preventive actions to their constituencies. In contrast with core security interests (like nuclear warfare), an uptick in violence in a faraway, non-strategic country provides a less convincing call for action. Second, preventive decisions are difficult to make. Decision-makers are predisposed to avoid making difficult decisions until a crisis breaks out and they are forced to act. Third, preventive actions are political, not technical, requiring the use of precious political capital for uncertain outcomes whose success may be invisible (manifest in the absence of violence). Perhaps, if decision-makers are able to overcome these obstacles and make more credible commitments to conflict prevention, then conflict prevention will become a more credible solution to violent conflict. | https://www.amacad.org/publication/prevention-answer | Worldwide |
| Paving the Way: Contributions of Interactive Conflict Resolution to Peacemaking | Ronald J.Fisher | Conflict Resolution, Peacemaking | This first-of-a-kind collection brings together in one volume the strongest available evidence of successful transfer effects from unofficial third-party work to official peacemaking. Using comparative case analysis from several real-world interventions, Paving the Way offers insights into the conditions and qualities of successful programs of interactive conflict resolution from experts in the field. Editor Ronald J. Fisher has assembled a collection of seminal case studies that illustrate interactive approaches to conflict resolution from the Malaysia-Indonesia conflict in the 1960s to the Peru-Equador peace process of the late 1990s. Integrating theory, research, and practice, the cases posit that interactive conflict resolution can make a significant, and sometimes essential, contribution to the resolution of protracted and violent identity conflicts. The methods and solutions offered in Paving the Way will serve as best practices for those in the field and as training tools and resources for scholars and policymakers. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12181 | Worldwide |
| Preventing Political Violence: Towards a Model for Catalytic Action--Lessons Learned from Guinea-Bissau | Conflict Prevention and Early Warning | This monograph lays out new ways the political violence that arises in failing states can be prevented and stability strengthened. This is essentially an interim report of the ‘Reducing Political Violence Action Group (RPVAG)’ that initiated an onsite case study in Guinea-Bissau, known as the ‘International Peace and Prosperity Project’. The aim was to set out a ‘Basic Concept’ for Violence Prevention, to try it out in a specific country, develop ‘Lessons Learned’ from that experience, and then to work towards a ‘New Approach to Violence Prevention’ and if possible a new ‘Model’ for similar work elsewhere. The monograph lays out the goals of the project and how it was implemented in Guinea Bissau. It discusses the basis of early warning indicators that guided the project on how and where to create a violence prevention initiative. The overall plan based around trust building and working with local leaders is presented as are the challenges and changes that were made to the plan during initial implementation in order to respond to changing circumstance The initial lessons learned and alterations to the plan itself are presented as recommendations about how to move the project in Guinea-Bissau forward as well as recommendations for similar conflict prevention projects. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12712 | Guinea-Bissau | |
| Civil Society in Conflict Transformation: Strengths and Limitations | Martina Fischer | Citizen action, Statebuilding, Humanitarian Engagement | This book chapter focuses on the potential contribution that civil society actors can make to peacebuilding. There is also an examination of what types of activities international and transnational NGOs undertake in order to influence international politics in a way that contributes to coping with global challenges. The author explores key questions such as: What are the strengths and limitations of civil society actors? What types of activities do NGOs undertake? What problems and dilemmas are faced in the development of civil society in war-torn societies? What is the role and potential of (local) civil society actors in war-to-peace transitions and what problems and dilemmas stem from the development of civil society in war-torn societies? She uses the example of Bosnia-Herzegovina to explore the limitations of civil society's contributions to peacebuilding, and how civil society relates to state-building. Finally, the chapter addresses how such considerations impact theoretical conceptualizations of the term "civil society". | http://hdl.handle.net/1920/12903 | Bosnia and Herzegovina |
| On the Significance of Religion in Conflict and Conflict Resolution | Christine Schliesser, S. Ayse Kadayifci-Orellana, Pauline Kollontai | Religion, Conflict Resolution | In this ground-breaking volume, the authors analyze the role of religion in conflict and conflict resolution. They do so from the perspectives of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, while bringing different disciplines into play, including peace and conflict studies, religious studies, theology, and ethics. With much of current academic, political, and public attention focusing on the conflictive dimensions of religion, this book also explores the constructive resources of religion for conflict resolution and reconciliation. Analyzing the specific contributions of religious actors in this field, their potentials and possible problems connected with them, this book sheds light on the concrete contours of the oftentimes vague “religious factor” in processes of social change. Case studies in current and former settings of violent conflict such as Israel, post-genocide Rwanda, and Pakistan provide “real-life” contexts for discussion. Combining cutting-edge research with case studies and concrete implications for academics, policy makers, and practitioners, this concise and easily accessible volume helps to build bridges between these oftentimes separated spheres of engagement. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12172 | Worldwide |
| Climate-Related Security Risks and Peacebuiliding in Mali | Farah Hegazi, Florian Krampe, Elizabeth Seymour Smith | Climate and peacebuiliding, Climate change, Climate-related risks | Climate-related security risks are transforming the security landscape in which multilateral peacebuilding efforts are taking place. Following a similar assessment of Somalia conducted in 2019, this study offers another glimpse into the future of peacebuilding in the time of climate change by providing an in-depth assessment of the United Nations Multidimensional Integrated Stabilization Mission in Mali (MINUSMA). To help future peacebuilding efforts become more climate sensitive, the study aims to produce practical knowledge on: (a) how climate change in Mali is challenging the successful implementation of MINUSMA’s mandate; and (b) how MINUSMA has taken the challenges stemming from climate change into account in its ongoing operations. Mali is experiencing a multidimensional crisis, triggered by a rebellion in the north of the country in 2012. The northern and central regions are currently the most affected by violence and insecurity. Socio-economic exclusion, poor governance in peripheral areas and competition over natural resources are among the complex set of root causes of the current conflict. Combined with weak governance, climate change is further undermining people’s human security. The dependence on natural resources for livelihoods makes large segments of the population in Mali vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, which are reshaping the social, political and economic context, and thereby potentially amplifying local grievances and marginalization. | https://www.sipri.org/publications/2021/sipri-policy-papers/climate-related-security-risks-and-peacebuilding-mali | Mali |
| Why Does Timor-Leste Remain Fragile? | Takashi Daimon-Sato | Development, Fragility,State-building | This article focuses on the concept of “fragility,” which gained prominence in literature on conflict-driven countries and serves as an analytical tool for policy analysis. Using this concept, this article provides a review of Timor-Leste since its independence in 2002. The country has achieved high economic growth, though the economy has remained fragile in terms of its high dependence on external factors, namely oil revenues. This study suggests that foreign aid and investments do not automatically improve fragility in resource-dependent economies unless they help diversify the monoculture economy, based upon democratic consensus-building among stakeholders. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12720 | Timor-Leste |
| Towards full spectrum conflict prevention: the international peace and prosperity project in Guinea-Bissau | Evan Hoffman | Conflict Prevention and Early Warning, Failed States | The author analyzes the results of a pilot project (2004 – 2009) focused on conflict prevention and early warning in Guinea Bissau by the Canadian International Institute of Applied Negotiation. Guinea Bissau was considered at risk of violent armed and as a result an early warning and crisis management process was initiated. The article focuses on the results and lessons learned of that process. The stages of the process—crisis management, violence prevention, and the development of a National Plan of Action for Peace and Prosperity in Guinea Bissau—are analyzed within the context of a failing state. In addition, the article explores to what degree, over five years, an outside-driven effort to prevent political violence was effective. While the project was never able to reach the ambitious and robust goal of political conflict being resolved nonviolently, there were many small successes along the way that can be learned from, including building trust and meeting local needs, local project leadership, and integrated efforts. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12711 | Guinea-Bissau |
| How local are local agreements? Shaping local agreements as a new form of third-party intervention in protracted conflicts | Rim Turkmani | Negotiations, Peace Agreement, Multi-Track Diplomacy | Based on two case studies from Syria, this article argues that unilateral external intervention in protracted conflicts is not only about military and financial support to one or other warring party. Unilateral external actors often get involved in the negotiation of local agreements, creating a hybrid form of intervention that combines the roles of warfighting, mediation, and policing. In this context, external actors are able to transform their military, financial and logistical support to states and non-state armed groups into leverage and negotiating power that determines the outcome of local negotiations, thereby gearing the dynamics of the conflict towards their own interests and away from the local agenda. This hybrid external intervention may, in some circumstances, contribute to an unjust and uncertain stabilisation process, while in other circumstances, it can undermine local peace efforts. The clear implication is the need for a greater role and mandate for multilateral actors. | https://peacerep.org/publication/how-local-are-local-agreements/ | Syria |
| Promoting Peaceful and Safe Seasonal Migration in Northern Central African Republic | Guillaume de Brier, Peer Schouten, Peter Marsden, Dirk Gillebert, Timea Szarkova, Anna Moens, Lucie Haye | Seasonal migration, conflict | The borderlands of the Central African Republic (CAR) are home to one of the largest seasonal livestock migrations (transhumance) in the world. Decades of unrest and crisis, however, have brutally disrupted most aspects of herding—the routes taken, the people involved, governance mechanisms, as well as relations to local populations. To understand these changes and inform future peacebuilding efforts, IPIS and Concordis conducted a large-scale mapping and consultation with 1.300 stakeholders in CAR’s western borderlands of Ouham-Pendé and Western Ouham. Based on these consultations, the report takes a deep dive into the different mutual perceptions of transboundary and local herders and sedentary people of the deep causes of conflict and pathways for peaceful cohabitation. It identifies changes in herding routes and practices, highlights grass-root barriers to peace, assesses trust in different institutions for security and justice, and identifies opportunities for conflict transformation and economic growth. | https://pure.diis.dk/ws/files/4060092/2021_Concordis_Report.pdf | Central African Republic |
| Peacebuilding in Fragile Contexts | Jonathan Marley | Fragility, Economics and Conflict, Humanitarian Engagement | Peacebuilding thinking and practice have evolved significantly over the past decade. The business case for the effectiveness of peacebuilding has been established. Successful interventions underscore the importance of peacebuilding initiatives, as do the high-profile failures that occur when peacebuilding is absent, fragmented or insufficient. With the emergence of new approaches to peacebuilding led by the United Nations Peacebuilding Architecture Review, this paper examines the state of peacebuilding operations and finance in fragile contexts and, building on established trends and debates, identifies four areas that could be critical for driving progress on peacebuilding over the next decade. The paper is one of ten working papers supporting States of Fragility 2020. Together with the papers entitled “Diplomacy and peace in fragile contexts”, “Conflict prevention in fragile contexts”, and “Security actors in fragile contexts”, It provides a comprehensive background to Chapter 2 on peace in States of Fragility 2020. | https://www.oecd-ilibrary.org/docserver/d222bc0a-en.pdf?expires=1651673547&id=id&accname=guest&checksum=C9569BD773B1329835C441EC6A2E46FE | Worldwide |
| The Security Council And Conflict Prevention: Entry Points For Diplomatic Action | Richard Gowan | Preventive Diplomacy, Monitoring/Verification: United Nations, Governance: Reforms | This paper explores how members of the Security Council can design and implement preventive diplomatic strategies in response to emerging, escalating and acute crises. The Council’s behaviour in crisis situations is often reactive and far from strategic. Council members regularly struggle with (i) uncertainty over conflict dynamics; (ii) divergent national interests; and (iii) the lack of clear policy options for managing a situation. These limitations reflect not only the inherently chancy nature of conflict prevention – which is always an uncertain business – but also the political limitations of the Council as a factious intergovernmental body. These limits mean that the Council is often only a supporting player, or not a player at all, in preventive efforts led by States or regional organizations. The paper provides options for building a degree of diplomatic coherence around a set of goals within the Council and with other actors, and how the Council can engage directly with actors in a conflict. | https://collections.unu.edu/eserv/UNU:7963/UNSC_ConflictPrevention.pdf | Worldwide |
| Crisis Management Beyond the Humanitarian-Development Nexus | Atsushi Hanatani, Oscar A. Gómez, Chigumi Kawaguchi | Humanitarian, Development | In addressing humanitarian crises, the international community has long understood the need to extend beyond providing immediate relief, and to engage with long-term recovery activities and the prevention of similar crises in the future. However, this continuum from short-term relief to rehabilitation and development has often proved difficult to achieve. This book aims to shed light on the continuum of humanitarian crisis management, particularly from the viewpoint of major bilateral donors and agencies. Focusing on cases of armed conflicts and disasters, the authors describe the evolution of approaches and lessons learnt in practice when moving from emergency relief to recovery and prevention of future crises. Drawing on an extensive research project conducted by the Japan International Cooperation Agency Research Institute, this book compares how a range of international organizations, bilateral cooperation agencies, NGOs, and research institutes have approached the continuum in international humanitarian crisis management. The book draws on six humanitarian crises case studies, each resulting from armed conflict or natural disasters: Timor-Leste, South Sudan, the Syrian crisis, Hurricane Mitch in Honduras, the Indian Ocean earthquake and tsunami in Indonesia, and Typhoon Yolanda. The book concludes by proposing a common conceptual framework designed to appeal to different stakeholders involved in crisis management. Following on from the World Humanitarian Summit, where a new way of working on the humanitarian-development nexus was highlighted as one of five major priority trends, this book is a timely contribution to the debate which should interest researchers of humanitarian studies, conflict and peace studies, and disaster risk-management. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12173 | Worldwide |
| Negotiating Disarmament: Lessons Learnt from Colombia, Nepal, the Philippines, South Sudan, Sri Lanka | Nicholas Marsh, Julia Palik | Demobilization, Disarmament, Reintegration (DDR), | Disarmament is often characterized as a necessary condition for peace to prevail in the aftermath of civil conflicts. Yet implementation is contingent on what has been negotiated behind closed doors, a process that so far has received little attention.Without knowledge of the positions, motivations, and interests of parties involved in disarmament negotiations, our understanding of particular disarmament outcomes remains incomplete. To fill this gap, we examined negotiations on disarmament in Colombia, Nepal, the Philippines, South Sudan, and Sri Lanka. Our findings focus on the degree of inclusivity in the negotiations, the symbolic relevance of disarmament, and the various roles of external parties in disarmament negotiations. | https://www.prio.org/publications/12869 | Worldwide |
| International Multiparty Mediation and Conflict Management Challenges of cooperation and coordination | Siniša Vuković | Mediation, Conflict Management | This volume aims to provide a detailed explanation of the effects of cooperation and coordination on international multiparty mediation in conflicts. Contemporary scholarship stresses that the crucial ingredients for a successful multiparty mediation are ‘consistency in interests’ and ‘cooperation and coordination’ between mediators. This book seeks to supplement that understanding by investigating how much the ‘consistency of interests’ and ‘cooperation and coordination’ affect the overall process, and what happens to the mediation process when mediating parties do not share the same idea and interest in finding a common solution. At the same time, it explores the obstacles in achieving coordination and coherence between various mediators in such an environment and how to surmount the problems that multiple mediators face when operating without a ‘common script’ in attempting to mediate a negotiated settlement. The study investigates three distinct mechanisms (both on the systemic and contextual level) that have the potential to deter defection from a (potential) member of the multiparty mediation coalition: geo-political shifts, changes in the conflict dynamics, and mediators’ ability to bargain for a cooperative relationship. As the number of states and international actors that are involved in mediation increases, a careful assessment is necessary not only of their relative institutional strengths and weaknesses, but also of how to promote complementary efforts and how to synchronize the whole process when one actor is transferring the responsibilities for mediation to others. This book will be of much interest to students of mediation, conflict management, war and conflict studies, security studies and IR. | https://mars.gmu.edu/handle/1920/12174 | Worldwide |