The Future of the UN Peacebuilding Architecture
Description
In 2004, the High-Level Panel on Threats, Challenges and Change proposed the creation of a new Peacebuilding Commission (PBC) within the United Nations to address certain gaps and weaknesses in international peacebuilding efforts, including the problem of inadequate coordination among key peacebuilding agencies and actors, the lack of sustained political attention to countries after the initial period of stabilization, and inadequate financing for peacebuilding. The recommendation ultimately led to the creation of the PBC in December 2005.
The PBC’s mandate, set out in founding resolutions of the Security Council and General Assembly, is:
1. To bring together all relevant actors to marshal resources and to advise on and propose integrated strategies for post-conflict peacebuilding and recovery;
2. To focus attention on the reconstruction and institution-building efforts necessary for recovery from conflict and to support the development of integrated strategies in order to lay the foundation for sustainable development; and
3. To provide recommendations and information to improve the coordination of all relevant actors within and outside the United Nations, to develop best practices, to help to ensure predictable financing for early recovery activities and to extend the period of attention given by the international community to post-conflict recovery.
Many analysts have examined the performance of the PBC and its subsidiary entities, the Peacebuilding Support Office and the Peacebuilding Fund. Some have commended the PBC for developing a robust program of work in a relatively short time, and for bringing greater international attention to bear on the first two countries on its docket, Burundi and Sierra Leone. Others, however, have expressed disappointment at the relatively modest goals and accomplishments of the PBC to date. Several commentators have also offered recommendations for improvements or changes in the operating procedures and activities of the PBC in the immediate future.
This research project, pursued in partnership with the Norwegian Institute of Internatioanl Affairs (NUPI), will step back from the day-to-day operations of the PBC and pose a longer-term strategic question:
What role or roles should the PBC perform five or ten years from now? Put differently, what are the right “stretch targets” for the PBC over the medium and long term?
In answering these questions, the project will focus on the PBC’s contribution to “sustainable peacebuilding.” The problem of sustainability refers not only to the need for ongoing international attention to specific countries at risk, but also (and more fundamentally) to the need for peacebuilding policies and strategies that yield durable and self-sustaining results in the host countries themselves. The practice of peacebuilding has long suffered from shortcomings in both of these dimensions of sustainability: International attention has tended to be fleeting, and the results of peacebuilding missions have often turned out to be superficial. As we look ahead to the possible future of the PBC in five or ten years, one of the key considerations is how the Commission might better address these problems of sustainability.
Participants
Roland Paris (Working Group Co-Chair), Director of the Centre for International Policy Studies, and Associate Professor, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, University of Ottawa
Kwesi Aning, Head, Conflict Prevention Management and Resolution Department, Kofi Annan International Peacekeeping Training Centre, Ghana
Thomas Biersteker, Professor, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies, Geneva
Richard Caplan, Professor of International Relations, University of Oxford
Cedric de Coning, Research Fellow, African Centre for the Constructive Resolution of Disputes (ACCORD) and the Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI)
Robert Jenkins, Professor of Political Science, Hunter College, and Fellow, Ralph Bunche Institute for International Studies, The Graduate Center, City University of New York
Monica Juma, Executive Director, Multilateral and African Renaissance Initiative, Africa Policy Institute, Pretoria
Carolyn McAskie, Senior Fellow, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs, University of Ottawa, and former Assistant Secretary General for Peacebuilding, United Nations
Erin McCandless, New School Graduate Program of International Affairs, New York
Richard Ponzio, Senior Strategy and Policy Officer, Office of the Coordinator for Reconstruction and Stabilization, US Department of State
Angelika Rettberg, Professor of Political Science and Director of the Research Program on Peacebuilding, University of the Andes, Bogota, Columbia
Jenna Slotin, International Peace Institute, New York
Eli Stamnes, Senior Research Fellow, Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI)
Necla Tschirgi, Research Associate, Centre for International Policy Studies, University of Ottawa, and former Senior Policy Advisor, UN Peacebuilding Support Office
Timeline and Events
August 31, 2009 - Paper drafts due
September 24, 2009 - Workshop (Ottawa)
February 2010 - Dissemination conference (New York)
Outcomes
Working papers were co-published by CIPS and NUPI in January 2010:
No. 1: Kwesi Aning and Ernest Lartey, Establishing the Future State of the Peacebuilding Commission: Perspectives on Africa
No. 2: Thomas Biersteker and Oliver Jütersonke, The Challenges of Institution Building: Prospects for the UN Peacebuilding Commission
No. 3: Cedric de Coning, Clarity, Coherence and Context: Three Priorities for Sustainable Peacebuilding
No. 4: Rob Jenkins, Re-engineering the UN Peacebuilding Architecture
No. 5: Carolyn McAskie, 2020 Vision. Visioning the Future of the United Nations Peacebuilding Architecture
No. 6: Erin McCandless, In Pursuit of Peacebuilding for Perpetual Peace: Where the UN’s Peacebuilding Architecture Needs to Go
No. 7: Angelika Rettberg, The Private Sector, Peacebuilding, and Economic Recovery: A Challenge for the UN Peacebuilding Architecture
No. 8: Eli Stamnes, Values, Context and Hybridity: How Can the Insights from the Liberal Peace Critique Literature Be Brought to Bear on the Practices of the UN Peacebuilding Architecture?
No. 9: Necla Tschirgi, Escaping Path Dependency: A Proposed Multi-Tiered Approach for the UN’s Peacebuilding Commission
Institutional Partners
Centre for International Policy Studies (CIPS), University of Ottawa
Norwegian Institute of International Affairs (NUPI)
Norwegian Peacebuilding Centre (NOREF)
Contact
Roland Paris
rparis@uottawa.ca