Working with Local Strength for Peace Building

Press Releases

Working with Local Strength for Peace Building

[Suva, Fiji – April 17, 2012] Recognizing local knowledge, working with local capacities and building relationships and partnerships with local actors provides concrete steps towards local-international collaboration for peacebuilding. These were the highlights of a framework for international-local engagement that was presented at a workshop in Suva today.

The workshop ‘Working with local strengths: supporting states to build the capacity to protect’ was conducted by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) together with researchers from the University of Queensland (Brisbane, Australia). The findings of a two-year research project on possibilities and challenges of collaboration between local peace builders and international practitioners were presented and discussed at the workshop. The project has explored prospects for improved cooperation between international, state, and local non-state peace and order actors in the Solomon Islands, Vanuatu, Bougainville and East Timor.

“Often state agencies and international interveners have a limited understanding of local societal strengths and can find it difficult to engage with local capacities and institutions for protection and conflict prevention. Yet, these capacities and institutions are in fact at the forefront of providing protection and conflict prevention for local populations,” said Dr. Morgan Brigg, the lead researcher.

“At this workshop we discussed and further developed a framework for international-local engagement. The framework provides concrete steps towards improved local-international collaboration, based on the three principles: recognising local knowledge, working with local capacities and building relationships and partnerships,” he said.

UNDP’s Conflict Prevention and Recovery Programme Specialist, Janet Murdock said the workshop helped raise awareness about the importance of local ownership of peace building processes.

“Peacebuilding has to be owned by the people UNDP through its project Building Capacities for Peace and Development (CPAD) has provided support to strategic and catalytic peace building projects in the Pacific that address the key conflict drivers, strengthen the region’s peace and security architecture and foster partnerships between governments and civil society groups,” said Ms Murdock.

The workshop brought together representatives from international and regional organisations, national and international NGOs, academic institutions and community-based organisations. It was held on the campus of the University of the South Pacific.

[Ends]

© Scoop Media