Introduction
This short brief summarises the state of play concerning the debates on peacebuilding and the post-2015 development goals. It argues that peace and security should have a prominent place in the goals, which will replace the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). It argues that the best way to achieve this is for there to be a separate goal on reduction of armed violence, with peace/security also integrated throughout the other goals as necessary. Finally, it suggests that policy-makers and activists who support this goal should switch to practical action in order not to miss the opportunity to integrate peace/security into the post-2015 framework. Above all, it is essential to start drafting options for a possible goal, including the targets that would fall under it and indicators of progress and to make the case to the decision-makers in the process in order for them to assess the feasibility of a peace/security goal and the version of it that will be acceptable.
The Prospects for Peace and Security in the Post-2015 Goals
Judging by the Task Team and High Level Panel reports, it now seems likely that there will be a new UN post-2015 set of global goals. While a comprehensive assessment of the impact of the MDGs has not been carried out, there is widespread consensus that they have made a difference precisely because they have been articulated as goals. Change occurred and there were positive outcomes that would likely not have come to pass without the MDGs.
Assuming that there will be goals in the new agenda, what will they look like? First, as the post-2015 goals will integrate the Rio +20 framework, covering 20 priorities, they will be broader and there will probably be more of them. The result is likely to be a combined set of sustainable development goals; the agenda will set out the dimensions of sustainable development, with goals for each of these dimensions. While ‘sustainable’ is often used as short-hand for environmentally sound, if we take the literal meaning of ‘sustainable development’ to be lasting — enduring — development, then peace clearly becomes an issue: development will not be lasting if issues that generate violent conflict are not addressed.
The UN Task Team (UNTT) Report from June 2012 identifies peace and security as one of four ‘key’ or ‘core’ dimensions, and further notes that it was not adequately covered by the MDGs.Footnote1 It states, ‘Peace and security … are critical for development and a major component of it.’Footnote2
There is, however, an increasing risk that without concerted campaigning on this issue its inclusion will be marginal or tokenistic. The opportunity to have peace and security recognised as one the dimensions of sustainable development may be slipping away. Within the High Level Panel's (HLP's) Communiqué of February 2013 it is notably less prominent than in the UNTT report.Footnote3 The reason to include it is simple: conflict prevents development. Since the Millennium Declaration, a body of evidence has led to a deeper understanding of the links between peace and development. Among the most prominent contributions, the World Development Report (WDR) of 2011 and the work of Paul Collier have highlighted that there is a set of conflict-affected fragile countries that are not developing. There is an accompanying body of work (policy, practice and projects) on how to integrate peace and development. The question is what to incorporate in the new goals, and how?
Discussions in civil society are lagging behind, with some still arguing against global goals and that the MDGs should be replaced by a declaration, a set of commitments or a vision. Peacebuilding organisations, which see understanding the context as a central precept of asserting their work, have not all accepted the idea of global goals. Some argue that goals — if there are to be any — should be set at the national level. While this is well intentioned in that it derives from recognition of the importance of context, it rather misses the point. A framework that does not include goals will simply be another set of principles, of which there are already many. The worthy suggestion of a new vision seems unrealistic, grandiose even. The world already has visions and it seems unlikely that the process will produce a vision that is more inspiring or more widely accepted then these.
An international framework, be it a global vision or set of principles, accompanied by national goals carries the additional risk of serving as a new burden on the countries who are already required to produce national goals or equivalent for the implementation of a range of international frameworks. If goal-setting is at national level, it will be another framework where the rich make flowery commitments and the poor are asked to take action.
Framing Goals to Include Peace and Security
Given the wide variety of potential goals and the mounting competition to have them included, the intergovernmental processes will focus on deciding which issues require stand-alone goals, which issues can be combined into single goals and which issues need to be mentioned but do not necessarily require a stand-alone goal. If we assume that there will be a set of headline goals which each include specific targets, then there will also be scope to integrate issues into the targets if they are not accepted as goals in themselves (as is the case for employment under the current MDG 1). The framing questions decided on by the HLP and the questions policy-makers are asking of civil society demonstrate a need for practical input, suggestions on how to frame goals for the peace and security dimension of development.Footnote4
The inclusion of a peace/security goal would be both symbolically and practically important, implying recognition that peace/security is a dimension of development leading to related improvements in policy and practice. Without a specific goal referring to peace/security it is unlikely that action will follow to promote peace.
Should there be a separate goal and integration of peace/security into other goals?
The debates in the peacebuilding community have focused on the merits of a stand-alone goal versus mainstreaming. But the two are not mutually exclusive: there is no reason why there should not be both a separate goal and references, targets and indicators that refer to peace, conflict, violence and security throughout the preamble and in other goals as relevant. Certainly, there is no reason not to lobby for both. To do so would reflect the nature of peace as an aspect of or an enabling condition for many of the other goals. It would also allow the incorporation of the concept of conflict sensitivity where relevant.
To rely solely on integrating peace throughout other goals presupposes, first, that the framework will be far more sophisticated than is actually likely and, second, that it will be rigorously and universally applied, which is also unlikely to be the case. This will not be a nuanced blueprint that will be sensitively applied in global policy-making. In addition, there is a risk of ending up with no meaningful (i.e. leading to action) inclusion of peace/security: as the other goals are not yet decided, trying to mainstream peace/security into them is rather difficult.
Shaping the goal: peace, conflict, violence and security
Armed violence is a broader category than conflict. It includes violence that occurs during situations of conflict but also other types of violence. More violent deaths now occur outside situations of conflict than during conflict. The peacebuilding community is grappling with how to respond to what are sometimes termed ‘new’ forms of violence, covering violence that is generated by criminal activity and other non-politically motivated violence and urban or gang violence. Levels of criminal violence have rapidly increased in countries that are supply or transit countries for trafficking (with increases in destination countries too).
Since the end of the Cold War, conflict itself has changed (and decreased — although the trend is now reversing), more frequently taking place within states rather than between states. Finally, there is increasing (or increasing recognition of) the overlap between and merging of different types of violence.
For example, if the goal is the broad one of reduction of deaths due to armed violence, then targets could relate to more specific types of violence, such as a reduction in the number of armed conflicts taking place, increases in peace agreements, and reduction in rates of violence in particular countries.
The goal could be framed positively — for example, that a majority of the world's population should live in peace — or negatively, so that the goal is reduction of conflict or violence. The latter is less vague and better lends itself to measurement. Content could be drawn from a number of sources: the WDR, the Peacebuilding and Statebuilding Goals that result from the New Deal process, and the Geneva Declaration.
One of the problems of goals — and a longstanding criticism of the MDG approach — is that they oversimplify highly complex matters. The relationship between peace and development is complex but this is true of many of the issues being integrated. While ‘peace’ may be difficult to measure, many aspects of violence, including conflict, can be measured. There are many potential indicators of progress towards reducing conflict and violence. A recent paper by Saferworld lists more than 80.Footnote5 But the goal has to come first, if just logically — indicators indicate progress towards meeting a specific targets and/or an overall goal. While it is useful to show that there are indicators for different aspects of peace/security, if the issue is not in the framework, quality of indicators is a moot point. It could be argued that peace is an enabling condition rather than a dimension of development, and should thus be included separately in a section on enabling conditions rather than as a goal. To differentiate between goals and enabling conditions is a false distinction, however. Even taking the existing eight goals, there are complex relationships between them; some serve as enabling conditions of or dimensions of the others. For example, as well as being a goal in itself, education serves as an enabling condition to meet other goals, as does gender equality.
Finally, promotion of good governance is a central component of development and peacebuilding. The WDR refers to the need to focus development assistance on building institutions that promote citizen security and justice, and jobs. Governance is not referred to in the MDGs but is likely to appear in post-2015 SDGs. One option is a goal that combines peace, security, governance and justice. Inclusion of governance changes the nature of the goals away from outcomes for people to outcomes for the states in which they live. This rightly recognises that development is political, and that poor governance is a reason for the failure of development.
Development or development assistance?
The MDGs were largely about development assistance: the goals of development policy and programmes; what to spend money on and the results that development assistance should produce. Peacebuilding organisations — and many others — have argued that the post-2015 goals should be about development not about development assistance. The emphasis on universality is a way to expand the scope of the post-2015 goals beyond development assistance: they are to be goals that apply to all people, wherever they are. The targets, however, may be narrower, focusing on particular regions or particular types of countries, which will allow the targets to address need but also potentially causes and enabling factors.
Even if the goals are universal, the new framework is not likely to be applied universally. The policies and practices that change because of it are still likely to be centred on development policy and the donor–beneficiary relationship. It is difficult to see this new framework being more widely applied, for instance to help shape anti-poverty policy in rich countries. That said, it is still important that the goals be universal; for instance it could be useful to anti-poverty campaigners working in richer countries.
Even if the post-2015 goals are still primarily about development assistance, it is just as important that peace be included. In order for development assistance to be effective the role of conflict and violence needs to be taken into account. Civilian peacebuilding, and conflict prevention are part of development, as recognised by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Development Assistance Committee (DAC) eligibility criteria.
Incorporating the external causes of violence/external stresses
One of the chief dilemmas for those working on the post-2015 framework is to ensure that they lead to action by all countries, not just the most impoverished. This is linked to but not to be confused with the universality issue mentioned below. As mentioned above, the goals will be global, in the sense of universal applicability, but will they lead to universal action, recognising global responsibility for the (lack of) development? Will they include references to the external causes of a lack of development and targets to tackle these causes?
For armed violence, there are any number of external causes that could potentially be included: the arms trade, exploitation of natural resources, demand-side use of trafficked goods (and people), money-laundering, financial and technical support provided to abusive governments, and so on. Some of these issues are referred to as ‘external stresses’ by the WDR which may be a more acceptable formulation.
There is likely to be a strong push from newly assertive developing countries for the inclusion of measures to tackle external causes. For peacebuilding organisations, it is crucial to argue for their inclusion, since at the heart of peacebuilding is tackling the root causes of conflict. Whatever can be included will be worthwhile and discussion of these issues during the preparatory process could have some value. Realistically, it is unlikely that very much will be included, taking us back to the point above that the post-2015 goals, like their predecessors, will be largely about making development assistance a little more effective. As such, they will not be without value but it is important not to over-state what can be achieved.
Moving Forward: Overcoming Obstacles and Drafting and Campaigning for a Goal
There are different likely sources of opposition to a goal on reduction of armed violence. There are still many within the development community who do not accept that peace/security is a dimension of development. Their fear is that development will be ‘politicised’. However, development — policy and practice — is highly political and it would be naïve to think otherwise. On the other hand, one of the clearest arguments for conflict to be central to the new framework comes from Oxfam International.Footnote6
There will be concerns that the goals that refer to security will not be accepted by the states that most rigorously defend sovereignty. Even reference to people's security will not alleviate their concerns that the goal may be used to justify external intervention. A goal that focuses on reducing deaths due to armed violence may be more acceptable, since external military intervention is a major cause of death due to armed violence.
It is now time to test the feasibility of a goal on reduction of armed violence through drafting options and taking the discussion to potential supporters and opponents involved in the intergovernmental processes.
The MDGs have been important and the post-2015 goals will also be important but some of the debates on how to integrate peace — and indeed other issues — over-state their importance. They will be a catalyst and a guide, serving to stimulate and re-focus action, primarily within the development sector, by setting out the dimensions of development and goals for them. In this, peace should be incorporated. A good set of goals will serve to improve policies and practice, enabling more people to live decent, dignified lives. The goals will not radically transform the future of the world and the nature of human life, or the relationship between states. All those who support a peace goal — from governments to multilaterals and civil society — should shift their attention to drafting a goal on reducing armed violence and then lobbying for it in order not to miss the opportunity to have peace recognised as a dimension of development.
Notes
2 Ibid., 45.
4 Ibid.
6 For civil society positions on post-2015, see http://www.beyond2015.org/civil-society-positions-0