Bridging Silos between Anti-Corruption and Peacebuilding
The Corruption and Peacebuilding Project (CPB) emerges from the integration of our combined 50 years of experience as peacebuilding scholar-practitioners with our more recent work on corruption. In our experience conducting conflict analyses and evaluations over the past decade, we have seen corruption appear time and again as a key conflict issue. Yet very few peacebuilding agencies stand up programs to address corruption in the conflict context. Even fewer anti-corruption programs benefit from the peacebuilding field’s wealth of experience in developing politically savvy, conflict sensitive approaches. Often, anti-corruption work in conflict contexts is carried out with little to no regard for the conflict dynamics, so little is done to mitigate any negative effects of the programming on conflict and fragility. This divide has been puzzling, as siloed thinking and practice diminishes the relevance and effectiveness of programming.
Building from the existing work on the conflict-corruption nexus, The Corruption and Peacebuilding Project will develop practical ways to support practitioners in tackling corruption in fragile and conflict affected states. It aims: to facilitate greater synergies between the anti-corruption and peacebuilding fields; to synthesize existing frameworks and approaches for effective, conflict-sensitive anti-corruption strategies; and indicate entry points for development practitioners, anti-corruption experts, and peacebuilders in settings where corruption is a underlying driver of fragility and conflict.
The U4 Anti-Corruption Resource Centre is a multi-disciplinary research institute that advises a core group of bi-lateral donors. U4 commissioned CJL to develop a short online course for practitioners on the theme of ‘Corruption, Conflict, and Fragility.’
While the course is a work in progress, we have conducted numerous consultation with development practitioners in FCAS. Often, the largest barriers for tackling corruption in their programming are related to organizational pressures and incentives, not a lack of knowledge or caring about corruption.
Subscribe and stay updated on the launch of the online course later this year.
The Berghof Foundation has long been a prominent leader in the conflict transformation and peacebuilding communities. CJL and Berghof have a working group on anti-corruption and peacebuilding. CJL is currently writing an article for their state-of-the-art handbook on the intersections between conflict, corruption, peacebuilding, and anti-corruption.
Despite significantly overlapping goals, the peacebuilding and anti-corruption communities are largely silo-ed; both would benefit from the cross-pollination of ideas and tactics because corruption and conflict are often inextricably intertwined.
To learn more read our blogpost Two roads that will never meet? An agenda for dialogue on the intersection of peacebuilding and anti-corruption.
24 June 2009
Pilfering the Peace: the nexus between corruption and peacebuilding
Journal articles by: Raymond June, Nathaniel Heller, Michael Johnston, Peter Uvin, Gaelle Kibranian, Daniel Friedman, Matt Herbert, Phyllis Dininio, Oscar Bloh, Ambrose James, Amy Margolies, and Corinna Kreidler.
Edited by Cheyanne Scharbatke-Church.
