tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-45772511884177749202024-03-18T20:18:04.293-07:00Chris Underwood's BlogChris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.comBlogger124125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-71234479556014475322024-03-10T01:13:00.000-08:002024-03-10T01:17:22.827-08:00Social mobility, feminism & me <span style="font-family: inherit;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbgCtxEUSpCuC-P_335r1vns3o7Djl5rQOkFR_aKC3g8Ypgg-eC5JoNSEErw_ijjrdnSNOkwxCxwPbKmHWBZmepKTUg8xBQw2GyNYaM5omXFNHQIByTUXc76qTEVgepftDDyIpPpfUrMzNhvffGb8S509ta6PWzSAKdkYQ_RFXoDsEpl2IIy0v3zFp9ao/s2560/Blog2.jpg" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="1707" data-original-width="2560" height="266" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgbgCtxEUSpCuC-P_335r1vns3o7Djl5rQOkFR_aKC3g8Ypgg-eC5JoNSEErw_ijjrdnSNOkwxCxwPbKmHWBZmepKTUg8xBQw2GyNYaM5omXFNHQIByTUXc76qTEVgepftDDyIpPpfUrMzNhvffGb8S509ta6PWzSAKdkYQ_RFXoDsEpl2IIy0v3zFp9ao/w400-h266/Blog2.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">HRH Duke of Edinburgh, Deputy President Paul Mashatile (front)</td></tr></tbody></table><br />International Women's Day is important for all of us. I published this blog on how my own world, and the possibilities I experienced were only possible as a result of a very feminist fight fought by my mother. I am now so very grateful that I remembered to tell her that, before she died. This was first published at the end of January on the FCDO internal intranet. I've edited it, slightly. </span><div><span style="font-family: inherit;"><br /></span></div><div><p style="background: white; color: #242424; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="border: 0px; color: black; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">Yesterday I sat at a table with the Duke of Edinburgh and the Acting President of South Africa. It was the conclusion of a successful visit which garnered widespread positive commentary on the deep and broad relationship between the UK and a country which has played such a prominent role in the consciousness of my generation. My first year of University coincided with the end of Apartheid in 1994, we hosted South African trainee teachers in the UK, the first of many such projects. <br aria-hidden="true" /><br aria-hidden="true" />So fast forward and I now have the privilege of representing my country in South Africa as Political Counsellor. I reflected yesterday, and today as I walked past the crest of the British High Commission how I’d arrived here. My own story began in Middlesbrough, an area with some of the highest social deprivation figures in Western Europe at the time.</span></span></p><p style="background: white; color: #242424; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="border: 0px; color: black; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"> </span></span></p><p style="background: white; color: #242424; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="border: 0px; color: black; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"></span></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjT8feEBEuvx5INbksVQPxVAFgPGyV9eOjmejvzpmwViWxl4hK5Kfvalbk3SFg2sYV1fFr8J9BWIOEMfLJxWkU_CvSJYMD615XGenrgq4nwFIoytVaFcMKF25qyxXEVeoPRarCBtqWxIR1Ka5G25NUXX65_yqgQkj2F8xHMYGguMNPWhrkaPLqDsnnUX2Y/s1280/Blog1.jpg" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="960" data-original-width="1280" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjT8feEBEuvx5INbksVQPxVAFgPGyV9eOjmejvzpmwViWxl4hK5Kfvalbk3SFg2sYV1fFr8J9BWIOEMfLJxWkU_CvSJYMD615XGenrgq4nwFIoytVaFcMKF25qyxXEVeoPRarCBtqWxIR1Ka5G25NUXX65_yqgQkj2F8xHMYGguMNPWhrkaPLqDsnnUX2Y/w320-h240/Blog1.jpg" width="320" /></a></span></div><span style="font-family: inherit;">But it didn’t really begin there for me, but with my mother. And that’s who I thought of at the high table of diplomacy yesterday. A woman who refused to accept her designated role, having been advised to leave school at 15 and concentrate on children alone. She bided her time, read voraciously and the more she did the more determined she became. Her Open University studies were often late at night and in the mornings discarded A4 scribbles, wobbling piles of books together with hastily prepared breakfasts and cramming of too many things into too few hours remain the strongest memories of my childhood. Ultimately, after many years she emerged from the fog with a PhD in Victorian feminist literature, a story of how so many women; George Eliot, Mary Wollstonecraft, Charlotte Bronte among them, chipped away at a patriarchal edifice that must have seemed overwhelmingly powerful at the time.</span><p></p><p style="background: white; color: #242424; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="border: 0px; color: black; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"> </span></span></p><p style="background: white; color: #242424; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="border: 0px; color: black; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">And without her, and her refusal to accept her role, I wouldn’t have been at that table yesterday, supporting a Royal Visit. </span></span></p><p style="background: white; color: #242424; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="border: 0px; color: black; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: inherit;"> </span></span></p><p style="background: white; color: #242424; margin: 0cm; text-align: justify;"><span style="border: 0px; color: black; font-feature-settings: inherit; font-kerning: inherit; font-optical-sizing: inherit; font-stretch: inherit; font-style: inherit; font-variant: inherit; font-variation-settings: inherit; font-weight: inherit; line-height: inherit; margin: 0px; padding: 0px; vertical-align: baseline;"><span style="font-family: inherit;">FCDO has some amazing and powerful colleagues who are each driving an equalities and inclusion agenda forward in their own way. I do wonder if we sometimes miss the opportunity to join up the dots and think about how we advance equality in a holistic way. On the face of it a white middle-aged man working as a diplomat would not be the obvious place to look for feminist impact. So, what else might we be missing along the way?</span></span></p></div>Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-76324047828427695312023-07-09T00:47:00.000-07:002023-07-09T00:47:23.938-07:00First impressions <p></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9yZQ9q7MkM9Lv_j2lIYN3eFyRCFUZOpTyIAvRheZANp1H12QAi6acX7aIZoZbbNpzzb85PDjVC_-mznUJgjrVfkoV0u22WGwoPecbegAT-WV40o7DoterubBCoaEf0ZrWhAsQPkP-K0jhDqWPx8vYP-003pFNpAc7qBvT9h7UhdRAsDwe5mARhmwZ6HY/s1024/Bokke.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="316" data-original-width="1024" height="124" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEj9yZQ9q7MkM9Lv_j2lIYN3eFyRCFUZOpTyIAvRheZANp1H12QAi6acX7aIZoZbbNpzzb85PDjVC_-mznUJgjrVfkoV0u22WGwoPecbegAT-WV40o7DoterubBCoaEf0ZrWhAsQPkP-K0jhDqWPx8vYP-003pFNpAc7qBvT9h7UhdRAsDwe5mARhmwZ6HY/w400-h124/Bokke.jpg" width="400" /></a></div><br />Last week I landed into OR Tambo airport to begin a four year posting as a diplomat representing the British Government in South Africa. Quite apart from the fact that I still can't quite believe I have the privilege of representing the UK, coming from a background where that idea would have seemed ridiculous, I feel most privileged at having been asked to come back to one of the most beautiful, fascinating and inspiring countries in the world. <p></p><p>And what prompted this post was watching the Springboks dominate Australia in what was a very one-sided Southern hemisphere rugby international, but what was also a very powerful collective expression of national identity. All traditions across this diverse nation seemed to be represented somehow, and all came together in a rendition of the anthem at the start, and celebrations throughout. </p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><iframe allowfullscreen='allowfullscreen' webkitallowfullscreen='webkitallowfullscreen' mozallowfullscreen='mozallowfullscreen' width='320' height='266' src='https://www.blogger.com/video.g?token=AD6v5dx_xtXrAveHCR7BhbzYjMTd76qjAc5msnGVaSnohLEGQmo_HhuikyriSubr_fwqv_Ss1gdSB87zyn-QxKC7gA' class='b-hbp-video b-uploaded' frameborder='0'></iframe></div><br /><p>We overlook the role of sport at times, but this was a striking reminder of how important it can be. The London2012 Olympics having been a pivotal social and cultural moment for the UK, for example. And for those who love watching, or taking part in sport I can't think of a better place to be than here in South Africa. </p>Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-90048989923343671912023-01-21T09:00:00.003-08:002023-01-21T09:21:22.277-08:00Development & Diplomacy: ‘twas ever thus<div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjMy60p0g9nuovonlibRq2b7KV6C_zWMeEHIeyRAXyk4gtdoe-CFkFkeYLnRG4dffLBf0GnrxL2jzwT3hljVXI0t-4ftkc5JSJcdS3_gt1kF1evfNAk8-XZ6zA8a6zpM-dwpulOGkSpBuNzsYAIi6pOebreiesVJkKLXcSrQVKcDk4q6I4fItphiW7c" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="400" data-original-width="1296" height="124" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjMy60p0g9nuovonlibRq2b7KV6C_zWMeEHIeyRAXyk4gtdoe-CFkFkeYLnRG4dffLBf0GnrxL2jzwT3hljVXI0t-4ftkc5JSJcdS3_gt1kF1evfNAk8-XZ6zA8a6zpM-dwpulOGkSpBuNzsYAIi6pOebreiesVJkKLXcSrQVKcDk4q6I4fItphiW7c=w400-h124" width="400" /></a></div><br />The merger creating the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) in the UK was not the first of its’ kind; Australia and Canada had done it years before and there were other examples of merged mandate departments, such as that in the Netherlands combining development and trade. But given the size and scale of DFID it is perhaps the most closely watched, and remains in the word of its’ departed Director General Moazzam Malik a “work in progress”. This is a blog musing on how the new Department might turn a chimera of doing development and diplomacy coherently into a reality in the coming years.</div><div><br /></div><div><b>What am I talking about? </b></div><div><br /></div><div>
One of the challenges with this debate is that people use terms with multiple meanings interchangeably. What is development? I do not accept the traditional refrain of ‘<a href="https://edition.cnn.com/2013/03/17/opinion/elliott-bono-ted-poverty/index.html#:~:text=Extreme%20global%20poverty%20has%20already,be%20virtually%20eliminated%20by%202030.&text=There%20has%20been%20astonishing%20progress%20in%20other%20areas%20of%20human%20development.">poverty eradication</a>’: such a feat is impossible by definition as poverty is relative and thus constant, and therefore non-eradicable. I also don’t think either outcomes such as $1.25 a day or inputs such as 0.7% of GNI are very helpful. That's not a metric to meaningfully measure anything except spending. When I met A<a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/05/ogp-africa-does-it-pass-amina-test.html">mina from Dar es Salaam</a>, she was probably earning over $1.25 - but her future had been stolen by corruption: economic metrics often miss what really matters. </div><div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: left;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjkl1baUhu3ZwoaxLDZQAOHU2Sxr4Jony-OAtS9MIY-Je_L9Cqs4vwaQdh-CDYBAQHKhVMLKsaLl9E642WLXiMb1hOFOpBjdMkthyVYIvsPWd_1jRwfbx84MI3xp6rqHX0gqnrZ54NYcB60Aq-PvJO9kuCx4pfSCbS-BgR_NNIbtm_6BsK0rX5AWjdR" style="clear: left; float: left; margin-bottom: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="468" data-original-width="235" height="240" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjkl1baUhu3ZwoaxLDZQAOHU2Sxr4Jony-OAtS9MIY-Je_L9Cqs4vwaQdh-CDYBAQHKhVMLKsaLl9E642WLXiMb1hOFOpBjdMkthyVYIvsPWd_1jRwfbx84MI3xp6rqHX0gqnrZ54NYcB60Aq-PvJO9kuCx4pfSCbS-BgR_NNIbtm_6BsK0rX5AWjdR" width="121" /></a></div>I take inspiration from former USAID Administrator <a href="https://www.files.ethz.ch/isn/118483/file_Natsios_Counterbureaucracy.pdf">Andrew Natsios’ thesis</a> that what actually counts, is what you can’t count. In other words, if the human condition is to be elevated then that is likely to be because of power, social norms around gender, class and/or the institutions within which communities can collaborate, compete without violence or hold each other accountable through electoral politics. Not by how much you’ve spent, or what their daily income at any one point is: Natsios termed this sort of measuring the "counter-bureaucracy". </div></div><div><br /></div><div>So for me development is about advancing a process of change that all societies – that's all of ours, North and South – are constantly engaged in. This is therefore a state of freedoms, accountable institutions and rules-based systems which allow all in any one society to advance their own individual potential and secure adequate resources to live comfortably and free of fear. An example could be a schoolgirl from a marginalised minority who is able to walk to school confident of not being attacked, and widely supported to fulfil her potential. She and eventually her children thus grow: in potential, in their contribution to society and in relative economic security. This goes all the way up Maslow’s hierarchy. </div><div><br /></div><div><b>Where does diplomacy fit? </b></div><div><br /></div><div>If we take classic political science theory then International Relations are an “agora” – the Greek idea of a public space – within which states negotiate, compete and sometimes contest. Scholars often argue that there are no rules in this game: that the agora is an anarchic space with each State acting according to rational self-interest. That implies multilateral institutions or global norms are largely superficial, a means to an end with States paying lip-service when it suits. I don’t accept this notion fully, and believe here that most demonstrably democratic States are sufficiently sophisticated to mean that policy makers are minded to make the world a better place, as much as pursue their national self-interest. The two are often the same. Examples here are the human rights campaigners of the 1970s evolving into the political leaders of the 1980s & 90s and who delivered much of the human rights agendas that even authoritarian States seek to associate themselves with today. </div><div><br /><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgiaUiim7iVLLXJxTDmYL7QySSmPZFRRlz4LYdA7xALi6eSg2lbkHNIk1D3YzS4Ak2DRW0jbgsTfxskGbTbVtjlyTJa-wSzCtZ_MhGHH2m4gVRuJZCXVXV7Stj6eQtpUMcyC5oFf-GjhDtKyjB-aJ_wvjZT_joOEYbT4-LZxUtg0rlVY52ATcxxvb9_" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="1366" data-original-width="1680" height="325" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEgiaUiim7iVLLXJxTDmYL7QySSmPZFRRlz4LYdA7xALi6eSg2lbkHNIk1D3YzS4Ak2DRW0jbgsTfxskGbTbVtjlyTJa-wSzCtZ_MhGHH2m4gVRuJZCXVXV7Stj6eQtpUMcyC5oFf-GjhDtKyjB-aJ_wvjZT_joOEYbT4-LZxUtg0rlVY52ATcxxvb9_=w400-h325" width="400" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Plaza de Mayo demonstration about the 'disappeared': Argentina, 1982</td></tr></tbody></table></div><div><br /></div><div><b>So how do we do it? </b></div><div><br /></div><div>
We learn from each other. Here are three challenges which are based on some core lessons, some of which are hard to hear depending on which side of the fence you traditionally sit.</div><div style="text-align: left;"><ul style="text-align: left;"><li>Change takes time. The <a href="https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/4389">World Development Report of 2011</a> told us that societies emerging from conflict (which is where most poverty and pestilence are to be found) take an average of 30 years to break this cycle. That is well beyond what are often short-term horizons involved in foreign policy making.</li><li>Silos are bad. The development sector as a whole is fragmented, specialised and often works at cross purposes. That is largely down to the way in which donors fund it; but it is also reflected within donor agencies themselves. Foreign policy specialists illustrate that to achieve big things you need to work across multiple complex issue areas in a way which allows you to combine your advantages to good effect. The more successful COPs are examples of this. Development professionals need to become much better at doing the same: so the challenge to a new Department like FCDO is how do we support colleagues to develop and apply new combined skillsets? </li><li>Incentives matter. This is an internal as well as an external point. Within a merged donor agency or Department, we need to ensure individuals can become professionals across traditional areas of both spheres. But incentives apply externally too. We need to recognise the hard truth that development programmes; either bilateral or multilaterally, have at times created perverse incentives that have worsened the circumstances of vulnerable populations, not enhanced them. Examples here are of structural adjustment programmes which often meant elites in Governments became more accountable to international creditors than they did to their own populations. In worse cases such programmes were instrumentalised in pursuit of harmful policies, entrenching exclusion and in some cases leading to violence or war. </li></ul></div><div><b>So what next </b></div><div><br /></div><div>
Success for me would look like foreign policy making being conducted with the application of development insights from recent decades. In turn we would see development programming being designed in a way which is cognisant of wider political dynamics and risks, including that they could be doing more harm than good. Applying this approach to all aspects of foreign and development policy might get us towards a place where we could actually crack the nut.
</div>Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-21347639868615560842022-02-26T00:03:00.002-08:002022-02-26T00:07:28.690-08:00Russia, Ukraine and the future <div><br /></div>
<iframe allow="accelerometer; autoplay; clipboard-write; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture" allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/2340NIaZDpU" title="YouTube video player" width="560"></iframe>“Who is ready to fight alongside us? I don’t see anyone … everyone is afraid” said President Zelensky this week. Earlier this week he warned European leaders on a conference call that they may not see him alive again.<div><br /></div><div>We are witnessing a human tragedy and a new era in international relations develop simultaneously and the outcome will shape the world for decades to come.
Part of that new era will be the increasingly uncomfortable convergence of trade-offs. Climate change emissions commitments versus reliance on pipelines for Russian fossil fuels. Avoiding alliances versus existential threats. Spending on military force versus domestic priorities on health or education. </div><div><br /></div><div>But part of it also will be the question of how the liberal democratic parts of our world project power through civilian, not military means. Early thinkers of what became the European Union wrote of “Civilian Power Europe”, <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0010836706063503?journalCode=caca">a beguiling concept</a> of the projection of power through non military means: regulatory, normative, market-based and other means of influence. François Duchêne’s 1972 article on this painted a picture of a new form of shaping human affairs, where the use of force was largely redundant.</div><div><br /></div><div>As we watch Russia brutally crush a free democratic and sovereign Ukraine this seems a distant concept for what may be a darker era ahead, particularly from the vantage point of Eastern Europe or other free countries across the World dominated by larger hostile neighbours. Freedom isn’t free, sadly, and our collective commitment to standing up to force with force will need to be reinforced. This will also be an immensely painful era for Russia as it enters the status of global pariah. </div><div><br /></div><div><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjFOQq2pbIcINp8lBWJh7ke2kgT8YKlig3LE_Huvgc-cIoUsJvxgGSGdQ7q8Wpa_HA7qmCAlwnrKL3HFtthpjfAoPVuVzJjfSQyUmjtERk2JNeZXEJKUUt3iJ-daY-2ALsVgP-aGhHRj4DYi0MMwJQoSF61CbtrQbAqFjBaKi5Nkrcwu52TUBeFqgGO" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="720" data-original-width="1280" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/a/AVvXsEjFOQq2pbIcINp8lBWJh7ke2kgT8YKlig3LE_Huvgc-cIoUsJvxgGSGdQ7q8Wpa_HA7qmCAlwnrKL3HFtthpjfAoPVuVzJjfSQyUmjtERk2JNeZXEJKUUt3iJ-daY-2ALsVgP-aGhHRj4DYi0MMwJQoSF61CbtrQbAqFjBaKi5Nkrcwu52TUBeFqgGO=w400-h225" width="400" /></a></div><br /></div><div>It could, however, also be an era in which democratic and free States renew and develop multilateral means of protecting and projecting the alternative. Successful, vibrant and free populations often make for messy governments but over the long term are how most people want to live. And in that lies power far greater than anything a weapons manufacturer is capable of producing. East Germans could see the towers and hear the music on the other side of the wall. Ultimately they tore that wall down with their own hands as strongmen impotently looked on. Our way of life in which we celebrate diversity, exercise freedom and hold leaders to account, choosing our own governments is something to protect – against populism and the attempts to undermine it by hostile states. But it’s also our best hope of leaving this era with the boundaries of democratic freedom expanding rather than contracting. </div><div><br /></div><div>It's on all of us in our own ways to work towards that.
</div>Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-33025986082378441232021-09-11T03:33:00.004-07:002021-09-11T03:44:01.748-07:009/11 & Hope<p><span style="text-align: justify;"></span></p><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPSWOVj3rtjGKXFovfBAU0nW2n6hgg-zZTTGNJ7_BQVRZIrDalLZllBA2Qu7Y6Mi635mjzj0Rr6kkHQ-PQhDWWoivL7zOrgCahEoCqNOxc0oZx0hmCyhFqd_S1Q2YV17DsQoG7Cci-0Vc/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="435" data-original-width="680" height="205" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgPSWOVj3rtjGKXFovfBAU0nW2n6hgg-zZTTGNJ7_BQVRZIrDalLZllBA2Qu7Y6Mi635mjzj0Rr6kkHQ-PQhDWWoivL7zOrgCahEoCqNOxc0oZx0hmCyhFqd_S1Q2YV17DsQoG7Cci-0Vc/" width="320" /></a></div><br />So we all have a story of where
we were. In my case sat agog inside my office reception in Farringdon, London.
Crowds outside peering in at our large screen on the wall, broadcasting what we
knew even then was history. The revolution was in the end televised. “Go home”
said our manager “it’ll be us next”.<p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">I was 25. Working out what I
wanted to do with my life. For much of the next two decades I spent in the
peacebuilding world. Peace, it seemed to me, was what we needed. The world at
large had other ideas. Or did it? <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Just as much of the world’s
attention is understandably focused on Afghanistan, and the story of Iraq, Syria
and terror attacks; I find optimism and hope in some of what I’ve had the privilege
to see in the intervening years. Of individuals capable of finding it within
themselves to forgive, to reach out and to build futures with those who had
themselves often actively tried to kill them. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Like Grace, in Rwanda. She’d
hidden in her family’s kitchen cupboard while her family were slaughtered by
the Interahamwe militia in 1994. Fifteen years on she was establishing a new
business with a man from the tribe and village who’d perpetrated that killing. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Like the old woman sitting under
a tree in Western Nepal, at the end of her garden. Where she’d last seen her
daughter kidnapped by armed Maoists during the civil war in 2004. Five years on
she was still sitting under that tree. She knew she’d never see her daughter
again. But she’d become a peacemaker to whom people would come to see,
mediating disputes. <o:p></o:p></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;"><table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><tbody><tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZpWUZeMLmyHIODetreEOO7JQ6lYnnuJJupp80QmKAwE26_liuSpb7ALX5W3ewrpZmcArW9uCuQaNaZHMvFcUG44TfQ4lARthFnlHIrMXPeZznp6548BNiKmiG4ryETqfWg1jWKxnlpaI/" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img alt="" data-original-height="523" data-original-width="903" height="185" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhZpWUZeMLmyHIODetreEOO7JQ6lYnnuJJupp80QmKAwE26_liuSpb7ALX5W3ewrpZmcArW9uCuQaNaZHMvFcUG44TfQ4lARthFnlHIrMXPeZznp6548BNiKmiG4ryETqfWg1jWKxnlpaI/" width="320" /></a></td></tr><tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Teacher John's house</td></tr></tbody></table></p><p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Like Teacher John in Turkana, NW
Kenya. A harsh, arid place racked by armed violence carried out with impunity,
particularly against girls. John spoke four languages and could have lived
comfortably. Instead he lived in a mud hut and invested his money in a new
school building so that girls could live while they studied, so they wouldn’t
be at risk by journeying to school. He and his wife must have thought of what
they were sacrificing as they used hot coals at the door by night to keep out
the snakes. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">Or like the young women from
Herat, Afghanistan, who proudly presented plans for their villages as part of a
governance programme designed to build stability and service delivery. Confidently
describing the lack of trust anybody felt in the programme but determined to
try to build a better future for the men, women, girls and boys of that beautiful
part of Afghanistan. <o:p></o:p></p>
<p class="MsoNormal" style="text-align: justify;">These are people that represent
the best of humanity. Their strengths and committment are beyond what most of us posess. And if we are to move collectively on from where our
world finds itself now, then we need to find and support these individuals. Who
quietly work in often remote places, overcoming psychological trauma and
material hardship in the hope for a better future for us all. They, I hope, are
the future now. </p>Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-60998681299901761622020-12-31T07:53:00.009-08:002020-12-31T08:29:55.295-08:00Building back better: a dose of humility <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQaHqpPOA3NQImV6plo9JhHfs425KDAIolQsT8c_l5dDN5n5p4HRnoQGwu4n9kWlM6I0dMXBD9oYxeZLqDvviJ2D631SuDx_pOsIiKHitjR4aCWkvn6gYw-q_yXqNEtOjK2xqELevHuBU/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="259" data-original-width="460" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiQaHqpPOA3NQImV6plo9JhHfs425KDAIolQsT8c_l5dDN5n5p4HRnoQGwu4n9kWlM6I0dMXBD9oYxeZLqDvviJ2D631SuDx_pOsIiKHitjR4aCWkvn6gYw-q_yXqNEtOjK2xqELevHuBU/w400-h225/image.png" width="400" /></a></div><br />Covid has been a sobering experience, revealing the frailties of our social fabric and laying waste to the most vulnerable among us. Without engaging in a counsel of despair, I think one of the lessons for us is that to overly rely on the State to guide human behaviour simply won't work. It may also be the case that the social frameworks that were in place before, are perhaps not with us any longer. And that part of our building back better in the West might involve re-learning those aspects of social control that underpin our responsibilities to each other, and the resilience to respond to crisis, from parts of the World where they remain strong. <br /><br /><b>The problem </b><br /><br />To share an anecdotal experience. This afternoon I stood in a supermarket and observed an elderly man standing with a basket of food, waiting for a checkout. Around him bustled shop workers, many without masks, and several shouting to their colleagues. Shoppers, including a young man with no mask, brushed physically past the elderly gentleman, rolling their eyes because he was in their way. And throughout the store, while the majority were wearing masks, many repeatedly removed them and showed no inclination to engage in distancing of any kind. Earlier today an intensive care consultant described such people as having “<a href="https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-55479018">blood on their hands</a>”. He’d seen the inevitable result of the behaviour I’d just witnessed in the ICU wards. <br /><br />So what’s going on? Thoughtlessness or a lack of something intangible, that might otherwise have altered behaviour? <br /><div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCZC4_5H3nfbLrcCKt57ao5MvobzUHEbELWH7msDogOBpzhXbdHSpD2NIoOQ7K_wQKQZ0WH37G3yRZCQXen9jJR00TSmAU01nNsGAbMlerWWhbxjCJRL-3y0RYuad7X1ISeIFpiTtJx88/" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img alt="" data-original-height="320" data-original-width="450" height="285" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiCZC4_5H3nfbLrcCKt57ao5MvobzUHEbELWH7msDogOBpzhXbdHSpD2NIoOQ7K_wQKQZ0WH37G3yRZCQXen9jJR00TSmAU01nNsGAbMlerWWhbxjCJRL-3y0RYuad7X1ISeIFpiTtJx88/w400-h285/image.png" width="400" /></a></div><br />I can’t help thinking of the stories I grew up with, of stoicism and communal support withstanding the onslaught of the Blitz. The images of St Pauls’ Cathedral, of newly homeless women making tea and others were echoed by my own grandparents in their own stories from that time. But I also think of some of the communities it’s been my privilege to work among during my own lifetime. In <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/07/power-blindness-conflict-governance.html">Turkana</a>, Nepal, Afghanistan and elsewhere where communities have run their own affairs in the absence of a strong State and done so in a manner which would make the sort of behaviour I saw in the supermarket, and that we see in <a href="https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2020/12/29/australia-threatens-deport-british-backpackers-sydney-beach/">beach parties</a> and other breaches highly unlikely. These are also places where the concept of '<a href="https://positivedeviance.org/">positive deviance</a>' often applies - where communities themselves have developed ways of dealing with challenges by innovating their own norms; be that cultivating land or looking after the elderly. No role for the State involved, nor for that matter international donors. <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/05/ogp-africa-does-it-pass-amina-test.html">Just ask Amina</a>, from Dar es Salaam. <br /><br /><b>Building back better? </b><br /><br />It’s fair to say that the governance challenges witnessed in the West during the last few years undermine the idea that others should simply adopt our model of managing their affairs unquestioningly. There are other models out there and no doubt their relative merits will be hotly contested. But to me, that’s only part of the picture anyway. <br /><br />We in the West will also do well to consider what we might want to learn from societies who have not relied on the State at all, be that either an authoritarian or liberal version, and have managed their affairs based on behaviours that do not encourage individualism, and the lack of empathy or responsibility that can entail, and which we have witnessed <a href="https://edition.cnn.com/travel/article/australia-christmas-beach-party-immigration-intl-hnk/index.html">a great deal </a>of throughout this pandemic with disastrous results. These are societies who have often managed to hang together in the face of challenges way greater than Covid, including armed conflict. Building back better will in my view need to involve a large helping of humility, and a willingness to learn from others. The vulnerable old man with his shopping basket deserved a great deal more care from those around him than he received. <br /> Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-29146965290924185002020-04-05T20:58:00.001-07:002020-04-05T22:39:24.960-07:00Covid-19: peace positive?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzJ021g99trNSQDqZDuvwAeiMlCp9pJSwU8mJRgPlQ_jtjdL5L6clwMxB9v51WRj8A2pZvkCYsEdM0ynDbtbyrmtaJ5BCv8veL8EKZpaAMM4rkgXJbayNboa4tO2GY1JxQ-rVF6m-W3Wk/s1600/soldiers.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" data-original-height="297" data-original-width="722" height="163" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgzJ021g99trNSQDqZDuvwAeiMlCp9pJSwU8mJRgPlQ_jtjdL5L6clwMxB9v51WRj8A2pZvkCYsEdM0ynDbtbyrmtaJ5BCv8veL8EKZpaAMM4rkgXJbayNboa4tO2GY1JxQ-rVF6m-W3Wk/s400/soldiers.jpg" width="400" /></a></div>
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C19 will change the world, but are there positives for peace and stability that might emerge from the carnage, and how might these be supported? Here are some emerging thoughts on how this, the pre-eminent shared challenge of us all, might just unlock conflict systems that have appeared intractable for generations.<br />
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<b>Regional cooperation </b><br />
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If C19 has taught us anything, it is that closing borders doesn’t work. There is not a single country that has been protected by doing this. Accepting that fact, and the inescapable reality that what happens in our neighbours and our neighbourhoods near and far will affect us in my view changes the dial fundamentally. Populations are in my view unlikely to respond to jingoism and ‘othering’ from elites if they can see they may pay the price at huge scale. Leaders used to whipping up sentiment may find they are in fact held to account for not working together with others.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqpOAeiJttC6s-wmJOQsa3AkLAkpDYFU51KHyvbaeC80PTG_XFmLr2JSi7Ga4IFXufNSMpuUifHJaRVghoQfiwpcB_QLyGvYScp4SwGx5_XQDl8R63iS3nvqmfjeSMIDbLddKW2KgxlBw/s1600/amisom.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="656" data-original-width="1000" height="208" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgqpOAeiJttC6s-wmJOQsa3AkLAkpDYFU51KHyvbaeC80PTG_XFmLr2JSi7Ga4IFXufNSMpuUifHJaRVghoQfiwpcB_QLyGvYScp4SwGx5_XQDl8R63iS3nvqmfjeSMIDbLddKW2KgxlBw/s320/amisom.jpg" width="320" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">AMISOM</td></tr>
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<b>Resolving conflict </b><br />
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If there is growing acceptance that we need to manage conflicts, to make way for collaboration on a shared pandemic, then what structures will we need? Beyond the UN perhaps the model of the African Union’s capacity to exert soft and hard pressure might be emulated within other regional structures in Asia for example. The AU’s condemnation of coups and isolation of coup leaders have in some cases resulted in change, while the African Union Mission to Somalia has involved the use of hard power. Could it be that we emerge with strengthened institutional frameworks to temper the worst excesses of power?<br />
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<b><br />A new economy </b><br />
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Measuring ‘development’ by economic metrics alone is bunkum. In the most fragile countries, including those ostensibly making progress, the model is frequently highly unequal with elites controlling the most successful sectors, at the expense of others. But that model itself has now been exposed, as C19 cuts off demand in the West for goods produced elsewhere. Building back will require a much wider and diverse economic base, and that will need to include a broader section of the population. This arguably presents a real opportunity to encourage a more diverse and inclusive economic model that may pay dividends in terms of peace as much as growth.<br />
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<b>Accountability </b><br />
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It is unlikely that civil society in any country will accept business as usual once this pandemic has passed. A renewed push for greater accountability, responsiveness and transparency within governance systems can be expected, and potentially encouraged. That is as true in the West as the South and East, and represents a potential moment to renegotiate social contracts between citizens and states. More accountability generally means more peaceful societies.<br />
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<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcMe6km_J4mSy2l2vgqM6C9pYbf2NXxhcneBNYu99QQOXluby6z0kujwlT-pKuyPIv7QG2kLEOgaydB-EhotEu6Df_2zcTcQ881friKNXou7rQx_Zkur62MdPFabHOOsrqeL-AieJJJkM/s1600/Taliban.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="540" data-original-width="960" height="225" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgcMe6km_J4mSy2l2vgqM6C9pYbf2NXxhcneBNYu99QQOXluby6z0kujwlT-pKuyPIv7QG2kLEOgaydB-EhotEu6Df_2zcTcQ881friKNXou7rQx_Zkur62MdPFabHOOsrqeL-AieJJJkM/s400/Taliban.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Taliban anti-coronavirus drive in NE Afghanistan. New form of legitimacy? (unclear how machine gun helps v Covid)</td></tr>
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<b>Legitimacy </b><br />
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The Black Death in 14th Century England stripped the then ruling elite of their main claim to legitimacy: namely, that it was divine will. This had been clearly dis-proven, in the eyes of the people, who proceeded to revolt. It is hard to imagine that the legitimacy of force or power alone, or narratives of supremacy will survive C19 intact. Renegotiating that legitimacy, combined with greater accountability, may open the way for far-reaching change in the balance of power that could in turn yield positive and peaceful results.<br />
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<b>What now? </b><br />
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None of the above is inevitable. But then, nobody knows what happens, now. It will take decades to know, and new generations to judge. But it is also inescapable that this is a pivotal moment in human development. </div>
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Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-28319842767982267472020-01-08T04:11:00.002-08:002020-01-08T04:22:34.876-08:00Infinity and beyond: Governance in fragile states<table align="center" cellpadding="0" cellspacing="0" class="tr-caption-container" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto; text-align: center;"><tbody>
<tr><td style="text-align: center;"><a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJj3tjIf__gfMF4ie-QHRdgHTSt6zwEu1YEvwEz3sCH1sNZGb-BTpXfyFGhTwx4_Jh1mvt7BfXiBCDqDhq2WO99andGDVo3dNJvvdKxsjL3SHVAri_uAWgHtYlaHDZZACNa_wO_U8TSeQ/s1600/buzz.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: auto; margin-right: auto;"><img border="0" data-original-height="350" data-original-width="590" height="236" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiJj3tjIf__gfMF4ie-QHRdgHTSt6zwEu1YEvwEz3sCH1sNZGb-BTpXfyFGhTwx4_Jh1mvt7BfXiBCDqDhq2WO99andGDVo3dNJvvdKxsjL3SHVAri_uAWgHtYlaHDZZACNa_wO_U8TSeQ/s400/buzz.jpg" width="400" /></a></td></tr>
<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Building State Capability</td></tr>
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The eminent Building State Capability blog has <a href="https://buildingstatecapability.com/2019/08/28/premature-load-bearing-a-fresh-look-at-the-wdr-2011/">a guest article</a> by Paul von Chamier which re-appraises possibly the most important World Development Report in recent years on how change happens in conflict affected states, that of 2011. His take makes depressing reading, using as it does the basis of the game-changing <a href="http://web.worldbank.org/WBSITE/EXTERNAL/EXTDEC/EXTRESEARCH/EXTWDRS/0,,contentMDK:23252415~pagePK:478093~piPK:477627~theSitePK:477624,00.html">WDR11</a> and applying an updated data-set from the last decade (quick re-cap: economic crisis, OECD downturn, Arab Spring, Syrian conflict and lots more) and re-testing the core conclusions against that data. You may recall WDR11 posited that change only happens in generational time frames for States emerging from conflict. Von Chamier’s findings echo this, but they go further. The below table applies the Bank’s World Governance Indicators and finds that in many categories of ‘positive governance’, while there are positive signs on political stability and voice/accountability for the rest FCAS are tagged as ‘infinity’: in other words at this rate they’ll never get there.<br />
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There will be lots of nodding among many of us at this, who have been <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2014/01/time-for-honest-conversation-change-in.html">pointing out for a long time</a> that short-termist approaches to change manifested by three-year projects that seek to rapidly ‘transform’ factors that took generations in our own countries, let alone anyone else’s, will fail. However, I do also think this take on things suffers from a bit of log-frame thinking based on limited metrics, resulting in an unnecessarily bad prognosis. A counsel of despair is never the best starting point for anything. </div>
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Von Chamier uses, in this blog, only the Bank’s governance indicators. Useful as they are, on corruption, rule of law, institutional effectiveness and so on they fail to capture what in my view is a nebulous and perhaps intangible factor but nevertheless critical, which is how human behaviour in the form of contestation and social movements (loosely defined) manifests. Note I said social movements, not civil society as such.<br />
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And while this article understandably uses data sets from the last ten years to augment the previous 20, perhaps it’s instructive to look at wider evidence stemming back centuries of human history and social change, which still has salience to contexts we see today. Struggles in England for the rights of citizens in the 15th century, parliament in the 17th, for the right of women to have the vote in the 19th and 20th, for equality on the part of many throughout that period and which still go on would suggest that our collective history, and thus our institutions, are shaped by how those groups pursue those agendas and how elites respond; in addition to other indicators that may portray a static picture. None of this is to dispute the core argument that change in societies scarred by conflict takes generations, nor is it to argue that things cannot go backward, but it is to say that there is an intangible human element that is often missed in this form of measurement and analysis.</div>
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So work from social scientists as far back as Charles Tilly’s on <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Social-Movements-1768-2004-Charles-Tilly/dp/1594510431">social movements</a> in the 1970s through to more contemporary analysis by <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Violence-Social-Orders-Conceptual-Interpreting/dp/1107646995">Douglas North</a> and others, not forgetting scholars from some of the countries on our lists of FCAS in <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/01436590500089240">the Middle East</a> or South Asia, would suggest that there is more to predicting rates of change; and that the answer of ‘infinity’ may therefore indicate that we haven't asked all of the right questions. </div>
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For external actors this may have implications that also echo those reached in WDR11; the import of contributing to initial political stability, creating space for human security and over the long-term peacebuilding and statebuilding in parallel to build on the one indicator that does shine out in the governance dataset: voice and accountability; which in the story of human progress could possibly the most important metric of all. </div>
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To infinity or beyond? </div>
Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-86203567540454980292019-12-23T05:52:00.002-08:002019-12-24T11:27:48.776-08:00Peace in the Triple Nexus: a response <a href="https://devinit.org/">Development Initiatives</a> have produced a <a href="https://devinit.org/blog/peace-triple-nexus-what-challenges-do-donors-face/">thought-provoking blog</a> on “the Nexus”; which sounds like an exciting new film for Christmas, but is instead a reference to the triple nexus idea of humanitarian, development and peace (HDP) programming; and the challenges of bridging what are sometimes contradictory strands together across institutional, disciplinary and political divides.<br />
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While their main conclusion is that peace funding needs to be scaled up in order for coherent HDP programming to be realised, I thought the article also risked repeating some of the conceptual barriers that still seem to bedevil the chances of achieving that coherence. So in an attempt to add some constructive criticism here are some thoughts.<br />
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The problem here, for me, is how peacebuilding itself is conceptualised. Here are the authors:<br />
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<i>“HDP programmes tend to work from different departure points. For humanitarians this can broadly be characterised as saving lives; for peacebuilding, as stability and security; and for development as opportunities for addressing poverty”. </i></blockquote>
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Peacebuilding is not about stability and security; it is about a long term and inevitably convoluted, contested and complex journey towards establishing the basis by which conflict can be managed without recourse to violence. This will frequently include aspects of how resources and wealth are distributed, the extent to which economic growth is inclusive, and to which institutions are effective but also perceived as legitimate and, ultimately, how contestation can be carried out through peaceful means. And while stabilisation is very much an essential part of breaking what are often cyclical conflict systems, complete with their own political economies, you can’t divorce your initial response from the longer-term factors likely to impact on the potential for longer term peace. There are dilemmas and trade-offs throughout, which span the three HDP strands. Therefore locking ourselves conceptually into a “peace = security/stability” box undermines the real extent to which HDP is ever possible. Because *all* not only *some* programming is political.<br />
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This article implies essentially that of the three strands, only peace programming is political. The authors state:<br />
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<i>“Peacebuilding in most of its forms is a political enterprise” </i></blockquote>
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They also, in reference to OECD DAC’s ‘3 Cs – Collaboration, Coherence, Complementarity – state:<br />
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<i>“They could be viewed as a spectrum with the humanitarian-peace nexus at the lower end with a minimum expectation of complementarity; the development-peace nexus in the middle; and the more established and less contentious humanitarian-development nexus at the higher end between collaboration and coherence”. </i></blockquote>
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Taken together this is depressing stuff. The idea that humanitarian work is not political or is somehow less contentious is surely not borne out by experience on the ground. Injecting what are often huge amounts of resources into a situation that has frequently arisen out of violent conflict, and is thus charecterised by competing groups, will always be intensely political. It will and does create winners and losers. It will and does run the risk of becoming instrumentalised by elites, both from among the target population or their surrounding host communities or governments.<br />
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But the really depressing point for me here is about expectations: relegating the humanitarian-peace nexus to the ‘lower end’ with “<i>…a minimum expectation of complementarity</i>” (and presumably not therefore much in the way of coherence or collaboration) is likely to make those risks more, not less likely.<br />
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The authors do however highlight some of the learning that has emerged on Nexus programming elsewhere; including the importance of factoring in analytical lenses on conflict sensitivity, the identification of peace dividends alongside immediate humanitarian need and thinking about how the design of immediate responses help or hinder long term developmental and/or peace outcomes. I would think building on those insights would require thinking that reverses the expectations outlined by our authors and makes the case for looking at all three HDP strands at each and every stage. </div>
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Like any conversation worth having this is likely to be a difficult and challenging one, in order to get to the nub of how actors from humanitarian, developmental and peacebuilding backgrounds could and should work in a collaborative, coherent and complementary way. It’s a goal well worth aiming for, and DI deserve real credit in opening some of these questions up to debate. </div>
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Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-43189109335905928982019-12-03T01:18:00.004-08:002019-12-03T02:38:11.485-08:00Innovative finance, conflict, ... and peace?<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Can private finance unlock potential to help break cycles of conflict and build durable stability and peace? Pertinent questions posed in a <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/innovative-finance-conflict-peace-donata-garrasi/">thought-provoking article</a> from Donata Garrasi from the Office of the UN’s Special Representative to the Great Lakes; and someone I had the great pleasure of working with during her time as the Coordinator of the <a href="https://www.pbsbdialogue.org/en/">International Dialogue on Peacebuilding & Statebuilding.</a><br />
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The article highlights some recent scholarship from Georgia Keohane, <a href="http://cup.columbia.edu/book/capital-and-the-common-good/9780231178020">Capital and the Common Good</a>, and argues persuasively that if we were able to create and sustain FDI flows into the markets of fragile states in the form of social impact investments, supported by a screening process to ensure conflict sensitivity and human rights principles were not compromised, together with a knowledge platform to capture learning as we go; then this would represent a chance to generate both economic and peace dividends.<br />
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It’s a compelling prospect and it’s fair to say dogmatic arguments about private investment not being part of the development space are now largely in the past. Donors are rightly looking at innovative ways in which these public private partnerships could or should work and there have been strong proponents on both sides of the fence; <a href="https://www.wbcsd.org/Overview/About-us/Our-team/ExCo/Paul-Polman">Paul Polman</a> arguably having been one of the more prominent business voices in recent times.<br />
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And yet. My main challenge to the thinking in this article is that it is so clearly written from the vantage point of the pinnacle of the UN system. For example, the Bretton Woods institutions’ creation at the end of WWII are cited thus:<br />
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<i>“The intent was to use financial institutions to further economic development and prosperity and create global stability – the ultimate public good. In other words: economic development for stability; just what is needed today”. </i></blockquote>
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This is true to an extent. But the institutions were also designed to seal the new power dynamics that had emerged in the West following the conflict, as the world emerged from the colonial era into the new bi-polar world that would assume the contours of the Cold War soon afterwards.<br />
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The article cites the need for a ‘knowledge platform’:<br />
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<i>“…that would bring together investors with a multi-disciplinary community of practice dedicated to enhancing investment in fragile countries”. </i></blockquote>
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It suggests the World Economic Forum or the OECD as hosts, and calls for visionary leaders from North and South to set the course. But we’re not short of visionary leaders, including from the South, and those who combine public and private sector spheres; such as these <a href="http://www.weabbd.com/">women from Bangladesh</a>. Why do these platforms always have to sit in Northern institutions; be they set amid snow-topped Swiss mountains or Parisian boulevards? </div>
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I listened to <a href="https://monocle.com/radio/shows/the-foreign-desk/296/play/">a fascinating podcast</a> this morning, which focused on political settlements and why some peace deals fail or falter. Both Jonathan Cohen, of <a href="http://www.c-r.org/">Conciliation Resources</a>, and Jan Egeland, S-G of the <a href="https://www.nrc.no/">Norwegian Refugee Council</a> and longstanding architect and supporter of peace accords over 20 years, spoke powerfully about the gritty, grainy realities of why some fighters return to the gun. What united their perspectives was what happens when young men and women who have demobilised, taken the first tentative steps out of fighting, find that they have nothing to transition meaningfully towards, whether that is employment, a role with dignity or both. </div>
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There's also a distinct absence in the article of any reference to the governance challenges likely to dominate any post-conflict environment. Endemic corruption, rampant elite capture and the routine use of violence as a means of sustaining access to resources are not issues that can be 'screened' for and dealt with easily, particularly if there are investments at stake. The level of trust this engenders was to me captured by visceral comments made to me by civil society <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2012/12/making-new-deal-work-view-from-ground.html">activists in Liberia</a> almost 7 years to the day, as they sought to support their own growth into long term peace through the New Deal. This is perhaps why investments of a less scrupulous nature are also a long standing feature of these environments.<br />
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As both Jonathan and Jan noted there are examples where economic growth has played an important and positive role, in providing alternatives for former combatants, marginalised groups and others; but this isn’t the uniform experience. Grounding conversations in how to generate economic growth that supports long -term peace to me means locating those conversations in those environments, where they can draw on the reality of the contexts being discussed. And with each of them being unique in their own right, it’s likely uniform approaches of the type normally associated with discussions emerging from the high peaks of finance are unlikely to have the traction they would need to succeed.<br />
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Clear-eyed conversations, grounded in gritty realities but with the ambition Donata rightly outlines for harnessing the power of growth – now there’s a winning investment..</div>
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Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-85686427909366206612019-09-04T05:54:00.000-07:002019-09-04T15:02:04.295-07:00Peter da Costa: Teacher, mentor, visionary and friend<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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This morning I had the sad privilege of attending the memorial of Peter da Costa, along with some of his family and friends here in London. Taking place in the suitably grand surroundings of Methodist Central Hall in Westminster, we said goodbye to a teacher, a visionary and passionate advocate for the rise of Africa and all its people. With the word ‘all’ being the important one.<br />
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I’ve never written an obituary before, and by comparison to the heartfelt and beautiful contributions this morning it won’t compare. But many of you knew Peter as did I, as a co-conspirator, a colleague and a friend with whom we conjured up ideas and tried to find ways to bridge divides and try doing old things in new ways. For those of us trying to contribute to peace, to fairness and human progress he was in my view the sort of person humanity desperately needs more of, but of whom it has so few. Amid the sadness however, and Peter would be the first to say this, his ideas remain with us even if their progenitor does not. We can all build on them. <br />
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Peter was a man of amazing combinations. A fierce intellect, reflected in an academic record that broke new ground, combined with a deeply human, humble and empathetic approach. The happiest I ever saw Peter was when he was drawing ideas out of people who hadn’t had the chances he’d had, couldn’t articulate them in the same language, but did have the qualifications of experience and a willingness to share it. <br />
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A profound sense of pride, particularly in the younger people he worked with and whose potential he sought to bring out, particularly in the form of partners supported by <a href="https://hewlett.org/in-memory-of-peter-da-costa/">the Hewlett Foundation</a>, for whom he worked as an advisor. Yet this was often combined with a lack of tolerance for what he perceived as laziness, from whomsoever it came. I think in hindsight he couldn’t stand the idea of people not contributing what he could see they were able to, in the mission to which he was so committed. <br />
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But in that mission, which I would describe clumsily as Africa finally emerging as a continent among equals, with all of its people – women every bit as much as men – able to reach their potential, he exhibited another combination. A depth of kindness and non-judgmental empathy to those around him, together with a fierce lack of tolerance for corruption or the abuse of power, from whomsoever that emerged. <br />
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Peter understood and spoke the languages of different tribes in the development world. Technology. Political economy. Innovation. Data. Evidence. Power. Conflict & peacebuilding. That he could combine them and see new ways for them to work together was reflected in his many achievements. He broke boundaries and silos, persuaded governments, pushed through sheer stubbornness and supported initiatives that stood the test of time, such as the <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/03/africa-data-consensus-power-politics.html">Africa Data Consensus</a>. He was a revolutionary who sought to take people with him. <br />
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One of my last memories of Peter was standing in a Nairobi nightclub. Over the impossibly loud music, and thudding, floor shaking bass, Peter was trying to outline a thought on something to do with political economy. An absurd situation, and I’m afraid I moved the conversation on to football instead. He rolled his eyes, but with the familiar twitches of a wry smile. A microcosm of Peter – high expectations, a fearsome intellect, but all the while deeply human. <br />
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I thought of him earlier this week as I saw the sun come up over Hyde Park. It’s not enough to never forget Peter, he’d want more than that. Take his ideas and example forward. I know I’ll try to.<br />
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<br />Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-1112371308802106342018-12-21T00:39:00.000-08:002018-12-21T02:55:23.652-08:00Peacebuilding: Time to think and act Human? <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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What is peacebuilding? That nearly all of you will give slightly (or significantly) different answers to that is part of what I perceive to be a wider problem. You could just as well ask ‘what is development’ with the same result. GDP, or rights? Jobs or voice? So in this brief thought piece I will restrict myself to a narrower question, which is one I believe needs to be addressed if we are to become more effective in understanding the causes of conflict, and acting to build long term and positive peace. <br />
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My argument here is that in the last ten years peacebuilding has largely benefited from a process of professionalisation. That’s a process we’ve witnessed among practitioners in the NGO sector, as much as in the donor agencies themselves, with cadres of professionals emerging in both. But my worry is that in that process we have erred too much on the side of analysing conflict through lenses of political science at the cost of wider perspectives, such as anthropology, in our quest to understand how and why humans behave the ways we do. And that makes us less effective. <br />
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When I first started in peacebuilding back in 2008 the wider development sector was heavily dominated by economists, and their metrics. So progress was seen in primarily economic terms and not those, say, of human rights, voice, struggles and the differentiated experiences of communities, women or marginalised groups. The economist mindset is still very much alive, and people like me <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/02/odi-goes-retro-backlash-begins.html">regularly argue with</a> their proponents, but we do generally have a more holistic approach now which is welcome. Yet in that process of widening the disciplines and perspectives we use, I fear the political scientist has become the new economist, largely without intending to be. <br />
<br />
And that’s a problem, in my view, on a number of grounds. Political science offers us strong and useful methods of understanding conflict and wider society, usually through the prism of institutions. But as a discipline it is massively dominated by Northern and Western viewpoints which make assumptions which simply don’t hold in many of the societies in which they are applied. Within academia this has provoked a backlash in which writers from the global South, such as <a href="https://cluelesspoliticalscientist.wordpress.com/2017/10/14/whose-imagined-community-by-partha-chatterjee-a-summary/">Chatterjee</a>, and several Middle East scholars have written powerfully to illustrate just how the theories of Hobsbawm, <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Imagined-Communities-Reflections-Origin-Nationalism/dp/1844670864">Anderson</a>, North and others simply don’t help us to grasp why people behave in the way they do in large parts of the world, in this case South Asia and the Middle East. <br />
<br />
Traditional Northern political science essentially holds that powerful elites win and then retain power by seizing institutions, and then setting the rules of the game in their favour, in perpetuity. And there’s a large degree of truth in that. But it tends to dismiss the idea that humans are also emotional creatures with deep spiritual attachments to land, ideas, communities and belief systems (famously by Ben Anderson's <a href="https://www.amazon.co.uk/Imagined-Communities-Reflections-Origin-Nationalism/dp/1844670864">"Imagined Communities"</a> thesis) which in my view shape their behaviours as much as, if not more than, rebelling to take power. So when you’re trying to understand a conflict that might take an ethno-nationalist form, for example, where conflicting groups self identify by ethnicity, in my view this is as much about those human characteristics as it is about powerful elites. The point is we need to understand both, and act accordingly. A lot of <a href="http://blogs.worldbank.org/publicsphere/sue-unsworth-s-upside-down-view">Sue Unsworth's work</a>, which shaped much of DFID's later thinking, also hinted at this, in order for the elite-community bargaining work which she held as central to success, to take place. <br />
<br />
As we look across what is sadly a growing number of conflicts worldwide, where many take on that ethno-nationalist form, this in my view is a pressing issue for us as a sector to get right, and it lies in the analysis we use and the theories we develop on the basis of that analysis. More anthropology, more Southern based persepctives and more balance with the new dominant theme is needed. Essentially in my view we need to think more about humans as they are, and not as if they were robots, controlled principally by elites, even in their own minds and conceptions of the world around them. How we might do this, will be the subject of my next piece! <br />
<br />
Until then, let me end by quoting <a href="https://philvernon.net/2018/12/18/the-bridge/">Phil Vernon</a>, a peacebuilder from whom I learned a great deal during my time at International Alert. Phil is both a peacebuilder and a poet, and this evocative peace captures a sight that will be familiar to peacebuilding practitioners across the globe: <br />
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<i>I come each day to clean the marble plaque, <br /><br />place flowers beneath Azadin’s face, and pray <br /><br />he rests in peace. The eve of the attack, <br /><br />he begged my blessing which I proudly gave – <br /><br />a mother's leave to die. <br /><br /> Low sunlight bathes <br /><br />the bridge, the road, the bracken-covered hills <br /><br />in warmth and welcome; piebald peaks arrayed <br /><br />Against the sky stand friendly guard. <br /><br /> War steals <br /><br />our children but it spares them all the ills <br /><br />of longer life, and us from saving them. <br /><br />I sit in simple silence simply filled <br /><br />with comfort by his being near. <br /><br /> She spends <br /><br />her evenings at the bridge contentedly; <br /><br />the sunlight dissolves gently in the sea. </i>Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-33305270236215658002018-09-16T22:06:00.000-07:002018-09-16T22:09:52.132-07:00Nirmala: Nepal's wake up call for donors? <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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Nirmala was 13 when <a href="http://kathmandupost.ekantipur.com/news/2018-09-14/family-mourns-and-a-country-recoils.html">she was raped</a>, murdered and left in the rice field that she walked across every day to go to school. She’d had to be stronger than her years, supporting her mother after her father left two years before. Teachers describe a bright and dedicated student who dreamed of supporting her mother and family to become independent and secure. Yet in a society <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/blogs/asia/2018/03/rape-nepal-180307134321758.html">where sexual violence is rampant</a> and deep rooted practices sustain an oppressive environment for the vast majority of women Nirmala had learned she’d have to fight every step of the way. On that day in July, however, she wasn’t strong enough to fight. Her body lay in the field for at least a week before it was found. The police did nothing, literally, and there <a href="http://kathmandupost.ekantipur.com/news/2018-09-13/kanchanpur-rape-and-murder-police-collect-blood-sample-of-suspended-cop-for-dna-test.html">are widespread suspicions</a> of some form of collusion. <br />
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<b>Short-termism: a Donor disease </b><br />
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As gut wrenching as this story is on a human level, it should also make us angry. Many young Nepalis have been out of the streets protesting this week, and it is their fight to change their society which those of us who care about Nepal must hope they win. But it is also in my view a searing, damning indictment of much of what many donor agencies have been doing in the country for the last decade or so since the end of the civil war. And perhaps worst of all many of us have implicitly acquiesced with this, trying to squeeze peacebuilding into other sorts of projects rather than loudly making the case and challenging donors to justify their neglect of it. <br />
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So what’s been the problem? Well, a familiar yet lazy assumption that “conflict” is over; short term uncoordinated and technocratic projects; a misplaced faith in technology or data; superficial attention to gender and marginalisation, and a propensity to adopt one size fits all approaches have arguably combined to fail to meaningfully impact on a single root cause of what girls like Nirmala face every day. Such as 6 year old <a href="https://www.aljazeera.com/blogs/asia/2018/03/rape-nepal-180307134321758.html">Puja Saha</a>, who was violated and then desecrated. This horrific murder and the fallout over a botched, ineffective and possibly corrupt response by the police and authorities to it should lead to hard questions being asked of each donor agency: what they are doing in the country to support peace and development. And if they are not, then why not.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;"><span class="irc_su" dir="ltr" style="text-align: left;">Residents of Bhimduttanagar in Western Nepal demand justice for Nirmala</span></td></tr>
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<b>Positive v negative peace </b><br />
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Nirmala’s family came from Kailalai in the West of the country. A former Maoist stronghold in the civil war, it’s where I first started work there over a decade ago. I remember the stories of <a href="http://admin.myrepublica.com/society/story/42843/original-owners-reclaim-maoist-seized-lands.html">forced land seizures</a>, of hiding young men and children in the forests <a href="https://www.hrw.org/reports/2007/nepal0207/4.htm">from forced abductions/conscription</a>, but also of young women routinely violated, sometimes as a means of settling inter communal disputes. Two types of violence. Both very real. The old woman who sat quietly in her garden under a tree describing in a hollow voice the day her granddaughter was taken in a raid. She’d slept under the tree ever since, in the hope of hearing her return. At that time the war had only just finished and fighters with uniforms and guns no longer posed a direct threat. But the most basic understanding of peacebuilding will tell you that peace is not merely the absence of war, but the transformation of deep rooted drivers of conflict that are experienced and fester long into the future if left unaddressed, usually by the most vulnerable. Donor agencies in Nepal, however, ceased the vast majority of peacebuilding support a few short years later. War was over, they said. Time for us to move on. The vaunted truth, reconciliation and justice processes never really got off the ground. <br />
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Peacebuilders sometimes describe <a href="http://www.irenees.net/bdf_fiche-notions-186_en.html">‘negative’ and ‘positive’ peace</a>. The former means that combatants with guns have gone, but some communities remain subject to violence or the threat of it, usually sustained by structural and social discrimination of various kinds. This begins to explain why the vast majority of conflicts are relapses of old. Positive peace on the other hand is when those underlying factors are being addressed in ways that allow all groups in society to feel secure, have the ability to pursue grievances through non-violent means and trust in the security, justice and governance institutions that are there to serve them equally. In Nepal, sadly, negative peace seemed to be enough for most of the donors.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Time to listen to evidence? </td></tr>
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<br />
<b>The future </b><br />
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Nepal has immense potential. Its’ history tells you that. If those of us who wish to support the country achieve that potential then it’s time to concede what the evidence from here and elsewhere tells us. Namely that peace requires long term investment: the game changing World Development Report of 2011 talked in terms of 30 years, for example. It takes generations to heal, and build trust. So donor projects with ridiculous claims of being ‘transformative’ over periods of 18 months or 2 years have got to go. They make little sense in terms of value for money, impact or basic common sense. We need to see long term programmes aimed at supporting the development of institutions capable of commanding the support of the communities they serve. Of supporting those champions within society who are challenging centuries of oppressive caste, ethnic or gender based norms that pose a direct risk to the lives of girls like Nirmala, often at great risk to themselves. And sustaining that work for as long as it takes. <br />
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If half the population is subject to routine violence or the threat of it, and marginalised communities remain under the yolk of entrenched structural and social discrimination then that is not peace. Nor, therefore, will it be stable or grow in a way that unlocks a country’s full potential, regardless of how much traditional development programming you engage in. Support for the current process of federalisation in the country, which in theory will bring governance closer to communities and thus more responsive is welcome, and great in theory. But it needs to be embedded in strong conflict analysis and long term, flexible initiatives that get to the roots of lingering violence, marginalisation and the corruption that sustains it. So let’s see less technocratic and short term isolated projects about data, technology or infrastructure and more long term and joined up engagement on what experience from elsewhere in the world (<a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/07/power-blindness-conflict-governance.html">Kenya is instructive</a>) tells us will be a contested and convoluted journey to a new dispensation of how government works, in order to avoid entrenching existing divides by default. <br />
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Nirmala was the future of Nepal. Her dreams and aspirations, together with evident ability, commitment and strength of character were ample evidence of that. Those out on the streets protesting will go back to their communities, many of them continuing to work in their own ways or as part of organised activism to change things for the better. They are the future too. Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-60091761914818026662018-05-25T01:53:00.002-07:002018-05-25T01:53:36.148-07:00Nepal, OGP & repeating the loops<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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It is said that the definition of madness is doing the same thing repeatedly and expecting a different outcome. Earlier this week I attended an event which suggested there was a very real risk of another country falling victim to what seems to be a trend of this, unless something can be done to bridge a divide between the evangelists of the open data movement and those of us working on peacebuilding and conflict transformation in volatile and contested states. <br />
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USAID Nepal hosted an event at which the US Ambassador, who is a strong supporter of anti-corruption initiatives, made very clear the US Government’s desire for Nepal to join the<a href="https://www.opengovpartnership.org/"> Open Government Partnership</a>, (OGP). Flanked by a panel including the Information Commissioner and representatives from civil society and Government, she spoke to a room packed to the rafters with the great and the good of public and civic life in Nepal. Supported by Victoria Ayer, a Board Member of OGP, the Ambassador extolled the virtues of open data which she claimed would lead to accountability and greater prosperity. <br />
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This is, to put it mildly, ambitious. Nepal is embarking on a process of federalisation which itself is highly contested and in some places has contributed to violence. It has also just witnessed <a href="http://indianexpress.com/article/world/nepals-new-power-bloc-communist-parties-merge-to-share-power-5072100/">an historic union</a> of the two Communist parties of Nepal forming a seemingly impregnable central Government with a two thirds parliamentary majority. So the Left has the strongest hold on the centre of power for generations, while a contested process of devolution of power to local government beckons.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">An historic merger </td></tr>
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None of this was mentioned. Not even once. In a conversation about governance. The only time the feel-good factor about how open data was going to change everything for the better was punctured was when a prominent civil society activist said that in her opinion the problem wasn’t a lack of data, it was a lack of honesty. The Ambassador herself quoted SDG16, which as she stated, is about "peace, justice and governance". That would suggest we should be talking about all three of those strands in parallel, not just one aspect of one strand. <br />
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So what does all of this mean? Do we simply roll our eyes and give up? No. But we need to have a much more holistic conversation about how change actually happens, rather than getting fixated on one aspect of a wider process or thinking that membership of an elite club will lead to manna from heaven. We already know data itself doesn’t lead to accountability. It’s about how power, politics, behaviours and attitudes shape human relationships. Indeed the lessons of <a href="https://www.opengovpartnership.org/">OGP</a> itself would point to the danger of assuming fragile and contested states make genuine progress in the way that the Ambassador predicts. A glance at Kenya’s stalled progress, Sri Lanka’s questionable advances, the Philippines’ descent into murderous State impunity and, of all places, Afghanistan’s almost total lack of movement would suggest some humility might be in order before making such claims.<br />
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Nepal is a beautiful, ancient country of enormous potential. But it is also highly fragmented along multiple lines, much of which is a poisonous legacy of civil conflict. It can and should make progress both on stability and growth, with the result that young Nepalis no longer have to become <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/dec/29/nepalese-workers-gulf-migration">mistreated economic migrants</a> to the Gulf, but can realise their own and their country’s potential at home. But for that to happen will require the development of strong, responsive local and national government structures in which contestation over resources, policies and priorities can be managed within institutions that are regarded as the legitimate fulcrum of a contest of ideas, without the need for violence. <br />
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So none of this is to say that open data, within or without clubs like <a href="https://www.opengovpartnership.org/">OGP</a>, doesn’t have a fundamentally important role to play. It is a critical part of deliberative decision making, informed by evidence as much as ideology or patronage. But for international actors wishing to support that, the overwhelming weight of evidence from within Nepal as with other fragile and contested environments points to the need to take a much more holistic approach to bridging the gap between statebuilding and peacebuilding to have any chance whatsoever of success. So despite the enthusiasm among elites for membership of clubs, I’m afraid we still need to talk about who’s voices are still not even part of the conversation. Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-27859331485107629102018-04-16T01:11:00.003-07:002018-04-16T01:13:27.621-07:00Syria: Norms, Power & Responsibility to Protect <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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In 2005 the United Nations declared that we have a ‘<a href="http://www.un.org/en/genocideprevention/about-responsibility-to-protect.html">responsibility to protect’</a>. That is to say, if humanity watches people being brutalised, murdered or driven from their homes then there is a duty to intervene to protect those populations. It was forged against the backdrop of repeated examples of industrialised inhumanity, after each round of which the world solemnly declared “never again”. Until next time. So the intent was to break that cycle and to make those words actually mean something, strengthening global norms and building deterrence by instilling fear in would-be brutalisers minds that they would one day be held accountable. <br />
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You could argue that the recent bombing, therefore, in Syria is an example of R2P in action. A red line <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2018/04/09/another-president-faces-a-red-line-on-syria-he-drew-himself/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.fa03051b5401">had been drawn</a> in 2013 by Obama against the use of chemical weapons by the Assad regime, but which had not been enforced, after a vote in <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/aug/31/syria-commons-vote-cameron-miliband">the British Parliament</a> meant that America would have been acting alone. This latest use of poison was the trigger for what turned out to be an extremely limited and essentially symbolic show of force by the US, UK and France. Whether it has any effect at all, given that Assad has now essentially won the civil conflict, remains to be seen. <br />
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Ultimately this shines a light on the limitations of normative power against realpolitik. In the wake of the British and French intervention in Libya, ostensibly to prevent a massacre and under the aegis of R2P, several other nations, <a href="https://sustainablesecurity.org/2016/06/09/brazil-and-the-responsibility-while-protecting-initiative/">notably Brazil</a>, tabled an alternative and slightly nuanced version, called Responsibility While Protecting. On one level this was about protecting against unintended damage, but in reality this was a limiting attempt to reassert the primacy of sovereignty and limit the role of Northern States. There would have to be an extremely high bar for any international power to intervene in future. <br />
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And that’s the contest we see in Syria. A largely impotent West seeking to engage in limited and militarily pointless actions to support a normative framework that holds little relevance to a powerful dictator, supported by Russia. It’s a grim sight for those wishing to break that ‘never again’ cycle. A quick glance at international impotence over the Rohingya crisis in Myanmar/Bangladesh, or the ongoing misery in the Democratic Republic of the Congo would suggest that this isn’t about to change any time soon. It seems to me that the contest over norms we would all want to see will take place within the very limited parameters of power, politics and geopolitics for a very long time to come. The people gasping for air in Douma will not live to see its conclusion, but its incumbent on the rest of us to work out the art of the possible, in an increasingly anarchic world. Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-48399750736586748762017-10-22T00:01:00.000-07:002017-10-22T00:14:19.203-07:00Impressions of Afghanistan <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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I paid my first trip to Afghanistan this month. The organisation I work for, <a href="https://www.saferworld.org.uk/">Saferworld</a>, is now working with some very impressive local and international partners in the country to contribute to the enourmous task of building ways out of the conflict systems that have held Afghanistan in their grip since the 1970s, and arguably beyond. The sheer scale of that challenge constantly hits you. Shortly after my departure the Taleban this week carried out a series of attacks which targeted <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/10/suicide-bomb-attack-kills-15-army-trainees-kabul-171021140135397.html">security forces </a>and <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-41699320">Shi’a civilians</a>, resulting in another huge loss of life. It's that cycle that leads so many to essentially give up on Afghanistan. <br />
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Nevertheless this country has such huge potential, and it lies within its people. I was privileged to witness villagers from across the country who are part of a World Bank and Government of Afghanistan project to shape the governance of their areas, called <a href="http://projects.worldbank.org/P160567?lang=en">Citizens Charter</a>. The aim of the programme as the name suggests is to forge a new form of responsive governance whereby citizens themselves collaboratively shape action plans for their areas that are then funded through either that programme or by bilateral donors supportive of the project. I was lucky to spend some time with some deeply impressive colleagues from <a href="https://www.oxfam.org.uk/what-we-do/countries-we-work-in/afghanistan?pscid=ps_ggl_2016_Prospects_Brand_Broad&gclid=EAIaIQobChMI6oqG5NWD1wIVBRQbCh1U6QzgEAAYASAAEgJf3vD_BwE&gclsrc=aw.ds&dclid=CIvhpOXVg9cCFcUS0wod_C4PiQ">Oxfam in Afghanistan</a> who are supporting this project across the country. <br />
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So there we were. In the gardens of the World Bank compound in Kabul. Itself within the green zone and with military helicopters constantly clattering overhead. The crème de la crème of the global elites in their Western suits and canopes watching Afghan villagers describe their challenges, hopes and vision for their areas. And it was quite inspirational. The beauty of the artwork on these flipcharts attested to the level of hope and importance invested in them by the Afghans themselves. And they didn’t just talk about access to water, to education and health as you might expect. They mapped where power actually lay and where accountability was missing. And where conflict drivers lay. That level of analysis reflects the way in which champions of this project within the Government of Afghanistan, who I was also privileged to meet, have also encouraged those villagers to talk about.<br />
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Later in that week I had a brief tour of Kabul and visited the famous “Television Hill”, so called after the TV transmitters that sit atop. In 1879 it was the scene of a bloody confrontation between British forces and Afghan tribesmen, and British forts still stand in Kabul itself. To climb that hill you drive through sprawling informal settlements, all of which are covered in the dust that seems to be everywhere in the city. You see piles of uncollected rubbish but also industrious families building houses. Looking down on Kabul you are struck again by the scale of the challenge but also the resilience of the people that inhabit it. With the enthusiasm I’d witnessed earlier and the ingenuity of the people on the side of this hill I haven’t yet joined the school of thought that essentially gives up on Afghanistan. It’s a place surely where the two approaches of governance reform and peacebuilding must surely come together and work hand in hand. That afternoon in the garden gave a glimpse of what was possible.<br />
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<![endif]-->Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-75973441223587063142017-09-24T10:14:00.000-07:002017-09-25T12:27:25.628-07:00Peace in our time? Europe, Fascism & Brexit <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
In May 1993 I was nearly 17 years old. Two events in 1993-1994 that took place in faraway places profoundly affected the way I saw the world and what I wanted to do when I grew up. One of them were <a href="https://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/grim-tale-of-slain-romeo-and-juliet-1.946689">the deaths of </a>Admira Ismic and Bosko Brkic. They were young people who loved each other. But Admira was a Bosnian Muslim while Bosko was a Serb. Yugoslavia was at that time being ripped apart by an ethnically defined and genocidal conflict which dictated that their relationship was not permitted. But they hadn’t read the script. As they ran across a square under sniper fire in a desperate attempt to escape the madness and live a life together shots rang out, killing Bosko instantly and injuring Admira. Instead of seeking to escape Admira crawled over to Bosko, lay down beside him and placed her arm across his chest. Witnesses said she died some 15 minutes later. I remember the images of their bodies lying in the square as snipers refused to agree a ceasefire. It was an image that said so much about tragedy but also something profound about the strength of the human spirit. <br />
<br />
I’ve often thought of them in the years since, as I’ve been privileged to see others <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2012/12/making-new-deal-work-view-from-ground.html">in conflict build peace</a>, frequently overcoming experiences and hatred with almost unimaginable strength, imagination and commitment. But I think about them more now, and I worry that we are not heeding the warning their story teaches us, especially in Europe. <br />
<br />
Recorded human history shows the ease with which populations can be manipulated into identifying themselves against ‘the other’. Elites construct ideals and largely fabricated or airbrushed national stories that either ignore the positive role of others or portray them as somehow malign. Scholars like Benedict Anderson came up with the term “<a href="https://www.amazon.de/Imagined-Communities-Reflections-Origin-Nationalism/dp/1844670864">imagined communities</a>” to describe this. And before you start to think that all sounds very far removed, when was the last time we saw a ceremony to mark the role of Polish, Indian, Caribbean or African soldiers <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/worldwars/wwtwo/colonies_colonials_01.shtml">who fought for</a> and with Britain in the 1940s? <br />
<br />
At a time when we need the highest calibre of political leadership in Europe, we are rewarded with Theresa May, Boris Johnson and Claude van Juncker instead. And in that absence of political leadership and thus an increasingly antagonistic relationship between UK and rest of Europe is the risk of rising division which you can see elsewhere across the continent.<br />
<br />
My country Britain succumbed to baser human instincts in last years referendum on membership of the European Union. I don’t blame those who did. They knew they were being forgotten about by a political elite who repeatedly demonstrated their lack of interest. But the tenor, tone, rumour and myth that dominated the campaign was sinister. You have to wonder what underlies a country totally reliant on immigration for its public services and industrial base voting against foreigners, which is how the referendum was presented.<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Today's National Socialism </td></tr>
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In Germany the far right has just been elected to the Reichstag for the first time since 1933. They are the third largest party. No surprises that Mr Brexit Nigel Farage <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/sep/08/nigel-farage-backs-far-right-afd-for-historic-german-election-success">recently spoke</a> at one of their rallies. And in Holland Geert Wilders may have lost the election. But he did come second. And if you look behind the euphoria of the elites at Macron’s victory in France it’s worth bearing in mind that that is the second time a neo-Nazi candidate also came second. Donald Trump may be the caricature of alt-right politics, but it’s worth reminding ourselves that much of his own programme centres on fear of foreigners too. <br />
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<br />
I believe Admira and Bosko were optimists. They ran across that square together because they thought there was a chance, however slim, of a better life. I’ve seen enough of others like them in the years since to be an optimist too, if a little cynical. But I wonder what they would tell us to do now. I think they’d tell us that as our political classes abdicate their responsibilities we can’t sit passively by and allow a similar set of disasters to emerge, fuelled by fear of foreigners and ‘the other’. <br />
<br />
Admira and Bosko were buried side by side by their families. Their memory tells us never to be so complacent to imagine we couldn’t get to that stage again, even in Europe. I hope in time we get a calibre of political leadership across Europe, Britain and the wider West that we can trust in. But in the meantime it’s on us. Civic society in all its forms to oppose and challenge intolerance and division while promoting a European Union, a United Kingdom and a West which is open, inclusive and liberal. <br />
<br />
The question, which I am rattling my brain about, is how. Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-26178919848477446742017-09-22T12:42:00.002-07:002017-09-22T18:52:28.657-07:00Tanzania leaves OGP: watershed moment? <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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</xml><![endif]-->Tanzania <a href="http://www.thecitizen.co.tz/News/Govt-abandons-JK-championed-plan/1840340-4103700-642mhm/index.html">is leaving</a> the Open Government Partnership (OGP). This was a country lauded by OGP itself to the extent that the initiatives Africa regional meeting <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/05/ogp-africa-does-it-pass-amina-test.html">was held there</a>, even while its government closed down <a href="http://www.theeastafrican.co.ke/news/Tanzania-now-bans--The-EastAfrican--/-/2558/2600522/-/cp5mmlz/-/index.html">newspapers</a>. An awkward contradiction. When <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/05/ogp-africa-does-it-pass-amina-test.html">I spoke to</a> ordinary citizens there, this was a government that had not earned the trust of its people and arguably had no place at the OGP table. The lesson of Tanzania, therefore, is surely that an initiative like OGP has to have red lines, and that the currency of credibility is trust. <br />
<br />
So what can we learn from this? I would argue that including recalcitrant countries within an initiative that is there to open up government to the people undermines that initiative itself, in turn arguably doing harm to that relationship by creating a form of whitewash that removes incentives for genuine reform. Therefore there should probably be fewer members of OGP but those who remain could inspire others. And there’s always a route back into OGP. Tanzania is in reverse gear but that’s not inevitably the future. <br />
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<br />
<b>Change is messy </b><br />
<br />
But this isn’t a purist argument either. No government in the world is perfect, as my own in the United Kingdom is so <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2017/sep/21/eu-brexit-negotiator-attacks-boris-johnson-old-fashioned-views-on-identity-european">magnificently demonstrating</a> at the moment. It’s fine to have a messy picture. <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2014/12/were-going-to-sing-from-same-hymn-sheet.html">At this meeting</a> in South Africa I remember passionate, fiery but deeply cynical civil society activists lamenting the state of their own governance while OGP’s own Paul Maassen urged them to see OGP as a lever to exert pressure and to hold those elites to account. OGP can be a space for citizen-state contestation with <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/02/can-chaos-collision-lead-to-co-creation.html">chaos, collision and innovation</a> on both sides. That’s a perspective on power and its one that holds a lot of purchase, so long as there is sufficient civic space for that to happen. <br />
<br />
<b>Down with technocracy </b><br />
<br />
At this week’s UN General Assembly Sanjay Pradhan, the CEO of the OGP, released a <a href="https://www.opengovpartnership.org/trust/open-government-approach-rebuilding-citizen-trust">collection</a> of essays themed on the essential role of trust. At the event EU Commissioner Timmermans, one of the <a href="https://ec.europa.eu/commission/commissioners/2014-2019/timmermans_en">more human</a> of the Brussels political class, talked of citizens demanding their governments to do less talking about openness and more doing about it. As Gov says ‘trust me’ the citizen response is increasingly ‘show me’, he said. That sort of thinking is such a long way forward from the way those in the opengov community used to talk about it. I’m hopeful that the days of fetishising technology, lauding technocracy and placing faith in simplistic <a href="https://openknowledge.worldbank.org/handle/10986/18408">‘feedback loops’</a> have now been replaced by serious analysis of the messy, contested way in which change in governance actually happens. <br />
<br />
<b>Watershed moment? </b><br />
<br />
Because if it has, then Tanzania could be a watershed. Rather than despair at the withdrawal of a country that should probably never been a member because its polity was simply not ready, now could be the time to redouble efforts, but do so with eyes wide open. A lesson of Tanzania is to know what the red lines are: freedom of the press for example. And to apply those red lines. Another, as I was told by <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/05/ogp-africa-does-it-pass-amina-test.html">Amina</a> in Dar es Salaam, is to measure the right things: like trust. Or legitimacy. Or justice. Not report cards. Nor projects. Nor activities. Trust is intangible, and there’s no app for that. <br />
<br />
<b>High stakes </b><br />
<br />
So I hope Tanzania is that watershed. And while some more Governments should be shown the door, we should champion others who are joining OGP right now and those continuing to make real strides. OGP isn’t the be all and end all of everything, and there are other routes to improving governance. The SDGs for example. But it is a barometer of sorts and one worth supporting, not least as the crisis in State legitimacy is now leading us to some very dark places. People who do not trust their political class and feel marginalised reach for extremes. That’s human nature. One <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2017/sep/19/donald-trump-threatens-totally-destroy-north-korea-un-speech">extremist</a> now runs the most powerful country in the world. So this is high stakes, and it’s incumbent on us all to pull together. Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-7309584037805328822017-06-20T10:30:00.001-07:002017-06-20T11:26:48.349-07:00 Broken Britain: A Conflict Assessment <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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</xml><![endif]-->Terrorism in London Bridge and Finsbury Park. Fire and fury in North Kensington. Race hate and bigotry in the wake of the Brexit Referendum. Is Britain broken, and if so do we understand how broken and what to do about it? I thought it was time to measure ourselves against a peacebuilding framework. The conclusion is that, while our institutions are relatively strong, the underlying currents of marginalisation, exclusion and widespread injustice leaves us in a dangerous place.<b> </b><br />
<br />
<b>Measuring peace </b><br />
<br />
I thought the five Peacebuilding and Stability Goals (PSGs) of the <a href="https://www.pbsbdialogue.org/en/new-deal/new-deal-principles/">New Deal for Engagement with Fragile States</a> (New Deal) was a good place to start.<br />
<br />
The New Deal was exciting because it was developed and designed jointly between fragile states and richer donor governments. It’s not a panacea, and <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2014/01/new-deal-trough-or-plateau.html">I wrote here</a> about its inherent flaws. But it’s a useful framework, and one which I hope gives food for thought.<br />
<br />
The PSGs, which are intended to guide all work in fragile and conflict affected states, are: <br />
<ol>
<li><b>Legitimate politics:</b> Foster inclusive political settlements and conflict resolution. </li>
<li><b>Security:</b> Establish and strengthen people’s security. </li>
<li><b>Justice:</b> Address injustices and increase people’s access to justice. </li>
<li><b>Economic Foundations:</b> Generate employment and improve livelihoods. </li>
<li><b>Revenues & Services:</b> Manage revenue and build capacity for accountable and fair service delivery. </li>
</ol>
So these are the internationally agreed principles for how we should measure and seek to improve the health of a state from a peace and conflict perspective. How does Britain measure up? <b> </b><br />
<br />
<b>Legitimate politics </b><br />
<br />
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<tr><td class="tr-caption" style="text-align: center;">Radical preacher</td></tr>
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On one level Britain’s politics measure up well. Turnout, particularly among young people in the last election, was high. Our democratic institutions are generally well regarded and corruption is measured <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/does-britain-deserve-its-top-10-ranking-in-the-corruption-perceptions-index-a6841636.html">as being low</a>. Our press is free and journalists are not attacked.<br />
<br />
But on a more fundamental level do the political elites still command the confidence of the people? I would argue that the vote to leave the European Union had less to do with the merits of Britain’s membership of the EU (not least because that was hardly discussed in the referendum campaign in favour of immigration) and more to do with widespread disenchantment with the political classes. This was exploited by a populist party, UKIP, using slogans and tactics reminiscent of Europe in the 1930s. That is not a healthy place to be. Just how unhealthy could perhaps be seen by <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-40323769">this week's attack</a> on a Muslim community leaving Ramadan prayers by a man raving about "killing all the muslims".<b><br /></b><br />
<br />
<b>Security </b><br />
<br />
Britain is generally a safe place to be. Crime is not for most people a daily experience. The attacks on London Bridge and Finsbury Park are horrific yes, but notable mainly for their rarity. <br />
<br />
But are we really as safe as we think we are? Hundreds of <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/society/2016/dec/07/men-killed-900-women-six-years-england-wales-figures-show">women die</a> at the hands of their partners in Britain. And our violent crime levels are actually <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1196941/The-violent-country-Europe-Britain-worse-South-Africa-U-S.html">among the worst</a> in the European Union. Young black men are dying from stabbings and knife crime at <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2017/apr/28/man-found-fatally-stabbed-on-london-bus-marylebone">an alarming rate</a>, with a morbid annual tally reported on every year. This is the same part of the population that is significantly over represented in the criminal justice system. If we are serious about establishing and strengthening people’s security, we have a long way to go. We could learn, perhaps, from other fragile States who themselves have made more progress in reforming their police that we appear to have to date. <b> </b><br />
<br />
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<br />
<b>Justice </b><br />
<br />
If you are arrested and charged in Britain you can reasonably expect to receive a fair trial. Our institutions are among the best in the world and, largely because of imperial history, are replicated throughout the English speaking globe. <br />
<br />
But what do we mean by justice? Beyond the institutions do people really feel that this is a just country? On Thursday morning I woke up to a fire in a tower in the area of London where I live. A few days on and it is now clear that nearly 100 people died in the most appalling circumstances. Their story, and the culpability of officialdom who <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/grenfell-tower-fire-latest-chief-fire-office-ronnie-king-government-ignore-warnings-gavin-barwell-a7795731.html">repeatedly ignored them in life</a>, while <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/grenfell-tower-fire-kensington-council-response-reserves-money-inquiry-theresa-may-a7797616.html">continuing to fail</a> their families in the wake of their deaths stands as a dark indictment of our society. I find it almost beyond comprehension.<br />
<br />
And why were they living there? Poor people live in tower blocks in this country because there is, and
has been for decades, a <a href="http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/grenfell-tower-fire-deaths-homeless-kensington-and-chelsea-luxury-properties-empty-a7791671.html">massive housing shortage</a>. Yet while social
housing is not built, local authorities do permit developers to
construct large luxury accommodation which is often bought as an
investment and left to stand empty. <br />
<br />
If you are poor in today’s Britain, this is how the system can and will treat you. That, in nobody’s eyes, can be called just. <br />
<br />
<b>Economic foundations </b><br />
<br />
Britain’s economic foundations <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/business/economics-blog/2015/apr/27/beyond-gdp-headlines-uk-economy">are arguably weak</a>. A country that forged its way based on manufacturing is now almost completely reliant on the services sector. And that too is largely reliant on access to markets, the largest of which this Government through Brexit is intent on leaving. Economic opportunities are centred on London and the South East, leaving large parts of the population in the former manufacturing areas, without much to go on. In fairness this Government has in the past demonstrated sincerity in attempting to develop a “<a href="http://northernpowerhouse.gov.uk/">Northern Powerhouse</a>” of growth, but this is likely to take decades and will be vulnerable to external shocks.<br />
<br />
The residents of Grenfell Tower lived in prosperous London too, however. The contrasts in this city between some of the richest real estate on planet Earth placed right next to some of the most deprived areas of the United Kingdom, with widespread poverty and higher levels of crime, is a permanent reminder both of injustice and the insecurity that that injustice breeds.<b> </b><br />
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<b>Revenues and services </b><br />
<br />
The ability to manage revenue and deliver services accountably and fairly is fundamental. On the surface Britain does have the basics right. A health service that is the envy of the world, for example. But this is now a country in which a local authority can completely fail its citizens, leading many of them to lose their lives as a result, and then fail them again to such an extent that the national government has had to step in. And nobody has resigned. <a href="http://www.standard.co.uk/news/london/grenfell-tower-protest-hundreds-gather-at-kensington-and-chelsea-town-hall-demanding-justice-for-a3567086.html">Kensington Town Hall was stormed</a> by those citizens last week, who felt they had no other way of holding anybody accountable. <b> </b><br />
<br />
<b>So what?</b><br />
<br />
Britain is hardly the only European rich country to be marked by glaring inequalities and injustice. But at some point we have to decide whether our generations are going to just pass that along to the next. As we look at ourselves in the mirror in the weeks ahead, we have some serious questions to answer. Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-26887109928135933512017-05-22T08:22:00.002-07:002017-05-22T08:22:42.783-07:00PDIA: Running before walking?<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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I’m beginning to wonder how much more PDIA has to offer, in particular for working in volatile and contested contexts. Not that I don’t remain a big fan of Matt Andrew’s work, but because I think it’s time some reality checks were applied to how it seems to be developing. If we don’t do that, I fear that the drive to move away from rigid top down approaches might lead us to another extreme, which could actually do some real harm. <br /><br /><b>Running over planning </b><br /><br />Matt has recently <a href="https://buildingstatecapability.com/2017/03/27/active-and-adaptive-planning-versus-set-plans-in-pdia/">posted several blogs</a> in which he explains how he and colleagues at Harvard have been deliberately minimising the workshopping at inception periods of PDIA programmes, in favour of ‘launchpad’ style events of no more than 1.5 days which seek to construct, deconstruct and then lead to action on the problems which have been collectively identified. He argues that the traditional evidence gathering period, complete with week long inception workshops rarely get either the diagnosis or the plans right at the outset, so it is better to adopt a more bite-sized approach in which action generates learning which in turn can shape action. <br /><br />Having just experienced another week long inception workshop I have a great deal of instinctive sympathy for this. But only to a point. In the workshop I just took part in, the real value wasn’t just the “data” or “evidence” we generated. No, it was the trust we developed between local partners and international actors, both of whom are about to embark on a programme in a conflict affected country, where there are very real risks of things going wrong. That just doesn’t fit with a ‘launchpad’ approach on its own. <br /><br /><b>Bias and power</b> <br /><br />Andrews does however <a href="https://buildingstatecapability.com/2017/03/27/active-and-adaptive-planning-versus-set-plans-in-pdia/">argue</a> persuasively on the importance of internal rather than external actors (consultants or people from donor agencies) leading this initial work. That is absolutely right. Andrews couches this in terms of navigating the biases that external actors inevitably bring. I would argue however that this is also about navigating the power asymmetry between those actors, invariably donors or wealthy INGOs, and their local partners. It might be veiled in positive language about solidarity, but that power imbalance is there, and it isn’t going anywhere soon. If you want to get the real picture, you’ve got to step back and be prepared to hear unwelcome truths. This lack of self awareness among donors even extends to the more <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2016/09/the-failure-debate-cold-shower-time.html">progressive among them</a>, who understand the need to incentivise <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2016/09/the-failure-debate-cold-shower-time.html">learning from failure</a>. <br /><br /><b>The ‘evidence hurdle’ </b><br /><br />Andrews argues for a one page plan arising from a quick and pressurised ‘launch pad’ into action, as the ideal PDIA approach. I don’t have an ideological problem with that, but I do just wonder how much Andrews and his colleagues have considered the evidence of at least the last 20 years from the peacebuilding sector. Scholars, policy makers and practitioners alike have all argued that to understand drivers of fragility, and to build peaceful relations that break deep rooted conflict systems, requires an analytical approach that guides long term engagements. That’s not to say you don’t need to be flexible and adaptive – in fact conflict affected states are in that sense the most relevant places for PDIA thinking to guide our work. But to jettison an analysis-guided approach in favour of just ‘getting on with it’ is itself a bit retrograde. <br /><br /><b>Combined endeavours </b><br /><br />That workshop I just did? It’s a programme that will adopt an approach that has taken much of Andrews’ earlier work and adapted it to a peacebuilding programmatic framework. I’m really excited about it, but also daunted at the scale of the challenge. I feel what we need to do is learn how to combine different approaches, taking the best of both rather than adopting PDIA wholesale, particularly some of the points Andrews argues in these latest blogs. In that way we could really begin to get to a level of change that always seems somehow just out of our reach.<br />
<br />
Who's up for <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/07/power-blindness-conflict-governance.html">a learning agenda</a> which combines power, conflict and governance thinking? Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-3121163287334015582017-05-11T20:44:00.000-07:002017-05-11T20:49:42.488-07:00Good Governance, or good enough? <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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Vive la France. Macron defeated a populist in the mould of Trump and himself becomes Vice Chair of the <a href="https://www.opengovpartnership.org/">Open Government Partnership</a>, no less. Onwards to advancing an agenda of openness, transparency and responsive governance, friends! <br />
<br />
But what is the plan, next? Is it really crisis averted, and we can now look ahead to a bright new dawn of advancing good governance around the world? For those of us who would like to see the sort of progressive agenda represented by the Sustainable Development Goals, specifically SDG16 on <a href="https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/sdg16">Justice, Peace and Governance</a>, what does success look like? <br />
<b><br />Justice is relative </b><br />
<br />
As with poverty, so it is with justice. Although there remain examples of top down, technical approaches to “justice reform” which ignore context and prioritise the implementation of Western models of law, most objective observers accept that this approach will <a href="http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt6wpk74">continue to fail</a>. And where you’re talking about countries that are volatile, contested and prone to conflict then you could be entrenching the very factors that perpetuate that fragility. <br />
<br />
So how to think about success? No easy answers. But it seems to me that the only models likely to work are ones that accept what might appear to be unpalatable aspects of the way communities settle their differences, without compromising on core values of human rights. This isn’t a challenge exclusive to ‘developing’ countries either. In the United Kingdom for example there is <a href="http://www.economist.com/blogs/erasmus/2016/11/sharia-law-britain">a live debate</a> about the extent to which informal systems of law might at some point integrate with the formal State systems. <br />
<br />
<b>Positive, not negative peace </b><br />
<br />
SDG16 holds that very person has the right to live free from violence or the threat of violence. A cursory look around reveals that the trend is very rapidly going in exactly the opposite direction. I worry too, however, that we lose sight of what ‘peace’ actually means. Within the peacebuilding community it is <a href="http://www.saferworld.org.uk/resources/view-resource/891-measuring-peace-from-2015-an-indicator-framework-at-work">a familiar concept</a> that peace is not simply the absence of violence, which you could measure by body counts. That could just mean that the violence is displaced elsewhere, or that the threat of violence remains due to unresolved grievance. That is so-called negative peace. It is time the idea of positive peace, meaning the ability of citizens to pursue grievances without recourse to violence, took wider hold. This would mean, for example, justice or governance institutions that are perceived to be legitimate by all sections of the population and are thus used as a means of settling disputes or contesting competing political ideas. <br />
<br />
<b>Good or good enough governance? </b><br />
<br />
Is all corruption bad? <br />
<br />
Rampant corruption is harmful and dangerous. It robs people of their futures and perpetuates human misery. Connivance between State elites and foreign firms to avoid tax is unforgivable. The hollowing out of State owned enterprises, such as we can see <a href="https://www.tuko.co.ke/26169-odm-accuse-kenya-airways-management-corruption-historic-loss.html">with Kenya Airways</a> for example, is rightly challenged. But we need to be careful about the entirety of what we wish for in the next 10 years. Many of the States that are now members of OGP for example are ones in which the rule of law is a process of negotiation, rather than rigid application. The State is still negotiating with its citizens, and citizens with each other. What that will need to mean is action plans that take account of that longer term, wider process of evolution rather than ones that envisage some kind of immediate transparency revolution fuelled by the holy grail of data and technology where wrongdoing is rooted out mercilessly at every level. Human societies just don’t work like that, and the collateral damage that such an approach might provoke in some places would lead to very real dangers for the poorest and most vulnerable people. That, to me, is more important than targets. <br />
<br />
<b>Vision </b><br />
<br />
A girl or boy born in 2015 will be entering adulthood in 2030. What do we want for them? If we want them to be confidently looking ahead to a lifetime of productivity, free from fear of violence and confident they can achieve their potential on their own merits, then we may need to reflect on how best we serve their future. Good enough may actually be better than good. Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-30723891672732022172017-04-24T01:53:00.001-07:002017-04-24T01:53:49.350-07:00What is the value of civil society? <!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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David Sasaki of Hewlett has written a <a href="http://davidsasaki.name/2017/04/what-if-we-valued-civil-society-enough-to-pay-for-it/">first class post </a>which throws down the gauntlet to civil society: either shape up to the extent that the people you claim to represent appreciate your value, or ship out. Harsh perhaps, but overdue. Sasaki calls for a frank conversation, and does not disappoint: <i><br /></i><br />
<blockquote>
<i>“Many civil society organizations do not add substantial value to the lives of those they claim to represent. They are more focused on pleasing their wealthy donors than the people they intend to serve”. </i></blockquote>
Sasaki’s next <a href="http://davidsasaki.name/2017/04/what-if-we-valued-civil-society-enough-to-pay-for-it/">observation</a>, however, is even more challenging, in particular for Northern INGOs beloved of policy reports and conferences in important places. Quoting former Hilary Clinton staffer Anne-Marie Slaughter he notes that CSOs: <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>“…will need to do more than just technocratic policy analysis if they are to remain relevant in our age of institutional distrust and government dysfunction”. </i></blockquote>
Phew – I can hear many famous names within Northern civil society say, that’s not us. We do field programming in hard places as well. But how much of that programming is driven by bottom up need, shaped by what communities themselves are saying that they want, compared to pre-cooked Northern policy agendas from both civil society and the donor community? I think most of us know the answer to that one. <br /><br />So while I agree with Sasaki’s <a href="http://davidsasaki.name/2017/04/what-if-we-valued-civil-society-enough-to-pay-for-it/">diagnosis</a> of the problem as far as it goes, I think he overlooks another critical element. That of the role of donors in creating the very incentives that require CSOs to be ‘focussed on pleasing their wealthy donors’. Until both Foundations and statutory donors stop creating such a short termist and questionable set of incentive structures, including the widespread use of profit-making firms at the expense of civil society with questionable impact, then it is difficult to see this changing. The current '<a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2016/03/payment-by-results-past-its-sell-by-date.html">payment by results</a>' fad is hardly conducive to this either. <br /><br />I also disagree with the primary treatment he prescribes. Sasaki says that civil society should catch up, emulate and seek to support more people like <a href="https://twitter.com/MariaSTsehai">Maria Sarungi Tsehai</a> in Tanzania. Maria is a deeply impressive individual who uses social media to mobilise and amplify the voices of communities often overlooked by powerful elites. I have had the privilege of working with Maria in the past (interestingly enough <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/02/can-chaos-collision-lead-to-co-creation.html">as a donor</a>) and I agree that this sort of politically informed working is by far more impactful than standard and pre-shaped governance programming. Yet I do not think that civil society is necessarily right to emulate individuals like that, but rather to find and develop others like her. <br /><br />In some ways this speaks to <a href="http://oxfamblogs.org/fp2p/positive-deviance-spotting-the-hidden-innovations-in-development-work/">Positive Deviance programming</a>, which the work of boundary-pushing organisations like Twaweza in Tanzania have done much to advance. In my reply <a href="http://davidsasaki.name/2017/04/what-if-we-valued-civil-society-enough-to-pay-for-it/">to Sasaki’s blogpost</a> I gently pointed out that those positive deviants might not be as highly educated, resourceful or fluent as Maria. But their ideas are just as important and in many ways more so. Hence learning from another resident of Dar es Salaam, <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/05/ogp-africa-does-it-pass-amina-test.html">Amina</a>. Her life chances were robbed by State corruption and continue to be shaped by it. Yet her commitment to public service and piercing analysis of where problems really lie and what needs to be fixed is compelling. It's just not presented in policy or development-speak. <br /><br />But to develop this new way of working, which we can all agree is likely to be working with the grain rather than against it, and thus more transformative than policy-led technocracy, the inescapable conclusion is that donors will need to buy into this agenda too. So far, there are precious few signs of that at scale. <br /><br /> Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-72974621599946804422017-01-01T05:52:00.001-08:002017-01-01T21:59:19.100-08:00Hope for 2017: disruption, discomfort and adaptation<!--[if gte mso 9]><xml>
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<br />
In a small hamlet in Turkana, Northern Kenya, is a teacher called John. This man and his wife are quietly dedicating their lives to changing the worlds of boys and girls in one of the toughest places in the world to be born. The land is semi-arid. All indices of poverty and violence are near the top of the scale. Teacher John is fluent in three languages, highly educated and could be living a very comfortable life. Yet he lives in the house above, placing hot ashes in front of the door every night to ward off the snakes. He’s sunk his own money into building a blockhouse for girls to sleep in so that their parents feel confident they won’t be attacked if they attend school, and has opened doors to opportunities for his pupils that would simply not have been there had it not been for what happens at that school. It’s not as if he is after recognition or reward. It takes hours to get there over roads that barely exist, and with armed guards to ward off potential attackers. Former pupils act as the schools sentries at night. But he and his wife do represent hope that seems to be in such short supply as we enter 2017: that those quiet heroes best represent humanity’s capacity to make progress despite the odds being loaded overwhelmingly against it. <br />
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Our challenge is to find those quiet heroes and support them. But to do so will mean disruption, discomfort and adaptation to the way we work. If we can do that, though, perhaps 2017 can be the point where we started to really change the world for the better. <br />
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<b>Disruption: getting our house in order</b><br />
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There is an inherent contradiction between the generosity of spirit that individuals repeatedly demonstrate by, for example, donating to appeals or working with refugees, and the consistent polling which reveals scepticism about the aid industry, or aid itself. The latter is grist to the mill for the Daily Mail brand of nationalism. <br />
<br />
But is it so complex? If the average British voter were to see the work that Teacher John is doing they would be likely to want to support it. We see this time and again in response to appeals such <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-31874360">as Comic Relief</a>. That’s good. So it tells us we need to be much much better at telling these stories effectively. <br />
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But there’s also an inescapable conclusion that the diet of fundraising <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/dec/04/-sp-africa-charity-awards">featuring patronising stories</a> about poor people has to end. And there is legitimacy in the criticism of the <a href="http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2550648/Fury-234-000-salary-boss-Save-Children-Charity-chiefs-huge-wages-reined-say-MPs.html">size of salaries</a> at the top of the aid industry, in addition to the vested interests that shape the way that large INGOs and private contractors behave. And, lest donors think that they are above criticism, they have shaped the industry that now exists. If they continue to fund the sector on the basis of <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2016/03/payment-by-results-past-its-sell-by-date.html">payment by results</a> and short term projects then the private contractors will grow ever more rapacious and large INGOs ever more inflexible. We all need to change.<br />
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<b>Discomfort: getting serious about conflict </b><br />
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Armed conflict is rising inexorably, with the death toll and human misery it brings. We already know that the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2015/jun/16/global-cost-conflict-reaches-14tn-says-report">cost of conflict</a> is decades of lost growth and a massive waste of human potential. We also know, from overwhelming evidence, that transforming cycles of conflict requires a long term and sustained programme of support for things like inter-communal relations based on trust, institution building that is people-centred and governance that commands public legitimacy over several decades after the fighting itself stops. Yet the international aid community continues to treat peacebuilding as a poor relation, even in places where fragility is a defining factor, while opting for short term projects that pretend that because fighting has stopped the conflict must be over. So technical or technology based approaches to ‘governance’ can be used instead. The people that will pay the biggest price for that are not the donors or the aid practitioners, they are the poorest and most vulnerable in whose interests we claim to work.<br />
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Thankfully we have some positives to draw on here. There <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2016/01/openness-in-fragile-environments-art-of.html">is growing recognition</a>, if not yet commitment, to do things differently in fragile settings.<br />
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We have a new UN General Secretary who has seen the impact of conflict first hand and in his first speech <a href="http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=55899#.WGkGC32I8ZU">expressed a determination</a> to make 2017 a ‘year of peace’.<br />
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And we have an SDG framework that we can use to hold governments and multi-national institutions accountable. <br />
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<br />
<br />
<b>Adaptation: finding Teacher John </b><br />
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I came across John almost by accident. I was working as a donor at the time and was looking for unusual suspects who had ideas about how to tackle deep seated problems that traditional forms of aid had consistently failed to address. But in him I also found an individual that represented the ideas behind the theory of <a href="https://aidontheedge.info/2011/02/08/a-qa-on-positive-deviance-innovation-and-complexity/">“Positive Deviance”</a>. This is the notion that there are individuals or groups out there who find ways of stepping outside a norm and in doing so find innovative ways of addressing apparently intractable problems. He was succeeding where most initiatives in this part of Kenya had failed.<br />
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The implications of this are profound. It means forgetting the idea that large, centralised approaches to aid or development will work. Rather, the approaches likely to work in achieving the aims of peace, justice and open government set out in the SDGs will take context as a starting point, be shaped by people like John and probably operate at a much smaller and intimate scale, navigating the unique contours of each. <br />
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<b>No complaining</b><br />
<br />
Meeting these three challenges will mean confronting vested interests that shape the behaviour of donors and practitioners alike. It will also mean adapting our work within a volatile and dangerous global context in which civic space is under threat in all of our countries. But nothing worthwhile is ever easy. And unless any of us are prepared to make the sort of sacrifices and adaptations that people like Teacher John do, we shouldn’t complain at the discomfort. Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-48913336504460367292016-11-08T10:59:00.000-08:002016-11-08T12:12:00.674-08:00DFID, Brexit & Soft Power <div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
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DFID is dead. Long live DFID. The new UK Government which emerged <a href="http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-37886882">from the fires</a> of the June 23rd referendum is in some ways very similar to the old. Familiar faces in some cases. But the accession of Priti Patel to the helm of DFID illustrated just how different things now are. Ms Patel isn’t so much an aid sceptic as a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2016/sep/14/priti-patel-plans-foreign-aid-overhaul-based-on-core-tory-values">pro-free trader</a> absolutely determined to press the influence of DFID into the service of the United Kingdom as it forges a new role outside of the EU. <br />
<br />
Anyone doubting Ms Patel’s ruthless commitment to that cause was disabused last week <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/dfid-civil-society-partnership-review">by the release</a> of DFID’s core funding of UK civil society. Out with the PPA, and in with four strands of short term projectised funding. This will inevitably mean that the expertise and experience of much of British civil society will be lost, as INGOs lose the ability to plan with confidence and invest in the development of their staff. But is the British Government alone able to do without that expertise, and is it clear what it means by soft power anyway? <br />
<br />
<b>What is Soft Power?</b><br />
<br />
There is no single accepted definition of what soft power actually is but the work of political scientists
Joseph Nye and Robert Keohane (2004) would command general agreement. If we look at how they defined it, we might be able to judge how far DFID is able to generate this intangible commodity. <br />
<br />
For them, soft power is the ability: <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>“to get desired outcomes because others want what you want”;<br />“to achieve goals through attraction rather than coercion”;<br />“convincing others to follow or getting them to agree to norms or instituitions that produce the desired behaviour.”</i> </blockquote>
It tends to rest on<br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>“the
appeal of one’s ideas or culture or the ability to set the agenda
through standards and institutions that shape the preferences of
others”;</i><br />
<i>“the persuasiveness of the free information that an actor seeks to transmit.” </i></blockquote>
For Nye and Keohane, scholars in the realist tradition of international
relations, the fundamental argument for soft power is that it works and
therefore obviates the need to resort to costly military and economic
instruments to achieve policy goals. <br />
<br />
So at first sight Ms Patel’s strategy makes sense for a Britain forging a new role in the world. Britain achieved great power status which it still exercises, for example on the Security Council, through the use of overwhelming military force. It remains a great power but increasingly it projects that influence through soft rather than hard means, and arguably achieves much more as a result. But how does DFID measure up against their definition?<br />
<br />
DFID can get desired outcomes through the sheer scale of its budgets. It is frequently far more the locus of British power in other countries than the Embassy or the Ambassadors could ever hope to have. It thus can achieve goals without coercion, but I would doubt it does so through 'attraction'. And as a result of its capacity to wield that power effectively it is conceivable that they can shape norms -although it's approach to short term projects undermines the long term engagement required to generate normative change. So I would say DFID's abilities here are significant, but mixed and often confused.<br />
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<b>Is this legitimate? </b><br />
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For some this new vision for DFID is an act of heresy. Personally I don’t have a problem with DFID being explicitly used in the British national interest. It always has been, Ms Patel is just being very open about it. And in any case this is UK taxpayers money and it is right that any UK Government acts in their interests. I would also however argue that her brand of neo-liberal free trade is not always in either their or any other nations citizens interests. The poorest people live in states affected by conflict and fragility. Breaking those cycles of conflict to enable stable and equitable economic growth is thus in every citizens interest, at home and overseas.<br />
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The World Development Report of 2011 (WDR2011) found that some 1.5 billion people live in countries affected by repeated cycles of political and criminal violence – causing human misery and disrupting development to the extent that almost no MDGs have been met in any fragile state. It argues that to break these cycles, it is crucial to strengthen legitimate national institutions and governance in order to provide citizen security, justice and jobs – as well as alleviating the international stresses that increase the risks of violent conflict. SDG16 takes this several steps further, establishing the imperative to work towards good governance, justice and peace. <br />
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To address this, the UK needs to contribute to normative change at global and local level. Specifically, it needs to address the social and political factors that drive violent conflict, perpetuate widespread abuses and prevent the poorest countries from achieving sustainable growth. These are underpinned by a range of social and normative barriers preventing citizens from engaging and participating meaningfully with the governance of their countries.<br />
<br />
By definition, addressing these issues requires the exercise of soft, rather than hard, power. Crucially this needs to be over the long term. <br />
<br />
Yet the UK cannot project norms independently, or exclusively with its traditional allies, without being vulnerable to charges of neo-colonialism from governments and others whose current policies and practices are challenged. It must thus work in partnership, in many cases new partnerships, with actors from a range of governments, civil society coalitions and multilateral institutions.<br />
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<br />
<b>So what’s in the tool box? </b><br />
<br />
I would argue Britain’s levers of soft power are threefold: intergovernmental leadership, a free and independent media and credibility by example. <br />
<br />
<b>Inter-governmental leadership</b><br />
<br />
The UK has demonstrably engaged in inter-governmental leadership to significant effect in the past. Examples include the Gleneagles Summit of 2005 in which UK leadership resulted in substantial agreements on climate change (associating leaders from Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa) and reducing poverty in Africa (with seven African presidents taking part). Without sustained British perseverance and exercise of soft power these outcomes would have been highly unlikely (Bayne, 2005). <br />
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More quietly, in the G8 context, the UK joined with Germany in leading a shift of emphasis into recognising the linkages between the pressures of climate change, security risk and poverty and beginning to develop the first elements of an internationally coordinated response to these dangerous connections (Harris 2012).<br />
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There are other inter-governmental partnerships in which the UK is a leading player, such as the Open Government Partnership (OGP), which consists of nearly 70 States. The OGP agenda, if enacted fully on the ground, would radically transform the lives of citizens. They are: <br />
<ul>
<li>Open Data: Radically opening up government data for greater accountability, public service improvement and economic growth;</li>
<li>Government Integrity: fighting corruption and strengthening democracy through transparent government;</li>
<li>Fiscal Transparency: helping citizens to follow the money;</li>
<li>Empowering Citizens: transforming the relationship between citizens and governments, and;</li>
<li>Natural Resource Transparency: ensuring natural resources and extractive revenues are used for public benefit</li>
</ul>
The new British Government, therefore, should continue on this path by scaling up its investment in exercising soft power in support of redefining international normative and legal frameworks in support of building stability overseas. <br />
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<b>Culture and media</b><br />
<br />
The UK is a consolidated and well established democracy which enjoys widespread respect for its democratic institutions. It also benefits from the English language and mass appeal of the British media, particularly the BBC World Service in the context of developing nations. The BBC World Service and BBC more generally, is therefore a key basis of soft power. <br />
<br />
Critically, however, this effect does not arise because the Service is a mouthpiece for British policy; in fact, it arises precisely <u>because it is not</u>. It is a critical and independent source of credible information accessed by populations who do not have alternative sources of independent information. It is thus an asymmetrical source of soft power. Returning to Nye & Keohane, on the importance of free information in building credibility through free information as a basis for soft power: <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>“…credibility is the crucial resource, and asymmetrical credibility is a key source of power. Establishing credibility means developing a reputation for providing correct information, even when it may reflect badly on the information provider’s own country. The BBC, for example, has earned a reputation for credibility, while state-controlled radio stations in Baghdad, Beijing and Havana have not.”</i> (Nye, Keohane, 2004) </blockquote>
British soft power, paradoxically, is therefore gained by a unique source of news from a British perspective that is frequently critical of the UK. <br />
<br />
It is thus disturbing that the Government has significantly cut the BBC World Service since 2010, already resulting in a loss of audience of around 14 million and the cancellation of five language services. There have been four funding cuts in four years, with each presented as a “one off” cut by Government, with the latest involving a reduction of £2.22 million in 2013. <br />
<br />
Applying Nye & Keohane’s analysis of the centrality of free and credible information to generating soft power, therefore, surely these cuts are misguided at best. <br />
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<b>Credibility by example: building stability & opening data </b><br />
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The UK has gained significant credibility by being among the first to reach internationally defined targets for international development, such as the commitment to spend 0.7% GDP on Overseas Development Assistance (ODA). It has hosted initiatives such as the Open Government Partnership. It is supporting new and equitable partnerships with governments in conflict affected situations, such as the New Deal for Engagement with Fragile States (New Deal), and is one of the leading financial and practical supporters of the UN Peacebuilding Fund. As a result the UK is able to utilise its soft power in pursuit of the foreign policy agenda represented by the Building Stability Overseas (BSOS) policy framework. Worrying, then, that Ms Patel has thus far been silent on all of the above.<br />
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The UK has also demonstrably led the world in the provision of Open Government Data (OGD), increasing transparency and by so doing enabling active citizens and civil society to hold decision makers to account. OGD aims, by the provision of usable data, to achieve impact on government efficiency, transparency, accountability, environmental sustainability, inclusion of marginalised groups, economic growth and supporting entrepreneurs. This is a practical agenda which builds on the insight of WDR11. The UK recently came top of 77 nations currently committed to pursuing OGD programmes in the latest Open Data Barometer index<a href="http://www.blogger.com/blogger.g?blogID=4577251188417774920#_ftn4">[4]</a>. So when will be hear about this agenda from Ms Patel? <br />
<br />
Soft power is entirely separate and not dependent on hard power, as some political scientists have claimed. Nye & Keohane make the same observation in relation to other states who have engaged in similar leadership and thus gained credibility and soft power which bears little relation to their capacity to project hard power: <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>“Canada, Sweden and the Netherlands have more influence than some other states with equivalent economic or military capabilities.”</i> (Nye, Keohane, 2004) </blockquote>
The Government should therefore utilise the political capital it has generated to challenge other governments to follow suit. For example while the US comes second after the UK in the Open Data Barometer overall, it scores poorly in the provision of company and land registration. Encouraging governments of wealthy countries towards greater transparency could be an important step towards reducing global tax evasion, another important HMG priority. Corruption is a first world problem. To the same end, the Government should also prioritise supporting local civil society in being able to effectively use such data to hold those in power to account. <br />
<br />
<b>Conclusion</b><br />
<br />
The UK Government is well placed to exercise significant soft power, relative to its peers. It has already demonstrated this, notably on changing norms and practices on good governance, sexual violence and open data. It benefits both from its active leadership on such agendas, in addition to the wider influence of the BBC World Service and historic links across the globe. <br />
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It has not yet, however, realised the full potential of this power and does not appear to take a systematic approach to doing so, as can be seen by short termism in cutting the reach of the BBC World Service and the removal of core strategic funding to UK civil society, favouring instead short-termist project funding. <br />
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The Government must therefore marshal its influence through the use of its intergovernmental leadership, free media and leadership by example, and in so doing realise the combined potential of the soft power Britain could potentially wield. Ms Patel may find she needs to revisit some of her decisions sooner than she imagines in order to achieve that vision. Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4577251188417774920.post-28658004281434042852016-10-05T06:14:00.002-07:002016-10-05T13:22:54.037-07:00Brexit Britain: a leader in peace, governance & growth? Whisper it quietly: this new Government might not actually be all that bad. Amid the predictable <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/global-development-professionals-network/2016/sep/14/uk-ngos-raise-concerns-about-priti-patels-new-approach-to-foreign-aid">sound and fury</a> from many in the UK development industry, itself populated mainly by left-leaning voters who were appalled at Brexit, the actual emerging policy picture as regards the direction of UK development policy shows early promise. I’m told that NGOs at the Conservative Party conference this week were left slightly taken aback, having braced themselves for an ideological onslaught that never came.<br />
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<b>Priti & Boris </b><br />
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<iframe allowfullscreen="" frameborder="0" height="315" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/hBOrHEnWoDw" width="560"></iframe>
First up was Priti Patel, DFID’s new boss and leading light of the Brexit campaign. She had a lot to say on the theme of the day: free trade. DFID’s role was to counter poverty, respond to disasters but also to create the conditions for growth. That she explicitly links the growth of markets to the UK national interest as a post-Brexit trading nation should not be held against her. It’s been the unspoken goal of Her Majesty’s Government since the creation of DFID in 1997. And the link to trade is also hardly new ground. One of the most progressive donors in the world today, the Netherlands, unified it’s trade and development Ministries years ago, arguably leading to <a href="http://ecdpm.org/great-insights/promoting-development-through-business/dutch-approach-aid-trade-private-sector-development/">greater coherence overall</a>. <br />
<br />
And on peace she had this: <br />
<blockquote class="tr_bq">
<i>“…we can and will play an active part in making our world a more peaceful and prosperous place”.</i> </blockquote>
A bit thin on the ground for detail but nothing to especially dislike.<br />
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Then came Boris Johnson. And what a different Boris this was. Gone were the jokes, and the blatant political ambition. In came serious analysis which, by comparison to the soundbites of Patel, had some particularly positive pointers for those of us interested in effective interventions to support peace, responsive governance and justice in some of the most complex, fragile and volatile places in the world. <br />
<b><br />Development needs freedom</b> <br />
<br />
Boris was vocal and blunt in his rejection of the pernicious thesis that development was possible without openness, transparency and responsive governance. That is a welcome and direct slap down to the sort of thinking led recently by the <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2013/07/odi-goes-retro-negative-peace.html">Overseas Development Institute</a>, and over which we <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2015/02/odi-goes-retro-backlash-begins.html">have tangled before</a>. Liberal freedoms were, he said, essential to growth that remained stable. End of. <br />
<br />
In fact Boris went much further than that. He castigated the regimes currently re-writing constitutions to lengthen spells of unbroken power in Africa while citing directly the closing civic space that has resulted in NGOs being targeted by those governments at home. The link between closing civic space and fragility is well established, with <a href="http://carnegieendowment.org/2016/10/04/closing-space-and-fragility-pub-64774">Carothers' recent work </a>being the latest to examine it. <br />
<br />
<b>Soft power? </b><br />
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Boris leaned heavily on the idea of British soft power as a means by which those freedoms being curtailed might be addressed. It was clear to me that he included UK aid relationships in that, but he also cited the BBC and other forms of influence around the world. It was possible, he argued, to marshal all of Britain’s collective influence to support openness as well as growth. (Britain's soft power is something that gets talked about a lot - I did an analysis of its true spread <a href="http://www.chrisunderwoodsblog.com/2013/11/soft-power-what-is-it-good-for.html">here</a>) <br />
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<b>Reasons for optimism </b><br />
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The centres of gravity in Theresa May’s Government have shifted radically. The Treasury has gone from one of the most powerful Departments to a weaker implementing arm of Downing Street. While DFID is now headed by a Secretary of State who is clearly aligned with an agenda on governance and growth which is backed by the more politically powerful Foreign Secretary. Left leaning NGO folk might not like the personalities but it’s not a bad set of alignments for a progressive development and foreign policy. <br />
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So – a good start in my book, if a little confused and light on the detail. Confusion, for example, could be seen by Boris’ reference to Ethiopia as a development good news story, with rising life expectancy and a £300m DFID programme.<br />
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Current events in Ethiopia may cast those statistics in a slightly <a href="http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2016/10/ethiopia-unrest-continues-day-deadly-stampede-161003130002688.html">less favourable light</a>.<br />
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And, to address Brexit, both Patel and Johnson called for British leadership of the aid industry. Well, it is fair to say that over the years DFID has been a thought leader on peace and governance. It is also fair to say that the European Union’s development policies are frequently confused and incoherent. The European Union’s 11 million farmers and their political voice arguably led to the suspension of the Doha Round (the <a href="http://www.euractiv.com/section/trade-society/news/eu-and-us-play-doha-round-blame-game/">US directly blamed</a> the EU for this) which would have done more for growth and poverty alleviation than all of the aid budgets combined. It was notable Boris Johnson directly cited British determination to restart that Round. Coherence between trade and development is not such a bad idea. <br />
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Ultimately Brexit has happened. We have a new administration in the UK. They face <a href="https://www.politicshome.com/news/uk/politics/opinion-polls/news/78626/theresa-may-holds-massive-popularity-lead-over-jeremy">no meaningful opposition</a> at home. So it’s just as well that, from what I saw this week, there is much to be optimistic about if you’re a peacebuilder. Chris Underwoodhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/03026438313352911527noreply@blogger.com0