Photo: Søren Dreyer

New Approaches to Conflict Prevention in Africa 

Peace, stability and human security are essential conditions for sustainable development.
COWI is serving as process facilitator as DANIDA implements its Africa Programme for Peace (APP), a 248 million DKK (€35 million) initiative to help Africans prevent and resolve conflicts that would otherwise derail development and perpetuate poverty.

The major development agencies are increasingly recognizing that "when local conflicts deteriorate into armed violence, human security disappears, development is set back and donors end up getting involved with humanitarian relief aid to help pick up the pieces," says Julian Elgaard Brett, a consultant working on governance, security and conflict issues at COWI.

Julian Brett has been serving for the past few years as technical advisor on the programme for Denmark's Ministry of Foreign Affairs, which oversees DANIDA.


Supporting African capacities

COWI has designed a comprehensive framework for the APP that allows the major African organisations - led by the African Union - to develop and implement African capacities for peace.

COWI's design helps integrate the continent-wide efforts to promote more effective conflict prevention, peacekeeping and post-conflict reconstruction.

The technical assistance involves working with the organisations to develop policies and plans that are consistent with international standards and which meet the continent's needs.

This includes a strong focus on building constructive links between the organisations, their member states, civil society and the development community.

Bringing people together

Julian Brett adds, "Everything boils down to bringing people together in strategic ways to prevent conflicts and help manage and resolve those that turn violent. It can be high risk - but, as we have seen countless times before, the option of doing nothing is often worse."

By Scott Berman, cht@cowi.com  
Published: 11.10.2006