Publications

It is an increasingly complex digital world that UN peacekeeping must navigate. A set of semi-fictional scenarios helps to contextualise the goals and pathways outlined in the recently adopted Strategy for the Digital Transformation of UN Peacekeeping and makes this complexity tangible for multiple target audiences.

UN Peacekeeping took a major step forward with the adoption of the Strategy for the Digital Transformation of UN Peacekeeping. Embracing a fuller use of new technologies to support mandate implementation and better protect civilians and peacekeepers, now requires innovation, comprehensive and committed action, and principled approaches to mitigate risks.

Exit strategies and transitions are part of the current debate on sustaining the impact of peace operations. The dashboard looks at triggers for the end of deployments and follow-up arrangements to offer an introduction to the debate on exit factors. For this purpose, data from 168 peace operations were analysed and examples presented.

Considering the diversity of peace operations, Annika S. Hansen and Tobias von Gienanth warn against drawing general and hasty lessons for other peace operations after the Taliban took power in Afghanistan. They write in the IPGjournal about the still important mandates, the definition and factors of success for international engagement.

Quality data are critical for development interventions to be effective but are hard to obtain in fragile contexts. In Anbar/Iraq, the 2020 founded GIZ Data Lab experiment “Data in fragile contexts” explores new ways to utilize alternative data sources in order to better understand contextual realities on the ground and how they correlate with conflict dynamics.

Partnerships can help foster innovation in peace operations. An example of a novel partnerships is the Humanitarian Technology Initiative, a collaboration between the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and humanitarian actors, which aims to further develop cutting-edge aerospace technologies for humanitarian purposes and apply them on the ground.

Artificial Intelligence offers the promise of more effective conflict analysis and more inclusive peace processes but faces the peril of reinforcing new exclusions and hierarchies of digital access. Balancing the promise and the peril is necessary to unlock the prospects of inclusive peacemaking through inclusive AI design, data collection and data analysis.

Virtual Reality (VR) as an avenue to mitigate the challenges of language training for UN Peacekeeping? Ryan Cross argues, that the use of VR language tools might be a solution to at least some of peacekeeping’s language problems.

In his new comment at IP Qarterly, Tobias Pietz argues that the current approach of CSDP is everything but ambitious in times when the EU is discussing European Autonomy. The Strategic Compass offers an unique opportunity to clarify not only the level of ambition of EU crisis management but also how this relates to collective defence.

On 21 May 2021, the German Bundestag will vote on the Bundeswehr's continued participation in the Kosovo Force. On this occasion, Andreas Wittkowsky describes the extremely turbulent environment for KFOR. It is defined by significant political upheaval in Kosovo, mixed political signals from Serbia, and the aftermath of Covid-19.

Hate speech impacts international peace operations by undermining mandate implementation, in particular political processes, and tarnishing a mission’s credibility. Based on his Strategy and Plan of Action on Hate Speech (May 2019), Guterres published more Detailed Guidance on Implementation for United Nations Field Presences in September 2020. A central role in implementing key commitments to address hate speech falls to digital technologies.

In a contribution to the IPI Global Observatory, Andreas Wittkowsky reviews the experiences that the OSCE Special Monitoring Mission to Ukraine (SMM) has made by pioneering the employment of technical monitoring systems in peace operations.

Join ZIF and Maude Morrison, Social Media and Conflict Mediation Adviser at the Center for Humanitarian Dialogue, for a conversation on capitializing on a growing awareness of the role of technology in peace mediation – a field that has long resisted the use of digital tools.

Are digital technologies a gimmick, silver bullet or too complicated? In the latest contribution on TECHPOPS, Jonathan Harlander (CMI) engages in myth busting in relation to ‘digital peacemaking’.

Want to know how peacekeepers, peacebuilders and mediators can use social media analysis to create more impact and influence change?

Plakat Weltkarte Peace Operations 2020/2021

Read Lisa Hultman’s captivating on ZIF TECHPOPS post on how data can help peacekeeping missions better understand how to prioritize, how to make the best use of their resources and justify the allocation of funds and resources.

New on the TECHPOPS blog, Irina Siminichina maps the evolution of UN resolutions, strategies, reform initiatives & policies on (digital) technologies over the last ten years.

In the latest ZIF TECHPOPS post, Jasmin Haunschild, Christian Reuter and Marc Kaufhold of PAESEC apply insights from crisis informatics to peace operations. Focusing on tools and practices that foster the involvement of citizens in communication in complex and unstable environments, they highlight the need to consider connectivity, access and usage, local risk culture and levels of trust when shaping tools and channels used to communicate during crises.

Tobias Pietz has written a scenario on cultural heritage and climate change for a new Chaillot Paper of the European Union Institute for Security Studies (EUISS). The volume presents 15 fictionalised scenarios that imagine how future conflicts might occur.