Conflict Sensitive Development Work The Do No Harm Approach

1. 4 Conflict Sensitive Development WorkThe Do No Harm Approach Mary Anderson & Local Capacities for Peace Project (1999) Dhaka, 8th September 2008

2. Aid can support war or peace 4 • Aid is not politically neutral • Aid is a vehicle to provide resources to people. Resource transfer represents power and wealth, it can • Feed tensions between groups • Weaken connections between groups • Framework for analyzing Aid‘s impact on peace and conflict

3. Impacts of aid and resource transfer in conflict situations 4 • Misuse and Substitution effects • Distribution effects • Market effects • Legitimization effects • Implicit ethical messages

4. Implicit Message 4 • If Aid agencies do not cooperate (or even compete), implicitly they send the message: it is not necessary to work with wom you disagree • If Aid agencies’ security policies do not evacuate only international staff from crisis regions, implicitly they send the message: different liveshave different value

5. Objectives of “Do-No-Harm” 4 • Minimum: Do-No-Harm Monitor intended and unintended impacts and avoid contributing to instability and violence • Desirable: Do-Some-Good Identify dividers and connectors in society in order to strengthen connectors and support local capacities for peace more effectively

6. Identifying connectors? 4 • systems & institutions: marketplaces, infrastructure, communication systems • attitudes & actions: individual people, civil society groups • shared values & interests: right to health service, food, love for children, education • common experiences: everyone suffered during the violence, .. • symbols and occasions: art, music, ceremonies, common cultural / national heritage

7. Who could be the dividers? 4 • systems & institutions: militant groups, production and distribution of weapons, hate propaganda • attitudes & actions: brutality, lawlessness, corruption, displacement, harrassment, etc. • different values and interests: different cultural/ religious values, struggle for land and resources, external interests • different experiences of law enforcement, salaries, access to job markets • symbols and occasions of subgroups

8. Characteristics of development intervention 4

9. Decisions about WHO should receive aid: 4 • Identity (e.g. religious, ethnic) • Political (e.g. IDPs, ) • Technical (e.g. damaged houses) • Geographical • Success (belonging to a village group) decisions that may favour one group over others  can match the lines of conflict

10. By whom: Decisions about staffing of programmes 4 • Need for educational qualifications (e.g. English language skills) • Control through local partner organisations • Ethnic and regional identity of field staff and beneficiaries

11. By whom: Decisions about local partners • e.g. farmer organisations based in communities in which only one of the subgroups live • e.g. village societies that represents particular political or social interests • e.g. community members that belong to specific religious or ethnic groups

12. Decisions about HOW to provide aid 4 • e.g. inclusive & participatory • e.g. trust building & credible • e.g. ensuring transparency • e.g. stengthening existing community structures

13. Thank You ….but that’s not all!!!!