Welcome to the online home of the Community of Practice on Environment, Climate, Conflict, and Peace (ECCP).

The ECCP Community of Practice is a collective of more than 1,300 individuals around the world, working for more than 400 organizations and institutions. (See the ECCP mapped out here.) This website showcases the collective work of the ECCP, from 2020 to today. You can sign up to join the community here.

What is the ECCP? How does it work?

The ECCP is a community of practice that aims to strengthen networking and community building on environmental peacebuilding, conflict-sensitive conservation, climate security, and other related topics through collaboration, dialogue, and learning between institutions and individuals around the world.

The ECCP is a constellation of convenings and connections. There are:

  • monthly, community-wide meetings meant to create a platform for networking and relationship building,

  • regular updates with recent publications, events, and resources circulated to the group, and

  • working groups on different topics raised by the community as priorities for collaborative action.

There is no formal “membership” within the community or each project or group, and participants do not need to choose participation in one over the others. Rather, working groups provide a framework for organizing information in a way that does not “re-silo” the community back into focus topics.

To learn more about what the community is up to in 2026, please see the 2026 Activities Page.

ECCP members in Nairobi hosted by Polycom, February 2024

How do I use this website? What can I expect to find here?

This website houses the collaborative work of the community of practice. You’ll find pages dedicated to current working groups, as well as projects throughout the history of the ECCP.

  • 2026 Activities - A breakdown of current activities within the CoP, and information on how to join in.

  • Art - Art is regularly woven into the work done by the ECCP. You’ll find more information about the artists who contributed to the White Paper project, as well as to Nature Footprints, an online & physical exhibition shown at COP28.

  • Chapters - As the ECCP has grown, city, country, and regional chapters have emerged. Each chapter is different, though all endeavor to meet in person at least once per year.

  • Community Fund - In 2025, the ECCP piloted a brand-new community fund. The fund re-opens for a new cycle in 2026!

  • Policy Working Groups - Under this dropdown menu, you’ll find specific landing pages for different policy fora, including the UNFCCC, CBD, and more. You’ll also find a specific page dedicated to climate security, linking to a 2025 online learning series organized by the community.

  • Nature-based solutions - In 2023, a group of community members came together to create this small database of nature-based solutions for peace and security.

  • Related newsletters - We’ve curated a list of related newsletters for those who’d like to learn more about these topics.

  • White Paper - From 2020-2022, the community engaged in an ambitious process to collaboratively develop a White Paper on the Future of Environmental Peacebuilding and accompanying compendium of 50 visions for the future of the field.

ECCP members at their collaborative Nature Footprints art exhibition at COP28 in Dubai, December 2023

 

Where did the ECCP come from? Where is it hosted?

The ECCP is currently co-hosted by the Environmental Peacebuilding Association (EnPAx) and the Centre on Conflict, Development, and Peacebuilding (CCDP) at the Geneva Graduate Institute. It is currently managed by a coordinator, Annika Erickson-Pearson, and the contributions of ECCP members to lead or co-lead specific workstreams. Funding is currently provided by community of practice members.

The community was created in early 2020 by the Geneva Peacebuilding Platform, as a part of its workstream on community management. Over the years, the community has grown from about 40 Geneva-based participants to more than 1,300 participants around the world. 

In 2020, ECCP community members began to coordinate on a collective project to create the White Paper on the Future of Environmental Peacebuilding. You’ll find that paper and 50 compendium articles here on this site.

In 2022, contributing White Paper authors and community participants drew upon the messages and cases in the White Paper to build a collaborative footprint for peace and conflict sensitivity topics at the Stockholm+50 Conference. They co-hosted side events, co-authored articles, and shared responsibility for bringing the topic to policy-makers working on environmental issues. By the end of the Conference, peace, security, and conflict sensitivity were referenced multiple times in outcome documents, and in some cases using the exact wording proposed by community participants.

Collaboration towards Stockholm+50 sparked promise for community collaboration in other policy fora throughout 2023 and 2024. The group coordinated again to raise visibility of peace issues at COP27, COP28, COP29, and COP30. A second group emerged to focus on conflict-sensitivity issues in multilateral biodiversity fora, including COP16 and the World Conservation Congress. Microprojects and connections continued to flourish between members in formal and informal ways.

In 2025, two new policy working groups emerged on a conflict-sensitive Green Transition, as well as Peacebuilding, Environment, and Security. Additional discussion groups on Decolonization and Complexity Theory were established, and a community fund with microgrants was piloted for the first time. Towards the end of the year, place-based chapters emerged all over the world.

You can read more about the community’s origin, function, and goals in this 2023 evaluation.

The objectives of the ECCP are:

  1. To foster inter-institutional collaboration and dialogue on ECCP topics and projects.

  2. To promote learning and innovation, recognizing that each actor has a unique angle to bring to the table.

  3. To harness the joint reach of all participants to mainstream ECCP into organizations, institutions, and policy processes.

Today, the community continues to meet regularly online, and in-person around the world. A current strategic outline is available here.

It should be noted that the ECCP is meant to serve as a container for shared action and facilitator of conversation. The ECCP does not take formal positions or jointly endorse policies. Information and views shared on this website and in ECCP communications should not be interpreted as a consensus and do not necessarily represent the views of all members. Instead, the ECCP is a space for individuals and institutions to come together, think, discuss, and act on critical issues.

The ECCP is supported by an active Steering Committee:

  • Alison Harley, WWF

  • Amanda Woomer, Oxford Policy Management

  • Carl Bruch, Environmental Law Institute / Environmental Peacebuilding Association

  • Eliza Urwin, Centre on Conflict, Development, and Peacebuilding 

  • Hassan Mowlid Yasin, Somali Greenpeace Association

  • Heloise Heyer, PeaceNexus Foundation

  • Hesta Groenewald, PeaceNexus Foundation

  • Keith Krause, Centre on Conflict, Development, and Peacebuilding 

  • Munini Mutuku, Kenya National Cohesion and Integration Commission

  • Natalia Chan, Saferworld

  • Subindra Bogati, Nepal Peacebuilding Initiative 

The ECCP is funded and run by members and partners.

We sincerely thank the PeaceNexus Foundation and their partners for their financial contributions and partnership. We also express appreciation to co-hosts Centre of Conflict, Development, and Peacebuilding (CCDP) and Environmental Peacebuilding Association (EnPAx) for the in-kind support that keeps the community going.

From 2020-2023, the ECCP CoP was funded by the Federal Department of Foreign Affairs (FDFA) of Switzerland through their contributions to the annual budget of the Geneva Peacebuilding Platform, the community’s previous hosting institution. Funding support for projects, including the White Paper on the Future of Environmental Peacebuilding and the Nature Footprints art exhibition was contributed from PeaceNexus Foundation, the Environment of Peace project of the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), the World Bank Group, the Berghof Foundation, the Madarat Cultural Organization, and the War Prevention Initiative of the Jubitz Family Foundation. In 2024, financial support was provided by the PeaceNexus Foundation, World Wildlife Fund Colombia and Germany (WWF) through the International Climate Initiative (IKI), and the United States Institute of Peace (USIP).

Join us

To receive updates, please sign up for the mailing list here.