Operationalizing Environmental Peacemaking: Perspectives on integrating the environment into peacemaking
art by Shamsia Hassani (Afghanistan)
Sebastian Kratzer and Lina Hillert (Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue)
While environmental issues are gaining traction in peacemaking practices, the sector needs to do more to ensure that mediation strategies, peace processes and agreements are sustainable and correspond to new realities.
Context
Environmental peacemaking starts with the assumption that the environment can help to sustain peace.[i] Although the UN set out guidelines in 2015[ii] to address the role and importance of natural resources in conflicts, standard mediation practice rarely incorporates environmental issues into peace negotiations and agreements. This paper defines environmental peacemaking as practices that (1) include, use, and frame the environment as an entry point for, and an element of, peace mediation, dialogue, and negotiation; and (2) produce both positive peace and environmental outcomes.[iii] It outlines the status quo of environmental peacemaking, shares insights from the activities of the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (HD), and suggests future action.
Despite being aware of the complex connections between the environment, conflict, and peacebuilding, most mediators have paid little attention to the environment in peace negotiations and in the drafting of peace agreements. A recent study shows that of all peace agreements signed between 2010 and 2020, only 16.6 per cent addressed the environment[iv], and only five agreements concluded over the past ten years explicitly mentioned climate change.[v]
The inclusion of environmental issues in peace negotiations can also backfire. Environmental cooperation can cause environmental degradation[vi] if peace agreements are “little more than coordinated resource exploitation.”[vii] The role of the environment in peacemaking – especially how to incorporate these considerations into negotiations, agreements or other violence-reduction mechanisms – is often either overlooked or misunderstood.
What’s been done
To close the gap between theory and practice, the peacemaking sector is gearing up its environmental peacemaking capacity and expertise. The UN’s Standby Team of Senior Mediation Advisers is adding a climate change and natural resources advisor to its 2022 cohort and strengthened is Climate Security Mechanism; while civil society actors are also scaling up their research, advocacy, and operational efforts.[viii]
HD, as a private diplomacy organization, puts the concept of environmental peacemaking into practice. HD has facilitated dialogue between conflict parties on shared environmental problems to promote cooperation in Ukraine, and supported countries in Asia in agreeing a framework that regulates coastguard interactions at sea to prevent an escalation of violence and environmental degradation. Meanwhile, HD has supported forest restoration in Asia to encourage dialogue across sensitive conflict lines. In Nigeria and Mali, HD is facilitating local agreements to resolve and prevent agro-pastoralist conflicts driven by the effects of climate change on scarce resources. In Nigeria, 29 communities signed the Kafanchan Peace Declaration[ix] in 2016, and 56 communities concluded the Southern Plateau Peace Declaration.[x]
Key commitments by farmers and herders concerning the environment:
Prohibit herders from letting cattle invade farms and in the event that this happens, discuss with the farmers the forgiveness or reparation of damages
In the event of destruction of farmland, encourage herders to contact the owner of the farm, as done traditionally
Seek amicable solutions, through dialogue, between farmers and grazers and refer unresolved cases to traditional and religious leaders
Not cause the death of cattle
Policy recommendations for the state and federal governments concerning the environment:
Establish a clear land-use plan strategically identifying and placing water points for livestock to decrease the potential for conflicts and promote shared resource management
Work with communities to identify grazing reserves and areas
Demarcate unclaimed land as it legally belongs to the Nigerian State and codify its usage
Adopt pastoral laws and codes
Increase bilateral cooperation between countries where transhumance crosses borders
In both agreements, communities made commitments relating to land, pasture and water-sharing while addressing crop destruction, grazing reserves and livestock routes. In the Koro Circle in central Mali, the Fulani and Dogon communities signed three humanitarian agreements in January 2021[xi] and one in February 2021. As a result, communities have set up committees to prevent tensions over natural resources from escalating into violence.
HD also launched a pilot environmental peacemaking programme in 2021. In Eastern Europe and the Caucasus, HD plans to test whether environmental dialogue tools developed in Ukraine are transferable to other ‘frozen’ conflicts. In Nigeria, a scoping exercise will identify how to help traditional authorities contribute to conflict resolution under the government’s National Livestock Transformation Plan. Moreover, in Asia, HD will facilitate dialogue among climate scientists and regional policymakers to assess climate-related conflicts and identify entry points for regional cooperation to help prevent future conflicts. Finally, in Syria, HD will assess and promote the steps needed to achieve a sustainable recovery of rangelands in areas and communities affected by the conflict.
Looking ahead
As environmental issues gain traction in peacemaking, practitioners need to integrate those issues into their mediation efforts. Smart approaches to environmental peacemaking will cover all levels of peace processes – across local, national, and regional dimensions – and find ways to interlink them. Current initiatives by peace organizations are well-placed to inform future practice. By creating stronger and complementary partnerships and exchanges with climate and environmental experts, mediators will be able to improve their conflict analysis and better define sustainable peace and environmental outcomes of their work. Greater understanding can reduce the risks of unintended or neglected consequences of peace processes, such as environmental degradation due to unsustainable resource-sharing agreements, and elevate their positive potential. Better systematizing and sharing expertise, lessons learned, and practice-based evidence on what works will contribute to more climate-sensitive peace agreements in the future.[xii]
Success will ultimately depend on peacemakers being able to make a convincing case to conflict parties, peace support actors, and their constituencies, of the important relationship between environmental issues and the prevention or resolution of conflicts – and on them having the knowledge and tools to do it well.
Footnotes
[i] Barnett, J. (2018) ‘Global environmental change I: Climate resilient peace?’ Progress in Human Geography 43(5): 927-936.
[ii] United Nations Department of Political Affairs and United Nations Environment Programme (2015) Natural Resources and Conflict. A Guide for Mediation Practitioners, Nairobi and New York: United Nations
[iii] Positive environmental outcomes may refer to improved living conditions and human security in a stable and healthy environment with sustainable use of and access to vital resources and adequate governance of the natural environment, and mechanisms to address or prevent conflicts related to environmental issues.
[iv] Hillert, L., Mai, D. and Schiavelli, C. (2020) ‘Environmental Peacemaking in the Making’, Capstone Report, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies
[v] Hillert, L., Mai, D. and Schiavelli, C. (2020) ‘Environmental Peacemaking in the Making’, Capstone Report, Graduate Institute of International and Development Studies
[vi] Ide, T. (2020) ‘The dark side of environmental peacebuilding’, World Development, 127:5.
[vii] Ide, T. (2020) ‘The dark side of environmental peacebuilding’, World Development, 127:5.
[viii] The Mediation Support Network, for example, gives a good overview of the sector’s current state on the matter (see https://padlet.com/mediation31/sazvf2pks2t9kzct).
[ix] Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (2016) The Kafanchan Peace Declaration (https://www.hdcentre.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/08/Kafanchan-Peace-Declaration-23.03.2016.pdf)
[x] Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (2016) The Southern Plateau Peace Declaration (https://www.hdcentre.org/wp-content/uploads/2016/07/Southern-Plateau-Peace-Declaration.pdf)
[xi] Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (2021) Three Peace Agreements Signed Between the Fulani and Dogon of the Area (‘Circle’) of Koro in Central Mali (https://www.hdcentre.org/updates/three-peace-agreements-signed-between-the-fulani-and-dogon-of-the-area-circle-of-koro-in-central-mali/)
[xii] A practitioner highlighted that it could be as simple as providing access to short practical case studies and learning events as ways to kick this off.