About  |  Contact  |  Nederlands

Peace and Conflict Impact Assessment Systems (PCIAS)

What is PCIAS?

A comprehensive methodology to assess the relevance and the future consequences of current or proposed development, humanitarian or peace interventions on the conflict dynamics and the peacebuilding process (By Luc Reychler and Thania Paffenholz )

Peace and Conflict Impact Assessment System is a process of identifying the relevance and future consequences of a current or proposed intervention on the conflict dynamics and peacebuilding process. The approach is proactive and tries to contribute simultaneously to enhance the conflict-sensitivity and the peace added values of the interventions.

The peace and conflict impact assessment system (PCIAS) could play a useful role at project, program, sector, and broad policy levels by

PCIAS can be used for improving the design and the implementation of all interventions from development or humanitarian work to peace and reconciliation or democratization efforts that take place in situations characterized by latent and manifest violent conflict or in the aftermath of a violent conflict or war.

We prefer to refer to this process/approach as a Peace and Conflict Impact Assessment System , and not as a PCIA, in order to make clear that organisations will not improve their impact on peace and conflict by conducting a few single PCIAs. This can only be achieved by introducing an integrated system approach into the routine planning, monitoring and implementation of their interventions.

top

What PCIAS is not?

PCIAS is not a sanctioning evaluation tool. A depiction of PCIAS as sanctioning is contra-productive, because it tends to restrain organizations from cooperating with the impact assessment process. PCIAS is not a tool, but a systems approach of thinking and acting. It is an appreciative inquiry of the planned or implemented projects, programs and policies. It is an educational and participatory exercise, which brings about a state of critical and creative awareness.

top

Is PCIAS something new?

We can argue that PCIA is not really new . Everybody makes implicit assumptions of the possible impact of its efforts. These assumptions are usually influenced by world views and theories. The main problem with implicit assumptions is that they are not adequately reflected upon, assessed, adapted and reframed to the specific context of an intervention.

Furthermore we can argue that impact assessment is not new in the evaluation research and practice. Measuring impact - intended and unintended - is well known.

What is new with the PCIAS, we are presenting in our book, is

There have been early attempts to measure the impact of activities related to war and peace. In December 1919, John Keynes book "The Economic Consequences of Peace" appeared in the bookstalls. Keynes argued that the peace terms of the Versailles treaty would be disastrous for both Germany and its allies. Keynes book was an early version of PCIAS.

The beginning of modern PCIAs started in the middle of the 1990's after the tragic event around the genocide in Rwanda, which led to the increase of international awareness of the negative impacts of well-intentioned humanitarian and development interventions. Since then, several organizations around the world have contributed to the development of a more appropriate methodology such as the well established Local Capacities for Peace methodology and the Do no harm approach of Mary B. Anderson, Luc Reychlers paper on Conflict Impact Assessment or Kenneth Bush's report A measure of peace, Peace and Conflict Impact Assessment or Conflict Sensitive Approaches to Development by Cynthia Caigals and Manuela Leonhard and the work of Cheyanne Church and Julie Shouldice, The evaluation of conflict resolution interventions.

An increasing number of PCIAs are now being conducted and different methodologies tested. In our book we build on the above connectional and practical experiences in introducing PCIAS and have developed a comprehensive methodology.

top

Words.words...words

The discourse on conflict prevention and peace and conflict impact assessment is characterized by a great deal of term- and concept differentiation. Term differentiation means that different terms refer to the same phenomenon, while concept differentiation means that the same term has different meanings. But despite this diversity, all the different labels aim at preventing harm and increase the peace added value of interventions in conflict areas.

Term differentiation

There has been some reticence in international circles about the use of the term "Conflict Impact Assessment" or CIA, because of the possible confusion with American "Central Intelligence Agency". Another name suggested by the Canadian and Dutch delegation to the OECD task force on conflict, peace and development cooperation is "Peace and Conflict Impact Assessment" or PCIA as introduced by Kenneth Bush in 1998 to avoid the above mentioned confusion, and to put the focus both on peace and conflict. This term has now being taken over by mainstream discourse in theory and practice.

We adopted this acronym, but decided to add an "S" to make it "Peace and Conflict Impact Assessment Systems" (PCIAS). Firstly, because the term PCIAS implies both dimensions, peace and conflict. Secondly because the 'S' suggests the necessity of introducing an integrated system approach to understand the transformation of conflicts and the peacebuilding process and identify the role of a specific organization can take to contribute towards it. The "S" thereby expresses that PCIAS is more then just a tool but a process-oriented approach of dealing with peace and conflict.

We use the term "Peace and Conflict Impact Assessment" (PCIA) to refer to the conducting of single PCIAs for example on the project level.

Concept differentiation

We can also see a lot of concept differentiation. Many organizations associate the term "PCIA" with different meanings. There is the widespread confusion of people who think that PCIA is a variation of conflict analysis. Many organizations are now introducing conflict analysis into their work and call it PCIA. As conflict analysis is only one step within a comprehensive PCIA(S) methodology, it is not helpful for the actual debate and awareness building, to confuse terminologies. Conflict analysis is conflict analysis and not PCIA!

Another source of confusion is the misuse of the "I" dimension of PCIA. The difference between PCIA(S) to other assessment methodologies is the fact that the objective of the former is to measure impact of an intervention on the peace and conflict context. This is the essence of a PCIA. However, most so-called PCIAs are not assessing impact at all! This is often due to a lack of know-how to assess impact, which is methodologically a challenge. Secondly, most organizations do not allow the time for a proper impact assessment. Despite the fact that they have the word in the title of their assessment reports, they are not PCIAs.

A last example of term confusion refers to the "P"-dimension of PCIA. Many assessors do not analyze peacebuilding processes but limit their attention to the conflict context. Therefore they don't assess the peacebuilding relevance and impact of an intervention. What they deliver should not be called a PCIA.

top

The overall methodology for PCIAS

In this short summary of our book, we would like to give the reader a quick general overview of the way we approach PCIAS methodologically. In the forthcoming book every methodological step is explained in detail. In separate chapters we explain the different steps how to do PCIA(S), also with examples and we also discuss the constraints and possible problems people who are dealing with PCIA(S) can run into. Moreover, the book tries to be as practical as possible by going in such operational details as providing the reader with the ideal Terms of Reference or reporting structures for a PCIA, a description of the process to establish a PCIA-System, many different check lists for measuring impact or selection criteria for PCIA assessment teams as well as many other practical hints. The book also discusses the way to do PCIAS from different actors' perspectives (donors, PCIA assessors, implementing agencies, etc.) and for different types of projects/programmes (development, humanitarian, peace and reconciliation). Our approach is made up of the following eight elements:

Step 1: Preparatory work

The PCIAS process starts with preparing for a single PCIA or introducing a PCIA-System. This step consists of awareness building about PCIAS, getting commitment from all involved stakeholders and clarification about the objectives of the specific PCIA(S). It also involves the drafting of a preliminary implementation plan which results in the joint development of Terms of Reference for the PCIA(S) . Finally a PCIAS-team needs to be build in this phase, too.

Step 2: Peace and Conflict Analysis

The second step of a PCIAS is the Peace and Conflict Analysis, which is one of the crucial elements of a PCIAS and forms the basis of the process to follow. It is important to analyse both, the conflict and the peacebuilding context of a country or area. For an overall policy PCIA we analyse the macro conflict setting and the status of the peacebuilding process. For a project PCIA we provide a short overall survey of the conflict and peace situation in a country and a thorough analysis of conflict and peacebuilding situation in the intervention area. It is also important to analyse and anticipate future developments in the conflict and peacebuilding situation. In the book we provide the reader with a variety of approaches to analyse peace and conflict and discuss their strengths, weaknesses and usefulness for different kind of PCIAs.

Step 3: Peace Deficiency Assessment

The third step is the Peace Deficiency Assessment. The objective of this step is to specify what conditions ideally tend to enhance peacebuilding in a particular situation (country, sector, programme, project), to check the reality against this ideal framework and to assess the missing needs for peacebuilding in order to eliminate the peacebuilding deficiencies.. For example for an overall policy PCIA, research frameworks can be used to identify building blocks for sustainable peacebuilding. For a sector PCIA sectorial frameworks can be used (e.g. ideal media situation in a country) and checked against the real situation (e.g. real situation of the media in a given country). We can than identify the deficiencies on the way to peacebuilding (e.g. what is missing to achieve conflict-sensitive media with a peace added value). This is an important step within a PCIA(S) which we newly introduced into our PCIA methodology, because it is impossible to discuss peacebuilding or the impact or relevance of an intervention for peace if it is unclear what kind of peace people do want to achieve. This step is of crucial importance because it raises the awareness of different understandings of peace and allows the PCIA assessor to assess the relevance and impact of the intervention against a framework.

Step 4: Mapping the intervention

The fourth step is mapping the existing or planned intervention/s (objectives and main activities lines ).

Step 5: Peacebuilding Relevance Assessment

The fifth step is the Peacebuilding Relevance Assessment: The objective of a peacebuilding relevance assessment is to find out whether the overall direction of a program or project (objectives and main activities lines) is satisfying the countries' peacebuilding needs. This step assesses how relevant a planned or ongoing intervention is for reducing violence and building peace. This is also a new step introduced into PCIAs, because it does not make sense to assess the impact of an intervention in peace and conflict, if the intervention is not relevant at all.

Step 6: Impact Assessment

Step number six is the Impact Assessment. It comprises of two elements/steps: first, assessing what kind of impact (real or potential) the conflict situation has or could have on an existing or planned intervention (= conflict related problems of the intervention). Second, assessing the impact of an ongoing or planned intervention on the conflict and peacebuilding context (= conflict and peace related consequences caused by the intervention). In the book we describe different methodologies for measuring impact, discussing the problems and constraints linked to impact assessment and providing the reader with check lists to anticipate peace and conflict impact including a methodologies for a so-called "Rapid PCIA".

Step 7: Recommendations

Step number seven provides recommendations on how to improve the peacebuilding relevance, conflict sensitivity and the peace added value of an intervention. It could also offer concrete recommendations about how to do incorporate a comprehensive, integrated Peace and Conflict Impact Assessment System in the routine planning, monitoring and evaluation of a project, programme or even organisation. In this chapter of the book we also describe the process how develop these recommendations out of the information from the previous steps.

Step 8: Post-step

After this last methodological step the process of PCIAS continues with the post-step which includes discussing the results, development of a joint action plan, writing the report and deciding on follow ups and how to do an evaluation of the PCIA(S). In the book we give practical hints, make the reader distinguish good from a bad PCIAS processes and provide trouble-shooting hints in case the process or part of it has gone wrong.

top