Crisis Prevention and Recovery in Europe & CIS

Crisis Prevention and Recovery

Since 2001, UNDP has considered crisis prevention and disaster mitigation to be integral parts of sustainable human development strategies. This mandate covers diverse activities, from confidence-building measures to prevent conflict, to reducing vulnerability to natural disasters.

   

Throughout the region of Europe and the CIS, UNDP helps governments and civil societies to cope with the aftermath of civil strife and to find innovative ways to prevent conflicts from occurring. It supports dialogue between communities and local authorities in conflict prevention and helps increase the level of participation through policy reform and institutional cooperation. UNDP’s long-term strategy is to integrate conflict prevention concerns with other development initiatives, and to foster social cooperation, tolerance and human security. Ongoing regional initiatives include:

Enhancing oversight of the security sector by non-executive bodies

Security is a public good that states are charged to provide for their citizens. The "war on terrorism” has increased the attention to security issues, but it has also hindered human rights protection and public accountability. Furthermore, in many countries of the CIS region, there is still a dominating executive branch of government and insufficient capacity in the legislative branch and civil society. Governance and human rights aspects are not sufficiently addressed in security sector reforms, which are often too focused on military assistance. Finally, the high level of corruption in the security sector and a lack of professionalism provoke tensions among political sectors and between politicians and civil society.

 

In partnership with the Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF), UNDP works to enhance the security sector oversight capacity of parliaments, ombuds institutions and civil society by preparing technical training materials, providing institutional capacity development assistance, and facilitating multi-stakeholder dialogues at the regional and sub-regional levels. 

Publications for 2008:

• Public Oversight of the Security Sector: A Handbook on the Role of Civil Society in the Democratic Control of Security Sector and Security Sector Reform 
  This handbook is intended to be a resource for civil society groups, researchers, activists and journalists worldwide.

Links
Peacebuilding Portal is an interactive online platform for national and regional institutions (majority are civil society organizations) working on conflict prevention, conflict transformation and peacebuilding. The Portal is currently up and running mostly for institutions in Sub-Sahara Africa. It is envisaged that the portal would be expanded to Eastern Europe, the Balkans, Caucaus, Russia and Central Asia in future.
 
The South Eastern and Eastern Europe Clearinghouse for the Control of Small Arms and Light Weapons (SEESAC) has a mandate from UNDP and the Stability Pact for South Eastern Europe (SCSP) to further support all international and national stakeholders by strengthening national and regional capacity to control and reduce the proliferation and misuse of small arms and light weapons, and thus contribute to enhanced stability, security and development in South Eastern and Eastern Europe.
 
UNDP Bureau for Crisis Prevention and Recovery (BCPR) Overview (pdf)