Partnership peacekeeping effective, despite many challenges

Schumann, Maurice P. & Corinne Bara (2023) A New Era: Power in Partnership Peacekeeping, International Studies Quarterly 67(3).

AU-UN IST PHOTO / Stuart Price

The UN frequently conducts peacekeeping in partnership with regional organizations, ad-hoc coalitions of states, and even single states. Despite the many challenges of this cooperation on the ground, we find in this study that parallel deployments of UN and partner missions are effective in curbing battle violence – more effective than peacekeeping by any actor alone.

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Bara, Corinne and Maurice P. Schumann (2023) Partnership Peacekeeping Works: What Does this Mean in a Divided World? IPI Global Observatory. New York: International Peace Institute (IPI).

Pierre Holtz for UNICEF

In 2015, then-Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon remarked that the UN had “entered an era of partnership peacekeeping.” And, indeed, in the past three decades, the UN has frequently conducted peacekeeping in partnership with regional organizations, ad-hoc coalitions of states, and even single member states. This piece reviews our research findings that parallel deployments of UN and partner missions are effective in curbing battle violence—more effective than peacekeeping by any actor alone. It also discusses the role the UN will play in the global partnership for peacekeeping in the near future.