The Fourth High Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness convenes in Busan, South Korea, on 29 November. Two thousand representatives of governments, the UN, other multilateral organisations and NGOs will meet to discuss and come up with a statement on how development aid can be delivered more effectively. So what would a successful High Level Forum look like for countries affected by armed conflict, which face the toughest development challenges? Continue reading
Author: Dan Smith
Take note of every casualty
A new charter has been launched, to recognise every casualty of armed violence. The campaign to get governments to sign up started last week. It needs the support of some major NGOs and a campaigning newspaper or two to get some momentum. But why does it matter? Continue reading
Thinking of the peace builders
On 21 September – the UN International Peace Day – International Alert launched a video for showing in cinema and around the internet, for tweeting and generally going viral, to spark interest in peacebuilding. Take a look:
England’s riots: If the UK were a fragile state…
Last week, rioting and looting gripped England. At a time when many people are feeling in one way or another bad about our country, it seemed salient (and perhaps inevitable) to ask, if the UK were a fragile state, how would we approach the events of last week, their aftermath and the future? Continue reading
Libya: the (next) moment of decision is approaching
When intervention in Libya was being discussed in Britain a few months back, the key ethical argument was the dual claim of the urgency of doing something and impossibility of standing by and doing nothing. After the first 2-3 weeks, it became clear even to passionate advocates of intervention that the issue was more complicated than that. Continue reading
What’s conflict?
Students in the Master of Fine Arts course at Slade, University College London, have put together a collection of their work. They chose the theme of conflict and all the pieces reflect on it in one way or another. The collection ranges from internal conflict to open war, from the personal to the political and back again. They asked me to write a foreword and as a result I had (the opportunity) to think about some things from the bottom up. Here is what I wrote: Continue reading
The world is not prepared for climate-related conflict
A recent meeting at DFID brought together a number of people from different government departments, NGOs and research centres to discuss some of the under-discussed aspects of the climate/security links. Laurie Goering captured the essence of the discussion in this AlertNet article.
Libya and the fog of intervention
The three weeks of what has become NATO’s armed intervention in Libya have generated far more questions than anyone could hope to answer. The uncertainties by no means overwhelm the case for intervention but they do add immediacy to the reservations expressed by the doubters and sceptics. Continue reading
The work of peacebuilding
The Woodrow Wilson Center for International Scholars was kind enough to interview me about the work of International Alert recently when I was visiting Washington. I think they edited the material very effectively to produce a quite effective summary account of some of the work and issues of peacebuilding.
Intervention in Libya? A case of shooting slowly from the hip
Only ten days ago, when UK Prime Minister David Cameron put up the flag for a no-fly zone over Libya, nobody saluted. Now the British and French are drafting a UN Security Council Resolution. After all, you cannot just sit and watch the dictator wield overhwelming force so he and his disgusting son can hang onto power and not think something should be done to stop him.
True enough – but you should think very, very carefully about what can and should be done. Continue reading
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