Addressing the Perils of Peace Operations: Toward a Global Peacekeeping System (Global Insights) (Report‪)‬

OVER THE PAST TWO DECADES, WE HAVE SEEN CONSIDERABLE PROGRESS made in international conflict management, peacekeeping, and peacebuilding. The end of the Cold War has led to the obsolescence of war between major powers, and globalization has increased the interconnectedness and interdependence among people, societies, and countries. However, the longevity and large-scale nature of armed conflicts in Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Somalia, Chad, and Sudan with enormous humanitarian consequences are solemn reminders that international institutions and peacekeeping actions are still unable to meet global challenges with global responses. A rethinking of the role of peacekeeping as an instrument of global crisis response could help to strengthen global governance in peace and security. The call for a global system in peacekeeping has been voiced by the 2009 UN report "A New Partnership Agenda" (New Horizon Report). It argues that international peacekeeping "needs a global system to match the global enterprise it has become." (1) In my view, for such a system to be effective, it needs to rely more so on the broadening partnerships of the UN with various regional organizations while increasing the interface between peacekeeping and peace-building at the same time. In view of the lack of strategic consensus by the Security Council permanent members, such a system cannot be created top down, but rather it needs to be built on peacekeeping practices, norms, and interdependent relations of states and institutions. This essay will briefly look at the important progress that peacekeeping has made over the past twenty years and then explore, in view of a continuous North-South divide and a resurging Westphalian bias, what such a global peacekeeping system could look like. Peacekeeping Evolution and Transformation