Politicians have significant power over the future of conflict-affected communities. Every day, they make decisions. How to respond to global violence? Where should resources be allocated? Which policies could help bring peace? But they may not understand the dynamics of a local conflict, or how local people could help end violence and contribute to peace.
In the UK, US, EU and at the UN, we’re building greater recognition and support for local peacebuilding as an effective response to conflict. We campaign, contribute to consultations and work with individual politicians. We persuade governments to rethink positions and policies that undermine peace and equality. We make sure they hear the voices of local peacebuilders, by supporting our local partners to speak directly to policymakers.
Together, we help power-holders understand conflicts and peacebuilding better. We hold them to account if they go back on commitments, or make choices that undermine the likelihood of peace. And we help them support peace by making decisions that favour local peacebuilders.
As well as advocating for greater support to local peacebuilders globally, we campaign alongside our partners on issues affecting their communities. For example:
We influence governments, institutions and civil society networks to prioritise locally led peacebuilding, humanitarianism and development and tackle discriminatory practices that make peacebuilders’ work harder.
We strengthened UK policies on locally-led development by influencing an international development White Paper, which led to new government commitments to create more equitable local partnerships. We’ve contributed to other consultations on local peacebuilding and partnerships, including the UK Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office’s “Africa Approach”. We’ve worked with other organisations to call out the government on dangerous overseas development funding cuts.
In the US, we’re resisting inflammatory rhetoric and damaging policies that undermine peace outcomes globally, including advocating for the reversal of aid cuts. We’ve supported individual politicians to stand for locally led peacebuilding in key debates, and before the destruction of USAID we had contributed to improvements in its approaches to work with local organisations.
We’ve called for the EU budget to increase direct and long-term funding for locally led organisations. By meeting with officials, we’ve inspired the EU Foreign Policy Instruments – responsible for the financial and operational components of EU foreign policy – to include support for ‘locally led ecosystems’ in its programme priorities.
We’ve fed into important UN discussions about responses to conflicts and changes to the institution’s way of working, including the UN Peacebuilding Architecture Review.
When crisis hits our partners and other local peacebuilders, we make sure their voices are heard internationally. When conflict escalated dramatically in eastern DRC, we uplifted our partners’ calls for action and supported them directly. When Myanmar was hit by a devastating earthquake amid civil war, we called for direct support to local responders.
We’ve called for an end to arms sales to Israel and its occupation of Palestinian territories, issued statements, signed onto campaigns, and advocated to politicians for action. We’ve called on the UK and other international governments to support justice, and uphold their obligations under international law. And we’ve supported other organisations’ campaigns calling for urgent international action to end the ongoing genocide in Gaza.
In the face of sweeping funding cuts that have devastated our sector and undermined peacebuilding, we’ve pushed for change. As well as pushing individual governments to commit funding for vital local work, we coordinated with civil society in the Global South to uplift their voices and demands in this open letter on the cuts.
We work with other organisations to highlight better ways of working, tackling discriminatory systems that undermine local peacebuilders and peace itself.
We support the Peace Starts Here campaign and its Peacebuilders’ Manifesto, which strives to change attitudes and behaviours in the peacebuilding sector.
We speak out against racism and exclusion, and advocate for decolonisation, in campaigns and publications. We called out biases in how funding is spent in Too Southern to be Funded. We’ve even reimaged advocacy itself.
We also shift the balance in the conversation, making sure we’re supporting civil society across the Global South to play a leading role in advocating for change and imagining the future of the sector. And we’ve called for all international convenings to be more inclusive.
Sign this open letter encouraging funders and policymakers to better support civil society through solidarity and systems change.
Support our partner Adeela in their pursuit of justice, safety and permanent peace in Sudan.
Our shared humanity is being degraded right before our eyes. Demand better from our leaders.
Peace Starts Here is the global movement for local peacebuilders, co-created by 10 local peacebuilders. Sign the manifesto to change attitudes and behaviours in the peacebuilding sector.
