The Special Issue of 3ie's Journal of Development Effectiveness will be launched at an event on 20 October 2026 co-hosted by the Permanent Mission of Germany to the United Nations, the Permanent Mission of Canada to the United Nations, and the Peacebuilding and Peace Support Office.
The launch event will bring together Member States, academics, UN entities, civil society organizations and other peacebuilding practitioners to exchange knowledge and innovative practices on measuring the impact of peacebuilding and conflict prevention initiatives. The event will provide a platform for sharing and amplifying new evidence of peacebuilding effectiveness and different ways to measure it, while connecting various stakeholders for collaborative brainstorming on how peacebuilding impact measurement can be further advanced.
Venue: Permanent Mission of Germany to the United Nations, 871 United Nations Plaza
In 2026, United Nations Peacebuilding and Peace Support Office (PBPSO) research partners, in collaboration with the wider academic community, produced a Special Issue of the Journal of Development Effectiveness that seeks to further contribute to the growing evidence base on what works, and why, to build peace. The Special Issue draws on the work conducted under the partnership between PBPSO, 3ie and International Security and Development Center (ISDC), and features impact evaluations of UN Secretary-General's Peacebuilding Fund (PBF)-supported projects in Guatemala, Mali, Niger, Sierra Leone, and Guinea. The issue also includes articles by academics conducting research on other peacebuilding initiatives, including in the Central African Republic, Sudan and Mexico.
Taken together, the Issue demonstrates how peacebuilding initiatives can make clear contributions to a range of positive outcomes, including reducing violence, improving trust in institutions, and strengthening social cohesion within communities. Moreover, by overcoming many methodological and operational challenges to conducting impact evaluations of peacebuilding initiatives, the issue shows that generating such rigorous research is not only highly valuable, but also entirely feasible.
Since 2021, PBPSO has supported innovative impact evaluations of PBF-funded projects in several contexts, including Sudan, Guatemala, and along the Mali-Niger border. Supported by the German Federal Foreign Office and Global Affairs Canada, and conducted through a partnership with the International Security and Development Center (ISDC) and the International Initiative for Impact Evaluation (3ie), these impact evaluations represent a major milestone in efforts to generate rigorous evidence on the effectiveness of peacebuilding interventions.
