The current state of peacebuilding programming and evidence

Currently very few conflict-affected countries have met a single Millennium Development Goal. The need for effective peacebuilding programmes is acute, as development indicators are dramatically low and poverty levels are dramatically high in these conflict-affected areas. This scoping paper by Annette N Brown, Faith McCollister, Drew B Cameron, and Jennifer Ludwig reviews the supply of and demand for evidence from impact evaluations and systematic reviews on peacebuilding interventions. 

The analysis focused on three inputs, which were presented according to a common framework of intervention and outcome categories developed by key stakeholders working in the area of peacebuilding. The first two inputs, a review of current and recent programming across 25 intervention categories and the results of a stakeholder survey, provide information on the demand for more and better evidence. The third input is a 3ie evidence gap map, which illustrates the evidence base of impact evaluations and thus the supply of evidence on intervention effectiveness. 

The scoping paper reveals several areas where the demand for evidence is high and the supply is low. There are other areas where some evidence exists, but a high demand for evidence suggests the need for further research or for meta-analysis to synthesise the existing research.

3ie also produced an evidence gap map report which presents the evidence gap map (EGM) for the impact evaluation of peacebuilding interventions. It describes the scope and methods for the EGM and the analysis of the information in the map.