Evaluation of Sida’s support to peacebuilding in conflict and post-conflict contexts

This report presents a synthesis of the findings from the evaluation of Sida’s support to peacebuilding in conflict and post-conflict contexts since the early 1990s. It has been commissioned by Sida and undertaken by Tana Copenhagen. The evaluation assesses Sida’s approach and support to peacebuilding at the strategic level and seeks to identify what has worked well and what has worked less well. To do so, it draws from four country evaluations of Sida’s support to peacebuilding in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Guatemala, Rwanda and Somalia.

The evaluation finds that Sida’s support has been relevant to the general context in the four countries. While Sida has played an important role in supporting processes that have contributed to positive change and has managed to identify and utilise opportunities to support peacebuilding, underlying conflict factors remain and continue to undermine sustainable peace. The alignment of Swedish strategies and underlying Sida documentation to specific peacebuilding needs has been weak because, with some exceptions, it has failed to target sufficiently the key root causes of conflict. The report includes recommendations to strengthen Sida’s peacebuilding engagement.