The 2011 World Development Report: Conflict, Security and Development (WDR) is a document by the World Bank on the challenges organised violence poses to the advancement of less developed countries. The report finds that over the last 30 years poverty has been reduced for most of the world's population - but this is not the case for the estimated 1.5 billion people living in countries blighted by on-going conflict. Not one low income country suffering from on-going violence has achieved a single Millennium Development Goal. Once mass violence takes root in a society, it can take a generation or more to restore stability.
Organised violence as defined by the report includes civil and inter-state war as well as the violence resulting from criminal activity, especially drug and human trafficking. The WDR does not address interpersonal and domestic violence, though it acknowledges they are also relevant to development.
The report finds that overall mass conflict has become less prevalent over recent decades, with the average number of worldwide battle deaths dropping from 164,000 per year in the 1980s to only 42,000 in the 2000s. But the 1.5 billion living in conflict wracked states have not benefited from this trend. A new form of mass violence plagues their countries, with cycles of political violence alternating with periods where as many or more die from criminal activity.
Despite the difficulties in overcoming a legacy of conflict, violence or authoritarian rule, several countries have made impressive progress including Chile, Colombia, Ghana, Indonesia, Mozambique, South Africa and Timor-Leste. The report offers lessons drawn from these past successes. The World Bank stress that their report does not proscribe standard fixes suitable for all, and that efforts to resolve conflicts should be nationally led from within affected countries. Workable solutions will have to be tailored to each set of individual circumstance. Yet the WDR does find that previous successful efforts share many common features, which are reflected in the report's WDR framework.
Key Messages
According to World Bank president Robert Zoellick in his forward to the report, the five key messages are:
1. "Institutional legitimacy is the key to stability." Institutions must be trusted to deliver if they are to reduce violence and promote peace. Often levels of trust among various stakeholders must be raised before necessary institutional transformation is attempted, and crucial to this end are quick wins − actions that produce early tangible results.
2. "Investing in citizen security, justice, and jobs is essential to reducing violence." The report finds that unemployment is widely considered to be the no 1 reason for youths to join both criminal gangs and contending armies. To address this, the WB states that it will henceforth focus more on promoting job creation. The WDR also acknowledges that existing development agencies do not yet have the capacity to adequately help fragile states build up police forces and justice systems, even though aid in building an army is more readily available.
3. "Confronting the challenge effectively" requires change. Development agencies including the WB itself have not yet fully adapted to the needs of the 21st century which are very different from those of the 20th. Instead of rebuilding nations devastated by a huge but one off war, they must address cycles of violence typically involving not just political conflict but also criminal activity such as trafficking. Greater speed, collaboration and staying power are needed for these new challenges. Also needed is a willingness to accept greater risk that not all aid efforts will be fruitful, and a greater emphasis on crisis prevention and early de-escalation of violence rather than post crises intervention which can consume vastly more resources.
4. "A layered approach" is needed. Many issues are best addressed on multiple levels - locally led efforts are essential but they often need to be complemented by national, regional and international action. Collaboration between development and humanitarian organisations, NGOs and TNOs, private sector and grass roots initiatives − especially women's groups − are all vital components of the most efficient solutions to the problems being faced.
5. "The global landscape is changing." Middle income and regional institutions such as the ANC are now playing a much larger role in shaping global affairs than was the case a few decades ago, which needs to be recognised by those involved in crafting and executing solutions to development problems.See especially p.11–12 WRD2011 fullPDF
The report creation process Although the World Bank produces World Development Reports annually, the 2011 report was two years in the making, written by a team led by World Bank directors Sarah Cliffe and Nigel Roberts. The writing process for the 2011 WDR marked a departure from previous reports, in that consultation was broader and deeper. Consultation extended beyond discussion with the traditional parties − representatives of OECD donor countries, leading academics, other multilateral and bilateral agencies - to reach out to, among others: leaders from the private sector and civil society; national reformers; local and regional leaders, especially those working in conflict affected countries.The reports states that in particular this included Afghanistan, Colombia, Congo, Haiti, Iraq, Kenya, Mali, Nepal, Pakistan, Papua New Guinea, Rwanda, Solomon Islands, South Africa, Sudan, Timor-Leste, Vanuatu, West Bank and Gaza, and Yemen. To further broaden the discussion process, use was made of new media technologies, including videos, blogs, and Twitter feeds. The actual document was not the sole or final end of the creation process – it also sought to foster an ongoing global conversation that will enhance the knowledge and collaborative capabilities of all the different actors working to speed development and resolve conflicts; a dialogue that will continue into the future interacting with everything from the UN's global policy making to the execution of local efforts by grass roots organisations. Rather than merely record the opinion of western experts, the report seeks to distill the world's collective experience and the recommendations of everyone involved in tackling the challenges of development and peace promotion.See especially pp.13−14 and 19−21 WRD2011 fullPDF
The WDR framework
The WDR framework is a process model showing how countries can break free of cycles of violence by establishing legitimate and effective institutions to promote stability and prosperity. Rather than being a top-down recommendation from the World Bank, the framework reflects the experiences of what worked best for various countries which have already successfully overcame prolonged violence. Case studies showing this are given for Ethiopia, Ghana, Indonesia, Mozambique, Rwanda and many other countries. The two key stages identified are confidence building and institutional transformation. The report details a number of "core tools" for use during each stage, which have been commonly used by those countries which have successfully resolved their long-running conflicts.
To create conditions where attempts at institutional transformation are likely to succeed, various factions with the power to make or break the undertaking need to gain confidence that the transformation will deliver worthwhile results. Two key tactics for building trust are for national governments to deliver early, tangible results that demonstrate a commitment to reform and work through building "inclusive enough""Inclusive enough" means that while its ideal for the coalitions to be all-inclusive, in some cases this won't be feasible, in which case the key is to have sufficient factions join to give reforms a good chance of success. coalitions. After delivering any available "quick wins", the coalitions build national and local support for peaceful change. Getting previously competing factions to work together often requires signals of a clean and irreversible break with the past.
Once sufficient trust has been built up to attempt institutional transformation, the first priority is to increase the capability of institutions to provide security, justice and jobs. As experience has shown there is a limit to how much change a society can absorb at one go, it is rarely advisable to attempt a "big bang" transformation that will achieve everything at once. Rather a "virtuous cycle" seems to work best, with alternating periods of confidence building and institutional transformation. Both the key stages should be nationally led, but the framework encourages international agencies to provide much needed support, and to help guard the process from being derailed by external stress. The WDR says the cycle can often take a generation to reach the end goal, which will involve the formation of stable, legitimate institutions able to support a satisfactory standard of citizen security, justice and jobs.Passim but see especially chapter 3, WRD2011 fullPDF
Synopsis As of April 2011 the report had been published in two versions: a 65-page overview and a 352-page full version. The full version includes a forward, an acknowledgments, a notes section, a glossary, the overview, and three main parts sub-divided into a total of nine chapters.
Part 1: The Challenge Chapter 1: Repeated violence threatens development The opening chapter reviews evidence suggesting that repeated cycles of civil conflict and criminal violence are a major factor retarding development in the countries and regions they afflict. The chapter highlights the devastating effect mass violence has on the over 1.5 billion living in countries severely affected by it. The WDR also summarises progress made in reducing war and battle deaths, showing how countries such as Ethiopia, Rwanda and Mozambique were able to make very rapid development progress once mass violence had been alleviated.
Chapter 2: Vulnerability to violence, Chapter two discusses the role played by external and internal stresses in triggering mass violence. A case is made arguing that a critical reason why some societies are more vulnerable than others to outbreaks of violence is the lack of quality institutions able to reconcile competing factions and peacefully address grievances held by sectors of the populations. The WDR argues that while elite pacts between rival leaders can deliver short term peace, violence generally soon reoccurs unless stability can be reinforced by impersonal institutions and good governance.
Part 2: Lessons from national and international bodies Chapter 3: From violence to resilience: Restoring confidence and transforming institutions This chapter introduces the WDR framework.
Chapter 4: Restoring confidence: Moving away from the brink
Chapter four focuses on the ways previous efforts have successfully built trust as a prelude to instuitional transformation in countries such as Chile and Indonesia. Both case studies and previous academic work are used to show that while it is important to build "inclusive enough" coalitions for positive change, they need not be all-inclusive, especially at the early stages of the process. Signaling a clean break with the past is also emphasised as important, as is the early delivery of tangible results. The WDR shows that national leaders driving the process often enlist help from non state actors – from both the civil and international sector.
Chapter 5: Transforming institutions to deliver security, justice, and jobs