This session will take a closer look at the factors that make project support to local governments in conflict situations a success or a failure. Possible forms of such project support - a specific form of city diplomacy – include joint projects between two or more local governments from different countries, often as a result of existing city twinning, to improve the living conditions in the involved communities that are affected by conflict; projects that facilitate groups of young people from conflicting parties to meet and talk; or projects aiming at exchanging experiences with a third partner, to mention just a few.

The session will start with the presentation of a list of key factors that potentially contribute to the success or failure of this kind of project support. This list is partly based on specific cases that have been discussed on the first day of the conference (e.g. Colombia, Sri Lanka, Balkan, Middle East) and partly on existing ideas and research on this matter. The speakers and the other participants of the session will subsequently have the opportunity to react from their experience. The ambition is to further increase the understanding of factors for success and failure in project support to partners in conflict regions.

 A further topic will be what the meaning of this ‘list’ could be in practice. For instance, how should it impact on the choices made by the UCLG Committee on City Diplomacy, Peace-building and Human Rights? Can and should the committee use the list for future decisions on which local peace initiatives it recommends to be supported through city diplomacy projects? Would it even be possible for the committee to ‘adopt’ a limited number of initiatives that have a clear potential for success, and if so which ones? On the basis of this kind of questions, the session will provide valuable inputs for the ‘The Hague Agenda on City Diplomacy’, the final document of the conference.

Moderator
Kenneth Bush, Associate Professor in the Conflict Studies Programme at St. Paul University, Ottawa (Canada)

Speakers

Jean-Michel Daclin, Deputy Mayor of the city of Lyon (France)

 

Klelija Balta, senior policy adviser of UNDP, Bosnia and Herzegovina

Chatham House Paper ‘Municipal Cooperation across Conflict Divides. A Preliminary Study’ by Zecharya Tagar (September 2007) (download here)

 

‘Building Capacity for Peace and Unity. The Role of Local Government in Peacebuilding’ by Kenneth Bush (January 2004) (download here)

 

‘A Handbook for Peace And Conflict Impact Assessment (PCIA)’ by Kenneth Bush (June 2008) (download here)

 

The peace-building role of local governments by Kenneth Bush (out of the book on city diplomacy which will be presented during the conference )