This month, the Graduate Institute’s Centre on Conflict, Development and Peacebuilding’s Dr Thania Paffenholz presented the findings of the evaluation of the Civil Peace Service (CPS) to the German Bundestag. Operational in 26 countries, the CPS – der Zivile Friedensdienst (ZFD) in German – is an instrument of the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ). Established in 1999 and set up as a joint endeavour of governmental and non-governmental organisations, the CPS aims to contribute to securing long-term peace by developing structures that promote peace after armed conflict (post-conflict peacebuilding), prevent conflicts from breaking out (crisis prevention) and help strengthen peaceful conflict resolution (mitigation of violence). During the period 1999-2009, 583 CPS experts – so-called ZFD-Fachkräfte – were deployed to 50 countries, with the financial volume of activities amounting to EUR 144 million.

In early 2009, the CCDP successfully applied to a public tendering process for a global evaluation of the CPS, which had been requested by the German Bundestag. The evaluation was conducted both in Germany and in eight selected countries from 2009 to 2011: Burundi, Cambodia, Colombia, Guatemala, Israel/Palestine, Niger, Serbia and Uganda. Drawing on research findings from the CCDP research project “Civil Society and Peacebuilding”, the aim of the evaluation was to create both accountability and learning opportunities for the CPS and its main stakeholders as well as to make recommendations for the future of the CPS and its projects. The evaluation was also part of the OECD/DAC pilot testing of its “Guidance on the Evaluation of Donor Engagement in Fragile and Conflict Contexts” (2008/2012). Insights from the research methods designed for and applied in this evaluation will thus be used to enrich the process of revising these widely-used international policy guidelines.

An executive summary of the evaluation can be found on the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development website.

The news release of the presentation in the German Bundestag is available on the Bundestag website (in German).

The Centre on Conflict, Development and Peacebuilding is the Graduate Institute’s focal point for research in the areas of conflict analysis, humanitarianism, peacebuilding, and the complex relationships between security and development.