The World Bank's World Development Report 2011: Conflict, Security and Development (WDR '11) proposes a renewed framework to guide the international community's work in fragile and conflict-affected situations (FCS). The WDR '11 calls for a paradigm shift based on the premise that the legacy of violence, weak institutions and the multiple challenges plaguing FCS cannot be resolved by short-term or partial solutions in the absence of institutions that provide people with security, justice and jobs.
The six themes of the World Bank's FCS Reforms
The World Development Report 2011: Conflict, Security, and Development provides the analytical foundations for improving the Bank's operating model in fragile and conflict-affected situations. It concludes that building capable and legitimate institutions, ensuring citizen security and justice, and creating jobs are essential to reducing violence–and providing optimal support requires better coordination among external actors.The Bank will build on the Report analysis in at least six ways:
1. Work to make country assistance strategies for fragile and conflict-affected Situations (FCS) more focused on fragility
The Bank will seek to identify more clearly the stresses that lead to conflict; assess the capability of key national institutions to effectively deal with citizen security, justice, and development; and identify transition opportunities that may help break the cycles of violence and protracted fragility.
2. Strengthen partnerships on development, security, and justice
The Bank will work more closely with other partners, in the spirit of the Paris and Accra agendas, and particularly with international agencies that possess expertise the Bank does not, or on areas that are outside its mandate. The Bank will also partner with others to look at how to fill current gaps in the international effort and response to FCS, and build upon its partnerships to strengthen the links between security and development.
3. Increase attention to jobs and private sector development
Bank will develop an approach to employment in FCS, in partnership with others, that develops a range of interventions to support jobs and livelihoods – both through public and community-based employment that can provide "quick wins" and through the necessary investments and research that support private sector development and job creation over time.
4. Realign results and risk management for FCS, away from risk avoidance
The Bank will review its definitions of risk tolerance, risk management, and expected results and will examine how it can better balance fiduciary and other risks in FCS against the risks of inaction or slow action, which may lead to a resurgence of violence and conflict.
5. Reduce financing volatility
Institutional development requires longterm and sustained support. Going forward, the Bank will work to ensure that essential institutions in FCS receive sustained support over several years, and will explore options for maintaining minimum levels of support to core institutions and basic services even in the context of governance or other setbacks.
6. Strive for global excellence in FCS work
The Bank recognizes the need for a different organizational approach–both in its internal organization and in its work with regional and global partners–in fragile and conflict-affected situations. It has been working to put in place the processes, organizational structure, and staff skill mixes and incentives to encourage innovation and informed risk taking. In an effort to bring resources closer to the field, it has created a Global Center for Conflict, Security, and Development. The center, in Nairobi, will conduct research on economics and public policy matters, and provide substantial support to country teams across all regions on issues related to security, justice, and development in crisis prevention and recovery.
Support to FCS is clearly at the forefront of the Bank Group's agenda. The impetus to reform the Bank's engagement with FCS comes from clients, partners and staff. Bank teams have been mobilized to work on each of these themes with concrete results expected over the next year.
Input Papers
Input papers were commissioned to inform the thinking for the WDR. Authors were asked to respond to a specific set of questions and terms of reference based on the WDR’s overall themes and storyline. These inputs should be read as“working papers” rather than formal peer-reviewed journal articles. Broadly, the works can be divided into: thematic papers, clustered by issue; and case studies and case notes that focus on country or regional experiences with issues of violent conflict and fragility.
Overarching WDR Concept Papers
Institutions and State Building Papers
- Service Delivery in Fragile and Conflict-Affected States
- Managing Public Finance and Procurement in Fragile and Conflicted Settings
- Representational Models and Democratic Transitions in Fragile and Post-Conflict States
- CDD in Post-Conflict and Conflict-Affected Areas
- Anti-Corruption Strategies in Fragile Situations
Data and Conflict Trends Papers
- Conflict Relapse and the Sustainability of Post-Conflict Peace
- Financing Peace: International and National Resources for Postconflict Countries and Fragile States
- Post-Conflict Recovery and Peacebuilding
- Demographic and Health Consequences of Civil Conflict
- Consequences of Civil Conflict
- Experiments and the Study of Conflict
- Interpersonal Violence Prevention
- Criminal Justice
- Transitional Justice, Security, and Development
- Improving Security in Violent Conflict Settings
- Public Security, Criminal Justice, and Reforming the Security Sector Justice
- Security and Justice Overview
Private Sector and Economic Growth Papers
- Using Regional Institutions to Improve the Quality of Public Services
- Unemployment and Participation in Violence
- The Role of the Private Sector in Fragile and Conflict-Affected States
- Resource Scarcity, Climate Change and the Risk of Violent Conflict
- Food Insecurity and Conflict: Applying the WDR Framework
- Food Security and Conflict
Other Papers and Background Notes
- The Impacts of Refugees on Neighboring Countries
- Horizontal Inequalities as a Cause of Conflict
- The Development Challenge of Finding Durable Solutions for Refugees and Internally Displaced People
- Homicide Data
- WDR Gender Background paper
- Capitol Flight and Violent Conflict
- Conflict in Melanesia: Themes and Lessons
- Timor-Leste's Recovery from the 2006 Crisis: Some Lessons
- Rwanda’s Exit Pathway from Violence: A Strategic Assessment
- Democratic Republic of Congo
- Drug Trafficking and Violence in Central America and Beyond
- Lessons from the Marshall Plan
- Germany’s Post-1945 and Post-1989 Education Systems
- State-Building, Economic Development, and Democracy: The Japanese Experience
- EU Accession: Norms and Incentives
- Liberia: Holding on to Monrovia
- Somalia and the Horn of Africa
- Nepal
- Some Notes on Conflict and Decentralisation in India
- Mali and its Sahelian Neighbors
- Engaging With Countries in Situations of Political Impasse
- Sub-National Violence in Middle and Higher Income Countries