Our Peacebuilding Principles

We put people at the centre of building lasting peace. While every situation is different, five core principles guide our approach.

Our role as peacebuilders is to assist in the development of local and national capacities for peace – values and attitudes, social processes and relationships, political and social institutions – all necessary to overcome the dynamics of conflict that lead to polarization, violence and destruction.

1. Peace must be locally-owned

Local ownership begins by ensuring that peacebuilding priorities are determined locally. If local people and groups are included in defining the problem, they can be engaged to also take ownership of the solutions.

We work on the basis that if people feel that the peace belongs to them, they are more likely to take personal responsibility for preventing its collapse. In this way, every citizen becomes a peacekeeper and peace becomes sustainable.

2. Reaching out to all parties in the process

Participatory processes are at the core of Interpeace's approach to peacebuilding. By reaching out to all relevant groups in society in the dialogue and priority setting process, actors from each social group are instilled with a sense of responsibility for the rebuilding and reconciliation process. By taking a comprehensive approach, we enable societies to find compromises, and develop constructive relationships between all sectors and levels of society.

3. The heart of the challenge is building trust

Building trust is at the heart of peacebuilding. Trust cannot be imposed, imported or bought. It emerges slowly and is built through collective engagement on issues both small and large. Trust is also built through consistent commitment to a common vision and is the most difficult outcome to achieve. More than the revitalization of infrastructure or the presence of government, trust is the glue that keeps society together in intangible but essential ways. It is trust that gives institutions their legitimacy and help individuals and groups to remain engaged as a society builds lasting peace.

4. Peacebuilding is a long-term commitment

Interpeace is committed to accompanying societies along the often lengthy and bumpy roads to peace. Support of local efforts must be patient, adaptable and consistent. There are no short-cuts or quick-fixes. Recognizing that the process of overcoming mistrust and deep divisions can be a difficult one, Interpeace seeks to empower local actors to establish independent peacebuilding institutions, which continue to address root causes of conflict and to promote peace over the long term.

5. Process matters

We put as much effort into "what" needs to be done to enable a society to build peace as "how" the process is approached. There is a need not only to focus on the end goal of building peace, but also on the process that will lead to lasting peace.

Strengthening the foundations of a society that is divided is not business as usual. Mistrust tends to be deeply engrained. Every major issue is explosive, political and urgent. Because of this urgency, the tendency is to bring technical solutions to problems rather than to seek holistic solutions to complex problems. How the process is managed and how the engagement of all sides is carried out will determine, in large part, the success of an initiative.