Peacebuilding and Local Governance

After violent conflict, local governments face enormous challenges. For stability and development, it is necessary to improve and maintain citizens’ security, integrate internally displaced persons or ex-combatants into the local community and overcome existing divisions within the society. Citizens will also need access to basic services – such as roads, water, schools and health care – and tangible economic opportunities. Finally, local authorities will often need to regain the trust of their populations.

These issues and challenges for peace building at a local level will be addressed in the two-week course ‘Peacebuilding and Local Governance’, that is developed in cooperation with The Hague Institute for Global Justice. During the course, we distill lessons from cases in Afghanistan, Burundi, South Sudan and the Balkans, apply theories and concepts to the local context of the participants, and discuss the impact of donor interventions on peace and stability. Special attention is paid to the role of gender in a post-conflict context.

This course will help you to:

• analyse the state of local governments and the local political economy in fragile countries;
• judge the impact of local governance and decentralisation on realising a sustainable peace and building state legitimacy;
• increase insight in the role local governments can play in increasing human security;
• design and implement initiatives aimed at strengthening local governments;
• cooperate more effectively with local governments, the private sector, NGOs and other stakeholders.

After successful completion of the course you will receive a certificate of The Hague Academy for Local Governance.

Staff of bilateral donors, multilateral agencies and NGOs, and civil servants working for ministries and local governments, who wish to be well-informed about the local dimensions of peacebuilding in fragile states.

The courses of The Hague Academy for Local Governance are facilitated by renowned trainers and practitioners with extensive experience of decentralisation and local governance in various development and (post-)conflict countries around the world. Contributions to this course come from, among others, Jamie Boex, principle research associate at the Urban Institute in Washington and leading expert in the field of (fiscal) decentralisation and Marco Lankhorst, senior researcher at The Hague Institute for Global Justice and expert in the field of local level conflict and security.

The course fee is € 2.890,-. This includes all training-related costs, as well as drinks, lunches, training materials and travel during the training programme. Travel to and from The Hague and accommodation is not included. The course language is English.

If you would like to receive more information or in case you have any questions, you can contact us at info@thehagueacademy.com  or +31(70) 37 38 695.

Deadline for application has been extended to 1 May 2013. Click here for more information about the application procedure and the online application form. 

The Netherlands organisation for international cooperation in higher education (NUFFIC) offers the opportunity to apply for a fellowship for this training course, as part of the Netherlands Fellowship Programme (NFP) for short courses. To see if you are eligible for a fellowship and to learn more about the rules and regulations regarding the fellowship, please see www.nuffic.nl/nfp. The deadline to apply for a NFP fellowship for this course has passed already.