Weathering Risk Peace Pillar: The new flagship initiative

The “Weathering Risk Peace Pillar” is a new flagship initiative, funded by the German Federal Foreign Office, to systematically implement and assess the impact of climate-security informed peace programming.

There is much anecdotal evidence that climate change can be an entry point for peacemaking and peacebuilding, and that integrating climate considerations into peace programming is a core component of sustainable development and peace. However, to date, there has been little systematic programming around this concept and, consequently, no robust and systematic testing of impacts.

The Weathering Risk Peace Pillar is designed to address this gap: to design, pilot and evaluate peace programmes which integrate climate-security risk analysis across a range of different geographic contexts and conflict types. The Peace Pillar thus adds a direct implementation dimension to Weathering Risk, a multilateral initiative developing and piloting integrated approaches for climate and security risk and foresight assessments. The Weathering Risk Peace Pillar ensures that the analytical approach of Weathering Risk is translated into peacemaking and peacebuilding action in the field.

For sustainable peace on the ground

The objective of the Weathering Risk Peace Pillar is to make substantial contributions to the prevention and resolution of conflicts through better, climate-security informed peace interventions. Simultaneously, it will generate robust and scientific evidence derived from the operational programming experience and rigorous impact assessments of pilot projects. This will help to better understand the added value of integrating climate-security risk analysis into peacebuilding efforts.

The first phase of the initiative was launched in January 2022. It will run over a two-year pilot period, during which projects will be developed and implemented by members of the new Climate, Peace and Security Consortium (CPSC). These include the Berghof Foundation, the Centre for Humanitarian Dialogue (HD) and the European Institute of Peace (EIP). The consortium further comprises adelphi research, which serves as coordinator and climate-fragility advisor of the Weathering Risk Peace Pillar, and Innovations for Poverty Action (IPA) as the partner responsible for evaluating the impact of pilot projects.

Through empirical learning from these pilot projects and ongoing, rigorous impact assessments, the Weathering Risk Peace Pillar will make valuable contributions to national and international policy and practice. Collecting lessons learned and good practice, it will provide evidence-based guidance on how to use climate-security risk analysis to support sustainable peace on the ground.

Contact: schulzadelphi [dot] de (Katarina Schulz)