Afghanistan: Limits and Lessons for International Peacekeeping

Officials gather in London next week to define a meaningful political strategy for Afghanistan amidst growing uncertainty over Afghanistan's future and the direction of the international effort. For the international community, the two pressing priorities are to transform the international presence from a heavily militarized operation to a civilian one, and to shift its external coordination into a locally owned enterprise. All this needs to happen in the context of a rapidly degenerating military effort and with the cooperation of a limited government.

The case of Afghanistan shows the particular challenge of implementing a UN peacekeeping mission, jumpstarting state-building and political assistance and coordinating aid in a fragmented framework. Lessons from Afghanistan also raise a number of questions for the future of peacekeeping missions: Can external forces help bring political stability, and if so, how effective can the role of the United Nations be in this process, and how does outsourcing of stabilization to regional security organizations support such a role? And for Afghanistan, can these lessons be redirected to develop a more effective mission?

Speakers

• Pierre Schori, Swedish diplomat and politician
• Sharbanou Tadjbakhsh, Director of the Master's Concentration on Human Security at the Master's of Public Affairs of Sciences Po and a Research Associate with The International Peace Research Institute (PRIO), Norway
• Fatima Ayub, Senior Advocate, Open Society Foundation-London (moderator)

A light lunch will be served.