UN Peace Operations and International Policing: Negotiating Complexity, Assessing Impact and Learning to Learn

by Charles T. Hunt

Overview

This book addresses the important question of how the United Nations (UN) should monitor and evaluate the impact of police in its peace operations.

UN peace operations are a vital component of international conflict management. Since the end of the Cold War one of the foremost developments has been the rise of UN policing (UNPOL). Instances of UNPOL action have increased dramatically in number and have evolved from passive observation to participation in frontline law enforcement activities. Attempts to ascertain the impact of UNPOL activities have proven inadequate.

This book seeks to redress this lacuna by investigating the ways in which the effects of peace operations – and UNPOL in particular – are monitored and evaluated. Furthermore, it aims to develop a framework, tested through field research in Liberia, for Monitoring and Evaluation (M&E) that enables more effective impact assessment. By enhancing the relationship between field-level M&E and organisational learning this research aims to make an important contribution to the pursuit of more professional and effective UN peace operations.

This book will be of much interest to students of peace operations, conflict management, policing, security studies and IR in general.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781138650329
Publisher:	Taylor & Francis
Publication date:	11/08/2016
Series:	Routledge Studies in Peace and Conflict Resolution
Pages:	306
Product dimensions:	6.12(w) x 9.19(h) x (d)

About the Author

Charles T. Hunt is a lecturer in International Security in the School of Political Science and International Studies, University of Queensland, Australia. He is co-editor of Making Sense of Peace and Capacity-Building Operations (2010) and co-author of Forging New Conventional Wisdom Beyond International Policing (2013).

Table of Contents

Introduction PART I: Context Setting 1. UN Peace Operations and Policing: Policing Change, Changing Police 2. Monitoring and Evaluation in Peace Operations: Measuring Progress, Assessing Impact and Gauging Success PART II: Theory and Framework Building 3. Complexity, Peace Operations and M&E: The Need for a Paradigm Shift? 4. A Framework for Monitoring and Evaluating the Impact of UNPOL PART III: Empirical Case Study 5. Conflict and Consequence in Liberia 6. M&E in Practice I: Strengths, Comparative Advantages and Potentialities 7. M&E in Practice II: Weaknesses, Latent Problems and Naïveté 8. Conclusion: Overcoming the Convenience of Simplicity

Editorial Reviews

'To some, UN Police are the most useful tool in post conflict situations. Others argue that the diverse, disparate nature of UN Police components in peacekeeping operations makes them unfit for purpose. Hunt's methodological approach to monitoring and evaluating UN Police performance has the real potential to assist in developing a clearer understanding of the effectiveness of international policing and in identifying areas that require strengthening and support, or even a total rethink.' — Andrew Hughes, APM, Commissioner (retd.) - Police Adviser to the UN and Director of the Police Division, DPKO, 2007-09

'Hunt's innovative study tackles two key questions in contemporary peace operations: what impact do these missions have on host societies and how might they be improved? Using detailed research on the roles of civilian police in UN missions and the case of UNMIL in Liberia in particular, Hunt makes the case that the key to effective policing lies in organizational learning and that this can be facilitated by a reformed approach to monitoring and evaluation. This book offers students and practitioners of peace operations much food for thought on how to design monitoring and evaluation frameworks that capture the complexity of contemporary peace operations and their interactions with the host society.'— Paul D. Williams, George Washington University, USA

'Charles Hunt's work is not only highly relevant for academics, it is also inspiring for programme managers and M&E practitioners questioning the limits of conventional systems and ''hungry for guidance'' on how to improve them.' —Stefan Rummel-Shapiro, Senior M&E Advisor, United Nations Peace Building Support Office (UN-PBSO)

From the Publisher