Is it possible to escape the destructive circle of violence? The new World Development Report (WDR) "Conflict, Security and Development", published in April, gives profound answers following a new method of preparing the World Bank’s flagship publication. As Sarah Cliffe, Director and Special Representative of the WDR 2011, points out, "Findings emerged less through our analysis and policy documents than through the consultations we held around the world. Essentially, we reversed the conventional order of WDR consultations. Instead of drafting the report and then going out to get feedback in the final stages, we worked from the outset with civil society and government reformers in different countries, and with partners in the UN system and regional institutions." According to Cliffe, Ethiopia, Mozambique, and Rwanda are useful examples to illustrate how countries have successfully emerged from violent conflict and have made substantial progress in key areas such as combating poverty. Key drivers of conflict such as injustice, human rights abuses, and bad governance, but also corruption or unemployment, need to be addressed by creating institutions to build new confidence or to plan for cross-border infrastructure projects to establish a regional perspective, as well as opportunities for income generation.

Although the role of natural resources such as strategic minerals and forests is only a minor topic of the report, it is a core aspect when it comes to defining new directions for international support. Especially fragile states need to be protected from food and resource shocks, according to the authors. However, it is also stressed that new analytical efforts are needed to examine the state of scientific knowledge about the availability of key resources, including oil, food, water, and land. In addition, the question of how climate change will affect each of the elements needs to be considered. To this end, a World Resources Outlook should be compiled by relevant agencies to provide policy makers with an integrated analysis they currently lack. Without such an analysis, further violent conflicts can be caused as an unintended consequence of policy making - as can be learnt from the expansion of bio-fuels production and its negative food security implications mentioned by the report. In light of the report’s sensitivity to potential negative implications of global change and environmental degradation, it is, however, somewhat surprising that there is no examination of the ways in which sustainable resource management or the establishment of a clean energy infrastructure may serve as a useful pathway to provide new means of income generation. (Dennis Taenzler)

For the World Development Report 2011, please seehttp://wdr2011.worldbank.org/fulltext.

See alsoSarah Cliffe's blog.

Published in: ECC-Newsletter, 2/2011