As one of the three pillars of the UN system, human rights have long been seen as foundational to peace and security. Nonetheless, since 2016, there have been additional efforts to encourage cross-pillar coordination, and strengthen the nexus between human rights and peacebuilding.
This Thematic Review contributes to these efforts by examining how the Peacebuilding Fund has supported synergies between human rights and peacebuilding in practice, taking stock of 92 projects implemented in 45 countries over the last five years.
The report also includes two country case studies, in the Democratic Republic of Congo and in Colombia, which allow for a more contextualized view of how human rights strategies can advance peacebuilding and conflict prevention (and vice versa), including in periods of transition for peace operations. A third case study, on programming to counter hate speech and disinformation, gathers emerging findings from this nascent field, while also documenting new forms of hybrid peacebuilding that combine virtual or online and traditional tools and methods.
