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Security Sector Reform Best Practices and Lessons Learned Repository

 

Compiled by Madeline England and Alix Boucher, with James McGurrin and William Durch

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      Sources

Practice notes:

1. Defense sector reform
2. SSR in stabilization environments
3. Threat assessments and reviews
4. National security policies and strategies
5. Governance and oversight of the security sector
6. Management of the security sector

      SSR Reference Spreadsheet and guidelines for use

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Sources

The SSR repository project looked across seven governments and eleven international organizations requested by the UN SSR Unit for their long-standing support and experience with SSR related activities. FOPO also researched numerous NGOs that engage in SSR, aiming for understanding from multiple perspectives, horizontally across countries and vertically from strategy down to practice. FOPO developed a database of 500+ relevant documents and, under Chatham House rules, interviewed 35 SSR experts from the various sources of the project. These sources are listed below, with only a sampling of the NGOs surveyed.

 

 

A bibliography of all 193 documents referenced in the spreadsheet is available here. A bibliography of all sources referenced in the six practice notes is available here. Documents are listed both by major source category (governments, United Nations, other international organizations, and NGO and civil society publications) and alphabetically.

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Defense Sector Reform

Defense Sector Reform: A Note on Current Practice by Alix J. Boucher

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SSR in Stabilization Environments

This practice note focuses on planning and implementing SSR activities in stabilization environments. Stabilization environments are characterized by circumstances related to descent into, continuation of, or emergence from conflict in which the physical security, economic, political, and humanitarian needs of the population are often far greater than the resources available to meet them. In addition to the challenges of SSR in any context (e.g., shifting power dynamics, limited resources, reconciling donor and host state priorities), SSR in stabilization environments faces challenges exacerbated by the context: security (ongoing threats to civilians and the state), governance (weak state capacity, fragmented authority, destroyed infrastructure), and social fragmentation (divisions within and among communities). As the degree of “permissiveness” increases, in a gradual and uneven process, long-term security sector reform programming may be developed in consultation with host state stakeholders and implemented. Given the variation in possible stabilization environments, this practice note on SSR and stabilization focuses on decision-enabling and planning tools for SSR assistance providers (e.g., maintaining flexibility, adjusting expectations, options for engaging with non-state actors, and setting the preconditions for long-term SSR) and on building the capacity of local actors to support decision-making and ownership. SSR must be able to seize windows of opportunity, respond quickly, and adjust appropriately to the context, to changing power dynamics, and to unintended consequences of SSR initiatives.

Security Sector Reform in Stabilization Environments: A Note on Current Practice by Madeline L. England

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Threat Assessments and Reviews

Threat assessments compile and analyze current and prospective challenges to a country’s security and interests, and may be conducted as part of wider reviews of national security and defence policy and institutions. They may serve as the basis for developing national security policy and strategy and for decisions on how to structure the institutions that implement security policy and strategy. This practice note describes processes behind the development of threat assessments and reviews, especially but not exclusively in countries emerging from conflict. It addresses the challenges of conducting reviews and assessments during ongoing conflict, examines the defence review process, and discusses the need to create procedures for periodic reviews of the security sector. The note does not specifically address assessment of public health threats or potential for natural disasters, but responding to such events may be a secondary role for national security services. This note discusses ways to ensure that results of threat assessments and reviews are accepted by national authorities and that the process itself is inclusive and legitimate.

Threat Assessments and Reviews (or Conflict Assessments and Defense Reviews): A Note on Current Practice by Alix J. Boucher

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National Security Policies and Strategies

A national security policy (NSP) is a government-wide analysis and description of the strategic level concerns a country faces; it addresses how the government plans to deals with these concerns. A national security strategy (NSS) is a government’s overarching plan for ensuring the country’s security in the form of guidance for implementing a country’s national security policy. In several contexts, an initial national security strategy may play an important role in determining a comprehensive strategy for security sector reform. The NSS can be a tool for building legitimacy of security actors in the eyes of a population. This practice note discusses the challenges to reforming national security structures, as they relate to drafting appropriate national security strategies, and provides examples of ongoing efforts in Afghanistan, Liberia, and Sierra Leone.

National Security Strategies and Policies: A  Note on Current Practice by Alix J. Boucher

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Security Sector Governance and Oversight

Although definitions for security sector governance vary, reform centers around two dimensions that enable effective oversight and accountability of the security and justice sector: 1) an institutional dimension to (re)build transparent mechanisms and processes for security policy, decisions, and practice, and 2) a normative dimension to transform relationships among security and justice providers, governing and oversight bodies, and the general public to embody principles of “good governance”—transparency, accountability, responsibility, participation, respect for human rights, compliance with international law, and regional peacebuilding. Traditionally, SSG reform efforts targeted support toward two security sector actors: bodies authorized to use force and civil management and oversight bodies. This approach is now widely agreed to be too narrow and state-centric given the importance of justice and rule of law institutions in providing security, the prevalence of non-state security and justice providers, and the need to include civil society for public participation and legitimacy. Therefore this practice note looks at all formal and informal actors with a role in influencing security sector governance.

Security Sector Governance and Oversight: A Note on Current Practice by Madeline L. England

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Management of the Security Sector

Management of the security sector is the implementation, direction, and operation of security policies, decisions, and practices. Management requires horizontal and vertical capacities, and often structural reorganization, among and within security sector actors to improve efficiency and effectiveness. These capacities include, for example, building and maintaining professional security forces, allocating scarce resources, reducing corruption, and engaging with civil society, all of which promote enhanced security and justice delivery. Improving managerial capacities is critical to the ownership and sustainability of good governance initiatives, national security strategies, defense sector reform, and all other elements of the security sector reform process.

Management is intractably linked to security sector governance and oversight mechanisms. Incorporating the principles of good governance (transparency, accountability, compliance with international law, and human rights) into management policies and procedures will help to generate efficiency, effectiveness, and legitimacy. Furthermore, because all management bodies (ideally) wield a great deal of authority over security forces, management bodies and their policies, decisions, and practices must themselves be subject to effective oversight. This practice note looks at these management capacities of security sector institutions from the perspective of three categories: executive authorities that manage the development and implementation of national security policy and strategy, the legislative and ministerial independent oversight bodies charged with oversight of the executive and security forces, and security force command authorities that direct and manage security forces and operations.

Management of the Security Sector: A Note on Current Practice by Madeline L. England

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SSR reference spreadsheet

The SSR reference spreadsheet is a web-accessible, cross-indexed, and interactive reference spread­sheet of SSR sources by themes. It is organized such that the rows contain SSR themes and activities extracted from the documents compiled and indexed by the Stimson team. The columns in the spreadsheet list the documents surveyed, grouped by government/organization/authors/case example, ranging from governments and international organizations to non-governmental organizations and individual scholars. At the moment it provides hyperlinks to public government, international organizations, and NGOs in the repository; links to other documents will be added as we obtain electronic copyright permission.

 

When downloading and opening the Matrix in Excel, you may be prompted to “ENABLE MACROS,” which is necessary for the Spreadsheet to be fully functional.  If your copy of Excel has set macro protection to Very High or High, you will need to change that to Medium or Low prior to opening the spreadsheet. 

 

Macro security is set by opening Excel and from the menu bar choosing Tools -> Macro -> Security. On the resulting popup, check either the Medium or Low option. Click OK, exit Excel, and re-open it to have the revised setting take effect. With the Medium setting, users are prompted as to whether they wish to enable macros. With the Low setting, macros will be enabled without prompt.

SSR Reference Spreadsheet, compiled by Madeline L. England and Alix J. Boucher, with James McGurrin and William Durch

Guidelines for using the spreadsheet by Madeline L. England and William J. Durch

 

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The SSR repository was made possible with support from the United Kingdom’s inter-agency Strategic Support for International Organisations (SSIO) program. More information on FOPO’s rule of law project can be found here.

 

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