Senior Associate
William Durch spoke at the Managing Global Order and Brookings-LSE Project on
Internal Displacement event United Nations Peacekeeping Operations: Fit for
Purpose? The October 18 event discussed critical issues facing United
Nations peacekeeping operations, and offered thoughts on how upcoming
challenges could prompt reform.
Other speakers included Anthony
Banbury, UN assistant secretary general for field support; and Brookings Fellow Noam Unger,
policy director for the foreign assistance reform project. Bruce Jones,
Brookings Senior Fellow and director of the Managing Global Order project,
served as moderator.
Audio of the event, as recorded by Brookings, is below. Click here to view a PDF of Durch’s presentation.
United Nations Peacekeeping Operations: Fit for Purpose?
Historic demand for United Nations peacekeeping has seen 120,000 peacekeepers deployed worldwide, managing crises from Lebanon to Darfur. UN political officers are currently assisting the new government in Libya and logisticians are backing up African Union troops in Somalia. But while crises from Haiti to Sudan underline the critical role of these operations, increasing budgetary and political pressures, and questions about the role and impact of peacekeeping, are adding complexity to policy debates about reform.