How civil society engagement can help the UN’s Peacebuilding Architecture meet its purpose

The ten-year review of the United Nation’s Peacebuilding Architecture (PBA), which includes the Peacebuilding Commission (PBC), the Peacebuilding Fund (PBF) and the Peacebuilding Support Office (PBSO), is an important moment to examine how the UN engages with local people in civil society through the PBA and in wider UN peacebuilding efforts. A challenge for the UN’s approach to peacebuilding in general is that it is often disconnected from the realities in the countries it is supporting: civil society can bridge this gap. Organised civil society provides the necessary link and local grounding for the PBA in all its various activities, and engaging with local civil society offers a way to make these activities more relevant, strategic and catalytic.