Comment & analysis

Making peace and justice a common cause: Justice as Prevention

29 January 2015 Will Bennett

A functioning justice system that upholds the rule of law is considered a critical feature of peacebuilding, state-building and post-conflict recovery efforts. However the concept of ‘justice’ must also encompass notions that go far beyond the rule of law. If peace is to hold, or if conflicts are to be avoided in the first place, as much as we need to construct justice institutions that focus on quality service delivery, we also need to engage on the much more significant agenda of building just and fair societies.

This is because justice is not something that is merely dispensed through the criminal justice system, but experienced either positively or negatively through the quality of relationships, transactions and behaviours between different sections of a society – each of which have a significant bearing on conflict dynamics.

Focusing on people’s experiences of injustice requires a commitment to prioritise and measure the function of justice systems far above their form. We know that poverty, insecurity and injustice are largely man-made consequences of unfair policies and practices. We know that states can fail because, amongst other things, their policies exclude people from decision-making processes and access to resources—the experience of which fuels insecurity and violence. And we know that poorly conceived economic investment can contribute to patterns of horizontal inequality, environmental degradation, resource securitisation and bad governance that increase the likelihood of violent conflict (which, it should also be acknowledged, may even be the cynical and explicit aim for some actors). Alternatively, that same economic investment can encourage conflict-sensitive broad-based development that can contribute to peace and prevent the escalation of violence. 

So we believe it’s time to be bolder when we talk about tackling injustice. We cannot blindly support inappropriate or internationally transposed systems that risk upholding laws, power structures and norms that in fact reinforce social injustices – such as gender inequality, unequal livelihood opportunities and unfair taxation or land rights. Because unless we address these injustices, sustaining any sort of positive peace and development is incredibly difficult.

Saferworld is therefore committed to developing an approach to ‘Justice as Prevention’ (JasP) in conflict-affected contexts that is:

  • as much about forward looking, preventative intent as it is about retrospective accountability,
  • concerned with addressing a broad range of injustices, including tackling the bigger social, economic and political justice issues associated with building just societies,
  • respectful of the boundaries and obligations of international criminal, human rights and humanitarian law, but at the same time looks beyond a legalistic, normative approach to justice,
  • customised and responsive to country contexts, and supports the development of fair legislation, justice institutions and access to justice,
  • encouraging greater complementarity in the practice of peacebuilders, justice and human rights practitioners.

If this is what justice should mean to peacebuilders, we need to have clarity on how exactly to work on it. Building institutions is important, clearly, but too limited. Focusing on them in isolation runs the risk of constructing them in the normative image of the donor or the narrow interests of a political elite rather than according to people’s needs. This runs counter to both a peacebuilding and justice ideal whereby all citizens ought to be given the opportunity to shape and reshape the institutions that govern them. Access to justice is obviously crucial, too: but merely having access to a justice system is no guarantee of its quality or fairness, and furthermore equal access to the law is very different to equality before it.

In countries such as South Sudan and Nepal, where we work with communities to solve security challenges, legacies of conflict are deeply embedded in society, and questions of formal justice and reconciliation are indeed vital to a just and lasting peace. However, issues such as access to roads and medical centres, allocation of government spending, ethnic/caste equality and political inclusion all feed into people’s sense of injustice that loom large in determining whether the future will be peaceful. It is for this reason that we propose a forward-looking approach to peace and justice as an area that requires more effective focus.

Many practitioners will be aware of the challenges here. The contradictions that can arise between peace and justice are well known, for example when those who insist on accountability for grievous crimes during war come up against those who believe that ending violence may depend on dropping the call for full justice. However, as Louise Arbour has pointed out, in many ways peace and justice are in fact interdependent, and the real task in hand is to reconcile the inevitable tensions between them “in a really workable fashion”. But we must, because the scale and complexity of challenges in conflict affected contexts means that adopting very narrow, normative peace or justice approaches comes up short. So we need to be more creative and try to integrate the complementary practice of peacebuilders, conflict prevention practitioners and reconciliation specialists on the one hand, and human rights, justice and rule of law actors on the other. 

Working more collaboratively might offer the flexibility to pursue a range of different engagements in different societies, each sequenced by reference to the contextual analysis of what is possible, appropriate, or optimal at any given time. Rather than support the view that peace and justice are somehow opposed to each other, Saferworld hopes to build on the common values these two areas share and develop a nuanced approach that instead seeks the maximal realisation of both.

There is timely international support for steps in this more coherent direction. The UN Secretary General’s synthesis report on the post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals identifies justice as an “essential element” necessary to “build safe and peaceful societies”. The report also emphasises the value of “strong institutions”, but there is an important caveat to be made here. Strong does not necessarily equate to fair or responsive. Any strength institutions draw should be from a sense of public legitimacy, not simply conferred by elites. Only then will they be accountable and more empowered to guarantee past injustices do not spoil the prospects for any future peace.

Justice is a system of power. And if we’re serious about building peaceful societies where people’s experiences of justice are positive rather than characterised by an absence of rights, resources and opportunities, we must have the confidence to investigate and realign how power is used both internationally and locally.

Will Bennett is a Conflict and Security Advisor in Saferworld’s policy team. We are keen to hear from and work with other organisations that are working on peace and justice issues. For more information please contact wbennett@saferworld.org.uk.

“The concept of ‘justice’ must encompass notions that go far beyond the rule of law, and address people’s broader experiences of everyday injustice and exclusion, which are not only challenging on an individual basis, but also drivers of underdevelopment and violent conflict.”

Will Bennett