Strengthening institutional capability to adopt conflict-sensitive approaches: five lessons from the Conflict Sensitivity Resource Facility in South Sudan

There is growing recognition of the interaction between aid and the drivers of conflict. In South Sudan, the scale and nature of this international assistance make it inevitable that aid will affect the economic, social and political drivers of conflict for better or worse. This has led to increased interest in and support for promoting more conflict-sensitive approaches to the design, delivery and management of aid.

This paper explores the challenges associated with promoting more conflict-sensitive approaches in humanitarian situations such as South Sudan. It draws on the experience implementing the pilot phase of the Conflict Sensitivity Resource Facility (CSRF) in South Sudan between 2016 and 2018, and presents five lessons to inform future initiatives by donors and other aid organisations. It emphasises that building organisations’ capacity to adopt conflict-sensitive approaches must involve systemic organisational change that goes beyond commissioning context analysis, ad hoc training and toolkits.

Read or download the report on the CSRF Research Repository here.

Read CSRF’s related blogs on capacity building – such as on turning ‘local knowledge’ into ‘collective intelligence’ and the meaning of ‘capacity’ and the localisation agenda.

The CSRF pilot phase was implemented by a consortium of NGOs including Saferworld, swisspeace, and CDA and funded by the British, Canadian, Dutch and Swiss Donor Missions in South Sudan. The current phase is due to run until December 2023.