The Pro-ARIDES Program has adopted a conflict-sensitive approach, aiming to guide implementing actors in anticipating (during planning) and observing (during monitoring and evaluation) the interactions between the program’s interventions and the conflict context. This involves assessing both the impact of conflicts on the interventions and the impact of the interventions on conflicts. The goal is to determine adaptation measures that prevent exacerbating divisions (following a “do no harm” approach) while maximizing efforts to strengthen social cohesion and peace within the program’s mandate. Understanding the local context to identify potential social and political divisions that may lead to conflict is crucial, while also being mindful of the social bonds that can mitigate conflicts and reinforce social cohesion.
To ensure conflict sensitivity in all interventions and at all levels of Pro-ARIDES, a conflict sensitivity analysis study was conducted in the program’s intervention areas in Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger.
The specific objectives of this study were to: (i) understand the conflict context in which the program is implemented, (ii) examine how the program might interact with this conflict context, and (iii) develop or adapt program strategies/activities based on an analysis of the context and the interactions between the program and the conflict environment.
The investigation followed a participatory, analytical, retrospective, and forward-looking approach, structured into three data collection phases.
The first phase was a documentary review of key prior studies or reports on conflict dynamics, as well as factors of vulnerability and community resilience within the Pro-ARIDES intervention areas.
The second phase involved organizing a conflict sensitivity analysis workshop for the program’s intervention areas (Burkina Faso, Mali, and Niger) with all stakeholders: implementation partners, national and decentralized technical services, administrative authorities, program beneficiaries (including youth and women), international NGOs working in conflict sensitivity, and conflict management structures in the program’s intervention zones.
Workshops were held in each implementation country, providing an opportunity to equip participants with concepts related to conflict sensitivity, such as: What is a conflict? Types of conflicts, violence and non-violence, why conflict-sensitive program management is important, how conflict and peace sensitivity is integrated into interventions, and an explanation of the conflict sensitivity evaluation tool used to identify capacity-building needs.
The third phase involved conducting interviews with resource persons from international organizations operating in the same intervention zones as Pro-ARIDES and those managing conflict-sensitive programs/projects.