The U.S Institute of Peace’s Center for Applied Conflict Transformation (ACT) is built on the premise that there are common tools and approaches to peacebuilding that are adaptive, but applicable to peacebuilding globally. We serve as the hub of the Institute’s common resources for governments, organizations, and individuals seeking to prevent, mitigate, and resolve violent conflict worldwide. ACT prioritizes evaluation and learning from our programs to adapt and improve our work. As of 2017, ACT is actively engaged in more than 40 fragile and conflict-affected countries around the world.

The Center leads the Institute’s long-standing engagements on:

  • Justice, security, rule of law: ACT’s Justice and Security Dialogue (JSD) program, which brings together police and local communities to build trust and facilitate collective problem-solving, is currently being implemented in several countries across West Africa, including Burkina Faso, Mali, Nigeria, Niger, Senegal, and Tunisia. USIP also spearheads the International Network to Promote the Rule of Law (INPROL), a global online community of practice, comprised of over 3,000 rule-of-law practitioners from 120 countries.
  • Inclusive societies – particularly engagement with religious actors and youth: ACT currently focuses on mapping of religious actors at the intersection of peace and conflict in Libya, Pakistan, and South Sudan. Across Africa and the Middle East, and now in Colombia, the Center’s Generation Change Fellows Program works to equip young peacebuilders with the skills needed to manage conflict nonviolently.

ACT houses and convenes USIP’s experts on current challenges to peace, including: 

  • Preventing electoral violence: ACT has played a pioneering role in broadening the understanding of election violence. In 2017, USIP published Electing Peace, a seminal research volume that examines the effectiveness of common practices to prevent election violence—paving the way for further research in Liberia and Kenya and evidence-based prevention in Pakistan, Burma and other USIP priority countries.
  • Addressing violent extremism: ACT leverages and integrates the learning on violent extremism from research and projects across the Institute, including those of the RESOLVE Network, which launched its first local observatory on conflict and extremism in Bangladesh in 2017.
  • Assessing the implications of resource scarcity: ACT views resource scarcity and abundance as a significant challenge to fragile and conflict-affected communities worldwide.

ACT continues to identify, design, and pilot the next generation of peacebuilding approaches and tools for effective negotiation, mediation, and dialogue; nonviolent movements; reconciliation; and promoting inclusive peace processes.

The Center brings strategic coherence and consistency to USIP’s core capabilities – research, grant-making, fellowships, publishing, education and training, and field practice – to maximize our impact.

USIP’s Global Campus

The Global Campus, part of the Academy, leverages the latest modern communication technologies to extend online education and training opportunities to individuals across the world. Now, from almost anywhere, professionals can increase their knowledge and skills to prevent violent and transform violent conflict through accessible, engaging online training opportunities.

USIP’s Conflict Management Training for Peacekeepers

We are excited to announce that USIP’s Conflict Management Training for Peacekeepers (CMTP) program training-of-trainers application (version Française) has been extended until August 9, 2020!

Since 2008, USIP has provided training on conflict management skills to more than 7,000 peacekeepers from 21 troop contributing countries (TCCs) deploying to 8 United Nations and African Union peacekeeping missions. The CMTP program provides a five-day training that strengthens the capacity of peacekeepers to protect civilians through the nonviolent resolution of conflicts. This training provides peacekeepers with knowledge and skills in the areas of conflict analysis, communication, negotiation, and mediation through a protection of civilian lens in order to improve their interactions with local populations and mission actors and more effectively carry out their mandate.

Additionally, the training equips peacekeepers with a range of skills and knowledge to strengthen their capacity to think deeply about culture, human rights, and gender. The Protecting Civilians through Conflict Transformation curriculum is rooted in principles of adult learning and thus builds on peacekeepers’ existing experiences and knowledge.

Given a recent revision of the training curriculum, the CMTP program is expanding its existing cadre of civilian trainers and mentors to deliver the Protecting Civilians through Conflict Transformation training and to mentor and coach TCC instructor cadres to deliver the training. You can find more details about, and submit your application for the program, here. For questions about the application or the process, please email Peacekeepertraining@usip.org.

Current Projects

Religion and Conflict Country Profiles

Religion and Conflict Country Profiles

While religion has not been a primary driver of conflict in Ukraine, its distinctive history and recent politicization have ensured that it remains an important aspect of the broader context surrounding the current war. Religion has shaped the formation of conflict narratives, as well as understandings and perceptions of the war within different communities. Misunderstanding and indifference to the role of religion in society can significantly exacerbate conflict dynamics, while understanding the peacebuilding potential of religious communities can shape interventions and create opportunities for future stability and social cohesion.

Religion

Religious Literacy and Peacebuilding

Religious Literacy and Peacebuilding

Peacebuilders and policymakers are engaged and involved with religious actors in almost every aspect of their work. Even where religion is not an explicit presence, it is a cultural undercurrent that is immutably present — and one that is often vastly underestimated by policymakers. As USIP’s three decades of experience working at the intersection of religion, peace and conflict has shown, the teachings of various religious traditions, the lived experience of those who practice them and the knowledge of how to engage with people of faith are all essential elements of effective peacebuilding.

Religion

Religious Women Negotiating on the Frontlines

Religious Women Negotiating on the Frontlines

In recent years, peace processes — such as the track 2 intra-Afghan negotiations — have shown that on both a moral and practical level, women’s inclusion is essential. Women’s involvement in peace processes increases their likelihood of success and longevity and can increase legitimacy. While more literature on women contributing to mediation and negotiation efforts is slowly being produced, little attention is currently being paid to the already existing work of women who employ their faith and mobilize religious resources for peacebuilding.

GenderReligion

Civic Mobilization in Civil Resistance Transitions Dataset

Civic Mobilization in Civil Resistance Transitions Dataset

Since January 2021, USIP has been collecting data on the frequency and characteristics of civic mobilization in 83 political transitions initiated through civil resistance from 1945 to the present to help understand when challenges to democratic progress have been successfully overcome and provide practical lessons learned for activists, policymakers and academics interested in nonviolent action and democratization.

Conflict Analysis & PreventionDemocracy & GovernanceNonviolent Action

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Featured Publications

Vice President Harris Helps Focus on Ghana, West Africa

Vice President Harris Helps Focus on Ghana, West Africa

Thursday, March 30, 2023

By: Palwasha L. Kakar;  Katherine G. Todd

Vice President Kamala Harris’ choice of Ghana this week as the place to launch her show of U.S. commitment to a new partnership with Africa can be no surprise. Ghana is one of Africa’s more established democracies and is at the center of the coastal West Africa region that the United States has targeted for focused efforts to prevent instability and the spread of extremism that is driving insurgencies in the neighboring Sahel region. As Ghana confronts that threat, notably in its vulnerable north, its community and civil society groups form an essential resource that partners should support.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

Fragility & ResilienceReligion

Before the Next Shock, the World Needs a ‘Marshall Plan’ for Food Insecurity

Before the Next Shock, the World Needs a ‘Marshall Plan’ for Food Insecurity

Tuesday, March 14, 2023

By: Adam Gallagher;  Arif Husain, Ph.D.

In recent years, the world has seen a host of interconnected challenges, with a crisis in one part of the world setting off epiphenomenal emergencies elsewhere. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine cut off many countries from their main supply of wheat and coarse grains, disrupting global food supply chains that were already stressed by the COVID pandemic. This led to further food insecurity in regions of the world, like East Africa, that were already dealing with starvation and malnutrition due, in part, to severe drought brought on by climate change.

Type: Analysis and Commentary

EconomicsGlobal Policy

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