The Institute for Integrated Transitions (IFIT) is pleased to announce Partial Agreeements: The Functional Alternative to All-Encompassing Settlements, the latest webinar within our 10 Peacebuilding Innovations series.
In situations of entrenched conflict, it is common to seek comprehensive rather than limited deals when negotiating. However, the default to all-encompassing goals can be counterproductive since local, regional and global conditions seldom will be propitious to achieving them. An approach of multiple ‘partial agreements’ to ‘shrink the conflict’, instead of seeking its comprehensive end, may sometimes be the wiser choice.
In this webinar, IFIT experts will examine the potential advantages and risks of partial agreements within the context of armed or political conflicts, as well as the range of issues that might be suitable for such agreements.
Date: Wednesday, April 19 from 4:00pm-4:30pm Barcelona time
Registration: Please click here to receive the Zoom link to be able to watch the webinar.
10 Peacebuilding Innovations is a year-long series of events and initiatives to mark IFIT’s 10th anniversary. The events are led by diverse experts belonging to IFIT’s staff, brain trusts, practice groups, and governance bodies. Each event lasts 30 minutes and is held via Zoom.
The Institute for Integrated Transitions (IFIT) is pleased to announce Negotiating with Violent Criminal Groups: Lessons and Guidelines from Global Practice, the latest webinar within our 10 Peacebuilding Innovations series.
Negotiations with violent criminal groups – such as mafias, cartels, gangs and pirates – occur more often than imagined. Yet, most of the attempts are unknown, whether because they were secretly conducted, publicly denied, or both.
In this webinar, IFIT’s Executive Director will discuss key findings from IFIT’s ground-breaking global study of the subject. The study represents the most diverse set of negotiations with violent criminal groups ever examined in one place.
Date: Thursday, March 30 from 4:00pm-4:30pm Barcelona time
Registration: Please click here to receive the Zoom link to be able to watch the webinar.
10 Peacebuilding Innovations is a year-long series of events and initiatives to mark IFIT’s 10th anniversary. The events are led by diverse experts belonging to IFIT’s staff, brain trusts, practice groups, and governance bodies. Each event lasts 30 minutes and is held via Zoom.
The Institute for Integrated Transitions (IFIT) deeply regrets to inform friends, colleagues, and partners of the tragic passing of Dr. Bassma Kodmani earlier today. The news is shared with a profound sense of loss and sorrow.
Bassma was not only a respected intellectual, academic, Middle East expert and women’s rights advocate, but also a renowned defender of a peaceful and democratic Syria.
At IFIT, she served with great dedication and honour for many years, both as a member of our International Advisory Council and as one of the founders of the Syria Resource Group.
The IFIT community extends its deepest condolences to Bassma’s family and friends, the members of the Syria Resource Group and all Syrians for this profound loss.
The Institute for Integrated Transitions (IFIT) is pleased to announce Building the International Law of Peace Negotiation, the third webinar within our year-long 10 Peacebuilding Innovations series.
The Peace Treaty Initiative is a major global undertaking that aims to establish a purpose-built multilateral treaty to help incentivise warring parties to choose the pathway of negotiation in order to prevent internal armed conflicts in the first place and to end them once underway. In this webinar, our expert panellists will discuss the origins and concepts underlying the initiative; explain how the treaty could help prevent and resolve armed conflicts in a more systemic manner; and describe the goals and outcomes of the ongoing global consultation process.
Date: Tuesday, December 6 from 4:00pm-4:30pm Barcelona time
Registration: Please click here to receive the Zoom link to be able to watch the webinar.
Panellists: Sarah Nouwen and Hesham Youssef, members of the Expert Advisory Group, Peace Treaty Initiative
10 Peacebuilding Innovations is a year-long series of events and initiatives to mark IFIT’s 10th anniversary. The events are led by diverse experts belonging to IFIT’s staff, brain trusts, practice groups, and governance bodies. Each event lasts 30 minutes and is held via Zoom.
The Institute for Integrated Transitions (IFIT) is pleased to announce The Initiative on Apex Court Appointments – Filling the Gap in Guiding Principles, the second webinar within our year-long 10 Peacebuilding Innovations series.
An apex court is the highest judicial body on constitutional matters in a country, often dealing with politically-charged cases that have foundational consequences for democracy and the rule of law. In this webinar, we will examine key structural characteristics and roles played by apex courts in a democratic society and explain how IFIT’s Initiative on Apex Court Appointments is filling the current gap in global guidelines and criteria for the selection and appointment of judges to these unique courts.
Date: Thursday, September 8 from 4:30pm-5:00pm Barcelona time
Registration: Please click here to register and receive the Zoom link.
Sujit Choudhry, Co-Convenor – Initiative on Apex Court Appointments
Kate O’Regan, High-Level Advisory Panel member – Initiative on Apex Court Appointments
10 Peacebuilding Innovations is a year-long series of events and initiatives to mark IFIT’s 10th anniversary. The events are led by diverse experts belonging to IFIT’s staff, brain trusts, practice groups, and governance bodies. Each event lasts 30 minutes and is held via Zoom.
Philanthropic support or annual sponsorship of IFIT’s short and long-term growth – expanding its local, regional and global impact – is an investment in advancing peace, justice and security for all.
As long as human conflict exists, IFIT will have a substantive role to play. The success of peaceful transitions requires continued presence in volatile regions and countries before, during and after peace and political settlements have run their course.
IFIT helps usher in negotiation and transition processes that are more inclusive, resourceful, evidence-informed and collaborative. Ensuring IFIT’s continued leadership in this field will generate reforms to, and eventually bring about the evolution of, traditional peacebuilding techniques which are often fragmented or fall short of aspirations.
IFIT brings together under one roof the best of theory and practice in relation to successful negotiations and transitions out of conflict or authoritarian rule.
We hope this case for support offers the starting point for a deeper conversation regarding how we can work together to move current practice away from fragmented interventions and towards more integrated solutions to strengthen peace, democracy, and human rights.
To discuss your partnership with IFIT please contact Adriana Brassart, IFIT’s External Relations Manager, at [email protected].
IFIT’s Distinguishing Features
IFIT’s uniqueness lies in the following combination of factors:
Expertise that covers both negotiation and transition processes, whether out of violent conflict or authoritarian rule.
An emphasis on promoting and harnessing local leadership, local expertise, and local action to advance local solutions.
An integrated methodology that ensures local partners have easy and organised access to leading global experts on critical policy dimensions of successful negotiation and transition.
A focus on long-term relationship building and systemic change.
A philosophy of dialogue and confidential engagement with leaders of all sides in any dispute or conflict.
A focus on doing gap-filling policy research on controversial subjects.
A highly cost-efficient and sustainable business model.
Picture: Moises Saman/Magnum Photos
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The Institute for Integrated Transitions (IFIT) is pleased to announce Locally-Led Peacebuilding: The IFIT Brain Trust Model, the first online event to be held as part of our new 10 Peacebuilding Innovations series.
This event brings together three recognised local leaders from Nigeria, Syria, and Venezuela who will share their first-hand lessons in bridging elite and community-level processes of dialogue and peacebuilding. The event will include discussion of the critical – but often overlooked – role played by local go-between peacebuilders who “lead from the middle”.
Date: Thursday, July 28 at 4pm Barcelona time
Registration: Please click here to register and receive the Zoom link.
10 Peacebuilding Innovations is a year-long series of events and initiatives to mark IFIT’s 10th anniversary. The events are led by diverse experts belonging to IFIT’s staff, brain trusts, practice groups, and governance bodies. Each event lasts 30 minutes and is held via Zoom.
The Institute for Integrated Transitions (IFIT) is delighted to announce that Professor E. Gyimah-Boadi will serve as the new President of the organisation’s Board of Directors.
“It is an honour to assume this position and I do so in a spirit of humility and deep admiration for the important global work of IFIT in supporting inclusive negotiations and transitions,” Professor Gyimah-Boadi said.
Professor Gyimah-Boadi is co-founder and Board chair of Afrobarometer, a global reference for high-quality data and analysis on African democracy, governance, economy, and society; co-founder and former executive director of the Ghana Center for Democratic Development; member of the editorial board of the Journal of Democracy; and author and publisher of over a dozen books and monographs. A former professor in the Department of Political Science at the University of Ghana, Legon, with previous faculty positions at various universities in the United States, he is the recipient of a myriad of international awards including the 2017 Martin Luther King, Jr. Award for Peace and Social Justice and the African Studies Association’s 2018 Distinguished Africanist Award. He was recently named as one of the “100 Most Influential Africans″ by New African Magazine.
Professor Gyimah-Boadi’s appointment comes in the wake of the untimely death of IFIT’s former Board President, David Gardner, who served with distinction for many years.
Board Vice President Leslie Vinjamuri and Board Secretary Jon Greenwald said, “Professor Gyimah-Boadi’s appointment is tremendous news. We very much look forward to working with him as he steers IFIT along its remarkable course.”
The latest in a series of consultation sessions, the International Law Workshop aims to promote reflective discussion on key questions of international law and policy embedded in the indicative text of the proposed treaty.
On Wednesday, May 9th 2022, the IFIT Syria Resource Group (SRG) participated in a panel discussion held as part of the Brussels VI Conference´s Day of Dialogue. In the session Giving Voices to Syrians, Sawsan Abou Zainedin, co-coordinator of the SRG, called for the international community to rethink its approach to providing support to Syria, in order to ensure an effective and sustainable response that meets the minimum needs of the Syrian people and facilitates communities to lead their own recovery.
Representing a coalition of 13 Syrian civil society platforms, Ms. Abou Zainedin urged attendees – who included ministers, policy-makers, donors, international organisations, and other stakeholders – to shift their focus towards more integrated and consistent policies which are guided by the key principles of human rights and sustainable peace.
The intervention served to reiterate the conclusions and recommendations that emerged from an earlier event, Towards More Principled International Support: A Dialogue between Syrians and the International Community, held independently by the SRG and the Syrian civil society coalition at the end of March. In this forum, the coalition presented its vision for international donor support of the Syrian population, focusing on how to achieve more integrated and consistent policies that would support Syrian communities, but without consolidating the war economy; worsening the divisions between different regions in Syria; planting seeds for new conflicts; contributing to more human rights violations; or empowering certain segments of the Syrian population at the expense of others.
