What’s the difference between peacebuilding and peacekeeping?
Have you ever asked yourself, what’s the difference between peacebuilding and peacekeeping? Although their objectives overlap, the key message is that peacekeeping is about ending the violence by keeping the protagonists apart using military force. Peacebuilding brings protagonists together to identify and address the root causes of the conflict.
Peacekeeping is often associated with UN Peacekeepers, whose role is to maintain peace during and after a conflict. Their role involves providing temporary services such as security and administration. Traditionally peacebuilding has also been practiced in areas that are emerging from conflict, but technically it could be practiced anywhere.
To oversimplify this question, you could say that peacekeeping involves entering areas in conflict and ending it, whereas peacebuilding involves encouraging measures that prevent conflict before it starts.
Moreover, peacebuilding is a more long-term and collaborative process focused on helping people build peace in their own countries. Where peacekeeping is a placeholder, peacebuilding aims to tackle the root causes of conflict before they occur, and its success is measured in the long term. Peacebuilding is a collaborative process focused on local people building peace in their own countries.
