Peacekeeping and conflict resolution

This chapter focuses on the ability of UN peacekeepers to successfully settle civil conflicts and seeks to shed more light on three categories of outcomes that are often thought to be intricately linked to the concept of conflict resolution: conflict intensity, peace duration and conflict recurrence. First, we present a systematic summary of the impact of UN peace operations on these three dimensions and explain how and through which mechanisms peacekeepers can affect conflict intensity, peace duration and conflict recurrence. Then we critically examine whether thinking about conflict as something that can be resolved by decreasing fatality counts, prolonging post-conflict peace, or preventing renewed conflict risks constraining our understanding of peacekeeping effectiveness. We argue that what can at first sight be claimed as the resolution of a conflict can mean very different things empirically. In cases where we observe an absence of, or a decline in, violence, we can face problems of equifinality because different trajectories with different implications for conflict resolution might produce the same outcome.