Sarah Cechvala argues that regardless of whether "peacebuilding actor" is an apt label for private sector companies, efforts to involve companies in a peacebuilding agenda will be far more effective if they account for the fact that, in almost every way, companies are different from peacebuilding actors. Continue reading for some of the more critical differences to keep in mind as policymakers try to involve companies in peacebuilding agendas.
American poet James Whitcomb Riley once wrote, "when I see a bird that walks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, then I call that bird a duck." Since Riley penned those words, the "duck test" has become a folksy aphorism about the importance of abductive reasoning, suggesting that things often are exactly as they appear.
If we apply the "duck test" to current international policy discussions that label private sector companies as "peacebuilding actors," they do not fare particularly well. Various multi-actor initiatives such as the Sustainable Development Goals, the post-Busan process, the UN Global Compact, and others, have asserted the "peacebuilder" label onto companies. All of these initiatives posit a central role for private sector actors in advancing peace. In fairness, there are clearly cases in which companies impact peace and conflict. But characterizing companies as "peace actors" overlooks all of the ways in which private sector companies are unlike established peacebuilding actors. They don't walk like ducks, or quack like ducks. What sense does it make to call them "ducks"?
Companies operate for the purpose of maximizing profits for their shareholders. Companies set up shop in fragile and conflict-affected environments only if they think that they can generate profits there. If feasibility studies suggest that they cannot, then they will not work in those environments. In this respect, they are dissimilar to established peacebuilding actors (such as various UN agencies, humanitarian organizations, and peacebuilding NGOs), which work in these contexts precisely because they are fragile and conflict-affected.
Companies are highly specialized entities, tailor-made to execute particular processes. In the extractive industries, for instance, companies are extremely good at extracting resources from the ground and bringing them to market. Staff are recruited for this purpose, and internal processes are designed with it in mind. Such companies are far more likely to employ engineers and lawyers than mediators or conflict resolution and community development experts. And staff KPIs (key performance indicators) are designed to encourage shorter timelines and greater profits, rather than social good.
Much of the work that companies do to manage their impacts on the wider society relates to gaining or maintaining a "social license to operate" – the approval of communities for the company's presence, resulting from good impacts outweighing bad ones. The idea of the social license represents a minimum threshold for social performance that forestalls demonstrations, roadblocks, protests, or other obstructive action. Unlike peacebuilders, in other words, extractive companies strategize to reduce harm to (or below) a minimum acceptable level, rather than to build peace.
Few, if any, companies see themselves as peace actors. When asked about peace, they often take the view that peace belongs to the "political" sphere and is therefore outside the remit of corporate activities. Time and time again, we hear companies assert that when it comes to politics, "we are neutral" or "we want to remain below the radar [in politics]." Stability, on the other hand, implies a predictable operating environment. Companies have a strong interest in this, and it is a more realistic framing of what companies might deliberately pursue in political arenas.
The accountability of companies is to shareholders and corporate boards, who are primarily concerned with companies' ability to maximize their return on investment (ROI). This, in turn, is the primary driver of corporate decision-making. Shareholders and boards, however, are almost always physically removed from the operational context and may know very little about it. In this way, companies are different from established peacebuilding organizations that are in many cases committed to social missions or donor or policymakers and logframes in which peace outcomes are the primary purpose of funded activities.
Evidence from case studies developed as part of CDA's Business and Peace Project suggest that, when companies do involve themselves in efforts to resolve conflicts, they tend to be motivated by a need to solve a concrete business problem (such as access to a resource). These rare cases arise when companies conclude that major challenges to their business approaches stem from the existence of conflict or the absence of peace. Unlike peacebuilding actors, however, companies rarely conduct conflict analysis or assessments to understand how their activities interact with key drivers of conflict.
Discussions about the role of the private sector in peacebuilding seem to gain greater and greater momentum without the benefit of these fundamental insights. Expectations that would be reasonable for established peacebuilding actors are simply transposed onto private sector companies. However they choose to label the private sector, policy initiatives related to business roles in peace need to be grounded in the practical realities of how, why, and by what means companies operate, and include the perspectives of companies themselves.
If it doesn't walk like a duck, swim like a duck, and quack like a duck, then it's not a duck, no matter what you call it.
This post is part of CDA Collaborative Learning Projects' Business and Peace blog series. In partnership with the Peace Research Institute Oslo and the Africa Centre for Dispute Settlement, CDA is undertaking a collaborative learning project on the topic of business and peace. The project seeks to enhance the evidence base on the topic in order to better understand how, why, and through what means private sector companies might be able to impact peace and conflict dynamics. Over the next several months, preliminary findings and other work products from this project will be posted here on CDA's website. Click here to subscribe to project updates.
Real ducky meets rubber ducky, too sweet!
Oil and gas fields in Neuquén, Argentina. Credit: Sarah Cechvala, February 2015.
Sarah Cechvala is a Senior Program Manager at CDA Collaborative Learning Projects. She has worked with companies in the Oil and Gas and Agribusiness sectors in a range of countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. Her areas of expertise are corporate social impacts, conflict sensitive business, responsible business practice, and aid accountability and feedback loops. She currently manages CDA's work on Business and Peace and has facilitated collaborative learning processes and field research in Africa, Asia, and Latin America. Recently, she led a case study on the topic of the private sector and peacebuilding in the Autonomous Region of Muslim Mindanao in the Philippines (case study is forthcoming). She holds an MA from Georgetown University and a BA from Boston University.
In operative terms, what will be the difference between efforts to bring peace to efforts to bring stability to a particular region? And lets assume that businesses will not look for stability by retorting to military solutions?
Can you give an example of one indicator of stability and one of peace?
Thank you for your inquiry! Your question raises the important distinction between stability and peace. In general, contexts that are peaceful tend to be stable, but stable contexts are not necessarily peaceful. Stability is often described in terms of the absence of disruptive behavior or violence, which can be achieved through various means including the suppression of dissent or grievances, rather than their constructive management. Peace, on the other hand, can be gained through mitigating or altering key drivers of the conflict.
In operative terms, we have seen companies achieve stability by paying illegal armed groups to allow the company to operate without disruption (which could finance or sustain conflict). We have also seen companies achieve stability by hiring local stakeholders who were members of armed militias. This example resulted in decreased violence and disruptive activities in the company's area of operations (described in our forthcoming Business and Peace Case Study in the Philippines). Corporate impacts on peace involve efforts on the part of the company to resolve the grievances that drive conflict. An excellent, if complex, example of this is the case of Colombian company ISAGEN in Tolima Department (as seen in our Spanish language case study, an English translation of which is forthcoming).
That said, indicators of both stability and peace are context-specific. It might be useful for you to take a look at our criteria for peacebuilding effectiveness, which offers some macro-level benchmarks for effective peacebuilding. These building blocks for peacebuilding effectiveness have emerged from over 15-years of our collective experience working on the topic of effective peacebuilding – https://www.cdacollaborative.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Reflecting-on-Peace-Practice-RPP-Basics-A-Resource-Manual.pdf.