Interpeace Conflict Mapping in the FCDC+3 region Jobs in Kenya

Interpeace Conflict Mapping in the FCDC+3 region Jobs in Kenya

Interpeace is an international organization for peacebuilding. With over 25 years of experience, it has implemented a broad range of peacebuilding programmes in Africa, the Middle East, Asia, Europe, and Latin America. Interpeace tailors its approach to each society and ensures that its work is locally designed and driven.

Through local partners and its own local teams, it jointly develops peacebuilding programmes based on extensive consultation and research. Interpeace helps establish processes of change that promote sustainable peace, social cohesion, and resilience.

The organization’s work is designed to connect and promote understanding between local communities, civil society, governments, and the international community. Interpeace also assists the international community – especially the United Nations – to play a more effective role in peacebuilding, based on Interpeace’s expertise in field-based work at grassroots level.

Interpeace achieves this primarily by contributing innovative thought leadership and fresh insights to contemporary peacebuilding policy. It also assists the international community through ‘peace responsiveness’ work, in which Interpeace provides advice and practical support to other international organizations (especially those in the security, development, and humanitarian aid sectors), enabling them to adapt their work systemically to simultaneously address conflict dynamics and strengthen peace dynamics.

Interpeace is headquartered in Geneva, Switzerland, and has offices around the world. For more information about Interpeace, please visit www.interpeace.org

Background

Interpeace has been active in Kenya since 2014, when it signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the National Cohesion and Integration Commission (NCIC); a government agency mandated to foster lasting peace and cohesion between Kenya’s various ethnic communities. This partnership was first put into practice in Mandera County, achieving significant peace gains since 2016.

NCIC and Interpeace interventions succeeded in largely stopping cyclical communal violence and in establishing local peacebuilding infrastructures that today are widely able to manage intermittent clashes. Given this track-record, NCIC recommended in the 2018 report “Footprints for Peace” to adopt the approach from Mandera County as a model for locally owned and locally driven peacebuilding architectures in all the 47 counties of Kenya.

NCIC and Interpeace therefore scaled up their activities to Wajir County and the North Rift (a region spanning the county borders of Turkana, West Pokot, Elgeyo Marakwet, Baringo and Samburu) in 2019 and further expanded to the counties of Laikipia and Marsabit in 2022.

Over the course of Interpeace’s expansion into Marsabit County, the programme identified the need to develop a more comprehensive understanding of its conflict dynamics, and particularly the ways these are connected to broader conflict systems in the wider region. Indeed, Marsabit County is situated at the centre of various conflict systems spanning Northern Kenya.

The conflicts in Marsabit are directly embedded in the wider Marsabit-Isiolo corridor that runs southwards from Marsabit and includes parts of Laikipia, Samburu and Isiolo counties.

However, it is also connected to North-Eastern Kenya’s conflicts by virtue of its border to Wajir, as well as the wider North Rift region, given the strong linkages between Marsabit and Samburu. Mapping out the various conflict corridors in Northern Kenya, identifying the ways in which these are interconnected, and analysing the relations between key actors in each corridor, will therefore be instrumental in guiding peacebuilding interventions.

Service or Assignment Description and Objective(s)
Interpeace aims to engage a supplier with extensive experience working on conflict mapping and geospatial analysis to conduct a conflict mapping covering the Frontier Counties Development Council (FCDC) region, as well as Baringo, Elgeyo-Marakwet and Laikipia (FCDC+3). Through this product, Interpeace aims to generate a comprehensive overview of the key conflict corridors, hotspots and actors across the FCDC+3 region, and the ways they are connected to one another and to dynamics in bordering countries.

More specifically, the objectives of the assignment are the following:

To map out key conflict corridors in the FCDC+3 region and visualize interconnections, including those related to cross-border dynamics.

To map out key conflict belts and identify relevant conflict hotspots, conflict parties and conflict drivers/history for each conflict corridor.

To map out key actors for each corridor, identifying opinion

leaders and peace responders and analysing their interests, level of influence and networks.

The findings of the mapping exercise are intended to guide Interpeace’s programmatic work in Kenya, amongst others informing the definition of strategic locations for peace structures or the development of engagement strategies with key conflict actors.

Activities, Deliverables and Timeframe

The consultant will work under the direct supervision of the Interpeace Kenya Country Representative, with support from the Kenya Senior Programme Manager, to deliver several activities that will achieve the above objectives. Provisional activities are outlined below, although these may be reviewed jointly by Interpeace and the supplier.

Production of research plan

Based on initial engagements with the Interpeace Kenya programme, the supplier will develop a research plan that will guide the subsequent research process. The research plan will outline methods used for data collection and data analysis, identify locations for data collection, and develop a timeline for the creation of the report. The research plan will also specify in more detail the components and structure of the report. Interactive formats may be considered in consultation with Interpeace.

Data collection

The supplier will conduct a desk review of existing literature and relevant initiatives to inform subsequent data collection. With the support of the Interpeace Kenya programme, the supplier is further expected to conduct field research in the FCDC+3 region, including interviews with key stakeholders in relevant government institutions and communities. Further interviews with key stakeholders will be conducted virtually and/or in Nairobi.

Report writing and validation

Following data collection, the supplier will produce a draft report that should include information on the following areas:

Identification of key conflict corridors and their interconnection (including analysis of cross-border linkages), including by means of a geospatial map.

Identification of key conflict belts in each corridor, as well as conflict hotspots, key conflict drivers and history for each conflict belt, including by means of geospatial maps.

Identification of key conflict and peace actors, and network analysis of relations between those actors.

Upon completion of the draft report, the supplier will facilitate a one-day validation workshop with the Interpeace Kenya programme, its partners and, potentially, other stakeholders to review and refine the report. The supplier will then incorporate comments and contributions from participants and develop the final report.

Deliverables Deadlines

The assignment is expected to begin on 1 July 2023 and is estimated to take the consultant approximately 20 days (to be negotiated). Final deliverables will need to be submitted by 30 September 2023.

Qualifications

The supplier, and the attached individuals delivering the work, are expected to have the following qualifications:

A minimum of 10 years of experience in conflict analysis, conflict mapping and peacebuilding.

Demonstrated knowledge and proven track-record in geospatial analysis.

Strong research and report writing skills with demonstrated track-record in drafting high-quality publications in English language.

Strong contextual knowledge of conflict and socio-political dynamics in Northern Kenya. Demonstrated networks with peace actors in the FCDC region is an asset.

Willingness and ability to various locations in Northern Kenya.

Knowledge of community languages of Northern Kenya is desirable.

How to Apply

Please submit a complete Expression of Interest to recruitment-eca@interpeace.org with the subject line “Conflict Mapping Kenya” by 19 June 2023 including:

CVs of persons undertaking the work, including three references.

Two writing samples of previous similar work.

Technical and financial proposal (max. 2 pages), containing a proposed daily rate and total fee in USD (excluding travel-related costs during the assignment). The cost of preparing an application and negotiating a contract, including any related travel, is not reimbursable nor can it be included as a direct cost of the assignment.

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