CAF25 Background Paper: Leveraging new technologies to enhance effectiveness and efficiency of peace operations

Emerging technologies offer the promise of transformative change to United Nations (UN) peace operations at a time when cost-cutting is shrinking mission footprints. These same technologies will become central factors in the legitimacy, credibility and trust missions hope to enjoy.

This paper highlights how the Review on the Future of All Forms of UN Peace Operations must present a vision for technology in peace operations that both leverages its potential and charts a course for missions’ championing of evolving normative and policy standards for its responsible use. Decisions around data governance, partnerships and digital inclusion will be core determinants of how peace operations act and are perceived to act, in the conflicts of the future.

This paper is co-authored by: Samiuel Christian Atuahene who is a research scientist and data strategist specializing in advanced analytics, artificial intelligence and migration-security studies, CSIR – Institute of Industrial Research and Senior Consultant for the Kofi Annan International Peace-Keeping Training Centre and; Dirk Druet who is a non-resident Fellow at the International Peace Institute and an Adjunct Professor at the Max Bell School for Public Policy at McGill University.