Negotiating the Peacebuilding Agenda: Social Problems and Post-Conflict Policymaking

This paper examines the inclusion and exclusion of policy issues in the peacebuilding agenda through a constructivist lens, providing a framework for analysing how social problems are ‘framed’ and ‘owned’ in post-conflict settings. It argues that policy issues become part of the agenda through the deliberate mobilization of a variety of both international and domestic actors and institutions over time. Empirically, the framework is applied to land policy in Côte d’Ivoire, a case that illustrates the fluid relationship between peacebuilding and development. The analysis reveals how land policy moved from being central to post-war reconstruction to being reframed within development and security paradigms, reflecting shifting donor priorities and domestic politics. These findings highlight the broader implications of peacebuilding as a contextually embedded, iterative process that reconfigures existing policy sectors. By focusing on the interplay between global and local dynamics of policymaking, this research contributes to a better understanding of the temporal and political mechanisms that shape peacebuilding interventions.