The politics of environmental peacebuilding: global agendas, advocacy networks, and domestic policy arenas

This article examines how environmental conflict narratives emerge and are used in peacebuilding policies. It advocates for a multi-level perspective that systematically connects global intervention agendas to political struggles in domestic policy arenas. Through a comparative analysis of four case studies—Liberia, Colombia, Côte d’Ivoire, and Lebanon—it investigates how environmental considerations are framed as security issues and incorporated into peacebuilding agendas. It explores how actors construct causal stories linking environmental issues to conflict, and how these narratives shape policy design, implementation, and resistance to change. It highlights how environmental conflict narratives are shaped by security concerns and donor-recipient relationships. While such narratives can support policy change by providing advocacy coalitions with a platform, their effects vary significantly depending on the domestic political context. This article contributes to environmental peacebuilding research by highlighting the strategic and contested nature of how environmental concerns enter peacebuilding discourse and practice.