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Institutional Links
Security System Reform and Rule of Law
The development of an effective and accountable security system and an impartial and accessible justice system in fragile states are critical conditions for promoting good governance and rule of law, upholding human rights, mitigating violence, and preventing impunity.
To be sustainable, security system reform (SSR) must be based on the principles of accountability, transparency, equality, civilian protection, democratic norms and respect for human rights. This suggests that SSR involves long-term investments that must figure prominently in peace operation mandates, and in the longer-term peacebuilding strategies that continue well after the departure of the initial peace operation.
While recent UN peace operation missions have all, to some measure, included security system components, such as the reform of, the military and police, equally critical elements of security system reform, especially justice and corrections, are not consistently addressed nor adequately resourced. In addition, few mission mandates make specific mention of governance-related security system activities designed to strengthen civilian control and accountability, focus on the impact of security sector reform on women and children, or promote gender equality within security system reform.
The international community has learned the hard way that it makes little sense to reform the military sector if governance structures are insufficiently robust to sustain control over the armed forces. Similarly, the professionalization of the police sector is ineffectual if the prosecutorial and judicial sector cannot absorb and process cases in a timely manner. Nowhere has this been in greater evidence than in Haiti, where inadequate security system reform has contributed to the repeated cycle of violence, corruption and insecurity.
Advancing SSR Policy
Canada promotes a coherent and comprehensive approach to security system reform, which recognizes the interconnectedness of the military, policing, justice, corrections, border management, and customs sectors, and the need to enhance civilian and parliamentary oversight of all the security system.
DFAIT is focussing its efforts on supporting policy development in this field, with a particular emphasis on integrating comprehensive and effective security system reform into peace operation mission planning processes, post-conflict needs assessments and supporting the transition process to partner-led initiatives when peace operations wind down.
At the UN, Canada has urged the Security Council to systematically include all elements of security system reform within integrated mission mandates, including justice reform and oversight bodies. Canada welcomes recent calls by the Security Council, the General Assembly and UN member states to enhance policy coherence in the field and looks forward to the forthcoming report by the UN Secretary-General on Security Sector Reform.
In addition, Canada has supported the International Center for Transitional Justice which promotes a justice-sensitive approach to security system reform, thus helping to better understand the linkages between transitional justice mechanisms and SSR. This includes the development of guidelines for the census and identification of security personnel which are already being used by Governments and international organizations in post-conflict states to enhance public accountability and good governance in the security sector.
Building Capacity
DFAIT contributes to capacity building and reform of countries’ justice systems to build strong, impartial and accountable legal frameworks that include protections for human rights. In the case of massive human rights abuses, capacity building initiatives may also involve supporting appropriate transitional justice mechanisms that combat impunity and, in turn, promote accountability.
Through the Human Security Program, DFAIT has funded a range of security system reform initiatives, from providing investigative techniques and forensic training for police in Guatemala, to supporting multicultural and human rights-focussed reforms of Bolivia’s security sector.
DFAIT has supported a joint DPKO-UNDP initiative, implemented by the Geneva Centre for Democratic Control of Armed Forces (DCAF) on UN SSR capacities in integrated missions. Recommendations arising from this research project are expected to feed into the UN Secretary General’s Report on SSR. In addition, seminars and roundtables have been sponsored, and will continue to be sponsored, to stimulate discussions at the national and regional level on SSR that will provide ideas for the UN Secretary General’s Report on SSR.
The Department focuses its efforts on building on the existing resources and capacities that are required to affect good governance in fragile states by supporting a broad range of actors including various government ministries, legislators, judicial officers, legal educators, truth commissioners, civil society organizations, and individuals, including women and minorities.
For example, in 2005, DFAIT supported the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), World Vision and the International Commission of Jurists in their efforts to build judicial capacity in Sudan through training, educational seminars, establishment of various legal centres, strengthening of traditional conflict resolution systems, and providing advice on judicial reform.
Currently, in Afghanistan and Haiti, Canada is working to build the capacity of local government and security sector institutions through the deployment of Canadian policing and corrections experts.
