Administrative Theory & Praxis

ISSN: 1084-1806 (Print) 1949-0461 (Online) Journal homepage: www.tandfonline.com/journals/madt20

Positive Peace and the Methodology of Costing

Peacebuilding Needs: The Case of Burundi

Abu Bakarr Bah & Nikolas Emmanuel

To cite this article: Abu Bakarr Bah & Nikolas Emmanuel (2020) Positive Peace and the
Methodology of Costing Peacebuilding Needs: The Case of Burundi, Administrative Theory &
Praxis, 42:3, 299-318, DOI: 10.1080/10841806.2019.1634403

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Administrative Theory & Praxis, 42: 299–318, 2020
Copyright # 2019 Public Administration Theory Network
ISSN: 1084-1806 print/1949-0461 online
DOI: 10.1080/10841806.2019.1634403

Positive Peace and the Methodology of Costing

Peacebuilding Needs: The Case of Burundi
Abu Bakarr Bah
Northern Illinois University

Nikolas Emmanuel
Soka University of Japan

Studies on conflict and social justice issues are increasingly focusing on positive peace instead
of violence itself. Accordingly, a key challenge facing the international community in promoting
positive peace is the cost of peacebuilding needs. This is a particularly difficult issue for the
United Nations Peacebuilding Commission, tasked with developing peacebuilding programs for
fragile countries at risk of returning to civil war and putting them on the path to positive peace.
Peacebuilding efforts address a wide variety of issues rooted in positive peace. Such a develop-
mental approach to peacebuilding requires significant resources which must be properly targeted.
That is to say, a central problem in implementing the peacebuilding mission and promoting posi-
tive peace is simply determining what needs should be focused upon and what amount of resour-
ces should be allocated. In this article, we develop a novel and creative way to costing the
peacebuilding needs that underpin positive peace based on a project that we recently undertook
for the UN Peacebuilding Commission and applied it to Burundi. We refer to our approach as
the Adjusted Comparative Historical Method (ACHM). This work contributes to the theory and
praxis of positive peace by addressing both conceptual and practical issues in administering posi-
tive peace.

In April 2018, the United Nations (UN) held a series of high-level meetings to assess the
efforts undertaken to strengthen the UN's work on peacebuilding and sustaining a vision of
peace that is deeply anchored in the notion of positive peace. This agenda embraces a frame-
work that emphasizes a new approach in UN peacebuilding efforts outlined in the January
2018 report from Secretary-General Ant
onio Guterres (UN, 2018). Along these lines the UN
has been examining six points, including how to: (1) Adjust to the new UN approach to
peace with the emphasis on conflict prevention and the promotion of positive peace; (2)
Strengthen operational and policy coherence within the United Nations system toward peace-
building and sustaining peace; (3) Increase, restructure and better prioritize funding to UN
peacebuilding activities; (4) Strengthen partnerships between the UN and key stakeholders in
the field; (5) Address the root causes of conflict to sustain peace; (6) Address the role of

Address correspondence to Abu Bakarr Bah, Department of Sociology, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb,
IL 60115, USA. E-mail: abah@niu.edu
300 BAH & EMMANUEL

women and youth in peacebuilding (United Nations General Assembly, 2018). The stated
goal of this framework is to enlarge peacebuilding efforts overall, increase the budgets, while
underlining the importance of prevention and conflict resolution as central to the responsibil-
ity of the UN in maintaining international security and pursing a positive peace. This repre-
sents an important step in advancing peacebuilding and an important shift in the
understanding of the concept of peace overall. Accordingly, in this article, we develop a
novel and creative way of approaching the costing of peacebuilding needs, one that underpins
the concept of a positive peace. We refer to our approach as the Adjusted Comparative
Historical Method (ACHM). In advancing the ACHM approach, our article is divided into
four sections. The first section provides a literature review and theoretical framework. The
second section proposes the ACHM methodology employed in the study. This framework
spells the formulae for the budget calculations along with the relevant variables used to con-
struct a framework. The third section presents the findings and discussions of the study. A
final section concludes the article and proposes some policy implications for ACHM. The
overall aim of our study is: (1) to provide a theoretical basis for our methodology; and (2)
anchor the methodology in empirical reality.
This article evolved out of a project we undertook for the UN Peacebuilding Commission
(UNPC). Our initial report to the UNPC outlines the essential elements of methodology. In
this article, we further refine the methodology and apply it to Burundi. Burundi is an ideal
case for the application of ACHM because there has been an ongoing peacebuilding effort by
the UN and African Union (AU) to avert another civil war through the promotion of positive
peace. In addition, there are only a few very limited studies of peacebuilding in Burundi. As
such, this article simultaneously contributes to the general goal of the development of an
adequate method for costing peacebuilding and our understanding of peacebuilding and the
promotion of positive peace in the specific case of Burundi.

LITERATURE REVIEW: POSITIVE PEACE AND PEACEBUILDING BUDGETS

Peace is frequently referred to as simply the absence of something negative, such as violence.
However, peace does not simply mean a lack of violent conflict. For example, when a cease-
fire is set in place, violence between the belligerents stops. As Johan Galtung (1996) argues
this absence of violence is negative peace where something undesirable ceases to happen.
Something is taken away to bring a form of peace. This situation is clearly better than out-
right violent conflict. Yet, negative peace has many obvious shortcomings. Patricia Shields
(2017, p. 6) so succinctly points out, “[N]egative peace uses a short-term time horizon, which
reinforces a tendency to see the job as complete once the fighting stops. It undermines efforts
for a broader peace by freezing the status quo, and it potentially leaves the door open for
human rights abuses to continue unabated.” Nonetheless, the field of peace research is domi-
nated by the study of negative peace. Yet Paul Diehl (2016, p.8) argues, “[P]eace is not
merely the inverse of war.” Beyond the war context, positive peace is also useful for how we
understand the issues and works of local administrative bodies as they deal with human
security issues. As Grant Rissler and Patricia Shields (2019, p. 2) argue, “the concept of posi-
tive peace provides a conceptual framework that readily supports key skill sets needed by
 COSTING PEACEBUILDING 301

public administrators facing ‘wicked’ problems in the globalized, networked, participatory

landscape of twenty-first-century public administration.” The notion of positive peace is also
useful for understanding issues of social justice as exemplified in the works of Jane Adams.
As Shields and Soeters (2017, p. 324) noted: “The ideal of positive peace incorporates social
justice, social equity, cooperation, community engagement, collaboration, effective-
governance, and democracy. This less well-articulated and studied notion of peace also deals
with the underlying social mechanisms that reinforce positive relationships, be they between
or within members of a family, tribe, city, or nations.”
There is much more to peace than the simple conceptualization of its negative variant
(Rissler & Shields, 2019). Peace does not only mean the absence of violent conflict. As Dr.
Martin Luther King Jr. reminded us, “[t]rue peace is not merely the absence of tension: it is
the presence of justice.” This idea refers to a positive peace, which goes far beyond its nega-
tive counterpart. Positive peace is a holistic, constructive, systemic framework for peace.
Shields (2017, p. 8) indicates, “[T]hese positive visions of peace incorporate a host of con-
cepts and values such as justice, democracy, sympathy, cooperation, effectiveness, freedom,
engagement, order, harmony, and collaboration.” With this understanding, peace exists
between people who interact in a nonviolent manner and are capable of managing their con-
flicts and incompatibilities. The research presented here attempts to contribute to the growing
literature on the study of positive peace in public administration (Rissler & Shields, 2019;
Shields & Soeters, 2017). Here, we look at the relationship between positive peace and
peacebuilding generally and more specifically in the case of Burundi. By focusing on the
costs of peacebuilding needs, we point to an important issue in administering positive peace.
Clearly, peace research should not just be reduced to the study of war. Certainly violent
conflict is a clear indicator of a broken relationship, one that needs more than just an end to
violence. Peace should aim to strengthen such broken relationships by confronting the under-
lying root causes and structures of violence (Rissler & Shields, 2019, p. 12). As Shields and
Soeters (2017, p. 334) indicate, peace should try to weave a transformed community through
pragmatic relationship building. After violent conflict, renewed relationships between
nations, communities, and individuals need to be built and then sustained by care and atten-
tion (Shields & Soeters, 2017, p. 329). An important administrative challenge is simply figur-
ing out the cost of implementing a positive peace program.
Along these lines, the overall goal of the recent UN approach to peacebuilding is to create
societies that are able to reconcile grievances and adopt the attitudes, institutions, and struc-
tures that can sustain peace (IEP, 2015). Peacebuilding missions, both as a political and
administrative endeavor, should take place within the concept of a positive peace (Shields &
Soeters, 2017, p.332; Rissler & Shields, 2019). Transforming a conflict and building an
environment in which positive peace can be sustained requires significant resources, along
with its proper budgeting and targeting. Studies of peacebuilding and postwar reconstruction,
especially in Africa, consistently show that positive peace is deeply rooted in not only halting
violence, but also addressing political grievances and human development issues. In his stud-
ies of peacebuilding in Sierra Leone and Liberia, for example, Abu Bah shows that in add-
ition to the conventional security sector reforms, peacebuilding entailed massive international
investments in human development and social justice initiatives under the banners of new
humanitarianism and people-centered liberalism (Bah, 2013, 2017).
302 BAH & EMMANUEL

One of the key challenges in contemporary peacebuilding operations geared toward

the promotion of a positive peace is the costing of peacebuilding needs. This is a par-
ticularly difficult issue for the UNPC, which is tasked with developing peacebuilding
programs for fragile countries at risk of returning to civil war. Budgeting peacebuilding
is difficult in part because peacebuilding itself is not clearly defined as different actors
and scholars emphasize different political, economic, and social goals for peacebuilding
activities. Furthermore, measuring peacebuilding success is even more problematic, fur-
ther complicating the costing of new cases where peacebuilding is needed. Fortunately,
the 2009 report of the UN Secretary-General on peacebuilding, which is anchored in the
notion of positive peace, identifies four priority areas: (a) basic safety and security; (b)
rule of law; (c) political processes; and (d) core government functions (UN, 2009).
Costing peacebuilding needs essentially refers to determining the amount of resources
required to promote each of these activities. While the UN has outlined the contours of
peacebuilding as a concept, it has yet to establish an adequate standard method for cost-
ing these needs and creating budgets that can meet the peacebuilding requirements for
countries at risk of civil war reoccurrence. Here, we develop an intuitive methodology
to cost peacebuilding needs.
ACHM is anchored in the peacebuilding priority areas identified by the UN.
Peacebuilding, which is “generically understood as external interventions that are intended to
reduce the risk that a state will . . . return to war” (Barnett, Kim, O’Donnell, & Sitea, 2007)
has received considerable attention in the scholarly and policy oriented literature. A critical
issue is how to ensure that peacebuilding is successful. One notable factor in the success of
peacebuilding is funding and the adequacy of the budget. Peacebuilding operations face
highly difficult conditions (Chesterman, 2004; Doyle & Sambanis, 2000). After war, “fear
and violence are prevalent, the economy is weak, infrastructure destroyed and society
traumatized” (Grimm, 2008). As Call and Cousens point out, “when peacebuilding fails, par-
ties to conflict often unleash greater violence than in the prior war” (Call & Cousens, 2008).
Furthermore, the immediate years following an end of a civil war are the most perilous, with
the risk of a return to war the greatest (Collier et al., 2003). While peacebuilders do not oper-
ate from a single blueprint, there is an impressive consensus that the international community
should act decisively in the initial postconflict phase to help build peace (Barnett, Fang, &
Zurcher, 2014).
However, what is meant by the term “peacebuilding”? The concept first emerged over
four decades ago in the scholarship of Johan Galtung (1976). In this work, Galtung appealed
for the development of peacebuilding structures that would be capable of promoting what he
called sustainable peace to address the root causes of violent conflict (UN, 2010). Yet, it was
not until 1989, with the UN Transition Assistance Group (UNTAG) mission in Namibia, that
the concept of peacebuilding emerged as a critical element in UN operations (Steinert &
Grimm, 2015). A few years later, peacebuilding emerged as a concept within the UN. This
critical development followed Boutros Boutros-Ghali’s 1992 report, An Agenda for Peace,
which defines peacebuilding as “action to identify and support structures which will tend to
strengthen and solidify peace in order to avoid a relapse into conflict” (UN, 1992). That said,
peacebuilding has turned out to be one of the most important challenges for the international
community (Barnett, Kim, O’Donnell, & Sitea, 2007).
 COSTING PEACEBUILDING 303

United Nations peace operations are generally seen as having a positive impact on the sus-
tainability of peace in former war-torn nations (Doyle & Sambanis, 2000). The Brahimi
Report further defined peacebuilding as “activities undertaken on the far side of conflict to
reassemble the foundations of peace and provide the tools for building on those foundations
something that is more than just the absence of war” (UN, 2000). The Brahimi Report proved
highly influential, informing later discussions on UN postconflict assistance. Building on this
foundation, at the 2005 World Summit, Kofi Annan’s proposal to develop a UN peacebuild-
ing architecture was endorsed. In 2006, UNPBC and its related mechanisms, the
Peacebuilding Support Office (PBSO) and the Peacebuilding Fund, were created. These three
bodies focus attention and mobilize resources for peacebuilding, while trying to coordinate
with other parts of the UN system and other international organizations.
In 2015, the UN decided to push forward with a more unified approach to peacebuilding,
along with trying to tackle one of the most challenging elements of peacebuilding—
estimating future costs. The UN Group of Experts recommended in 2015 that various devel-
opment partners “should initiate a process of preparing more detailed and accurate
country-by-country estimates of the overall funding needs for sustaining peace over the lon-
ger-term” (UN, 2015). As the UN has noted, there is no standard methodology for costing
peacebuilding, which understandably makes planning extremely difficult (UN, 2017).

METHODOLOGICAL OVERVIEW: THE PEACEBUILDING BUDGET PROCESS

Our approach is based on identifying all possible historical cases of peacebuilding and select-
ing those countries that are comparable to the case country as peacebuilding budget models.
Budget data from those comparable countries is then adjusted to fit the size of the case coun-
try, the complexity of its conflict, and its economy. In this methodology, we refer to five
types of countries: (a) Peacebuilding Case (PC)—any country with a peacebuilding or a post-
war reconstruction program and a published budget data; (b) Case Country (CC)—the coun-
try for which a peacebuilding budget is created (i.e., Burundi); (c) Comparable Historical
Case Country (CHCC)—a country that shares at least two common features with the CC; (d)
Historical Case Country (HCC)—the country that is most similar to the Case Country and its
budget is used as a baseline to estimate the budget of the CC; and (e) Adjustment Country
(AC)—any CHCC that is used to determine rates of adjustment between the CC and the
HCC. Furthermore, our approach centers on two complementary budget issues: (a) overall
cost of the peacebuilding needs; and (b) appropriate budget allocation to each of the peace-
building needs.
The overall cost of peacebuilding needs refers to the Overall Peacebuilding Budget (OPB)
for implementing the activities that would fulfill the peacebuilding needs as outlined in the
2009 report of the UN Secretary-General on peacebuilding (basic safety and security, rule of
law, political processes, core government functions). This excludes Special Cost Items (SCI),
such as elections and war crimes tribunals, which are typically funded separately from the
regular peacebuilding activities. In this part of the methodology, we estimate how much
would be needed to effectively implement the peacebuilding mission. We estimate SCI separ-
ately, which will be added to OPB.
304 BAH & EMMANUEL

The OPB is derived through two different methods: (a) the HCC approach; or (b) the aver-
age adjusted budget approach. The HCC approach simply adopts the budget of the HCC as a
baseline budget and adjusts the baseline budget based on the size (population and territory)
of the country (i.e., Burundi), conflict intensity, economy (GDP), and inflation. In contrast,
the average adjusted budget approach uses the average adjusted budget of all the CHCC as
the OPB. It is important to note that average adjusted budget is not a mere calculation of the
average of all the budget of the CHCC (adjusted only for program duration). It would involve
adjustment for size (population, territory, GDP) and inflation (see World Bank, World
Development Indicators, 2017e). The average adjusted budget approach treats each CHCC as
a HCC. The average adjusted budget approach would include more data and require far less
subjective judgment. However, it takes away from the comparability level, especially when
only two comparability criteria are used, and there are huge differences between some of the
CHCC and the CC. Potentially, the budgets of vastly different countries can be included,
which can reduce the similarity between the reality of the CC and the OPB. The HCC
approach can yield far more similarity between CC and OPB. We think that this factor is
very important and therefore favor the HCC approach.
A related issue to the OPB is SCI in peacebuilding. Countries may have expensive peace-
building activities (national elections, war crimes tribunals, truth and reconciliation, etc.), which
do not appear in proxy peacebuilding or postwar reconstruction programs, such as UNDAF,
PRSP, and others. We cost SCIs separately and include them as separate budget lines. SCI can
be calculated using the HCC approach or the adjusted average budget approach.
The other issue is budget allocation, which deals with the proportion of OPB that will be
spent on each peacebuilding item. Our emphasis in the allocation is on making sure that the
budget components include elements that: (a) have been consistently needed in prior peace-
building missions; and (b) are unique to the particular CC. We refer to the former as regular
costs items and the later as new costs items. Additionally, we emphasize inclusive participa-
tion and parity in determining the components of OPB and the amount of funds to be allo-
cated to the budget priority areas of the international actors and those of the national actors.

Elements of the Adjusted Comparative Historical Method (ACHM)

ACHM is based on four elements: (a) historical comparison; (b) proportional adjustments
and distributions; (c) dynamic budget distribution; and (d) inclusion and parity between
peacebuilding priorities of international and national stakeholders.

Overall Peacebuilding Budget: Peacebuilding Cases, Baseline, and Adjustments

The first element of the Adjusted Comparative Historical Method (ACHM) is historical com-
parison, which entails identifying all the Comparable Historical Case Countries (CHCCs) and
selecting the countries that are most comparable to peacebuilding in the CC (i.e., Burundi).
We begin by identifying all of the Peacebuilding Cases (PCs). Currently, the UN
Peacebuilding Commission lists six countries on its agenda: Burundi, Sierra Leone, Guinea,
Guinea-Bissau, Liberia, and Central African Republic (see United Nations Peacebuilding
Commission, 2017; http://www.un.org/en/peacebuilding). Because this number is small, we
 COSTING PEACEBUILDING 305

extend the PC group to also include all countries with a recent peacekeeping mission (see
UN Peacekeeping, 2017; http://www.un.org/en/peacekeeping/operations) and an active post-
war reconstruction program (see UN Development Group, 2012; https://undg.org/home/guid-
ance-policies/common-country-programmingundaf). This significantly increases the number
of PCs. Postwar reconstruction programs can include programs such as the UN Development
Assistance Framework (UNDAF), and the UN/World Bank/IMF Poverty Reduction Strategy
Programs (PRSP) (see Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers; http://www.imf.org/external/np/
prsp/prsp.aspx; United Nations Development Group 2012a,b; 2013a,b; 2014; 2015a,b; 2016a,
b,c; 2017; IMF 2005a,b; 2006; 2007a,b; 2008; 2009a,b,c; 2016). These postwar reconstruc-
tion programs are good proxies for peacebuilding because their elements overlap with the
peacebuilding components identified in the 2009 Report of the UN Secretary-General on
Peacebuilding.
For each Peacebuilding Case (PC), we record the country’s average annual peacebuilding
budget, territorial size, population size, population density, and GDP (World Bank
2017a,b,c,d). We exclude countries with peculiar elements (e.g. complex geopolitical issues,
conflicts that ended very long ago). Also, we code each country in terms of peacebuilding
success and conflict intensity. For a country to be a CHCC, it must share at least two of the
following criteria with the Country Case:

a. common border;
b. less than three countries away;
c. same continent;
d. same geographical subregion;
e. same regional organization;
f. same economic classification;
g. similar conflict intensity;
h. similar form of conflict (e.g., civil war along regional lines, ideology-based war, etc.);
i. overlapping conflict periods.

If there is more than one CHCC, one of them is selected to be the HCC. The country that
is most comparable to the CC, especially in terms of the nature and timing of the conflict,
the geographical indicators, and size of economy is selected as the HCC.
The second element is proportional adjustments of the baseline budget to minimize hidden
factors that may distort the comparability between the HCC and the CC. A critical issue in
determining the right budget size is whether the budget is adequate to meet the peacebuilding
context. Arguably, budgets that are adequate will increase the chances of peacebuilding suc-
cess, while those budgets that are inadequate will likely undermine peacebuilding success.
We hold that four factors (population size, territory, economy size, and conflict intensity)
influence the adequacy of the peacebuilding budget and the likelihood of peacebuilding suc-
cess. Each of these factors figure prominently in the data we collected. In terms of country
size, we favor territory and population over a single population density measure because
population density greatly inflates the budget. For economy size, we favor GDP to GDP/cap-
ita because we have already made an adjustment for population. We also adjust for inflation.
For conflict intensity (major and minor), we used the Uppsala Conflict Data Program (2017)
306 BAH & EMMANUEL

TABLE 1
Data on Key Variables

Peacebuilding
UNDAF Population Territory GDP UCDP success: Comparable
budgets (millions, (thousands of (billions conflict Change historical case
Country (n ¼ 18) (millions) 2016) sq. km.) USD, 2014) intensity in FSI score country?
Successes (n ¼ 10)
Comoros 95 1 2 1 1 –7 Yes
Cote d’Ivoire 343 23 322 34 1 –6 Yes
Guatemala 399 17 109 59 1 –1 No
Liberia 468 5 111 2 1 –5 Yes
Macedonia 121 2 26 11 1 –9 No
Nepal 685 29 147 19 1 –5 Yes
Sierra Leone 533 7 72 5 1 –10 Yes
Sri Lanka 413 21 66 75 2 –10 No
Sudan 1428 41 1879 82 2 –2 No
Tajikistan 363 9 143 9 1 –5 Yes
Non-Successes (n ¼ 8)
Angola 250 26 1247 147 2 3 No
Burundi 616 12 28 3 1 7 Yes (CC)
CAR 1017 5 623 2 1 7 Yes
Chad 1311 15 1248 13 1 4 No
DR Congo 2420 80 2345 36 1 0 No
Guinea-Bissau 340 2 36 1 1 15 Yes
Mozambique 710 29 799 17 1 6 Yes
Uganda 954 40 242 27 1 0 Yes

(see UCDP; http://ucdp.uu.se). To control for peacebuilding success, we used data from the
Fragile State Index (Table 1). Each of the four adjustments is made proportionately and dir-
ectly to the baseline peacebuilding budget instead of the prior adjusted budget. The amount
is then added or deducted as the case may apply.
Concerning our adjustments, if the two countries vary in conflict intensity, we will increase
or decrease the budget. If the HC is minor conflict and the CC is major conflict, we will
increase the peacebuilding budget. If the HC is major conflict and the CS is minor conflict, we
will decrease. To determine the rate of increase or decrease, we would do the following:

a. From the list CHCC, we identify all the countries with the different level of conflict
intensity from HCC (e.g., if HCC country is “minor,” we would identify all the countries
that are “major”). Another way to think of this is to simply identify all the CHCC with a
conflict intensity score that is the same as the conflict intensity score of the CC.
b. From those selected countries, we identify the country that is most similar to the HCC
(as described before). We refer to this country as the Adjustment Country (AC).
c. We adjust the budget of these two countries (i.e., HCC and AC) according to their popu-
lation and territorial size ratio (as described before).
d. We then find the ratio between the two budgets (after the size adjustment).
e. We use this same rate (percentage) to increase (or decrease) the budget of the CC (from
the HCC).
 COSTING PEACEBUILDING 307

Since the ACHM is based on the past peacebuilding budget, it is important to adjust for
inflation, which is a normal budgeting practice. We use a simple calculation based on the
total global inflation rate from the last year of the baseline budget to the start of peacebuild-
ing in the CC. We adjust the budget of the CC by the same inflation rate. We make the infla-
tion adjustment after all the other adjustments have been made.

Overall Budget Distribution: Regular Costs and New Costs

The last two elements of Adjusted Comparative Historical Method (ACHM) deal with the
internal budget distribution. The key goals are to ensure that the internal distribution of
the budget reflects historically established peacebuilding needs and needs that are unique to
the CC. Also, the distribution formula seeks to ensure inclusion and parity between the
peacebuilding priorities of international and local stakeholders. To achieve these goals, we
provide a two-step process for distributing the budget. First is the creation of a Prototype
Budget, which can be adopted by the CC without any modifications if it prefers. The second
part would involve the creation of a Proposed Budget based on expert decisions to eliminate
one or more regular cost items that are clearly not needed for the country at the given time.
In cases where there are no compelling reasons to eliminate any of the regular cost items in
the budget, the Prototype Budget becomes the Proposed Budget.
The key features of the Overall Peacebuilding Budget (OPB) distribution model are the
regular cost and the new cost items. Regular costs are peacebuilding needs that consistently
appear in prior peacebuilding cases, while new costs are peacebuilding needs that are pecu-
liar to the CC. In particular, we determine which peacebuilding needs should be considered a
regular cost item and how much money should be allocated to each of the regular cost items.
As for new cost items, we focus on parity and inclusion between the peacebuilding priorities
of international and local stakeholders.
To determine the regular cost items, we begin with the UN priority areas (basic safety
and security, rule of law, political processes, core government functions). These four areas
form the core peacebuilding needs categories in the budget. From these priorities, we list
all activities in peacebuilding programs of all the CHCCs. From this list of known peace-
building activities, we determine which items should qualify as regular cost items.
Regular cost items are automatically included in the Prototype Budget for the CC. For an
item to be classified as a regular cost item, it must meet a certain frequency threshold. In
other words, items that appear at a high rate in the budgets of all the CHCCs will be
deemed regular cost items. The threshold can be high (e.g., 75%) or as low as 50 percent
or 25 percent. High threshold would mean that fewer items would be automatically
included in the Prototype Budget and more money will be available to assign to new cost
items. A low threshold would automatically include more items in the Prototype Budget
and leave less money for new cost items. An item’s frequency rate is calculated by a
simple percent measure. For example, under a 75 percent threshold, any item that appears
in at least 75 percent of all CHCC budgets will be considered a regular cost. All the
regular costs will be compiled into a single list. Any item that does not meet the regular
cost threshold will be moved to the new cost list.
308 BAH & EMMANUEL

In terms of how much money should be allocated to each regular cost item, we use a sim-
ple proportion measure. For each regular cost item, we find its average budget allocation per-
centage from all the CHCC and use that percentage to allocate for that activity in the budget.
If on average 20 percent of the budgets of the CHCC went to “women empowerment,” for
example, then 20 percent of the budget of CC will go to “women empowerment” (assuming
that “women empowerment” met regular cost threshold). We expect that the total percentage
of a regular cost item will be well below 100 percent of the OPB since only items that are
truly reoccurring are included in the regular costs list. As we already noted, different thresh-
old levels can be used to ensure that the regular cost items do not take up the entire or most
of the budget. It is important to ensure that there is money left for new costs, since each CC
may have needs that are unique or requiring varying levels of resources. This threshold
approach ensures that peacebuilding activities that did not received funding in past peace-
building are not left out in new cases.
New costs items will be peacebuilding needs selected for funding by international or national
stakeholders. To compile the list of new cost items, all items that appeared on the list of known
peacebuilding needs but did not meet the threshold level for the regular cost list will be pre-
sented as items that they may be selected for funding. Host country and international partners
will each provide a list of peacebuilding needs that do not appear on the regular cost lists. They
may also choose to include items that appear on the regular cost list for which they would like
to increase funding, beyond the regular allocation under the regular cost item formula. All of
these items are combined into a single list of new costs (eliminating overlapping items).
To determine how much money will be allocated to the new cost items, all the items on
the regular costs list will be subtracted from the OPB. The remaining funds will go to new
costs items. International partners will determine where to put 50 percent of the new costs
funds, while the host country determines the other 50 percent.

Prototype and Proposed Budget

The prototype budget is the OPB distributed according to the regular and new cost formulas
outlined above. In addition, the prototype budget will list any Special Cost Item (SCI) as a sep-
arate budget item. Countries can adopt the prototype budget without any modification if all the
items on the regular cost items are deemed by host and international stakeholders as needed. In
cases where there are expert doubts or significant disagreement about some of the budget items,
the prototype budget can be transformed into a proposed budget based on expert advice. The
proposed budget is the prototype budget refined to eliminate items on the regular cost list that
are clearly not needed for the CC. For example, it is possible that “security sector reforms” may
appear at a high frequency in the budgets of the CHCCs, which will make it meet the frequency
threshed (e.g., 75 percent). At the same time, it is possible that the CC may not need “security
sector reforms” because that has already been conducted. In that case, national and international
actors can use expert opinion to remove “security sector reforms” from the regular cost list. In
cases where an item is removed from the regular cost item, one of the stakeholders can still
fund the activity through its share of the new cost items fund. We should note that the proposed
budget would not involve adding new items to the regular cost list.
 COSTING PEACEBUILDING 309

BURUNDI: APPLICATION OF THE ACHM METHOD

Burundi is an ideal case for the application of ACHM because of its history of war and
peacebuilding. Burundi is clearly in dire need of all the peacebuilding activities identified by
the UN in order to achieve positive peace. In addition, Burundi has postwar reconstruction-
cum-peacebuilding programs that have been largely based on the extant ad hoc costing prac-
tices. This study not only draws on Burundi, but also shows how the components and cost of
peacebuilding in Burundi could be derived through our ACHM approach. The ACHM meth-
odology is applied to Burundi to show how this framework can provide insights into the
peacebuilding needs of Burundi. The application is based on building a four-year peacebuild-
ing budget (2017–2020).
By the end of Burundi’s civil war in 2006, when the Forces for National Liberation joined
the peace process, some 300,000 people lost their lives in the thirteen-year civil war. When
the UN peacebuilding architecture was established in 2005, it aimed to create effective mech-
anisms to prevent conflict and to avoid its reoccurrence by promoting positive peace.
Accordingly, the UN began post-civil war reconstruction efforts in Burundi in 2006 when
key leadership in Bujumbura approached the newly established UNPBC and asked to be put
on its agenda. Burundi would be one of two initial countries (along with Sierra Leone) to
receive UN peacebuilding funding (PBF) beginning in 2007. The overall goal was clearly to
help Burundi avoid backsliding on the peace process and a reoccurrence of civil war. Until
the recent instability that started with the events of April 2015 when President Pierre
Nkurunziza announced that he would disregard the constitution and run for a third term,
Burundi remained a leading recipient of the PBF, which designed and implemented a variety
of programs to advance the political dialog, build social cohesion, improve youth participa-
tion, and improve the respect of fundamental human rights, among other fronts on the peace-
building agenda (Campbell, Kayobera, & Nkurunziza, 2010).

Comparable Historical Cases and Historical Case Country

Among all the potential CHCCs, Liberia emerged as the most comparable to Burundi. As
such, Liberia is the HCC for the purpose of determining the OPB and the general elections
budgets. We began with a list of around sixty PCs with recorded peacebuilding and peace-
keeping programs. From that list, we removed countries with: (a) active conflicts; and (b)
those with wars that are fundamentally different from the wars in Burundi (e.g., independ-
ence/separatist wars, terrorism wars, contentious geopolitical wars, very short wars related to
elections). Some of those removed countries include Zimbabwe, Haiti, Palestine, Indonesia,
Bosnia. That process led to a shortlist of eighteen PCs, including Burundi and Liberia. We
collected data on each of the shortlisted PCs (Table 1).
From the available budget data, we found the UNDAF and PRSP budgets and used them
as proxies for peacebuilding activities. Most notably, UNDAF budgets are excellent proxies
for peacebuilding. We collected data on the overall budget figures and the total program
years/duration of the program. Accordingly, we eliminated the shortlisted countries that do
not have published UNDAF and/or PRSP budgets. Based on this, six more countries were
eliminated, leaving eleven countries (excluding Burundi) as potential CHCCs. We applied
310 BAH & EMMANUEL

TABLE 2
Adjusted Starting Budget and OPB (2017–2020)

Starting budget (constant)

$ (Liberia’s four Adjustment figure
Adjustment item years UNDAF) $ (based on ratio) Budget balance $
Population size (250%) 374,716,796 x 150% 562,075,194 939,791,990
[11,553,000/4,615,000 ¼ 2.5]
Territory (25%) 374,716,796 x; –75% 281,037,597 658,754,393
[27,834/111,369 ¼ 0.25]
Population density (939%)
GDP (136%) [2,869/2,122 ¼ 1.36%] 374,716,796 x 36% 134,898,047 793,652,440
Conflict intensity (same score: 1) 374,716,796 0
Peacebuilding success? (Yes) 374,716,796 0
Global inflation 374,716,796 x 6.803% 25,491,984 819,144,424
(2013–2015) (6.803%)
Elections
Final budget (excluding elections) 819,144,424

the comparability criteria for inclusion as a CHCC for Burundi. Kyrgyzstan was eliminated
because it did meet the criteria of having at least two factors in common with Burundi (see
above). This left ten CHCCs.
From the ten CHCCs, Liberia and Uganda emerged as contenders as the most comparable
countries with Burundi. Uganda has more common geographical proximity, but there was a
lot of fuzziness about its conflict duration. In addition, its economy and territorial/population
size are far bigger than Burundi. On the other hand, Liberia is less geographically near, but a
bit more similar in terms of economy and size. Our judgment leads us to conclude that
Liberia is the most comparable country with Burundi. As such, we used Liberia as the HCC
to help build the peacebuilding budget for Burundi.

Adjustments: Starting Budget and Overall Peacebuilding Budget

To arrive at an OPB for Burundi, we used the UNDAF budget as our primary budget data
because the data was compressive. In addition, the UNDAF budget components are fairly
similar across all the CHCCs. Overall, it was more reflective of peacebuilding activities than
the data in the PRSP. Because Liberia is the HCC, Liberia’s UNDAF is used as very good
proxy data for peacebuilding in Burundi. Next, we adjusted Liberia’s 2013–2017 UNDAF
overall budget of $468,395,995 to meet the peacebuilding budget duration for Burundi.
Liberia’s five-year budget was adjusted to reflect a four-year budget period ($468,395,995/
5 years x 4 years ¼ $374,716,796). Based on this program duration adjustment, $374,716,796
becomes the Starting Budget for Burundi (2017–2020). Finally, we adjust the Starting Budget
to meet the specifications for Burundi (Table 2). The specifications outlined in our method-
ology are: size (population/territory), GDP, conflict intensity, peacebuilding success,
and inflation.
 COSTING PEACEBUILDING 311

TABLE 3
Elections Special Costs Adjustment

Adjustment item Starting budget $ (UNDP, 2016)

Population size (250%) [11,553,000/4,615,000 ¼ 2.5] 14,669,442 x 150%
Territory (25%) [27,834/111,369 ¼ 0.25] 14,669,442 x –75%
Global inflation (2015) (1.439%) 14,669,442 x 1.439%
Final budget for elections 25,882,616

For Burundi, we made the following adjustments, which yielded an OPB of $819,144,424
excluding the cost of election. These figures are based on the following adjustment, as shown
in Table 2:

 Increased the Starting Budget by $562,075,194, because the population of Burundi is 150 per-
cent bigger than Liberia’s population.
 Reduced the Starting Budget by $281,037,597, because Burundi’s territory is 75 percent
smaller than Liberia’s territory.
 Increased the Starting Budget by $134,898,047, because the Burundi’s GDP is 35 percent
higher than Liberia’s GDP.
 We made no adjustment for conflict intensity because Liberia’s conflict intensity score is
the same as that of Burundi (see Table 1). Both countries have an average conflict inten-
sity score of 1 based on the UCDP dataset. We made no adjustment for peacebuilding
success because peacebuilding is considered to have been successful so far in Liberia
based on analysis of data from the Fragile States Index (See Fund for Peace, 2017;
fsi.fundforpeace.org).
 We added the global inflation to the Starting Budget, which we estimate to be
$25,491,984 (see World Bank; http://data.worldbank.org/indicator/FP.CPI.TOTL.ZG).

Based on the above adjustments, we reached an OPB of $819,144,424, which is what

Burundi would need for peacebuilding (2017–2020). At the moment, general election would
be the only SCI that can be anticipated. As such, Burundi would need $25,882,616 in inter-
national support in order to hold elections. The election budget figure is derived from the
Liberia UNDP election cost estimate of $14,669,442 (UNDP, 2016). This figure was propor-
tionally adjusted for population, territory and inflation (Table 3).

Prototype Budget: Regular Cost Items, Thresholds, and Budget Distribution

The Prototype Budget is the budget that is derived by applying the budget distribution criter-
ion to the OPB (excluding elections), which is $819,144,424 (2017–2020). The Prototype
Budget is based on a budget distribution model aimed at determining: (a) which peacebuild-
ing activities should be included in the budget as regular cost items; and (b) how much
money should be allocated to each regular cost item on the budget. Ideally, the Prototype
Budget should be an adequate budget in terms of the overall peacebuilding cost, the core
peacebuilding activities to be undertaken, and the amount of money to be allocated to each
312 BAH & EMMANUEL

of the core peacebuilding activities. It should also leave some money for new cost items,
which is the case in Options 1 and Option 2 discussed below.
To get a Prototype Budget, we first developed a budget distribution model for regular cost
items based on known peacebuilding activities listed in the UNDAFs and OECD-DAC
(OECD, 2012–2015) records. The model lists all known forty-seven peacebuilding activities
grouped into six categories: political processes, safety and security, justice, core government
functions, basic services, and economic revitalization. For each peacebuilding activity, we
looked into the UNDAF budget of each of the ten CHCCs and Burundi. We recorded
whether the specific peacebuilding activity was listed in the country’s UNDAF budget, how
much money was allocated to that activity, and the percentage share of the item in relation to
the country’s overall UNDAF budget.
Next, we calculated the rate of frequency at which each of the forty-seven peacebuilding
activities occurred in the UNDAF budgets of all the countries. For each item we recorded the
rate of accordance as percentage. For example, “education for vulnerable populations” was
listed in nine out of the eleven UNDAF budgets, which gave it a 90.9 percent occurrence
rate. In addition, we recorded the average budget percentage that was allocated to each
peacebuilding activity across the eleven UNDAF budgets. For example, on average 7.86 per-
cent of UNDAF budgets were allocated to “education for vulnerable populations.”
Finally, we determined which items should be included in the Prototype Budget as regular
cost items. We used three frequency thresholds (i.e., >75%, >50%, and >25%). Each thresh-
old level provides a different budget option. Option 1 budget is based on a 75 percent fre-
quency threshold, Option 2 is based on 50 percent threshold, while Option 3 at 25 percent.
Based on Option 1, Burundi would have ten regular cost budget items, which are mostly
related to basic services and economic revitalization (Table 4). Those items would cost
$590,685,044 leaving $228,459,380 for new cost items, which international and national
actors can decide to spend on any peacebuilding activity they deem necessary. Option 2
would add four more items (including justice and human rights), and bring the budget to
$757,790,505 leaving $61,353,919 for new cost items. Option 3 would add another ten items,
including security activities and take the budget slightly over $921,065,126 leaving no money
for new cost items. The budget for election budget will remain $25,882,616. It should be
noted that all of these peacebuilding activities are rooted in the notion of positive peace.

Proposed Budget: Realistic Distribution Options

Based on the Prototype Budget distribution, we can propose an actual 2017–2020 peacebuild-
ing budget based on the three options discussed. Because of the uncertainties about the secur-
ity and political future of Burundi, we make budget proposals based on two scenarios: (1) no
adverse sanction against regime; and (2) adverse sanctions. Each scenario has the three
options based on the thresholds. Ideally, the Prototype Budget should be adequate in terms of
the overall peacebuilding cost, the core peacebuilding activities to be undertaken, and the
amount of money to be allocated to each of the core peacebuilding activities. It should also
leave some money for new cost items. However, a Prototype Budget may not perfectly
achieve these goals, which can make a budget too rigid and not very relevant to the present
security, political, social, and economic state of a country. To avoid such problems, we used
 COSTING PEACEBUILDING 313

TABLE 4
Application of Budget Model and the Prototype Budget (Option 1: >75%)

Item frequency Average % Share of

Regular cost items rate % share % $819,144,424
Health 100.00 12.14 99,444,133
Employment generation and livelihoods (e.g., in 100.00 7.11 58,241,169
agriculture and public works), particularly for
youth and demobilized former combatants
Economic recovery through enterprise recovery, 100.00 5.93 48,575,264
including value chains, skills programs and
apprenticeships, particularly for youth
and women
Women’s empowerment and gender equality; 90.91 4.72 38,663,617
youth empowerment and participation
Education 90.90 9.40 76,999,576
Education for vulnerable populations 90.90 7.86 64,384,752
Multidimensional risk management (violence, 81.81 7.55 61,845,404
disasters, climate change, etc.)
Water and sanitation 81.81 5.84 47,838,034
Food assistance for vulnerable populations 81.81 5.72 46,855,061
Management of natural resources (including land) 81.81 5.84 47,838,034
and extractives
Total 590,685,044
Remaining budget for new cost 228,459,380
Electoral processes 25,882,616

our expert judgement to adjust the Prototype Budget as a way to illustrate how international
and national actors can use expert analysis to transform a Prototype Budget into an actual
budget based on ACHM.
Scenario 1 assumes that the international community will not take any punitive sanctions
against the Burundi regime for its extension of the president’s term and violations of basic demo-
cratic principles. As such, donors will not place any unusual restrictions on areas where donor
funding can be used. In Scenario 1, we simply applied our expert judgment to remove peace-
building items that we believe will not be needed (or will be least needed) in Burundi dur-
ing 2017–2020.
For the Option 1 budget, we did not remove any item, as we believe that Burundi will
need all the items that appeared in Option 1 of Burundi’s Prototype Budget. Those items
would cost $590,685,044, leaving $228,459,380 for new costs. Similarly, we did not remove
any item under the Option 2 budget, which would cost $757,790,505, leaving $61,353,919
for new cost items.
For Option 3, which would cost $921,065,126, we removed seven items and moved them
to the new costs list. These are: management of natural resources, economic recovery, educa-
tion, water/sanitation, public sector and administrative management, strengthening private
sector, and basic public administration. We remove those items because we believe Burundi
will have less capacity to absorb those resources and it would need more investment in secur-
ity, refugee, and conflict management activities. By removing those seven items, the budget
came down to $668,503,764 leaving $150,640,660 for new cost items.
314 BAH & EMMANUEL

Scenario 2 assumes that the international community will take punitive sanctions against
the Burundi regime for its extension of the president’s term and the violations of basic demo-
cratic principles. As such, donors will place restrictions on areas where donor funding can be
used. Based on what we can gather from the news and policy documents, it seems that
donors will not fund items that can enhance the position of the current regime. Instead, fund-
ing will be limited to humanitarian and human rights issues. Based on this assumption, we
removed items that we believe will be refused funding by donors. We applied this assump-
tion to all three budget options.
For Option 1, we removed two items (management of natural resources and economic
recovery). By removing those items, the budget came down to $494,271,746 leaving
$324,872,678 for new cost items. For Option 2, we further removed one more (rehabilitation
of basic infrastructure), which puts the budget at $597,729,686 leaving $221,414,738 for new
cost items. For Option 3, we removed an additional five items (SSR, political parties, justice,
and public administration), which brought the total number of removed items to eight. This
puts the budget at $721,010,922 leaving $98,133,502 for new cost items. We remove those
eight items from the regular cost list because they are likely to be seen by donors as simply
helping the regime. Consistent with ACHM, we moved all those items to the new costs list.
By applying ACHM to Burundi, we have shown how the methodology would work to
help international peacebuilders plan for and allocate resources to promote positive peace.
Moreover, we have highlighted core issues that are critical to the promotion of positive peace
in Burundi. Overall, the methodology has clear elements that can be easily calculated and
replicated across cases. The core problem the UN identified with the lack of methodology for
costing peacebuilding needs is that peacebuilding budgets remain ad hoc. As such, they miss
the opportunity to be grounded in the best historical insights, data-driven, or relevant to the
case. Our methodology addresses all of these issues.

CONCLUSION

Peacebuilding has become a critical aspect of international and regional security.

Increasingly, peacebuilding efforts address a wide range of issues concerning human devel-
opment and good governance. This more all-encompassing notion of peacebuilding is rooted
in a broader and structural understanding of peace anchored in the notion of positive peace.
However, such a developmental approach to peacebuilding requires significant resources,
which must be properly budgeted. A key challenge in implementing the peacebuilding mis-
sion and promoting positive peace is simply determining the various peacebuilding needs and
the amount of resources required to meet those needs. The UN has done significant work in
articulating the peacebuilding needs. However, it still does not have an adequate method-
ology for budgeting them. Too often, peacebuilding missions rely on various ad hoc methods.
In cases where there are significant international interests and a willingness by donor coun-
tries to provide the funds, those ad hoc methods have worked. However, for the UN to prop-
erly plan and secure funding for peacebuilding missions and effectively promote positive
peace, it is important to develop a proper method for preparing peacebuilding budgets. This
will not only address donor concerns about why and how money is spent, but more
 COSTING PEACEBUILDING 315

importantly, peacebuilding will be based on more accurate identification of peacebuilding

needs and the level of required resources.
In this article, we develop and apply our Adjusted Comparative Historical Method
(ACHM) as a way to address the budgeting problems in contemporary peacebuilding prac-
tice. ACHM is based on straightforward formulas, a historical approach to peacebuilding,
and inclusive definition of needs anchored in positive peace. ACHM is a viable approach to
costing peacebuilding needs that complements and improves on the extant approaches. The
application to Burundi helps us understand how ACHM could work in practice and also
examines some peacebuilding challenges in Burundi. Even though there are limited studies
on peacebuilding in Burundi, it represents a quintessential country-case that needs significant
international attention and planning. Burundi has all the potential risk factors for a further
genocidal civil war. At the same time, peacebuilding has been working in Burundi. African
Union’s mediation efforts clearly averted what could have been a Rwanda-like civil war.
Moreover, because of the size of the country and relative lack of complex geopolitical inter-
ests, the UN and AU have a much greater chance of impacting peace in Burundi. A key step
in that process would be to identify the necessary peacebuilding needs and how to allocate
critical resources to meet them and inculcate positive peace.
The application of ACHM to Burundi also adds to our practical understanding of how
positive peace is linked to public administration. A key issue for promoting positive peace is
administering appropriate peacebuilding programs. Developing the right budget is a common
administrative challenge. Shields and Soeters (2017) point to an important connection
between Jane Addams’s work in the Chicago municipal government and her work in promot-
ing positive peace. One of the lessons of her work is that the application of positive peace is
both a moral and administrative challenge. Administrators must find ways to put programs
into practice, and also learn from the application of programs. This article points to similar
challenges, notably for international administrators working on peacebuilding programs. As
we have argued, a key step in addressing some of the conceptual and practical challenges of
promoting positive peace is to develop adequate methodologies for costing a peacebuilding
program. This study adds one more step in the effort to bring the positive peace into public
administration discourses.

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Abu Bakarr Bah is Professor of Sociology at Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL and
Editor-in-Chief of African Conflict & Peacebuilding Review.
Nikolas Emmanuel is an Associate Professor in the Graduate School of International Peace
Studies at Soka University, Japan.