The World Bank has been providing operational and strategic support to country programs. These tools and approaches are not intended to be prescriptive, but rather to provide a basic framework for Bank strategies in fragile states.

The findings of the WDR on “Conflict, Security and Development” have many implications on the Bank’s strategic framework in fragile situations. The WDR findings call for a paradigm shift in the development’s community work in fragile situations. Situations defined by instability and the potential for violence require strategies that integrate security, justice, and economic concerns.  This argues for FCS strategies that identify internal and external stresses and address them through the creation of capable and legitimate institutions over time, and in a way that allows for inevitable interim setbacks. This, in turn, requires a proper and consistent definition of fragility across institutions, and calibration of expectations on risks and results. It also requires a shift from focusing solely on responding to crises to considering modes of prevention or preparedness for future shocks. 

To contribute to sustainable peace and development in fragile and conflict-affected situations, the Bank’s engagement will balance early interventions with incremental institution building, and will invest in flexible and consistent engagement, with a long-term horizon for results.  Given the pressure for results and the need to support incremental action for long-term institutional development, the Bank will need to take a longer-term view of its engagement and of its expectations.  Early engagement also implies better prevention based on an understanding of risk of conflict and violence. 

The World Bank Group’s enhanced engagement with FCS will be based on five guiding principles that reflect an emerging international consensus, analysis and findings from the WDR 2011, and lessons from operational experience. 

1.     The World Bank Group’s engagement with fragile and conflict affected situations flows from its mandate of poverty reduction and growth and especially from its comparative advantage in supporting long-term institution building.

2.     The WBG recognizes that fragility is a long-term challenge rather than an episodic emergency, and that conflict is, at base, a result of the inability of a society’s institutions to resolve stress emanating from inside and outside the country.  This recognition requires a long-term commitment to support country institution-building efforts with different sets of instruments, measurements, and intermediate results than in mainstream low-income countries.

3.     The WBG actions in support of governments dealing with fragility, conflict, and violence that threaten development will be tailored to specific contexts; these contexts vary greatly, from low-income rural to middle-income urban environments, as do the institutional endowments available in different cases.  While common causes and similar remedial principles apply across different situations, specific remedies require intensive local understanding of a type that the Bank needs to capture.

4.     The WBG’s work in fragile and conflict affected situations will be strongly anchored in a country’s own preferences and leadership to ensure that strategies are owned by a country’s own leaders and citizens; on all occasions the Bank Group’s commitment will be to support countries in building stronger and more legitimate institutions that serve to resolve competing social, economic. and governance claims.

5.     The WBG is committed to work in operational cooperation with other agencies, with a more open-minded appreciation of the comparative advantages of other partners (including those specializing in security, diplomacy, and justice interventions) at national, regional and global levels.