UCC-Defence Forces Lecture Series 'Is there a future for UN peacekeeping?' by Dr. Renata Dwan, Deputy Director of Chatham House, The Royal Institute of International Affairs.

7 Apr 2021

The next lecture in the UCC-Defence Forces Lecture Series will be on 'Is there a future for UN peacekeeping?' by Dr. Renata Dwan, Deputy Director of Chatham House, The Royal Institute of International Affairs.

The lecture will take place on-line on Thursday the 29th of April 2021, 6.30-8.00 (Irish/UK time) and can be viewed via this link: https://teams.microsoft.com/l/meetup-join/19%3ameeting_MWI1MjY1MjQtNmNiMy00YWQyLWI4NDAtMWZlMGZmNzVkNWUw%40thread.v2/0?context=%7b%22Tid%22%3a%2246fe5ca5-866f-4e42-92e9-ed8786245545%22%2c%22Oid%22%3a%22c4a52d97-5ca7-444a-998b-57d60695eff1%22%2c%22IsBroadcastMeeting%22%3atrue%7d&btype=a&role=a

(- no registration or log-in is required, but we kindly request that you go to the link shortly before the start time of 6.30pm).

The Blue Helmets are one of the most visible faces of the United Nations around the world. Over seven decades, and despite many challenges, peacekeeping has proven to be one of the UN’s most durable and adaptable peace and security tools. Yet UN peacekeeping has declined rapidly in terms of number of operations, troop deployments and budgets over the past 10 years.  Against a backdrop of increased geopolitical competition, changing conflict dynamics, and a global pandemic with severe economic impact, what are the prospects for UN peacekeeping and to what extent can it evolve to meet contemporary conflict challenges?

Dr Renata Dwan was appointed Deputy Director of Chatham House, The Royal Institute of International Affairs, in November 2020. In her 15-year UN career she worked on peace and security issues, including as director of the United Nations Institute for Disarmament Research (UNIDIR) in Geneva and chief of policy and best practices at the Department of Peacekeeping Operations. Renata served in Afghanistan, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Haiti, Mali and Syria and led major UN-wide policy initiatives on peacekeeping, security sector reform, and crisis management capacities. Prior to the UN, Renata led the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute’s programme on armed conflict and conflict management and was Deputy Director the EastWest Institute security programme in Budapest. She served as a Special Adviser to the European Union Council Secretariat on crisis management issues.  She received her MPhil and DPhil in International Relations from Oxford University.

The UCC-Defence Forces Lecture Series aims to contribute to informed public debate on contemporary global security challenges, how such problems may impact on Ireland and how Ireland can contribute to addressing regional and global security threats. The lecture series is jointly organised by the Defence Forces and UCC’s Colleges of Arts, Celtic Studies and Social Sciences and Business and Law. Previous lectures in the series can be viewed at: https://www.ucc.ie/en/government-and-politics/research/departmentofgovernmentandpoliticsguestlecturesandseminars/ucc-defenceforceslectureseries/

For more on this story contact:

Prof. Andrew Cottey

EU Jean Monnet Chair in European Political Integration

Department of Government and Politics

University College Cork