Brochure

Sustaining peace through decent work and employment

A joint ILO/PBSO Brochure

This brochure was jointly developed by the ILO and the UN Peacebuilding Support Office (PBSO) of the Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs (DPPA). It aims to consider how underemployment and decent work deficits can exacerbate, particularly in times of COVID-19, grievances, inequalities, turmoil, conflict and violence.

In this framework, the joint brochure intends to guide UN Country Teams, UN Resident Coordinator Offices, UN Agencies, funds and programmes as well as governments, workers’ and employers’ organizations strategic choices about how employment and decent work can contribute to sustaining peace in the Humanitarian-Development-Peace Nexus, through the following potential pathways: (i) mainstreaming employment and decent work into joint UN planning frameworks, (ii) designing and implementing programmes in a conflict-sensitive way to contribute purposefully to peace by addressing simultaneously three conflict drivers: the lack of economic opportunities; the lack of contact and social cohesion; and the existence of grievances and sense of injustice, (iii) supporting the creation of immediate decent jobs and livelihood opportunities in humanitarian responses, specifically for youth and women, that must be used as an investment in long-term development, (iv) focusing not only on the quantity of jobs created, but also on the quality of work, (v) strengthening labour and economic institutions, social dialogue and Fundamental Principles and Rights at Work, and (vi) building evidence on the contribution of decent work, employment and livelihoods programmes to peacebuilding processes.