Donor governments and multilateral institutions recognise that a diverse, resilient and effective civil society is key to increased peace and stability in conflict-affected contexts.

Yet there are counter currents, which make donor support to civil society-led peacebuilding activities difficult in practice. Institutional donor prerogatives and constraints can lead to prescriptive programming and skin-deep engagement with civil society actors.

However, peaceful change in conflict contexts is not linear, is dependent on multiple factors, and cannot be imposed or sustained from outside; instead, effective donor support requires an institutional approach which enables civil society-led action, and allows for flexibility and creativity as conflict contexts evolve. This brief explores through two case studies how a particular model of civil society engagement – peacebuilding partnerships between ‘insider civil society’ such as local organisations and networks and ‘outsider civil society’ such as international non-governmental institutions (INGOs) – functions effectively to facilitate peaceful change.

It puts forward – using the partnership approach as an example – three recommendations for how donors can better accommodate and support civil society-led peacebuilding, mindful of the institutional pressures they face. In doing so, it offers reflections from practice for how donors can realise commitments on partnership with regards to civil society actors contained in both international frameworks and in donor specific policies and strategies. These efforts are particularly pertinent in light of the widely accepted global problem of declining civic space, with areas that are experiencing conflict and instability some of the worst affected.