Developing a Global Mechanism for Atrocity Forecasting and Prevention
Recommendations
Improve Early Warning and Assess the Efficacy of Early Action
• Researchers should continue to improve early warning to identify countries most at risk of atrocities, strengthen real-time monitoring, and account for nonstate perpetrators of atrocities.
• Governments, multilateral organizations, and civil society should assess and evaluate interventions to enhance understanding of successful approaches to atrocity prevention.
Initiate Early and Sustained Engagement in At-Risk Countries
• Governments and civil society should conduct actor and relationship mapping in countries with early signs of risk for mass atrocities far in advance of the outbreak of any violence, coordinating their efforts to avoid “mapping fatigue” in local communities. Funders should include resources for such mapping in funding packages.
• Government and civil society stakeholders engaged in prevention activities should work to build trust with local communities to strengthen information sharing in countries at risk of mass atrocities.
• The international community should continue to identify and implement creative engagement strategies that bridge the gap between doing all or nothing. To do so, governments, funders, and implementing organizations need to invest in effective, targeted evaluations of their work and place a priority on innovation.
Target Advocacy Appropriately
• Advocates should continue to work within and across governmental agencies and international institutions to mainstream atrocity prevention.
• In early warning, advocates should consider targeting and informing elected members of the UN Security Council who may not have access to information and can be a conduit to the permanent members of the council.
• When pushing governments and regional organizations to take early action, advocates must provide the clearest possible assessments of the situation and targeted requests for action.
Strengthen Multilateral Capacity for Atrocity Prevention
• The United Nations should increase financial and personnel resources for the Office of the Special Advisers for the Prevention of Genocide and the Responsibility to Protect.
• The selection committee for the next UN secretarygeneral should choose a candidate who will advocate strongly for atrocity prevention and continue to support the Office of the Special Advisers for the Prevention of Genocide and the Responsibility to Protect.
• The Peacebuilding Commission, which serves an important role in upstream prevention, should be better resourced.
• Regional organizations should continue to strengthen capacity for atrocity prevention and apply adequate political pressure on leaders to help mitigate atrocity risks as necessary.
Consider New Approaches for Monitoring AtRisk Countries and Coordinating Early Action
• An institution or set of institutions should conduct a feasibility study for the creation of a publicprivate consortium of civil society, government, and multilateral organizations to review early warning and coordinate strategies for early action in countries most at risk for mass atrocities.
• A consortium of civil society actors, including universities, should build a platform capable of tracking and curating early warning information, producing pertinent, country-specific, daily updates for decision makers and atrocity prevention practitioners.