ABSTRACT

Over a decade ago Mats Berdal (1996: 66) lamented the ‘general failure to plan and coordinate activities among UN agencies, donor-countries and NGOs related to both the long-term and more immediate requirements of excombatants’. These challenges have only grown in the intervening years. The deficiencies in DDR planning, implementation and evaluation continue to reemerge and meaningful solutions are in short supply. Until recently, the absence of a clear DDR doctrine or widely agreed output and outcome indicators has contributed to ambiguity.2 The paradigmatic benchmark of DDR success – whether or not a state relapses into war – takes us only so far. This chapter argues that the linkages between DDR outputs and desired outcomes remain poorly defined.