David Jensen

United Nations Environment Programme · Post-Conflict and Disaster Management Branch

Peaceful and healthy environments are prerequisites for sustainable development, but in many regions of the world, the devastating impacts of armed conflict, unsustainable resource exploitation and climate change are intensifying the degradation of our environments and contributing to fragility, instability, and insecurity. In response to these c...

This chapter defines and describes the emerging field of environmental peacebuilding. It starts with a brief overview of the academic and policy discourse on environment, conflict, and peace. This discourse has generated many of the threads that – when woven together – form the fabric of environmental peacebuilding. It then outlines the core dimen...

This paper investigates key innovative paradigms that seek enhanced consensus building on the sustainable mining agenda of the mineral resource development industry and realities on the ground. It reviews the 55 most relevant academic articles from 2000 to 2019, retrieved from the Web of Science, PubMed and International Conference on Sustainable D...

This paper assesses the extent to which mineral rich African countries enable the creation of public geoinformation for enhancing sustainable mining in policy contexts. The paper reviews accessible works and searches databases of industry, governments, civil society, academia, and international organizations. Focus is on 23 major producer countries...

For all the evolutionary ages of mineral resource development, there have not been concerns about sustainable mining until the 21st century. Thus, this paper explores the extent to which emerging geospatial technologies have been deliberately used in the mining industry activities to achieve the United Nations Agenda 2030 Sustainable Development Go...

This discussion paper explores the global political economy of environmental data and how public and private sector actors can jointly generate global public goods while avoiding data and technology monopolies and governance processes which lack transparency, inclusion and accountability. It also touches upon the question of social media and consum...

This textbook accompanies the massive open online course (MOOC) on Environmental Security and Sustaining Peace. Conflicts over natural resources and the environment pose some of the greatest challenges in 21st century geopolitics, presenting serious threats to human security at the local, national, and international levels. Nonetheless, natural res...

Since 1989, notable changes in geopolitics, technology, social movements, and economics have transformed the world. With respect to conflict and post-conflict environmental peacebuilding, three key themes characterize the post-Cold War world: (1) a change in how wars are fought and financed; (2) a change in the United Nations’ (U.N.’s) engagement o...

This paper describes MapX, a spatial data infrastructure that aims to support the sustainable use of natural resources and the environment by increasing access to the best available geospatial information and related monitoring technologies. MapX is supported by an online platform that provides authoritative spatial data at local, national and glob...

Many countries will rely on the extractive sector to generate the inputs and revenues necessary to advance progress towards the sustainable development goals (SDGs). While the last decade has seen a strong push for financial transparency in the extractive sector, it is becoming equally necessary to also include the social and environmental performa...

This guide collects and summarizes good practices on the successful mediation of resource conflicts. It consolidates lessons from decades of hands-on experience at both the local and international levels mediating conflicts over extractive resources, land and water. It draws on the field experiences of DPA’s mediators together with 30 additional me...

This report focuses on the relationship between women and natural resources in conflict-affected settings, and discusses how the management of natural resources can be used to enhance women’s engagement and empowerment in peacebuilding processes. Part I of the report examines the relationship between women and natural resources in peacebuilding con...

This report focuses on the role of natural resources in disarmament, demobilization and reintegration (DDR) programmes and illustrates how the management of natural resources can be used to promote more effective and sustainable reintegration. Part 1 of the report explores the relationship between natural resources, conflict economies and armed gro...

The special issue on Human Conflict (18 May, p. [818][1]) largely ignores a central dimension of violent conflict: the complex role of natural resources in the onset ([ 1 ][2]) and conduct of conflict, peacemaking, and recovery from conflict. Grievances over access to land have been central to wars

Peacebuilding efforts and international environmental law have developed independently and in very different manners. There have been efforts to develop common approaches and standardize procedures, but organizations and individuals seeking to build the foundations for a durable peace still operate under a variety of guiding frameworks. Natural res...

Since the end of the Cold War, peacebuilding efforts and international environmental law have developed independently and in very different manners. Experiences in managing natural resources to support post‐conflict peacebuilding in dozens of countries over the past twenty years, however, highlight the critical role that natural resources often pla...

This report aims to provide a comprehensive overview of how peacekeeping operations affect and are affected by natural resources and environmental conditions. The report is divided into two main parts. Part 1 reviews the environmental management of peacekeeping operations and showcases good practices, technologies and behaviours that have already b...

Repairing infrastructure, restoring basic services, and cleaning up damage left in the wake of armed conflict are the first order of business for post-conflict states. Doing so provides a basis for badly needed economic recovery and improved livelihoods, yet the environmental dimensions of these activities are often overlooked. Thirty-five authors...

Natural resources and post-conflict assessment, remediation, restoration, and reconstruction: Lessons and emerging issues

There are three key deficiencies in the existing body of international humanitarian law (IHL) relating to protection of the environment during armed conflict. First, the definition of impermissible environmental damage is both too restrictive and unclear; second, there are legal uncertainties regarding the protection of elements of the environment...

This report aims to summarize the latest knowledge and field experience on the linkages between environment, conflict and peacebuilding, and to demonstrate the need for those linkages to be addressed in a more coherent and systematic way by the UN, Member States and other stakeholders. http://postconflict.unep.ch/publications/pcdmb_policy_01.pdf

This report inventories and analyses the range of international laws that protect the environment during armed conflict. With a view to identifying the current gaps and weaknesses in this system, the authors examine the relevant provisions within four bodies of international law – international humanitarian law (IHL), international criminal law (IC...

This article provides an overview of UNEP's post-conflict environmental assessment and recovery work in Kosovo, Afghanistan, Sudan and Lebanon.

UNEP's role in post-conflict environmental assessment and recovery