COVID-19 and Peacebuilding in Africa: Youth, Resilience and Innovation Options

This Policy and Practice Brief (PPB) draws extensively from the rich online conversations which attracted almost 200 youth peacebuilders from different parts of Africa, organised by the African Union (AU) Youth for Peace (Y4P) programme and UNESCO-International Institute for Capacity Building in Africa (UNESCO-IICBA) and, with additional assistance from the GIZ AU-APSA Programme. The two-part webinar series was titled ‘Mobilising Resilience during and after COVID-19: A peer-to-peer experience sharing among youth peacebuilders in Africa’. It provides some key messages from the discussions that took place, with particular focus on what resilience means to young peacebuilders; how they are mobilising resilience in the face of the COVID-19 pandemic; and, the policy implications of the options they choose for the youth, peace and security (YPS) agenda in Africa. It also highlights the role of the AU Peace and Security Council (PSC)- commissioned report on A Study on the Roles and Contributions of Youth to Peace and Security in Africa and AU Continental Framework on Youth, Peace and Security to contribute to the YPS agenda.