Lauren is the Sr. Peacekeeping Researcher for CIVIC. She has four years of experience in refugee resettlement in Africa, where she was deployed to UNHCR offices throughout the continent to interview civilians fleeing conflict. Lauren has worked as a researcher for the World Peace Foundation, Conflict Dynamics International, the International Committee of the Red Cross, and the Humanitarian Evidence Program at the Feinstein International Center.

“They said ‘it’s your government to protect you.’ We said it was the government that killed us:” Civilian Perspectives on the Future of UNMISS

By Lauren Spink and Daniel Levine-Spound   Between November and December of 2020, CIVIC carried out interviews with civilians and civil society leaders living in Bor, Juba, and Wau in South Sudan. Up until recently, the UNMISS bases in each of these locations hosted a Protection of Civilians (PoC) site. The sites were created in…

#WPS20: Improving Information-Sharing on Conflict-Related Sexual Violence through the UN Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Arrangements

As part of a broader research project on how the peacekeeping missions in the Central African Republic (CAR), the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) and South Sudan are analyzing and responding to CRSV, CIVIC assessed challenges to information-sharing between humanitarian actors and peacekeepers. We found that the Monitoring, Analysis, and Reporting Arrangements (MARA) established by the UN can contribute significantly to improved information-sharing.

Peacekeepers in South Sudan are Helping Minimize Threats to Civilians through Dialogue at the Subnational and National Levels

South Sudan’s revitalized peace process (R-ARCSS) has been largely elite-focused and has yet to yield real dividends for South Sudanese civilians. In this context, the United Nations peacekeeping Mission in South Sudan (UNMISS) is implementing a new program of work that ties together national support to the peace process in the country with subnational engagement on protection and peacebuilding.