CSO - UN Dialogue 2025
CSO-UN Dialogue on Peacebuilding 2025
10 - 11 December, Palais des Nations, Geneva
What?
Co-chaired by the UN Department of Political and Peacebuilding Affairs (DPPA) and CMI-Martti Ahtisaari Peace Foundation, the 3rd annual Civil Society Organization (CSO)-UN Dialogue on Peacebuilding will convene diverse civil society actors and UN representatives at the Palais des Nations in Geneva on 10 - 11 December 2025.
DPPA, alongside civil society and UN System partners, launched the CSO-UN Dialogue on Peacebuilding Initiative in 2023 to create a platform for diverse civil society actors, especially from the Global South, to contribute to global peacebuilding policies and objectives and enable the UN to more systematically engage with CSOs in its work building and sustaining peace.
Culminating in annual Dialogues, the Initiative aims to institutionalize UN-CSO-Member State exchanges on peacebuilding and sustaining peace. Since 2023, this Initiative has created momentum for meaningful civil society inclusion in peacebuilding and generated concrete entry points for engagement. It has formed a network of 13 CSOs representing all regions of the world and 7 UN entities that meet regularly. It is also being operationalized as a standing platform that connects CSOs and the Peacebuilding Commission (PBC).
Why?
In the context of increasingly complex drivers of conflict, more meaningful inclusion of civil society, attention to local contexts, and trust-building at global, national, and local levels are urgently needed. The CSO-UN Dialogue on Peacebuilding Initiative provides a critical platform for civil society-UN-Member State exchange of views on key priorities in peacebuilding and sustaining peace. It also serves to further ignite multistakeholder collaborations for the implementation of the Pact for the Future.
DPPA’s Peacebuilding Support Office (PBSO) is uniquely positioned to sustain this platform through its linkages to Members of the PBC and the wider UN System through the Peacebuilding Contact Group. Moreover, through managing the Secretary- General’s Peacebuilding Fund (PBF), the Office connects programming on the ground to global-level policy processes.
How?
| Co-creation of each Dialogue with 10+ global and regional peacebuilding CSOs | Meaningful engagement, including at the regional level, between annual convenings |
| Long-term vision to build an institutionalized platform for SSTC on peacebuilding | Multistakeholder partnerships involving Member States, the UN System, and CSOs |
1st Annual Dialogue
The 1st CSO-UN Dialogue on Peacebuilding took place on 30 November – 1 December 2023. The inaugural Dialogue convened 72 civil society participants from over 45 countries, the majority from the Global South, who were joined by representatives of over 20 UN entities and Member States to discuss challenges and opportunities for meaningful civil society-UN collaboration on peacebuilding.
2nd Annual Dialogue
On 12-13 December 2024, the 2nd iteration of the annual Dialogue was held in New York. The two-day Dialogue was attended by 125 civil society participants from 78 countries and all regions of the world. Among them, 57% were women, and 27% were youth. The Dialogue focused on conflict prevention as the overarching theme and took deep dives into financing for peacebuilding, meaningful civil society engagement, Youth, Peace and Security (YPS), and Women, Peace and Security (WPS).
