Measuring the success of peace operations: Directions in academic literature

This background paper examines how the academic literature has approached the question of success in peace operations. Here it should be noted that many theoretical and methodological issues have not been settled, nor does this contribution seek to resolve them. The aim here is to shed light on the issue, and indicate where choices need to be made for research into success to be rigorous. The first section examines differences between the way that scholarly and practitioner analyses approach this question. The section that follows looks at how the academic literature has approached the definition of success and where some of the fault-lines lie. In the conclusion I outline a number of methodological decisions that need to be made when conducting research on success.