Evidence synthesis: What interventions have been effective in preventing or mitigating armed violence in developing and middle-income countries?

The UK Department for International Development (DFID) commissioned this Rapid Evidence Assessment (REA) to answer the following research question: What interventions have been effective in preventing or mitigating armed violence in developing and middle-income countries? This review of the evidence serves multiple goals. First, it addresses a clear policy demand. It was carried out rapidly in order to feed into ongoing and urgent policy debates about the effectiveness of policies and programmes that promote conflict prevention and mitigation. The research builds on previous work including the DFID-funded study ‘What Price Peace’ (2010) and other reviews of the earlier literature. Second, it provides a foundation for future research. The study identifies gaps that future research must address and emerging bodies of literature that must be encouraged in order to build a stronger evidence base for decision makers to draw on. Third, it represents an opportunity for learning. This is the first attempt that the authors are aware of to carry out a systematic stock-take of the evidence across a range of intervention types, disciplines, and regions. The review thus generates valuable methodological lessons for similar exercises going forward. The review examines academic articles and evaluations published in English, Spanish and Portuguese between 2010 and 2015. It adopts a systematic approach to the literature search and quality assessment to maximise transparency, replicability and the potential to update.