Position Descriptor:            Africa Justice and Peacebuilding Advisor
Job Code Title:                     Technical Advisor II

Band:                                      D
Department:                         PIQA
Supervisor:                           AJPWG Team Leader

Location:                               Africa

Introduction:

CRS officially established the Africa Justice and Peace Working Group (AJPWG) in 2009 in recognition of the Church’s potential to carry out peacebuilding and governance work and with the assumption that if CRS supported it to do so, the Church would be more prepared to respond to increasing demands to address such issues.

Since 2009, the AJPWG has supported the Church’s engagement with the Second Synod on Africa 2009 and subsequent follow-up actions. It helped build the Church’s capacity to engage in peacebuilding and governance efforts in a number of African countries, such as South Sudan and the Lesser Great Lakes. It has also offered the Institute for Peacebuilding in Africa (IPA), an annual capacity building workshop aimed at CRS’, the Church’s and other partners’ staffs. Lastly, the AJPWG has worked with universities in Africa to strengthen their peacebuilding curricula and capacities to train the next generation of peacebuilders in Africa.

Both CRS leadership and staff members have supported the AJPWG’s inter-regional and continent-wide focus as a way for CRS to optimize its peacebuilding and governance resources in Africa. AJPWG core members are trusted by the Church and are now seen as go-to resources for guiding the Church in its peacebuilding and governance efforts. They enable CRS to work more closely with country and regional bishops’ conferences and to strengthen the peacebuilding and governance capacities of the Church in Africa as a whole.

The AJPWG is therefore well positioned to implement the agency’s intended shift from a regional-based approach to technical support to a global “lines of expertise” system with pooled resources.  What remains will be to formalize the AJPWG’s de facto operational modalities of sharing and deploying technical resources more collaboratively across the African regions.

Primary functions:

The Africa Justice and Peacebuilding Advisor (hereafter referred to as the Advisor) shall be responsible for providing technical leadership in articulating and advancing the CRS strategic vision for the core competency, the integration of peacebuilding, governance and gender into CRS’ development and humanitarian programming. In doing so, the Advisor shall assume responsibility for the following core functions of a technical advisor:

• Nurture and strengthen relationships between CRS and its key partner, the Church of Africa, in the execution of its own strategy, Africae Munus;
• Provide technical support to country programs particularly as part of award-funded short-term technical assistance;
• Strengthen the capacity of the Church of Africa, at the country, regional and continental levels in Peacebuilding, Governance and Gender (PBGG) integration, consistent with CRS’ Partnership and Capacity Strengthening Unit’s best practices and standards;
• Stimulate knowledge generation, learning and sharing among staff of CRS and partners in the areas of PBGG;
• Participate actively in the business development cycle with a particular focus on prepositioning CRS to increase its access and influence with public donors.

Specific Responsibilities:

1. Contribute to advancing the Agency’s strategy, especially by accompanying country programs to integrate governance into the development of strategic plans, programming and management approaches;
2. Develop clearly defined and articulated technical approaches rooted in CST for governance (i.e., elections, local governance, parliamentary strengthening, resource governance and access to justice) and focused on increasing equity and social cohesion;
3. Introduce tools and templates to build country program staff capacity so that CRS adopts and more systematically integrates these technical approaches to governance in signature and other programming areas;
4. Market these technical approaches to public donors and identify potential growth opportunities to replicate and scale them up;
5. Serve as a technical writer or reviewer for these growth opportunities and contribute as needed to overall proposal development;
6. In collaboration with monitoring, evaluation, accountability and learning colleagues, support the development and application of monitoring and evaluation methods and tools for governance;
7. Participate in evaluation of country programs’ governance and integrated governance projects, identifying and documenting promising practices and lessons learned;
8. In collaboration with other PBGG Advisors and the AJPWG Team Leader, identify, develop, and implement initiatives that:

9. Develop and implement capacity strengthening initiatives to support the Church in assuming its leadership role, including but not limited to the Institute for Peace in Africa as the platform for:

1. sustained capacity building in the basics of governance for CRS partners so that they develop capabilities in these areas; and
2. action and learning in governance through support for research, documentation, and sharing of knowledge on major issues confronting the continent.

10. Work with church partners on the continent and abroad to coordinate and harmonize integrated and standalone PBGG priorities and programs and advocacy.
11. Support Church and other partners in advocacy at the local through international levels.

Key Working Relationships:

Internal

• AJPWG Team Leader
• Regional Directors and Deputy Regional Directors for Program Quality in Central, East, West, and Southern Africa regions of CRS; Signature Programming Area and other development programming pooled technical advisors in the regions
• Program Impact and Quality Assurance (PIQA) Director for Technical Integration, PIQA Senior Technical Advisors for Justice and Peacebuilding, Gender, Protection
• Country Representatives; Heads of Programming; PBGG Program Managers

External 

• The leadership and staff of continental and regional Episcopal conferences, institutions, and organizations of the Catholic Church;
• The leadership of institutions and organizations in Africa and elsewhere which have a stake in the promotion of PBGG on the continent.
• Representatives of donor agencies and other bodies with interest in PBGG in Africa.

Personal Skills:

1. Excellent interpersonal, diplomacy, and negotiating skills;
2. Proven ability to work effectively as part of a multidisciplinary and multicultural team;
3. Ability to work successfully in the field with people at all levels, and to manage conflict and move groups toward completion of an activity;
4. Superb conceptual and analytical skills with ability to digest large amounts of abstract information and synthesize it into actionable recommendations or action steps;
5. Ability to develop and nurture good relations with public donor senior management and staff;
6. Ability to take on multiple tasks simultaneously;
7. Excellent skills in public representation and written and oral communication;
8. Strong proposal development/writing skills and demonstrated experience;
9. Strong personal orientation and commitment to peacebuilding as a way of transforming relationships and social injustice; committed to the principles of Catholic Social Teaching;
10. Extensive facilitation and training skills; demonstrated ability to transfer knowledge and information to diverse audiences; experience in organizing meetings and trainings.

Qualifications:

1. Advanced degree in the social sciences, theology, international relations, public policy, public administration or related fields;
2. At least 10 years professional experience in elections, local governance, parliamentary strengthening, resource governance and/or access to justice, 5 of which should be in Africa;
3. Knowledge of and experience with working with country, regional and continental institutions of the Catholic Church and other civil society organizations;
4. Ability to work with bishops and key Church personnel in representation and training;
5. Knowledge of religious, social and political dynamics and trends in Africa;
6. Experience with program monitoring including development of indicators, data collection tools and methodologies, data analysis, and data presentation;
7. Recognized technical leader in governance with significant publications in relevant fields;
8. Fluency in English and full professional proficiency in written and spoken French;
9. Computer skills (Word, Excel, Access, Outlook, SharePoint, SalesForce);
10. Willingness to travel up to 50% of time.

Physical Requirements/Environment:

Position is based in Africa with frequent travel throughout the continent, including to areas that are experiencing civil conflict. Generally travel will be 3-5 day trips, but occasional 10-12 days trips are possible. Normal office environment when not traveling.

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