What it Takes to Return : UN Peacekeeping and the Safe Return of Displaced People

Can the international community enable conditions for voluntary, safe and sustainable returnof displaced people As conflict is key in the decision to leave and to return, this paper investigates whether thedeployment of UN peacekeeping operations can reduce the insecurities driving displacement and delaying return. Itexplores the case of South Sudan, which hosts the second largest UN peace operation in the world. It combinesinformation on peacekeepers' subnational deployment with data on individuals' intention to move and hostcommunities' perceptions of returnees and internally displaced people (IDPs) using two surveys, one carried outbetween 2015 and 2017 and one in 2018. To mitigate concerns about non-random subnational assignment of peacekeepers, thepaper exploits variations in the presence of previous infrastructures and information on the total supply oftroops to African countries from each troop-contributing country. The paper finds that UN peacekeeping affects boththe magnitude and the quality of return. Displaced people are more likely to return home if peacekeepers are deployedin their county of destination. At the same time, the local presence of peacekeepers mitigates host communities'negative perception of IDPs; they also enable the delivery of support to communities that seem to improve attitudestoward returnees and IDPs.