Home : A message from President Martti Ahtisaari

A message from President Martti Ahtisaari,
Chairman of the Crisis Management Initiative

Presently, hardly any issue gets greater attention and concern of the international community than the question of how to respond to violent conflicts and the threats to international peace and security that they pose. Globalisation has made individual human suffering an irrevocable universal concern. In our interconnected world, security is increasingly indivisible. Terrorism is an example of the new security threats that seriously challenge what is still a largely state-centred security system. Therefore, it is in the interest of the International community to intervene and stop the spreading of violence, atrocities, and human rights violations and to support reconciliation and reconstruction in societies.

Recent crises have demanded decisive and long-term involvement of the international community in the reconstruction of these societies. These operations as well as others, have demonstrated the need for a more coherent response to crises and conflicts and have exposed a gap between existing civilian and military capabilities. Today, the field of crisis management is witness to a great number of agents confronting the same problems but lacking a shared or consistent knowledge, coordination or communications technology or user culture. As a result, the different organisations work, wastefully, on the same problems, plan and take decisions without consulting with one another or without access to up-to-date or adequate knowledge. As in relations between civilian organisations, there is also a need to achieve greater conceptual coherence about the overall strategy and goals of crisis management missions at the civilian-military interface.

Modern, well utilised information technology is a key enabler of many of these objectives. Technology as such is hardly the driver of the organisational change, but it can provide decisive support for the organisations' information management and communication strategy through administrative innovation and implementing new kind of thinking into the tools of everyday work.

President Martti Ahtisaari,
Chairman of the Crisis Management Initiative