Approach

Safestainable supports various clients in integrating Human Rights standards into their security and management practices worldwide, by conducting specific consultancy projects and training.

The Safestainable Approach

Operating a business in volatile areas can open up important opportunities but present equally great risks and challenges.

The management of security risks in conflict areas is a major challenge for companies. They can if addressed in an inappropriate way, greatly increase operational costs and have considerable and costly legal and reputational risks.

Safestainable will help you profit from existing economic opportunities by adopting a sustainable approach towards security management that acknowledges the interdependence of security, legal, and reputational risks.

Safestainable will assist you in dealing with security, legal, and reputational risks in a systematic and integrated manner throughout the project cycle. Our services will help you to make the best decisions, to elaborate and implement appropriate strategies, and to identify best practices in order to guarantee the efficient and cost-effective functioning of your project.

The underlining approach is to go beyond traditional security management strategies, by acknowledging the interdependence of different risks and by integrating the respect of International Humanitarian Law and Human Rights principles, active stakeholder dialogue, and existing best practices into security management. This will create beneficial socio-economic effects for stakeholders and will help to reduce your security threats, as well as reputational and legal risks and liabilities. It can also open up future business opportunities.

While focusing on non-armed security approaches, we acknowledge that the use of armed security services might be a necessary element in a comprehensive security strategy. In these cases, we will advise you on how to best select security providers and to establish safeguards in order to avoid negative impacts on your security, legal, and reputational environment.

Having extensive field experience in conflict areas, we strive to provide not solely strategic and theoretical advice but to assist you in implementing practical and pragmatic solutions, which have a positive impact on your daily operations and on your stakeholder environment.

Security, legal, and reputational risks are interdependent and a strategy adopted in one field is likely to affect the others. For example, a security strategy relying mainly on armed deterrence might increase the risks of human rights violations and can negatively impact a company's reputation.

Basic Premise

• Companies active in a context of social and political tension are never neutral actors. Their presence and activities have either positive or negative impacts on host communities and societies.
• The companies' daily operational interaction with host communities and societies are equally, if not more, important than their community relations programs in establishing the terms with local host communities and societies.
• The ability of company strategies to influence different conflict actors and to affect the operational environment changes along the course of a project. Prior to investment, companies have considerable leverage to influence national conflict actors and to shape the macro environment. However, after investment, this leverage continuously decreases. On the other hand, companies' leverage on local conflict actors and their power to shape the micro-level environment is low prior to investment but increases over time. These facts often lead to a major reputational risk, as companies experience the highest external pressure from civil society to influence national conflicts when their ability to influence national factors is the weakest.