Albrecht Schnabel is a Senior Fellow at DCAF’s Research Division. He currently works on security sector reform and peace processes; on engaging armed nonstate actors in security sector reform and governance; on the legitimacy and utility of subsidiary roles of armed forces; on women and children as agents of peace and conflict in post-conflict peacebuilding; on the practise of security sector reform in challenging environments; and on human security-based threat analyses and their relevance for security sector institutions.
Before joining DCAF, Albrecht was a Senior Research Fellow at the Swiss Peace Foundation “swisspeace” in Bern. At swisspeace he directed the research programme on human security (HUSEC) and was responsible for the Bern-based team of the early warning programme FAST International. Previously he served as an Academic Officer in the Peace and Governance Programme of the United Nations University, Tokyo, Japan (1998-2003). He was an Instructor at Queen’s University (1994), an Assistant Professor at the American University in Bulgaria (1995-96) and the Central European University (1996-1998), a Visiting Lecturer at Aoyama Gakuin University (2002-03) and, since 2004, he has been a Lecturer in International Organizations and Conflict Management at the Institute of Political Science at the University of Bern.
In 1997 he was a Visiting Research Fellow at the Institute for Peace Research and Security Policy at the University of Hamburg and participated in OSCE election monitoring missions in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Since 1999 he has served as a trainer for the UN System Staff College course on Early Warning and Early Response and, in 2001-02, as President of the International Association of Peacekeeping Training Centres.
Albrecht was educated at the University of Munich, the University of Nevada, and Queen’s University, Canada, where he received his PhD in Political Studies in 1995.
“Towards a Human Security-Based Early Warning and Response System” (with Heinz Krummenacher), in Hans Günter Brauch et al., eds., Facing Global Environmental Change: Environmental, Human, Energy, Food, Health and Water Security Concepts, Hexagon Series on Human and Environmental Security and Peace, Vol. 4, Berlin/Heidelberg/New York: Springer, 2009, pp. 1253-1264.
“Improving Early Warning and Response Systems: Learning from Human Security, Preparing for Climate Change,” in Andrea Ricci, ed., From Early Warning to Early Action? The Debate on the Enhancement of the EU’s Crisis Response Capability Continues, Brussels: European Commission, Directorate-General for External Relations, and Luxembourg: Office for Official Publications of the European Communities, 2008, pp. 387-398.
“The Human Security Approach to Direct and Structural Violence,” SIPRI Yearbook 2008: Armaments, Disarmament and International Security, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008.
After Mass Crime: Rebuilding States and Communities, co-editor (with Béatrice Pouligny and Simon Chesterman), Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 2007.
Transforming War Economies, co-editor (with Danielle Lalive d'Epinay), Working Paper 3/2007, Bern: swisspeace, October 2007.
“Insurgencies, Security Governance and the International Community,” in Alan Bryden and Marina Caparini, eds., Private Actors and Security Governance, Wien: LIT Verlag, 2006.
“Conflict Prevention: Concept and Application” (with David Carment), in Gustaaf Geeraerts, Natalie Pauwels and Éric Remacle, eds., Dimensions of Peace and Security: A Reader, Brussels: P.I.E.-Peter Lang, 2006.
Security Sector Reform and Post-Conflict Peacebuilding, co-editor (with Hans-Georg Ehrhart), Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 2005.
Researching Conflict in Africa: Insights and Experiences, co-editor (with Eghosa Osaghae, Elisabeth Porter, Gillian Robinson and Marie Smyth), Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 2005.
Gender Awareness in Research on Small Arms and Light Weapons: A Preliminary Report (with Emily Schroeder and Vanessa Farr), Working Paper 1/2005, Bern: swisspeace, January 2005.
Conflict Prevention from Rhetoric to Reality: Organizations and Institutions (Vol. 1) and Conflict Prevention from Rhetoric to Reality: Opportunities and Innovations (Vol. 2), co-editor (with David Carment), Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2004.
Human Rights and Societies in Transition: Causes, Consequences, Responses, co-editor (with Shale Horowitz), Tokyo: United Nations University Press, 2004, 452 pp. Republished in 2005 by Bookwell, New Delhi.
“Changing International Relations and the Role of the Military in Post-Conflict Peacebuilding Operations” (with Hans-Georg Ehrhart), S+F: Sicherheit und Frieden/Security and Peace, Vol. 22, No. 1, 2004.
