Reflecting on Peace Practice Workshop
Co-sponsored by the Collaborative for Development Action and the Program on Citizen Peacebuilding, University of California,
Irvine
Dialogue Efforts in Peace Processes
May 16-18, 2002
The conference brought together peace practitioners
and scholars with
experience in dialogue processes as a form of citizen peacebuilding. Issues
addressed included understanding effectiveness of peace work, identifying meaningful
indicators for peace work, and exploring inadvertent negative impacts
of well-intended efforts.
For three days approximately 25 peace practitioners,
including international scholar/practitioners and national and local practitioners
from selected
conflict regions (Northern Ireland, Israel, Guatemala, Southern California)
discussed their successes and frustrations in their citizen peacebuilding
activities. All shared concrete experience working with a range of
dialogue processes (including so-called back-channel--closed, high
level--dialogues, as well as more transparent dialogues involving civil
society). Dialogue work is one of the primary tools used in peace
initiatives, and therefore deserves focused examination. Participants'
common experience of dialogue work enabled a more targeted exploration of the
broader questions of effectiveness and impact.
Details about the co-sponsoring Reflecting on Peace
Practice project and
final reports can be found at: www.cdainc.com
Turning
research into action for a safer world
