In response to requests received over many years, this summer the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding is launching a specifically tailored to women who are oriented toward social change and who wish to develop their abilities to lead the cause of peace and justice in their regions of the world.

The women in this program will be scholarship-supported by donations and grants and will be grouped in cohorts with other women in their geographical area. The cohorts will move through the two-year program as a group, covering similar material and acquiring complementary skills while they together develop ways to maximize their impact on their home region.

This inaugural year the program will focus on women in three regions: Liberia, Somalia, and two South Pacific Island nations (Fiji and the Solomon Islands). The initiative is enthusiastically backed by Nobel Laureate . Her Gbowee Peace Foundation Africa secured funding from USAID for four women from Liberia to participate.

Like Gbowee herself, most of the women in the Women’s Peace Leadership Program will be drawn from civil society organizations. They have proven themselves to be eager, intelligent change-agents, but they realize they need a better theoretical foundation for their work, as well as more tools for analysis, strategic planning, monitoring and evaluation, and organizational leadership. And they need each other! All cohorts will be divided into small sub-groups that will be assigned their own experienced mentor for the duration of the program. Some of the work will take place in the classroom, but much will occur in the field, in the women’s home regions.

We are very excited about the future possibilities for these cohorts, viewing them as a form of “critical yeast” to help their societies rise from conflict and from unequal treatment of women.

Though the women’s leadership program is new, women graduates of CJP have been playing leadership roles around the world for more than a decade, as will be evident from the pages of this issue of Peacebuilder. The new program is simply building on the work already being done to reduce violence against women and children and to create a more just, peaceful society for everyone.

One week after Leymah Gbowee was named a winner of the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize, she returned to ��ݮ���� over the weekend of October 14-16 to be honored as EMU’s 2011 Alumna of the Year.

During that weekend Gboweee, a 2007 graduate of the Center for Justice and Peacebuilding (CJP), spoke frankly about her fear of losing touch with the suffering women she desperately wants to serve, as she tries to handle the overwhelming attention emanating from the Nobel Peace Prize.

She told students, staff, faculty and alumni gathered in Lehman Auditorium that she prays every morning and every night to do God’s work with humility, because that is how she will do the most good for the most people.

Since that weekend Gbowee has been a keynote speaker at major international gatherings, such as a TED conference in March 2012. The had been viewed nearly 200,000 times as of April 19, 2012.

In her TED talk, Gbowee focused on her desire to educate and otherwise empower girls and women. This proved to be a curtain-raiser for her announcing in early April the launching of a new non-profit organization, the Gbowee Peace Foundation Africa.

At EMU’s Homecoming and at TED, Gbowee spoke of being a low-earning, single mother in the late 1990s and of having no choice but to ignore appeals to personally care for bright young girls who hungered for education but were abused instead. She spoke of a girl raped by her grandfather for six years and of villages where nearly every girl was exploited sexually.

She referred to Liberia’s teen pregnancy rate of three out of every 10 girls. “I was at that place and somehow I am at this place, and I don’t want to be the only person at this place. I am looking for ways for other girls to be with me.”

She spoke of traveling 13 to 15 hours per day on dirt roads throughout Liberia to hold meetings with groups of girls. “We go into rural communities, and all we do — like has been done in this room [at TED] — is create the space. When these girls sit … you unlock great leaders.”

She spoke about seeing 50 girls in one village become energized to the point of launching a voters’ registration campaign, with the slogan “even pretty girls vote,” which led to the defeat of an incumbent who had disparaged Liberia’s national legislation against rape.

“I am troubled when I see there’s no hope [among village girls], but I’m not pessimistic because I know it doesn’t take a lot to get them charged up.”

With USAID funding, the Gbowee Foundation is providing scholarships to four women to be part of the Women’s Peace Leadership Program, beginning at the 2012 Summer Peacebuilding Institute (SPI).

The Gbowee Foundation has also secured two full scholarships for Liberian women to Vassar College and two one-year scholarships for graduate study at the University of Indianapolis. In Liberia, the foundation is funding scholarships for four young Liberian women to study at the Mother Patern College, Cuttington University and the University of Liberia.

Gbowee shares the 2011 Nobel Peace Prize with a fellow Liberian, President Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, and women’s rights activist .

Gbowee’s honor was in recognition of her leadership of the Women of Liberia Mass Action for Peace, which brought together Christian and Muslim women in a nonviolent movement that had a key role in ending Liberia’s 14 years of civil war in 2003. The movement is chronicled in her memoir, Mighty Be Our Powers, and in the award-winning documentary, “Pray the Devil Back to Hell.”

Gbowee’s journey from being a destitute and depressed mother of four to being an assertive campaigner for peace began in the late 1990s when she received training in trauma healing and reconciliation from Lutheran church workers in Liberia during that country’s civil war. These workers had been trained by Barry Hart, a Mennonite peace worker in Liberia in the early 1990s and now a professor at CJP.

Encouraged by close colleagues in West Africa who had been educated at CJP, Gbowee first came to CJP in 2004 for SPI and returned in 2005 for a session of Strategies for Trauma Awareness and Resilience (STAR). In 2006-07, she was in residence at EMU as she finished her master’s degree in conflict transformation.

In her memoir, Gbowee credits another Liberian, Sam Gbaydee Doe, who earned a master’s degree from CJP in 1998 – along with CJP professors Hizkias Assefa, John Paul Lederach, and Howard Zehr – with particularly influencing her journey to peacebuilding.

“EMU opened my eyes that I was not the only crazy person in the world… It brought in a perspective of global conflict,” said Gbowee. Meeting fellow students of peacebuilding from around the world “put a face to those conflicts.” She added, “It has made the world a village for me.” Now when she hears about oppression and violence in other regions, she asks herself, “How I can help and how I can get helped by some of my other colleagues in this area?”

Gbowee co-founded Women, Peace and Security Network (WIPSEN) in the spring of 2006, with a fellow SPI alumna, Thelma Ekiyor, and a third woman, Ecoma Alaga, who previously worked for an organization founded by two CJP alumni, the West African Network for Peacebuilding. Due to the growing demands on her time, Gbowee has announced that she will relinquish her position as executive director of WIPSEN in December 2012.

Gbowee is now the mother of six. Her first-born son, Joshua Mensah, is a rising junior at EMU.

(Photos by Jon Styer.)

In the first program in North America of its kind, 12 women from Liberia, the South Pacific and Somalia will gather as a carefully selected and wholly sponsored cohort at the 2012 Summer Peacebuilding Institute (SPI), with eight other fully funded women covering the same material at an East African site.

Sri Lanka, the home country of several graduates of EMU’s conflict transformation program, is emerging from three decades of civil war after the Sinhalese-dominated government’s brutal defeat of the Tamil-minority insurgency in 2009.

The words “peace,” “reconciliation,” and “pluralism” are known throughout the country, but bringing these conditions to fruition remains a hope and a dream. One of the people at the forefront of making them a reality is an energetic graduate with multiple degrees, .

In October 2011, five months after finishing her degree at EMU, Sri Lanka President Mahinda Rajapaksa named Pushpi the coordinator of the Sri Lankan Reconciliation Secretariat. In posted on December 19, 2011, Pushpi explained that her office had no actual powers, but was mandated to advise, guide and facilitate dialogue and other moves toward reconciliation. Online photos of Pushpi at work in Sri Lanka suggest that she is often outnumbered by taller, older men in her meetings, yet she appears unintimidated.

“When Pushpi entered our program, her commitment to peacemaking in her home country was immediately apparent,” says Howard Zehr, EMU professor of restorative justice. “In addition to her quiet confidence, I was impressed by the way that she consistently sought to apply what she was learning to the situation in Sri Lanka. Her current role therefore seems a natural fit.”

Soon after her appointment, Pushpi invited representatives from non-profits like Save the Children, Rotary and other civil society groups to meet with government officials to explore ways to integrate ex-combatants and promote respect and equality for all religious and ethnic groups.

“We have set up district reconciliation committees in three northern districts and hope to do the same in the other two as well,” Pushpi said in the December 11 interview. “We had productive input from the local officials who attended about problems and possible solutions.”

Asked about her concept of “reconciliation,” Pushpi replied: “My guru, the father of conflict transformation, Professor John Paul Lederach [founding director of CJP, now based at the University of Notre Dame] calls it ‘a meeting ground where trust and mercy have met, and where justice and peace have kissed.’

“In simpler terms, it’s about bringing people together to move them beyond the past through reestablishing trust and normalcy, [and] forgiving each other,” Pushpi said. She pointed out that such trust requires a legitimately just society based on mutual respect among ethnicities such as the Sinhala and Tamil, as well as among different fractions of single ethnicities such as the northern and southern Tamils and Muslims.

“All communities should accept ex-combatants/beneficiaries, military and the police, war widows and disabled into their localities with open arms. There should be a positive atmosphere for the natural day-to-day activities to progress without fear and prejudice.

“Most importantly the youth who are cut off from the rest of the country for over two decades and made to think the southerners were of different nature, must mingle together and share their values and cultures to disperse the misunderstandings. Even though such a process will never be achieved overnight, even small steps taken without delay could lay a foundation for a lasting relation.”

Pushpi spoke of convening meetings of officials in education, health, agriculture, the military and the police to share their concerns and explore solutions. As a direct result of these meetings, she rallied contributors—Rotary members, private computer companies, foreign colleges and Sri Lankans in diaspora—to refurbish a rundown building to house an educational and vocational training center that will serve ex-combatants, among others.

Pushpi also called attention to the urgent need for “safe houses for young unmarried mothers, education on sexual and reproductive health, and income-generating activities for war widows,” in addition to more English and math teachers, vocational training for youths, and extracurricular activities and cultural exchanges in the schools in the language of each population group.

In posted April 3, 2012, Pushpi noted that “the root cause of the ethnic conflict could lie in the failure of successive governments to address the genuine grievances of the Tamil people,” but she added that every Sri Lankan “should individually take it upon ourselves to contribute in whatever way we can [to the solution].”

“Every little bit adds up,” she said. “A collective peace achieved would have a longer life span since the many stakeholders having a sense of ownership would also be the guardians of it.”

Pushpi has frequently turned to fellow Rotarians in Sri Lanka to provide the funding and volunteer assistance necessary for many of her initiatives, such as exchange programs between ethnically diverse young people living in different areas of the country. She was a Rotary Peace Scholar in 2007, Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar in 2009, and National Peace Award recipient in 2011 from the Rotary Club of West Colombo.

In 2009-10, Pushpi combined her master’s degree studies at EMU with mediation training at Harvard Law School. She holds an undergraduate law degree from the University of Buckingham and an MBA from the University of Cardiff, both in the United Kingdom. She has a diploma in conflict resolution from Bandaranaike Center for International Studies in Sri Lanka, which is affiliated with the UN’s University for Peace in Costa Rica.

(Photos courtesy of Pushpi Weerakoon.)

At the end of 1995, years before , arrived at CJP as a Fulbright scholar, she gathered representatives of non-governmental women’s groups in Nepal and founded the Beyond Beijing Committee to lobby for women’s rights and inclusion as equal participants.

Earlier, in September 1995, Shakya had the Nepalese women’s delegation to the United Nations’ Fourth World Conference on Women at Beijing. Participation in this conference “started the trend for the first time in the history of Nepal to be inclusive of its multicultural heritage and minorities and rural population,” Shakya told Peacebuilder.

Shakya launched in 1998, not long after Nepal descended into a war lasting from 1996 to 2006. Her organization continues to monitor, document, mediate, and rescue people suffering from violence. Today the program is focused on reconciliation work, based on peace and compassion rather than revenge and anger.

A major component of the program is a workshop lasting four to six days in which traumatized women and children, in separate sessions, are helped to work through their grief and anger and to move forward. “We find that after four or five days in our program, the participants recognize that revenge or other forms of violence only perpetuates further violence rather than peace, at both the personal and community levels,” said Shakya.

In a June 2011 interview with the alumni magazine of Smith College—where Shakya earned her undergraduate degree and currently serves as a board member of the alumni association—Shakya spoke of the value of art therapy for traumatized children. Their art has been the basis of comic books and art exhibitions that graphically show how these children experienced Nepal’s war.

“A lot of them [the children] had been child soldiers,” Shakya told Smith magazine. “They saw a lot of torture, a lot of killing; they themselves had to go through a lot of torture. They have lost their parents in the conflict. And for women, some of them have been soldiers themselves as Maoist insurgents. Some of them have been tortured and raped. They cannot sleep. They cannot think straight. They still live in fear.”

Yet Shakya has been heartened to see how even highly traumatized women and children have responded positively to the workshops sponsored by HimRights.

“[In most cases], they go through an amazing change. On the first day, they’re really mad and they say something like, ‘I want revenge.’ The anger that comes out is unbelievable. And we would gradually see each day how they changed. By the fourth day, they will stand up and say, ‘I don’t want revenge. It just doesn’t help. It will only instigate more violence.’ [Usually, by the end] there is so much compassion and understanding for each other.”

also hosts public hearings in which local policy makers, along with representatives from both sides of the conflict, hear testimony from women and children on how the violence affected them firsthand. In the Smith article, Shakya said she hopes that dialogue will ultimately translate into policies based on mutual understanding, with an eye to reconciliation and lasting peace based on social justice.

, also chaired by Shakya, consists of established female leaders in the fields of women’s rights, social justice, media, political empowerment, law, and community development in Nepal. It has a network of 182 committee members, plus 625 affiliated members, at the national, regional, district, and village levels. “From the beginning, Beyond Beijing embraced marginalized women in Nepal, notably dalits and indigenous women in remote regions, and ensured that they were represented at all levels of the organization,” said Shakya.

Shakya, who is married with two adult sons, told Peacebuilder that her long-term goals are “to change societal attitudes toward women and children. Unfortunately, the patriarchal value system will not go away easily.”

, PhD in Social Work 2008, Osmania University in Hyderabad, India. Dissertation title: “A Study of the Quality of Life of Sri Lankan Refugees Living in Camps in Tamil Nadu.” Current work: Chief Zonal Officer in CASA (Church’s Auxiliary for Social Action). “We work in the villages of India. I coordinate development efforts in the four southern states of India. Our focus is on poverty alleviation and political awareness and empowerment of the oppressed classes, particularly the dalits, tribals, women and backward castes.”

, PhD in Theology 2005, University of Durham in the United Kingdom. Dissertation title: “Corporate Discipline and the People of God: A Study of 1 Corinthians 5.3-5.” Current work: College and seminary professor of religion and a mediator in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois. Previously Brenneman was an assistant professor of religion and the director of peace and conflict studies at Mennonite-affiliated Bluffton University in Ohio. “My dissertation was a study of community discipline in the ancient church in Corinth, with implications for churches today.”

, PhD in Peace Studies 2008 from the University of Bradford in the United Kingdom. Dissertation title: “A Transformative Approach to Public Dispute Resolution: A Study of the U.S. Model and the South Korean Case.” Current work: Education and publication, including book writing, focusing on peacebuilding and conflict transformation; lecturer at universities, special events and workshops for different groups. “I published a book titled Conflict Resolution in Korean Society in 2010. I also translated a book entitled Managing Public Disputes. Both books are my efforts to introduce conflict resolution/transformation to Korean society and encourage people to take different approaches to conflict based on dialogue and collaboration.”

, PhD in Political Science 2004 from Banaras Hindu University in Varanasi, India. Thesis title: “Refugee Problematic and Regional Security in South Asia.” Current work: Assistant professor in the  in Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi. Kaushikee’s online curriculum vitae list dozens of seminars given, workshops led, conferences organized, and papers, monographs and a book published, both in India and in other countries, notably the Republic of Ireland, Northern Ireland and the United States. Her range of interests is wide—from human rights to conflict resolution—but she has demonstrated a particular interest in the Gandhian approach to peace and conflict resolution.

, Doctor of Letters (D.LItt.) 2012, Drew University in New Jersey. Dissertation title: “On the Survival of Mennonite Community in Modern-Day America: Lessons from History, Communities and Artists.” Current work: Editor-in-chief at ��ݮ����, including writing and editing Peacebuilder magazine. “The Mennonite church-community offers the world a distinctive and much-needed minority voice on behalf of living peacefully and helping people who are suffering. I hope this community will resist the historic trend of the assimilation of minority communities into the dominant culture.”

, PhD in Conflict Analysis and Resolution 2010 from the School for Conflict Analysis & Resolution at George Mason University, Fairfax, Virginia. Dissertation title: “The Politics Of Ritual: Exploring Discourse Regarding The Use Of Ritual In Northern Uganda.” Current work: Chief of Programming and Training for Africa Region of the United States Peace Corps. “In this role I provide strategic oversight and guidance to the development efforts of 25 country programs in Africa.  It is the largest regional program in the Peace Corps—approximately 41 percent of Peace Corps Volunteers serve in Africa. Though not the largest part of what I do, I have started a post-conflict support initiative for our programs in Rwanda, Uganda, Sierra Leone and Liberia.”

PLUS: Three female graduates earned doctoral-level law degrees before enrolling in CJP: , Doctor of Law 1988 from the Catholic University in Quito, Ecuador; , JD 1988 from George Washington University School of Law; and , JD 1987 from West Virginia University School of Law.

In February 2009, , was invited to speak at an event organized by a coalition of groups that was urging the U.S. Congress to pass the International Violence Against Women Act (IVAWA).

Turner was a featured speaker because she had spent years addressing the widespread violence (often rape) inflicted on women in her native country of the Democratic Republic of the Congo. Turner came to EMU after years of working for the United Nations Development Programme and for CARE International on women’s issues, with a particular focus on the brutal treatment of women in war-ravaged areas of the Congo.

IVAWA had bipartisan backing—including Senator John Kerry, a Democrat, and Senator Richard Lugar, a Republican—but despite the efforts of Turner and other eye-witnesses to the violence against women in many countries of the world, the act did not get passed before Congress adjourned in 2009. The act was re-introduced in 2010, but as of April 2012, it had not been resurrected and passed.

According to :

The IVAWA, if passed, would for the first time comprehensively incorporate solutions into all U.S. foreign assistance programs—solutions such as promoting women’s economic opportunity, addressing violence against girls in school, and working to change public attitudes. Among other things, the IVAWA would make ending violence against women a diplomatic priority for the first time in U.S. history. It would require the U.S. government to respond to critical outbreaks of gender-based violence in armed conflict—such as the mass rapes now occurring in the Democratic Republic of Congo and Haiti—in a timely manner. And by investing in local women’s organizations overseas that are successfully working to reduce violence in their communities, the IVAWA would have a huge impact on reducing poverty—empowering millions of women in poor countries to lift themselves, their families, and their communities out of poverty.

Though Turner started her journey to peacebuilding focused on the treatment of women, she is broadening the scope of her interests as a PhD candidate at the School for Conflict Analysis & Resolution of George Mason University. She wants to explore the role of doctorate-holding leaders of society and other intellectuals in contributing to the violence in the Congo, or at least in acquiescing to it.

“EMU opened my eyes that I was not the only crazy person in the world… It brought in a perspective of global conflict.”
–Leymah Gbowee, MA ’07, 2011 Nobel Peace Price Laureate

Welcome to the Spring-Summer 2012 issue of Peacebuilder! Our focus in this issue is Women Leaders in peacebuilding. We hope you find the following articles inspiring, as they highlight to the global work of women building peaceful societies and communities.