2012
TRAINING REPORT ON CONFLICT RESOLUTION AND PEACE
April 29, 2012
INSTITUTE FOR SOCIAL CHANGE
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Contents 1. Rationale ............................................................................................................................................... 3
2. Introduction .......................................................................................................................................... 3
3. Profile of Trainer ................................................................................................................................... 3
4. Overall Training Objective ..................................................................................................................... 4
5. Methodology ......................................................................................................................................... 4
6. Proceedings ........................................................................................................................................... 5
1. Sharing Training Objectives .............................................................................................................. 5
2. Introduction of the Participants ........................................................................................................ 6
3. How Conflict is Defined ..................................................................................................................... 6
4. Conflict Tree ...................................................................................................................................... 8
5. Peace Making .................................................................................................................................... 8
7. Training Evaluation ............................................................................................................................... 9
8. Certificate Distribution ........................................................................................................................ 10
9. Training Schedule ................................................................................................................................ 11
10. List of participants ........................................................................................................................... 12
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1. Rationale
Institute for Social Change organized one day training workshop on Conflict Resolution and Peace on April 29, 2012 at Hyderabad. Basically, it is growing need of time to create harmony and peace among the people of diversified culture and background through the teachings of peace defenders and theories of conflict resolution and peace. Increasing intolerance has created unrest among the people of different culture and beliefs, so there is acute need of educating youths and people who can really make difference in the society regarding the peace and conflict resolution. Therefore, training workshop is organized for youths, junior professionals and emerging organizations to orient them about the peace and conflict resolution, so that they could transfer the teaching to the maximum people for creating peace and clam in society as a whole.
2. Introduction
One day training on Conflict Resolution and Peace was arranged by Institute for Social Change (ISC) on dated 27th April 2012 in Basic Development Foundation training hall, Hyderabad. 24 youths, fresh graduates, students from the University of Sindh, Mehran University of Engineering and Technology and few among them were NGO workers attended this training workshop. Mr Suhail Memon was a leader trainer of the training.
3. Profile of Trainer
Mr Suhail Memon is a highly confident, devoted Journalist, author and writer. He is a famous columnist and political analyst. He is author of 4 books and more than 400 articles in the largest Sindhi newspaper Daily KAWISH. Suhail is international Liaison for various organizations. He is working with CNN, BBC 2, CBC, Swiss Radio, Belgium TV and German News on assignment basis and has contributed in more than 100 stories on different current and disaster issues. Suhail have been working as Executive Producer (Provincial Head Sindh) of a Radio Media Project of Center for Research and Security Studies Islamabad. He was responsible for the production, broadcast and distribution of a program based on humanitarian issues in the flood affected areas. Currently, he is working as Radio Mentor in INTERNEWS EU, the world's largest Media Development Organization. Suhail holds Masters in International Relations from ShahAbdul Latif University Khairpur Sindh and bachelor of laws and legislation (L.L.B) from same University. Suhail Memon is also an international Peace activist and has received successful peace study and conflict resolution certification from Thailand top university chulalongkorn as Rotary Peace fellow. Suhail has done case studies of transformation of Monarchy in Nepal into democracy and stateless peoples of Mountains of Thai-Burma Border hills.
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4. Overall Training Objective
To orient the participants, particularly youths enabling them to decipher the significance of peace to avoid conflict for the harmony and peace for the continuous development of people and society as whole.
5. Methodology
Training workshop was totally interactive and participatory. Lecturing was used to share the information to the participants. White board and chart sheets were also used to make concepts and theories more clear and understandable. Participants were encouraged to ask questions and to make them clear understood.
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6. Proceedings
1. Sharing Training Objectives Training started with brief introduction of Institute for Social Change (ISC). Mr Jabbar Bhatti, a
focal person of ISC, said that ISC is emerging organization which has started its interventions by
developing the capacities of youths, community groups and emerging development actors
enable them to seek their suitable and dignified career in development sector and play their
due role for the uplift of a society.
He further elaborated ISC trusted in youths’
capacity and they just need to be given space
and opportunities so that they could make the
differences and they would play their role for the
development of people and society. He also
shared the training objectives why ISC has
organized this training, because the increasing
intolerance, civil wars, religious extremism have
created unrest among the people. Small conflicts getting turned into big issues and putting
people into quarrel because people are not ready to sit gather and to listen each other. This
phenomenon is growing in our society. For the resolution of the conflicts and creating culture
of tolerance and sitting together, youths can play the big role; hence youths were targeted to
learn the tools and methods of resolving the conflicts.
Observing the social values and norms, the intolerance and fundamentalism are increasing day
by day. Every person is thinking he is right and
considering other inferior and less important.
This trend and tendency is growing fast. No
attempt has been made to create tolerance and
harmony in the society. People have to provide
space and consideration to the opinion of others
as one feels honor and recognition. The sole
purpose of the training is to develop capacity of
the youth cadres to create society m more
tolerant and peaceful.
Before handing over to trainer, Mr Jabbar Bhatti introduced Mr. Sohail Memon, his vast
experience and long engagement with national and international media. In addition to be
remained with media, he has done in depth course on peace and conflict resolution from
abroad so he has good understanding on the subject.
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2. Introduction of the Participants Later on trainer suggested exercise for the introduction of participants. He said everyone has to
introduce by telling a story on resolving the conflict occurred in his/her life. Certainly everybody
must have indulged into such problem in his/her
practical life. Trainer said every participant start
brainstorming at the event happened in the life
before sharing in front of the participants. Every
participant told an event on problem faced and
how it was resolved peacefully by him/her. The
focus was made on observing how issue was
resolved the peacefully. Participants introduced
themselves remarkably unique by telling a story.
By hearing conflicting stories, facilitator said life is full of conflict and concluded the exercise
adopted for the introduction of the participants. He further defined that the stories shared by
participants embedded with conflict of various nature and types. Overall basis of the conflicts
were the following:
Ethnic
Linguistic
social
Political
Economical
Religious
Cultural
Internal
External
3. How Conflict is Defined People of different ideas, culture, values and interest are living in this country. When making
decision about how to order life in the community, there is bound to be conflicts because of the
different views, opinions, interests, style and understanding that are a natural. In the autocratic
contexts, disagreements are resolved by one person who is considered high in authority. While
in democratic society, everyone is allowed to express his/ her opinion and a conclusion is
reached by majority by taking into account minority rights.
Conflict is normal and natural part of our lives, but important thing is that how we respond to
conflict determines whether it is constructive or destructive. Non violent conflict resolution
strategies can empower us to solve community problems, in the interest of common good.
Following are conflict resolution strategies:
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Communication: Talking and listening so as to understand others views.
Negotiation: when people or groups decide to work out a conflict themselves.
Mediation: when a third person id asked only to assist the disputing parties in coming to
resolution.
Arbitration: when third person makes the
decision for the disputing parties.
Legislation: when a law is made or changed
to prevent the problem from occurring.
Adjuration: when the judge hears each side
and makes decision according to law.
The facilitator appreciated the participants for
their proactive approach and the participation in
the training. Very participatory approach was developed in the training. Mr. Sohail Memon said
first try to understand the peace then conflict. He asked from participants what peace is and
how to maintain it? Absence of war or any conflict is peace. Then he discussed in detail
conflict what is conflict and different types of conflict? Types of conflicts:
Symmetric
Asymmetric
Symmetric
A conflict between two equal parties like conflict between America and Soviet Union is called
symmetric
Asymmetric
A conflict between two unequal parties like conflict between Lebnan and European powers is
called asymmetric. He further said that conflict is not natural but human induced. It is always
between two parties. There is an important to diagnose the history of conflict as we get the
comprehension of the conflict by which it will be easy to suggest solution and resolve the
conflicts.
For the resolving any conflict, conflict mapping is suggested. By adopting conflict mapping
peaceful resolution is expected. Conflict mapping is done by adopting these following steps:
Conflict history
Conflict context
Geographical
Structure/ Relation
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Decision
Main issues studied:
Fact based
Value based
Interest based
4. Conflict Tree Group activity
All participants were divided into three (3) groups. Each group was assigned a topic on conflict
resolution. They were explained the task of studying
issue completely and suggest peaceful solution of
the conflict. Each group was given sheets with
marker for writing and then presented their
presentation before all the participants.
Peace Building: Every person has to build peace
Peace Keeping: Peace maintaining
Peace Monitoring: peace should be monitored by a
person who has mandate between two parties.
5. Peace Making
Conflict theorists often use three terms--peacekeeping, peacemaking, and peace building-- that are easily confused. Peacekeeping means keeping people from attacking each other by putting some kind of barrier between them. Often this barrier is made up of neutral soldiers--peacekeepers--from the UN or a group of neutral nations. The soldiers do nothing to settle the disputant's differences or help negotiate a peace agreement--they simply keep the two sides apart.
Peacemaking is the process of forging a settlement between the disputing parties. While this can be done in direct negotiations with just the two disputants, it is often also done with a third-party mediator, who assists with process and communication problems, and helps the parties work effectively together to draft a workable peace accord. Usually the negotiators are official diplomats, although citizens are getting involved in the peacemaking process more and more. While they do not negotiate final accords, citizen diplomacy is becoming an increasingly common way to start the peacemaking process, which is then finalized with official diplomatic efforts.
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However, peacemaking is not the final step in the peace process. As both the situations in the Middle East and Bosnia so well demonstrate, it takes more than a peace accord to bring peace to a region. The peace accord is just a beginning, which must be followed by long-term peacebuilding--the process of normalizing relations and reconciling differences between all the citizens of the warring factions.
Techniques of peacemaking vary greatly and are beyond the scope of the material we can present here. However, the fundamental techniques used include negotiation, mediation, official and unofficial, or "track two" diplomacy all of which are described in more detail in other sections.
7. Training Evaluation At the end of training all participants were given evaluation forms to be filled as their feedback
would remain guidance for the ISC, and their suggestions and opinions of participants would
enable ISC management to improve the quality of training. Following are findings of the training
evaluation:
This training was new for me
This training would be help me in resolving the conflicts in future
I will apply my learning in practical life
This is the first time that I have attended such training, but I want learnt about it more
I still need to learn more about the conflict resolution
I learnt the methods to resolve the conflicts
After this training I am inclined to be peace maker
I learnt why conflicts are happening
I would try to build peace at personal and as well as organizational level
I would try to avoid conflicts
Training was good that improved my knowledge and capacity about the conflict resolution
and peace
Training course have been effective if it has two/three days duration
I would also help others to make peace in our society
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8. Certificate Distribution Least but not last, time came when participants were to award training certificates. Though it
was small ceremony but very meaningful in which chairman of ISC was invited to distribute the
certificates. But before going to certificate
distribution ceremony, participants were invited
for their feedback, comments and suggestion.
Many participants shared training was good,
excellent, but time was very short.
Some of the participants also demanded handouts
and said these should have distributed among the
participants etc. They were tried to satisfy by
sharing that due to funding constraints training
was limited to one day aiming to give the participants detailed orientation on the subject and
get them familiar with the basic concept of conflict resolution and peace. What type of
approach and methods could be applied the conflict, if it appears.
Later on, Mr Punhal Sario, Chairman of the Institute for Social Change and Mr Suhail Memon
Lead trainer distributed certificates among the participants.
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9. Training Schedule Training Contents Time Methodology
Introduction of participants 15 minutes Interactive Training Objectives 10 minutes Sharing What is peace 30 minutes Lecture Conflict? 30 minutes Lecture Tea Break 15 minutes Conflict diagnosis 30 minutes Lecture Conflict mapping and Conflict tree 45 minutes Power point snap
Conflict Case study exercise an hour Lecture Lunch Break Peace study .kinds of Peace process an hour 30 minutes Lecture Tea Break 15 minutes 12 Do’s and 12 not to do’s in conflict Transformation
an hour Power point
Certificate distribution ceremony 30 minutes Participatory
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10. List of participants # Name Organization/profession E-mail
1 Saira Buriro Sindh Youth Netwark [email protected]
2 Samina Khoso Sindh Youth [email protected]
3 Suraya Buriro Sindh Youth Netwark [email protected]
4 Fahad Hussain Sindh Youth Netwark [email protected]
5 Sajjad Ahmed SYN & SSYDO [email protected]
6 Chagan Lal Syn Member [email protected]
7 Neelash Sharma Syn Member [email protected]
8 Agha Khan Pathan Syn Member [email protected]
9 Anees Ahmed Syn Member [email protected]
10 Akhtar Shaikh SSYDO [email protected]
11 Ayaz Chandio SSYDO [email protected]
12 Saddam Hussain Institute for Social Change [email protected]
13 Sarvech Abbasi Citizen Walfare [email protected]
14 Raheel Kazi SCF [email protected]
15 Pireh Sharmaila FM Preranlri [email protected]
16 Ghufrana Memon Syn Member [email protected]
17 Shaista Burir Syn Member [email protected]
18 Proopa Rani SSYDO [email protected]
19 Ain Bemisal SSYDO [email protected]
20 Sajida Chana PODA Sajida.Poda@gmail
21 Zeeshan Ali Memon FYND-NGO [email protected]
22 Sittara Bano PFF [email protected]
23 Rizwan Ali Abbasi Shah Social Sami [email protected]
24 Rabil Aziz KTN News [email protected]