CCTS
Review 30

I will draw on my experience of working in the Middle East, Mindanao and Sierra Leone. These are hugely complex conflict situations, to which it is impossible to do justice in a short talk. What I am presenting is a personal analysis and personal view, in which I will try to pick out some of the pacification and peacebuilding elements in the various processes in these countries.
In Israel and Palestine, the Israeli government, with the backing of the US and others, is clearly attempting to pacify the Palestinians. There is little evidence at government level of any genuine attempt at peacebuilding. It is about attempting to pacify by superior military and economic power. Sharon was very quick, after 9/11, to categorize the Palestinian struggle as part of a global terrorist threat to Western democracies. With US backing, Israel is attempting to put the conflict into that frame, rather than the one in which the Palestinians see it, as a fight for justice and their rights to a state.

The civil society groups I work with in both societies do not believe that violence will ever resolve the problem. Not surprisingly, the Palestinian groups are more organised than the Israeli ones, much clearer about what they are trying to do – as is often the case with oppressed groups. The Israeli groups are younger, in terms of their origin and development, and are attempting to find their own identity and their own place in this field. Both groups are trying, within their own societies, to promote the notion of a just peace, in the terms they see it.

Michael made an important point when he said the role of an outsider is not to make peace for parties in a violent conflict but to provide support, when it is requested by the people within the societies working to bring about peaceful change. However, the issue is not simply about what we want to do as practitioners, but about what it is possible to get funding for. Some funders expect to see peace break out in the course of the three-year project they are funding. You attempt to say to them that maybe that is not a realistic time scale.

Another popular notion amongst funders is that the way to go about ending the violence is by bringing together the two sides in a conflict. I and my colleagues have been strongly resisting that notion, in relation to the work in Israel and Palestine, because what the people on the ground say to us is that, while the Palestinians are ready for a dialogue with their Israeli counterparts, the Israeli groups are not yet ready for it. It would not be right to say to the Israelis that they have to go and talk to the Palestinians. At the moment we are working separately with the two groups. If at some time in the future they both express the desire to come together, this can be facilitated.

An issue that arose in all the three places in which I was working was whether the groups themselves believe that violence could ever get them what they want. When work began with the Palestinian group, it was clear that some of them thought violence could be part of the answer. But in the process of looking at the problem they have changed their minds and now believe that change has to achieved by nonviolent means.

In Mindanao, the Philippines government also seized the opportunity provided by 9/11, to get funding from the US for what they describe as the fight against the terrorists infiltrating from Indonesia. The Philippines government is receiving a lot of US support, to assist its efforts to defeat and pacify the groups which hope to set up an Islamic state in Mindanao. However, there is widespread corruption within the Philippines’ government and, because the so-called war on terror is deemed more important than anything else, the US turns a blind eye to it. Unless it is dealt with, there will never be a just peace.
The conflict I am engaged with in Mindanao is between one of the revolutionary communist groups, the Revolutionary Workers Party of Mindanao (RPM-M) and the government. This has been going on for over thirty years, and what is particularly interesting is that the RPM-M is looking for a solution based not only on politics but also on community development. They want to improve the situation of some of the poorest communities in Mindanao and ensure that they are provided with basic services. But it should not have taken a revolutionary war to get a government to meet its basic obligations to its citizens. The RPM-M are attempting to change the situation from the ground upwards, working with communities and trying to help them to prioritise what they see as the most important development issues. That process has been going on for some time. At the macro level, the government is pursuing contradictory policies; it is attempting to pacify and defeat some of the groups, while simultaneously engaging in discussion with the RPM-M, as part of a community peacebuilding process.

My recent work in Sierra Leone was with the Red Cross. Sierra Leone is one of the few places where it is a bonus to be able to say you are British, despite the fact that we were the colonial masters for many years. People for the most part are grateful to Britain for sending in its forces and driving out the RUF. If a country is faced with a guerrilla army committing all sorts of atrocities, should that be allowed to continue for years on end? Or should an armed force be sent in to bring the slaughter to an end?
During my last visit I was working on a project to rehabilitate former child soldiers, and young girls who had been taken and used as sex slaves by the rebel forces. The aim of the work is to help them to come to terms with their experiences, to give them a basic education, and to teach them a trade so that they can earn their own living. Peacebuilding, in the long term, is not simply about bringing armed conflicts to an end. A large part of the problem in Sierra Leone is due to the fact that the youth felt completely disengaged from society and had no place in it. The government now realises, however belatedly, that unless you integrate your young people into the society, they are liable to join the next armed group that comes along, with the result that the cycle of violence begins again.

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