CCTS
Newsletter

by Adam Curle

Is our title accurate? What do we co-ordinate? If not, what do we do? And/or, what ought we to do? My own original perception of the need was for more people to be prepared to play a constructive part in helping people cope with conditions of violence and chaos. A group, I thought, like ours could organise or co-ordinate (not quite the same thing) this preparation or training.

It has not worked out like this, though some of us are engaged in training and some of us belong to constituent organisations that do training. We have set up meetings attended by numbers of European trainers, but could hardly say that we are in any significant sense 'co-ordinating' conflict resolution training in Europe. I'm not saying we should be doing this, but if we aren't, what should we be doing?

I think we can safely claim that in the five years that we have existed as a group, we have experienced and learned a great deal. Circumstances have also altered greatly. It's natural and proper that we should adapt our concept of our purpose (supposing we really ever had a shared one) to these new conditions. These include:

• The fact that large numbers of people in Eeastern Europe have travelled, been to and given workshops, and, in general, learned much about the nature of conflict and its resolution, violence, nonviolence, human rights, etc.
• Great numbers have suffered and are suffering profound traumas.
• There is growing awareness, at least in Serbia and Croatia, of the need for social change -- and more obvious opposition to this by current leaders.
• Connected with the above, the necessity for the development of civil society is widely felt.
• There are enormous numbers of outsiders, like us, who still think of themselves as the 'foreign experts', a role that has become obsolete.
• In many places hatreds felt at the beginning of the conflict have persisted and often increased since Dayton.
• And there are probably many other altered factors.

I'll try to suggest how I think we could respond to this changed and changing situation. To start with, let me say I think that we have, in our different ways, made useful contributions to the people and organisations we have worked with. But I don't think we have recorded or shared these adequately. I think we have an obligation to the CCCRTE and our funders to do so either in writing or in systematic discussion among ourselves (as opposed to the brief progress reports we usually give). I think the Newsletter has been a valuable innovation, but it does not obviate the need for more comprehensive analysis and discussion of work done.

The individual members of the CCCRTE have not all been involved practically in the work in former Yugoslavia, but most of those who have not, for example, Greta, whose work is in neighbourhood mediation in London, and the representatives of Responding to Conflict, could do a great service by comparing their approaches with those of us working in Eastern Europe; this could be most enlightening.

What we have done is to hold a day-long conference on the principles of evaluation, but not, which seems to me paradoxical, on the activities that need to be evaluated.

It could also be extremely interesting to compare different approaches -- for example, workshops with different groups of people in different places with intensive long-term work with the same group of people -- what are the advantages and disadvantages of these approaches.

It would also be worth considering offshoots of CCCRTE work (I mean by this work funded by CCCRTE). For example, the trauma counselling which arose as a result of a CCCRTE-sponsored visit to Zupanja, but was carried out with non-CCCRTE funds by non-CCCRTE members. How does this relate to our main task (whatever this may be)?

Finally, I am sure that it would be important to us as a group to do what no doubt we have all done as individuals -- to consider our role as outside interveners in the pains and problems of other countries and other cultures.

These will, I hope, be taken as comments rather than complaints. I am well aware of the valuable work done by CCCRTE members during the committee's existence. I am only making a plea that we step back and re-examine our role, considering carefully how to make best use of our talents and facilities.

I think we owe it to our funders and our colleagues in Europe to present our work and its conclusions in a helpful and accessible manner.

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