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What's new ?
- Mapinduzi Journal 2
125 years after the Berlin Conference: time to invent a new cooperation
Mapinduzi Unit is a group of women and men, Africans and Europeans,
who have been working for years with and for initiatives, organisations
and movements in Africa. We are creating a forum for rethinking and
creating around change in Africa. The forum promotes cross-culturalism
(métissage), critical thinking, productivity, intellectual courage and
openness towards new ideas. It also wants to draw lessons from its
members’ experiences and make them available to others.
>> continued here
- Civil Peace Service
in the
Great Lakes Region :
Challenges and achievements
The Civil Peace Service (CPS – in German: Ziviler Friedensdienst,
ZFD) was set up in 1999 by the German government among others in
response to requests from civil society. It serves as an instrument for
making human resources available to the partners in countries in conflict,
post-conflict or destabilised situations in order to boost their
capacity to contribute to sustainable peace. The German CPS operators
work with their local partners in the countries and regions concerned.
>> continued here
- Civil Peace Service
Mano River Newsletter
In all societies, some people
continue to grow
wealthy through their control
of land, while the lack
of control of the use of land
helps to keep others poor,
but this is especially true of
the poor in rural areas in
Sierra Leone and Liberia
since without access to
land the single most critical
component of livelihoods
in rural communities
people’s survival may
be called into question.
Land in this context represents
both an outcome of
rural poverty and a root
cause of this poverty.
Thus, it is crucial that as we
attempt to achieve a balance
or ‘peace’ between the
economics and politics of
national development, we
ought to do so with the realization
that we are walking
a very tight rope.
Concerns for ‘catching up’
in the so-called development
race which is materialistic,
technological and
global, must be tempered
with maximizing the ‘good’
life of the people in the
Mano River Basin.... >> continued here
- Civil Peace Service in the Great Lakes Region : Challenges and achievements
The Civil Peace Service (CPS – in German: Ziviler Friedensdienst,
ZFD) was set up in 1999 by the German government among others in
response to requests from civil society. It serves as an instrument for
making human resources available to the partners in countries in conflict,
post-conflict or destabilised situations in order to boost their
capacity to contribute to sustainable peace. The German CPS operators
work with their local partners in the countries and regions concerned.
In the Great Lakes Region (DRC, Rwanda and Burundi) the programme
has been in existence since 2001 and the following German
operators are involved there:... >> continued here
- DAILY OBSERVER : Do not force me
About 40 young womens drawn from Clara town. Westpoint and Slipway last week converged at the A.P.CAMPHOR Memorial United Methodist Church in Clara town to brainstorm on issues affecting their individual well-being [as women]. The four-day workshop focused on Gender-Based Violence against women and children. The workshop was organized by the Ecuminical Women Organization in Liberia (EWOL). The EWOL serves as the Women's desk of the Liberian Council Churches (LCC)... >> continued here
- Mapinduzi Journal 1 - Context analysis:
an important step towards a strategy
for social change
The Mapinduzi Unit adventure started in 2008. Mapinduzi is a Swahili
word that means profound change or, revolution…
We are a group of men and women, Africans and Europeans, who have
been working for many years with initiatives, organisations and movements
in Africa. For a long time, we have wanted to set up an innovative think
thank to discuss and work on change in Africa. Such a forum is meant to
be a mix of different origins, beliefs and experiences, open-minded, productive,
courageous and receptive to new ideas. The forum also aspires to
develop lessons learned and to make them accessible to others.
The group is not an organisation or consultancy firm but a free association
of people willing to usefully share their experiences and, especially,
contribute to meaningful change.... >> continued here
- 8 STEPS TOWARDS PEACE IN EASTERN DRC – A COMMUNITY BASED PERSPECTIVE
While the ongoing crisis in Eastern DRC cannot be resolved without strong international commitment, well-directed military interventions and humanitarian support to the population; it is important that we do not lose sight of community development. Local communities are the nucleus of social change and that we need to start with them. Grassroots activists, and especially women, can bring important solutions to the table. Yet we need to ensure that peace-building initiatives do not create new conflicts.The Congolese state is of an unstable and hybrid nature - it exists, but it doesn't. State institutions are present in scenarios of monetary revenue... >> continued here
- Advocacy for Change:
Our Struggle
for Peace
In recent years, advocacy has become a key word in development work
and peace building initiatives. We have decided to move beyond the
‘buzz words’ and instead pull together some case studies and lessons
learned from various advocacy initiatives of the “Civil Peace Service,
EED”.We will present some of the main concepts of this work and outline
some of the fundamental tools that have been developed by other actors
and stakeholders as well as by ourselves in the hope that... >> continued here
- Celebrations: International Day of Peace 2009 in Sierra Leone
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- Our contribution
to peace:
a patchwork of
complementary actions.
Introduction
The Civil Peace Service Programme (CPS) of the EED, the Church Development
Service of the association of Germany’s Protestant Churches,
in cooperation with its partners in the Democratic Republic of Congo
(DRC) and in the Mano River region of West Africa, seeks to strengthen,
in a lasting way, civil organizations and groups – governmental and
non-governmental, local, regional and national ... >> continued here
- International cooperation in Crisis Zones : Multiple identities and shared commitment
The Civil Peace Services engage participants from numerous cultures to work together in peace-building, whether to prevent conflict, transform it or stabilize the situation to bring lasting peace. This multiculturalism is perceived as an opportunity in the sense that it permits participants to learn with and from each other, contributing experiences and methods that have been effective elsewhere. The professional support persons from the Civil Peace Services bring their own contribution, transform and stabilize conflicts to build sustainable peace. This learning process is always reciprocal. Nevertheless, reality has shown that it is this same multiculturalism that is often ignored or viewed as an obstacle in the peace-building process. It can also be reduced to a mere ...
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- Sexualized violence in the DRC
"All cameras are now on the female survivors of war rapes in Eastern Congo: they seem to look us straight in the eye. By contrast, the perpetrators are usually shown as an anonymous mass of gun-brandishing brutes that loot everything in their wake. To find solutions to the ongoing crisis, we need to address the human tragedy on all sides.
Explanations for why soldiers rape are usually reductionist. They either suggest that rape is used as a weapon of war, or that it is innate to warring in general. However, sexualized violence in the DRC is only one of the symptoms of a crisis that reaches far deeper into society. For generations, the Congolese people have been used to serve the interests of foreign powers and their own national and local leaders. People's lives, their dignity, integrity and potential have been disregarded and dismissed...>> continued here
- Demystifying impact : Our Work for Change
lish version of the first CPS booklet in the series : Constructing Peace.
Impact is a key concept regarding peace-building activities. But it has also become a myth in a jungle where every attempt of looking critically at your own work seems shaped by donors’ demands and actually ill-adapted to field realities.
In this booklet CPS/EED proposes methods, examples and techniques for demystifying impact and develop your own way of measuring and analysing change...>> continued here
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