PEACEW RKS

RECONCILIATION IN PRACTICE

Kelly McKone

[ [
Cover & TOC photo: Dreams of the Future Most 

Mira event, Prijedor Municipality, Bosnia and 

Herzegovina. An icebreaker activity where young 

participants engaged with each other both as individuals and as groups from different schools and 

communities in a circus workshop. The game helps 

them to overcome some of the potential fears and 

prejudices they may hold against the ‘other’. Photo 

by Max Reeves, ©2010 Most Mira.

The views expressed in this report are those of the 

author(s) alone. They do not necessarily reflect the 

views of the United States Institute of Peace.

United States Institute of Peace

2301 Constitution Ave., NW

Washington, DC 20037

Phone: 202.457.1700

Fax: 202.429.6063

E-mail: usip_requests@usip.org

Web: www.usip.org

Peaceworks No. 111. First published 2015.

ISBN: 978-1-60127-303-1

© 2015 by the United States Institute of Peace

About the Report

This report addresses a critical knowledge gap between 

reconciliation theory and practice in postconflict settings. 

Spearheaded by the Center for Applied Research on 

Conflict at the United States Institute of Peace (USIP), the 

larger project goal is to map reconciliation practices to 

better understand how reconciliation is conceived, what 

activities are being undertaken to promote reconciliation, 

what theories of change these choices imply, and how 

these practices are being evaluated.

About the Author

As a former research consultant for USIP’s Center for 

Applied Research on Conflict, Kelly McKone focused 

on how practice connects to theory in reconciliation 

programming worldwide. She holds a master’s degree in 

international politics from American University.
PEACEWORKS • AUGUST 2015 • NO. 111

CONTENTS

Introduction ... 5

Methodology ... 6

Descriptive Statistics ... 7

Limitations ... 7

Project Intervention Strategies ... 8

1. Conflict Mediation ... 8

2. Trauma Healing ... 10

3. Community Leader Dialogue ... 12

4. Exposure to the Other ... 14

5. Joint Development Projects ... 18

6. Community Dialogue ... 21

7. Broadening Change ... 24

8. Documenting History ... 27

9. Vertical Connections ... 30

10. Research Initiatives ... 32

Other Research ... 33

Indicators of Reconciliation ... 34

Individual ... 34

Community ... 35

Government ... 38

Discussion ... 39

Conclusion ... 42

Appendix A. Questionnaire ... 43

Appendix B. Research Sample ... 44

Appendix C. Project Matrix ... 47

Appendix D. Project Frequencies ... 50

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Summary

■ Reconciliation projects can be loosely organized into ten overlapping intervention strategies. Related activities are associated with particular groups of participants, intended beneficiaries, objectives, and underlying theories of change. In general, practices draw heavily 

on contact theory.

■ Operationalizing the definition of the word reconciliation and commonly associated terms, 

such as trust, social cohesion, and social harmony, would be a tremendous gain in monitoring and evaluating reconciliation projects.

■ Indicators used to measure reconciliation are generally weak. Those related to personal or 

institutional change would especially benefit from more development. Relatively stronger 

indicators, typically used by larger and more established organizations, are not being 

adopted on a wider scale. Concerted efforts to disseminate existing evaluation tools would 

contribute significantly to the field.

■ How information is transferred between stakeholders receives little if any evaluation 

attention. Organizations instead focus primarily on what messages are being delivered, not 

on how the consumers of this information are understanding and reacting to these 

messages.

■ Evaluators rarely explicitly name their working assumptions and, a few projects aside, do 

not test the validity of these assumptions. Furthermore, many of the evaluations have some 

(possibly a significant) selection bias, but in general do not account for potential data 

distortions in analyses.

■ Most intervention strategies focused on early-stage reconciliation. This could point to a 

lack of funding for medium- to long-run practices or to unclear distinctions between 

short- and long-run strategies. A strong but unstated and unproven assumption in the field 

is that negative peace is an acceptable indicator of reconciliation and that, with time, reconciliation will naturally progress to positive peace.

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Introduction

Reconciliation is among the most daunting long-term challenges peacebuilders face. Peacemaking, Herbert Kelman suggests, proceeds in three phases1

: First, “conflict settlement” between political actors marks the end of violent conflict, either through military victory or “negotiated peace agreement.” Second, “conflict resolution” builds a pragmatic partnership at both 

the national and the local levels, fosters working trust, and sets the cooperative stage for reconciliation. This final phase, Kelman argues, requires managing individual and collective identities to remove “the negation of the other as a central component of one’s own identity.”2

 These 

interconnected phases have largely developed as fields of study and practice unto themselves, 

reconciliation perhaps receiving the least inquiry despite its critical role in building inclusive, 

sustainable peace after mass violence.3

However, moving from the first to the third phase of peacemaking presents additional 

challenges. The focus shifts from a smaller contingent to an expansive pool of political actors. 

When resources are limited and largely controlled by Western donors, as they typically are, 

funds tend to be relatively thin by the time they reach reconciliation work. Yet reconciliation is 

geared toward strengthening peace and in this sense is also conflict prevention. What, then, is 

reconciliation? How are organizations working with divided populations to help ensure that a 

cold peace does not turn to hot conflict? How are these organizations measuring their success 

when their goal is to break down the lines of division to deepen an existing peace?

A key component in the practical application of reconciliation work is understanding how 

the term reconciliation is conceptualized. A definition that permeates the academic literature 

and has largely been adopted into programmatic language is that reconciliation is managing 

either individual or collective identities. Daniel Bar-Tal asserts that the lines of division are created, reshaped, or reinforced by violent conflict and are upheld by eight psychological societal 

beliefs that constitute a conflict ethos.4

 Three of these beliefs—“the justness of one’s own goals, 

delegitimizing the opponent, and positive self-image”—are direct obstacles to reconciliation 

and transforming them should be the primary goal of reconciliation.5 Some scholars, such 

as John Paul Lederach and Andrew Rigby, take a more religious and often Christian-based 

approach, arguing that reconciliation is when the truth about the past, mercy to perpetrators, 

justice for victims, a mutual need for well-being, and time come together.6 For Ernesto Verdeja, 

mutual respect for divided peoples underpins the essence of reconciliation, whereby political, 

civil societal, and individual forces build this respect by disseminating the truth of the past, 

holding perpetrators accountable, acknowledging victims’ suffering, and upholding the rule of 

law.7 Verdeja further argues that

through sustained and personal interactions with former enemies...we slowly rehumanize them, we individualize them in ways that are impossible when collective identities 

trump individuality. Through this process, fraught as it often is with distrust, anger, and 

fear, respect can develop over time, though it may take years. Forgiveness may not always 

be possible but mutual respect can serve as the cornerstone of new relations.8

The definitions of reconciliation are expansive and tend to cover many overlapping concepts, such as intergroup respect, trust, harmony, social cohesion, coexistence, justice, and peace. 

These elements positively reinforce one another in a momentum-building process that leads to 

societal tipping points that in turn trigger broad normative changes in identities and intergroup 

relationships.9

Finding the strategies needed to overcome the enormous obstacles to reconciliation requires 

concerted and coordinated efforts by individuals, nongovernmental organizations (NGOs), 

and governments. However, before considering the appropriate next steps, it is important to 
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step back and assess what work is currently being done around the world, how reconciliation is 

being conceptualized, and how organizations are measuring the impact of their work.

To that end, the larger project behind this report aims to address knowledge gaps by providing a snapshot of reconciliation efforts. The report itself unfolds in four stages, first discussing the research methodologies used to gather and analyze data about the practice and evaluation of reconciliation projects. It then presents and evaluates ten distinct, albeit overlapping, 

areas of practice in the field. The results that follow are presented according to whether change 

was measured at the individual, community, or government level. The final section discusses 

gaps in the practice and evaluation of reconciliation and offers recommendations for future 

research. The report does not suggest what practices are best or worst or what indicators are the 

strongest or weakest. These questions are important, however, and are indeed those for which 

this research is meant to provide a base to inform future studies.

Methodology

To effectively convey the work being done around the world to promote reconciliation, as 

many organizations as possible were included in this study. To identify those working on reconciliation, research drew on Peace Direct’s Insight on Conflict peacebuilding organizations 

database.10 Requests to participate in the research were also sent out on major peacebuilding 

listservs, and a number of experts were asked for references to organizations they knew of 

working in the field. Approximately 150 organizations were identified. To avoid bias in the 

results toward a single definition that may not be fully accepted in the field, no definition of 

reconciliation was offered during the data collection.

To gather information on organizations working in the field and in more detail on reconciliation projects, requests to participate in an online questionnaire were distributed broadly 

through key peacebuilding channels and directly to certain identified organizations. The questionnaire included sections for project activities, objectives, and evaluation indicators; survey 

respondents were asked about “their most successful reconciliation program in the past three 

years” (see appendix A). After incomplete or unusable surveys were discarded, fifty-three responses remained; these were primarily used to analyze evaluation indicators.

In addition, information was gathered from the websites of the 150 identified organizations. When organizations had an abundance of related available information, only a representative sample of projects was studied.11 Organizations that either did not provide adequate 

information or that were not explicitly working to promote reconciliation were eliminated. 

Information was captured for projects that had run some time in the previous ten years. In total, 

110 organizations were included (see appendix B).

Complex programs were broken down into project components, which created 277 distinct 

units for analysis. Ten categories of intervention strategies were developed based on core project 

activities. In some cases, the grouping was clear because of the organization’s more direct approach to promoting reconciliation. In many, however, the framework was indirect. For example, 

an organization may have brought participants together to engage in an art project to work 

directly toward a goal, such as art therapy for trauma, or to facilitate a more core set of activities, 

such as a dialogue session or an exhibit for the wider community. Such frameworks were common given the sensitivities surrounding reconciliation work, and teasing out a framework directly tied to a secondary set of activities presented a coding challenge. To group strictly by type 

of project would have created disparate objectives and theories of change within each section, 

which is precisely the type of confusion this mapping intended to clarify. Creating categories for 
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different types of intervention strategies and assigning projects to only one category, however, 

was in no way meant to indicate that the groupings do not overlap or feed into one another.

Each strategy was then separately analyzed to distill the types of participants, intended 

beneficiaries, objectives, and underlying theories of change associated with each category of 

activity. NVivo 10 qualitative analysis software was used to tag language on the participants, 

intended beneficiaries, activities, and objectives for each of the projects in each of the ten categories. The word frequency tool tabulated the most common, meaningful words, which were 

then analyzed in the context of the project language to unveil usage trends for each category. 

These words are identified by bolded text in the intervention strategies that follow later in 

this report.12

The theories of change were mostly derived by connecting activities to objectives for each 

strategy and were further informed by careful analysis of the explanations organizations offered for their project logic. The theories of change—much like the results for the participants, 

intended beneficiaries, activities, and objectives—are best understood as a kind of average of 

the projects included in the subsample. These averages are not meant to apply perfectly to any 

individual project but are instead presented as a picture of the larger practice.

Because so many strategy objectives overlapped, the evaluation indicators were analyzed 

separately. The indicators were taken primarily from the fifty-three questionnaire responses. 

The questions are not necessarily direct quotations from an evaluation but are instead more 

general and representative. Similarly, the indicators are not an exhaustive list but do offer insights into the current boundaries of evaluation for reconciliation projects.

Descriptive Statistics

The sample of 277 projects used in this research was drawn from approximately forty-six conflicts 

across the globe (see appendix C). Seventy-nine projects were conducted in sub-Saharan African 

nations, fifty-six each in Europe and the combined Middle East and North Africa region, and 

forty-four in Asia. The remaining forty-two projects were in Southeast Asia, the Americas, Australia and Oceania, or multiple countries; all had sample sizes of less than twenty. Comparing the 

distributions of the ten strategies across the four regions with larger sample sizes reveals that the 

distributions of strategies are, somewhat surprisingly, fairly similar. Notably, however, Europe had 

more community dialogue projects and Asia more broadening change projects.

Some differences in project distribution across the strategies overall were fairly large (see 

appendix D). Community dialogue projects were the most numerous at 26 percent. Broadening change, vertical connections, and joint development projects were next, at 14, 10, and 9 

percent, respectively. The remaining categories—the final 41 percent—totaled twenty or fewer 

projects combined. Given these low sample sizes, which were particularly low in conflict mediation and documenting history, the results may not hold much external validity.

Limitations

The sample data for this research are constrained by certain limitations and potential biases. 

First are exclusions for lack of Internet presence, websites in a language other than English, or 

alternative reconciliation language in project descriptions.13 Second is that the information used 

for projects in the analysis was taken from organization websites or reports. It is possible, and 

perhaps likely, that the language in internal project documents was tighter and project logic and 

objectives better explained. In-depth confidential questionnaires were used to correct for this 

issue, but low sample size often forestalled the correction. Another potential source of bias arises 
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in nearly all evaluation work: The language chosen to describe the work and experiences reflects 

a normative, globalized reconciliation discourse. In other words, a funding bias is possible toward organizations more able to talk the talk of reconciliation to the donor community, a bias 

that would be captured in the meta-evaluation of the field presented here.

Third, this research focuses on projects to identify and analyze organizational practice. Certainly government-led efforts, such as truth and reconciliation commissions, and local healing 

practices carried out by local people without an organization’s help are important factors affecting the larger reconciliation process. This report addresses reconciliation work by local organizations that may or may not be funded by government agencies. Last, the cross-project analysis 

has inference limitations. The cross-sectional techniques present certain strengths necessary to 

answering the research questions but could not take conflict context or implementing organizational characteristics into consideration. However, because this research focuses more on what 

the different practices are and why they are being used and less on their efficacy, this limitation 

should be minimal given that project activities are generally fairly comparable, even if the averages here do not necessarily fully capture all nuance.

Project Intervention Strategies

The ten intervention strategies identified here include a discussion of the most common participants, beneficiaries, activities, and objectives and how these project elements come together in a 

theory or theories of change underpinning the intervention logic. The order of the first six reflects 

their general sequencing, although different project interventions often overlap in time and space. 

The last four strategies do not fall neatly into a given phase and were often used throughout the 

reconciliation process to overcome specific obstacles or to bolster overall effectiveness. 

1. Conflict Mediation

Many reconciliation projects involve creating or strengthening an institutional layer at the community level to be the point of contact when a dispute arises between members of divided 

communities. Community members may feel more comfortable going to local institutions to 

resolve disputes for any number of reasons, such as physical accessibility, lower costs, local norms 

for conflict resolution, or distrust in legal institutions at the regional or national level.14 The 

apparent propensity is to keep the dispute local. If a mediation body does not exist or is ineffective or untrustworthy, then at best tension between communities could intensify and at worst 

people could turn to violence. These project intervention types therefore seek to either create a 

mediation authority at the community level or build the capacity and effectiveness of an existing 

institution. The analysis covers ten organizations and twelve projects (see table 1).

Table 1. Conflict Mediation Summary

Participants Community leaders

Beneficiaries Communities

Activities Convening and training in mediation, negotiation, conflict analysis

Objectives Peacefully resolve conflicts, foster tolerance, cohesion, and cooperation

Theory Local capacity reduces disputes, peaceful resolution heightens peaceful 

coexistence
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Who Participates? Who Benefits?

Intervention participants are almost exclusively local community leaders. Who qualifies as 

a community leader, unsurprisingly, differs depending on the local culture and conflict context. Religious figures were the most commonly identified. Given the low sample size in this 

strategy, other leaders were mentioned by single projects. These included mayors, police, civil 

society organizations, men’s groups, women’s groups, youth groups, and elected peace ambassadors. Essentially, the core qualities include a certain degree of legitimacy and influence in the 

community.

Communities, typically defined in broad terms, were the most commonly named beneficiaries of conflict resolution bodies. Only a few organizations offered a more specific identification, but even then did not go beyond naming the ethnic groups involved in the conflict. 

Because capacity building was a common goal of the projects, local organizations, community 

institutions, and local governments were each identified as direct beneficiaries. The parties 

involved in a dispute were also named by a few of the organizations sampled. Although the 

low sample size makes it difficult to draw conclusions more generally, the results suggest that 

community members, both within and between divided communities, will benefit from an 

institutional authority staffed by influential local leaders.

Creating Change

Project activities to bolster local dispute resolution take several forms. One of the most common 

is to train the leaders of the mediation institution, whether existing or being formed. The most 

common trainings focused on mediation, negotiation, and conflict resolution more generally. Others included human rights, communication, conflict transformation, conflict analysis, 

restorative justice, trauma healing, resilience, conflict sensitivity, community mobilization, and 

gender. Much of the project language focused on creating or strengthening mediation bodies. 

Few organizations, however, explained exactly what these activities entailed. The little language 

that does exist suggests that projects are creating space for leaders to meet or hold workshops on 

long-term planning or conflict analysis to better enable them to resolve local disputes.

The most common, and most direct, objective was to peacefully resolve conflict. Given 

that this objective does not necessarily offer any insights as to how doing so improves intergroup relations, the question becomes how resolving conflict connects to reconciliation. Is dispute resolution seen as squarely within the realm of reconciliation or as an indirect contributor 

to reconciliation? The projects do not necessarily offer any cohesive answers but do support 

the notion that a conflict mediation body is needed as an indirect support to reconciliation 

efforts. In other words, without a local institutional layer, any progress toward reconciliation 

can be easily undone if disputes are allowed to deepen divides and grievances between people. 

Moreover, if the mediation body can help demonstrate that people can have positive interactions, particularly during conflict, it can foster peaceful coexistence and tolerance, community 

cohesion, and cooperation, and help catalyze dialogue to advance reconciliation efforts.

If we connect activities to objectives, two primary theories of change underpinning conflict 

mediation intervention strategies emerge. The first is taken from USAID/CMM and Mercy 

Corps’ Building Bridges to Peace project in Uganda, which seems to capture the direct relationship between the common activities of this strategy and the commonly identified objective 

of peacefully resolving conflict. The second is derived from the more indirect connections 

between peaceful conflict resolution and reconciliation.
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Theory 1. “If we build local capacity to resolve disputes jointly across lines of division, 

then we will see a reduction in disputes because people will gain tools, skills, and relationships needed to resolve disputes peacefully.”15

Theory 2. If local institutions can repeatedly demonstrate that disputes across lines of 

division can be resolved peacefully, then people from the divided communities will be 

more capable of peaceful coexistence in the short term and more likely to forge working 

relationships in the medium to long term through increased cooperation and dialogue.

Certain assumptions underlying these theories should be considered when evaluating project effectiveness. Three are particularly significant: First, the mediation body will effectively be 

able to bring people together from across lines of division. The community leaders who will 

serve as mediators must be able to work together effectively to solve disputes. In addition, 

community members must actually go to the dispute resolution body to resolve their conflicts 

with people from across the lines of division. Second, mediators will be able to cooperate, and 

their decisions will demonstrate to divided communities that they can cooperate to peacefully 

resolve their conflicts. If the mediation body is not seen as a legitimate authority, or if it cannot peacefully resolve disputes, then the desire to build trust between divided parties will be 

undermined. Third, successful dispute resolution can yield intergroup cooperation and trust, 

and these are key variables contributing to reconciliation. 

2. Trauma Healing

Several organizations, in their efforts to promote reconciliation, provided psychosocial support to those affected by violence (see table 2). Traumatic events are common during conflict 

and can make certain reconciliation issues, such as dealing with the past, especially difficult to 

overcome, and thus complicate reconciliation efforts. Put differently, without healthy individuals and communities, lingering stress from past violence is likely to impede if not completely 

undermine reconciliation efforts. In general, these projects were meant to provide an outlet for 

conflict-related negative feelings. In releasing that energy, people would presumably be more 

willing and able to constructively participate in the reconciliation process. Sixteen organizations covering nineteen distinct projects were included in the analysis.

Table 2. Trauma Healing Summary

Who Participates? Who Benefits?

The participants and intended beneficiaries of trauma-healing projects included individuals, 

identity groups, and communities. Individual participants included children, women, victims, 

survivors, ex-prisoners, and ex-combatants. Most projects did not offer specifics on types of 

trauma, though one indicated torture and another post-traumatic stress disorder. A few projects 

noted beneficiaries of trauma healing as the larger population to benefit from ripple effects of 

either personal or group healing. Most referred generally to participants and beneficiaries as 

Participants Individuals and communities

Beneficiaries Same

Activities Counseling, funding, arts, training

Objectives Raise trauma awareness, increase psychological health, enable productive 

participation

Theory Awareness of trauma heightens ability to participate
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being the same people. The benefits may extend beyond those directly involved, but organizations did not emphasize these possibilities as their counterparts in other project types did.

Creating Change

Projects for trauma healing supported either healing activities themselves or other activities 

geared to raising awareness and how to tend sensitively to people’s needs. Ten of the projects 

directly supported trauma healing at the individual and community levels in a variety of ways. 

Three offered direct counseling services. Two offered funding for local healing activities designed and implemented by local leaders and community members. These activities were highly 

context specific and included dances, ceremonies, animal slaughter, and other activities meant 

to acknowledge past sufferings and symbolize collective healing, and in one case readiness for 

reconciliation. Four projects used various forms of art therapy for both individuals and groups. 

The projects overlap significantly with the healing aspect of the art projects described later in 

the community dialogue section. They are categorized under trauma healing, however, because 

the art was used to stimulate not a conversation across lines of division but rather individual or 

intragroup healing. The arts took a variety of forms, including painting, sculpture, theatre, sharing local folktales, singing, and yoga. When discussed, art projects noted giving participants an 

outlet through which to express and deal with their negative emotions.

Training was the fourth way projects directly supported individuals and the primary strategy 

used in raising awareness of trauma and heightening sensitivity toward it. In training, three projects taught skills to trauma-affected participants to help with individual and group healing. On the 

individual level, projects taught participants about how trauma affects the mind and body and offered skills to help people cope with their stress. The knowledge and skills offered included understanding the connection between forgiveness and healing, stress management, conflict resolution, 

and mental health awareness, among other general peacebuilding skills. Training was also, with 

one exception, the only strategy to raise awareness about the impacts of trauma on the community 

and how to work with trauma-affected populations. The six projects for the most part did not 

provide specifics on trauma training programs. A few discussed training a group of people to serve 

as a resource or network. The only nontraining project to raise awareness was a radio drama that 

covered topics about how trauma can affect communities and how to help trauma-affected people.

At the most basic level, trauma-healing project interventions focused on raising awareness of the consequences of trauma and promoting psychological healing. Organizations discussed a number of intermediary goals assumed to connect healing to reconciliation. Psychologically healthier individuals and communities were thought to be more willing and able to 

constructively engage in the wider reconciliation process. The reconciliation process is riddled 

with tension and conflict; if people cannot cope with their trauma, they are more likely to 

have a negative reaction to potential conflicts, which could ultimately impede larger efforts 

to improve intergroup relations. Although only a few projects mentioned activities in which 

psychologically healthier people would be more able to positively participate, the two most 

common of these were justice procedures and intergroup trust-building initiatives. Trauma 

healing was presented as a necessary element in creating a common historical narrative or collective identity and fostering a culture of peace. Connecting the activities to the objectives of 

trauma-healing interventions points to one primary theory of change:

Theory 1. If trauma-affected individuals or communities are aware of their trauma and 

have strategies to cope with it, we will see more willingness and ability to constructively 

participate in other reconciliation activities.
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Several assumptions need to be taken into account when evaluating the effectiveness of 

trauma-healing projects. First is that those affected by the trauma will participate in healing activities. Second is that these projects will effectively raise awareness about the consequences of 

trauma and lead to psychosocial healing. Third, people who are able to cope with their trauma 

will constructively participate in other reconciliation activities. Last, and building on the third 

point, is that other reconciliation activities in which to participate are available so that potential 

momentum for reconciliation gained from the healing is not lost.

Because trauma healing was discussed primarily as a precondition to constructive participation in other reconciliation activities, it tends to land early in the sequencing of intervention strategies. A few projects mentioned healing activities as coming before bridging and 

dialogue activities, but did not necessarily conceive of the healing as a discrete stage. It was 

instead conceived of both as a way to create ripeness for intergroup relationship building and 

as a necessary activity alongside the others to ensure that people received continued support 

throughout the reconciliation process. Trauma healing was thus not necessarily meant to lead 

to full psychological healing, but as a step in that direction. The logic of the projects indicates 

a threshold beyond which people are able to control and deal with their negative emotions effectively enough to engage in intergroup activities.

3. Community Leader Dialogue

A project was counted as dialogue if its activities involved “a conversation or exchange of ideas 

that seeks mutual understanding through the sharing of perspectives.”16 After data collection, it became clear that the objectives and underlying theories of dialogue strategy for community leaders and for community members differed markedly, although the essence of the 

activities was similar. Dialogue targeted at leaders was therefore analyzed separately from that 

targeted at community members. The two participant types reflect a distinction identified in 

the Boston-based, nongovernmental humanitarian research organization CDA’s Reflecting on 

Peace Practice program as engaging with “key people” or “more people” in peace work.17 In 

the former case, key people are leaders whose buy-in may be a necessary first step to working 

with community members. Leader involvement hinges on the notion that without their support, progress toward peace, or in this case reconciliation, is not possible. On the other hand, 

practitioners who engage in the more people approach tend to “believe that peace can only 

be built if many people become active in the process, i.e., if there is broad involvement of ‘the 

people’.”18 The analysis includes information from thirteen organizations and eighteen distinct 

projects (see table 3).

Table 3. Community Leader Dialogue Summary

Participants Community leaders, especially religious

Beneficiaries Community members in leaders’ spheres of influence

Activities Direct and indirect dialogues, often focused on the past

Objectives Engage community in future programming, create ripeness for 

intergroup contact

Theory Leaders set precedent for positive intergroup interaction
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Who Participates? Who Benefits?

The criteria for this strategy inherently answer the question of who participates. The question 

therefore becomes exactly who community leaders are. The data overwhelmingly indicate 

religious leaders from across divided communities. A few projects also mentioned civil society, 

youth, and community leaders, deliberately delineated from religious leaders, but were not precise about who these leaders were or why they were selected. Religious leaders may have been 

recruited because they were thought to be especially influential or simply most interested in 

participating. Put differently, the general lack of mention of local political leaders, such as chiefs, 

mayors, elders, or council members, raises questions about selection bias in which organizations 

might only have been able to recruit a certain type of leader. Bias was also raised as an issue in an 

interview, that religious leaders see reconciliation as a social goal tightly linked to their religious 

work and thus are strongly inclined to participate in reconciliation projects. This is not to say 

that including religious leaders is inappropriate, only that the lack of mention of other types of 

leaders is puzzling, though beyond the scope of this research. The intended beneficiaries of community leader dialogue projects were almost exclusively community members within leaders’ 

respective spheres of influence.

Creating Change

Projects used three frameworks, one direct and two more indirect, to promote dialogue between 

community leaders. The direct approach involved bringing participants together to discuss a 

given set of issues. Project descriptions do not provide specifics about the meeting agendas, 

but the language suggests that participants know who will be in the meeting and that they are 

meeting to discuss a select set of issues related to the conflict and reconciliation. About half of 

the projects used this more direct approach.

One of the two indirect frameworks involved training, used in a way to spark conversation 

on topics that perhaps could not have been discussed without the ripeness created by participants first learning together. These included lessons on various peacebuilding and reconciliation topics, such as forgiveness, repentance, and healing, through the lenses of the communities’ 

religions. Several of the trainings also sought to empower leaders with the knowledge and 

skills needed to promote reconciliation activities, particularly community dialogue, in their 

communities.

The second indirect framework used cultural tours. In these projects, leaders from divided 

communities traveled together to different regions of the country to learn how people from 

those areas experienced the war, which was deemed especially important when war had created 

rigid geographic divisions or where populations most affected by the conflict were in remote 

regions. The cultural learning certainly had value in and of itself, as discussed later in this report. 

These projects are categorized as dialogue, however, because cultural learning was harnessed 

to both catalyze and create a synergy with dialogue activities. Although it is not clear from the 

project language why the more indirect strategies were used instead of direct dialogue, interviews with project staff suggest that sensitivities from both community members and the leaders may have inhibited the more direct approach. The environment simply might not have been 

ripe for direct dialogue. Organizations may be trying to create that ripeness by first facilitating 

intergroup learning about religion, culture, and wartime experiences.

Nearly all of the projects listed some variation of “engaging the wider community” as their 

main objective. The precise activities differ from project to project but can be categorized as 

either community dialogue or intergroup activities. Leader dialogue was commonly discussed 
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as a prerequisite to broader community dialogue. This order could be the case for two primary 

reasons. First, leaders may have the respect and authority needed to introduce and generate 

support from community members. Second, some leaders set a precedent for the community 

by demonstrating that intergroup cooperation and productive dialogue were each possible and 

that community members could engage in healthy exchanges across lines of division. Positive 

interactions among leaders may in fact be necessary before community members are even able 

to engage with one another. In a sense, leader dialogue is a signal to the wider community 

that intergroup contact is permissible even if other barriers or sensitivities still hinder actual 

participation.

Beyond community dialogue, the other common form of engagement was collaborative 

community projects. The main objective of community leader dialogue interventions is to prepare, and to sometimes actively catalyze, community members for intergroup contact primarily 

in the form of community dialogue or service projects. As it relates to reconciliation, leader 

dialogue is therefore seen as a necessary precondition to the larger goals of generating intergroup tolerance, peaceful coexistence, and more openness to a reconciliation process. This 

intervention strategy, then, points to one key theory of change:

Theory 1. If dialogue enables leaders to understand the narratives, religious and cultural 

perspectives, and wartime experiences of people from across lines of division, then leaders will set a precedent for positive intergroup interaction and will be able to share this 

knowledge with their communities to demonstrate that positive intergroup interactions 

are possible, which in turn will help prepare community members for participation in 

future reconciliation activities.

Four main assumptions are embedded in this theory of change. First is that leaders have 

the motivation and space to come together. Second is that leaders will be able to find common 

ground that can frame future discussions. Third is that leaders must have enough influence to 

effectively get their communities to adopt an alternative understanding to the conflict and to 

the Other. Fourth is that leaders can reach some critical mass of people in their intragroup 

discussions to reframe thinking about the conflict and reconciliation. Put differently, do leaders 

have a forum in which they can discuss these matters with community members? Can they 

meet the same community members over a sustained period to ensure that the complex issues 

and the strategies to overcome differences are fully understood? 

In the sequence of reconciliation project strategies, community leader dialogue seems to fall 

before or at the same time as most others. Clearly, leader dialogue comes before community 

dialogue or bridging projects when divided community members have little if any meaningful 

contact with one another. If successful, leader dialogue is meant to drive community engagement in future intergroup reconciliation activities in two ways: by making space for community 

members to interact with one another, and by demonstrating that such interactions can move 

divided communities forward on a more shared, positive path in the future (see box 1).

4. Exposure to the Other

One set of projects focused activities on introducing people to the personalities, culture, and 

general lives of people on both sides of the divide (see table 4). Distinguishing these projects 

from community dialogue projects was not always easy. These projects also overlapped significantly both with joint development project intervention activities and with the different 

project frameworks used to approach community dialogue sessions. However, interventions 

to expose people to different aspects of the lives of the Other were made a distinct category 
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Box 1. Case Study: The Mindanao Bishops-Ulama Conference, The Philippines

Spanish colonization created a divide between Christian and Muslim populations in the Philippines. This divide was deepened when the United States became the governing authority 

of the island of Mindanao with the settlement of the Spanish-American War and created 

policies that promoted northern Filipino Christians to settle on the then Muslim-majority 

island.1

 Mounting religious tensions in Mindanao contributed to a forty-year civil war between 

Moro insurgent groups and the Filipino government before a peace agreement was signed 

in 2012.2

 During peace talks in 1996, Christians began to worry that their government was 

conceding too much to the rebels, doubts that threatened the peace agreement. To help 

ease tensions during the talks and with implementation of the potential agreement, high-level 

leaders from both faiths were brought into the discussions to “provide a moral and spiritual 

dimension to the peace agreement, symbolically demonstrate that dialogue among highlevel religious leaders is possible and act as a body to pressure the MNLF [Moro National 

Liberation Front] and the government to reach a resolution.”3

 This started what is now the 

Bishops-Ulama Conference (BUC), which consists of approximately twenty to twenty-five 

representatives each from the Catholic, Protestant, and Islamic faiths.

The BUC mission is to use dialogue to find common ground among the religions to “support the on-going peace process in the region through the promotion of mutual knowledge and understanding, acquaintance and friendship as well as reconciliation through repentance and forgiveness as indispensable elements of the culture of justice and peace, of 

total development and authentic progress.”4

 In addition to the religious leaders’ upward 

influence on government policymaking, a key component of their work is to share their 

understanding of common religious doctrine with the people of Mindanao. The grassroots 

impact of the BUC has come in a variety of forms. First, the BUC leaders help sponsor an 

annual Mindanao Week of Peace that includes five days of activities meant to generate 

wide participation from people across faiths in different art and cultural activities. Second, 

the leaders work closely with schools to develop peace education projects to instill values 

of peace in youth today to help uphold peace in the future. Last, the BUC catalyzed the 

formation of a number of grassroots interreligious dialogue efforts, such as the Ustadz 

Imam-Priests-Pastors Forum. Although the BUC has not been formally evaluated, anecdotal evidence suggests that leader dialogue has opened spaces for community dialogue 

by sending a strong message of cooperation and peace between religions to the general 

public. One grassroots participant explained in the Catholic Relief Services report on the 

project that “the BUC has been an inspiration for people on the ground. Since political 

leaders don’t talk to each other, seeing religious leaders talking to each other inspires 

them [people on the ground] to emulate them. It sets a precedent for many activities initiated by dioceses and civil society organizations.”5

Notes

1. Brenda Fitzpatrick, “The Philippines: The Mindanao Bishops-Ulama Conference,” in Pursuing 

Just Peace: An Overview and Case Studies for Faith-Based Peacebuilders, ed. M. M. Rogers, T. 

Bamat, and J. Ideh (Baltimore, MD: Catholic Relief Services, 2008).

2. BBC News, “Asia: Philippines Profile,” November 24, 2014, www.bbc.com/news/world-asia15521300.

3. Fitzpatrick, “The Philippines.”

4. The Bishop-Ulama Conference, “Mission/Vission/Goals,” http://bishop-ulma.page.tl/Mission-sVission-s-Goals.htm.

5. Fitzpatrick, “The Philippines.”

precisely because they did not explicitly involve a formal dialogue session or did not focus on 

creating an economic benefit to communities. In a sense, these projects were one step removed 

from dialogue in that the focus was to get people from both sides to interact in more informal 

and presumably less sensitive activities. Eighteen organizations were included in the analysis. 

Of the twenty projects covered, seven operated in the context of the Israel-Palestinian conflict; 

the heavy representation of these projects may introduce an element of bias.
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Who Participates? Who Benefits?

Participants were almost exclusively youth, community members, or sometimes both, from 

both sides. Many of the projects targeted at youth were run through elementary or secondary 

schools and either involved students from within a single school or brought together students 

from separate schools. A few projects also involved university students. Most projects aimed at 

engaging community members did not offer much participant information. In the three projects that did, the individuals included survivors and perpetrators, people not included in existing 

projects, and parents. About five of the projects included both youth and adults; these were typically sports or theater productions or more intragroup intergenerational activities. The intended 

beneficiaries were also not often specified in the project language. In a few cases, the participants 

and the intended beneficiaries seemed to be the same group of people. More commonly, however, the projects were described as being for the benefit of the country or society at large.

Creating Change

Project activities fell into seven categories used either solely or in combination to expose people 

directly or indirectly to the Other. Two activities, sports and ice breaker games, were used in 

four projects, typically in combination with one another, and brought together youth participants to participate in mixed teams. The sports played were all team games, such as soccer, rugby, and hockey; the ice breaker games were a mix of individual and team games, such as spelling 

bees, bingo, and treasure hunts. A third activity was peace education, used in four projects, 

three of which used it as the sole activity. It was unclear from the project language whether 

these activities involved people from divided communities, but the language did suggest that 

the educational activities were more for students within an identity group. The curriculums 

included religious texts, beliefs, language, history, and traditions of people from both sides.

Three projects used a combination of the fine arts with cultural tours to expose people to 

the viewpoint of the Other. Participants were university students in two cases and community 

members in the other. The cultural tours served as inspiration for the fine arts activities, which 

entailed writing stories or taking pictures of symbols from the Other’s vantage point. The art 

outputs for these projects culminated in at least one project in a cohesive product then released 

to the public as a learning tool.

Two activity types, media and performance, were particularly geared to reaching a wide 

audience to expose people to themes of intergroup tolerance and cooperation. Three projects 

worked solely through media to broadcast information on various themes to sensitize people to 

new ideas and perspectives without holding a formal dialogue. One project used radio to talk 

about common issues that presumably affect all people, thereby highlighting potential areas and 

Table 4. Exposure to the Other Summary

Participants Youth, community members

Beneficiaries Communities, nation

Activities Sports, peace education, arts, media, building social capital

Objectives Reduce fear and stereotypes, foster tolerance and respect, increase contacts

Theory Strong relationships critical to peacebuilding
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reasons for intergroup cooperation. The other two projects created documentary films that portrayed people from each side of the divide doing something different and more positive than the 

postconflict norms of intergroup relations. One film offered footage and testimonials of people 

from different ethnic groups helping each other during the conflict despite their differences and 

perceptions of acceptable social behavior. Another film documented intergroup encounters and 

dialogue sessions so that the audience could see what those exchanges were like and could hear 

the reflections of participants afterward. One of these film projects also created a magazine and 

journal to further expose a wider audience to the various topics explored.

In five projects, live performances were also used to expose a larger audience to new ideas 

about the Other. These activities included theater productions, concerts, and other cultural 

events. Most of the participants were school children and the performances were often coupled 

with at least one other activity type. Performances involved participants from both sides for 

either intra- or intergroup audiences. The shows were meant to strengthen the relationships 

between participants through a cooperative activity and to expose community members to the 

positive outputs of that cooperation while learning about the other culture and perspectives.

The last activity, used in three projects, was to build a network of people or organizations 

to help support the continued work of exposing divided peoples to each other’s lives. This was 

intended to take place alongside others to help boost project capacity and sustainability and 

to give local ownership to exposure activities. Network members met primarily to brainstorm 

and plan community activities. They also seemed to engage in dialogue sessions as part of their 

work, though it is unclear whether discussions included important themes for events or were 

more along the lines of simple introductions. Either way, these networks occupied, or possibly 

connected, the space between exposure activities and intergroup dialogue.

Project interventions to promote people’s exposure to the Other typically had both shortterm and long-term objectives. Most immediately, the exchange of information about the culture, history, and ideas of divided groups was geared toward breaking down stereotypes. When 

activities involved bringing people together from across lines of division, organizations also 

commonly discussed easing the tension between people who were unfamiliar with one another, 

laying the groundwork for intergroup tolerance, peaceful coexistence, respect, and, in some 

instances, friendship. About half of the sampled projects focused exclusively on these shortterm objectives. The other half offered both short- and long-term, or only long-term, objectives. The most commonly mentioned long-term objectives were that intergroup contact and 

understanding would help contribute to peace, reconciliation, social harmony, diversity, and 

a just society. Perhaps the most encompassing theory of change for this intervention emerged 

from Search for Common Ground’s theory of Healthy Relationships and Connections:

Theory 1. “Peace emerges out of a process of breaking down isolation, polarization, division, prejudice and stereotypes between/among groups. Strong relationships are a necessary ingredient for peacebuilding.”19

This theory of change underpins several project strategies. Exposure to the Other is thus 

just one element of a larger process. Two primary assumptions are embedded in the theory. 

First is that intergroup contact or exposure to the culture, traditions, history, and perspectives 

of the Other will give rise to the attitudinal and behavioral changes associated with breaking 

down prejudices and stereotypes. Second, and perhaps less contentiously, is that the tighter intergroup relationships that will emerge if the first part of this theory holds will indeed deepen 

reconciliation and contribute to sustainable peace.
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Projects that aim to increase intergroup contact and understanding fall fairly squarely before intergroup dialogue projects and overlap considerably with the activities and theories associated with joint development projects. This strategy seems to be used when formal dialogue 

may be too contentious. The intergroup contact seems to be used when organizations hope to 

ripen a given context for more difficult community dialogue projects. The implicit assumption of this logic is then that intergroup prejudice and stereotyping must be broken down to a 

particular point before dialogue can be productive. If people are unfamiliar with one another, 

or divided groups have dehumanized one another, projects must first seek to mitigate fear and 

promote rehumanization before addressing more contentious issues.

5. Joint Development Projects

Joint development projects aim to promote reconciliation by bringing together members from 

two or more divided groups to jointly design and implement a mutually beneficial project (see 

table 5). These efforts almost exclusively focused on economic development, such as creating 

or restoring a school, road, or bridge. Other activities in this grouping were community volunteerism (two projects) and promoting intergroup business ventures (one project). Eighteen 

organizations and twenty-five projects were included in the analysis.

Table 5. Joint Development Projects Summary

Who Participates? Who Benefits?

The most common participants in joint development projects were communities, youth, and 

leaders. The project language often stressed the desire that all community members from 

across conflict lines be included and participate. Several projects talked about including different sectors of the community, though no projects sampled offered a clear definition of either 

community or community sector. Within the unit of community, youth and leaders were the 

two most commonly targeted groups to participate in projects, either independently or jointly. 

When mentioned, the leaders identified included women, religious leaders, or, more generally, 

those viewed as decision makers within the community.

Only seven joint development projects identified the intended beneficiaries; the findings 

may therefore have little external validity. Keeping this in mind, the two most common groups 

of beneficiaries identified were communities and people affected by the conflict. Examining 

the language of the projects more generally, it is clear that joint development projects are meant 

to benefit more than just project participants through the ripple effects of economic development, a point discussed more in depth later in the report.

Participants Youth, community members

Beneficiaries Community

Activities Collaboration

Objectives Cooperation and trust, economic or human development

Theory Interactions catalyze positive relationships, economic advantages 

promote cooperation
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Creating Change

Essentially, joint development involves collaborative projects, activities, and work to benefit 

both communities. Project language often emphasized that communities need to work together to identify a common problem, develop a solution, and implement the solution (see box 

2). Through these activities, projects strove to achieve two objectives: First, repeated, positive 

contact between divided communities would catalyze intergroup cooperation and trust. Second, because activities supported development efforts, the projects directly contributed to the 

economic foundation of the communities needed to build a durable peace. In sum, the projects 

promoted intergroup harmony and reconciliation.

Although no one theory of change unifies joint development projects, similarities in underlying logic offer insights into how organizations understand the ways in which this intervention strategy connects to reconciliation. The following two theories of change best encompass 

the ideas that seem to inform joint development projects:

Theory 1. If people from divided communities jointly develop and implement development projects that benefit the larger populations of each community, then the increased 

intergroup interactions will catalyze the formation of the trustful and cooperative relationships needed to create community harmony, peace, and reconciliation.

Theory 2. If people from divided communities jointly develop and implement development projects that benefit the larger populations of each community, then the concrete 

economic advantages of the projects will promote cooperation, help mitigate the economic causes of the conflict, and establish the economic interdependence needed to build 

sustainable peace.

The joint development project intervention strategy incorporates several additional assumptions. First is the idea of a common need that can be met by a development project. 

Furthermore, this intervention strategy assumes that divided communities’ distinct needs can 

be best met through cooperative efforts, as opposed to each group working independently to 

achieve its needs. Second is that the completion of the development project has real economic 

benefits to both communities that do in fact, to some degree, tie their economic success to 

intergroup cooperation. Long-term evaluation is needed to determine whether such projects 

in fact do generate economic advantages over time.20

Although few organizations specified where their projects fell in the sequencing of general reconciliation programming, some remarked that participants first needed both adequate 

trauma counseling before engaging with members of the other group and project management 

training to help ensure the success of the project. Several made their hopes clear that the bridging activities would create space for intergroup dialogue, either during or after the project. These 

findings were supported by an analysis of community dialogue and training, the types of activities most commonly associated with joint development. The small sample size of these findings 

makes it difficult to draw firm conclusions, but joint activities seem to be used in the early stages 

of reconciliation efforts in which communities have little contact with one another.
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If the eye is unable to see, the nose also cries. —Swahili Proverb

In the town of Eldoret, Kenya, the disputed 2007 national elections sparked a campaign 

of violence by members of the pro-opposition Kalenjin, Luhyas, and Luos peoples against 

the Kikuyu people, who were traditionally part of the country’s ruling class and who supported the incumbent Kikuyu President Kibaki’s reelection.1

 Inequalities between ethnic 

groups over land tenure, political rights, cultural prejudices, and economic marginalization 

fueled the violence that left dozens of people in the Eldoret region dead in just two days.2

The power-sharing agreement between Kibaki and Raila Odinga produced a negative 

peace in the country as the government and citizens scrabbled to reestablish security. In 

Eldoret, community members and leaders faced new challenges regarding how to reconcile Kikuyu and Kalenjin people living in the same space in this tense, fragile postviolence 

environment.

Given the lack of national leadership in reducing tensions and promoting reconciliation in 

Eldoret, the Catholic Diocese there took the initiative in bringing divided groups together 

to build a more sustainable, positive peace. The bishops’ efforts started with providing 

humanitarian relief to affected households and holding intra- and eventually intergroup 

dialogue sessions with community chiefs.3

 The dialogue sessions provided a platform for 

community leaders to identify the root causes of the conflict and to develop a strategy 

to both address these problems and repair relations primarily between the Kikuyu and 

Kalenjin ethnic groups.

The primary project, which the diocese developed in partnership with youth leaders, was 

to create an eight-kilometer road to connect the Kikuyu village of Yamumbi with the Kalenjin village of Kapteldon. In the short run, the road would promote reconciliation by fostering intergroup cultural learning and allowing each group to demonstrate its commitment 

to the well-being of the other group.4

 In the medium to long run, the project would help 

mitigate economic grievances and rebuild social relations by promoting economic trade, 

the free movement of people, and intergroup communication. The project employed forty 

youth from each village as well as a few community elders to oversee the project activities. 

The youth also chose to build the road by hand to help maximize intercultural learning and 

relationship building.

The diocese and project participants noted several signs of success, including people’s 

willingness to speak more openly about race with members of other ethnic groups or in 

public settings about issues in the past, share food, greet one another, work alongside one 

another, intermarry, let their children play together, buy goods from one another, and move 

more freely between communities. Furthermore, youth who participated in the construction 

of the road created an association—After the Peace Road Project, What?—to continue to 

support income generating projects. These indicators offer some support to the success 

of the road project and larger efforts in Eldoret, but community members have expressed 

dissatisfaction with justice from the violence, making it difficult to trust and work with the 

Kalenjin. Many Kikuyu people lost assets as a result of the violence and found it difficult to 

work alongside, and share tools with, the people who stole their goods and had not compensated them for the losses.5

 Despite this, the road project is seen as a success story.

Notes

1. Center for African Studies, “Swahili Proverbs: Methali za Kiswahili,” University of Illinois at 

Urbana-Champaign, http://swahiliproverbs.afrst.illinois.edu/association.html.

2. Jeffrey Gettleman, “Mob Sets Kenya Church on Fire, Killing Dozens,” New York Times, January 

2, 2008, www.nytimes.com/2008/01/02/world/africa/02kenya.html.

3. Cornelius Korir, Amani Mashinani (Peace at the Grassroots): Experiences of Community Peacebuilding in the North Rift Region of Kenya (Eldoret: Catholic Diocese of Eldoret, 2009).

4. Ibid., 36.

5. Scott Baldauf, “Kenya’s Torn Tribes Rebuild Trust with Picks and Shovels,” Christian Science Monitor, 

March 12, 2009, http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Africa/2009/0312/p01s01-woaf.html.

Box 2. Case Study: A Road to Reconciliation
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6. Community Dialogue

The second type of dialogue focused on community members rather than leaders. The many 

related projects and their diverse, fluid structures make the boundaries of this intervention 

strategy particularly ambiguous, however. Some projects are also clearly about more than dialogue alone. For example, projects geared to creating and implementing shared textbooks, such 

as in the Israel-Palestine and Bosnia and Herzegovina contexts, were classified as dialogue 

because many of the projects talked about using the curriculum to facilitate an exchange of 

ideas about the conflict. However, creating a joint curriculum transcends dialogue in ways this 

research could not fully capture. This limitation holds for all of the intervention strategies but 

is perhaps most applicable to community dialogue. Forty-four organizations and seventy-three 

projects were included in the analysis (see table 6).

Who Participates? Who Benefits?

Community dialogue projects target a broad range of participants and use numerous frameworks. 

Framework differences will be teased out and help clarify how participants connect to them. A 

little over a third of the projects targeted youth. Because these tended to work through indirect frameworks, participants commonly also included leaders, teachers, and coaches. Dialogue 

among adults commonly involved either intra- or intergroup discussions with survivors, victims, 

soldiers, or combatants. A few projects also involved women, minority, and diaspora groups. 

Project language typically described groups in terms of religion, ethnicity, or role in the conflict.

Project beneficiaries fell fairly evenly across three general groups: participants, communities, and the nation. In most other intervention strategies, the focus was more strictly on communities. These potential differences are possibly due to the relatively low sample sizes in other 

groups or to ambiguity about beneficiaries in the project language, either of which could render 

these seeming differences relatively insignificant.

Creating Change

About a third of the projects used direct dialogue strategies. In these, organizations sought to 

bring people from across lines of division to a safe, neutral space for conversation, sometimes 

outside the conflict environment. Nearly all included an element of talking about the past. 

In the few projects that included alleged combatants, the discussion often incorporated an 

element of truth telling. When dialogues included only victims, the discussion usually gave 

space to participants to tell their personal stories. In a few instances, conversations resembled a 

strategy meeting in which participants spoke about steps to be taken in their communities to 

Table 6. Community Dialogue Summary

Participants Youth, women, ex-combatants, leaders, educators, victims, survivors

Beneficiaries Participants, communities, nation

Activities Direct dialogue, arts, education reform, sports, cultural exchanges, training

Objectives Personal healing, intergroup trust, mutual respect, behavioral change

Theory Therapeutic effects and empathy and trust drive changes in attitudes 

and behaviors 
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deal with the past. In general, direct dialogue typically encouraged participants to learn about 

the experiences and narratives of the Other and occasionally to find a more inclusive or, even 

more ambitiously, a common historical narrative.

Discussions about the past were often coupled with conversations about how the conflict 

shaped people’s attitudes and behaviors. Although not explicitly identified in the project language, connecting past atrocities and suffering to present-day attitudes and behaviors appeared 

to be a strategy to make people more aware of why they are the person they have become. Such 

awareness would presumably make it easier for people to understand the complex identity of the 

Other and to be more aware of their own identity and actions. A more informed understanding 

of personal and interpersonal identities therefore seems to be a necessary first step to creating 

meaningful changes in attitudes and behaviors and thus fostering trust. Whether discussion 

about the future is missing or consciously excluded could not be determined. Another common 

element was coupling formal discussions with informal activities. Again, the reason for more 

informal activities was not often explained but seemed to relieve tension or enable participants 

to establish personal relationships.

Almost two-thirds of the projects used indirect strategies. These in turn were implemented 

within approximately five mutually inclusive frameworks. The two most common involved 

school curricula and art. 

Fourteen projects used educational activities among not only students but also, if less frequently, teachers, administrators, and parents. Activities within this subgroup varied widely. 

Several created a joint curriculum, either within a school or at a regional or national level, typically to form a common historical narrative or to discuss different narratives, experiences, and 

cultures. These projects were often coupled with trainings for teachers on how to be effective 

facilitators of sensitive classroom material. Many of the activities also had a strong democracy component, such as civic education, healthy debate, and diverse participation, as well as 

straightforward reconciliation. Common topics included coexistence, tolerance, diversity and 

social inclusion, personal identity, national identity, conflict history, healthy communication, 

democracy, effective conflict resolution, and the country’s future.

Thirteen projects used art as a framework. The most common activities were theater productions and art exhibitions or films. Productions were typically dramas and tended to highlight 

common problems or a contentious issue. Art exhibitions or films focused heavily on different 

viewpoints about peace and reconciliation expressed in painting, photography, or videography 

put together as a collective whole, usually for public presentation. First, projects often used art 

as therapy, for participants to both reflect on their viewpoint and attach it to something tangible that could be shared with others. Second, people knew that their perspectives were going 

to be part of a larger whole. This approach allowed facilitators to keep the comparisons focused 

on the art rather than on the individuals. Finally, the public display or performance had a dual 

role, a source of pride and a way to take the lessons on understanding to a larger public. 

Projects used a number of other frameworks as well. Five used media, such as movies, radio, 

or an academic journal. These efforts did not have participants per se but instead sought to 

spark reconciliation conversations at larger community, regional, or national levels. The media 

productions emphasized the desire to bring together multiple perspectives on a given contentious issue. This type of dialogue fits only loosely under the community dialogue category, and 

overlaps heavily with community outreach strategies discussed later, but is included here in 

light of the emphasis on catalyzing a conversation.
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Sports, typically for youth participants, were also used in five projects. Similar in many ways to 

arts projects, sports activities required children to work together on a team, which enabled them to 

focus on the game before engaging in conversation. Several of the projects drew parallels from the 

dynamics of the sport to intergroup interactions in society, focusing the dialogue topics on issues 

such as teamwork and conflict resolution. Other projects used the unity and trust the sport generated to discuss more sensitive issues, such as human rights, equality, and cultural identity. Sports 

promoted the integration of individuals into a larger whole—in this case a team—wherein the 

process of the game helped build working relationships. These relationships were then leveraged in 

the dialogue to discuss topics more tightly tied to group attitudes.

Last, cultural tours—such as those in the community leader dialogue intervention strategy—were used in four projects. Although project language was not specific, leader visits 

seemed more centered on meeting people and being visible, and community tours more about 

visiting and discussing key historical sites. Seeing sensitive historical sites helped participants 

learn about the experiences of other people and better understand the history of the conflict 

and how it affected people differently across both time and space.

Although training was not a framework per se, twelve training projects were coded as community dialogue because they were discussed in terms of directly supporting dialogue efforts. 

Training for facilitators concentrated on the skills and knowledge needed to lead discussions 

on sensitive topics, such as identity, trust, forgiveness, and diversity. Training facilitators was 

generally treated as a way to boost the reach and effectiveness of dialogue projects. Training 

aimed at participants focused on mediation, negotiation, facilitation, effective communication, 

and general conflict resolution because participants would undergo personal change and these 

skills were considered necessary drivers and supporters of such transformation. In other words, 

if participants were equipped with the skills and knowledge needed to understand their identity and peacefully deal with the tension and conflict that arise through the dialogue process, 

then personal and intergroup change would be more likely and more durable.

The objectives for community dialogue vary, but at its heart is the notion of transforming 

people and relationships. Projects described this transformation at the individual, interpersonal, 

community, and national levels. On the individual level, sharing experiences was conceptualized 

as personal healing. Through conversation, people gained an awareness of who they were and 

why they held certain attitudes and behaviors. Moreover, and particularly in dialogues that included perpetrators, the truth-telling element contributed to a sense of justice for past atrocities. 

When skills training, particularly in conflict resolution, were added to a more articulated consciousness of personal identity and justice, individuals would conceivably have the knowledge, 

skills, and willpower needed for personal transformations. A few projects mentioned the importance of forgiveness in personal and intergroup healing, but the concept—harshly criticized in 

reconciliation literature—was somewhat surprisingly not a commonly listed objective.21

Whether after or in synergy with individual change, dialogue projects nearly always entailed 

openly discussing the goal of transforming relations between people across lines of division. A 

number of projects brought people together to simply meet their counterparts, especially when 

conflicts involved geographic divisions. These meetings were the first steps to rehumanizing 

divided peoples, conceivably or presumably so that deeper dialogue could take place. Hearing 

other narratives, it was felt, would help reduce intergroup fear and break down stereotypes and 

misconceptions. In other words, creating a safe space in which a variety of stories could be voiced 

would help foster empathy. This understanding would contribute to the larger goals of building 

trust between people and developing respect for diverse viewpoints. In turn, the transformation 
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of individuals and personal relationships would bolster the intergroup tolerance and coexistence 

needed to promote meaningful reconciliation and lasting peace.

Many dialogue projects connected their grassroots work to shifts in attitudes and behaviors 

at the community and national levels. Projects often conceived of participants as the future 

leaders of social change. Participants were to develop the skills, capacity, and desire to project 

their personal transformations to their communities and the wider national society. The idea 

of a ripple effect across society, however, includes a set of assumptions: that participants will 

in fact undergo change themselves, that they will want to change others, and that they are 

capable of creating change. These assumptions become problematic when considering possible 

selection bias, in that it is unclear that those most open to reconciliation are the right people to 

catalyze change among those least open to reconciliation. Nonetheless, grassroots dialogue was 

often debated as a way to unite people and build a peaceful, harmonious, and inclusive nation.

Two theories of change are offered to explain the logic of this intervention but cannot fully 

capture the nuances and differences found, though certain trends are apparent. Discussion of 

the project logic should be used to inform a more nuanced understanding of why and how 

community dialogue is thought to promote reconciliation. 

Theory 1. If we bring people together from across lines of division to share their experiences during the conflict, the therapeutic effects and the empathy and trust resulting 

from sharing and being understood by the Other will drive changes in individual attitudes and behaviors because participants will be better able to peacefully and productively deal with the effects of the past on their lives. 

Theory 2. If participants in community dialogue projects are able to trust and empathize 

with people from across lines of division, they will become leaders who will promote 

intergroup healing in their communities and broader society, which in turn will produce 

a more peaceful, inclusive, and tolerant society.

Many assumptions associated with these theories of change are beyond the scope of this 

research. Several within its scope are significant, however. First is that community members 

are motivated at least in part to participate, though knowing when the time is right to move 

into dialogue can be difficult to determine. Second is that participants generally have a positive dialogue experience that can contribute to personal and intergroup healing. Third is that 

participants will come to understand the narratives and experiences of the Other through 

talking and that this understanding will give rise to changes in attitude and behavior. Fourth, 

participants will gain the skill and motivation to effect change in their communities. 

Community dialogue’s place in the reconciliation sequence was difficult to determine. In 

general, however, it followed leader dialogue and fell near joint development. In relation to 

bridging activities, dialogue could create readiness for intergroup activities or be a product of 

them. This variability can be explained several ways. First, where community dialogue falls relative to bridging activities could depend on the conflict and the preferences of a given community. Second, the inconsistencies in programming could reflect divides in the literature about 

whether a working relationship—typically taken as a behavioral change—comes before or 

after intergroup attitudinal changes. In any case, the analysis of community dialogue interventions demonstrates why dialogue is often viewed as the jewel of reconciliation work.

7. Broadening Change

To some degree, all of the project intervention strategies aimed for a wider impact than that on 

the project participants. This pattern implies that project designers at least hoped for a ripple 

of change effect across a wider population. Some projects, however, were quite intentional in 
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this respect. The strategies analyzed here were to broaden reconciliation efforts through either 

community participation events or outreach initiatives (see table 7). Twenty-eight organizations and thirty-eight projects were included in the analysis.

Who Participates? Who Benefits?

Because of the focus on engaging a wide audience to expand the beneficiary base of reconciliation efforts, distinguishing and disaggregating participants from beneficiaries was often difficult 

or not even necessary. Some projects had no participants per se. For example, in a traveling 

theatre production, the audience is more significant than the actors. The same is true of a radio 

show. Perhaps more important for this intervention type is whether the audience was broadbased or more targeted. Not quite half of the projects strove for broad-based participation. The 

remainder sought to broaden participation but to more targeted groups. These groups included 

government leaders (4), victims (4), youth (3), academics (3), working professionals (3), and 

women or minorities (2).22 The distinction here between broad-based and targeted community 

outreach is not meant to imply that broad-based activities were completely untargeted or that 

targeted activities were not meant to benefit people outside of the audiences identified.

Creating Change

The two main activity types were events and community outreach. Although each engaged a 

wider population, they also had distinct objectives and underlying logic. 

About half of the projects staged events. The most common were artistic performances, festivals 

or carnivals, public discussions or debates, or some combination (see box 3). Two events were anniversaries to either commemorate atrocities or celebrate peace. Less common were sports tournaments, 

public walks, and public prayers. The events were generally designed to handle large numbers of 

people from both sides. Although project descriptions were not explicit, the heavy emphasis on arts 

and games suggests a need for minimally contentious activities. This logic overlaps considerably with 

the exposure to the Other intervention. Specifically, assuming that more contentious activities—such 

as intergroup dialogue—can engage only a narrow set of participants, given selection bias or financial 

constraints, then less sensitive activities—such as musical performances—which should be better at 

engaging people more resistant to change or not included in more targeted programming.

Other projects focused on outreach activities, almost exclusively using mass media. Six projects used print media, such as magazines, newsletters, newspapers, and information booklets, 

among others. The purpose of these publications varied, but in general, the goal was to disseminate information about recent peace developments—government legislation and press releases 

on human rights, governance, and reconciliation—and the types of changes people should expect 

in their personal lives. Four projects developed radio or television projects to either disseminate 

Table 7. Broadening Change Summary

Participants Broad-based

Beneficiaries Broad-based

Activities Community and regional events and outreach

Objectives Widen public participation, raise public awareness

Theory Positive contact sets precedent for further interactions
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lesser-known information about past atrocities or to discuss themes related to peace and conflict. 

Three projects created documentary films that either reported the causes of the conflict and the 

current reconciliation processes or told success stories from grassroots action. Two projects engaged in campaigning activities to raise awareness on civil rights to empower people to stand up 

for their rights.

Broadening the impact of and support for reconciliation projects is believed to catalyze change 

several ways. First, especially in events, contact between people from divided communities both 

breaks down stereotypes and fear and demonstrates both sides’ dedication to peace. Including as 

many people as possible in events may help demonstrate the critical mass working together to 

change societal divisions. Seeing this dedication could help foster positive intergroup interactions 

and tolerance, and facilitate development of a shared vision for the future. Wider participation 

could also help mitigate stigma surrounding participation in reconciliation activities by setting a 

precedent for increased intergroup contact and cooperation. Second, reconciliation is about making 

large changes to interpersonal and intergroup relations. These projects create avenues for engagement for people who do not participate in other project types. In reaching a wider audience, these 

projects increase the capacity and amplify the impact of other interventions and the reconciliation 

process overall. Third, if people do not know about the work being done to promote peace and 

reconciliation and related progress, they may feel marginalized, which works against reconciliation. 

Furthermore, people must know their rights before they can advocate for themselves and therefore 

Box 3. Case Study: Youth Arts Festival

For a number of years, Most Mira, a European organization operating in the northwest 

region of Bosnia and Herzegovina, has hosted the Youth Festival to “build a bridge of 

understanding and tolerance between the young people of the Prijedor Municipality 

using the arts in a spirit of creative collaboration and participation.”1

 The region, which 

was relatively ethnically mixed before the Bosnian war, is now largely segregated along 

ethnic lines regionally and by school, divisions that this festival actively tried to break 

down. In the festival’s first year in 2009, children age six to fifteen came from one Serbian 

village and one Muslim village. In 2011, the festival included children from six schools or 

youth groups from across the region, many of whom organized fundraising activities to 

help sponsor the five-day festival. The festival entailed three days of various forms of art, 

such as theater, filmmaking, dance, and circus activities, and a final day for participants to 

perform for one another, as well as their friends, parents, and other community members. 

Wide participation was a key objective, and children who are largely divided in their 

day-to-day lives attended the festivities to “play together, have fun together, and build 

new friendships” to show each other and their wider communities what they can achieve 

together.2

 The evaluation report for the 2010 festival, which included a survey for teachers and volunteers and small focus group discussions and a collaborative body mapping 

exercise for the youth participants, highlights the success of the festival in building tolerance and promoting wide participation.3

 Notably, children expressed their enjoyment 

of the creative activities and discussed how collaboration and learning with their activity 

group members helped foster friendships across lines of division.

Notes

1. Most Mira, “Youth Festival,” March 12, 2015, www.mostmiraproject.org/what-it-is.

2. “Most Mira Festival,” commentary by Kemal Pervani, 2011, www.mostmiraproject.org/what-it-is/

2011–2/short-film.

3. Most Mira, “Most Mira Youth Festival 2010 Report” (London: Most Mira, 2010), www.mostmiraproject.org/wp-content/uploads/Most-Mira_Youth-Festival2010.pdf.
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for change. Increased participation in events and materials to bolster awareness thus empowers

people to stand up for their rights to promote a respectful, just, and diverse society. Connecting 

the activities to the objectives and goals points to three primary theories of change:

Theory 1. If public events can draw large audiences from divided communities and if 

attendees have positive interactions participating in the event activities, this positive 

contact will set a precedent for further interaction that promotes greater tolerance and 

cooperation to widen and deepen reconciliation.

Theory 2. If people are more informed about their rights, they will be empowered to 

protect their personal and group rights, creating a more respectful and just society 

capable of genuine reconciliation.

Theory 3. If people are more aware of the work being done to promote reconciliation at 

the different levels of society and if they have avenues through which they can engage in 

the work and discussions of the reconciliation process, they will have the knowledge and 

ability needed to effectively contribute to existing and future projects, thereby informing 

and amplifying the impact of reconciliation policies and programs.

Several questions need to be considered when monitoring and evaluating projects to broaden change. First, are the projects able to reach or include a large population? This issue comes 

with definitional difficulties because many of the projects aimed to include as many people 

as they could; this, however, may not be enough to produce the desired changes. Second, are 

participants getting the intended interaction or information from the activities? If people from 

divided communities are going to an event but are not engaging with their counterparts, one 

must ask whether being in the same area as segregated groups is enough to foster intergroup 

tolerance. In the case of outreach projects, information dissemination was the most common 

focus but little attention was given to the uptake of that information by the intended audience. 

Relaying information about new legal rights is important, but if people cannot understand the 

application of those rights, do not have the power to exercise them, still do not see members 

of the Other as having the same rights, or see human rights mainly as a defense of unpopular 

groups, disseminating information may not be enough to effect the desired change.23 Third, 

broadening projects often work from the assumption that part of people’s decision to not engage 

in the reconciliation process is an information barrier about what is going on and how they can 

participate. If an information barrier is not the reason, then breaking that barrier down may not 

engage the target population. In addition, the large scale of the project or, in the case of many 

events, their one-off nature will make evaluating their impact even more difficult.

Projects to broaden change by increasing participation and raising awareness were applied 

throughout the sequence of reconciliation projects. Broadening change efforts were designed 

to bolster the impact of other projects, to regain momentum for peace, and to engage more 

members of different stakeholder groups, which are arguably objectives that reconciliation 

practitioners and policymakers are striving for at all stages of their work.

8. Documenting History

Dealing with the past is a common theme among reconciliation project interventions, and perhaps no other strategy analyzed focuses more squarely on the past than those aimed at historical 

documentation. A characteristic of many, if not all, postconflict contexts are disputed narratives, 

including those of outright denial, about the causes of the conflict and who perpetrated the 

violence. Through the collection of testimonials and other evidence from victims and sometimes 

perpetrators, this intervention strategy seeks to bring more historical narratives into society’s 

understanding of the past and how the violence affected different individuals and groups. Because a given society may never fully accept any one narrative, these projects aimed to gather 
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and document information about what happened, paying special attention to the rights and 

voices of marginalized people whose viewpoints and suffering may not be commonly heard.24

Documenting history projects perhaps most squarely connect to the fields of transitional justice 

and human rights. Several organizations were not necessarily documenting history for public 

consumption, however. All organizations stressed the sensitivity of this intervention strategy 

and therefore made information public based on their professional assessments. The sample size 

for this intervention is low: Only seven organizations covering nine projects were included (see 

table 8). Three projects operated in Cambodia and two in Colombia. The results are therefore 

offered cautiously. Moreover, because the sample size was so low, the data were not analyzed 

using NVivo, and no theories of change could be developed.

Who Participates? Who Benefits?

Two types of participants figured in documentation interventions: those involved in collecting 

historical information and those contributing information. Perhaps the less important were those 

collecting information; the few organizations who mentioned such participants listed experts, civil 

society members, or the staff of the organization. In regard to project staff, the organizations predominantly represented a marginalized group. When documentation involved gathering information from people, participants included victims, perpetrators, the families of perpetrators, women, 

leaders, and civil society members. Beneficiaries were not explicitly identified. However, the projects 

seemed to be working primarily for the benefit of the victims and marginalized peoples. Because 

these projects were seeking truth, and because the projects seemed to attribute an intrinsic value 

to knowing that truth, this intervention strategy was also discussed as a benefit to society at large.

Creating Change

The core activity of documentation interventions was collecting information, particularly new information, about the past (see box 4). All of the projects, at the very least, included stories from victims, 

such as filmed or oral testimonies, photographs, personal artifacts, diaries, songs, letters, memory 

maps, and film, among others. Such documentation inserted a narrative into history that may not 

have been fully included or understood at the time. In doing so, organizations hoped to amplify the 

marginalized voices of the victims, which introduced an element of personal and group healing and 

to ensure that their stories were not lost over time. Victims’ stories helped tie individual to collective 

experiences, and people could see that they were not alone in their suffering. Victims would in turn 

come to feel less isolated, which could help prepare them for trauma healing and dialogue work.

A few projects gathered information from and about both perpetrators of the violence and 

victims. Sometimes the material included interviews, but most was more objective. This harder 

evidence included press reports, videos and pictures, official legal documents, personal identiTable 8. Documenting History Summary

Participants Those who document or experience history

Beneficiaries Victims and the marginalized

Activities Gathering oral history, exhibitions, media projects, performances

Objectives Amplify marginalized voices, create accurate historical record 

Theory NA
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fication materials, diaries, and maps, among others. The Cambodian organizations engaged in 

this strategy noted that in the absence of a formal truth commission, the documentation sought 

to both hold leaders accountable for their actions and serve as a source of justice for victims. The 

collection of evidence of perpetrators’ roles established a record of responsibility and thus took 

documentation a step further than recording the effects of the violence.

Historical documentation interventions also incorporated certain broad objectives. Before 

people could move forward from past atrocities, a historical record needed to be established 

that did not further marginalize victims by excluding their stories. An inclusive history backed 

up by overwhelming evidence from victims, legal reports, media sources, and sometimes even 

perpetrators could not easily be discounted. Even if the documentation did not establish a fully 

accepted historical truth, it underscored the reality that successful reconciliation depended at 

least in part on the assumptions that the narratives of victims had to be included in discussions 

and that their stories were a critical piece of history. Again, where documenting history fell in 

the sequence of reconciliation varied and was problematic to determine. Several projects, however, were explicit about wanting to spark historical dialogues or change school curriculums so 

that children understood a more accurate version of their nation’s history. Again, given the low 

sample size, these findings may not reflect similar projects in other contexts.

Box 4. Case Study: “Herstories” Archival Project, Sri Lanka

May 2009 marked the end of the twenty-five-year civil war in Sri Lanka with the decisive 

victory of government forces over the Tamil Tiger insurgency, a victory that raised concerns 

across the world about the future well-being of the minority Tamil people living in the northeast.1

 Recognizing the need for survivors’ stories from both sides of the conflict to be told 

in order to build a unified Sri Lankan identity, project staff and local partner organizations 

collected testimonials from mothers in both the south and north of the country to contribute to the “Herstories” archival project. In Sri Lankan culture, “mothers are the guardians 

of their family history. They are the pillars of strength upon which a family is built.”2

 Given 

their role in society, approximately 270 women participated in the project through letter 

writing, photo essays, videos, memory mapping, and other forms of storytelling to create a 

living history that reflects the shared suffering and diverse identities and histories within the 

country. In their stories, which have been translated into English, Sinhala, and Tamil, mothers talked about their experiences during the war, as well as their hopes for the future:

We were displaced from Kilinochchi on 15-09-2008. My husband died on 25-06-2004. 

Now I have my children with me. We faced a great number of difficulties. We were 

continuously displaced from one place to another. We suffered immensely on account 

of the war. On 20-05-2009 we were taken by the army to a camp. We continued to suffer many difficulties in the camp as well. My four children are still studying. In the camp 

it was very difficult to study and manage. On 18-02-2010 we were resettled in our 

village in Kilinochchi. I find it difficult to look after my children alone. We experience 

dire poverty everyday. I pray to God that at least in future there will be peace and my 

children will be able to get their education without any disturbance.3

The project has been showcased in a traveling exhibition throughout Sri Lanka and the world 

to both spread the stories of these mothers to help promote reconciliation within Sri Lanka and 

to inspire grassroots storytelling in other conflicts as a means to build and uphold peace.

Notes

1. BBC News, “Sri Lanka Country Profile: Overview,” January 9, 2015, www.bbc.com/news/

world-south-asia-11999611.

2. Herstories, “‘Herstories’ of Resilience and Hope,” 2013, http://herstoryarchive.org/about-us.

3. Herstories, “Letters, Kilinochchi District, Letter 7,” July 17, 2012, http://herstoryarchive.org/

letters-kilinochchi/killinochchi-letter-7.
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9. Vertical Connections

Although nearly all of the interventions operated at the grassroots level, vertical connection 

strategies suggest that bottom-up approaches must at some point connect with the policies and 

processes at higher institutional levels for reconciliation to really take hold in a country. Policies 

in local and national governments undoubtedly affect the process.25 Work at the individual and 

community levels therefore operate within a national framework, or sometimes lack of one, that 

is largely determined by the political leaders. Because individuals, communities, and local organizations are affected by both the positive and negative consequences of government policies 

and programs, several organizations sought to strengthen connections between decision makers 

and the people affected by those choices to help ensure that policies were inclusive and reflected 

the wishes of citizens. Twenty-eight projects across nineteen organizations were included in the 

analysis (see table 9).

Who Participates? Who Benefits?

Projects seeking to create or strengthen vertical connections to advance reconciliation often 

discussed bringing together key stakeholders. Nine categories of participants were identified. 

These stakeholders included national-level leaders (16), local leaders (14), civil society members (14), youth (8), private-sector leaders (5), security sector workers (4), experts (3), NGOs 

(2), and members of diaspora groups (2).26 Civil society members included peace activists, 

women’s groups, victims, and teachers. Local leaders included traditional leaders, religious 

leaders, elders, and local politicians.

How these stakeholders most and least commonly interacted is significant. Because of the 

large number of stakeholder groups relative to the project sample size, given the wide variance 

of participants across projects, determining patterns was not possible. However, the correlations between categories offer insights. The three most common pairings were national leaders 

and private-sector leaders, youth and experts, and local leaders and private-sector leaders.27

The three least common were national leaders and youth, national leaders and diaspora groups, 

and private-sector leaders and youth.28 Intended intervention beneficiaries were typically not 

identified. When they were, the most common was the country, which reflects the intervention 

goal to widen and deepen participation in reconciliation. A few projects that sought to bring 

marginalized people into higher level discussions emphasized the particular benefit to such 

groups, which were often youth or minorities.

Table 9. Vertical Connections, Summary

Participants Local, national, and private-sector leaders, security sector, NGOs, 

civil society, youth

Beneficiaries Nation, the marginalized

Activities Dialogues, training, media to create bridges between communities 

and institutions

Objectives Mitigate information gaps, give people a stake in peace, 

more effective programs

Theory Understanding perspectives and interests heightens likelihood 

of collaboration
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Creating Change

The two most common vertical connection activities were direct dialogue and training. Nineteen of the twenty-eight projects brought stakeholders together for dialogue sessions. Perhaps 

most common were discussions with key stakeholders about obstacles to peace, such as rule of 

law, models of governance, government services, and land disputes. Dialogues to share information about the work being done at the different levels of society and the challenges to that 

work were also fairly common. These discussions included presentations on lessons learned from 

grassroots programming, findings from local research initiatives, and strategy planning about 

which policies and programs would be most beneficial in the near term to promote reconciliation. The built-in sustainability of the dialogues to connect the different layers of society varied 

widely. In a few cases, the dialogue was set up as a one-time meeting between stakeholders. In 

others, a network of stakeholders was established to facilitate repeated conversations.

Eight projects used training on topics such as conflict resolution, conflict prevention, conflict 

transformation, conflict management, consensus building, and leadership. Half of the trainings 

were coupled with dialogue activities. When participants were exclusively civil society members, 

the sessions typically entailed participants sharing the importance of the knowledge and skills 

they had learned with local or national government leaders to coordinate activities and to help 

inform future programming. Some trainings, though, included participants from different levels 

of society; skills gained in these trainings were used to help create more constructive dialogue 

sessions after the training. Three projects focused on training police to give them the knowledge 

and skills needed to better meet the needs of a diverse population. Police training focused on 

creating connections by reestablishing trust through better security services.

Using media to promote vertical connections was a third, albeit less common, activity. In 

two projects, radio, television, or printed media provided a platform for people from all levels 

of society to offer their thoughts about steps forward. Media projects can perhaps best be 

understood as less structured, more informal, and highly visible dialogue. Two other projects 

that engaged in media disseminated information about work done across the country.29 Taken 

together, projects that used media sought to highlight the cooperation and dedication of stakeholders to peace and reconciliation. 

Projects to create or strengthen vertical connections work through several mutually reinforcing channels. First, by bringing stakeholders from different levels of society together, project 

implementers hoped that people would come to understand the perspectives and challenges at 

the various levels. The cross-level contact and understanding help forge relationships between 

stakeholders and promote more cooperative efforts to create the most effective and pressing reconciliation policies and programs. Second, including a wide range of participants in program 

and policy planning gives people a stake in peace. If people, especially those most susceptible to 

joining violent groups, are engaged in their communities and have a voice in higher-level decision making, they will be less likely to resort to violence. Third is making more effective policies 

and programs for the benefit of society. Dialogues offer a forum through which stakeholders 

can share information about their needs, efforts, and challenges. Sharing this information helps 

decrease horizontal and vertical social capital, which in turn helps coordinate the efforts of people 

and organizations to promote reconciliation and thus makes for more informed, effective policies 

and programs. One primary theory captures much of the logic for these projects:

Theory 1. If key stakeholders from across and between the different levels of society come 

to understand one another’s perspectives and interests in the reconciliation process, then 

they will be able to collaborate to create more inclusive policies and programs that best 

advance the reconciliation process by meeting the diverse needs of the different stakeholders.
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This theory incorporates several assumptions. Identifying key stakeholders and determining 

when and how they should be included in a given activity is difficult. The vertical gaps between 

certain stakeholders, such as police and civil society, might be particularly problematic and 

therefore need more direct attention. The ripeness for participation across stakeholder groups 

also varies. Even if organizations can identify groups ready to constructively participate, the 

question remains of whether the intervening organization has the necessary legitimacy and neutrality. If organizations can successfully identify and convene key stakeholders, the next question 

is whether participants can cooperate to effectively inform more inclusive policies and programs. 

Competing interests and political sensitivities, among other obstacles, could impede the translation of discussions into actions that reflect the voices and needs of the various discussants. A 

final major assumption is that the participants, particularly in the dialogue sessions, are legitimate representatives of their respective groups. Testing these assumptions is difficult but critical.

None of the projects identified a particular place for its activities within the larger sequence. 

Because social and political contexts within a given environment shift, and because the willingness of stakeholders to engage in the reconciliation process strengthens, or sometimes weakens, 

the various levels of society will need to meet regularly to coordinate their efforts. Ongoing 

conflict analysis and project sustainability are particularly critical for vertical connection strategies because these factors not only affect the impact of the activities but also inform decisions 

about who should and should not participate.

10. Research Initiatives

Several organizations focused on research initiatives. The main project components were methodologies, including what and who were being studied, and objectives. The analysis here differs 

from that of the other intervention strategies presented because using the same framework—

defining participants, beneficiaries, activities, and objectives; deriving theories of change; and 

determining sequencing—was not appropriate. Instead, research initiatives were grouped according to the type of research, and objectives were tied directly to the grouping. Nineteen 

organizations, operating twenty projects, were included in the analysis (see table 10).

Barometers

One of the most common research initiatives was to create and implement a reconciliation barometer. Seven projects engaged in this research. Barometers commonly involved large-N surveys across a country’s population to gauge people’s perceptions of and attitudes about various 

reconciliation-related topics. The barometers were designed to provide a snapshot of progress 

and were often repeated on an annual or biannual basis to reveal trends. Survey respondents 

were often members of civil society. Organizations commonly used a stratified random samTable 10. Research Initiatives, Summary

Participants Researchers

Beneficiaries Society

Activities Reconciliation barometers, conflict analysis, case studies

Objectives Improve reconciliation policy and practice, include diversity of viewpoints

Theory NA
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pling methodology that consisted of various strata, such as gender, race, urban-rural residence, 

and age.30 Indicators were typically developed from consultations with civil society representatives, experts, local and national government officials, community leaders, and representatives 

from local NGOs, as well as from similar barometers used in other contexts. Survey questions were geared toward measuring intergroup relations and perceptions about reconciliation. 

To measure at the individual and community levels, questions gauged prejudices; intergroup 

trust; understanding about the narratives, culture, and history of the Other; and feelings about 

the importance and likelihood of and their commitment to improved intergroup relations. To 

measure the macro-level enabling environment for reconciliation, some barometers collected 

information on people’s perceptions about their physical, economic, and cultural security; the 

efficacy of government institutions; and the legitimacy, effectiveness, and commitment of the 

country’s political parties to work together to create a strong, unified country.

The primary goal of reconciliation barometers was to improve reconciliation policy and 

practice. Though the results were for broad consumption, the primary consumers of the survey 

information were government officials and local NGOs. In theory, the barometers enabled 

policymakers and practitioners to measure their collective efforts to advance national reconciliation. Moreover, by breaking down perceptions according to the different strata, governments 

and organizations could better identify where they had made strong progress and areas that 

needed more attention. Identifying large differences in perceptions within and between strata 

would inform policymaking and guide where to target reconciliation programming.

Conflict Analysis

Six research initiatives focused on analyzing the causes and consequences of violence and their 

impact on the future of peace and reconciliation between groups. Participants ranged from civil 

society members to national-level leaders, but focus was on the attitudes and ideas of civil society members. Participants were asked about contentious issues related to peace and what they 

thought needed to happen to improve intergroup relations and build a more durable peace. 

In many ways, the logic and goals overlapped with those of vertical connection strategies. 

The research was conducted to bring a diversity of viewpoints from civil society into higherlevel discussions to help improve and prioritize reconciliation policymaking and programming. 

Conflict analysis was used in addition to or as an alternative to dialogues. With the resulting 

broader understanding, decision makers and practitioners would at least theoretically be better 

equipped to make policy and programming decisions.

Other Research

Two other types of research were identified as supporting the reconciliation process. First, 

three projects engaged in initiatives to examine the experiences and lessons of one or more 

country cases to inform practice in their own country. These efforts involved both broad comparisons of the reconciliation processes and more targeted comparisons of specific issues, such 

as gender and mediation. Second, one initiative involved experimental research to determine 

what factors, such as gender, individuals’ roles in the conflict, and various political and psychological indicators, either promoted or hindered constructive dialogue. This effort was geared 

toward improving the effectiveness of dialogue, particularly dialogue to create and strengthen 

vertical connections between civil society and formal institutions.
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Indicators of Reconciliation

How do projects measure the impact of their work on promoting reconciliation? If reconciliation is the change in relationships within and between individuals, communities, and government institutions, what would we expect to see if change has occurred? In recent years, 

the donor community has made great efforts to increase accountability to stakeholders, to 

better understand the efficacy of intervention strategies, and to test assumptions associated 

with these strategies.31 However, for many reasons, evaluation has often fallen short, a task 

that only becomes more challenging in conflict-affected environments.32 Before determining 

the next steps in monitoring and evaluating to improve projects promoting reconciliation, it is 

important first to step back and observe what the field is currently doing to measure its impact.

Although monitoring indicators are indisputably critical to measuring project success, the 

analysis here focuses primarily on evaluation indicators, which are geared to measuring the 

changes projects aimed to achieve. The results look at individual, community, and government 

or institutional levels. The grouping methodology is not meant to create the impression that 

the categories are disconnected or do not overlap. The results are also not a judgment on the 

efficacy of indicators, nor are the indicators an exhaustive list. They are instead a snapshot and 

offer a base on which future discussions can be developed.

Individual

Individual-level indicators of reconciliation were those meant to measure either changes within 

a person that affect only that person, or changes in interpersonal relations between members of 

divided communities within a participant group. Changes within a person may not at first seem 

like a measure of reconciliation, but in fact point toward a person’s ability to make change, motivation to engage in further reconciliation efforts, and self-awareness about attitudes and behaviors toward the Other, all of which emerged as objectives in one or more intervention strategies. 

Shifts in interpersonal relationships were restricted to the relationships between project participants, which measures the most basic, localized changes projects sought to achieve. Questions to 

respondents about their general attitudes toward the other group were arguably more indicative 

of a larger social change and are therefore analyzed in the section on community-level indicators. Indicators can be loosely grouped into four categories of change: self-awareness, personal 

empowerment, motivation, and personal relationships with the other participants.

Reconciliation ultimately may be about improved intergroup relationships, but in many 

cases the theories of change suggest that changes must first come within an individual. Three 

types of indicators were used. First, projects sought to measure participants’ self-awareness of 

the reasons they hold certain attitudes. These indicators were generally vague—loose references 

to participants engaging in more critical self-reflection, having more empathy, and better understanding how their prejudices affected their attitudes and behaviors—and projects did not 

offer any particulars about how they measured changes.

Second, several projects drew on the idea that individuals must be empowered to make 

the desired changes in their lives and to promote change in their communities. Again, projects 

offered little information about the specifics of the indicators they used. They referred instead 

to individual empowerment in terms of people, and particularly youth, not being bystanders 

when someone needs help; to being able to withstand negative social pressures; to having 

self-confidence in making their voices heard; to contributing ideas about how to improve intergroup relations; and generally to demonstrating strong civic values.
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A third set of indicators sought to measure changes in participants’ motivation to continue 

promoting reconciliation either with their same participant group or with new groups. These 

indicators also served as measures of project sustainability after the intervention. Measurements 

were either of participants’ perceptions about their willingness and desire to continue engaging 

in reconciliation activities as leaders or, and perhaps more directly, on the formation of clubs, 

the development of community projects, and the continuation of intergroup meetings after the 

project had ended. Taken together, positive changes in individuals’ self-awareness, their sense of 

empowerment, and their motivation can best be understood as the factors catalyzing the agents 

of change that projects were seeking to create within the larger reconciliation process.

The indicators that perhaps fit most squarely within the common conceptions of reconciliation are those meant to measure shifts in personal relationships. Essentially all of the indicators focused on changes in the short term. One set measured behaviors thought to be associated with meaningful friendships: exchanging phone numbers, texting, greeting one another, 

sharing food and beverages, spending time together outside the project, inviting one another to 

events, working together professionally, and exchanging meaningful goods. Similarly, other indicators measured improved communication, such as participants asserting that they were less 

afraid of dialogue, that they could be more open about their experiences, and that communication was more productive. In essence, evaluating changes in interpersonal relations—whether 

using surveys or focus group discussions, occasionally in comparison to a baseline—looked at 

shifts in the dimensions of friendships between people during the project. It does not seem, 

however, as though any of the projects evaluated these factors in the medium to long term.

Community

Community-level indicators were geared to measuring actual or perceived shifts in the knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors in communities as a whole. Evaluation techniques included 

questioning participants or conducting surveys about personal thoughts or general relations 

between groups. More than half of the indicators were at the community level, which could 

indicate organization and donor desires to have a broader effect on reconciliation. In fact, the 

outcome indicators developed by Social Impact to measure projects for “increased tolerance 

and reconciliation” nearly all reflected changes in wider society, however defined.33 Many of 

the questions were also closely related to those in the World Bank Group’s Social Capital Assessment Tool (SOCAT): community characteristics, community support, networks and mutual support organizations, exclusion, solidarity, trust and cooperation, and conflict resolution.34

A number of questions for both community- and government-level indicators also mimicked 

questions, particularly on trust, in the World Values Survey (WVS) and the Capacity Enhancement Needs Assessment.35 The results are loosely categorized into four groups: people’s 

perceptions, attitudes, and behaviors about overall intergroup relations; attitudes and behaviors 

associated with intergroup socializing; people’s knowledge about the narratives, culture, and 

history of the Other; and the potential for future reconciliation.

Measuring General Intergroup Relations

The most common community-level indicators were those on people’s perceptions, attitudes, 

and behaviors about relations between groups. 
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First, many projects directly asked people whether they or their group were afraid, prejudiced, 

or intolerant of those from across the lines of division. Measures were often questions: Do you feel 

negative toward other groups? Do you think the divided communities are prejudiced against each 

other? Do you get along with people from a different group? In a few instances, projects looked for 

shifts in behaviors that would indicate reduced intergroup fear and prejudice.

Second, several projects tried to determine the number of intermarriages or asked people 

about their attitudes toward intermarriage. An increase in intergroup marriages was generally 

understood to be a strong indication of improved intergroup relations.

Third, several projects asked respondents open-ended questions about the most serious 

issues facing their community and which entities they thought were responsible. Decreases in 

references to intergroup tensions or blaming the Other were taken as positive signs.

Fourth, projects often tried to measure positive changes in intergroup trust as an indicator of 

improved relations between divided groups. Following the format of many of the larger WVS and 

SOCAT trust surveys, one common survey question was: How much do you trust members of the 

other community? More indirect attitudinal questions were also asked: Would you start a business 

with a member of the other community? Would you trust a member of the other community as 

your leader? Would you trust a member of the other community to watch your animals? In rare 

instances, projects noted examples of demonstrated behavior changes associated with increased 

trust, such as people actually starting a business or doing a project together.

Fifth, indicators were also related to forgiveness and reparations for past abuses. In regard 

to forgiveness, indicators measured either respondent attitudes to forgiveness for past crimes 

through questions such as “Are you ready to forgive other groups?” or demonstrations of forgiveness. Similarly, a few organizations tried to measure attitudes towards giving victims reparations or documented actual instances of giving reparations, such as voluntary land-sharing. 

Taken together, these five groups of indicators were the most common variables used to measure changes of various dimensions of intergroup relations at the community level.

Measuring Intergroup Socializing

A second set of indicators used to measure reconciliation at the community level focused on attitudes and behaviors, particularly of youth, toward intergroup socializing. This category arguably fits squarely within the individual framework but because of the abundance of socializing 

indicators is analyzed here. Voluntary intergroup socializing between nonparticipants was one 

of the strongest indicators for increased tolerance, social cohesion, and social harmony.

Questions on intergroup socializing typically focused on either people’s interest in participating or their perceptions about how much their communities supported such activities. In 

the first, respondents—largely youth—were asked yes or no questions: Do you like to spend 

time with peers who are from a different group than you? Would you be willing to participate 

in activities with members of the other groups in the future? To measure perceptions of community support, questions were again in yes or no format, such as “Do you think your community is supportive of intergroup initiatives?” Occasionally, questions focused on why support 

was low and what could be done to overcome such barriers.

If reconciliation is progressing, project implementers expected to see demonstrable changes 

in intergroup behaviors. Although only a few projects measured behaviors across time, indicators did offer some information about communities’ behaviors at a particular point, lending 

insight into the current state of reconciliation and possible areas for further attention. Projects 

occasionally observed voluntary intergroup socializing directly. More commonly, they con-
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ducted community surveys on behaviors: How often have you interacted with members of the 

other group in the past X month(s) and in what capacity? Have you attended any ceremonies 

or festivals either hosted or attended by members of the other community? How many intergroup activities have been held in the past X month(s)? Do you have friends from the other 

group? How many times have you texted or called members of the other group in the past X 

month(s)? Did you invite members of the other group to your last birthday or social gathering? Together, indicators of people’s attitudes and behaviors measured progress toward greater 

social cohesion and, therefore, reconciliation.

Measuring People’s Knowledge of the Other

The notion that people must understand the narratives, culture, and history of the Other is 

perhaps both a precursor to and an outcome of deepening reconciliation. (A potential source 

of significant bias bears repeating: Nearly all of the evaluation indicators discussed in this section came from a few projects operating in either the Australian or Israel-Palestine contexts.) 

Only a few projects evaluated this outcome, though many interventions identified it as desired, 

which could indicate an evaluation gap in reconciliation work. The results outline four dimensions: general attitudes toward learning, demonstrated knowledge, recognition of differences in 

opportunities for achievement, and self-evaluations of knowledge.

The most common evaluation questions measured general attitudes to learning about the 

narratives, culture, and history of the Other and, less commonly, demonstrations of this knowledge. Common attitudinal indicators included yes or no questions: Is it important to know 

about the culture of other groups? Are you interested in learning about their culture? Is the 

culture of the other group important to the country’s national identity? Some questions were 

specifically about language: Are you interested in learning the language of the other group? Is 

it beneficial to know the other group’s language? Should the school teach the language as part 

of the curriculum? Demonstrations of knowledge were uncommon and examples typically 

emerged from focus group discussions. Focus group session indicators were qualitative descriptions by the evaluation team that people had a better understanding of different viewpoints, 

could articulate the suffering of other groups during the war, and generally used more empathetic language when discussing the Other. In general, however, project evaluations included 

more indicators of attitudes about learning than demonstrations of actual learning did. Behavioral indicators were almost exclusively qualitative.

Projects used two other indicators. Some questions measured perceptions about social inequalities either created or perpetuated by the conflict: Do members of the other group have 

lower, equal, or greater access to opportunities? Do you believe they need help to reach equality? Do you think that being born into the other group makes it harder to achieve? Self-evaluation questions asked how respondents rated their knowledge about the culture and history of 

the Other. These indicators all came from the Australian reconciliation barometer and required 

respondents to choose high, low, or not at all responses to questions about their knowledge of 

other faiths and the culture and history of the Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders. The small 

number of organizations employing these indicators, as well as the small number of indicators 

identified, point to a possible gap in evaluation metrics.

Measuring the Potential for Reconciliation

Several strategies, especially those seeking to broaden change, saw motivation as both a driver 

and an indicator of reconciliation. The most common indicators were people’s perceptions 
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about the country’s future and their attitudes about actions necessary to a reconciled future. Do 

you believe in a viable shared future for the country’s divided communities? Do you think the 

various communities can live together in peace? Do you believe that people can cooperate and 

build the country together? 

Perception questions were commonly paired with indicators of commitment to present efforts to effect change in the future. A common indicator was direct observation of participation 

in reconciliation activities and community organizations over time. Several projects discussed 

the feedback loop between a negative view of the future and low participation in the present as 

affecting hopes for a viable shared future. Some projects also tracked the number of community 

organizations and who participated in them over time as an indicator of social cohesion. Organizations also measured interest in and commitment to changing conditions that could affect 

the future of reconciliation. First were measures of need: Do you see a need for development/

coexistence/community reconciliation? Second were questions related to justice and forgiveness: Should your group forgive other groups for their misdeeds? Is it necessary that all groups 

apologize and forgive each other to build a better future? Last, a few projects asked about the 

efficacy of reconciliation projects in creating meaningful change to intergroup relationships: Do 

you believe that the projects in your community can resolve intergroup conflict and tension? 

Government

Government-level indicators were meant to capture changes in either institutions or leaders. The conflict mediation, vertical connections, and research project strategies had the most 

prominent government-level objectives. Perhaps the three most common related objectives 

were for people at different levels of society to better understand the perspectives and challenges of those at other levels, to give all levels of society a stake in peace by increasing social 

engagement and trust between levels, and to make more effective reconciliation policies and 

projects and to improve institutional performance for the benefit of greater society. Because 

these objectives are not mutually exclusive, indicators could often not be tied to a single objective. Indicators were therefore grouped into four categories: perceived change in institutional 

performance, demonstrated change, vertical information gaps, and vertical trust.

The most common types of government indicators were survey or focus group questions. First 

were direct questions about respondents’ ability to participate in or influence higher-level decision 

making. Second were those about the responsiveness or efficacy of services of different institutional levels. Do you feel that X institution is doing a good job fulfilling its duties? Do you think that 

local authorities are more responsive to your needs now compared to at the start of the project? Do 

you think local authorities collaborate well with community members to solve local problems? Is X 

institution supportive of projects in your community? Many of these questions focused on security 

sector performance. Third were questions about people’s perceptions on authorities’ understanding 

and respect for citizens’ rights: Do you think political leaders better understand X citizen [than at 

the start of the project]? Do you think political leaders are more respectful of X citizen?

When possible, organizations tried to gather qualitative or quantitative data thought to 

indicate the types of changes one would expect if institutional performance had indeed increased. A common indicator, particularly in conflict mediation, was data on the number of 

disputes brought to mediators and the percentage of those disputes peacefully resolved. These 

data were often coupled with qualitative descriptions from mediators. However, whether more 

disputes over time was a positive or a negative indicator was unclear, given that more disputes 

could indicate greater comfort with and trust in the mediators or rising tensions between 
USIP.ORG 39

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groups. Moreover, no indicators were found on the difficulty of cases being resolved by mediators, making meaningful progress even more difficult to assess. Another strong indicator was 

partial or full adoption of recommended policies or practices that better addressed civil society. 

Demonstrated change at the government level is exceptionally difficult to measure because it 

is also difficult to attribute. Several organizations nonetheless pointed to policy revisions and 

claimed at least partial success.

A key objective of projects working across levels of society was to decrease vertical space by 

closing information gaps about the work being done at different levels and the challenges facing the different stakeholders. Improved coordination and information-sharing was indicated 

when, for example, stakeholders reached out to other levels of society to ask for input on an 

issue. Perhaps most common, however, were indicators directly measuring people’s knowledge about the work being done in other levels and how that work related to their work and 

lives. This data was most commonly gathered through surveys and typically measured people’s 

knowledge of new laws and legislation in state or national governments: Are you aware of X 

new law/legislation/process? Can you name at least three issues or rights on X topic? Have 

you received information recently about X? Do you know the mandate and function of X 

institutional authority? Only one indicator measured the information gap from the perspective 

of the institutional authorities about the work being done at a grassroots level. Even then the 

question was arguably tangential: Do you feel better prepared to engage with your constituents 

and why? Together, these questions aimed to measure changes in vertical space, particularly 

between civil society members and local or national governments.

The final indicator category, which cuts across the three other categories several ways, was 

the level of trust between layers of society, particularly citizen trust in institutions. Some questions were project specific: Has your trust in local authorities increased since the start of the 

project? Why? Other questions measured trust on a broader scale: How would you measure 

your trust in X authority on a scale from 1 to 5? Has your trust in your local (or national) 

government improved over the past year? One organization offered qualitative evidence about 

local leaders expressing increased trust and confidence in civil society.

In sum, organizations measured several dimensions to gauge their objectives at the government level. The indicators, however, nearly always tried to measure vertical distance and institutional performance from the perspective of civil society members rather than of stakeholders 

at every relevant level.

Discussion

One of the primary goals of this report was to explore the field’s collective understanding of the 

word reconciliation and the factors that contribute to that process and goal. It does not offer a 

definition for the field, but rather reveals the current boundaries of the definition as they reflect 

practice. In general, the intervention strategies support the notion that reconciliation is about 

reshaping identities and improving intergroup relations to peacefully manage differences in 

the wake of violent conflict. Organizational practice largely focuses on making these changes 

at the community level, but connects them to individual and government levels. A common 

definition in the field is unlikely, and in fact may not even be that necessary. For evaluation 

purposes, however, an operational definition helps clarify the variables and their means, which 

strengthens research in the field.36 The current objectives—social cohesion, social harmony, and 

trust—are fluid, which weakens research and evaluation potential. The flip side is that these 

words may not have much meaning because the field has not given them any.
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The need to develop meaningful monitoring and evaluation indicators in the peacebuilding field is well understood. However, the analysis of the indicators used in reconciliation 

programming does point to some particularly weak areas that would benefit greatly from more 

attention. Reconciliation indicators are most strongly developed for changes at the community 

level but are quite weak at the individual and government levels. The common objectives of 

individual change involve self-awareness, empowerment, and motivation. No robust indicators 

of these objectives seem to exist. If they do exist, there is a disconnect between their existence 

and their adoption by organizations.

Although some government-level indicators were more developed and more widely used, 

two of the four categories were notably weaker than the other two. Those for perceived and 

demonstrated change in institutional performance were relatively stronger than those for information gaps and trust between vertical layers. The most obvious explanation may be a lack 

of access to government officials. A few projects were unable to reach officials for follow-up 

after the project; the flimsiness of the few related survey questions suggests too little political 

space for robust evaluation. These obstacles have largely resulted in evaluators shifting their 

energy to surveying or interviewing community members about their perceptions of higher 

level changes. Project staff must carefully consider these evaluation hindrances in their project 

design. Separately, the evaluation community should help develop creative ways to measure 

objectives at higher institutional levels to assist the efforts of implementing organizations. In 

general, indicators meant to capture changes within or between vertical layers are fairly weak. 

Their development should be sensitive to the political environment in the project’s operating 

context to more effectively capture the necessary information on a project’s performance.

In addition, certain baskets of practice could greatly benefit not only from stronger evaluation techniques but also from better ways to connect to larger reconciliation processes. For 

example, interventions that aimed at helping individuals, such as trauma healing, generally 

suffered from weak or absent evaluation and did not clearly connect to the other stages of 

reconciliation. Although other project types were commonly coupled with a clear next stage, 

changes at the individual level that connected to the larger reconciliation process tended to be 

implicit outcomes of healing not sustainably tied to efforts to connect individual changes to 

those between divided peoples.

Another aspect that merits closer attention is how information circulates between audiences within a project or between sequenced projects. For example, community leader dialogue 

interventions were largely used to promote understanding and cooperation between leaders 

from divided communities to create ripeness for intergroup contact, cooperation, and dialogue 

between divided community members. This may be happening in projects, but the connection 

between leader contact acting as a catalyst to wider intergroup contact through information 

transfer is not evident from project documents. As leaders work to find common ground and a 

framework to talk constructively about reconciliation issues within and between communities, 

projects should capture how that information is being transferred to larger communities and 

received by community members. Through which forums is information being transferred? 

Who is included and excluded from hearing those messages? Is the information uptake happening as leaders intend? Are those messages coming through successfully in future programming for community member participants? More careful process tracing of the narratives and 

information could inform sequencing and measuring project impact over time.

A final point relates to some of the broader assumptions. First is that participants want 

to change their attitudes and behaviors. It has not been proved, however, that either personal 

healing or any sense of justice will necessarily create any meaningful change in people’s at-
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titudes and behaviors toward other groups in the aftermath of violence. This is not to say that 

such connections do not exist, only that many experts question the strength, or sometimes 

even the existence, of these connections, which are engrained in the entire logic of dialogue 

and other project types.

Second, it was unclear how sustainable any of the interventions were over time. If projects could 

not support repeated interactions between relevant groups, it is questionable whether enough time 

was allowed for the presumed personal, interpersonal, and intergroup changes to take hold.

Third, possible selection bias related to who participates likely impedes efforts to repair 

broken intergroup relationships. If projects are only able to engage the members of society 

most ready to change, or those least affected by the conflict, then practitioners need to be 

mindful that their projects may not be reaching the people most resistant to reconciliation. 

This participant selection bias points to another important question: Who is being asked to 

reconcile with whom? Many projects tried to bring together divided narratives about the conflict in a more neutral space in which the idea that everyone suffered is dominant and that in 

some way every member of civil society was a victim of larger political processes.37 This logic is 

clearly intended to prevent the postconflict development of victim and perpetrator identities, 

which can entrench conflict identities for generations to come. However, encouraging or creating this “everyone suffered” discourse as the hinge that can unite and reconcile divided groups 

arguably could be an initiative that undermines rather than strengthens reconciliation efforts 

because it inherently discounts the unequal suffering of certain groups and the responsibility 

of others, and hence undermines larger justice processes. Who is participating in programs and 

organization desire to create points of commonality between divided groups to further reconciliation present not only serious sampling biases but also questions about the strength of the 

underlying logic on which many theories of change are built.

This mapping of reconciliation work also revealed several questions and potential concerns 

that should be investigated in future research. Most projects, with the notable exception of 

documenting history interventions, focused on early-stage reconciliation. This could reflect 

either underdeveloped medium- to long-term practices or that in a field with limited funding, 

resources are being allocated to projects operating in hot or only recently postconflict contexts. 

The apparent assumption, essentially teleological, is that negative peace is an acceptable indicator of reconciliation and that, with time, reconciliation will naturally progress from negative to 

positive or, using another metaphor, from thin to thick. However, if this assumption is not true, 

which literature suggests may be the case, then a thin level of reconciliation may instead be 

sustaining a negative, and hence tenuous, peace over time. This point was made clear by Youk 

Chhang, the director of the Documentation Center of Cambodia, who says of the continued 

need to work for reconciliation that “the past never died and the past has never passed” in 

Cambodia, decades after the country’s genocide.38

The intervention strategies used in reconciliation work seemed rather narrow, undeveloped 

in scope, and based on a fairly narrow set of theories of change, which raises questions about 

work in the field. First, does the field need new baskets of practice or does it need to concentrate on refining the existing baskets? Perhaps intervention strategies not captured in this study 

could provide further breadth to the field. When questioned on this point in presentations of 

this research, however, academics and practitioners could not provide new examples, which 

supports the idea that the mapping captured the bounds of practice fairly well. Practice hinges 

heavily on ideas drawn from contact theory, theories that have been widely criticized, but potential alternatives to contact practices are not apparent. Refining these practices that delve 

deeper into the content of the different practices may therefore be the most practical next step.
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Second, the heavy reliance on public language for this mapping raises interesting questions 

about what exactly these results revealed. Does this mapping better reflect actual practice or 

organizational-speak about reconciliation work? A clear next step would be research analyzing 

how well public language matches up with the work on the ground. Given that nearly all of the 

projects were funded by Western donors, language and practices that match well could indicate 

donors shaping a certain cadre of practices. A large disconnect might indicate a reconciliationspeak that organizations have adopted in their grant proposals to meet perceived donor ideologies. In-depth research on development and implementation of projects over time in a specific 

context, or that allows for locally based practitioners to reflect on their work, would each be 

useful methodologies to lend insights into these important knowledge gaps.

Conclusion

Mapping the practices used to promote reconciliation has yielded a useful framework on which 

future research can be built and further informed by the weak points identified in common 

assumptions and evaluation metrics. The peacebuilding field has struggled to find evidence 

of its demonstrable impacts in light of the growing demands from the donor community to 

justify spending. Compounding this problem are tensions among researchers and evaluators 

about whether efforts at developing indicators, at least in the short run, should focus on finding 

the best indicators that can be easily adopted by organizations and that are readily comparable 

across contexts, or whether efforts are better spent developing indicators produced locally and 

therefore perhaps better at capturing data on desired changes.39 Both are important to advancing the field’s knowledge and practice. Easily adopted indicators are important for organizations that may not otherwise be able to competitively apply for funding without external help 

on the monitoring and evaluation aspects of their projects. Although donor pushes for better 

monitoring and evaluation of grantees are correct in spirit, such expectations can create distortions in the field by biasing funds toward organizations that can best “walk the walk and 

talk the talk” of reconciliation. This research revealed how weak evaluation is for reconciliation 

projects. It is critical to develop more rigorous evaluation practice to be sure that activities are 

effectively advancing goals. As evaluation efforts in the field develop, donors must be mindful 

that their money is not creating an elite group of organizations at the expense of locally led 

initiatives to repair relations in a way that makes sense for their people, their culture, and the 

history they have lived through.
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Appendix A. Questionnaire

“The Applied Research on Conflict Center (ARC) at the United States Institute of Peace is 

conducting research on how we can better measure the impact of reconciliation programs on 

the ground.

“To facilitate our understanding of the scope of reconciliation work being done around 

the world, we are asking people/organizations working on reconciliation programs to fill out 

the questionnaire below about their most successful reconciliation program in the past 3 years. 

This questionnaire is primarily geared towards gathering information about: 1) program activities; 2) results and learning from the program; and 3) qualitative or quantitative tools used to 

gather results. If you would like to share information on more than one of your organization’s 

reconciliation programs, please click on the survey link again to fill out the questionnaire additional times.

“Please note that the information you provide here will be kept confidential. This research 

will feed into a larger workshop on evaluation methods; however, we will reach out to your 

organization for consent to use the information provided here before using it for additional 

research purposes.

“We appreciate your assistance in this research and hope that together we can advance the 

field of monitoring and evaluation in reconciliation programs.

“Organization Name:

“Information for point of contact at your organization (this should be the person who we 

should follow-up with if we have any additional questions and who can give consent to use the 

program information for public knowledge):

• Name:

• E-mail:

• Reconciliation program name:

• Program year(s):

• Name of program lead:

• Country where program was implemented:

• Please provide a brief description of the program:

• Please list the primary activities of the program:

• Please list the objectives of the program:

• If you have/had evaluation indicators for the program, what are/were the indicators 

of success? What were the results of the program and what quantitative and/or qualitative tools did you use to measure its success? If you did not have indicators, please 

answer None.”
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Appendix B. Research Sample

• Ajoka Theatre

• All for Peace Radio

• American Institute for Contemporary German Studies

• As We Forgive Rwanda Initiative

• Asociación Pacto Colombia - Mujeres Ecuménicas Constructoras de Paz

• Balkan Sunflowers

• Beyond Walls

• Butterfly Peace Garden

• Catholic Diocese of Eldoret

• Catholic Relief Services

• Center for Democracy and Reconciliation in Southeast Europe

• Center for Dialogue Reconciliation

• Center for Nonviolent Action

• Center for Peacebuilding

• Center for Sustainable Peace and Democratic Development

• Centre for Peace Advancement in Nigeria

• Centre for Peace and Reconciliation

• Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation

• Community Relations Council

• Conciliation Resources

• Corporación Conciudadanía

• Dialogue for Life and Reconciliation

• Documentation Center of Cambodia

• EcoPeace/Friends of the Earth Middle East

• El Rosario University

• Facing History and Ourselves

• Fundación para la Reconciliación

• Genesis Project

• George Mason University, Center for Peacemaking Practice

• Glebe House

• Glencree Centre for Peace and Reconciliation

• Global Rights

• Haqsoor

• Healing Foundation

• Healing Through Remembering

• Herstories Archive Project

• Hijos e Hijas por la Memoria y Contra la Impunidad

• Historical Memory Center

• Institute for the Healing of Memories

• Institute of Research and Dialogue for Peace
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• Inter-Faith Activity and Partnership for Peace

• Interfaith Encounter Association

• Interfaith League Against Poverty

• International Alert

• International Centre for Ethnic Studies

• International Organization for Migration, Grupo de Memoria Histórica

• Interpeace

• Inter-Religious Coordinating Council in Israel

• IREX

• Islamic Organization For Promoting Peace and Reconciliation

• Jena Center for Reconciliation Studies

• Jerusalem Peacemakers

• Johns Hopkins University

• Just Peace Initiative

• Just Vision

• Justice and Reconciliation Project

• Karuna Center for Peacebuilding

• Kumi Human Rights Initiative

• Lutheran World Relief, Asociación Minga

• MARCH, Lebanon

• Mariya Arafasha Foundation

• Mercy Corps

• Ministry for Peace and Reconciliation Under the Cross

• Moi University, Kenya, Centre for Public Sector Reforms

• Most Mira

• Mozaik Community Development Foundation

• Nansen Dialogue Network

• National Peace Council, Sri Lanka

• Pact Sudan

• Paigaam

• Palestine-Israel Journal

• Pan African Center for Peace and Conflict Resolution

• Peace and Community Action

• Peace and Reconciliation Group

• PeacePlayers International

• Post-Conflict Research Center

• Propaz Foundation, Guatemala

• Radio La Benevolencija Humanitarian Tools Foundation

• RECONCILE International

• Reconciliation Australia

• Reconciliation, Education & Community Training
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• Samadeepa Samaja Kendraya

• Sanayee Development Organization

• Search for Common Ground

• Seeds of Peace

• Shikaya

• South African Institute for Justice and Reconciliation

• Speedwell Trust

• Sri Lanka Unites Reconciliation Center

• Sudan Sunrise

• Suffolk Lenadoon Interface Group

• Sulha Peace Project

• SUPPORT Nepal

• Survivor Corps

• Survivors Associated

• Sustainable Development Policy Institute

• The Abraham Fund Initiatives

• The Jerusalem Intercultural Center

• The Junction

• The Parents Circle Family Forum

• The Peres Center For Peace

• Trauma Healing and Reconciliation Services

• Ubuntu Centre

• UMAM Documentation and Research, Lebanon

• United States Institute of Peace

• University of Ulster, International Conflict Research Institute

• West Africa Network for Peacebuilding

• Yoga Fusion Participatory Action Research Network

• Youth for Peace

• Zimbabwe People’s Revolutionary Army Veterans Trust
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Appendix C. Project Matrix 

Asia 44

Cambodia 4 5 3 1 13

China/Japan 1 1

Indonesia 1 1

Kyrgyzstan 1 1 2

Kyrgyzstan–Tajikistan 1 1 2

Nepal 2 1 3

Philippines 1 1 1 1 4

Sri Lanka 1 1 3 2 1 2 4 1 1 2 18

Percentages 5 5 9 7 11 18 23 9 5 2 7

Australia and Oceania 11

Australia 2 1 1 2 2 2 10

Fiji 1 1

Percentages 18 9 9 18 9 18 18 —

Central America and the Caribbean 2

Guatemala 2 2

Percentages 100 —

Europe 56

Armenia 1 1

Multiple (Balkans) 1 2 1 1 1 1 1 8

Bosnia and Herzegovina 2 1 4 7

Cyprus 1 1

Georgia 1 1

Georgia-Abkhazia 1 1 2

Germany 3 3

Kosovo 2 1 3

Macedonia 1 1

Northern Ireland 3 4 13 3 3 1 2 29

Percentages 5 9 14 38 9 4 7 9 5 — Conflict Mediation Trauma Healing Leader Dialogue Exposure Joint Development Community Dialogue Broadening Change Documenting History Vertical Connections Research

Table A1. Project Matrix

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Other Total
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Conflict Mediation

Trauma Healing

Leader DialogueExposure

Joint DevelopmentCommunity Dialogue

Broadening Change

Documenting History

Vertical Connections

Research

Table A1. Project Matrix

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Other Total

Middle East and North Africa 56

Afghanistan 2 1 3

Iraq 1 1 1 3

Israel 1 2 2 5

Israel/Palestine 1 1 5 1 9 5 3 1 26

Lebanon 1 1 2 1 1 1 7

Pakistan 1 2 1 1 2 1 8

Syria 2 2

Yemen 2 2

Percentages 9 11 13 9 25 13 2 14 4 2 —

South America 12

Colombia 3 1 2 2 2 2 12

Percentages 25 8 17 17 17 17 —

Sub-Saharan Africa 79

Burundi 1 2 1 5 2 2 13

Cote d’Ivoire 1 1 2

Ghana 1 1

Guinea-Bissau 1 1 1 1 4

Kenya 1 1 1 3

Liberia 1 1 2

Nigeria 1 2 1 1 1 6

Rwanda 1 1 1 1 7 1 2 1 15

Somalia 1 1

Somaliland/Somalia 1 1

South Africa 1 1 8 1 11

South Sudan 1 2 1 1 1 6

Sudan/South Sudan 1 1 2

Uganda 3 1 2 2 1 1 1 11

Zimbabwe 1 1

Percentages 6 11 6 4 6 28 11 0 11 8 8 —
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Other 17

India/Pakistan 2 1 1 1 5

Multiple* 1 1 4 2 2 2 12

Percentages 18 6 6 29 18 12 12 —

Total counts 12 19 18 20 25 73 38 9 28 20 15 277

Total percentages 4 7 6 7 9 26 14 3 10 7 5 98

*Multiple encompasses projects where the implementing organization discussed implementing the same project model in two or more countries. Conflict Mediation Trauma Healing Leader Dialogue Exposure Joint Development Community Dialogue Broadening Change Documenting History Vertical Connections Research

Table A1. Project Matrix

1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Other Total
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Appendix D. Project Frequencies

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

Conict Mediation

Trauma Healing

Community Leader Dialogue

Exposure to the Other

Joint Development Projects

Community Dialogue

Broadening Change

Documenting History

Vertical Connections

Research

Other

NUMBER
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Notes

1. Herbert C. Kelman, “Conflict Resolution and Reconciliation: A Social-Psychological Perspective on Ending 

Violent Conflict Between Identity Groups,” Landscapes of Violence 1, no. 1 (2001).

2. Ibid.

3. Yaacov Bar-Siman-Tov, From Conflict Resolution to Reconciliation (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004).

4. Daniel Bar-Tal, “From Intractable Conflict Through Conflict Resolution to Reconciliation: Psychological 

Analysis,” Political Psychology 21, no. 2 (2000): 351–65.

5. Ibid.

6. Andrew Rigby, Justice and Reconciliation: After the Violence (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner, 2001); John Paul 

Lederach, Building Peace: Sustainable Reconciliation in Divided Societies (Washington, DC: U.S. Institute of 

Peace, 1998).

7. Ernesto Verdeja, Unchopping a Tree: Reconciliation in the Aftermath of Political Violence (Philadelphia, PA: 

Temple University Press, 2009).

8. Ibid.

9. Ian S. McIntosh, “Reconciliation, You’ve Got to be Dreaming: Exploring Methodologies for Monitoring and 

Achieving Aboriginal Reconciliation in Australia by 2030,” Conflict Resolution Quarterly 32, no. 1 (2014): 55–81.

10. Insight on Conflict, “Peacebuilding and Reconciliation,” www.insightonconflict.org/themes/reconciliation.

11. For example, if an organization had multiple programs that involved creating a radio program, only one radio 

program was selected for this research. This decision lies somewhat on the assumption that similar activities 

within an organization are based on the same, or similar, theories of change and that the added value of gathering all of the information would be marginal for the purposes of this research. However, this assumption will 

certainly not hold true in every case.

12. The settings for the queries run in NVivo were a minimum character length of 4 and the text match option 

was set to level 3, meaning that results were either exact matches, words with the same stem, or synonyms for 

the main returned word.

13. Because reconciliation was the term used for Internet searching, programs exclusively using alternative language to discuss their programs (such as “to promote trust and social cohesion” or “to promote justice”) may 

not have returned hits from the searches. If a program using alternative language was found and it clearly fit 

within even the undefined bounds of reconciliation in this research, it was included to try to correct for this 

bias as best as possible. 

14. Mercy Corps, “Building Bridges to Peace: Final Evaluation Report,” June 2011, www.mercycorps.org/sites/

default/files/uganda_building_bridges_to_peace_final_evaluation_june_2011.pdf.

15. Ibid.

16. Dan Snodderly, ed., Peace Terms: Glossary of Terms for Conflict Management and Peacebuilding (Washington, DC: 

United States Institute of Peace, 2011), http://glossary.usip.org.

17. CDA Collaborative Learning Projects, “Reflecting on Peace Practice Program,” 2004, www.cdacollaborative.

org/programs/reflecting-on-peace-practice.

18. Ibid.

19. Cheyanne Church and Mark M. Rogers, “Understanding Change,” in Designing for Results: Integrating 

Monitoring and Evaluation in Conflict Transformation Programs (Washington, D.C.: Search for Common 

Ground, 2006), 10–23.

20. John D. Wooten Jr., “Meta-Evaluation of USAID/Uganda Evaluation Reports” (Washington, DC: The 

Mitchell Group, April 2010); Andrew Blum, “The Peace Bridge to Nowhere,” Foreign Policy, September 22, 

2014, http://foreignpolicy.com/2014/09/22/the-peace-bridge-to-nowhere.

21. See, for example, Thomas Brudholm, Resentment’s Virtue: Jean Améry and the Refusal to Forgive (Philadelphia, 

PA: Temple University Press, 2008); Valérie Rosoux and Thomas Brudholm, “The Unforgiving: Reflections 

on the Resistance to Forgiveness After Atrocity,” in Law and Contemporary Problems 72, no. 33 (Spring 2009), 

33–49; Rebecca Saunders, “Questionable Associations: The Role of Forgiveness in Transitional Justice,” in 

International Journal of Transitional Justice 5, no. 1 (2011): 119–141.

22. Number of programs that listed each target group given in parentheses. 

23. A vivid example of this problem can be found in a study of history education and reconciliation in Guatemala: 

Cadets in a Guatemala City military academy were well versed in international human rights, including the 

Geneva Conventions. But the students did not read the well-respected Historical Clarification Commission’s 

final report about the conflict, which included charges that the Guatemalan military had committed genocide 

against the indigenous Mayan civilian population in the course of fighting a leftist insurgency. One student 

said that in response to questions from students from other schools about why the army had been genocidal, 

the military academy students responded that “the army did what it did to defeat the insurgents. People get 

killed in wars, that’s why wars are bad.” As this example indicates, a technical knowledge of human rights does 

not equate with acknowledgment of harms committed, with a wholesale rejection of one of the most extreme 

form of human rights abuses as a way to solve conflicts, or with concern for the suffering of the former “enemy.” 
52 USIP.ORG

PEACEWORKS 111

Elizabeth Oglesby, “Historical Memory and the Limits of Peace Education: Examining Guatemala’s Memory 

of Silence and the Politics of Curriculum Design,” in Teaching the Violent Past: History Education and 

Reconciliation, Elizabeth A. Cole, ed. (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield, 2007), 175–202, 188–89.

24. The theory behind this area of practice can be seen to reflect the work of Charles Taylor on recognition, among 

others. See, for example, Charles Taylor, “The Politics of Recognition,” in Multiculturalism and the Politics of 

Recognition, Amy Gutmann, ed. (Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1992). 

25. On the “architecture of peacebuilding,” which conceptualizes peacebuilding as a multilevel structure in which 

each level not only has its own distinct peacebuilding logic, methods, and challenges but also must be linked 

to other levels for a broad peace to become sustainable, see Andries Odendaal, A Crucial Link: Local Peace 

Committees and National Peacebuilding (Washington, DC: U.S. Institute of Peace Press, 2013).

26. Number of programs that included participants from the listed group given in parentheses. 

27. The correlation coefficients for these three pairings were 0.40, 0.29, and 0.27. 

28. The correlation coefficients for these three pairings were -0.41, -0.32, and -0.29. 

29. These two programs were coded into this intervention rather than the Community Participation category 

because they were specifically meant to engage and connect all levels of society and were coupled with training 

or dialogue efforts. 

30. In stratified random sampling, the population being sampled is broken into different important groups, or 

strata, based on their importance to the overall research. In barometers, groups are often made for different 

ethnic groups, genders, and age groups, among others. A random sample from each strata is then taken. This 

sampling strategy is particularly useful in the case of barometers because it can boost the representation of 

smaller groups in the overall sample that may not have been well represented using simple random sampling. 

See http://betterevaluation.org/evaluation-options/stratifiedrandom. 

31. USAID, “USAID Evaluation Policy” (Washington, DC: USAID, January 2011), www.usaid.gov/sites/

default/files/documents/2151/USAIDEvaluationPolicy.pdf.

32. OECD, Evaluating Peacebuilding Activities in Settings of Conflict and Fragility: Improving Learning for Results, 

DAC Guidelines and References Series ( Paris: OECD Publishing, 2012).

33. Social Impact, Fragile States and Peacebuilding Programs: Practical Tools for Improving Program Performance and 

Results (Arlington, VA: Social Impact, 2006), www.socialimpact.com/resource-center/downloads/fragilestates.pdf.

34. Christiaan Grootaert and Thierry Van Bastelaer, Understanding and Measuring Social Capital: A Multidisciplinary 

Tool for Practitioners (Washington, DC: The World Bank, 2002).

35. World Values Survey, “Wave 6 2010–2014 Official Aggregate v.20141107.” Aggregate File Producer, Asep/

JDS (Madrid: World Values Survey Association, 2012), www.worldvaluessurvey.org/WVSDocumentationWV6.

jsp; Mary McNeil, Kathleen Kuehnast, and Anna O’Donnell, “Assessing Capacity for Community-Based 

Development: A Pilot Study in Tajikistan” (Washington, DC: World Bank Group, 2004).

36. For example, the term war has been widely operationalized to mean one thousand battle-related deaths 

between or among combatants in a given year. Academic debate has helped refine data on the threshold of the 

death count and what is meant by a combatant or state and whether the state had to be one of the combatants. 

The definition is not meant to be perfect, but the operationalization of the definition has offered scope and 

helped guide more comparable research studies in the field with clearly defined limitations; www.nsd.uib.no/

macrodataguide/set.html?id=54&sub=1.

37. Frances Fortune and Adriene Sindayigaya, Intamenwa! Les Indivisibles. Mobilisation of Burundian Youth for 

Political Reconciliation (Washington, DC: Search for Common Ground, 2011).

38. Youk Chhang, “Cambodian Genocide Education Brownbag,” presentation at the United States Institute of 

Peace, Washington, DC, March 18, 2015. 

39. Deepa Narayan and Michael F. Cassidy, “A Dimensional Approach to Measuring Social Capital: Development 

and Validation of a Social Capital Inventory,” Current Sociology 49, no. 2 (2001): 59–102; Everyday Peace 

Indicators, “About.” http://everydaypeaceindicators.org/about/.
 5

About the Institute

The United States Institute of Peace is an independent, nonpartisan 

institution established and funded by Congress. Its goals are to 

help prevent and resolve violent conflicts, promote postconflict 

peacebuilding, and increase conflict-management tools, capacity, and 

intellectual capital worldwide. The Institute does this by empowering 

others with knowledge, skills, and resources, as well as by its direct 

involvement in conflict zones around the globe.

Chairman of the Board: Steven J. Hadley

Vice Chairman: George E. Moose

President: Nancy Lindborg

Chief Financial Officer: Michael Graham

Board of Directors

Stephen J. Hadley, (Chair), Principal, RiceHadleyGates, LLC, Washington, 

D.C.• George E. Moose (Vice Chair), Adjunct Professor of Practice, The 

George Washington University, Washington, D.C. • Judy Ansley, Former 

Assistant to the President and Deputy National Security Advisor under 

George W. Bush, Washington, D.C. • Eric Edelman, Hertog Distinguished 

Practitioner in Residence, Johns Hopkins University School of Advanced 

International Studies, Washington, D.C. • Joseph Eldridge, University 

Chaplain and Senior Adjunct Professorial Lecturer, School of International 

Service, American University • Kerry Kennedy, President, Robert F. 

Kennedy Center for Justice and Human Rights, Washington, D.C. • Ikram 

U. Khan, President, Quality Care Consultants, LLC, Las Vegas, Nev. • 

Stephen D. Krasner, Graham H. Stuart Professor of International 

Relations, Stanford University, Palo Alto, Calif. • John A. Lancaster, 

Former Executive Director, International Council on Independent Living, 

Potsdam, N.Y. • Jeremy A. Rabkin, Professor of Law, George Mason 

University, Fairfax, Va. • J. Robinson West, Chairman, PFC Energy, 

Washington, D.C. • Nancy Zirkin, Executive Vice President, Leadership 

Conference on Civil and Human Rights, Washington, D.C.

Members Ex Officio

John Kerry, Secretary of State • Ashton Carter, Secretary of Defense 

• Gregg F. Martin, Major General, U.S. Army; President, National 

Defense University • Nancy Lindborg, President, 

United States Institute of Peace (nonvoting)
2 Looking for Justice

Overcoming the enormous obstacles to reconciliation in 

war-torn societies requires concerted and coordinated 

efforts on the part of individuals, nongovernmental organizations, and governments. The first step is to assess the 

work currently being done. How are organizations conceptualizing reconciliation? What strategies are organizations 

using to promote reconciliation? What are the theories of 

change underpinning program intervention strategies? How 

are organizations measuring their success? In answering 

these questions, this report addresses a critical knowledge 

gap between postconflict reconciliation theory and practice.

Other USIP Publications

■ Managing Conflict in a World Adrift edited by Chester A. Crocker, Fen Osler 

Hampson, and Pamela Aall (USIP Press, January 2015)

■ A Crucial Link: Local Peace Committees and National Peacebuilding by Andries 

Odendaal (USIP Press, September 2013)

■ Addressing Land Conflict in Afghanistan by Erica Gaston and Lillian Dang 

(Special Report, May 2015)

■ Conflict Dynamics in Sindh by Huma Yusuf and Syed Shoaib Hasan (January 

2015)

■ Using Technology in Nonviolent Activism against Repression by Kelly McKone, 

Maria J. Stephan, and Noel Dickover (January 2015)

■ Local Peace Processes in Sudan and South Sudan by Jacqueline Wilson 

(Peaceworks, May 2014)

PEACEWORKS • AUGUST 2015 • NO. 111

UNITED STATES INSTITUTE OF PEACE • 2301 CONSTITUTION AVE., NW • WASHINGTON, DC 20037 • USIP.ORG 

@ usip