Local Peacebuilding in Practice: Community Dialogue’s Contribution

By Ann Kelleher (Fall 2015)

The following explanation and analysis of Community Dialogue’s practice presents how healthy human interactions can thrive in the complex, even contradictory, and emotionally fraught environment of a post-violent conflict society. Since sustainable peace requires constructively connecting across social boundaries, Community Dialogue (CD) has earned its peacebuilder designation. It can serve as a case study illustrating how dialogue activities can assist in achieving peace.

While ample analyses exist explaining how wars happen, much less is available about how peace happens. Examples of local peacebuilding confirm that flames of hope flicker amid overwhelming public information about violence with its great facility for attracting attention. Commentators have a penchant for writing about atrocity and other accounts of inhumanity, and then focus on official peacemaking when its possibilities arise. Meanwhile public information providers seem to largely ignore other remarkable and often risky efforts for peace. Those made by local people.

Certainly violent conflicts and top-level peacemaking deserve attention as compellingly important, exciting, courageous, and therefore newsworthy. However the public should have access to additional information, stories of locally prominent peacebuilders whose actions make a proportionately significant contribution to peace. Lost in fogs of ferocious violence, they may seem small in comparison and hard to find since they often occur at the grass roots. Yet in spite of this difficulty far too few sources tell stories of the human capacity for constructive, humane interactions helping to create conditions for peace. Such information should become part of our general knowledge.

Why Study Community Dialogue?

Community Dialogue as a case study makes sense because of its enduring success over seventeen years and deserved reputation for quality facilitation in widely divergent settings. Established as an organization in October 1997,[1] demand has persisted for CD facilitation and its topically-focused pamphlets. Consequently a variety of foundations and public funders have continued to finance CD activities. Such sustainability provides evidence that the organization has effectively met real peacebuilding needs over time. It also means, according to those familiar with its work, that Community Dialogue has maintained its integrity in both motivation and practice. Using prominent CD characteristics as categories, the following commentary explains how the organization's vibrancy, established during its origins, remains ongoing as it energetically responds to requests for its skills and expertise.

  • As a grassroots community organization, Community Dialogue's origins reflected Northern Ireland’s fraught public environment.

In the mid to late 1990s Northern Ireland's people experienced a charged atmosphere expectant with the potential for peace talks and punctuated by off and on again ceasefires. The 1997-98 multi-party talks ensued producing the Belfast (Good Friday) Agreement. Community Dialogue originated during that dynamic decade evolving organically from the interactions of socially concerned people with a wide variety of backgrounds; educators, religious and paramilitary leaders, mediators, middle and working class, all community workers in one way or another, and reflecting the breadth of opinions in both of Northern Ireland's historic traditions.

They met as freely forming groups engaging in many vigorously animated and multi-sided conversations, discussions, debates, and of course, arguments. Participants in the groups thought it essential to engage in public discussions about the peace process because its results would have a profound effect on the lives of everyone. Those taking part in the group interactions understood that peace was too important to involve only the official negotiators.

Community Dialogue crystallized from several groups: “There are maybe a dozen or more different threads that you could trace back as the origin [of CD]. The roots of what we are arise from the apparent failure of the OPSAHL Commission 1992-93,[2] and the hunger of many community activists to review and revisit the process of including people in decisions about their future and finding a way to effectively do this.”[3] Among the group of 30+ founders of CD, including those who became its long-term facilitators and supporters, opinions differ as to which of its initiating strands to emphasize.

Many agree, however, on one main strand called Signs of the Times. Participants in this group trace its origins to Ireland during the late 1980s into the early 1990s when Jesuits held a series of dialogues, at least one lasting for three weeks at a retreat center. They discussed theological and current public issues and emphasized their interrelatedness. Naturally the violence in the North of Ireland raised relevant issues. One of the leaders had experienced a similar interactive process among Central American Jesuits in responding to thatregion's violence in the 1980s.

As one of the groups emerging from the Jesuit-led discussions, Signs of the Times included more lay people and had a committee that organized parallel gatherings in Northern Ireland and the Republic as well as combined North-South interactions. Its members decided on topics, recruited participants and provided facilitation. The fact that some sessions included gender issues illustrates the variety of forward-thinking topics. Signs of the Times members learned the value of dialogue during their intense interactions. It has the capacity to enable and deepen understanding of others' views as well as clarify one's own, and can do so in a way that creates healthy connections among participants.

In addition to Signs of the Times, the Peace and Dialogue group contributed to founding Community Dialogue. Set up by Noreen Christian in 1994, Peace and Dialogue began meeting after the ceasefires broke down. "The primary reason was to gather the energy of the community to prevent withdrawal, silence and apathy." Noreen Christian became a founding member as well as the first Chair of Community Dialogue.[4] A group called Democratic Dialogue provided a third source of members and motivating ideas for Community Dialogue. While both groups, Peace and Dialogue and Democratic Dialogue, formed as "people's initiatives" at about the same time, “Democratic Dialogue was more academic, statutory and business focused.”[5]

Any discussion of Community Dialogue's origins must make mention of Women Together. "Founded in the mayhem of 1970" the organization developed a wide range of activities. According to a member, by the 1990s "We brought together women from across the divides in Northern Ireland, from the South and eventually from the Church of Scotland Guild as well: women engaged with sharing, shifting and shaping a society free from violent conflict. . . . We always encouraged open and honest dialogue."[6] In the early post Agreement period, Women Together focused on a new initiative called People Moving On in order to engage in campaigning and lobbying for the Belfast agreement's full implementation. Also, a representative of Women Together participated "in the tentative early conversations about the need for continued dialogue amongst ordinary people. . . . Community Dialogue was born." In May 2001 Women Together closed their office transferring "material assets, energy and enthusiasm for reconciliation and change to this new organization."[7]

Community Dialogue's early membership overlapped among the groups already noted here, as well as some others. Those who created Community Dialogue had coalesced around the need for a dialogue group with distinct characteristics: grass roots people embedded in their local communities, from a wide variety of political and economic backgrounds, and sharing the aim of providing a voice for Northern Ireland's community and voluntary groups. After all, people throughout society had a high stake in both ending the violence and in the governing system that an agreement would initiate. Dialogues would contribute to a more comprehensive understanding by Northern Ireland's people of the political issues relevant to the multi-party talks. It also would assist grassroots learning in preparation for a potential election to approve a peace agreement. “As a society we are very reluctant to talk politics or religion. For example, the middle classes are ‘great friends’ with the ‘other’ side, but there is a veneer of politeness and there are taboo subjects that are skirted around. This is a clique and people are not challenged. People do not know the ‘other.’ . . . The referendum decision could not be a just judgement if people did not understand what was on offer.”[8]

In undertaking responsibility for enlivening and enlightening interactions at the local level, CD members knew how effective such engagement could be because of their own experience in various dialogue groups. They understood "dialogue" as profound interaction among people with substantially different and deeply-held perspectives. As dialogue participants themselves, CD's founders had learned the value of both cognitively and emotively learning about and respecting each other's differing views. They consciously applied active listening as well as other dialogue methods as they developed CD's facilitation practice. They understood that contentious interactions can be courteous and considerate, and that it could result in profound, intensely experienced learning.

Community Dialogue formally offered its first dialogue in 1998. Its original members had developed what became CD's process during earlier dialogues held by their separate organizations. They secured grant funding for 1999 dialogues from the Joseph Rowntree Charitable Trust and the Community Relations Council, with the Omagh District Council providing added financing. At the turn of the new century, CD’s budget had grown substantially financed by the Hewlett Foundation and Atlantic Philanthropies as well as a major increase from the Community Relations Council.[9] In addition to its Belfast office, CD opened another in Omagh.

  • CD has enabled dialogues of extensive scope and scale.

From its beginning Community Dialogue offered flexibility in focus and format, as illustrated by the ample number and variety of sponsors, topics, venues and session arrangements that included seminars, presentations, training sessions, residentials, and public discussions. CD facilitators organized public sessions around issue-relevant speakers, films, leaflets, art exhibitions and performances. Members also engaged in media interviews and commentary. Groups and organizations across Northern Ireland and cross-border requested facilitation. At first topics emphasized issues related to the Belfast Agreement, then its impeded implementation. Further into the new century CD sessions added identity issues, sectarianism, and dealing with the past while moving into ethnic diversity and gender issues as they surfaced in the public consciousness.

The following quote from the book Peace Comes Dropping Slow by Brian Lennon indicates CD's broad impact in its early years.

By 2004 Community Dialogue had run over 500 general events, including half-day and evening seminars, nearly 200 local groups meetings, over 50 one or two-night residentials, 19 youth events and almost 100 internal dialogues. In that period there were also over 30 newspaper articles, 24 publications and 24 radio programmes, some of a considerable length. All these were attempts to publicise the perceptions we were hearing and to encourage further dialogue around them.[10]

A booklet by David Holloway adds that by 2004 an estimated 6,750 people had participated in CD’s dialogues.[11] Clearly CD was responding to a large-scale and ongoing demand for its work.

The pace of CD activity has continued well into the new century’s second decade. To illustrate, in the year April 2014 to March 2015 CD reported delivery of 122 dialogues, instead of the planned 86. These included three residentials and thirty accredited training sessions. The dialogues were delivered to 1,077 participants, instead of the anticipated 908. In addition, CD staff wrote and disseminated twenty-four informational materials, ten more than the anticipated fourteen, with most offered on the CD website for downloading and photocopying.[12]

  • The need for dialogue continues in a society still deeply divided while experiencing increasing plurality.

Community Dialogue originated as an organization to offer ordinary people opportunities to engage in respectful learning about each other’s perspectives and, in the process, to refine and perhaps revise their own. Given its grassroots orientation, CD formulated its dialogues from important issues reflecting their time and place, and has continued to do so. Its work has provided a positive response to significant and emotionally laden divisive events in Northern Ireland.

At its launch, CD focused on the political cross currents churned up by the 1998 agreement and its need for electoral approval. Subsequent dialogues responded to the dashed hopes resulting from the agreement's stuttering and then stalled implementation, followed by years of political stalemate well into the new century. Broader social issues surfaced as well in CD facilitations with two figuring more prominently. First, many dialogues focused on legacies of the past's prolonged violence, such as trauma, victimhood, sectarianism, clashing identities and "the double minority problem." Second, CD's encouraging peaceful ways to deal with difference also applied to society's increasing pluralism defined as multi-cultural, multi-gender and multi-economic class. Relevant social tensions and even hate crimes began surfacing in the news. Although they had existed earlier, they were submerged by the dominant PUL-CNR divide. Community Dialogue's practitioners knew that to achieve a participatory society, local people needed to tackle both sectarianism and other forms of prejudice.

Subtle shifts in the wording of CD's mission statement reflected the broadening of its work. In 2002 the organization had asserted its mission as: “Community Dialogue exists to build trust and understanding in Northern Ireland through dialogue, research and analysis contributing to a peaceful, just and stable society.”[13] According to CD's 2005 Annual Report the Mission Statement had expanded: “Community Dialogue empowers people, both locally and internationally, through dialogue, research, analysis, and education & training to address issues of division and exclusion leading to the creation of a peaceful, just, and inclusive society.” This newer phrasing embodied three additions; education and training, an international dimension, and wording that connoted social marginalization.

While broadening its mandate to include disparaged groups considered different due to ethnicity, gender and income, Community Dialogue also maintained its focus on the legacies from thirty years of violence. For example, the persistence and in some cases even deepening perceptions of marginalization in the PUL community have caused CD to articulate this trend more prominently as its facilitators plan their future work. The flags issue in particular has highlighted the need for a focus on festering loyalist alienation. Community Dialogue has responded by consulting with local leaders in PUL communities to design a dialogue project flowing from a session on "Protestant Experience, Uncomfortable Truths." This recent seminar in Derry was organized by CD in cooperation with Derry-based organizations (North West Community Network, the Junction, and Towards Understanding and Healing). Much remains to be done in building inter-community bridges.

  • CD staff have demonstrated both creativity and a wide variety of relevant capabilities.

Community Dialogue has benefited from the contributions of many people who have served as its facilitators, commentators, planners, writers, and administrators. Its continued sustainability serves as a tribute to the ability of its contributors to cooperate in synthesizing their knowledge and abilities in a flexible socio-political environment. The organization's practitioners have kept up-to-date with information and analysis. Also they have maintained their extensive contacts with a wide variety of local groups in Northern Ireland as well as cross-border. Adaptable, CD has a reputation for fair and open facilitation that empowers participants whatever their background and issues. In addition, CD maintains a network of over 60 facilitators who have a wide range of skills and experiences. They are called upon to provide facilitation in various dialogues as needed depending on specific contexts and themes, art forms in particular – drama, music, photography, dance, painting/drawing.

Throughout its history, CD facilitators have demonstrated different interaction styles. Currently CD has three central staff, two with facilitator/project design/writer capabilities, and one administrator responsible for maintaining effective office procedures including vital budget monitoring. The facilitators have alternative styles. One possesses an appealingly outgoing, stir-things-up sort of personality, and the other presents a gentle, make-people-feel-comfortable approach. Both have for years created safe spaces that encourage people to have the confidence to speak freely about what matters most to them. When possible they often co-facilitate, overtly calling upon their differing yet complementary interpersonal styles to deliver effective dialogues.