The aim of the Creating Safer Space Café is to enable people in different parts of the world to exchange knowledge and to help build a community of Unarmed Civilian Protection (UCP) researchers and practitioners.
This month, Dr Kara Blackmore (LSE), PI on the Network+ Project ‘Strategies for Safety and Solidarity: Understanding Protection through Creativity in South Sudan and Colombia’ shared her insights into designing and preparing visual policy briefs, as well as using arts-based methods to map UCP practices.
In February, the team of researchers working on the project: ‘Exploring unarmed civilian self-protection in Cameroon’s Anglophone conflict’ undertook successful data collection in Cameroon. They used Arts-based methods entailed drawing workshops, poetry workshops and storytelling workshops with local civilians affected by the conflict. Based on a prior mapping exercise, residents from conflict ‘hot spots’ were identified and transported to safe locations where the workshops were undertaken.
Although some participants were a little anxious at first about their abilities to draw or compose poems, we found that everyone relaxed into the task and produced very good accounts of their experiences by means of drawings or poems. Some participants stated afterwards that it had been beneficial to express traumatic experiences through drawing or writing poems. One-to-one interviews were also undertaken with selected community organisers, including leaders of women’s and youth groups, and NGO workers. Such fieldwork in the midst of armed conflict can be complicated, and unexpected challenges can arise, as they experienced.
As they began their fieldwork, scores of boys and young men from one small town in the Southwest region were arbitrarily rounded up and detained by the Cameroonian military, and were unjustifiably accused of being separatist supporters. This was the same small town from which many workshop participants had been invited.
This abuse of power by the military, terrible in itself, also disrupted the researchers’ plans as local people were clearly preoccupied in seeking the release of their young men. On the morning of the planned workshops, the mothers of the captured boys and young men led a women’s peace march to demand the release of their sons and family members. This involved several hundred women walking 17 km from their town to the prison where the young men were being held.
The women marched holding peace plants as a symbol of their non-violence. The outcome was really gratifying – the women’s interactions with the authorities were largely successful, and the release of most of the detained boys and young men was secured. This was, perhaps, an example of unarmed civilian protection in itself. The workshops also went ahead thanks to the amazing efforts of the Cameroonian team members who organised alternative workshop participants at short notice. The researchers’ also had the added bonus that two of the women on the peace march made a detour to attend the workshop and provided everyone with a first-hand account of their experiences.
Cynthia Ngugi
Cynthia is a seasoned program coordinator with a very strong analytical and accounting background. Specializing in education management, she’s amassed over 7 years of experience in program coordination. She’s passionate about translating programs visions and objectives into reality through personalized attention and improving efficiencies and effectiveness by innovating new ways of achieving tasks.
As data analyst enthusiast, she has used her background in economics, accounting and newly acquired skills in Python, R statistics and power BI to evaluate databases, identify trends and solve key challenging areas in the graduates’ life and this led to a 30% increase in the graduation numbers from Backlog students. Automation of the generation and classification of the university graduation list which has reduced the time spent from months to 5 min.
Currently she works as Exams Associate at the Strathmore University Business School. Academic Qualifications Bachelor of Arts in Economics, Certified Data Analyst (ILAB), Certified Public Accountant of Kenya (CPA(k)).
Beginning of fieldwork in Cali, Colombia
Between November and December 2022, Luisa María Colonia Zúñiga, Gustavo Suárez Ríos and Italia Agüado Urmendiz conducted field research in the Llano Verde neighbourhood, located in the east of the Colombian city of Cali.
Through focus-groups and semi-structured interviews, the researchers collected information related to perceived threats faced by women. They obtained testimonies from women victims of the armed conflict in Colombia, with the aim of turning their memories of conflict into instruments of building peace and protection. This protection comes in the form of resistance practices against police intimidation and the multiple forms of violence that the women face on a daily basis.
During this fieldwork, the team also interviewed attorneys who have collaborated with the community in developing community advocacy tools.
The researchers are currently analysing the material collected during the field visits and in the archives of the organization Masterpeace Cali, and combining the results with documentary matrix prepared in January 2023 where they collected important information related to their research. This research and analysis has since been published in the media and reports of civil society organizations.
Among the interesting insights they have identified so far is the central use of community cohesion as a mechanism for peaceful civilian self-protection of populations relocated to urban areas due to cultural diversity and the high rate of unmet basic needs. Memories of violence are a shared experience that enables peaceful group action.
Inicio del trabajo de campo en Cali, Colombia.
Durante los meses de noviembre y diciembre de 2022, Luisa María Colonia Zúñiga, Gustavo Suárez Ríos e Italia Agüado Urmendiz llevaron a cabo la investigación de campo en el barrio Llano Verde ubicado al oriente de la ciudad de Cali.
El grupo de investigadores recolectó información relevante relacionada con las amenazas que se perciben en el entorno de las mujeres que participan de la investigación, a través del ejercicio de grupos focales y entrevistas semi direccionadas. Asimismo, obtuvieron testimonios de mujeres víctimas del conflicto armado en Colombia donde se evidencia el uso de las memorias por parte de ellas para resignificar el pasado en las acciones pacíficas de protección que llevan a cabo en el presente a modo de resistencia frente a políticas de miedo y la exacerbación de múltiples violencias que se han convertido en cotidianas.
Adicionalmente, durante el trabajo de campo también entrevistamos a abogados que han colaborado con la comunidad en el desarrollo de herramientas de abogacía comunitaria.
En este momento, estamos comprometidos en el análisis del material recolectado en las visitas de campo y en los archivos de la organización Masterpeace Cali. Asimismo, estamos analizando la matriz documental elaborada en el mes de enero de 2023 donde recabamos información fundamental relacionada con la temática de la investigación, que ha sido publicada en medios de comunicación e informes de organizaciones de la sociedad civil.
Entre las perspectivas interesantes que hemos identificado hasta el momento, se tiene que se presentan limitaciones en la cohesión comunitaria como mecanismo para la autoprotección civil pacífica de poblaciones reubicadas en zonas urbanas debido a la diversidad cultural y a la alta tasa de necesidades básicas insatisfechas. Sin embargo, las memorias de las violencias son un punto de encuentro que posibilita la acción grupal pacífica.
