Beyond Intractability: A Free Knowledge Base on More Constructive Approaches to Destructive Conflict
Introduction:
Mari Fitzduff, the former Executive Director of Irish conflict resolution organization INCORE, and now a professor and the Director of the MA Conflict and Coexistence Programme at Brandeis University, tells how one bad experience had a long-lasting effect.
This rough transcript provides a text alternative to audio. We apologize for occasional errors and unintelligible sections (which are marked with ???).
Complicating Efforts
Mari Fitzduff
Professor and Director of the MA Conflict and
Coexistence Programme at Brandeis University
We'd had a very bad experience in training in the early mid-70s in
Northern Ireland, where a couple of groups had come over from the United States, I'm afraid.
They are very intense, very difficult groups with a lot of the community folk in
Northern Ireland. They left without debriefing and left a lot of sorrow behind,
a lot of distrust about group techniques. It was basically using a tavis doc
technique, people couldn't really understand large group stuff, and that in a
way, put people off group work.
Wrongs are often forgiven, but contempt never is. Our pride remembers it forever. -- Lord Chesterfield
Other Resources from Beyond Intractability Peace-Building: A Field Guide The authors of this edited volume describe how fieldworkers 'fit' in the overall peacebuilding process and provide details of the most effective practices.
Nobel Peace Prize Winners
Lord John Boyd Orr of Brechin Former President of the National Peace Council and World Union of Peace Organizations, and 1949 Nobel Peace Laureate
The Beyond Intractability Knowledge Base Project Guy Burgess and Heidi Burgess, Co-Directors and Editors c/o Conflict Information Consortium(Formerly Conflict Research Consortium), University of Colorado Campus Box 580, Boulder, CO 80309 Phone: (303) 492-1635; Fax: (303) 492-2154; Contact