Iraq

Iraq Programs: Training and Educating Leaders for a Democratic Iraq

Civil Society and Leadership Development Grants

Through selected grants to NGOs and civil society organizations, USIP seeks to promote understanding and the practice of democracy in Iraq at the community, national, and regional levels. USIP also looks to facilitate research, training, and educational projects in such areas as conflict management, coalition building, and negotiation throughout Iraq. Through education and training grants, funds will also be targeted to enhance the ability of Iraqi women to participate in public debate and policymaking in Iraq.

A Look at Selected Grant Projects Supported by USIP:

Youth Leadership Development – A project to support the establishment of a student debating society and newsletter in Iraq to promote a culture of tolerance and respect for citizens’ rights among Iraqi youth.

Leadership Training for Iraqi Women – A project to convene a five-day workshop in Lebanon on the role of Iraqi women in political life and conflict resolution. The project will combine training in political participation with a comprehensive program on peacebuilding and conflict resolution as part of a broader strategy to: (1) promote Iraqi women's rights and participation in peace, conflict resolution, and reconstruction processes; (2) enhance the knowledge of key Iraqi female civil society leaders about women's rights and the status of women; (3) raise awareness about the role that Iraqi women can play in peace and reconstruction processes; and (4) build the capacity of interim governing bodies to include women.

Iraq Foundation – A professional development project in Baghdad to promote women's participation in public life in Iraq. The initiative, which will be implemented entirely by the foundation's Baghdad office, will result in a series of fifty meetings for Iraqi women activists to develop a nationwide women's advocacy network. It will also produce a collection of handbooks focusing on: (1) the role of women's NGOs in promoting women's rights; (2) women's constitutional rights and international charters and practice; (3) women's legal rights under existing law; and (4) the woman as a leader. The handbooks will be distributed to meeting participants and disseminated to others for use in their own organizations.

Dohuk University – An education project to strengthen conflict management and educational skills in the former Kurdish region of Iraq through short courses for undergraduate students at Salaheddin, Suleymaniyyah, and Dohuk Universities. The project builds upon earlier work undertaken by the Academic Consortium for Cooperation and Conflict Resolution (ACCCR), including workshops leading to the development of curricular materials on Iraq-specific approaches to teaching conflict management. These short courses, each ten-hours long, will examine theoretical and practical elements of conflict management from different disciplinary perspectives.

Partners For Democratic Change – A professional Training program to strengthen conflict management skills of twenty-five civil society representatives from the northern, central, and southern regions of Iraq. The program will consist of two training workshops in Dokan Lake, Suleymaniyyah (located in northern Iraq) on "Inclusive Community Change and Mobilization" for civil society leaders. Through the program, each participant will develop and implement community action projects for tangible impact in their communities. A subsequent lessons learned meeting will enable training workshop participants to learn from each other's experiences, identify best practices, refine future Training programs, and publicize the results of their applied work.

Rutgers University – A research project that will produce a monograph in Arabic and English to examine key institutional components of the process of creating a postauthoritarian society in Iraq—namely, the reconstitution of its higher education system. The study will focus on the role of education—a central component of the Baathist regime's efforts to remove from the historical record all political and cultural events that were perceived as contrary to its ideology—in the transition from the Baath regime to a new system of government, and how Iraq can utilize the educational system to promote the building of civil society and counter the legacy of repressive dictatorship. Research and interviews will be conducted in North America, Europe, Jordan, and with faculty at four universities in Iraq.

Sabre Foundation, Inc. – An education project to enhance the library collections in the areas of constitutional design, ethnic conflict, and transitional justice of some twenty Iraqi universities. In consultation with Iraqi colleagues, this initiative is just one component of a collaborative, multinational effort to develop core library collections in Iraqi universities and to ensure access to the information resources that will support revitalized university curricula and new modes of learning throughout Iraq.

Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars– A project to support a three-day workshop involving approximately seventeen women leaders from Iraq. The purpose of the workshop is to enhance their leadership and planning skills in an effort to advance women's participation in Iraq's reconstruction process. This project is part of a larger program involving two days of meetings at the World Bank, where participants will focus on capacity building; three days at the Woodrow Wilson Center, where they will focus on reconstruction issues; and two days at the American Bar Association, where the focus will be on legal issues and problems of implementation.

• Learn more about USIP's Grant program.

National Security Officials Training

In March 2004, USIP's Professional Training program launched a special Training program designed for senior national security officials responsible for providing professional continuity in the ministries of the new Iraqi government. Consisting of a series of workshops, USIP, in partnership with National Defense University's Near East-South Asia Center for Strategic Studies (NESA), convened the first two workshops of the series in Washington in mid-late March. Participants in the workshops included officials from the Ministry of Defense and the uniformed military.

Each USIP training workshop followed two weeks of training at NESA and employed a series of interactive exercises designed to:

• refine participants' skills in conflict analysis and resolution,
• master negotiation styles and techniques, and to
• understand the roles third parties can play in mediating disagreements.

The participants also engaged in vigorous consideration and discussion of how different cultures interact with one another and of the situation in Iraq and how to build a better future there.

Building upon the experience from the first workshop, Iraqis in the second group also participated in the Strategic Economic Needs and Security Exercise (SENSE)—a computer-based simulation that focused participants on coordinated decision making in a postconflict environment.

In late May, USIP conducted a stand-alone program for officials from three Iraqi ministries (Foreign Affairs, Defense, and Justice) that included the SENSE simulation and meetings with government officials and others in Washington. In June USIP conducted another program in partnership with NESA. Participants in USIP portion of the June training were drawn from a range of Iraqi ministries: Defense (including uniformed military), Justice, and Planning.

A fifth USIP training workshop conducted in mid-September 2004 included participants from the Ministries of Foreign Affairs, Finance, Interior, Justice, and Planning. As in previous programs, the Iraqi officials had extensive meetings in Washington. They formed working groups which undertook the most systematic analysis yet of Iraq's core national interests, and then identified specific goals to advance those interests, and detailed work plans to achieve those goals. They participated in an upgraded version of SENSE, which had been modified (based on input from earlier Iraq workshops) to include new elements such as inflation risks and a significant oil sector, with pipelines vulnerable to terrorist attacks.

To date USIP has trained 173 Iraqi officials—including thirty-four women—who will form what former Secretary of State Colin Powell called the "human infrastructure" of Iraq's democratic government when he hosted the May participants on a visit to the State Department. Iraqi participants in the programs conducted to date have expressed great appreciation for USIP's work. The overall coordinator for this training effort was Program Officer Mike Lekson, with Program Director George Ward and former Program Officer Ray Caldwell, who provided substantial elements of the training, and part-time program officer Allison Frendak overseeing the SENSE simulations.

• Learn more about the work of USIP's Professional Training program.