The Annual Grant Competition

2012 Annual Grant Competition
Award Recipients

Aaron Weah and Anupma Kulkarn, University of Liberia (Liberia), $128,893
A project to bolster future post-conflict reconciliation initiatives and research. The team will analyze conceptions of reconciliation in four West African states, and then based on the South Africa reconciliation barometer, create and evaluate a Liberia Reconciliation Barometer to assess the effects of truth and reconciliation and other conflict management programming.

Alexandra Scacco and Shana Warren, New York University, $117,158
A structured evaluation to assess the impact of an intergroup business and computer training program on the attitudes and behavior of Christian and Muslim men in the mixed cities of Kaduna and Jos, Nigeria.

Ann A. Laudati, Utah State University, $119,199
A two-year survey project to broaden understandings of resource or mineral-related violent conflicts in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). The team will analyze secondary economies in the North and South Kivu provinces of the DRC by conducting 300 interviews and 2,500 household surveys, holding capacity-building workshops, and producing manuscripts and policy documents relevant to similar conflict zones around the world.

Ayelet Harel, Mazen Faraj, Rakefet Enoch, and Osama Abu Eyash, The Parents Circle - Families Forum (Israel) $120,000
A dialogue education program based on a compelling USIP-funded documentary on the encounters of Palestinian and Israeli bereaved families, entitled "Two Sided Story." The initiative will include the training of facilitators and the development of a screening guide and related curricular materials for the film that will be used as an education tool in programs that will bring Israeli and Palestinian facilitators from among the bereaved families into classrooms and informal group settings in communities in Israel and the Palestinian Territories.

Chinara Jakypova, Institute for Public Policy (Kyrgyzstan), $120,000          
A training and workshop program to enhance skills of mediators, NGO leaders and community practitioners to promote nonviolent conflict resolution and people-to-people dialogue programs in Kyrgyzstan. The train-the-trainers program, which will ultimately reach 500 civil society and community leaders, will also include a series of roundtable policy discussions, 20 grassroots level dialogue programs and the documentation and dissemination of successful dialogue initiatives.

Cyanne Loyle, Helga Malmin Binningsbø, and Scott Gates, West Virginia University, $109,183      
A research project to examine the rationale for use and the impact of justice processes during armed conflicts, by conducting elite-level interviews and primary source data collection in Uganda, Sudan, and Nepal. The team will share lessons learned with policymakers and practitioners addressing ongoing conflicts such as those in Afghanistan, Syria or the Democratic Republic of Congo.

Cyrus Samii and Ruth Ditlmann, New York University, $119,942
A randomized field experiment to examine the impact of a sustained intervention that combines inter-ethnic contact, sport, and peace education over multiple years to promote peacebuilding between Israeli and Palestinian youth. Utilizing quantitative and qualitative methods, the research will assess the impact of the PeacePlayers International program on inter-group and intra-group perceptions and on political identify formation among youth in a society marked by deep divisions and a legacy of conflict.

Dana Burde and Elisabeth King, New York University, $114,906  
A cross-national, qualitative, case study research project to explore the potential role of education to contribute to peace in two countries—Kenya and Pakistan—that are experiencing youth bulges and violence for which youth is blamed, and where educational programs are attempting to address the issue.

Federico V. Magdalena, University of Hawaii, $118,510  
A project to develop and introduce a peace and conflict resolution education program to the highly diverse student body of Mindanao State University (MSU) through faculty training and the delivery of an enriched history curriculum to 12,600 undergraduate students.

Floride Ahitungiye, Search for Common Ground, $109,999           
A project to identify, engage, and train 36 Burundian youth leaders from across the political spectrum in leadership training, conflict transformation and communication in an effort to advance a peaceful electoral process for the 2015 elections. The initiative will also include a dozen Youth Inspired talks outlining the young leaders’ vision of peace to be broadcast on several radio stations around the country and presented at regional peace programs organized by youth.

Francis Rolt, Max Graef, Transnational Crisis Project (United Kingdom), $102,050  
A training and technical assistance project to enhance the capacity of Radio Capital in Damascus, Syria, focusing on program production, strategic communications,  conflict-transformation techniques, impact evaluation and sustainability.

Frank Elbers, Human Rights Education Associates (HREA), Inc., $39,368    
A project to develop and implement a self-paced e-learning course to enhance the capacity of media professionals (war reporters, bloggers, citizen-journalists, editors) around the world to report accurately and responsibly on conflict and post-conflict situations, particularly from the perspective of international humanitarian law. The four 3-to-6 hour e-courses will be developed in English, beta tested, revised, translated into Arabic, French and Spanish, and published on HREA's website in open access format.

Gonen Sagy, Friends of The Arava Institute, $92,435  
A project to train 450 Jewish and Arab students on intercultural understanding, environmental literacy, and cooperation engaging Israeli and Palestinian high school students in Jerusalem using shared environment issues as a common denominator.

Inga Schei, Hayya Bina (The Lebanese Association for an Inclusive Citizenship, Lebanon), $119,208
A research project to map and assess zones of conflict and emerging political and confessional actors. Findings will enhance the capacity of local grassroots leadership to address sectarian conflicts and inform the development of new mechanisms for the management and prevention of confessional/sectarian violence within the context of the country’s shifting political landscape.

J. Thiagarajah, Consortium of Humanitarian Agencies (Sri Lanka), $110,804            
A human security research project to compare the experiences of Tamil, Muslim, and Sinhalese women from the Northern Province in Sri Lanka, and improve the gender-responsiveness of programming by organizations facilitating the resettlement and long-term sustainability for women internally displaced persons (IDPs). Through workshops, policy reports, and scholarly papers, the project will inform resettlement work internationally.

Jhumka Gupta, Yale University, $117,396            
A project to assess the prevalence and consequences of gender based violence (GBV) among women in Abidjan, Cote d’Ivoire. The project team will look at the factors that increase vulnerability to GBV, as well as the efficacy of the International Rescue Committee’s socioeconomic empowerment programs for combating GBV, and disseminate this data to improve the capacity of other post-conflict and conflict-prevention GBV programming. 

Joyce Kaufman and Kristen Williams, Whittier College, $112,372
A comparative research project to provide practical guidance for policy and decision makers on the use of disarmament, demobilization, and reintegration (DDR) in post-conflict societies. A group of scholars will examine DDR, in particular women’s experiences, and compile an edited volume and policy primer.

Maria Rost Rublee and Avner Cohen, Australian National University, $118,884
A research and workshop program engaging a team of prominent nuclear policy specialists and practitioners to explore the motives behind nuclear decision-making processes and the impact that nuclear norms have on such decision-making. Published findings, including an edited volume, will address global nuclear governance issues, will be widely disseminated in the policymaking, academic and practitioner communities.

Mark Tessler and Amaney Jamal, Princeton University, $120,000
A survey and analysis project (The Arab Barometer) to assess public opinion in twelve key Arab countries, including new surveys in Libya, focusing on popular attitudes towards democracy; civic engagement and political participation; tolerance and respect of diversity; attitudes toward status of women and gender equality; and support for terrorism and radical ideologies

Pablo de Greiff, Roger Duthie, and Clara Ramírez Barat, International Center for Transitional Justice, $119,686           
A two year collaboration among experts who will examine the preconditions and consequences of transferring transitional justice tools to new contexts, structuring their papers around four thematic clusters: institutional formation, conflict, redress of new forms of criminality, and atypical institutional settings. The team will publish and disseminate a case-study guide for use by peacebuilders and organizations implementing related post-conflict interventions.

Peter Coleman and Stephen Gray, Columbia University, $129,844            
A project that combines applied research, training and advisory activities, working with the Myanmar-based International Peace Support Group and the Myanmar Peace Centre in Yangon. Activities will include a needs assessment of international and domestic peacebuilding capacity, peacebuilding training for local stakeholders, assessment of Myanmar's conflicts that will result in recommendations for effective peacebuilding interventions, and advisory work with international actors (development,
peacebuilding, government and business investors) to ensure conflict-sensitivity and the efficacy of peacebuilding interventions.

Susan Wolfinbarger, American Association for the Advancement of Science, $119,474
A study to examine six cross-border conflicts, identify elements of conflict that can be verified through remote sensing, and generate lessons for future use of satellite imagery as an analytic tool for early-warning and other conflict prevention efforts.

Youk Chhang and Sok-Kheang Ly, Documentation Center of Cambodia, $120,209
A project to implement a series of teacher training workshops on teaching the recently approved curriculum on the Cambodian genocide for some 1300 teachers in 13 provinces around the country.