As a national, nonpartisan, independent Institute, the U.S. Institute of Peace draws on our exceptional convening power to create opportunities for diverse audiences to exchange knowledge, experiences, and ideas necessary for creative solutions to difficult challenges. We serve as an important, neutral platform for bringing together government and nongovernment, diplomacy, security, and development actors, and participants across political views. The Institute’s events help shape public policy and priorities to advance peaceful solutions to conflict and strengthen international security.
On October 6, USIP released a Special Report on women’s roles in non-violent struggles. With the National Democratic Institute for International Affairs (NDI) and the non-profit organization Just Vision, USIP gathered path-breaking activists, scholars and filmmakers to examine how women’s participation—and the success of non-violent campaigns—can be strengthened.
A staggering 230 million children live in lands that have become battlefields, and extremist groups exploit their traumas to recruit youth to violence. Yet from these same embattled lands, young leaders emerge, working to heal divisions in their communities and build peace. They often face large social or political forces of violent conflict, and even threats of suppression or violence by combatants. As they do, how can others help them sustain the personal resilience on which their work depends? On May 4, USIP hosted a global discussion online.
While Colombia’s government and the guerrilla group known as the FARC work on the final details of a comprehensive peace deal, one part of the proposed accord is already in effect: the commitment by both sides to recover and return the remains of tens of thousands of “disappeared” people—those presumed to have been secretly killed in the conflict. USIP and the Latin America Working Group Education Fund held an event on April 22 for an early assessment of how implementation of the agreements on disappearances is proceeding.
Women have played groundbreaking roles in Colombia’s peace process between the government and the country’s largest rebel group, the FARC. With a peace agreement in sight and on the occasion of International Women’s Day, the U.S. Institute of Peace held an event on March 8 that briefed on the status of women in peace processes, with a focus on the Colombia case. The discussion was co-sponsored by USIP’s Colombia Peace Forum and the Conflict Prevention and Resolution Forum.
Since the Arab revolutions of 2011, unarmed resistance has become a major force in global politics, from Tunis to Tahrir Square and on to Ferguson, Missouri. Nonviolent movements have historically outperformed their violent counterparts, but they don’t always succeed. On February 25 the U.S. Institute of Peace hosted a panel of experts in this field of study and an Emmy-award winning news producer examine the challenges of building and sustaining nonviolent movements, and discuss lessons for scholars, activists, policymakers and practitioners.
On February 3, President Santos discussed Colombia's progress in security and governance over the last 15 years. He also reviewed the state of the negotiations with the FARC, the prospects for a country at peace, and the challenges that lie ahead.
Through international education, students become more effective communicators, more engaged citizens, and learn to think critically about the relationships between local and global issues. These skills are all vital to building peace in a world full of conflict.
On November 4, the U.S. Institute of Peace, the Alliance for Peacebuilding and the United Nations Association of the National Capital Area hosted Ambassador Jan Eliasson, Deputy Secretary-General of the United Nations, for a discussion on how to turn commitments of peace into action in today’s global development assistance systems.
On the United Nations-declared International Day of Peace, September 21, USIP highlighted an essential process for any country to heal from a violent conflict: reconciliation. USIP convened this reconciliation discussion as part of a daylong celebration of the international day of peace. If you took some action for peace, share it with us at #PeaceDayChallenge. Read the event coverage, Reconciliation as the Road to Durable Peace.
Just because a movement of civic resistance establishes itself as nonviolent doesn’t mean it won’t experience violence in the course of the confrontation, however long the campaign might last. On Thursday, August 20, 2015, USIP's Global Campus hosted a Twitter Forum with activists and scholars to discuss nonviolent movements.