Multiple expressions of peace for grassroots emancipation and empowerment: how local Cypriot grassroots peacebuilding organizations realize the impact of their peacebuilding strategies'
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Date
2022-03-30
Authors
Godoy Junior, Carlos
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Abstract
This qualitative study explores the experiences, understandings, and perspectives of Cyprus grassroots Non-Governmental Organizations' (NGOs) peacebuilding practitioners about the impact of their diverse peacebuilding strategies on local emancipation and empowerment, and to what extent these local practices make ordinary citizens self-aware of their role to break the ethnic divide and transform conflict. It is based on the data collected from semi-structured interviews with 10 peacebuilders working with Cypriot grassroots NGOs and explores how they make sense of their everyday lives within a divided Cyprus, examining their experiences and perceptions of strategies that affect a varied target audience comprised of members of vulnerable, minority, and marginalized groups of North and South Cyprus societies.
Informed by the emancipatory peace, the local turn, local ownership, and conflict transformation theories, the findings point out the relevance of bicommunal peacebuilding practices to progressively change intergroup attitudes and people’s mindsets, facilitating new relationships that can transform the Cyprus conflict. Those activities are carried out by grassroots peacebuilding organizations, which play a critical role in empowering people and creating channels to give a voice to Cypriot people, especially the unheard, invisible, and marginalized, and raising awareness about their rights. In addition, the study indicates that empathy, intelligible communication, and conveying of information make these organizations more approachable and attractive to local citizens. They maximize their influence on people paving the way for reconciliation between Greek Cypriots and Turkish Cypriots and their common wish for a united Cyprus.
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Cyprus, Bicommunal initiatives, Emancipation, Empowerment, Arts and peacebuilding, Grassroots peacebuilding organizations, Peacebuilding practices, Storytelling