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Public Event - February 19, 2007

The kick-off event for the workshop was a full-day public event organized by the Liberia National Law Enforcement Association (LINLEA), CVT-Liberia and the National Coalition of Civil Society Organizations in Liberia (NCCSOL). Participants in the public day event included over 155 representatives of Liberian civil society organizations. The focus of this day was to highlight local and national government support for human rights advocacy efforts in Liberia; provide an introduction to the New Tactics project tools; highlight current tactics being implemented in Liberia; discuss potential tactics; and invite the participants to join in follow-up activities or meetings led by the NCCSOL and other organizations.

The participants were organized into small discussion groups of 10 to 12 people where they had an opportunity to share their views on the key issues facing Liberia and discuss tactics currently being used to address those issues. Each group shared their three top issues and chose one tactic which they felt was addressing one of these issues with some measure of success.

List of participants in Public Day Presentation

TOP ISSUES OF CONCERN (Public Day participants highlighted these key areas and current tactics being used to address them)

The public day event generated a list of over thirty concern areas. Small groups then selected their top concern to discuss the kinds of tactics currently being used to address that concern. It provided an opportunity for those attending to identity areas that have achieved some success while helping to raise awareness of potential ideas and collaborations for future action.

Four-day Hands-on Intensive Training - February 20 - 23, 2007

During the next four days, the workshop gave a small group of 30 selected participants an opportunity to work intensively in small groups to create customized "tactical portfolios." New Tactics employs a package of training tools including "tactical mapping," the Training for Change "spectrum of allies," and electronic tools available on the New Tactics website. The process and the documentation tools allowed participants to analyze their strategic situation, identify allies, collaborate on complex campaigns, and plan future actions, in part by adapting promising approaches used elsewhere in similar strategic situations.

Participants also increased their capacity to use website tools and resources, and learned additional skills. These skills will help them to be more effective in posting their own experiences with the use of tactics and sharing ideas with others on the New Tactics website.

Participants

The thirty participants were selected through the following three processes:

• An application for participation was distributed to members of Liberian civil society groups through LINLEA which was a partner host organization for the workshop and a founding member of NACCSOL. Over 81 member organizations belong to NACCSOL. In addition, funders and other partners in the country made the application available through their networks.
• CVT offered the opportunity to participate to its pool of sixty-five psychosocial counselors in community mental health projects in Liberia and Sierra Leone.
• The New Tactics project selected tactical trainers from African torture treatment centers in Ethiopia, Kenya, Namibia, Rwanda, South Africa and Uganda.

List of Participants and Staff in Training Workshop