Dear Kiradit,

This is by NO means an irrelevant question. Knowing who 'the culprit' is can be one of the most difficult stumbling blocks, because it is to some extent essential, and in many cases we cannot be sure. In fact, it is the uncertainty about who the culprit may be that perhaps adds to the security risk of the tactic.

Basically, though, accompaniment should involve an initial analysis which gives us sufficient confidence about the most probable source of threat, and enough confidence in our analysis of the interests and motivations of that source of threat to believe that they would be concerned about being observed or reported in their action. Whether this is a relatively anonymous abuser for whom notoriety would be something new, or an already heavily criticized violator who is sufferring some political setbacks from the embarrassment of being accused of such violations, and does not want to further add to the pressure.

If the source of threat (or their bosses) have no reason to be concerned about international observation, publicity, embarrassment or the moral pressure of a witness, it would be reasonable to doubt the protective impact of the tactic.

Fortunately, though, most of the research done to date suggests that perpetrators of politically-motivated human rights abuses usually have political interests and motivations that can be negatively affected by international pressure, even if these interests are not immediately obvious.

- Liam Mahony

I would also be interested in knowing about the many organizations doing accompaniment that are not on the international radar screen.

Regarding the use of accompaniment in Africa - I think it is worth considering also that indirect or un-deliberate forms of accompaniment are being carried out all the time by people and organizations who are not explicitly using this terminology, not based in organizations with a mission to protect or deal with human rights, or often doing accompaniment as a by-product of carrying out a different mission.

For instance, CPT, PBI and NP have all done different forms of "community accompaniment," where instead of accompanying individual threatened activists, they are accompanying an entire community that may be under duress by making their presence visible there. But this reality can extend to a great many other institutions: humanitarian and development organizations, for instance, often have an international component of their presence and visits to communities facing threats, and through this, although they do not claim to be offerring any protection, the implicit protective value of the presence may often have the same impact. Similarly, the presence of international missionaries, UN agencies, journalists, individual solidarity activists, etc. can all have this impact through presence. So if we tried to count up the numebr of organizations who are doing accompaniment unconsciously or non-publicly - in Africa and elsewhere - the number would be far greater than the the few organizations that consciously and rigorously use the tactic.

In some cases, I think the protective impact of this unconscious or non-public accompaniment may be much higher than the impact of the organizations we are featuring here, because some of these are much larger well-known organization with greater political clout, whom an offending government is actually more worried about offending.

However, a big difference is that these other organizations are only implementing a fraction of the power of the tactic. Groups that are consciously and strategically using accompaniment are able to take greater advantage of the potential, by thinking tactically about exactly where to use their presence, how to back that presence up with political communication or public reporting or external solidarity, and with a longer-term commitment to follow-up on the needs of the people we focus on supporting.

In the research I did for the book "Proactive Presence," I found that the political dynamics that logically justify accompaniment as an effective tool were as evident in the African countries I looked at as they were in Latin America or Asia, even though the international institutions offerring this tactic were less presence there.

Liam

Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT) has done three exploratory delegations to the Great Lakes Region in Africa (I believe they have visited Eastern Congo and Uganda). CPT’s website has a page outlining our work in the region, as well as report from the 2006 delegation to the Democratic Republic of the Congo. The most recent delegation just returned around the first of the year, and delegation members are meeting this week to review their findings and make a recommendation about possibilities for future accompaniment in the region. If you are working in the Great Lakes region of Africa, CPT may be able to benefit from your experience.

I haven’t worked directly with CPT’s Africa Great Lakes project, but my sense is that one of the challenges to starting an ongoing accompaniment project there is that many of the armed actors in the regions we’ve visited don’t appear to be very responsive to international pressure. The fear of outside scrutiny leading to international sanction is one of the things that makes unarmed accompaniment effective in the areas that it’s used. In a sense, this is another way that the world community’s neglect of African issues is playing itself out; given the context of neglect armed actors don’t believe the international community will pay attention to their abuses even with the presence of international accompaniers, so accompaniment as a tactic can’t be as effective.

Nils Dybvig - Christian Peacemaker Teams - Barrancabermeja, Colombia

Hello, Zsuzsa and Corina,

I am interested in hearing more about your "competency framework" and the ways in which you are using it to train peaceworkers.

My name is Sarah Henken and I currently serve (from the U.S.)  as coordinator of the Presbyterian Accompaniment Program in Colombia. I hope some of our accompaniers will get involved in this discussion, and we are interested in learning about what other groups are doing. Thanks!

-Sarah 

Helo Zsuzsa and Corina,

I'm a nonviolence trainer from Australia and have been part of the development of a competency based training and assessment framework for PBI's Indonesia Project - which incorporates many protective accompaniement related 'compentencies'.  In fact what i've found is that every single aspect of the training for field volunteers/workers - from personal and group skills to security technigues, needs to centre around concepts of protection.  - I'd be certainly be interested in you work and discussing more.

Its exciting the amount of work going into improving the quality and extent of peaceworker training around the world at present.The 'Preparing Adults for Peacework and Nonviolent Intervention in Conflicts Guide' is certainly great work and may be what you have been involved with within Partir?

www.peacetraining.org/files/materials/PeaceTraining_guide.pdf

Anthony

Dear Nancy, 

 In August 200, Nonviolent Peaceforce in cooperation with PATRIR in the context of the ARCA project organized a Core Training for Civilian Peace Teams in Sovata, Romania. After a full month when the participants were first assessed and then started on the training, they had the possibility of doing a joint simulation with the Romanian Army. I was involved in this simulation as one of the volunteers. 

 At the debrief at the end, both parties found it very helpful this collaboration in joint training. In the simulation were involved many recently joined soldier as well as people who had been in international missions in Irak and Afghanistan. Their attitudes to the training were diverse: some considered it a duty, some saw it as a break from their normal routine, some were actively engaged in it, some not so much. The Nonviolent Peaceforce trainees seemed to be engaged in the training, this was on the basis of much tiredness after the full month of intensive training.

This type of collaboration appeared to me beneficial as it prepares the army to interact with other types of actors that might appear in a specific conflict area and to the NP trainees it gave them a direct interaction with an armed force and the type of organization and training that the armed forces have. 

 Another important thing is that unarmed accompaniment is likely to develop credibility with armed forces personnel and a greater understanding from them in such a way that they can both prepare in the eventuality of an encounter in an area and possibly even act as partners.

You can read the account of Phil Esmond, NP Capacity Building Director by clicking here...

Best wishes,

Corina Simon 

Peace Action, Training and Research Institute of Romania (PATRIR), Cluj-Napoca

One thing Nonviolent Peaceforce makes a point of is saying that we are not there to 'bring peace', but rather to support and encourage local people who want to fight for their rights, as they see those rights, but without killing each other. We began -- with some of the founders of Peace Brigades being also some of the founders of NP -- primarily thinking about the power of 'the stick' ... of being 'the eyes of the world' ... and thus pushing the perpetrators of human rights violations back into their shadowy lairs.

But as it has turned out -- without doing much of the one-on-one accompaniment that PBI has specialized in -- that the overall encouragement and support ... more generally to the communities at larger ... simply by being in dangerous areas where other international NGOS are not willing, for instance, to overnight ... by that indication of standing-with, a positive and more subtle power than 'standing-against' ... we've managed to help some local peacemakers expand their work. 

    At times this approach is frustrating for our team members since they are enjoined to *not* raise their voices. Sometimes it is better to keep a low profile, despite observation of abuse.

    There are also the extremely complicated constraints of maintaining political legitimacy with those who issue visas and work permits.

    One of the most vexing problems, somewhat related, is the fact that, by and large, our activities have only a local effect. Sometimes we are asked "Well, why haven't you stopped the war in Sri Lanka?" Since the Ceasefire Agreement was just officially ended by the government, this isn't a surprising question. But, again, it is not we who ever made any claim in that regard. It is only the people engaged in the conflict who can end it. And yet ...

    And yet Nonviolent Peaceforce was created with large-scale deployments in mind. For the sake of making national impact. We have not gotten there yet.

David Grant, Strategic Relations Director

Nonviolent Peaceforce - Washington DC office 

Kiradit,

I am glad you a part of this discussion. I also want to highlight some of the extensive resources available to increase our learning and sharing... I'll list just a few here:

http://www.hdcentre.org/Civilian+protection+publications This site has Liam's latest work and other work as well...

http://trainingforchange.org/content/view/111/33/ will bring you to a manual on THIRD-PARTY NONVIOLENT INTERVENTION by George Lakey and Daniel Hunter.

Liam also co-wrote a book "Unarmed Bodyguards" which is very useful: Mahony, L. and Eguren, E. Unarmed Bodyguards, International Accompaniment for the Protection of Human Rights, West Hartford, Kumarian Press, 1997.

And just a few others:

Moser-Puangsuwan, Y and Weber, T, editors. Nonviolent Intervention Across Borders: A Recurrent Vision, University of Hawaii Press, 2000.

Sharp, G. The Politics of Nonviolent Action, Boston: Porter Sargent, 1973.

Weber, T. Gandhi’s Peace Army, The Shanti Sena and Unarmed Peacekeeping, Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 1996.

Griffin-Nolan, E. Witness for Peace: A story of Resistance, Louisville, John Knox Press, 1991.

http://www.nonviolentpeaceforce.org/en/feasibilitystudy Brings you to:

Feasibility Study

The Nonviolent Peaceforce Feasibility Study was undertaken by an international team of researchers whose efforts were coordinated by Christine Schweitzer, currently Programme Director for NP. Each chapter is a large file and the entire document is well over 300 pages.

Happy reading!

Peace,

Jan

Jan Passion -- Programme Officer, Nonviolent Peaceforce

Betsy Crites' comments from Guatemala adds important nuances to my earlier points on how important it is to know the source of threat. There are many other settings like Guatemala today where this is ever-harder to pinpoint. Does accompaniment "not work" in these settings? Well, I would not go that far.

I do think it is more uncertain, and perhaps alot more risky. When I worked in Guatemala in the mid 1980s, I knew we were facing a horrific genocidal machine of control-freak military design, in which death squads responded to military imperatives most of the time. Horrible, but nonetheless predictable.

When we don't know who it is, or we know the violence is coming from economic or illegal forces who are difficult to reach with international pressure - the uncertainty level is huge.

But there are still a few positive points to consider. For instance, Betsy points out the huge level of impunity in Guatemala, where 2% of assassinations are prosecuted. We should consider that the justice system in Guatemala is likely to be under considerably greater international pressure to respond and prosecute a case in which there was international observation and attention. The cases "we are watching" may have a better chance of being part of that 2%. If this understanding of the potential pressure for state reaction is also understood by perpetrators, than arguably that reflects some deterrent value, because they would have less interest in attacking in a situation where their impunity would be less assured.

More generally, in a place like Guatemala, with its long history of accompaniment by so many organizations over time, there is a possibility of a stronger official perception that the whole country is being accompanied and watched - even on a policy level, where they know that levels of impunity, failure of fulfillment of peace accords, or other official actions are not going to go unnoticed, especially when they related to specific organizations being accompanied. One can hope, at least, as it would be impossible to empirically verify. 

The unsettling risk, though, is that we need to be careful that the solidarity of our presence is not projecting a sense of safety to people that exceeds its actual deterrent value.  This is nearly impossible to ensure, since local people will draw their own conclusions about what difference our presence makes. But at least the conscious accompaniment organizations understand the vital importance of a humble dialogue process with those we accompany, in which we can do our best to keep protective expectations a reasonably low level.

- Liam

I remember being asked once if unarmed accompaniment was meant to address 'root causes'. I replied essentially not. The questioners, Muslim students in the Philippines, were disappointed because 'root causes' was their concern.

The point has been made that unarmed accompaniment is not intended to stop a conflict. To do that would simply lock in the status quo, no matter how unjust that might status quo be. Rather the point of 'nonviolent non-partisan civilian peacekeeping' is to allow -- one might even say 'encourage' -- the conflict to continue, but by nonviolent means.

When it comes to criminal violence, however, that goal becomes moot. The 'force' against criminal violence, without firearms, that I immediately think of are the British 'bobbies' who patrolled locally with nothing more lethal than sticks. Same, I suppose, of many police I have seen around the world who have only lathis. Not that those billy clubs, lathis and sticks can not be lethal. But in all cases these police without firearms do 'carry' with them, to more or less extent -- depending upon the fairness of their actions -- a level of moral authority. After the Partition of India from Pakistan in the late 1940's, Gandhi and his followers used their much greater 'moral authority' to walk between rioting mobs of Hindus and Muslims.

   But, again, regarding criminal violence, it seems possibly more effective for local people to become directly involved. Community policing contains aspects of this. As does the original "Shanti Sena" ('peace force', Hindi) in India. They were village development workers, very local, dependent upon local financial support (living very simply) ... and trained and available to go to areas of violence, on call, only in times of crisis. But, again, that was political violence, not criminal.

David Grant, Strategic Relations Director

Nonviolent Peaceforce - Washington DC office 

“Community accompaniment” is an important tactic for Christian Peacemaker Teams (CPT). The Colombia team has always focused its accompaniment work on communities rather than individuals. We let the communities determine what they need; sometimes it is a general physical presence throughout a community or a specific physical presence at a meeting where there is a risk of violence or intimidation. At other times the community may request protective accompaniment of a few threatened leaders as they travel through a conflict area or after they have received threats.

Usually, our accompaniment has a political component as well. Our political accompaniment of a community might include visibilizing their goals and the threats against them to an international audience, advocating for foreign policy changes in the U.S. or Canada, or mobilizing supporters in responding to action alerts. We always involve the community in the process to define the accompaniment we will provide.

There are challenges involved in accompanying communities: defining who is the community and who speaks for the community, deciding when you've received sufficient community input, managing relationships with multiple community members rather than a small group of leaders, but community accompaniment is at the core of CPT's work.

Nils Dybvig - Christian Peacemaker Teams - Barrancabermeja, Colombia

Thanks John,

 Just to build on what you were saying - (I'm also a big one for clarity of definitions and language) - one way Gultung defines 'peacekeeping' that i've found useful is that it is 'dissassociative' as in it aims to keep conflicting parties apart.  In situations where it is highly unlikely that the more dialogue-based approaches of peacemaking or peacebuilding would be appropriate or possible due to the level of violence.  Peacekeeping methods also include living walls - community truces  any method aimed at getting in between opposing sides.   As a peacekeeping method accompaniment has the effect (or tactical aim) of keeping parties apart - such as keeping the human rights abuser apart from the threatened activist.   

I like to think, as part of the triad of peace approaches, that nonviolent accompaniment, if carried out efectively and for long enough, eventually allows enough safety and political space for the actors in a conflict to develop peacemaking and peacebuilding type initiatives.  

- anthony

John Wilmerding urges us to categorize accompaniment not as nonviolent action butstrictly as "peacekeeping". I usually steer clear of difinitional discussion, but I'll risk a few comments on this one, because I don't find this distinction accurate or helpful.

When we use terms, we need to consider not only the clarity that someone may have once had when they outlined them, but the fact that many of these terms have absorbed multiple definitions and perceptions over time. Peacekeeping is just such a term. The UN doesn't own the word, but neither does Johan Galtung - and when we use this or other words to describe our actions we are sending very different messages to different audiences.

One assumption behind the term "peacekeeping" is that we are dealing with a situation of armed conflict. Most of the world, hearing this term, will presume this constraint of scope. But accompaniment as a tactic is used widely in non-armed-conflict settings, protecting vulnerable groups from a wide range of types of repression, discrimination, and marginalization.

This is why the broader term of "human rights protection" is preferred by many - because it refers to both conflict and non-conflict settings, and refers to potential protection from a wide range of types of abuses, not just direct violence. 

PBI was founded as an organization trying to promote and sustain non-violent action in places where nonviolent activists were under duress. Over its long history of development of this particular tool of accompaniment which has been such a useful one in the field of human rights protection, it is now seen by many, inside and out, to be a "human rights organization."

I would personally continue to make a strong case for seeing the link between accompaniment and nonviolence and nonviolent action. I see accompaniment as a tool that nonviolent activists who face threats use to protect themselves and thus enable better nonviolent action.

Who are the protagonists of this tool? Accompaniment is a tool that is used by nonviolent activists to strengthen their nonviolent resistance capacity. It is not we who are "doing accompaniment." It is those activists on the ground who are "using accompaniment".  We are there only to help their nonviolent struggles, which, to my mind, places accompaniment firmly in the realm of active nonviolence, albeit in a somewhat subservient and humble role in the process.

One of the positive strengths of this tool is that it has been able to be used so effectively despite a wide range of perceptions about all these concepts, words, and definitions. Within PBI itself, and other organizations doing this work, there is a diverse range of uses of terminology like "human rights" or "nonviolence" (although seldom if ever does one hear PBI call itself 'peacekeepers)- so don't look at my comments here as anything but my own personal approach.

Liam