An evening of conversation to create communities across conflict

Last week’s evening event at Norrsken House saw the end of a fantastic first week of this year’s GATHER Fellowship, and the start of the Fellowship that will help our 16 Fellows develop their social initiatives for conflict transformation.

It was an evening amongst supporters, peace-builders, Ambassadors, professionals, students and friends, all sharing a passion for social innovation and peace. SE Forum hosted the evening with our partner Seeds of Peace and our Interim Executive Director, Thomas Kanestad, welcomed the guests. He was followed by SE Forum Programme Director Fiona Hazell and Seeds of Peace’s GATHER Programme Director Jonah Fisher, presenting the GATHER Fellowship and its mission of transforming conflict.

Seeds of Peace’s Alumni Engagement Manager, Ashraf Ghandour, moderated the evening’s panel discussions that included all 16 Fellows, sharing their experience and expertise on topics such a dialogue, education, art, and entrepreneurship in a context of conflict.

Inspiring words on conflict transformation

We heard from Scott who will be travelling across the US to meet with people and organisations working to build bridges between people of different views. And we heard from Marwa who is working in Tunisia using dialogue as a tool to support marginalised women, and Tugba who’s created a board game for children and young people to engage with social and gender equality issues.

All 16 Fellows reflected on the importance of letting people express their voices. The importance of getting to know people who are of different opinions to you. And the importance of respecting other people’s culture and background, and to listen to what others have to say.

We were impressed with all of their thoughts and ideas to inspire conversations and empower the marginalised and we can’t wait to follow them over the year as they work to build on their initiatives and ventures to create bigger impact.

Photo credit: Stina Svanberg