Posts Tagged: peacebuilding

CFP Senior Fellow John Caulker on Ebola in Sierra Leone

John Caulker, Senior Fellow at Catalyst for Peace and Executive director at Fambul Tok, appeared on MidPoint to give an update on Ebola in Sierra Leone. He discussed the impact of the disease and how groups like his are handling the marathon fight of against it, as well as what’s happening with children orphaned by Ebola.

Blog banner image (c) Sara Terry for Catalyst for Peace

Storytelling in Post-War Sierra Leone

Fambul Tok Director/Producer Sara Terry speaks eloquently about filmmaking that tries to let a culture speak for itself⎯being mindful of a Western audience, without imposing Western assumptions on the story itself or how it gets told. Her Director’s Statement, copied below, illuminates CFP’s approach to storytelling⎯responding to Ben Okri’s call for a ‘new seeing’ of Africa, that can help ‘reveal its brightness, its brilliance, its beauty.’

The Power of Forgiveness: Truth-Telling ….Keep reading this post >

The Nuts and Bolts of Making Community Ownership Work

Fambul Tok in Sierra Leone has pioneered a large scale, but fully locally-owned and led post war reconciliation and community building process. The key to local local ownership is in the PROCESS Fambul Tok uses facilitate community agency, collective decision making, and collective action.

So – how exactly does that process work?

Download our How It Works chart here [PDF].

The first step of any Fambul Tok process is a consultation. Sierra Leone ….Keep reading this post >

Community-Driven Action is needed for effective Ebola response: Libby Hoffman in the Building Peace Forum

CFP founder and President Libby Hoffman wrote an article for the Alliance for Peacebuilding’s Building Peace Forum, linking inside-out, community-owned and led peacebuilding to effective Ebola response. Her article highlights the powerful impact of Fambul Tok’s Peace Mothers groups in preventing the spread of Ebola and helping communities respond constructively.

An excerpt:

This ‘inside-out’ approach holds great promise for effective Ebola response, as Fambul Tok’s newly-empowered community leaders are showing ….Keep reading this post >

Leadership for community-ownership

Adapted from the original written by Jina Moore.

Good leadership is critical to the success of any program. But when a process is meant to be community-owned and led, the kind of leadership required to support and sustain that process is unique.

Listening to community stakeholders in Pujehun District, Sierra Leone

Fambul Tok has pioneered living out this kind of leadership in practice for over 8 years, so it exemplifies the ….Keep reading this post >

Interweaving peacebuilding and film

Interweaving peacebuilding and film yields transformation.

There are occasional moments in this work when people, activities, resources, and timing all align, and there’s a powerful experience that grabs you in the pit of your stomach, leaving you feeling – This is what it is all for.  Thursday, May 10, 2012 was one of those moments for me, with the workshop Fambul Tok held in Waterloo, just outside of Freetown (Sierra Leone), for a group ….Keep reading this post >

How can we catalyze peace?


Catalyst for Peace is not just a collection of individuals asking that question for ourselves individually. We are interested in answering that question collectively – programmatically and organizationally. How can we BE and CATALYZE a community of peace?

We would say that programs and organizations catalyze communities of peace when they:

Allow the courage, grace and the will of ordinary people in the midst of the most difficult circumstances to provide leadership ….Keep reading this post >

Fambul Tok filmmaker interview

In an interview from the world premiere of Fambul Tok at SXSW film festival in Austin, Texas in the spring of 2011, Producer/Executive Producer Libby Hoffman and Director/Producer Sara Terry talk about their motivations in making the film, the approach they took, and their hopes for the impact it can have in the world.

Blog banner image (c) Sara Terry for Catalyst for Peace

CFP Senior Fellow John Caulker to NPR: “Ebola Is Real”

Yesterday, CFP Senior Fellow and Fambul Tok Executive Director John Caulker appeared on NPR’s Weekend All Things Considered. He told host Scott Simon what the outbreak looks like on the ground.

Caulker: This is the major communication we are trying to pass on to the authorities, not just to the government of Sierra Leone, to the U.S. government, to the British, to all those who are coming to our ….Keep reading this post >