Collaborating on Peaceful Futures in Asia and the Pacific: Follow-Up Event

This two-hour event will continue our work toward collaborating on peaceful futures in Asia and the Pacific.

We intend to merge and build upon two prior discussions. Across both events there was a strong desire to build a network/s to enhance professional and technical opportunities, share experiences, and build our field in Australia and the region.

Interested persons are encouraged to read the Padlet summaries ahead of this event and to contribute to the deliberations there.

A strong positive response to further explore possibilities for collaboration and networking across practice, research and advocacy, beginning locally, and extending nationally and regionally exists.

This follow-up event on 30 August 2021 will focus on planning and strategising for such a network, and will be hosted by the Initiative for Peacebuilding, University of Melbourne together with the University of Queensland, PaCSIA and Conciliation Resources.

It will bring together organisers and participants from earlier discussions; and encourage inclusion of those interested in discussing and advancing the proposition for enhanced collaboration for peace in Australia and the region.

We intend to focus on the planning and potential for such a network committed to collaboration and non-violent approaches to peace.

This isn’t yet a ‘network’ event but we aim to join up some of the discussions and groups working towards such a network and to develop the idea for an Open Space 2022 networking event that could bring many interested people together.

Our previous discussions have generated the following 6 key propositions/questions for advancing collaborative networking:

1. Regular Network Gatherings? (both for technical and relational engagements/ could be hybrid, Zoom and/or place-based?)
2. (Annual) Open Space Event? (Open space is a form of self-organising facilitation whereby people come together around a loose theme or topic and specify what they want to discuss with each other. Participants’ interests then dictate the organisation of people into sessions).
3. Coordinating and organising? (we are assisting the ‘light planning stage’ but the ways we might continue going forward need to be inclusively developed/discussed).
4. A Network Platform? (what technical infrastructure would work to enable this)
5. A stakeholder mapping exercise? (who are ‘we’ and how can we systematically get a better sense of who may be connected)
6. Australian Council of Peacebuilding? (This ‘later-stage’ proposition is for a structured institution bringing together stakeholders and organisations of the field, deriving legitimacy from their shared expertise and consensus to advocate for shared goals or aims. This may be part of existing structures like ACFID or RDI?).