Happy 2016 from the SIRLab team to all of you!
SIRLab’s project in Ghana involving the “peace pledges” has nearly reached all 80 communities identified by the partnering development organization and the data collection process is in the early stages.
As we wrote in our last post for this project, a SIRLab research team developed two “peace pledges” to pilot test in partnership with a development organization that is working to form producer cooperatives in Ghana’s diverse Eastern corridor. The pledges, one focused on preventing conflict and one focused on promoting cooperation, were translated into 5 tribal languages and set to a song with the help of a drum teacher. During the implementation of the pledges, however, many of the community members liked the idea of the song but, humorously, found the drum beat to be a little…flat. Everyone worked together to reconfigure the pledges and the improved versions have been taught to the producer cooperative members in the communities. Click below to listen to one of the peace pledges, this one focused on conflict prevention:
To track conflict, a SIRLab research team and the partner development organization have identified and installed “Peace Facilitators.” These individuals are responsible for observing the cooperative members in each community for the duration of the peace pledge pilot study. In the event that conflict occurs among the producer cooperative members, the Peace Facilitators complete a “Conflict Tracker Sheet.” These documents record important information such as the reason behind the conflict, the severity of the conflict, and the parties involved in the conflict, critical data for the overall project.
For the next update on this project, and all SIRLab projects and events, follow us @SIR_Lab.
Photo & Audio Credit: Daniel Kansake.