Mediation should address challenges related to religion and conflict in order to seize the opportunities it offers for peacebuilding. Religion is a shaping factor in creating identities and identifying worldviews and thus religious and traditional peacemakers have a strong influential role in enabling the success of a mediation process.
To advance the significant role of religion in mediation, the UN Religion and Mediation Course trained 25 United Nations personnel with knowledge and tools to support the design of mediation processes in violent political conflict where religion plays a role. The course taught participants to analyse religion’s role in conflict, become familiar with mediation approaches and gain tools to design mediation processes with a religious dimension. The UN Religion and Mediation Course was developed in partnership with the Network for Religious and Traditional Peacemakers, Ministry for Foreign Affairs Finland, Swiss Ministry for Foreign Affairs, CSS- ETH Zurich and UNDP. Speakers included Dr. Azza Karam, Pekka Metso, Brendan McCallister, and Dr. Andrea Bartoli among others.
Over the course of three days, participants discussed the significance of inclusion, in particular gender, and how it can be integrated in mediation processes. Participants also analysed multiple case studies, including on religious inclusivity in mediation processes throughout several contexts as well as created their own mediation design process.
19 December 2019