By itself, a military approach to conflict and international
security issues won’t solve those problems, says Shelly Whitman.
That’s a remarkable attitude coming from someone employed by
Dalhousie’s Centre for Foreign Policy Studies, which is funded
primarily through the Department of National Defence, publishes the war
machine-friendly Canadian Naval Review and hosts regular
conferences on weaponry advances.
But Whitman is creating the Peace Praxis Institute within the
Centre, designed to bring a wider perspective to foreign policy
issues.
“This is the way forward,” she says. “Everyone has to grasp the idea
that you can’t achieve development without achieving security, and you
can’t achieve security without achieving development.”
Beyond talking to military people about long-term approaches to
peace, the Peace Praxis Institute aims to bring together academics with
people working on the ground to implement policy.
Its first project is the creation of a field guide on child soldiers
to be used by peacekeeping forces and humanitarians working in war
zones. This week, academic researchers meet with nine former child
soldiers for an intensive two-day session.
“No one has asked them what they see from their perspective,” says
Whitman. “We’ll be asking specifics about their training, how they
survived, how children come up with strategies to avoid certain tasks
and for survival.”
That information will be used to write a draft of the manual, which
will then be circulated through two humanitarian organizations working
in Africa to be field tested. The feedback from people working in the
field will make a more user-friendly and effective final edition.
Three of the former child soldiers will be giving public lectures
this week (see Events listings on page 10 for details). Proceeds from
the lectures will underwrite the costs of flying the six others to
Halifax.
This article appears in Aug 27 – Sep 2, 2009.