ICRN's next Contaxt Colloqium
Join us for our next ICRN Colloquium featuring Dr. Negusu Aklilu, who will present Building peace before the polls: Political party dialogues to prevent electoral violence in Ethiopia.
Abstract: I would like to showcase a closed pre-election political dialogue we conducted in 2021, informed by intergroup contact theory and associated methodologies to address political concerns and associated emotional phenomena. Owing to this intervention, political parties were able to resolve some critical issues of concern, and leaders were able to commit for peaceful election, whereby complaints were agreed to be filed in a non-violent way to institutions set up for that purpose. This process played a pivotal role in averting electoral violence that negatively affected the country in 2005. The lesson is that in the context of hotly contested and difficult elections with a potential electoral violence, pre-election debates are not enough, and inter-party dialogues might play a role in improving the context.
Bio: Negusu’s mission life is to transform political culture in Ethiopia and the region by championing open dialogue, reconciliation, and pragmatic collaboration. He is a biologist, environmental policy, and climate adaptation expert, turned to peacebuilding practitioner and dialogue facilitator. He holds a doctoral degree from University of Massachusetts Boston specializing in the socio-environmental dimensions of China-Africa partnership, and is a Yale Fellow. He has founded and coordinated Destiny Ethiopia Initiative that conducted national transformative scenario planning in 2019 with 50 influential and insightful leaders, who drew four scenarios of possible futures for Ethiopia, namely, Broken Chair, Hegemony, Divided House, and Dawn. He also co-initiated the Multi-stakeholder Initiative for National Dialogue (MIND), a consortium of eight local organizations, which laid foundation for the launch of national dialogue process in Ethiopia. Negusu designed and facilitated dialogues among actors such as historians, youth, women, media professionals, activists, religious and cultural leaders, justice professionals, and political parties. He is also a co-founder of Eastern Africa Mental Health and Psychosocial Support Practitioners Network. His other skills include facilitation, conversational intelligence, and policy advocacy. He is a member of the Advisory Committee of the Ethiopian National Dialogue Commission (ENDC).
Date: Monday, 24 November Time: 12:00 GMT / 13:00 CET Discussant: Julia Schreiber Registration: https://events.teams.microsoft.com/event/8566dd07-c8df-441d-806c-58c802edc894@6230e860-bfc5-4095-a6bc-104721add6e6