Transnational peace building: bringing salt and light to Colombia and the USA

Abstract

In 2003, Lutheran World Relief (LWR), an international relief and development NGO, began a peace-building initiative in Colombia. It facilitated the formation of a partnership between peace-sanctuary churches in Colombia and six communities of faith in the US Midwest, co-ordinated by LWR staff. This partnership, called ‘Sal y Luz’ (Salt and Light), has the goal of education and advocacy both in Colombia and in the USA. Sal y Luz represents a powerful example of transnational solidarity for peace. There are also implications and lessons of this case study for the broader field of NGO peace-building work. The Sal y Luz model of peace building brings benefits in terms of NGO accountability and effectiveness. The key innovation of the model is the means by which LWR effectively helped its US constituency to understand and become involved in peace-building work.

Keywords:

• Aid
• Civil Society
• Conflict and Reconstruction
• Methods
• Latin America and the Caribbean
• North America

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Phillip Cryan for his helpful comments on an earlier draft.

Notes

‘Peace building’ refers to a wide range of activities that could occur at any phase of a conflict (not limited to post-conflict activities). This is how the subset of NGOs relevant to this article uses the term.

Information in this section draws on the following LWR interviews and documents: interviews with Phillip Cryan, Grassroots Co-ordinator, LWR (3 August 2006); Sarah Ford, Director of Office of Public Policy, LWR (29 August 2006); and Kathryn Wolford, LWR President, interviewed on Minnesota Public Radio, Midmorning Show ‘Redefining Aid’ (28 March 2006). Public documents: ‘Lutheran World Relief – An Introduction’ (organisational brochure); LWR website; Peace to Others, Through Others: LWR's Quarterly Newsletter Vol. VII.III (September 2006), pp. 1–3. Internal documents: ‘Developing a Framework for Linking Local Peacebuilding to National and International Policymakers’, a grant proposal to the Ford Foundation (8 December 2003); Vince McElhinny ‘Minutes from LWR Evaluation Workshops’ (May 2006); Vince McElhinny ‘Progress Report on the Evaluation of LWR Colombia Advocacy Project’ (16 July 2006); ‘Sal y Luz Colombia Advocacy Push (2006) Some Thoughts on Strategy’.

The six Midwestern sites are in Southeastern MN; Minneapolis/St. Paul; St. Peter, MN; Freeman, SD; Sioux Falls, SD; and Iowa City, IA. The three Colombian churches are in Zambrano, Bolívar; Sincelejo, Sucre; and Tierralta, Córdoba.

For example, one of the peace-sanctuary church leaders in Colombia has moved from local and regional community leadership to a national leadership role, and is currently working on a documentation process with a different organisation.

LWR had only one Midwest-based staff person, who had a demanding job of training and organising across a large tri-state region. So, although this was an expensive programme for a lean organisation like LWR, there could have been even more support.