Initiative for Peace: Reflection on Term 1
PRE-IFP: PEACE CONFERENCE 2019
IFP Conference, Dover Campus, September 2019
REFLECTIONS/ NEW LEARNING FROM INITIAL SESSIONS: PEACE BUILDING TRAINING
FUTURE GOALS & THINGS TO THINK MORE ABOUT…
- I want to gain confidence in my own thinking, my own ideas and perceptions of how to encounter and respond to conflict. I feel that a big fear that is holding me back is that I feel that my knowledge on conflict is very limited, and therefore I cannot develop ideas very quickly during group discussions, or I often hold back on what I wish to say. To overcome this, I think I will start to keep more updated with current affairs, on a more global context – importantly gaining more awareness on an issue through reading opinion articles or from sources that share a certain perspective.
- To better understand the complexity of peace and conflict, perhaps reflect and connect what we learn in each session on a personal level – seeing how I am exposed to certain situations of conflict myself. For example, analysing and being aware about how stereotype conflict is something that I am subconsciously exposed to everyday due to my nurture and values learnt through my upbringing. [Living in Singapore all my life, not being exposed to too much conflict – I am blinded by the fact that sterotypes and my personal values constantly influence my perception of an issue, causing a certain bias] — Alongside this, I can see how similarly, conflict can arise due to the values and attitudes that build its foundation, and can cause many grand-scale issues in various scenarios. (This in particularly was a striking moment of learning during this term in IFP)
- A key takeaway from these few sessions was learning how to carryout peace conferences and use certain activities to teach others, perhaps residing from areas of conflict, about peacebuilding and conflict resolution. For example, I am aware that the scenarios used in our activities may need to change, as we need to be empathetic of the situation of the country in which we conduct the peace conference. For example, the Jah and Kay simulation may be too personal, for those who come from areas that are under-developed and who share similar struggles to the Jahs. Not only will personal issues affect their well-being, but may also cause their emotions to interfere with their decision making as a peace-builder.
Overall, I cannot wait to learn more in IFP, from learning how to analyse conflict to finally, learning more about effectively guiding other people on a path to peacemaking. I ultimately value the time spent collaborating and communicating with various people to think about and find ways to combat and prevent conflict.
Initiative for Peace – The Jah and Kay Simulation
