future now”

Chapter Four
Collective and individual
efforts in peacebuilding
4Collective Activism presents an analysis of the data from the
questionnaires of the 28 groups working on peacebuilding 1 .
4Individual Efforts uses information from the individual interviews,
as well as from the focus group discussions.
4For Examples of Peacebuilding Activities all the generated
data was used to identify potential example stories. Additional
research was then conducted to gather more information
about the projects.
Collective activism
Geographical distribution
28 of the 49 women’s groups researched are involved in
peacebuilding activities. The groups are spread over the
geographical areas covered, as shown in Figure 5.
The largest proportion was found in Al-Hasaka, where ten
out of 14 women’s groups were involved in peacebuilding.
Such a high rate of involvement can be attributed
to several factors, including the relatively stable security
situation in the region and a functional environment for
civil work. In addition, due to historical disputes between
different groups of society and decades of state discrimination
against some of these groups, the region, which
has a diverse population, is at risk of new conflicts. As
civil society organizations are aware of this fact, their focus
on the importance of civil peace, coexistence and reconciliation
has also increased. In Damascus and its countryside,
eight out of eleven women’s groups 2 worked on
peacebuilding. Here, the relatively high level of involvement
can be explained by Damascus having several more
established women activist groups than in other regions.
Many women’s organizations are centered in Damascus,
and although the majority of them have emerged after
2011, their founders and activists are veterans who have
been active long before the uprising. In addition, because
it is the capital, Damascus enjoys much religious, ethnic
and political diversity. Similar to Al-Hasaka, this diversity,
when combined with the scale of the violence and the
oppression by the regime, has prompted many women
activists to be proactive and implement projects promoting
peaceful coexistence or else respond with peacebuilding
initiatives whenever there are suspicions of potential
violence.
The majority of peacebuilding activities of the groups in
this region have targeted the countryside, especially Eastern
Ghouta, which has long been out of the regime’s control.
The women activists said that in the first years after
the uprising they were respected in Ghouta and enjoyed
a relatively good level of communication and access to
negotiations with the armed factions there, most notably
the Free Syrian Army (FSA). Occasionally, these armed
factions even facilitated the implementation of women
activists’ projects. However, the situation changed dramatically
when Jayesh al-Islam 3 (Army of Islam) took power.
In Aleppo, only two out of six women’s groups carried out
peacebuilding activities. The majority of the remaining
groups focused on economic empowerment to improve
the wellbeing of the women they targeted 4 . The spread of
various armed forces in Aleppo and its countryside is one
reason for this poor involvement, as most of these forces
Figure 5: Women’s groups working in peacebuilding
10
8
6
10
8
4
5
2
0
2
Street art in Aleppo, saying “Hand in
hand, we build it together”.
Hasaka Aleppo Damascus
and its
20
countryside
Crossborder
2
1 1 0
Idlib Deir Ezzor Daraa Latakia