UMass Boston wins grant for Nigerian Youth Leaders Exchange Program
The University of Massachusetts Boston’s Graduate Program in Dispute Resolution will be hosting an exchange program to connect Nigerian youth leaders and members of civil society organizations working to bridge the country’s Muslim-Christian divide with American experts in conflict management and resolution. The exchange program will be led by Assistant Professor Darren Kew, and is being supported by a grant from the US Department of State, Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs.
“Building Citizen Engagement and Conflict Resolution Skills in Civil Society: An Exchange Program for Nigerian Youth Leaders” is broken into two main phases. First, the Nigerian youth and civil society leaders will spend 3 weeks in Boston as they participate in workshops and site visits, working with American conflict resolution professionals experienced in interfaith and intergroup dialogue and consensus building. In addition to UMass Boston, American professionals will come from partnering organizations including Public Conversations Project, the Consensus Building Institute, the Massachusetts Office of Dispute Resolution and Public Collaboration, The Mediation Group, and CDA Collaborative Learning Projects.
Six months after the Nigerians visit Boston, American conflict resolution practitioners will travel to Nigeria where they will meet and conduct training programs with Nigerian partner organizations including Academic Associates PeaceWorks in Abuja, the Interfaith Dialogue Center in Kaduna, the Centre for Democratic Research and Training of Bayero University in Kano, and Settlement House in Abuja.
Darren Kew (Ph.D., Tufts University) specializes in the connection between institution building in Africa and the development of political cultures that support democracy, particularly in terms of the role of civil society groups in this development. He has worked with the Council on Foreign Relations’ Center for Preventative Action to provide analysis and blueprints for preventing conflicts in several areas around the world, including Nigeria, Central Africa, and Kosovo. He has also been a consultant to the United Nations, USAID, the US State Department, and to a number of NGO’s, including the Carter Center in a 1999 effort by former President Carter to mediate the Niger Delta conflicts and a 2007 effort to improved the Nigerian election process. His work on how conflict resolution methods promote democratization of national political cultures is one of the first of its kind in linking these important fields.
The first phase of this exchange program is set to begin in June 2008.