1 00:00:00,090 --> 00:00:06,540 Hi, everyone. Welcome. Happy New Year and happy Hillary through for those of you who are in Oxford. 2 00:00:06,540 --> 00:00:15,210 Today, we are having a cohosted event. G.R. has joined forces with the Oxford Institute for Ethics, Law and Armed Conflict. 3 00:00:15,210 --> 00:00:20,440 So just introduce this group. ELAC or the Oxfordian sued for ethics. 4 00:00:20,440 --> 00:00:26,940 One Armed Conflict is an interdisciplinary research programme which is based at the Globe Ethnic School of Government. 5 00:00:26,940 --> 00:00:35,790 It seeks to understand and to strengthen law, norms and institutions to restrain, regulate and prevent armed conflict. 6 00:00:35,790 --> 00:00:44,430 It brings together researchers, academics and practitioners in areas such as international law, international relations and philosophy. 7 00:00:44,430 --> 00:00:53,730 EULEX mission is to propose a framework of rules and practises that can drive legal and policy reforms on various aspects of armed conflict. 8 00:00:53,730 --> 00:00:59,850 So, as I mentioned, we have joined forces for a very interesting and a very important discussion. 9 00:00:59,850 --> 00:01:06,990 And we are privileged to welcome Leslie DOMAs, the director and producer of the feature length documentary The Prosecutors, 10 00:01:06,990 --> 00:01:13,020 which, as the three mentioned, all registered participants had the opportunity to watch over the weekend. 11 00:01:13,020 --> 00:01:18,900 Thanks to art works projects, Bernat that we are a visual journalist and filmmaker, 12 00:01:18,900 --> 00:01:25,140 and Nadia Siddiqui, cross disciplinary researcher and co-director at Social Enquiry. 13 00:01:25,140 --> 00:01:29,340 I'll be introducing our speakers as we go through the panel. 14 00:01:29,340 --> 00:01:32,320 So first of all, I will give the floor to Leslie. 15 00:01:32,320 --> 00:01:38,790 And before I do so, let me give a brief introduction of your many professional engagements over the years. 16 00:01:38,790 --> 00:01:45,930 Leslie DOMAs is the founder of Artwork's Projects, an Emmy Award winning our director, architect and mother. 17 00:01:45,930 --> 00:01:53,910 Current projects include directing the prosecutors curating a touring exhibition on ending female genital mutilation for the United Nations, 18 00:01:53,910 --> 00:01:59,610 and co editing a book of photography on the impact of war on children in Syria. 19 00:01:59,610 --> 00:02:08,100 She is in preproduction on a narrative feature on women's rights and in development on a film about the movement for Irish independence. 20 00:02:08,100 --> 00:02:13,710 Her multimedia human rights focussed work has toured the cross five continents in major policy, 21 00:02:13,710 --> 00:02:19,890 academic and cultural settings and been the recipient of grants from the National Endowment for the Arts. 22 00:02:19,890 --> 00:02:25,530 The MacArthur Foundation. The Open Society Foundation. The International Labour Organisation. 23 00:02:25,530 --> 00:02:35,670 And many other major philanthropic institutions. Leskie is a graduate of Columbia University and Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service. 24 00:02:35,670 --> 00:02:41,110 Leslie, the floor is yours. Thank you so much. 25 00:02:41,110 --> 00:02:47,170 It's really an honour to be here. I must say two things that are framing this conversation. 26 00:02:47,170 --> 00:02:55,060 One is I will be drinking coffee throughout my chat. And as other people are chatting, this is not a sign of disrespect. 27 00:02:55,060 --> 00:03:04,400 I wish we were altogether. And if we were sitting in an auditorium, I would also be drinking coffee onstage, as that can be mentioned. 28 00:03:04,400 --> 00:03:09,970 I think of that kind of Michigan. This list of goulash of the things that I work on. 29 00:03:09,970 --> 00:03:18,910 Also right now, we are in production on a film around the four women peace negotiators sitting down with the Taliban right now in Doha. 30 00:03:18,910 --> 00:03:23,980 But from Afghanistan and it's 10 and a half hours ahead from where I live. 31 00:03:23,980 --> 00:03:28,710 And so day and night have slid into kind of just a week. 32 00:03:28,710 --> 00:03:37,190 Hours. I also wanted to frame my talks today around the fact that in the United States, 33 00:03:37,190 --> 00:03:43,220 for those of you who are American, who have spent time in the United States, it's Martin Luther King Day. 34 00:03:43,220 --> 00:03:54,920 And this is an extraordinarily important day because it gives us a moment to really reflect not just on one very, 35 00:03:54,920 --> 00:04:03,140 very special human being, but on the entire history of non-violent protest. 36 00:04:03,140 --> 00:04:08,960 And as I was thinking about making coffee and thinking about this this conversation today, 37 00:04:08,960 --> 00:04:18,770 I thought to myself, non-violent protest is very much related to the idea of judicial processes. 38 00:04:18,770 --> 00:04:29,060 Because if you think of societies of the forming of societies as the gathering of lots of people who are inherently going to be different. 39 00:04:29,060 --> 00:04:33,200 Right. So there's seven billion plus of us and every single human being is different, 40 00:04:33,200 --> 00:04:42,680 which means that every single human being has different opinions and thoughts and ideas and that we have to come together to live. 41 00:04:42,680 --> 00:04:50,060 Sometimes that's conflicted. Sometimes there's a lot of conflict and it can become very violent and transitional. 42 00:04:50,060 --> 00:04:59,880 Justice is this long arc of life, as I see it, of kind of smoothing all those Escher's edges of bringing us together. 43 00:04:59,880 --> 00:05:05,330 Of of saying what do we need to do to let us live together when our conflicts 44 00:05:05,330 --> 00:05:10,130 have exploded to a point that is not acceptable because we have used violence, 45 00:05:10,130 --> 00:05:15,830 which is fundamentally, at least for me, absolutely not acceptable. 46 00:05:15,830 --> 00:05:22,670 So so on Martin Luther King Day, we're in this interesting position in this country, in America, 47 00:05:22,670 --> 00:05:30,200 where we recently had a group of people who exercised two rights, which are totally acceptable. 48 00:05:30,200 --> 00:05:35,750 They protested, which is something that should be cherished in open societies. 49 00:05:35,750 --> 00:05:37,670 Right. As Karl Popper talked about. Right. 50 00:05:37,670 --> 00:05:43,040 We can have these messy, open, vibrant societies in which we have lots of opinions and we do lots of things. 51 00:05:43,040 --> 00:05:49,280 And we protest and we talk and we argue and then we go to courts. 52 00:05:49,280 --> 00:05:53,450 So the people in the United States who attacked the capital, 53 00:05:53,450 --> 00:06:04,160 who attacked the process that the Congress uses to to verify an election, went to courts and they had every right to do that. 54 00:06:04,160 --> 00:06:10,880 And there is this expectation from the rest of us that the court process will move forward and that we will accept what happens. 55 00:06:10,880 --> 00:06:14,900 And then we have these layers of courts. Right. You go to a court and you don't like what they said. 56 00:06:14,900 --> 00:06:17,270 So you appeal and you go to the next court. 57 00:06:17,270 --> 00:06:25,010 And those are also really wonderful things around how we as a society can effectively and structurally come together. 58 00:06:25,010 --> 00:06:29,030 And those people lost. Right. So they lost the first time. They lost the second time. 59 00:06:29,030 --> 00:06:32,780 They lost the third term. They went to the Supreme Court. They lost. 60 00:06:32,780 --> 00:06:40,010 And then this is where it breaks down because then they attacked the structure of our democracy. 61 00:06:40,010 --> 00:06:41,870 And that's the part where it is unacceptable. 62 00:06:41,870 --> 00:06:46,940 And that's the part where Martin Luther King would have told us, if you don't like the answer that you were getting in court, 63 00:06:46,940 --> 00:06:51,050 there are non-violent ways to say, should we question the laws? 64 00:06:51,050 --> 00:07:00,720 Is our structure correct? Do we need to reimagine it? And in making the prosecutors. 65 00:07:00,720 --> 00:07:08,060 This is something that was so exciting because we looked at three different cases. 66 00:07:08,060 --> 00:07:12,660 I'm going to talk a little bit about the kind of questions that audiences tend to ask about the film. 67 00:07:12,660 --> 00:07:18,630 And the first one is always, why did you pick these three, three cases for those who did watch the film? 68 00:07:18,630 --> 00:07:26,640 We looked at that, the judicial response to complicated sexual violence in Bosnia, Colombia and the Democratic Republic of Congo. 69 00:07:26,640 --> 00:07:30,810 And we picked those three cases for very specific reasons. 70 00:07:30,810 --> 00:07:35,760 One is that they were at different stages in their conflict resolution. 71 00:07:35,760 --> 00:07:42,840 So the United States is still lurching its way through conflict resolution and transitional justice from its birth, 72 00:07:42,840 --> 00:07:51,000 from the twin evils of genocide of Native Americans or people who lived here before it was called the Americas 73 00:07:51,000 --> 00:07:58,230 by white Europeans and the enslavement and trafficking of an entire group of people from another continent. 74 00:07:58,230 --> 00:08:04,350 So we're still lurching through a transitional justice process of that in the former Yugoslavia. 75 00:08:04,350 --> 00:08:15,050 You have the instance of a court system that moved from the ICC y to the ICC to the suit court ABH and then to the cantonal courts. 76 00:08:15,050 --> 00:08:24,240 And it gave us a wonderful example of what does a judicial process look like 20 plus years out and how can that evolve? 77 00:08:24,240 --> 00:08:30,660 I have great admiration for the the idea that you can if you live in Bosnia, it's not perfect, 78 00:08:30,660 --> 00:08:37,110 but you can go to Bihac and you can go to a war crimes court in your own community with the every 79 00:08:37,110 --> 00:08:47,810 expectation that your case will be heard and that this is not lost and that it is right there near you. 80 00:08:47,810 --> 00:08:55,640 In in Columbia, when we worked with the fiscal year and we documented what they're doing for those who happen to be Americans, 81 00:08:55,640 --> 00:09:03,910 you know, sort of not familiar, it's a little bit like the attorney general's office. They work nationally, but they work out of the booger, as. 82 00:09:03,910 --> 00:09:07,430 Sandra would call it, in in Colombia, in Bogota. 83 00:09:07,430 --> 00:09:14,300 And we're looking at something that was like eight, nine years out of when the agreement had been made with the paramilitaries. 84 00:09:14,300 --> 00:09:19,640 So we got to see how this starts to be implemented and where those expectations are. 85 00:09:19,640 --> 00:09:22,550 Tragically, we still had threatening of witnesses. 86 00:09:22,550 --> 00:09:31,250 We still had a sense that Marco Rubio Perez might escape, which is why he was not present in the courthouse. 87 00:09:31,250 --> 00:09:39,950 He was virtually, as we are today in the courthouse. But the victims, survivors and witnesses move forward with the process. 88 00:09:39,950 --> 00:09:47,330 And in the eight years, there had been this sense that despite ongoing violence, this judicial process was going to be effective. 89 00:09:47,330 --> 00:09:52,470 And it was going to work. And the result was going to be implemented. 90 00:09:52,470 --> 00:09:59,410 In the Democratic Republic of Congo, we then had something that and Bernadette is here with us today. 91 00:09:59,410 --> 00:10:05,560 And she is much more of an expert as a Congolese citizen and director and journalist. 92 00:10:05,560 --> 00:10:13,590 But we had what Amani Cotnoir and the Dean might say is kind of an evolving, aspirational and ongoing. 93 00:10:13,590 --> 00:10:22,140 Transitional justice period. So we have war crimes being committed while we are still documenting and trying war crimes. 94 00:10:22,140 --> 00:10:27,270 There are those who feel that the military is the wrong place to documents something that may have been perpetrated by the military. 95 00:10:27,270 --> 00:10:33,150 There are others who feel that it is the right place. I will leave that to the lawyers in this conversation to address. 96 00:10:33,150 --> 00:10:40,530 But just to say, it's very exciting to watch a process go on, which is happening such that victims, 97 00:10:40,530 --> 00:10:46,260 survivors and their communities can see it happen even as other events are being perpetrated. 98 00:10:46,260 --> 00:10:53,580 So I think when we talk about whether the judicial system is a deterrent, it is a wonderful example of that. 99 00:10:53,580 --> 00:10:59,880 I would also just like to say something about transparency and the idea of documentation, 100 00:10:59,880 --> 00:11:09,390 which is that sometimes there's this expectation that in the economic north of the global west that we have the most open of societies. 101 00:11:09,390 --> 00:11:15,140 If you watch the film, you might think to yourself that the best footage or the most. 102 00:11:15,140 --> 00:11:20,630 Intimate footage of a trial is not in Bosnia or Colombia. 103 00:11:20,630 --> 00:11:25,020 The two probably wealthier countries in terms of per capita, not what's in the ground. 104 00:11:25,020 --> 00:11:32,810 But but that's another issue around colonialism. But but sort of, you know, per capita income. 105 00:11:32,810 --> 00:11:36,860 And if you look at, you know, basic humanitarian statistics. 106 00:11:36,860 --> 00:11:44,270 But in fact, in Congo, the accessibility and the transparency of the judicial system was breathtaking. 107 00:11:44,270 --> 00:11:51,410 The combination of the judges, local magistrates and and what was afforded and the commitment to community seeing trial, 108 00:11:51,410 --> 00:11:56,390 there is nothing that you would ever see in the United States and certainly not in the other two countries. 109 00:11:56,390 --> 00:12:02,060 I had been thrown out of courtrooms in so many countries and never in Congo. 110 00:12:02,060 --> 00:12:10,280 And I think that, again, if we are committed to a strong transitional justice process, fighting for transparency is a key component of that. 111 00:12:10,280 --> 00:12:15,350 I would like to say that I think that art and documentary film have a lot. An important part of that. 112 00:12:15,350 --> 00:12:29,870 But I. But I am biased. I might close with just one more one more comment, which is I'm often asked why we made a film about. 113 00:12:29,870 --> 00:12:37,160 The judicial process and not specifically documenting the stories of survivors, 114 00:12:37,160 --> 00:12:42,040 which is clearly the core and is my own personal motivation, the actual crime, 115 00:12:42,040 --> 00:12:48,600 I have spent years working with a kind of group of people who who describe 116 00:12:48,600 --> 00:12:56,480 themselves often as legal victims of survivors if they lived end of witnesses, 117 00:12:56,480 --> 00:13:01,070 of experts and advocates. That is all one group of people. 118 00:13:01,070 --> 00:13:05,270 Someone who has had a lived experience of conflict related sexual violence is an expert. 119 00:13:05,270 --> 00:13:09,320 They are very often the best advocate. They are illegal victim. 120 00:13:09,320 --> 00:13:13,460 And they are a witness to what happened in working on this film. 121 00:13:13,460 --> 00:13:17,390 Early we we talked a lot with those advisers, those experts. 122 00:13:17,390 --> 00:13:22,700 And what they said to us is we don't need to tell our stories to an audience. 123 00:13:22,700 --> 00:13:25,760 The world knows this happens. This is not something that we are interested in doing. 124 00:13:25,760 --> 00:13:30,740 What we would like to do is work with you to show what can be done. 125 00:13:30,740 --> 00:13:35,930 What we are doing, what has been done and what needs to be amplified. 126 00:13:35,930 --> 00:13:42,020 So I see this a little bit as a pre-emptive note, because sometimes I'm asked, you know, 127 00:13:42,020 --> 00:13:46,370 didn't you think that you should spend 90 minutes putting a camera in front of somebody so they can tell their story? 128 00:13:46,370 --> 00:13:50,390 And I would just say, when you work with someone who is a survivor, 129 00:13:50,390 --> 00:13:56,250 you might want to find out if they're telling that story for you, but they're telling that story for them. 130 00:13:56,250 --> 00:14:00,980 Now, my timer tells me I've used up my time and I've been a bit rambling, but I hope you'll forgive me. 131 00:14:00,980 --> 00:14:07,580 And I'm excited to give them the rest. Thank you very much, Leslie, and your closing remarks. 132 00:14:07,580 --> 00:14:11,270 Very good link to the next presentation. 133 00:14:11,270 --> 00:14:18,410 Looking more, the question of stories of survival is through the perspective of resilience within the communities. 134 00:14:18,410 --> 00:14:24,530 And I'm delighted to give the floor to that, if you will. And I'll just start with a brief introduction. 135 00:14:24,530 --> 00:14:29,810 She's a visual journalists and filmmaker based in Goma, eastern DRC. 136 00:14:29,810 --> 00:14:37,010 She's an alumnus in social justice photography, decomposing of the colonial gaze led by Yola Africa. 137 00:14:37,010 --> 00:14:42,590 She reports on issues related to human rights, the environment and the exploitation of raw materials, 138 00:14:42,590 --> 00:14:48,650 bearing witness to the resilience and transcendence of the people in this conflict affected region. 139 00:14:48,650 --> 00:14:56,540 She most recently directed the short documentary Letter to My Child from Rape, which brings to the screen the powerful words of the poet. 140 00:14:56,540 --> 00:15:05,860 Advocates dishonours Kaboul as she breaks prejudice to claim a future for the child she bore as a result of sexual violence in Baghdad. 141 00:15:05,860 --> 00:15:11,300 Thank you so much for being with us. The four zorse. OK. 142 00:15:11,300 --> 00:15:16,310 Thank you. I'm very happy to be part of this panel. 143 00:15:16,310 --> 00:15:25,550 Firstly, I apologise because my English is not so good, but I will try to to express what I have to say. 144 00:15:25,550 --> 00:15:34,610 And I'm to be part of this this panel about transitional justice. 145 00:15:34,610 --> 00:15:49,990 It's a big honour for me to to talk about what I'm working on daily and to speak about transitional justice through lands. 146 00:15:49,990 --> 00:16:02,780 It's, um, for me, it's like her to, uh, to to to to give enlight those stories of resilience in DRC. 147 00:16:02,780 --> 00:16:14,060 As everyone know, D.R.C. have been more and more reported based to the image of war of violence. 148 00:16:14,060 --> 00:16:20,750 But there is there are no enough stories based to their resilience, 149 00:16:20,750 --> 00:16:28,400 how people in these days in that situation manage to to improve their their daily life. 150 00:16:28,400 --> 00:16:40,240 And in that angle, I, I directed the film letter to my Child from Rape, which we work with. 151 00:16:40,240 --> 00:16:45,800 Lesley Thomas. And to direct this film. 152 00:16:45,800 --> 00:17:02,440 It was. It was for me, it was an occasion to discover a brave, a brave woman who were behind this village that letters. 153 00:17:02,440 --> 00:17:15,230 And it's, uh, it's like two to two to to him to increase the voice of that those survival. 154 00:17:15,230 --> 00:17:19,700 Of sexual violence and. 155 00:17:19,700 --> 00:17:36,410 So I know that the feeling was not a pro screened in this in this occasion, but to see to see the film, were you people who are following us can. 156 00:17:36,410 --> 00:17:44,960 Can. Can go to visit Depositary, so on. 157 00:17:44,960 --> 00:17:52,850 On our Web site. It's a letter, a letter to my child dot com saw. 158 00:17:52,850 --> 00:17:58,340 I'm here. And if there are some questions. 159 00:17:58,340 --> 00:18:07,160 Open to respond. Thank you. Thank you very much about that at the. 160 00:18:07,160 --> 00:18:18,780 We will leave during the Q&A. A link to the Web site of the film so that people who are in the room can can be directed to it. 161 00:18:18,780 --> 00:18:26,170 And as you have seen, today's panel looks at art and transitional justice through two lenses. 162 00:18:26,170 --> 00:18:29,560 The first one is the depiction of transitional justice through art, 163 00:18:29,560 --> 00:18:34,240 and the second one is the role of art in transitional justice and effectuating this transition. 164 00:18:34,240 --> 00:18:42,430 I'm going to give the floor to Nadia Siddiqui. She's a cross disciplinary researcher and writer interested in the links between cultural practise, 165 00:18:42,430 --> 00:18:46,810 social dynamics and justice as a goal directorate social enquiry. 166 00:18:46,810 --> 00:18:52,240 She leads research exploring identities and belonging and displacements in return. 167 00:18:52,240 --> 00:18:58,510 Measuring social cohesion and understanding wealth, reconciliation, accountability mean to communities. 168 00:18:58,510 --> 00:19:05,300 She? S President previously worked with Oxfam, the Middle East Research Institute, to be Afghanistan endless network. 169 00:19:05,300 --> 00:19:11,140 The Applied Theatre Collective and the International Centre for Transitional Justice, amongst others. 170 00:19:11,140 --> 00:19:17,770 Nadia has also helped produce art design events in New York City that have garnered national and international attention. 171 00:19:17,770 --> 00:19:26,160 She holds a B.A. in psychology from the University of Michigan in the Nemitz seen evidence based social intervention from the University of Oxford. 172 00:19:26,160 --> 00:19:30,960 Thank you, Nancy, for being with us. The poisoners. Thank you. 173 00:19:30,960 --> 00:19:37,380 I think I'll just skip showing my slide. Just just go ahead and read. 174 00:19:37,380 --> 00:19:41,450 It's really nice to be here and be able to participate in this discussion. 175 00:19:41,450 --> 00:19:49,020 So I think you, the convenors, for inviting me and actually organising an event on this topic in particular. 176 00:19:49,020 --> 00:19:57,630 So because let's play a bit of that. Have spoken about their work using art to present transitional justice. 177 00:19:57,630 --> 00:20:05,270 As I mentioned, I will talk more about how art and creative practise. 178 00:20:05,270 --> 00:20:12,770 In the absence of or an accompaniment to formal transitional justice processes kind of work and how they serve, 179 00:20:12,770 --> 00:20:18,590 I generally serve as mechanisms for encouraging and supporting positive social change. 180 00:20:18,590 --> 00:20:27,410 I'll first focussed mostly on some of the the writing I've done and the thinking on the ways in which storytelling 181 00:20:27,410 --> 00:20:33,620 and specifically community based and participatory theatre can contribute to transitional justice aims. 182 00:20:33,620 --> 00:20:41,060 Using some examples from Afghanistan, where I've worked with local human rights activists to build an Artspace platform to connect 183 00:20:41,060 --> 00:20:48,920 victims of conflict to each other and sort of mobilise around issues of memory and accountability, 184 00:20:48,920 --> 00:20:57,380 and then also looking at the ways in which such practises and creative practises and art based practises can be of use to 185 00:20:57,380 --> 00:21:05,720 supporting those who actually work within the transitional justice space as people who do transitional justice as well. 186 00:21:05,720 --> 00:21:10,400 So storytelling within the realm of cultural expression in ongoing and post-conflict settings 187 00:21:10,400 --> 00:21:14,930 provides an opportunity for portraying narratives of war and were related experiences. 188 00:21:14,930 --> 00:21:22,100 This also holds true in context where there isn't conflict per say, but the legacies of unaddressed injustice remain and continue. 189 00:21:22,100 --> 00:21:31,010 And I'm thinking here of places like the United States. Such expressions can serve as an important step not only towards individual healing, 190 00:21:31,010 --> 00:21:37,640 but also more broadly towards restoring collective memory and repairing the social fabric in which individuals are embedded. 191 00:21:37,640 --> 00:21:44,480 Reconstructing narratives of past events and telling stories in collective forums can provide a certain sense of normalcy and closure. 192 00:21:44,480 --> 00:21:48,110 And at the same time, and perhaps more importantly for transitional justice aims, 193 00:21:48,110 --> 00:21:53,820 reclaiming truths through sharing of stories can also serve as a means to foster positive change. 194 00:21:53,820 --> 00:22:00,580 They can be a political process. So in the context of particularly in which transitional justice processes are nascent, 195 00:22:00,580 --> 00:22:08,480 theatre can be used as an alternative informal method to push for rights claims and help ensure recourse for survivors. 196 00:22:08,480 --> 00:22:17,030 Artspace forms of storytelling, including participatory theatre, are potentially useful means for addressing the need for self articulated, 197 00:22:17,030 --> 00:22:24,550 personal and shared narratives, opening space for people to collectively share their stories and create meaning about what happened to them. 198 00:22:24,550 --> 00:22:31,540 It would be remiss to put not to point out the formal transitional justice processes like trials. 199 00:22:31,540 --> 00:22:34,120 Truth seeking exercises themselves are performative. 200 00:22:34,120 --> 00:22:42,880 I mean, they are and have amongst their direct aims providing forums for testimony in an effort to bring accountability and uncover truth. 201 00:22:42,880 --> 00:22:48,460 But often because of the constraints of of of these processes, 202 00:22:48,460 --> 00:22:54,070 they usually can only include a select number of people, number of victims as participants. 203 00:22:54,070 --> 00:23:06,060 And they do leaves. They they can potentially leave certain truths sort of uncovered in terms of the scope of what they're focussed on. 204 00:23:06,060 --> 00:23:12,220 Testimonies themselves may also be constrained because of the formal processes and proceedings in a truth commission. 205 00:23:12,220 --> 00:23:15,330 Orna in a trial or a tribunal. 206 00:23:15,330 --> 00:23:22,870 You know, people participants can't speak freely about what's happened to them and sort of set the scene in the context. 207 00:23:22,870 --> 00:23:26,800 They sort of move a little bit more in a linear progression. That's what these things are for. 208 00:23:26,800 --> 00:23:30,140 So participatory theatre and community based theatre. 209 00:23:30,140 --> 00:23:37,090 On the other hand, hand offer participants anaesthetic instrument to analyse their past in the context of the present 210 00:23:37,090 --> 00:23:43,540 and to invent and shape their futures according to their own needs through exercises and games. 211 00:23:43,540 --> 00:23:50,350 That helps them to termin that helped them determine for themselves what those outcomes can be as opposed to having solutions imposed upon them. 212 00:23:50,350 --> 00:23:58,810 So cultural expressions outside of formal proceedings, while not able to capture the complex truth inherent in like in a broader historical narrative, 213 00:23:58,810 --> 00:24:04,180 can inform such processes by capturing national a national record. 214 00:24:04,180 --> 00:24:06,070 Because they're densely packed with meaning. 215 00:24:06,070 --> 00:24:11,200 And this meaning may not be apparent in literary or historical documents or straightforward testimony alone, 216 00:24:11,200 --> 00:24:18,100 but rather found and performed and expressive behaviours. And so we may uncover so much more than we thought we originally looking for in 217 00:24:18,100 --> 00:24:23,540 having these processes first or in accompaniment to more formal proceedings. 218 00:24:23,540 --> 00:24:32,430 And so in a context. Emerging from conflict in conflict, where there's still injustice, reclaiming cultural production and sharing stories. 219 00:24:32,430 --> 00:24:41,190 And keeping them going serves as the bull bull bulwark against erasure and against official narratives that don't include these stories. 220 00:24:41,190 --> 00:24:45,150 Furthermore, it highlights key elements of the initial steps towards justice, 221 00:24:45,150 --> 00:24:50,070 such as acknowledgement, recognition and representation that we we say are important, 222 00:24:50,070 --> 00:24:51,090 but that we often don't fully, 223 00:24:51,090 --> 00:24:58,800 meaningfully engage with at all levels in stages of justice processes or using them as measurable benchmarks towards progress. 224 00:24:58,800 --> 00:25:04,020 So we think of are there new laws? We don't necessarily think of how are people interacting with them? 225 00:25:04,020 --> 00:25:10,530 How are they feeling that they're being responded to? So in Afghanistan, 226 00:25:10,530 --> 00:25:17,430 it was through these games that Afghan activists decided to actually try and use these new mechanisms 227 00:25:17,430 --> 00:25:23,240 to create sort of a broader platform of the disparate and disconnected sort of victims communities. 228 00:25:23,240 --> 00:25:31,860 With US organisations, women's groups to create art that reflected the narratives of conflict across time periods, 229 00:25:31,860 --> 00:25:37,260 geographies, languages, expressions, and also sort of look towards the future. 230 00:25:37,260 --> 00:25:41,610 So they're not stuck in the conflict. But starting from this point. This is what's happened to us. 231 00:25:41,610 --> 00:25:48,390 This is what we can do. And that this diverse group of Afghan participants created these performances based on their own 232 00:25:48,390 --> 00:25:55,650 and others experiences and then shared them back with their peers in the theatre performance, 233 00:25:55,650 --> 00:25:59,490 I think helped put people's experiences back into context and allow them to have at least 234 00:25:59,490 --> 00:26:03,420 some modicum of acknowledgement of what happened to them and what happened to others, 235 00:26:03,420 --> 00:26:13,380 and sort of understanding that across this 40 year long conflict, many things have happened, that there are connexions between between communities. 236 00:26:13,380 --> 00:26:19,110 And this was also true when it was performed. We brought this play to the US for some advocacy work. 237 00:26:19,110 --> 00:26:24,540 But where it resonated the most was with African-American artists themselves who either 238 00:26:24,540 --> 00:26:29,400 left the country when they were very young or their families had fled conflict. 239 00:26:29,400 --> 00:26:38,100 And a lot of them expressed that for the very first time, they're hearing the stories of their families told by other Afghans in native language, 240 00:26:38,100 --> 00:26:42,780 using their own customs, their own cultural traditions, and that that meant something. 241 00:26:42,780 --> 00:26:51,210 This is like a missing piece of their own sort of narrative that's being put back together for them. 242 00:26:51,210 --> 00:26:59,250 So that gets us a way that they can incorporate their own identities into this and in their own families into this broader legacy. 243 00:26:59,250 --> 00:27:02,200 And in that way, I miss the point of sort of having these performances, 244 00:27:02,200 --> 00:27:07,710 is that the interaction, that performer that audiences have with these performances, 245 00:27:07,710 --> 00:27:14,010 help with individual healing and understanding that they may spur collective engage a collective action engagement, 246 00:27:14,010 --> 00:27:19,170 sort of broader thinking around justice. That's the hope of that. 247 00:27:19,170 --> 00:27:20,910 But there's also another sort of part to this, 248 00:27:20,910 --> 00:27:32,970 which is that the act of actually participating in a creative process itself is a form of kind of building collective action and building agency. 249 00:27:32,970 --> 00:27:41,220 So in the process of putting these these these art pieces together, working towards collective understandings of narratives, scenario building, 250 00:27:41,220 --> 00:27:47,160 testing out responses to to problems through the use of theatre, elaborate has been to connect with each other, 251 00:27:47,160 --> 00:27:51,390 have thought, which is something I think we we tend to not we undervalue. 252 00:27:51,390 --> 00:27:59,540 It is important to have fun in these contexts and allow them to express more freely emotion, 253 00:27:59,540 --> 00:28:04,500 deep seated emotions reflect upon themselves and others and then experiment together, 254 00:28:04,500 --> 00:28:13,750 sort of all of these things which are acts of care, healing and learning individually and collectively and in themselves I think are really important. 255 00:28:13,750 --> 00:28:18,930 But it also serves to create what Peacebuilders called a liminal space. 256 00:28:18,930 --> 00:28:25,230 So this in-between set aside context where the rules for acting and interpreting meaning are different 257 00:28:25,230 --> 00:28:31,680 and where there is a possibility to actually sort of expand connexion and in the sort of safe space, 258 00:28:31,680 --> 00:28:37,530 basically to play around and sort of see what there is to to practise in terms of 259 00:28:37,530 --> 00:28:44,430 then moving forward and in real life to sort of pursue actions towards justice. 260 00:28:44,430 --> 00:28:49,320 And so so that's sort of what the process did in Afghanistan to a certain extent. 261 00:28:49,320 --> 00:28:55,110 We had these plays going on. This was in 2010, 2011. 262 00:28:55,110 --> 00:29:02,220 But there is also a broader undercurrent of using it to sort of mobilise people together to sort of work on these issues or think about them, 263 00:29:02,220 --> 00:29:06,030 take them back to their own communities and start problem solving in small ways. 264 00:29:06,030 --> 00:29:12,500 They could, you know, bring justice when better processes were not actually taking place yet. 265 00:29:12,500 --> 00:29:17,370 And so I want to turn to the thought of using this to turn to the second sort of question I have, 266 00:29:17,370 --> 00:29:26,080 which is that we we tend to focus these methods on victims in affected communities, but we sort of assume that people who work on transitional. 267 00:29:26,080 --> 00:29:35,100 Countries. So the prosecutors, teachers. Mediators, investigators. 268 00:29:35,100 --> 00:29:41,720 We don't really. I think that they might need support in some kind of way to sort of also deal with 269 00:29:41,720 --> 00:29:45,930 what with what their what they have gone through there from this these companies, 270 00:29:45,930 --> 00:29:50,180 from these countries that are coming from outside. But what space do they have? 271 00:29:50,180 --> 00:30:00,930 What support do they have to reflect and impacts our experiences and and understand how those things influence what they do like? 272 00:30:00,930 --> 00:30:04,350 These positions are really difficult to be in. 273 00:30:04,350 --> 00:30:11,310 A lot of times people who are part of them are being seen as agents of change or are being told that that's what their role is. 274 00:30:11,310 --> 00:30:14,190 And there's a lot of pressure to deliver or not. 275 00:30:14,190 --> 00:30:20,490 You know, there's also pressure is not delivering and that that can take it a very big physical and emotional toll. 276 00:30:20,490 --> 00:30:24,990 So not only harming the individuals who are working on these processes as they get started. 277 00:30:24,990 --> 00:30:31,210 The activists, civil society members, judges, you know, lawmakers, 278 00:30:31,210 --> 00:30:37,830 but that they may actually affect the processes themselves as burnout as by its takes takes a hold. 279 00:30:37,830 --> 00:30:46,140 So in a sense, being using these creative mechanisms available to connect with peers may make for not only healthy people, 280 00:30:46,140 --> 00:30:49,770 but also better informed processes that also better serve victims committees. 281 00:30:49,770 --> 00:30:52,350 Because there's a sense of, OK, how would how would this work? 282 00:30:52,350 --> 00:30:59,430 How am I feeling about this and what sort of more more innovative ways of approaching these these issues? 283 00:30:59,430 --> 00:31:08,040 Could there be? I mean, for me, it's it's sort of it's it's one of these things that having worked with civil society quite a lot. 284 00:31:08,040 --> 00:31:13,290 And hearing victims stories, it comes to the same same point. 285 00:31:13,290 --> 00:31:15,750 If we are happy, 286 00:31:15,750 --> 00:31:23,820 quote unquote happy or feel it's important for victims to have creative outlets and them to mobilise for justice and we hear their stories, 287 00:31:23,820 --> 00:31:30,560 why shouldn't the same be important for the people who are ultimately responsible for making that change at the highest levels? 288 00:31:30,560 --> 00:31:37,800 We we sort of tend to negate the fact that there might be some need, you know, in the not so. 289 00:31:37,800 --> 00:31:45,020 And this is coming out of work. I think that's the issues of sort of the toll of working and unpacking diocese. 290 00:31:45,020 --> 00:31:51,660 You know, it's been happening in regard to aid workers, with teachers teaching the curriculum around peace, building social workers. 291 00:31:51,660 --> 00:31:55,080 But it might be worth extending to practitioners as well. 292 00:31:55,080 --> 00:32:05,780 I mean, it's not to say that theatre solves everything or art does everything, but that the inclusion of creative experience, all processes might be. 293 00:32:05,780 --> 00:32:14,690 Helpful for those who are working within transitional justice beyond and who may need assistance beyond sort of the technical capacities that exist. 294 00:32:14,690 --> 00:32:31,190 And then this might be another means of art, being able to support transitional justice by supporting the people who are actually working to enact it,