Twenty years of working for peace
QUNO peaceworkers mark twenty years of the scheme
Rhiannon Redpath and Owen Everett invited Friends to join them in celebrating twenty years of the Quaker Peace & Social Witness (QPSW) peaceworker scheme with an interactive workshop on Sunday evening. The two young Friends showed a short film and talked about their own experiences. Friends were challenged to explore different perspectives by walking to different sides of the room if they agreed or disagreed with statements such as ‘women are more at risk in war than soldiers’ and comparing views.
Rhiannon is placed for one year with Gender Action for Peace & Security, working on their ‘No Women, No Peace’ campaign. She works to raise awareness about issues that affect women in Afghanistan and other conflict areas. She urged us to consider the foundations of peace, saying ‘where women’s views are not represented then peace cannot be sustainable’.
Owen is placed jointly with War Resisters’ International and ForcesWatch. His main project has been editing a new book Sowing Seeds: The Militarisation of Youth and How to Counter It.
The book highlights the government’s policy of increasing public pride in the armed forces. It questions recruitment initiatives that target schools and the inequality whereby children from disadvantaged and ethnic minority backgrounds are more likely to be recruited to the infantry – with far higher risk of injury and death.
The peaceworkers reflected that their placements had helped them to explore ‘how Quaker values can be lived out in their work’. The scheme has helped them learn about themselves and examine what kind of work they might like to do.
