Peace teams are unarmed groups of trained civilians who provide security, moral support and mutual contacts to help local communities prevent the escalation of violent conflict and/or contribute to the reconciliation process. They can play an important role in transforming violent conflicts.

Various organizations that send volunteers provide them with basic training in non-violence and cultural knowledge to work in conflict areas such as Sri Lanka, South Sudan and Syria. These volunteers work with local organizations and one of the things they usually do is simple but effective: providing round-the-clock guidance to threatened people, often human rights activists. They provide information, check facts and serve as go-betweens and, depending on the context, they can help with peace negotiations (as happened in the Philippines) or the liberation of child soldiers (like in Sri Lanka).

Some examples of organizations in this field are: Peace Brigades International (PBI), Community Peacemaker teams (CPT) and Nonviolent Peaceforce (NP). PBI has existed the longest (more than 40 years). PBI Netherlands writes that it believes that sustainable conflict transformation cannot be imposed from outside, but must be based on the convictions of the local population themselves. That is why they only work at the request of local human rights organizations and individual human rights defenders. Their country specialists from 2016 are working on the following themes:

1. Impunity (failure to try and punish persons guilty of human rights violations)
2. Business & human rights (human rights violations related to business activities)
3. Social exclusion (groups of people who cannot fully participate in society, based on their gender, sexuality, age, nationality and ethnicity)
4. Land Rights & Environment (indigenous communities, which regularly face the loss of their traditional land due to the arrival of large projects and multinationals)

Some PBI ‘satelites’ like the one in The Netherlands also do local work in addition to international work. PBI Netherlands participates in the Shelter City project in Utrecht, a project coordinated by Justice and Peace. In The Netherlands there are 13 shelter cities, of 22 cities in total around the world (yet none in North-America or Oceania, at the moment of writing, early 2024). Temporary shelter of up to 3 months, training and security are offered to human rights defenders such as journalists, community leaders, lawyers, artists and scientists, who fight human rights violations in their home countries.

Nonviolent Peaceforce has a very similar approach to PBI. PBI works extensively in South America, plus Kenya, India and Nepal, while NP works in Iraq, South Sudan, Philippines and Myanmar. CPT is somewhat smaller, Christian (inspired by the Mennonites and Quakers) and works in Palestine, Iraqi Kurdistan, Colombia and the Greek island of Lesbos. A unique part of their work is ‘solidarity networking’, collaboration with individuals and organizations working on change. This is how the Aegean Migrant Solidarity network was created.

There are also smaller lesser known teams that work more locally, such as the DCpeaceteam and Meta Peaceteam in the US, EAPPI in Palestine and others. Do your own research and find out who is working in this field! A world without war is possible. For example, take a look at World Beyond War.

photo of a training of NP in South Sudan, used with permission.