OST and violent conflict (long)

[Michael M Pannwitz]

Dear Gil,
there is something striking about your mail: you make a strong case
for the limits of open space while at the same time reporting of the
enormous training in  and use of  ost in your country. My feeling is
that focusing on the actual practice and use of ost is what will be
of value in the long run. Lets dwell less on where it might not be
possible to use it.
>From Berlin I send best wishes for your work!
michael

--Original Message Text---
From: Gilbert Brenson-Lazan
Date: Sat, 27 Apr 2002 11:01:16 -0500

Good Morning all:

Until now I have remained silent regarding the use of OST in the case
of civil conflict and violence, specifically in the case of treaty
negociations en Colombia where there are a multiplicity of factors
and actors, both armed and unarmed.  At this time, however, I feel
both the need to share our learnings and the authority to do so, as I
have lived and worked in Colombia for over thirty years, the last ten
years of which I have taught OST to hundreds of grad students and
have opened spaces in over one hundred social systems in Latin
America, most of which involved serious conflict.  We are also
currently training and mentoring several teams of facilitators in
community development and refugee management in the Colombian war
zones.

First and foremost, I can only agree in part with Harrison´s
statement that OS is pretty much the same in conflict-violence
situations as it is in "normal" situations.  We have very
successfully used OST in many conflict situations in companies, NGOs,
communities and governmental agencias.  Our learning, however, is
that there is a point in the process of escalation of a conflict
(Glasl, Gnass and Brenson, 1998) in which OST ceases to be a viable
option, simply because there is no shared need to be agreed upon or
met, only the "need" to destroy one another. This has also been borne
out by the excellent work of ICA-Canada in the development of
strategies of facilitating conciliation.

In our experience in violent conflict situations, when there does not
exist an awareness or recognition of a common need shared by a
critical mass of participants,  the space rapidly degenerates into a
launching pad for mutual attacks, retaliations and even greater
polarization, because, from the beginning, that was the hidden agenda
of so many of the participants. Even in the Incan Empire, where open
space techniques were successfully used by the Mitimaes
"facilitators" over 1500 years ago, the "Minga" and the "Tequio" were
never used when the conflicts reached a certain "temperature"
(translation of the Quechua word used).

It might be thought that this would not be a problem if the sponsors
arrived at an agreement beforehand and that has, in fact,  been the
case in some  situations.  However, in others, the "agreement" is "De
dientes pa´fuera"  (From the teeth out) and it behooves us to
remember that "agreement" has different meanings in different
cultures. Just last weekend, two dear friends and clients of ours,
the Governor of the Antioquia Province and his Advisor on Peace (a
former a Colombian Defense Minister) were on a peaceful citizens
march for non-violence.  As they approched the last town on their
schedule, a messenger from one of the guerrilla groups approached the
almost 1000 marchers and informed them  that the FARC Guerrilla
Movement would not allow the march to continue unless the Governor
agreed to sit down and negociate with the local Guerrilla leader in a
nearby village.  The Governor, his Advisor and a half dozen clergy
and leaders of the social pastorate willingly went with the messenger
with the best intentions to negociate.  Once they arrived, they were
immediately informed that by order of the National Guerrilla
Headquarters they were to be held prisoners of the FARC.  All but one
of the priests were released and the last one, the Provincial
Chaplain, was released the following day to tell the tale and to
carry demands for capitulation to the Colombian President. No word
has been received in the last week on the condition of the Governor
or his Advisor, who now are a part of the list of thousands of
kidnapped citizens in Colombia.

Regarding the specific case of the Colombian situation, there is no
black and white and not even a couple of shades of gray.  There are
dozens and dozens of conflicting social, political, commercial,
international and criminal interests simultaneously at work, some
intent on physically annihilating some of the others for a variety of
reasons: power, revenge, money, drug trading, arms dealing, etc.  The
rest of Colombia is in the middle of this multiple crossfire.

I can certainly see an effective use of OST with the GOs,
International and National NGOs and Civil Society to bring them
together to generate effective estrategies.  I can certainly see an
effective use of OST to bring concerned citizens together.   I cannot
see OST as a useful intervention in the communities in the war zone,
since any gathering of even a small group of citizens can and does
easily provoke a guerrilla, paramilitary or military attack. Nor can
I see its usefulness in conversations in another country between
leaders of the different armed camps whose only declared intent and
reason for existence is to kill one another.  That has been going on
for years now, with some of the best negotiators from around the
world, but with no results.

I hope I am wrong.

Warm regards,

Gil



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    AMAUTA INTERNATIONAL, LLC
     Bogotá, Colombia - St. Paul, MN
 Gilbert Brenson-Lazan - Socio-Gerente
  Tel: (+57-1) 345-2724 - Fax: 345-2072
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         e-mail: <gbl at amauta.org>
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Michael M Pannwitz
Draisweg 1
12209 Berlin, Germany
FON +49 - 30-772 8000     FAX +49 - 30-773 92 464
Fax2mail: 49-30-263 917 301 521
www.michaelMpannwitz.de

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