Sustaining the Change

Keeping momentum and ultimately reaching sustainability is one of the challenges faced by practitioners and scholars in the field of social transformation. Sustaining the change accomplished is a critical factor in enacting social transformation; this chapter addresses this matter. For social change to be sustained there needs to be a combination of approaches from capacity building in the actors involved to institutional and structural support. This can be achieved by developing support networks that mutually share the attributes needed for continued success. In this chapter, the authors explore how building and mapping out networks from the lens of sustainability is pivotal, and how this contributes to growing their effectiveness. Moreover, building and further developing what Dr. Fisher-Yoshida calls communities of practice, is part of the approach they suggest as they engage with social transformation processes that can be sustained both in space and in time.

Monitoring and Evaluation

This chapter focuses on how monitoring and evaluation plays a pivotal role in the design and execution of initiatives leading up to social transformation. The work evidences that measuring effectiveness is one of the biggest challenges that many social change organizations face; this chapter addresses this issue. It explores and suggests qualitative and quantitative methods to track progress and how to measure growth. Among these methods is a narrative analysis tool that the authors have developed to evidence the ways in which a person's story of self, or the story of a group, transforms overtime. The methods suggested here respond to both local needs and global measures of success, such as the United Nations' sustainable development goals. Conceptually, this section draws from the notions of participatory action monitoring and evaluation as discussed by Chevalier and Buckles, and of the power relations that mediate processes of evaluation discussed by Chapela and Jarillo.

Transforming Through the Arts

The work of scholars and practitioners working in the field of peacebuilding and social transformation is equally art and craft. The arts have a social function that goes beyond its aesthetic nature as they have historically served as powerful tools for social transformation. These are acts of creation that are the results of rigor and intention. This chapter offers a discussion on how communities in Medellin have used the arts as tools for creating moments of creativity that have led to social transformation. To make sense of this, the authors use Lederach's suggestion to center simplicity when thinking about peacebuilding initiatives, as well as his use of Haiku as an analogy to how we, as scholars and practitioners of peacebuilding and social transformation, should approach our work.

Dealing With Unintended Consequences

Well-intentioned interventions can sometimes have negative or, if you will, undesired effects. Because the overall approach of this book is systemic in nature, the authors devoted some time to discuss “unintended consequences” and to suggest some ways to anticipate them and in cases circumvent them. This chapter addresses some of the unintended consequences that happen when intervening in a dynamic social environment. It provides examples of how unexpected outcomes and side effects that overshadow positive contributions take place as people and organizations design and execute social interventions. Though not all unintended consequences are negative; here they share a case where the unintended consequences were positive and desirable, which allows them to argue that unintended consequences can be both positive and negative. In this chapter, they draw heavily on dynamical systems theory as understood by Coleman, and on the coordinated management of meaning theory, as suggested by Pearce.

Grasping the Context

Nothing happens in isolation and there is always history and spatiality that mediate the present state of affairs. Social conflicts are historical and geographical in nature, and in order to explore them and transform them, it is necessary to have a method. This chapter offers such a method. Drawing from ethnographic approaches from anthropology, and from practical methods such as Theory U and dynamical systems theory (DST), this chapter offers a dedicated study of a conflict area (Medellin, Colombia), and of how peace knowledge emerges from it. By peace knowledge the authors refer to contextual knowledge of specific peacebuilding and peacekeeping strategies that are rooted and specific to particular cultures and societies. This chapter discusses the method that they have developed to engage with social contexts to both identify the ways communities respond peacefully to conflicts, and to elicit culturally sensitive practices that have the potential to transform violent conflicts.

Developing Self-Awareness

Understanding the relationship between the particular and the general is pivotal to understand and bring about social change. In this chapter, the authors focus on the development of self-awareness and using “self as instrument of change.” They have evidenced that as people become aware of their self-transformation, their impetus to transform their most immediate community increases. Also, when the self-transformation of a community member is evidenced by the rest, that person is conceived as possessing a moral authority that legitimizes his or her role as a leader. In fact, when working in communities transitioning out of conflict, we need to be the best version of who we are so that we can relate with authenticity to develop trusting relationships. The authors draw from the concept of mystery included in the coordinated management of meaning (CMM) theory, as well as from Carol Dweck's discussion on the difference between growth mindset and fixed mindset.

Doing Fieldwork From a Distance

The content of this chapter responds to the current historical circumstances as we continue to move towards remote learning, research, and practice. The focus here is conducting fieldwork remotely. Many of us do not live locally where we conduct the majority of our fieldwork and so we need to develop and rely on a variety of ways to stay connected through means other than being in the same geographical location. In addition, as we experience the Covid-19 pandemic, it becomes necessary to think about the possible reconfigurations that will result from this, especially for those conducting fieldwork. This chapter offers a discussion on the constraints that doing fieldwork remotely represents, and also the opportunities and added value that emerge when doing fieldwork from a distance. Here they discuss the limitations for constructing and sustaining rapport with communities when working remotely, and also the value that it has in terms of security and time.

Developing a Process

Community-based processes responding to social conflicts tend to originate organically, and because they adapt to the fluctuating nature of communities, they are “messy.” The authors' fieldwork has found that one of the biggest challenges youth and community leaders face in transforming their communities is in developing a process for their work. This chapter offers a discussion on how to set goals and desired outcomes, identify the resources needed, and then figure out the steps that need to be taken to get there. They draw from concrete experiences that have produced desired outcomes, and from the lessons learned from those experiences, they offer methods to enhance already established initiatives and projects, and to give birth to new ones. Conceptually, this chapter includes discussions on the centrality of interpersonal and community dialogues as understood by Pearce and Buber, as well as on the implications of the development and limitations of resilience by Schein.

Building Relationships

The quality of our relationships determines, to a large extent, the quality of our life and the life of our community. This chapter offers a discussion that elucidates the centrality of relationships and of relationship building in processes of social transformation. In this discussion, the authors shed light on the ways trust between community stakeholders is built over time and the highly sophisticated embedded processes of collaboration. Rapport, as shown in this book, is pivotal to co-create systemic and long-term processes of social transformation, and this section of the book is devoted to this discussion. Conceptually, this chapter draws from Coleman's understanding on dynamical systems and the implication of networks in peacebuilding, and on Lederach's concept of the moral imagination and the effects of collective power.

Learning About Others

There is a necessary linkage between understanding the “self” by understanding the “other.” This chapter offers concrete experiences of “being the Other,” “being Othered,” “Othering,” and in general, getting to know and work with other people in processes of social transformation. Conceptually, the authors draw from social constructivism (Gergen) and theories of power (Deutsch) as a way to elucidate the array of how “self” and “other” is constructed collectively through social relationships mediated by power. This chapter discusses the process whereby social conflicts have roots in power relationships that hierarchize identities, rendering some as dominated and others as dominant, and how this produces personal and social struggles that have powerful transformative effects. This chapter offers the story of Son Batá, a group of Afro-Colombian artists and community leaders, that in their exploration of their personal and social identity have deeply transformed their community.