The 2012 edition of the Training on Leadership, Conflict Management and Mediation Skills for Electoral Stakeholders (LEAD) was organised by ECES, the Barcelona International Peace Resource Center (BIPRC), the Center for Creative Leadership – Leadership Beyond Boundaries (CCL-LBB) in Barcelona on the 10-14 December 2012. The training was implemented with contributions from MediatEUr and Osservatorio di Pavia.
The course was attended by representatives of the the Iraqi and Georgian electoral commisions and of more than 35 participants from Kenya, Poland, Indonesia, Sudan, Nepal, Lithuania, Costa Rica, Zimbabwe, Cameroon, Togo, Afghanistan, Alegria, Haiti, Pakistan, Spain, Sierra Leone, Burundi, Nigeria, Italy and Spain.
The overall objective of the five day LEAD workshop was to look into ways in which representatives of electoral stakeholders could improve their leadership skills and take on board means for preventing and/or mitigating the escalation of election-related violence and conflict throughout the respective electoral cycles.
Besides developing new approaches in conflict prevention that took on board both leadership development excercises and conflict prevention strategies, ECES and MediatEur worked as well on the inclusion of effective and efficient mediation mechanisms in the training curriculum.
The Training Agenda was divided as follows:
DAY 1: Introduction to Election Management and Election-Related Violence: Participants were introduced to the fundmaental concepts of election and conflict management. They analysed the importance of individual behaviours in the management of high-tension situation through the screenening, and following analysis, of the movie An African Election.
DAY 2: Addressing the trigger of conflict in the long run to elections: the second day focused on how to implement strategies that in the long run can prevent the eruption of election-related violence. The sessions during the day focused on fundmanetal leadership development excercises such as the social identity, the mental models, the learning curve. Additionally, several sessions have focused on Conflict Analysis, Managment and conflict resolution mechanisms.
DAY 3: Getting closer to elections: responding to alerts: the third day focused on how to respond to violence when it suddendly erupts. Participants learned how to interpret and manage the VUCA world and were introduced to the fundamental approaches in conflict mediation as well as to the most powerful early-warning tools.
DAY 4: Media, Elections and Conflict: The day revolved around the role of Media during elections and on theit importance as actor in the defusing tense situations and decreasing the potential for hate speeches.
DAY 5: Sustainability of violence prevention: Participants worked on the importance of ensuring that every approach to the prevention of violence and to the management of election is sustainable and effective.
