JAKARTA — Peace must be built through agreement, relationships, and understanding. Differences in views, beliefs, and identities do not always have to end in sameness, but can open space for dialogue in which people listen to and understand one another.
This was elaborated by Phoebe Milliken, Director of the Master of Peacebuilding at Hartford Inernational University for Religion and Peace, in a public lecture held in cooperation with the Center for Global Peace and Conflict Resolution (CGPCR) of Hasanuddin University.
Milliken explained that peacebuilding is not only about efforts to stop conflict. The concept is a process of building understanding, skills, and relationships amid diversity. Experiential education in peace learning can be an alternative step toward understanding and preventing conflict. Theory, Milliken said, needs to be supported by direct experience, cohort development, and engagement with communities.
“Peace is not enough to learn only in the classroom. We need to practice it, interact with others, and learn from experience,” explained Milliken.
One of the skills Milliken discussed was reflective listening and paraphrasing. This approach gives participants room to directly understand the dynamics of communication, difference, and conflict in social life.
Listening, Milliken said, is not just waiting for a chance to give an answer, but an effort to understand what others say and experience. “Sometimes, a person just wants to feel heard and understood,” Milliken said.
In conflict resolution practice, the ability to listen and paraphrase can help reduce misunderstandings and open space for more constructive communication.
From this perspective, peacebuilding does not stop at resolving conflict, but also includes the practice of building trust and relationships between people in everyday life.
These views were shared at a public lecture titled Global Perspective on Peacebuilding: Building Peace Across Differences through Interreligious Dialogue and Global Peacebuilding, held by Hasanuddin University at the Unhas Jakarta Campus on Saturday (22 August). (*/aya)
Editor: Ishaq Rahman
This article is an English translation of the original Indonesian report.