Community engagement is at the core of our peacebuilding work. We work with community stakeholders to strengthen local ownership and ensure meaningful participation in project activities. We create inclusive spaces where community members actively participate in peacebuilding and prevention of conflicts and violent extremism. Given the divergent needs of people affected by conflict, such as in the communities where we work, we begin our peacebuilding project cycle by carrying out an assessment in search of evidence that guides our peacebuilding activities. We do this by conducting key informant interviews with community leaders, focus group discussions, and quantitative surveys with community members to understand the issues in the community and how they affect different demographics. Activities under this thematic area are not only limited to youth but also include men and women, addressing their different needs. For instance, the agency of women as mediators and peacebuilders is often excluded in mediation and conflict-resolution processes, while they perpetrate almost no violence. These are some of the issues that our work addresses.

Under this theme, we equally identify and strengthen peacebuilding and conflict prevention structures in the rural communities where we work. We train members of these structures on topics such as non-violent communication, conflict resolution, violence interruption, how to separate observations from judgments, express needs without accusation, and focus on mutual interests to resolve conflicts. These trainings use role-playing exercises based on past local incidents. We work with these structures to develop protocols to intervene quickly after incidents, identify high-risk individuals, and deploy respected community figures to prevent retaliatory actions through targeted mediation before conflicts escalate.