Transitional justice as education: A feminist network for empowering truth commissions

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Colombia's Commission for the Clarification of Truth, Coexistence and Non-Repetition is tasked with investigating the truth behind one of the world's longest running armed conflicts. In its preparatory phase, the Commission has been attentive to lessons learned from truth commissions around the world, of which there have now been more than forty. It introduces a number innovative practices, positioning it as an important part of Colombia's wider transitional justice process and of its chances to build a lasting peace. Too often, truth commissions (TCs) have left engagement with formal and informal education until the end of their work, missing out on opportunities to engage the wider population in their work and to effect change in mind-sets and educational processes. Likewise, many TCs have included women's experiences of violence only narrowly or have approached gender as a discrete theme, unconnected to the rest of the TC's work. The Colombian TC is determined not to repeat these mistakes. However, like the Colombian peace process more generally, the TC faces significant challenges - polarised public opinion around peace, as demonstrated by the no victory in the 2016 referendum on the peace deal between the government and the FARC; rising rates of violence and active conflict regions of the country; and an upcoming Presidential election that may jeopardise the peace process. As they begin their work, Truth Commissioners and TC staff working on gender and pedagogy are bound to confront daily challenges of a high stakes, emotional, and exhausting stakes endeavour to collect the testimonies of up 50,000 Colombians affected by conflict.This network seeks to support the gender and pedagogy work of the Colombian TC, ensuring that the TC is able to make a significant contribution to embedding a gender just and inclusive peace in Colombia. Using tools from the arts and humanities in feminist methodologies, affective agency, and transformative pedagogy, the network will connect Colombian truth commissioners and their teams with inspirational feminist leaders, who have led and learned from TC experiences elsewhere. These former Truth Commissioners are peace activists, human rights advocates, indigenous leaders, educators, and dignitaries - they will share their experiences being part of truth commissions from South Africa to Canada and Timor Leste to Peru, and they will support and offer strategic advice on the gender and pedagogy work of the Colombian TC, through a series of workshops and travel visits.The project will collect the experiences and reflections of these inspirational leaders through a series of peer interviews, that will also feed into the supportive relational work of the project. These will be used to produce an interactive website aimed at future feminist peace activists and leaders around the world, which shares the life histories, advice and inspiration of these incredible individuals. The network will have impact at a number of levels, including for: 1) the individuals who make up the network and draw energy and inspiration from it for their important transitional justice work; 2) the success of the Colombian truth commission and its contribution to peace in Colombia; 3) international TC and transitional justice best practice; and 4) sharing and developing theoretical tools around affective agency and transformative pedagogy in transitional justice.