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     Please share with us what you are doing relating to nonviolent change. If you send us a short report of your doings, learnings, ideas, concerns, reactions, queries,  we will print them here.  Responses can be published in the next issue.

Darling G. Villena-Mata:

Hello dear people.  This will be my last act as co-editor for the journal. I want to thank Steve, Robert, and Marilee for their ongoing work and spirit of volunteerism in putting this journal together.  Steve, in particular, thank you for your lead and guidance of this journal.  My practice in trauma work and in hypnosis continues.  I am available for consultation, training, and speaking engagements in the areas of trauma, conflict resolution, and multicultural/diversity issues affected by societal traumas. My focus continues to be from a wholistic perspective about conflict dissolution and peace creation. The effects of transgenerational and intergenerational traumas, activated by current situations will affect the long-term dissolution of conflicts.

For the upcoming May16-18  meeting of the 19th Annual Meeting of the Research/Study Team on Nonviolent Large Systems Change in Lisle, Illinois, U.S.A., I will be presenting and facilitating discussion of the long-term psychological and transgenerational (physiological) effects of trauma on resolving conflict between members of perceived opposing parties. I will further discuss how perception of abuse and abuser contributes to the human body's desire to maintain active at some level "fight, flight, freeze" immune and behavioral responses toward people and situations perceived as life threatening, thereby making any conflict resolution short-term if at best. Without addressing *how* to create a healing bridge for all parties concern as well as understanding the psychological and physiological impediments to peace (both internally in the body and externally with communities), conflict dissolution may not occur for any long-lasting basis. The presentation and discussion is discussed in my book, Walking Between Winds: A Passage Through Societal Trauma and Its Healing --Discrimination's Impact on Love, Safety, Health, and Conflict. If you are not able to make it to the meeting and wish to have me speak for your group or institution, please feel free to contact me. You can reach me at circlepoint@earthlink.net

 
Steve Sachs:

As Leah and I are in the middle of our multi-trip move to Albuquerque, I am increasingly concerned about the combination of the providing of misinformation and secrecy on the part of the Bush administration. Just after the 9/11 destruction of the World Trade Center, the administration stopped the Environmental Protection Agency from reporting that the collapse of the towers had spread a great deal of toxic material that made the air in the surrounding area dangerous to breath for some time, contributing to the health problems of people, who believed the doctored EPA reports stating that the air was safe, and who entered or remained in the contaminated area without breathing masks. Recently, the Office of Management and Budget (OMB), which answers directly to the White House, reacted to complaints about the administration's manipulating EPA's post Towers collapse reports by proposing that all reports relating to emergencies should be made by it, rather than the individual agencies whose technical staffs professionalism is often sufficient to prevent such political manipulation. For the most politicized agency in the national government to control all information coming from federal agencies concerning serious situations would clearly be dangerous to American citizens, and to democracy, especially under a presidency that has demonstrated a particularly strong tendency to misinform. Moreover, this kind of political control of information would undermine the credibility of the government. One need only remember that during much of the communist period in Poland, virtually no Polish citizen believed what the government said. But because the government was untrustworthy, any rumor, no matter how implausible, was given credence by many.

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These articles and opinions of the authors do not constitute the endorsement of Nonviolent Change nor its publisher, Organization Development Institute, or any of its staff, nor of CirclePoint which is housing the Nonviolent Change Journal.

©2002.2003, 2004.  All rights reserve. The Nonviolent Change Journal is published by the Research/Action Team on Nonviolent Large Systems Change - an interorganizational and international project of The Organization Development Institute.

Permissions: Reposting and reprints are encouraged, as long as proper source acknowledgement is given. As a courtesy, please let us know that you are reprinting or electronically reposting. It helps us know of the interest level. Thank you.