Many people, who live in communities within the borders of South Africa and who live in neighbouring countries and beyond, live without a sense of belonging and a sense of pride.  

What can be done to make tomorrow better?  Governments all over the world cannot keep up with the growing demand for health, education, training, safety and security – the fundamental rights of all human beings. 

What practical steps can be taken to ensure that it is not only the wealthy nations and communities that benefit from development?  World-wide, the resources to address the needs of all people are lacking.

In the mid 1990s the Community Peace Programme, believing that all human beings have the knowledge and the ability to manage their own environment, responded to this challenge.  A system of action was implemented which involved poor community members gathering together in a facilitative environment to resolve disputes and agree on workable and effective plans of future-orientated action. 

Over more than a decade, the Community Peace Programme has built a widely replicable model of local governance, centered on the activities of a network of “Peace Committees” in 180 sites across South Africa.  In addition to facilitating PeaceMaking and PeaceBuilding initiatives, the programme is  responsible for documenting, analysing and reflecting critically over processes and practices, and circulating the results to a variety of audiences.  The programme has reached further afield than South Africa and has been adopted in Argentina, Canada, Australia, Brazil and Uganda to date.

An efficient three-day average resolution time and the 99% success rate in finding a solution that determines a plan of action are factors contributing to the success of the Peace Committee model.   Due to the success of this model, Peace Committees have become a valuable resource in the communities they serve.