OK, welcome everyone. We're just waiting there for people to file in virtually into our virtual room. Welcome to an event hosted by the Department of War Studies, specifically the Conflict Research Conflict Development Research Group, Conflict Security Development Research Group. Delighted to welcome today's speaker who's spoken at the department before about her previous book and that is Professor Severine Otisair. Severine's known to many of us for her past research on peace building, her book Peace Land, which is, Severine came to speak to us about before. And we're very excited to have Severine come today to talk about her new book, The Frontlines of Peace. As many of you know, Severine is a professor of political science at Barnard College in Columbia University, but also writes other articles, including media pieces as well for outlets such as New York Times, Washington Post, Foreign Affairs. So Severine is going to talk to us for between maybe 40 minutes to an hour. And then we're going to have some comments, some reflections from my colleague Dr Christine Cheng, also in the Department of War Studies. Christine's been reading through Severine's book, so it'll be really interesting to hear some of those thoughts. And then you will have an opportunity to ask questions. What I would like you to do is to put any questions you have in the dedicated Q&A box that you should see down there on Zoom. If you type your questions in, you can do that during the talk or you can wait until we come to questions. I will then put as many of those as I can in our allocated time to Severine, and we'll try and get through those. If you can do me a huge favour and keep your questions relatively concise, please know small novels, and also good to make them questions. I mean, comments are always interesting, but ideally we can focus on the questions that you might have, make the most out of our time. So it will be Severine to begin, then fall by Christine, and then I'll come back and I'll put some questions to our speaker. So without further ado, Severine, pleasure to have you again. Thank you for joining us, and the floor is yours. Thank you so much, Ciaran, for this very kind introduction and for inviting me to speak with all of you today. I'm really, really thrilled to be back at King's College London. I have wonderful memories of every time I've been there, especially the last time when I came to present the book and to launch my second book. So, I mean, it's only virtual and I'm looking forward to seeing all of you in person again post-pandemic, but in the meantime, I'm absolutely thrilled to be talking with you, especially because I understand that thanks to the virtual format, we actually have people joining us from all over the world, which is absolutely fantastic. As for me, I'm joining you as you can probably see from my home in New York City. Due to the pandemic, I'm still not really allowed to work from my office or on campus, but it doesn't matter, because I'm absolutely thrilled to talk with you about my new book, The Frontlines of Peace, and now you should be seeing my slides if someone can nod to Christine or Ciaran. Okay, fantastic. So, The Frontlines of Peace is a book about hope. It's a book about the ordinary and yet extraordinary individuals and communities that have no effective ways to confront violence. And so, to start, I'd like to tell you a story about this kind of people. It's a story that takes place in Congo in the midst of one of the deadliest conflicts since World War II. In 2007, a little boy named Luca was kidnapped and forced to work for a non-group and for rebels just like the ones that you see in my photo.  Somehow, Luca survived and after three years with the armed group, the militia commanders released him and they sent him back home to his mother, Justin. But Luca had trouble assimilating. He hated school. He was often hungry because his mum didn't have much money and he still believed what his commanders had drilled into him, that the only way to survive was to use violence. So, Luca kept running away to join militia. The only time he felt safe was when he had a gun in his hands. He was a child and this was the only life that he knew. Meanwhile, in the United States, a young Indian American woman named Victoria Chakor was working for various aid organisations focused on Congo. And Victoria was going very uncomfortable with her work because her colleagues used the traditional top-down approach to peace-building. They relied on outsider skills and expertise and, as a result, they ended up harming the very people that they wanted to help. So, for instance, most of them believed that violence in Congo was due to the illegal exploitation of mineral resources, like Colton, which the young men in my photo are mining. So, they spent their time and efforts advocating for new laws on conflict minerals, but the new legislations cost many vulnerable people their jobs and these people then had to join armed groups in order to survive. So, whenever Victoria travelled to Congo, she started asking ordinary citizens what they believed. Would lead to peace and that's a photo of her doing just that. And eventually, she decided to try something in the village where Justin and Luca were living. So, in partnership with local activists, Victoria organised lengthy meetings and workshops so that the residents would develop their own analysis of their community's conflict and agree on the most feasible answers. And the first part of that plan was for Victoria and her fellow activists to give out $40 each to a few village women, including Justin, who used the money to start small businesses like Telloring or Donald Trump. Businesses are the kinds that you see in my photos. The businesses took off and eventually the participants had enough money to implement the second part of that plan. So, they installed tabs for clean drinking water and they organised trainings for the teachers to learn how to curb ethnic violence rather than fueling it. And eventually, they lobbied authorities for protection and better services. So, Luca now had three meals a day, shoes without holes and role models who didn't use violence to survive and gain power. And like Luca, all of the villagers were safer and they were healthier. And one day, Victoria was talking with Justin and Justin kept using the word success to refer to the whole initiative. It was because Luca had turned 13 and for the first time in his life, he was speaking in the future tense. He had stopped running away all the time and he was making plans, peaceful plans within his community. He now wanted to hold a pencil instead of a gun. And now you see where the artist has found her inspiration for the cover of my book. As for Victoria, she decided to create the Resolve Network, which has used this approach to have more than 7,000 people over the past 10 years. All individuals at risk of being recruited by own groups and more than half of them for more combatants like Luca. Militias have formed and we formed in Congo. The pressure to remobilise has been enormous, but not a single person participating in the Resolve programmes has either started or gone back to fighting. And to me, this story is inspiring. It's also very telling because there are big differences between the way most peace building organisations work and what Victoria did. So to start, Victoria decided to build peace from the grassroots by relying on insiders instead of always focusing on the needs and leaders based in capital cities and headquarters. And even more importantly, Victoria didn't come and boost her beliefs and that way she avoided doing more harm than good. Unlike so many people before her, Victoria was humble. She was respectful and she put ordinary citizens in the driver's seat.  I formed them within many different organisations in many different countries. And the work that they do is incredibly important because unfortunately there are many people who face the kind of terrible circumstances that Justin and Luca faced. As you know, more than one and a half billion people live under the threat of violence in nearly 50 conflict zones around the world. In just the past five years, wars have spawned the worst refugee crisis since World War II. So peace building is a crucial task for many states and international institutions. And when I say peace building, I really mean any and all actions that have promote peace before, during and after a conflict. The thing is that our templates and techniques for approaching war and peace just don't work. Afghanistan, Colombia, Congo, Syria, Ukraine, Myanmar, we've heard the same story many times before. It was violence. The United Nations got involved. Donald countries pledged millions in assistance. Warring parties called for ceasefires, designed agreements, held elections and the headlines for peace. And then a week or two later, sometimes just days later, violence cleared up again. Sometimes it had never actually ended and in many cases it lasted for years after. One of the statistics that I found in Christian's work that I thought was really, really illuminating is the statistic saying that more than half of all ongoing wars have already lasted for more than 20 years. And what I've seen in my own work is that inhabitants of war-torn countries and onlookers from the outside are fed up with the apparent inability of governments, peacekeepers and international institutions to end violence. And there has been plenty of discussion about what has gone wrong when we've tried to stop wars in the past. But now I think it's time to ask what has gone wrong. And it turns out that elections don't build peace and democracy itself may not be the golden ticket, at least not in the short term. Contrary to what most politicians preach, building peace doesn't require billions in aid and massive international interventions. Instead, it often involves giving power to ordinary citizens. Ultimately, many successful examples of peacebuilding in the past few years have involved innovative grassroots initiatives led by local people and are time supported by foreigners, often using methods shunned by the international elites. So, rather than focusing on abstract peace agreements, negotiations between government and rebel leaders or handshakes between presidents, the front lines of peace details the concrete everyday actions that actually make a difference on the ground. So you'll see some of these are bizarre, some are creative, some involve age-old traditions and some are just common sense. My book explains how peacebuilding can actually work so that we can finally improve the lives of billions of people. And I show that to end violence for more and also to address violent conflicts at home, we have to fundamentally change the way we view and build peace. And I made this argument by building on 20 years of work in 12 different conflict zones, the ones that you see now in red on my map, as well as more than 800 in-depth interviews that I conducted with peacebuilders, warlords, survivors, ordinary citizens, outside observers. So, for instance, if you look at the photos now on my slide, on the bottom right hand side, you see me conducting interviews. And on the bottom left, I'm conducting participant observations. I was patrolling with United Nations peacekeepers. And I was really happy that day. I thought, yay, I'm fitting in. I'm such a good ethnographer. But the thing is that I'm not a man. And there were only men on this military base. And also I felt that there was something wrong with my bulletproof jacket. I went patrolling with the peacekeepers for several hours and the bulletproof jacket was heavy. It was super uncomfortable. And it didn't protect my heart or any of my vital organs. And it's only when we were back to the base that one of the Indian officials told me, huh, you know you've been wearing it backwards. Anyway, I still got really good material that day. So in the book, I first tell the stories of ordinary people, grassroots activists and local leaders who did manage to make a difference in war zones. Then I describe the limitations of the conventional way to build peace, which I'm sure if you've taken any class with Christine or with Kieran, you've studied extensively. And for me, in the book, I call it Peace Inc. And so I describe the limitation of this conventional but problematic way to end war. And I show that Peace Inc relies on governments, elites and foreign peace builders and usually excludes local citizens and grassroots activists. And building on these stories, I suggest a better way to help re-establish peace in conflict zones. And the conclusion shows how the lessons from the book can help us address not only tensions in war zones around the world, but also political, religious or cultural conflicts in ostensibly peaceful places, like in North America, Europe, or like in New York and London. So to start, let me tell you the story of each week, which is quite literally an island of peace incant. For the past 25 years, one of the deadliest conflicts since World War II has reached around each week. And despite the presence of one of the largest and most expensive peacekeeping mission in the world, several million people have died and hundreds continue to die every day, but each week itself has avoided mass violence. So the island is stunningly beautiful, as you can see in the photo I took when I was there, but what makes the place even more not-worsy and the peace even more surprising is that the island contains all of the same preconditions for violence that have fueled generalized fighting in other ports of Congo. So you have a geo-strategic location. Each week is located right at the border between Congo and Rwanda, two countries that have been at war regularly since the 1990s. And we also have mineral resources, ethnic tensions, lack of state authority, extreme poverty, local conflicts of our land and traditional power, and many other features that have led to generalized fighting in the neighboring provinces. And what's fascinating about each week is that the island is peaceful because of the active everyday involvement of all of its citizens, including the ones that you see in my photos, and including the poorest and least powerful ones. So it's not the army, the state, or the police who managed to control tensions, and it's not fine peace builders either. It is the members of the community themselves. And they do this by fostering what they call a culture of peace, by organizing in grassroots structures and local associations that help resolve conflicts, and by drawing on very strong beliefs that help deter violence by both insiders and outsiders, such as blood packs. Blood packs are traditional promises between two parties who agree never to hurt each other. And so the story of each week shows us that local community resources can sometimes feel peace better than the usual elite agreements and outside interventions. And foreign peace builders can help in this process. So take the themes of the Life and Peace Institute in Congo. LPI is a Swedish peace building organization that is involved in various conflict zones and usually focuses on working at the grassroots. And the LPI Congo team relies on local expertise and they reject universal approaches to peace building. They rely on local employees supervised by a few foreigners and these foreigners often have extensive preexisting country knowledge. So LPI doesn't implement programs directly, but instead it works with and through if you handpick local organizations and the main role of these organizations is to support people on the ground. These local organizations empower local people to develop their own analysis of their community's conflict, agree on the most feasible answer, just like they're doing in the photo you know see on my slide, and then implement those solutions. So you see the difference with the usual way to build peace in conflict zones. In the LPI model it's not foreigners based in headquarters and capital cities who conceive, design and implement peace building programs. It's not national or provincial elites either and it's not the state or the government. Instead it is the intended beneficiaries and community members themselves including ordinary people who conceive, design and implement peace building programs with the help of LPI and its local partners. And I'm going to give you a concrete example so that you can see how this actually works in practice. So for several years there was a very deadly conflict in the plane in eastern Congo. It led to a lot of death, a lot of suffering and the involvement of local militias, Congolese groups and even the Ramadan government. And so in 2007 three Congolese organizations decided to address these tensions with the help of LPI. And so for three years they focused on understanding what the problem was. They organized a lot of small and large meetings and in these meetings they included everyone. Regular leaders, ministers, food soldiers, rebel combatants, ordinary citizens, farmers, civil society activists, women's groups etc. And that's a for example one of these meetings. And they progressively realized that the conflict was not so much a proxy war between Congo and Rwanda as we interveners sought at the time but rather it was a conflict between herders and farmers because cattle often destroyed crops. The farmers retaliated by killing the herders. The herders families reached out to local militias who went on to attack the farmers communities and so on and so forth. So all of the people involved, the combatants, the ordinary citizens, they all designed solutions that they thought would work to address the problems that they viewed at the root of the conflict. And so on and so forth. So all of the people involved, the combatants, worked to address the problems that they viewed at the root of the violence. So for instance, they established troops for moving cattle with minimal disruption to farmers. They also erected public signposts to clearly mark the past that the herders should take with their cattle. They also established mediation committees in which representatives of both herders and farmers would smooth out any tensions that may arise because you know with cattle you can always make sure they stay on the right path. So to make a very long story short, of course there were issues, challenges and setbacks but while all of the elite agreements and large peace conferences had never really made a difference before, local residents saw tangible results once LPI and its local partners got involved. For several years, the seasonal migration of cattle took place with very little violence. Dozens of militiamen handed in their weapons and communities that were fighting slowly started working together. They started sharing the same market, for instance. So outsiders can help, we established peace. But the catch is that to really help, they can't continue acting as they usually do. Because there are countless limitations with the conventional way to build peace, which again I'm sure you've talked about a lot extensively with Christine and Karen and which in this book I call Peace Inc and which relies on governments, elites and foreign peace builders and usually excludes grassroots activists and ordinary citizens. The Peace Inc conventional approach to peace buildings relies on many detrimental and really misleading assumptions like the idea that only top-down intervention can end on violence. And if you haven't read Christine's work on this topic, I highly recommend it. I've been using it extensively in that part of my argument. Also the idea that all good things come together and here I'm like a big shout out to Karen's work, which is fascinating when you think about this topic. And there are other people who show that this idea that elections, for instance, will naturally lead to peace is highly, highly problematic. And there is also this idea that only outsiders have the required skills and expertise to build peace. So let me tell you the story of all my my own career in international aid got started. When I was 23, I got my very first job out of graduate school as assistant country director for Mid-Sunday Mould, doctors of the world in Crossable. So if you see my photo, that's me at the time. And next to me is my wonderful husband, Philip, whom I know some of you on this call know, and who owns the copyright of many of the photos that I'm showing you today. So when I arrived in Crossable, I didn't speak Albanian or serve operation.  I actually started reading my first book about the Balkans on the flight there. And sadly, I was coming from Paris, so the flight was too short and I never finished that book. But I got the job because I spoke decent English. I had a good training in political analysis, two fancy master's degrees and some field experience in a variety of both warplaces and developing countries. And in hindsight, I feel absolutely terrible when I think about my class of war assistant at the time. His name was Nereb. So my job was to analyse the political, security, humanitarian situation in Crossable and write reports for my supervisors. But it was Nereb who had the skills and expertise that I liked. Nereb had 20 years' experience analysing political and social issues. He had a tremendous knowledge of the Balkans, history, politics and culture. He had lived in Crossable all his life. He was also much older and much wiser than I was. But I was the outsider, so I was in charge. And the thing is, I had never supervised anyone in my life before. I was 23. So I had no idea how to deal with him and eventually I found a way to keep him busy. I asked him to compile and translate clippings from the local press. I can still see him every morning religiously posting his work on our bulletin board and none of my colleagues ever read it. Even I often didn't have the time to do so. This was such a waste of time, energy and talent. And the thing is that I realised afterwards that this was not a stroke of good luck for me and bad luck for Nereb. That was a typical situation for foreign peace builders. Most foreign peace builders assume that local people do not have what it takes to build peace, that they are incompetent, corrupt and violent, otherwise they wouldn't be at war. And by contrast, individuals believe that they have the required skills and expertise to build peace. Because to them, what makes a good peace builder is education and work experience in specialized topics like gender or human rights or election organisations. And if possible, having worked in a variety of conflict zones. And in contrast, although there are exceptions, the knowledge of country specialists is usually much less valued and the knowledge of local people is usually trivialized. The result is that in virtually all aid and peace building organisations, foreigners feel the management positions and local people make up the lower level staff. And the foreigners often don't speak the local languages and they often have no in-depth understanding of local societies, cultures and institutions. And the consequences are often disastrous. Well-meaning international efforts have led to an increase in violence in places from Afghanistan to Congo to many other countries. And I'm sure, again, if you've taken classes with Christine and Kieran, that you've actually talked about that already. And I want to tell you a story that to me encapsulates all of that. In 2003 or 2004, rebels to cover the city of Bukavu in eastern Congo, the town that you now see in my photo. And the rebels went on a looting, raping and killing spree. I was there at the time it was absolutely, absolutely terrifying. And at a point, a little boy, so several soldiers entered the house just next to his and he heard shouts and screams. It was obvious that the neighbor was about to be raped. So the man said to the little boy, go and seek help. So the little boy ran to seek help at the nearby peacekeeping base. But when he arrived, the sentry on duty was a Yuregweian soldier who didn't speak Swahili and didn't speak French. The little boy was panicking. He tried and tried to communicate with what's happening, but still the peacekeeper didn't understand. And finally, the sentry broke into a huge smile. He made a sign that, yes, I understand, please wait. He went inside the base and came back a few minutes later with a pack of cookies that he handed to the boy. Cookies. So, yes, outsiders do not always understand what's happening and relying on them exclusively can be really problematic. Another standard issue with our common approach to peace is that many conflicts revolve around political, social and economic stakes that are distinctively local. And when I say local, I really mean at the level of the individual, the family, the clan, the community. So our usual top-down approach that focuses on the leads and leaders in capital cities and headquarters is not and cannot be enough. And I realise that for the first time during one of my very first trips to Congo, it was more than 20 years ago and I met this woman who was my age. Her name was Isabel. Local militias had attacked Isabel's village. They had killed many men.  They had looted everything. And then they wanted to take Isabel, but her husband stepped in and he said, no, please, please don't take Isabel's technique instead. So he had gone to the forest with the militias and Isabel never saw him again. And the reason why militias had attacked Isabel's village was not because of anything related to international and national tensions like the war between Congo and Rwanda. No, it was because the rebels wanted to take the land that the villagers needed to cultivate food and to supply. Isabel's story has stayed in my mind all these years because it embatties the awful consequences of local conflicts that foreign peace builders so often ignore. And if you're interested and more than happy to elaborate on all of the problems with our standard approach to peace and peace building during the discussion, if you're interested. But again, I think that it's something that you're very familiar with because Christine and Karen has worked on this extensively. And so I'm sure that you've talked with them a lot about their work and about all of the problems. So what I want you to know is to use the 10 minutes or 15 minutes that I have left to show you how we can change that. Because we really need to focus on success stories instead of always focusing on challenges, problems and failures. So these past few years I've looked for cases of what I call unlikely peace. Places where everything conspires to cause violence and yet somehow you have peace, like in each week. And I've found places like that all over the world in Afghanistan, Colombia, Congo, Israel and the Palestinian territory, Somalia, for instance in the two villages right to the photos you now see on my slide. And the example that I like the best is the story of Somalia. So there is a really interesting contrast between on the one hand Somalia, which is extremely violent, has some of the highest rankings in some of the world's least desirable categories, most corrupt countries, second most failed state, etc. And on the other hand, you have this autonomous region in the north of Somalia that is called Somalia. That went through a devastating independence war with Somalia in the late 80s and in the 1990s. A war that actually destroyed more than 90% of all of the towns, some of which still haven't been fully rebuilt, as you can see in the photo I took when I was there a couple of years ago. But for the past 20 years, Somaliland has experienced little violence, little terrorism, and it now has a well functioning state, decent public services, as you can see in my photo of the capital, Hargeza, and even some kind of functioning democracy. So, of course, there are many reasons for this difference, but the key one is that the usual peaceing, top-down, outsider's-led approach prevailed in the rest of Somalia, while Somaliland benefited from sustained grassroots peace-building initiatives that were led by insiders, by Somalilanders themselves, just like the people you now see in my photos. And the case of Somaliland shows us that local people can help build peace not only on a small scale, like in Italy, but also over a large territory and a quasi-state. And the good news is that we can support this kind of efforts without falling into the same old-tired relationship between outsiders and insiders that I've told you about and without destroying local peace efforts, as interveners so often do, because they are role models we can learn from. In my research, I found a lot of out-of-the-box approaches by interveners who did manage to actually make a difference both at the highest level and on the front. And I talk a lot about these people in the front lines of peace. They are named Vitriae Ataco, Banu Altunbaz, James Canbury, Peter Van Holden, Le Mac Bowie. I could go on and on. They come from all over the world and they work for very different organisations in very different countries, but they have a few things in common. They don't believe that as outsiders they know better that they have the right theories, skills and expertise or that they know the ideal solutions to people's problems. Instead, they respect local residents, they listen to them and they are open-minded. They understand that other people may have a different understanding of peace, democracy, development and different priorities. They also know the local context one. They speak at least some of the local languages and they have extensive local networks. They stay on site for years, sometimes decades. They don't place themselves at the forefront of peace efforts and they don't put their logos everywhere, but instead they remain low-profile and the children spotlights on the achievements of their local partners, local authorities, local staff, local populations. They are flexible. They keep adapting their strategies based on the results and feedback that they get and the way the situation evolves. Lastly, they understand that sometimes there are hard choices to be made because all good things do not go together. Sometimes we may have to choose between worthy goals, for instance between peace and justice or peace and democracy. The best interveners understand that they shouldn't be the ones to make these choices. The people who have to live with the consequences of a decision should be the ones making it. By way of conclusion, there is one last thing that I want to mention. All of these ideas, all of these lessons from conflict zones can help us address not only tensions in war zones around the world, but also cultural, political, religious and ethnic conflicts in our own communities, whether we live in New York or in London or anywhere else in the world. So, for instance, take my own country. We all know that violence is rising in the United States, so thankfully it's nowhere near the level of violence that we see in Somalia or Congo. But still, there are three things that all of us, so all of us US citizens, but also all of us who live in Europe, in the UK, all over the world, all of us can learn so that we can improve the situations in our own communities. So, the first one is that we can develop personal, informal relationships with our opponents, whether they are political, cultural or religious opponents. It is by listening, talking and bonding of our shared interests that the residents of the zones of peace that I've told you about have managed to keep balance at bay, like my two friends have done here in each way. And this is also in the United States, the strategy used by people like Christian Picciolini, who's a former gang leader, and Gerald Davies, who's an African American jazz musician, by developing personal relationships with members of white extremist groups. Christian and Gerald have managed to convince hundreds of militants to renounce hatreds. So for us, sport clubs, religious groups, art associations, trade unions, these are all good places where we can start building common ground. We can also build on the specific, on our specific local cultures to help smooth out tensions. So you remember how the residents of each way and Somaliland filled on their specific customs and beliefs to decrease violence around them. Well, in the United States, my favorite story is that of people, a group of women in the south side of Chicago. So this group of women were absolutely fed up with seeing so much violence and bloodshed around them. So they decided to hang out on street corners. They brought holding chairs, and they sat on them for hours and hours.  So over time, the number of shootings and killings in their communities has decreased a lot. And the last thing we can all do is to support grassroots associations with time, money, efforts, whatever we can spare. You remember how important local grassroots associations were in helping build a heaven of peace in each way. Well, local associations have proven just as effective in other parts of the world. In other parts of the world. For instance, in the United States, the organization Cure Violence has managed to reduce shooting and killings by up to 73% in more than 20 cities. They also have very, very effective programs in the United Kingdom. And of the time, whether in the US, the United Kingdom, so wherever they were, they always rely on the same kind of insider bottom up approach that has worked so well in places like each way and so many. And so, of course, our Congress, administrations, governments, elected representatives also have an important role to play because, as we all know, real peace lasts only when built both from the top down and from the bottom up. But whether at home or abroad, the essential point is that we need many more individuals like Justine and Bechaya, and like the inhabitants of each way and so many. We certainly need more organizations that work like we solve Cure Violence and the Life and Peace Institutes and more programs that follow the basic principles that I've told you about. Because it's with individuals and programs like these that we can help the one and a half billion people who live under the threat of violence in conflict zones, and that we can also improve the situations in our own communities. And so, of course, all of these ideas are not magic ones. But because they take into account deeply rooted causes of conflict, they can definitely be game changers. And so, if you want to know more about all of that, please feel free to ask a question now. Q&As are always my favorite part of these kind of discussions. You can also follow me afterwards on social media. Note that I'm the most active on Twitter, but I use the other platforms like Instagram and Facebook regularly. You can find the full text on free access of all of my articles on my webpage, severinautosture.com, along with a lot of resources that you may enjoy. And, of course, my three books have a lot more stories, details and ideas about everything that we're discussing today. And I actually consider the front lines of peace to be the best of my three books. So I'd be really honoured if you would check it out. Thank you so much, everyone. I'm very much looking forward to Christine's comments and then to the discussion with you. Okay, so severin, thank you. Thank you for such a great book talk. Thank you for such a great book. I think it's really different from your previous books. And we've actually talked about why that is. There's a lot more of you, obviously, in this book. And it's a book that is, and Karen and I were saying this earlier on to Danny, that this is actually a really wonderfully accessible book. And let me just say a couple of words, just thinking about your previous work and this work. So I think, as scholars, we have a tendency to critique. And you've cast that critique as the peace ink critique within this book. And I think the interesting thing is that you really emphasise that we should look to how we can change things actually and not just look at the negative and really, really think about the positive. And as you said at the beginning, I really do feel like this is much more a book of hope. And I have to say, I've struggled with this myself in a previous work. And people ask, well, you know, where are the stories that work? Where are the countries that work? Where are the success stories? And why were those places successes as compared to others? Right. And then trying to disentangle all of those things is really, really difficult considering how many things are changing. And, you know, the particular geopolitical, environmental, sociopolitical conditions at the time, all the people that were involved and so on and so forth. And I think what's really nice about this book is you focus on things that are much more local. And in that way, it makes it easier to grasp. The other really powerful thing about the book is that is just the, you know, the narratives, it's about stories. And I think when you said that you think this is your best book in a lot of ways, I think that the way and I would say that undeniably, it will be your most powerful book. It is because people will remember more of that. And I think it's because of the format in which you tell the stories, right? That we just are better at remembering stories. That's why when you read a newspaper article, the thing that resonates with you is that there is a person, usually at the center of the story, and the arc of whatever it is that we're thinking about is focused around the person and their personal narrative. And that's the thing that sticks in our minds. And that, I think, is actually what makes this book powerful. It is all of those individual stories, the people that really narrate what piece building looks like on the ground and how it can work in new and wonderful ways. So to everybody, I would say this is actually an eminently accessible, readable, fun to read book. And if you're looking for something that gives you a lot of the, I would say, academic framework, but in a really different kind of way, this is a book without footnotes, right? That'll tell you everything. So I was like, where are the footnotes? There are no footnotes in this book. There are no citations. And that is wonderful. It makes it very, very easy to grasp. And so just, and I really like the way you did.  And then what Savarin does at the beginning is she talks about, well, it can't be this reason, that reason, the other reason, the other reason, right? So this is the typical destroying of the various theories, but she does it in a way that I think actually makes it easier to understand, gives you the examples, and doesn't just provide a bunch of citations like we would normally do. And then says, okay, so if those reasons don't make any sense, let's talk about what is much more plausible, right? So, you know, there are lots of things that I think are really admirable about the book in that way. And part of it is just about how it's constructed and how it's very actually easy to read and easy to digest. I want to talk about some of the things that just, you know, struck me as I was reading through it. And I wanted to start with the last comment that you made in terms of thinking about our own societies because that was a thing that really struck me. And I was thinking about Brexit in particular and I was thinking about the U.S., of course, right? And actually Karen and I years ago had talked about applying a lot of the CSD lessons to London, that if there is actually a, if there is a huge selling point for this book for us, I think within conflict security and development, is that it encompasses absolutely all of the approaches that we teach in our course in terms of thinking about the local, really understanding the local context, listening to local people, being really humble about what you know, thinking about the limitations of what the international community can do, what foreign powers can do, and just really thinking about the possibilities of how you construct change in a way that is respectful of local people and local voices.  You can call it the local ownership model. You know, there's participatory research, whatever it is, right? That basically involves really understanding the context and bringing in people's voices who are the ones that are the most affected. And I think you've been doing that for two decades now and still trying to do it. And it feels like we've got some very thick heads around the world that haven't still gotten the message. I know there are various people on this call that do this for a living. Various organisations like conciliation resources, like Peaceful Change, all of these kinds of organisations have taken expressly this kind of an approach and are absolutely dedicated to trying to enact these kinds of principles. But I'm not sure that the message has penetrated all the way through. And I would say that just thinking about the what does this look like in terms of our own communities. How do we get at some of these divisions? It made me think about bowling alone. You know, going back to Putnam's work around civil society and thinking about just local associations, thinking about just really basic things about how we're civil to each other or not civil to each other, but the bonds of generalised trust across society. How much do you trust another stranger? What are the really small things that we do for each other that help create that trust? Everything from either going to church together, going to mosque together, just having friends of different ethnicities, having friends from different religions, having friends across ethnic groups, being willing to marry across those lines. All of the ways in which we would say, I would say we normally associate each other. Part of that has to do with not just the places that you're talking about in Congos, Maliland, and so forth that are in violent conflict, but also obviously our own societies. And as they become more polarised, and as we become more polarised, that becomes more and more difficult. And I think a lot of the things that you're talking about here really are relevant to, certainly to this country, to Brexit land versus Remain land, as well as obviously to red and blue in the US. But thinking about those lessons around trust and community cohesion, and where do those local community resources and practices look like so that you can build that culture of peace? You know, my big fear is actually that we talk a lot about other places, but we're actually not so good at doing it at home. We take a lot of the things for granted that exist right now, and I think a lot of those resources of peace that we have at home are actually being frayed and being completely worn down in some cases. But anyway, let me go back to some of these other things around your book and thinking about the really interesting dimensions and the other people's work that you've drawn out too is what does peace look like and feel like on the ground and you're talking about Pamela Fritchell's book and her work with Roger McGinty and just those small examples that I think are really helpful and we talk about in our air classes all the time, but I think it's maybe helpful for this audience to think about the pieces and always just about signing the peace agreement or thinking about the ceasefire. A lot of people don't... I mean, in practical terms, how does that affect somebody who lives in these places in their day-to-day lives, right? That it might matter more that you can go to sleep in your pajamas as you talk about and not have to worry and, you know, being able to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night without actually having to worry about gunfire and, you know, or being attacked in the dark or just thinking about things like, hey, how many dogs are barking out there? What is going on in terms of who is in your community? Who are the strangers there? And who is there that might do harm to your community? That paying attention to the very small things are actually really good indicators of how local people measure peace versus how we might measure peace. And they are not... You know, there might be a correlation between these things, ideally there is, but oftentimes we care more about particular things and local communities really care about different things. I don't think we take those things into account enough and we really undervalue the things that actually matter to the people that are the most affected. You know, if there is one thing, if there... I think the one line, you know, going back to your book about the things that matter and how to think and sum up your book, it goes back to the people who have to live with the consequences of a decision should be the ones that are making it. So... And let's take this a step further to, you know, your next paragraph here. Let their intended beneficiaries decide even if the result is unpopular, unfashionable and uncomfortable, and even if it turns off some well-intended donors. Right? So I think back to what happened in Somalia with Al-Shabaab, well, the early version. It wasn't really Al-Shabaab then, but it was the Islamic courts, right?  But at that moment, actually, you know, there was something that looked like it could have been a piece in Somalia, and this was really long and hard fought. And then we decided post 9-11 that the US didn't like that along with Ethiopia. They weren't going to stand for that. And kind of rejected that and look where we are now in Somalia, right? And I felt like there were moments like that where, you know, I read this and I think about a moment like that where it doesn't really suit our sensibilities for one reason or another. And we talk about these things being local, but we don't always really mean it, right? So the rhetoric only goes so far often to the point that it actually endangers our own interests or the way that we perceive our interests if there's too much at risk then. It's just a no go. But I'm going to really leave it at that and just suggest that there are a couple of things for those who are particularly working on, who are working for organisations that are active in the programming side and active on the policy intervention side. That there's a lot of hopefulness in the book. And there are some particular things just around the last figure that you showed, thinking about humility, thinking about listening, thinking about, you know, really basic things that I think we all know, but sometimes find it hard to practice because of the ways in which power is constructed, that you walk into a place and by virtue of the fact that your skin is white or in many cases, you know, if you're going into Africa not black, then you get treated in a particular way and you sort of assume that role without really thinking about it. Reading this book is a reminder that you have to be so active about those power dynamics, like actively thinking about how you act and behave and engage, right? That, and I think you have lots of lovely anecdotes and the fact that you talk about your own experience is really powerful, right? That you're the first person to say, hey, I've been through this. I know who you, I've been you. I've made that mistake. Don't make the same mistakes that I've made. And I think that's really wonderful and humbling and helpful to people so that they can see themselves in some of the lessons that you've learned. So, yeah, I think this is a wonderful contribution to both, not just the literature academically, but also just a little larger piece building debate. So, thanks, Eveline. Thank you so much, Christine. Thanks for your thoughts. Thanks for reading the book so carefully. Thank you. Ciaran, should I answer questions or do you want to go to your Q&As directly? The choice, Sefri, and if you'd like to respond now, you can or you can respond while you answer questions as well. Which one? Okay, I'll just say a few words, just because I'm so thankful to Christine for spending so much time really thinking about the book. So, I'm so glad that you think the book is enjoyable to read and accessible because I've worked two years on just making it accessible. I think we've talked about that when we actually met.  And then I started working with an agent and with my editor and with colleagues to make the book as accessible and as an easy read and enjoyable read as possible. So, took me two years. I completely rewrote the manuscript and all of the footnotes have become an appendix. So, that's for me it was so hard because you know how we are as coders like not having a footnote feels like a sacrilege in my own book. But my editor and my agents were like no footnotes, no footnotes. And so I moved everything to the appendix and so I think there are 10 pages of the appendix in the book of sources and everything. And I agree with them it makes the book much more readable and much more accessible while still making sure that I acknowledge all of my sources that anybody who wants to learn more about anything I describe can find the sources. I also wanted to react on what you said about how it applies to our own community because again that was one of the things that I really cared about for this book. And that's one of the things that during the two years when I rewrote the manuscript I thought a lot about because I didn't want to write a book that was about what's going on out there in these places that are foreign and at war. I really wanted to show that we are all facing different versions of the same problem and that the solutions actually work. And I've been doing a lot of these presentations and I just realized yesterday that often people are puzzled by the subtitle of the book. So in case anybody is puzzled the subtitle is an insider's guide to changing the book. So it's a joke. It's based on an insider's guide to the galaxy. Is it an insider's guide to the galaxy?  And it's also to me it's a joke and at the same time it encapsulates the argument of the book because it's saying that we are all insiders. We're all insiders somewhere. We're all outsiders somewhere. So we can have something to contribute in our own community. We can all change the world as insiders around us. Just like we can all help other insiders change the world if we act as outsiders and follow the model of my role models. On the definition of peace, Christine, I fully agree. I was talking with my editor and my editor was like, oh, you should write an entire article on that. It's so much fun to think about the different definitions of peace. Not only those you've mentioned about sleeping in Colombia or dog sporking at night but then once I've started presenting the book often people come back and they tell me their own definition of peace or the thing that they've heard in their own countries and I think we could write several papers on that and I know that Tamina and Roger McGinty have written on that and it's one of the things that I like best talking about when I talk with my own students. One of the things that I like least in the book and in everything is what you were mentioning at the end, the fact that I've had to acknowledge that we can't have it all, like that all good things do not go together sometimes where really there are really hard choices to be made and that makes us really uncomfortable and sometimes that goes against our own values against everything that we hold dear and that puts us both as scholars and as peace builders and as activists in really, really, really hard positions. But there is hope, as I describe in the book and now I'm going to start talking because I really do want to have time to talk to you in this. Thanks, Severin. Antonio points out that it was the hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy, I think you were a reference. Thank you, thank you. Yes, yes, exactly. Thank you, Antonio. All my best stuff is in the end notes in my book. That's very frustrating that nobody ever reads of those in a lot of books so you should always check them out. That's a general tip to everyone. I'm going to ask you, there are kind of three questions that are on the theme of the local. I had a question about that too. We'll see if we have time. So the first comes from Anna, I'm sorry, Ann Semedini, who's asking, it's specifically about the Taliban in Afghanistan and predictions that the civil war might return. There might be civil war soon. And Anna asks, what peace building strategies would be effective with Afghan women, given the restrictions placed by their Islamic faith and culture? I'd like to tack on to that a broader question because that is very much about local context and accessibility and maybe it's not always possible to deal with the local actors or the bottom-up people that you want to deal with. And I wanted to ask if in your examples, in your book and the research, you delved into success stories where people are overcoming this question of which locals, which grassroots organisations get access or are spoken to. Some of the organisations you mentioned, for example Cure Violence, I've done research in places in the world where just as we've seen in many conflict settings, there is a degree of competition between who gets to have access, who's the gatekeeper. So it would be interesting to hear a little bit about that particular aspect. We have a question from an alumna of ours, Monica, a CSD alumna saying, thank you for your work. Organisations in the peace building field increasingly use randomised control trials, RCTs, to demonstrate their effectiveness. But as you point out, peace building is inherently localised, you need contextual local knowledge. So even with the same organisation or initiative, is it actually useful to compare these hyper-local results of peace building interventions? How much can you actually compare with RCTs and perhaps more broadly, even with a book like yours? And then a question from... It's on the same theme. You take that one. Because now I'm already forgetting about the first question that you said. So the more you take on, I'm always going to answer the last question. But then, as Han passed, the earlier questions will get much less attention. Go for it. Yep. Okay. Thank you. So, okay. Let me try to think about... Because to me, the three are already extremely different. So let me try to think of a way to answer them in a way that kind of makes sense. Okay. So I'm going to start with... I took notes when you were speaking because I know that my brain doesn't... Anyway. So I'm going to start with your question. That sometimes it's not possible to access and which locals should we use. And that's why I think that outsiders have a role and outsiders with country knowledge. Outsiders who already have the networks and who can understand what are the different fractional lines in a society which local organisations are actually representative, which local organisations are just front for political or armed groups, which local organisations are just a one-man show, and which are just... How do you call it in... I'm trying to find the English equivalent of a term we always use in Congo. You know, les organisations portefeuille. Like organisations that are just wallet organisations. They take your money and etc. So that's where we need... That's why really we need people who understand the context. And that's also why outsiders are important, outsiders with country knowledge, so that they can help identify all of the groups within a society and they can really help make sure that everyone is included. Because when you work with local peace builders, sometimes when they're part of a community they will be rejected by the other community. Or some of the more biased organisations will not want to include the other community. And so again, that's why we need extensive country knowledge to make sure that all local knowledge because the fracture line within one village will not necessarily be the same fracture lines as within another village, within another village, etc. So that's why we really need to work and to build on local knowledge. And that's why outsiders with country knowledge are also just as important as insiders with country knowledge. And that leads to the answer I had for Anne. Anne Hyde, it's very nice to meet you. We've been in touch on social media a lot. So very nice to meet you, Anne. And on the peace building strategies with Afghan women, I would tell you the answer that I always gave, ask them. Ask them because they know. They know what the... And that's what they did. The book is always saying is don't ask me and someone who's in New York City right now. Last time I was in Afghanistan was 20 years ago. I mean a bit less than 20 years ago, but I don't have that knowledge. And so what's really important is to use the general principles. And I know you've read the book, Anne. So the general principles that we find in the book on asking Afghan women what they think would be effective, how they want to be supported, when they want to be supported, whether they want to be supported by outsiders. And if so, what kind of outsiders? Because given what's going on in Afghanistan, sometimes actually being supported by an organisation that is affiliated with the United States or with the United Kingdom may not be the best approach. So just asking them. And to go back to Kiaran's point. Yes, sometimes accessibility is not possible. But the one thing I learned when I was in Afghanistan is that yes, the same thing in Somaliland. Of course, if you send male soldiers to talk with Afghan women and to try to organise peace deals and peace meetings with them, it's not going to work. Now if you send a woman, as a woman, I had fantastic access to other women. I had really bad access to men, but I had fantastic access to other women. And so again, it's like this idea. Every, all of our approaches have to be tailored to local cultures, to local circumstances. And once we understand these local circumstances, once we work with insiders, with the people who live in these cultures who can brainstorm with us, that's when we can find the peace building strategies. And even before finding the peace building strategies, we have to brainstorm with them so that they help us define the problems rather than us assuming that we know what the problems are. And now let me answer Monika's question. Talking about randomized control trials. So that's not at all what I do. I've never done a randomized control trial. I know that all my colleagues at Columbia do that, but not my thing. But to answer your question, basically what I understand the question to be is whether this kind of methodology can actually help. And I think that Christine already gave us the beginning of the answer in her comments when she was talking about the everyday peace project. And Pamina for her show's work. Well, what's the title of her book? Is it Everyday Peace? Christine, I'm blanking on it. Everyday Peace. Okay. And Pamina's book is fantastic because it gives us a sense of how we can actually use quantitative analysis, randomized control trials, merge it with qualitative approaches to have a really effective and productive definition of peace. And how to take into account the fact that we were talking with Christine, that there are so many different definitions of peace and so many ways to understand peace. And in Pamina's book, she shows that you can respect the diversity, compare all of these hyper-local results in a way that is extremely scientific, extremely rigorous, extremely, extremely reliable, and that uses all of the best social science techniques. Down talking. Thank you, Severin. That's great. Okay. We've got a question here from Oshin Tanzi, a colleague of ours who, as you know, works a lot on UN peacekeeping. It's a great question. He said that you recently presented your findings to the UN Security Council. How do you think UN peacekeeping should be reformed to take your findings into account? Do you need less UN peacekeeping or simply different UN peacekeeping? I'm not going to ask you another question just in case it's too much. So, thank you. Yeah, thanks, Oshin, and hi. It's very nice to see you again. Thanks for your question. You know, I think that we need completely different United Nations peacekeeping. And that's basically what I said during my presentation at the United Nations Security Council, which was a very short version of what I've told you today. And to me, UN peacekeeping has to be completely reformed to follow the models that I portray in the frontlines of peace. So, the models of the organizations like the Resolve Network and the Life and Peace Institutes and the model of the individuals, because some of the role models I portray in the book actually work for United Nations peacekeeping missions and UN agencies. So, basically what that means is supporting local conflict resolutions in addition to elite agreements. So, obviously not stopping to work on the top down like I'm not saying replace one with the other, but support more local conflict resolution, actually build on the knowledge and the skills of the ordinary people and the local activists who live in conflict zones. So, that's something that's always kind of easy to tell them because they have it in all of their reports that they should focus on that and that it's really important and local ownership and local ownership, blah, blah, blah. So, they're talking the truth. They're not talking the book. That's really clear from everything that I've seen and everything that all of the feedback that I get on this book and everything that I hear from local activists. But the book actually shows a way to work the book and to actually build on the knowledge and skills of ordinary people and local activists rather than just saying that it's important. And I've told them as well, you know, planning deployments and strategies over the long term, which is really important because you can't build this in six months or a year, not putting their logos everywhere. You know, as we've been saying, like remaining low profile, recruiting and deploying a lot more people like the model peace builders that they portray in the book, promote these people, give them more resources, more responsibility. As I think that Kiran and Christine were saying, or I can't remember which of you said that, but there are people on this call who do this kind of work. And we all know a lot of people, a lot of organisations who do this kind of work. So we should really empower the role models, the people who have already this humble, low profile putting local people in the driver's seat approach. And you know, I think the flexibility is important, accountability to people on the ground. And here I'm doing a shout out for the work of Susanna Campbell who has a fantastic book on accountability. So plenty of other little things that could make a big difference, actually do make a big difference wherever they're used. So to me, that's how peacekeeping could and absolutely should be reformed. So that it becomes better and effective peacekeeping. Excellent, thank you. I'm going to ask you two questions. They're relatively short. So the first is Annika. To what extent has the EU and EU LEX actually helped or benefited Kosovo? And the second question, I'm going to say Margi, but it might be Marie. So I'm sorry if I'm mispronouncing your name. In your view, what does it take for diplomats working for governments with a security agenda to make effective peacebuilding possible? So I'm going to answer Annika's question first because it's a very easy answer. I have absolutely no idea. That's not what I know, but Leslie, that's not what I focused on in my book.  So I prefer not to answer. And I'm trying to think that whether I can refer you, that's my usual approach when I don't know the answer to your question is try to refer you to the work of someone who does good work on that. But I don't even know of someone who's looked at this question. So Christine and Ciaran, if you think of a colleague whose work we could mention by all means, please do that, but I can't even think of a good source for you, Annika. If I do, I will tell you and Christine and Ciaran if you do, please mention it. And on the question of what it takes for diplomats to make effective peacebuilding possible, I think that donors really, it's like the answer I had for the previous question on UN peacekeeping. They can really, really make a difference by the first thing, saying that grassroots conflict resolutions and insider's knowledge matter. These are two different things because usually people merge them. So I'm saying grassroots conflict resolution and also insider's knowledge because insider's knowledge matter both for grassroots conflict resolution and for top-down peacebuilding. And saying that it matters means write it in job descriptions, write it in UN resolutions, in mission mandates, in reports, like everywhere so that people on the ground can't blame the headquarters or the donors because that's often something that I hear. It's, oh, we'd love to do what you suggest but our donors won't let us. So just making it clear that the donors are okay with this kind of approach. And also I also think that long-term funding, long-term department, encouraging long-term thinking is really important for that. Obviously there needs to be huge reform in the way that donors and diplomatic missions work but it's possible because again, I portray in the books some role models who are diplomats and who manage to support long-term projects. Also something really basic but stopping to require non-governmental organisations or the UN to put the donor's logo everywhere because it's really simple but it's obvious when you see a donor's logo on a bridge, a program, a computer or something, automatically you think this is the project of the donor. It's not my project. And so this shuts down local ownership. It creates a whole power dynamic. Logos or really this idea of putting our logos everywhere go really against a lot of things that matter in peace building. Donors can also help a lot by encouraging flexibility. And again, that's something usually donors require these templates with we're going to do XYZ in all of this time. These are step one, step two, step three. These are the indicators and this is what we're going to do. While all of the successful peace building programs that I document, they're really flexible. People really, really adapt their strategies and they keep adapting their strategies. And I know for donors, again, that would mean reviewing the way they select projects and the way they work. But again, it is possible. There are role models and I portray them in the book. It is completely possible for donors to do that. And encouraging accountability to people on the ground is something, again, we've talked extensively and Susan Akemble has worked on that extensively as well. And lastly, they can really help by promoting the kind of model peace builders that they become in. So you remember my little diagram with all of the sub-bubbles. Just again, recruiting these kind of people, putting them in charge, giving them resources, giving them promotions, et cetera. I think that would help a lot. Thank you. I'm going to ask you one last question because we're running out of time. For those of you who ask questions, we didn't get time to answer. Thank you, first of all, for asking those questions. One more reason for you to grab a copy of the book if you don't already have one and you'll be able to find your answers there. So I'd encourage everyone to buy a copy of the book. If you have a copy, if you read the book and you enjoy it, leave a review. It really matters to us. Other than the kind of formal journal reviews that we get, it's quite important to see what people think of the book and for other people to learn about this, particularly if there are useful lessons here and it's the kind of change that people want to see. It's a very good way to try and support the work and get that message out. So last question from Adioti. Thanks you for the presentation. Very insightful. Just on the point of the local, where and how do you see the role of the diaspora, depending on the context of course, in these narratives and processes? Thank you. That's something that I thought about a lot because for several reasons, personal and professional. So diaspora to me are really interesting because they can be insiders, they can be outsiders. They have this really unique position. To me, basically I think of diaspora members as outsiders with extensive country knowledge. To me, that's really because when I think about the diaspora, usually I think about my students whose parents came from other countries. So they are first generation Americans. They've grown up here, but they do have a really, really good understanding of what's going on in the country. They speak the language, etc. They are just not completely part of the community and I think about their parents who have lived in abroad for such a long period of time that they don't belong to the society anymore. And I know that I've made that experience myself. I consider myself a French... I'm part of the French diaspora abroad and I know that all people have made me understand when I'm back to France that I'm not part of the French society anymore. I'm not part of the French community. I am an outsider because... And it started very quickly. It started after just a few years, like maybe five, ten years in the United States. Like people made me realize that I was... I didn't understand. I did not experience French society. So I do think that diaspora members are outsiders, but there are these kinds of outsiders who have everything that I think matters in terms of local network, local understanding, local knowledge. And so they can really help as outsiders. But again, the catch is that to really help, they can't take the usual piece in approach because it's not because they are diaspora members that automatically they are going to be humble and respectful. I've seen diaspora members arrive and think, okay, I know everything. I have the solutions for you and let me fix the problems for you. Which local people on the ground respond absolutely infuriating with good reasons. And I've also found diaspora members who came back and who were very humble and very aware of their limitations and who did fantastic work in supporting the communities on the ground, whether they were communities in which their families were living or other communities. Thank you so much, Severine. That is the end of our time. So thank you to everyone who attended and for the questions. Thank you very much, Christine, for your comments and for going through the book and offering your reflections. And Severine, thank you so much for speaking to us today and we hope the next time that we welcome you, it will be in person. It would be great to have you back. Thank you so much, Caroline. You've been a fantastic host and a fantastic chair for this meeting. And thank you, Christine, for all your thoughts and again for reading the book. And thanks to both of you for being so supportive and thanks to everyone who was on this call and who submitted questions. I really enjoyed talking with you and I hope that we'll all be able to see each other again in person post-pandemic. And in the meantime, be safe, be healthy, and thanks for your support, everyone. Bye.


Good morning We are gathered here as a collective group of city and county leadership To show our support for Chief Aubrey Jenkins and also the hard working Leadership of our fire department We are here today as community leaders and Of course community leaders throughout this city Has genuinely authentically supported Chief Aubrey Jenkins The last few weeks have been very very difficult in the life of this city for all of us For all of us who have Looked at this city in a very inclusive way Have looked at this city to say we continue to expand and grow ourselves Many of us are here today Not because of what you've heard of the rumors that have been dispelled But you're here today to support this man who gives of himself his time his talents and his gifts We are asking everyone in this city of ours and I think you know as well as I and members of this council and members gathered around This DS today That we are an inclusive community undergirded with the true sense of support We understand that a full investigation is still underway So why clamor in rumors and misinformation? If anything Let us be genuine as we embrace The totality of inclusiveness and embrace the whole notion of Support is very Very necessary Look at these firemen these firemen and women Who runs? To the fire and not away from it But they are running towards that realization Realization that support is needed Please let me reiterate this fact Until a full investigation is done We've heard We've sensitized ourselves and we are ready now to lend wholeheartedly our support actually Enough is enough Until the full picture is drawn. I Want to welcome now chief Skip Holbrook our chief of police Thank You Reverend McDowell This is Difficult for me. I don't know that I've never experienced an attack on a Decorated colleague Like I witnessed just a couple days ago when I received a copy of this press releasing the intentions of Talking about a just a tragedy that occurred in our city a few weeks ago And I want to talk a little bit about that about that letter Where that release You know, it was it was authored by some people that I don't know And I certainly know we're not present at that fire And we're not part of that fire investigation that occurred after the fire And let's talk about the fire investigation and what chief Jenkins did and how he led that so the day of that fire there was a co-response to the fire Based on an existing agreement between the clumbly original fire department and a neighboring agency with Irma Fire fires arrived on the scene About 413 in the afternoon Or excuse me, they were dispatched about 413 and they arrived just three minutes later and then immediately begin Initiating suppression operations and rescue operations And of course, we know that during the time that they were fighting that fire several firemen were injured and we had a fireman it was Killed during the firefighting activity a response by local state and federal law enforcement assets that have subject matter expertise and fire investigations and I was on scene as well and While the fire was still being worked. I had a conversation with chief Jenkins and he expressed his desire that we had a very aggressive multi-agency approach to Investigating the fire in the origin and cause of the fire And he immediately initiated that while that scene was still hot As I said upon that request we had local state and federal authorities on the ground and 24 hours later we had an unprecedented Request by the fire chief again To activate the national response team and That was immediately done and within 24 hours of that we had national response team Investigators on the ground In my over 30 years in law enforcement. This was the most comprehensive response To an investigation that I've been a part of We we met multiple times every single day Collectively as leadership and we made decisions collectively We always had consensus and I saw everybody Working as a one team They checked their egos at the door. Nobody had an agenda. The agenda was as directed by our fire chief Get to the bottom of this The reason law enforcement was involved was we wanted to make we had a fire fatality and we wanted to make sure that we Either proved or eliminated any criminal intent Within a few days of working the scene the fire experts the subject matter experts That were part of each of the participating agencies. They reached a conclusion a preliminary conclusion of the origin and cause As we briefed his leadership It was decided collectively and unanimously that Chief Jenkins would in fact be the person that would talk about that if the appropriate time and that It certainly was his prerogative to release some preliminary findings, which he did And those preliminary findings were accurate and they remain accurate based on the information that has been Determined by investigators to date That that origin and cause was Accidental at this point and it originated at a stove The national response team will issue a written final report within the next couple weeks and And again as of today nothing has changed in that origin and cause the the letter that I read wrote that I read It misrepresented what I just stated Co-response to the fire to fight the fire based on agreements that have been in place for years and Immediate request by the fire chief for appropriate access to do an investigation of the origin and cause of the fire Now, let me address leadership That's my fire chief he's Everybody knows him. He's honest. It's a day is long. I've participated in executive staff meetings with him where he Tirelessly advocates for the men and women of the Columbia original fire department He has served with distinction for decades with this agency serve this city and And It disgusts me that anybody Would question that With any critical incident There's review and from the very beginning He has not shied away from that We have the response the criminal slash fire investigation origin and cause and then you have critical incident reviews the sheriff and I Took part in a very critical review of how we handled riots and civil unrest and We acknowledge mistakes and we took corrective action. So we wouldn't make those mistakes again That's what leaders do if the mistakes made you own it you correct it and you move on And you have the courage to ask for those reviews and I know you know the fire department is renowned for incident command and doing after-action reviews and learning learning if it was a way they can do something better and It is disingenuous For anybody to suggest that there's any other agenda other than doing what's right and seeking the truth and it's insulting that Anybody that has not been on that line In that trench on that ladder that was suggesting anything otherwise Thank you. Good morning I'm the city manager Teresa Wilson and What you just heard are the facts of the situation The facts that have occurred ever since the tragic events that occurred that resulted in a line of duty death That we are all Heartbroken about but now isn't the time to point fingers to find blame To even give any credence and I'm just going to shoot it straight to some rogue outside group Who's running in the town of the paid dues of some? Supposed organization that Lends itself to come into town and pray on communities to misinform first of all as The chief said never lay to foot to my knowledge or picked up a hose or anything else on the day of the incident but yet come here and Conflate issues and point blame Now that's about all the attention. I'm going to give to that The chief is already given the facts of the investigation the arrogance and disrespect the attempt to agitate community and Misinformed people is the reason why we're standing here one of the reasons But the overarching reason is to show support for a man who's given over 44 years to serve this community and most recently in a very Long and hard-fought budget process that happens every year this time He and the command staff and members of the battalions that are standing with him today Thought above and beyond to be creative to begin to further address Some of the other issues that departments all over this country are facing like short staffing resources Facilities needs and we did that Members of city and county council Expect me and the county administrator who I know would be standing here with us to if he could to be good stewards of taxpayer dollars They budgeted it for and have allocated over an additional one and a half million dollars each To begin to address some of those needs from a staffing perspective to pay our firefighters more Over $10,000 more as a starting firefighter will be has been approved in the proposed pay plan a Step play plan that allows these firefighters who want to be career professionals To succeed and see how they can grow their careers and support their families Over time if they choose to stay These are the discussions that have been happening these are the Issues that fire chief Jenkins and his team have been advocating for and it been quite successful so to say When I see some misinformed Disrespectful arrogant pressure lease come out on the very day That our city council and I'm sure county council members as well are doing the work the real work to make real change was so very disappointing so very disrespectful and So very unnecessary to come into town When communities are at their most vulnerable during a line of duty death and everything that is involved with that We don't fear We welcome the investigative process Let it continue. It's a process and whatever comes with it We're here to address those things Make any changes if there are any that need to be made nobody is shying away from that but it's a process and Unfortunately when such groups pray on The very employees That we're trying to serve because the taxpayers expect certain service delivery and they expect accountability and they expect That I as a manager hold my employees accountable To do the things they're supposed to do and when I decide that in the midst of all this There's confusion and I'm gonna address the confusion with employees. It's a shame that certain people decide to hide behind Social media platforms. I'm not on social media. So if you have something to say Stand up and be about it and say it and I'm speaking directly to These agitators and speaking even to members in our own department who decide that they're gonna have these separate associations to supposedly address issues Now I will say these associations they are and you know, I you know the fire culture has this We're not a union state, but you know, even in South Carolina. They're these associations who work within the department If you're gonna do that Sit out and talk about things ahead of time It's okay. We're not afraid to have conversations but don't hide behind people and Definitely don't get in my lane because we've coexisted really well over the last few years when you have Worked as associations because you stayed out of the lane of governance of budgets Of staffing issues and the like when we as Professionals are trying to work through those things and get funding and and be true to what our citizens are asking for That's what's been happening up here with city and county council members. They've been doing the work They've approved the budgets So when you decide to coincide and co-mingle these dismiss information with that Otherwise, I'm usually pretty behind the scenes and quiet but when you do that You're gonna hear from me and they did hear from me this week about it so anyone in the organization who is is Uncomfortable or feel some kind of way. So do I And very pointedly we will hold you accountable for your actions Don't hide behind social media It's not necessary You've got a problem let's put it on the table and address it in the right way But do not misinform this community and most importantly do not step on the legacy of your leader 44 years in counting We're just up here to give the facts sheriff lot says that all the time and he delivers a press conference If you want the facts of things then that's what we're giving you the truth. We're standing in our truth And whatever else comes with it let the chips fall where they may nobody's scared of that because we've been handling things just According to the plan following the protocols and the processes and that's not gonna change I don't care who swoops into town and they can swoop right back out You know these three gentlemen Chief Holbrook chief Jenkins Sheriff Lide I call them the three musketeers all the time Sometimes they let me be their fourth. I Trust them with my life and I trust them With the lives of the team members that they lead period in the story We appreciate the support being given a chief Jenkins. He deserves it. He deserves it a Life well lived a Public servant is doing his best So don't get in my way about it Thanks enough Is enough? We have law enforcement sheriff lot Chief Holbrook We have communities around the city that have called in to say We support chief Jenkins We have school board commissioners Aaron Bishop our own members of city council members of county council that are here and we also Also have with us chairman Overture Walker Isn't it great? This is not just a one man or one woman This is an inclusive fellowship who understands what support and Supporting this chief is all about we have presidents here with us today So we're not by ourselves The worst thing that can happen in a city is for persons to share miss information Thank you all for being here today Thank you all for being a vital part of this community and thank you chief Jenkins For being who you are You