Executive Summary: The 7th SEACSN Regional Conference “Issue Based Reconciliation”, Phnom Penh, Cambodia, 2003
Executive Summary: The 7th SEACSN Regional Conference “Issue Based Reconciliation”, Phnom Penh, Cambodia, 2003
Academics, practitioners and researchers from Indonesia, Philippines, East Timor, Laos, Malaysia, Singapore, Thailand, Vietnam and Brunei converged on Phnom Penh, Cambodia in August 2003 for the Seventh SEACSN Regional Conference entitled Issue-based Reconciliation. They were joined by their Cambodian colleagues for presentations and discussions with the following aims:
- To explore the variety of issues raised within reconciliation processes in Southeast Asia.
- To answer the question “why an issue needs to be reconciled or why it does not”.
- To look at experiences and efforts at reconciliation, and compile the lessons learned from those experiences.
- To explore the variety of recommendations, analyses and prospects in relation to community, national, and regional reconciliation.
The papers presented covered a variety of angles on issue based reconciliation as well as examining the various methods, strategies and levels where reconciliation occurs. Topics included:
- Human Rights, Justice and Reconciliation
- Community Reconciliation, History and Culture
- Inter-State relations, History and Culture, Justice and Reconciliation
- The East Timor, Aceh and Papua Crisis experience
- People Peace Making, prevention of Gender based violence, and Community Peace Building
- Weapons, Security and Dispute Settlement Methods and Reconciliation in Cambodia Methods of Reconciliation
In the closing session Dr Bilveer Singh of the National University of Singapore (NUS) synthesised the findings of the conference. He concluded that the presenters had defined reconciliation as a process that would assist resolution of conflict and enhance peace and justice. Generally the concepts discussed through the conference assumed that:
- conflict existed or exists in a given situation to discuss reconciliation;
- reconciliation can be analysed at a number of levels;
- reconciliation is both internal and external to political entity;
- discussions on reconciliation have both long and short term time frames;
- reconciliation happens at various levels – from governmental level through to local level of people and villages;
As far as mechanisms for reconciliation were concerned, two main approaches were dominant in the discussions:
- Traditional (indigenous) methods, often informally undertaken, through long-established religious, cultural and tribal authorities and norms. These often tended to be successful.
- Non-Traditional methods involving state and non-state actors. These often tended to be unsuccessful.
The discussion raised an important question in relation to the understanding of reconciliation. In the words of Professor Singh:
“In Political Science and Legal constructs, the concept and definition of Reconciliation have particular meaning. In the literature covering conflict resolution, settlement, prevention, pre-emption and management, Reconciliation is differentiated from other mechanisms and methods, being merely one of the tools in a broad spectrum of related concepts such as adjudication, arbitration, mediation and negotiation. Yet, in the discussion [in the SEACSN Regional Conference], there was often a tendency to look at it in a generic sense with reconciliation referring to any activity that would assist in stalling, terminating and solving a conflict. Is this broad-based approach useful? Or is it more important to look at the specific approaches that help bring peace and where reconciliation is merely one of the methods compared to mediation, adjudication, arbitration, etc?”
Presentations by practitioners and researchers showed that reconciliation, in different societies and communities serve different purposes:
- To demonstrate commitment for general and local peace
- To settle / solve past issues
- To acknowledge past wrongs
- To seek Truth
- To seek Compensation
- To heal past wounds
- To seek Forgiveness
- To seek Justice
- To regain human dignity
- To promise not to repeat violations and achieve security, harmony and unity
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