Join AfP for a conversation with author Libby Hoffman, whose new book offers a powerful guide to national reconciliation, sharing her learning journey as a peacebuilder and as the co-founder, funder, and program partner of Fambul Tok in Sierra Leone. Fambul Tok anchored post-war reconciliation in indigenous traditions of communal truth-telling, apology, and forgiveness, using a community-mobilization process later adopted by the government for people-centered planning and development. Rooted in principles of wholeness and mutuality, The Answers Are There issues a powerful call to funders, policymakers and practitioners to be willing to transform ourselves, in order to better support transformation around the world.
Libby will be joined in conversation by John Caulker, founder and Executive Director of Fambul Tok; the Hon. Francess Alghali, Minister of State for the Vice President of Sierra Leone; and Melanie Greenberg, Managing Director of Peacebuilding at Humanity United.
Speaker Bios:
Libby Hoffman:
Libby Hoffman is the founder and President of Catalyst for Peace, a US-based private foundation building peace from the inside-out – creating space for those most impacted by violence to lead in building the peace, supported by healthy, inclusive systems. She co-founded Fambul Tok (Family Talk) in Sierra Leone, which created the world’s first national scale, fully locally-owned and led reconciliation program and is now pioneering a national people’s planning process and framework. She produced the multiple-award-winning documentary film Fambul Tok and is a lead author of the companion book – both released in 2011. A former Political Science professor at Principia College, Libby has an MALD from Tufts’ Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy and a BA in Political Science from Williams College.
John Caulker:
John Caulker founded and has led the implementation of the Fambul Tok program since its inception in 2007, initially through his position as the founding Executive Director of Sierra Leonean human rights NGO, Forum of Conscience. He continues his leadership of Fambul Tok as the Executive Director of Fambul Tok International – Sierra Leone. Mr. Caulker first became a human rights activist as a student leader during the initial years of the war in Sierra Leone. Risking his life to document wartime atrocities, he infiltrated rebel camps disguised as a rebel to gather information and stories that he would then pass along to international organizations such as Amnesty International, Article 19, and Human Rights Watch. He founded Forum of Conscience as a human rights NGO in Sierra Leone in 1996.
Francess Piagie Alghali:
Mrs. Francess Piagie Alghali is currently the Minister of State in the Office of the Vice President of the Republic of Sierra Leone. She is the Principal Assistant to the Vice-President and supervises Sierra Leone Extractives Transparency Initiative Unit (SLEITI) and is Chairperson of the SLEITI Multi-Stakeholder Group, the Millennium Challenge Corporation Coordinating Unit (MCCU), Private Public Partnership Unit (PPP), the Scaling up Nutrition Secretariat (SUN). She has over 20 years of experience in administration and management during which time she has held leadership positions in national institutions. She was Executive Secretary of the Human Rights Commission of Sierra Leone, the National Human Rights Institution from 2010 to 2015 and has substantial experience in human rights. She also served as Foundation Registrar of Njala University one of the Public Universities in Sierra Leone. She holds a B.A Hons. Degree in Modern History, a Postgraduate Diploma in Education and a Master of Education Degree. She has also attended several conferences and professional development programs on Human Rights, Higher Education Management, Leadership and Strategic Change and Women’s Leadership, at some of which she has presented research papers, served as resource person and as facilitator.
Melanie Greenberg:
Melanie Greenberg is Managing Director at Humanity United, overseeing the Peacebuilding & Conflict Transformation portfolio. In this role, Melanie develops, refines, and implements strategies to build peace and counter violent conflict. She also oversees HU’s office in Washington, DC. Melanie comes to HU from the Alliance for Peacebuilding (AfP), where she served as President and CEO. Before joining AfP, Melanie was the President and Founder of the Cypress Fund for Peace and Security, a foundation making grants in the areas of peacebuilding and nuclear nonproliferation. She has also served as a visiting scholar at the Johns Hopkins School for Advanced International Studies, focusing on issues of justice in post-conflict peacebuilding; and as director of the Conflict Resolution Program at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. Melanie previously served as associate director of the Stanford Center for International Security and Cooperation and deputy director of the Stanford Center on International Conflict and Negotiation.