Communities are a powerful force for pre-empting and preventing extremisms, provided they are equipped to intervene to ensure that community members do not become trapped in the process of radicalization.
In the WASL community check-in call on March 16, 2023, WASL member Mira Kusumarini of Empatiku, a peacebuilding organization based in Indonesia, presented a new guidebook to build the capacity of communities to do just that, entitled Identifying Early Warning Signs: A Guidebook for Building Community Resilience to Violent Extremism.
The 2nd Indonesian Women’s Ulama Congress or Kongres Ulama Perempuan Indonesia (KUPI) will be held in Semarang and Jepara, Central Java, Indonesia from November 23 – 26, 2022, co-organized by the Asian Muslim Action Network (AMAN Indonesia), a member of the Women’s Alliance for Security Leadership (WASL).
ICAN, with the support of Global Affairs Canada, has developed a set of “Case Studies on the Role of Gender and Identity in Shaping Positive Alternatives to Extremisms,” in Cameroon, Indonesia, Jordan, Libya, Pakistan, Somalia, Sweden, and the United States.
The case studies demonstrate how conducting a Gender-Based Analysis Plus (GBA+) improves understanding of the drivers, narratives and roles that engender extremisms and violent extremist activity. By profiling examples of peacebuilding, deradicalization, reintegration and counternarrative work in these contexts, the case studies emphasize how attention to gender and intersectional identities can improve the effectiveness of interventions to transform extremisms – not only by preventing or countering it, but by providing positive alternatives that enable people to realize a peaceful, pluralistic future.
The She Builds Peace campaign was launched in Indonesia in March 2020 by the Asian Muslim Action Network (AMAN).
Mira Kusumarini talks to ICAN about C-SAVE’s efforts to alter the lives of returnees and prepare their communities to accept them.