January 22, 2010 – In 2009 the Foundation, along with its operational partners, in accordance with its mandate to foster Nelson Mandela’s legacy of reconciliation, launched an initiative to advance social cohesion in a select number of South African communities.
Based on the Foundation’s existing community conversations series around issues of HIV/AIDS, this community conversation series was developed as a result of an outbreak of xenophobic violence in South Africa in 2008, proudly supported by ABSA, De Beers, DFID and the Hasso Plattner Foundation.
Entitled Community Conversations: Communities Embracing Each Other – 2009, the booklet details the outcomes of the 15 dialogues the Foundation convened in various communities across South Africa.
The community conversation series looks to foster dialogue in those South African communities affected by the violence and aims to:
- Foster and facilitate dialogue within communities around the critical issues they face, and to bring to the surface latent or unarticulated tensions that classically are barriers to seeking common solutions.
- Create linkages between various community stakeholders, and between communities and the relevant policy makers.
- Help build the capacity that enables communities to take ownership of this dialogue process.
The booklet details the methodology behind the conversations; the reasoning behind the initiative; the Foundation’s goals; the areas the Foundation’s community conversations team visited; the challenges each of those communities face and how those communities are finding ways to address those challenges.
To obtain a copy of the booklet, contact nmf@nelsonmandela.org. The booklet can also be downloaded as a pdf document from the Nelson Mandela Foundation website.