We invited Joshua Weiss to the podcast to help us understand what happened in the negotiations that preceded the Iran war, and how negotiators might bring it to an end.  

Josh Weiss is an internationally recognized conflict resolution expert, educator, and author. He is co-founder of Harvard University's Global Negotiation Initiative and Senior Fellow at the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School. He also directs the Masters in Leadership and Negotiation program at Bay Path University, and runs a private consulting firm. And he’s a co-founder of the Abraham Path Initiative, a network of walking trails that connect communities and helps support local economies in the Middle East. Weiss’ latest book is Getting Back to the Table: 5 Steps for Reviving Stalled Negotiations.

Explore related episodes:

How one Iranian content creator is fighting the information war (February 2026)

Reporting from Iran with a bias towards peace (February 2024)

Building peace on a walk through the Middle East (June 2022)

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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In normal times, Nour hosts Iranian diaspora musicians, comedians, journalists and others on her online show Mehmooni with Nazanin. But since mass protests began in December, she's been using social media to amplify the message of the protesters and call attention to the massacre and disappearances of thousands. 

She's also calling out others – including news organizations that cover nuclear talks without mention of the government's brutality, social justice activists who are strangely quiet on Iran, and content creators who've taken government-sponsored trips to the country. 

Making Peace Visible spoke with Nazanin Nour on February 10, 2026. 

Follow Nazanin Nour 

Instagram @iamnazaninnour

Youtube @nazaninnour

Facebook @iamnazaninnour

Follow Mehmooni with Nazanin on Spotify

Human rights organizations mentioned in the interview

Abdorrahman Boroumand Center for Human Rights in Iran / @iranrights

Center for Human Rights in Iran/ @centerforhumanrights

Iran Human Rights Documentation Center

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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This aphorism from political philosopher and journalist Antonio Gramsci is one of our guest Neha Sanghrajka’s favorite quotes. When you learn her story, you’ll understand why. 

A Kenyan born lawyer, Sanghrajka spent almost a decade in Mozambique mediating a peace process between the country’s president and a guerrilla leader stationed on a remote mountaintop. Sanghrajka and her colleague, Swiss Ambassador Mirko Manzoni, travelled back and forth between the capital of Maputo and the militant headquarters in the remote Garongosa Mountains 45 times – a journey of over 1000 km each way. And when she wasn’t hoofing it up the mountain, Sanghrajka spent many hours just listening to local people, without expectation. 

The peacebuilders walked a delicate line. Knowing that previous processes had failed when they were over-exposed to the media, they protected the negotiations from scrutiny. At the same time, they engaged journalists and civil society with the public implementation of the process. 

Neha’s story presents a fascinating example of how polarized groups can actually buy into a process of reconciliation, despite major setbacks along the way; and how journalists can report responsibly and critically, while still supporting the aspiration of peace. 

Before moving to Mozambique, Neha Sanghrajka worked with former UN Secretary General Kofi Annan during the 2007 election crisis in Kenya and helped facilitate election reform there. She’s now a fellow at the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs at Harvard University.

Learn more about Neha Sanghrajka

Read Sanghrajka and Mirko Manzoni’s report on the peace process in Mozambique

Visit the Maputo Accord website

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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In the new field of ‘peace tech,’ companies are using AI to predict the likelihood of major events – like military invasions or popular uprisings, and modeling how to prevent violence before it starts. With their ability to process massive data sets from intelligence, journalism and other sources, these tools can also quickly gain insights on what’s driving conflicts on a population level. Important tools for governments and mediators, they also appeal to corporations working around the world – customers who Abrams hopes will bring in revenue to sustain the peace tech sector. And as you’ll hear, he’s very optimistic. 

Brian Abrams founded B Ventures Group, a venture capital firm for peace tech, in 2023. Prior to that he was president of Ibex Investors and a managing partner at Row Capital. 

Connect with Brian Abrams on LinkedIn. 

Learn more about the peace tech companies discussed in this episode: 

Anadyr Horizon

From Business Insider: Inside the Billion-Dollar War over Peace Tech

Transcend AI

CulturePulse

odr.com

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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In this special episode, we look at the many narratives surrounding the U.S. action in Venezuela, and separate fact from fiction. We also discuss what this power shift means for Venezuelans, who have been living under a repressive regime, and a longrunning economic crisis. Our guest is Enrique Roig, an international relations expert whose career has spanned government, NGOs and the private sector, and more than 40 countries. Roig has more than two decades of experience in diplomacy, development and human rights, including extensive experience in Central and South America. He’s testified before Congress about human rights abuses committed by the Maduro regime.

Roig served in the State Department during the Biden administration, as Deputy Assistant Secretary in the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor. Currently the Vice President for External Affairs at Human Rights First, he writes about Venezuela and U.S. foreign policy on Substack at Enrique Roig - Unleashed. 

LEARN MORE

Enrique Roig’s Substack

On human rights in Venezuela from Human Rights Watch

On journalism in Venezuela and the diaspora: 

How Venezuelan journalists broke the information blockade with a 10-hour broadcast of Maduro’s ouster

Listen: MPV’s episode with Caracas-based journalist Tony Frangie Mawad:

Journalism under authoritarianism: An indie reporter persists in Venezuela

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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His new book is called  Possible: How we Survive - and Thrive - in an Age of Conflict. It’s filled with incredible stories from Bill’s career. In this episode, Bill talks about how lessons from the failures and success of the past – in places like Northern Ireland, Colombia, and the Middle East – can be instructive when dealing with the conflicts of today.  He shares exciting ideas about how journalists can tell stories about peace. What’s more, his insights on managing conflict can be applied anywhere from the UN to the boardroom to your own family. 

William Ury’s ideas aren’t easy to implement –  in fact they’re incredibly challenging. Ury says conflicts don’t end, but they can be transformed, from fighting with weapons to hashing differences out in a democratic process. And if Northern Ireland, South Africa, and Colombia – places where people said violent conflict would go on forever – could transform their conflicts, then there’s hope for the seemingly “impossible” conflicts of today. 

Music in this episode by Joel Cummins, Podington Bear, Kevin MacLeod, Meavy Boy, and Faszo.

This episode was originally published in May 2024.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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The series turns the idea of American exceptionalism on its head, asking: What can we learn from others about protecting democracy when the stakes are high? Co-hosts Susan Hayward and Matthew D. Taylor bring their expertise to bear as scholars of religion, religious extremism, and peace. 

In this episode, Taylor and Hayward explore Sri Lanka and Myanmar (Burma), two Buddhist-majority countries. In the words of one guest, a “minority complex” exists in both countries – the sense among members of the dominant group that they’re under threat from minority groups inlcuding Hindus, Muslims and Christians. Authoritarian leaders have exploited these fears, but religion has also been used in creative ways as a tool of resistance. And in Sri Lanka, a nonviolent uprising unseated an elected president who had become increasingly authoritarian, amidst an economic crisis in 2022. 

Guests are Geethika Dharmasinghe from Sri Lanka, a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Toronto, with a PhD in Asian Literature, Religion and Culture, and David Thang Moe from Myanmar, is a Postdoctoral Associate and Lecturer in Southeast Asian Studies at Yale University.

American UnExceptionalism is a project of Axis Mundi in collaboration with the Institute for Islamic, Christian, and Jewish Studies. This episode was produced by Scott Gill and engineered by Scott Okamoto, with production help from Kari Onishi. The executive producer is Bradley Onishi. 

Additional producer by Andrea Muraskin and Jamil Simon at Making Peace Visible.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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The bad news is polarization efforts in the United States haven’t been very successful, according to an analysis of 77 interventions aimed at decreasing partisan animosity, published in The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. It showed that while interventions can briefly reduce animosity, their effects are small and short-lived. 

But Coleman’s not giving up - he's just changing tactics. 

In this episode, we discuss some of the most recent findings from Coleman’s lab at Columbia University Teachers’ College, which he says is part of a “radical new science of peace.” In their latest study, Coleman and colleagues focus on the media: using AI to comb through 700,000 news reports from a diverse group of 18 countries, including the United States. What they found points to a new way to understand what makes a society more peaceful –  or more polarized. 

LEARN MORE:

Peter T. Coleman’s research lab: The Morton Deutsch International Center for Cooperation and Conflict Resolution

Coleman’s Medium post on classifying peace in global media, “A Radical New Science of Peace.”

AI for Good? AI Finds Lasting Peace in Unexpected Places in Psychology Today, by Peter T. Coleman and Larry S. Liebovitch.

Take the Polarization Detox Challenge

Listen to our December 2022 episode with Peter Coleman. 

Follow Peter T. Coleman on Bluesky

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Millions of American children have had parents serve in Iraq, Afghanistan, or other wars following September 11, 2001. This episode focuses on the wellbeing of those children, who tend to grow up fast. 

Susan Hackley is the director of the short documentary film Veteran Children. The film offers a window into the often hidden lives of military spouses and kids. Through interviews and roundtables, viewers meet children who have suffered as a result of their parents’ service, and also those who stepped up to help a wounded parent. 

Hackley made the film after a long career in peacebuilding, during which she served 19 years as managing director of the Program on Negotiation at Harvard Law School, one of the world’s leading centers of negotiation and conflict analysis. She also served as Chair of the Alliance for Peace Building. Military lives and families are personal to Hackley. She lost a boyfriend in the Vietnam war, and her son served as a Marine Corps infantryman in Iraq. 

Dr. Harold Kudler is a psychiatrist and expert on the mental health of veterans and their families, who is featured in Veteran Children. He’s a Medical Associate Professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Duke University. 

LEARN MORE

Watch Veteran Children for free (30 minutes)

Statistics and recommended reading from the Veteran Children Project

Issue of the journal The Future of Children on Military Children and Families, with chapter Building Communities of Care for Military Children and Families co-written by Dr. Harold Kudler

The Military Child Education Coalition

Sesame Street’s Resources for Military Families

Zero to Three’s Resources for Military Families 

The Military Family Research Center at Purdue University

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Media outlets run by and for non-white audiences, while working under great financial pressure, occupy a special role in the information ecosystem. With immigrants and people of color so often targeted, ethnic and indigenous media outlets are often paying closer attention to these rumors and lies about their own communities. So, they’re well positioned to address disinformation before it reaches the general population. And they offer lessons for mainstream journalists and news consumers. 

A new report, Disarming Disinformation: United States takes an in-depth look at how disinformation shows up in ethnic and indigenous communities and in their news media, and also highlights ways these outlets are fighting disinformation. It was published in October 2025 by the International Center for Journalists in collaboration with journalism schools at the University of Maryland and Arizona State University.

Our guests this episode are:

Garry Pierre-Pierre, editor-in-chief of The Haitian Times, an English-language news outlet that covers Haiti and the Haitian diaspora. The Haitian Times was one of five case studies highlighted in the disinformation report. 

Sarah Oates, Associate Dean for Research/Professor and Senior Scholar at the Philip Merrill College of Journalism at the University of Maryland. Oates is a co-author of Disarming Disinformation: United States, and of the book Seeing Red: Russian Propaganda and American News. 

Special thanks to Nabeelah Shabbir. Music in this episode by Doctor Turtle. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Megan K. Stack is a  journalist and contributing opinion writer for the New York Times, who’s reported from several conflict zones including Israel/Palestine and Northern Ireland. In this episode, she analyzes key moments and actors in the negotiations that ended the “Troubles,” the 3 decades of violence between Irish Catholics and Protestants in Northern Ireland. And she makes the case for applying lessons from that peace process to Israel’s negotiations with Gaza – including on the sensitive issue of disarmament.

Read Megan Stack’s essay Northern Ireland, Gaza and the Road to Peace.

Use this link to share the episode: www.makingpeacevisible.org/megan-stack

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions and Joel Cummins. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Orbán’s government, with its consolidation of executive power, Christian nationalist and anti-LGBTQ policies served as inspiration for Project 2025, the Heritage Foundation’s plan for Donald Trump’s second term. Heritage Foundation president Kevin Roberts has called modern Hungary “not just a model for conservative statecraft but the model.”

A new documentary film, Democracy Noir, shows how Orbán changed Hungarian politics. In the words of Budapest-based journalist Babett Oroszi, Orbán has “hacked democracy” – quietly using the levers of democracy, rather than a violent revolution, to accomplish his aims.  The film tells the story of modern Hungary through the eyes of three female members of Hungary’s resistance – reporter Oroszi, nurse and activist Niko Antal, and Tímea Szabó, an opposition leader in Hungary’s parliament. 

Our guest, director Connie Field, has followed Hungarian politics since the country’s first years as a democracy in the early 1990s. An American progressive and award-winning documentarian, she has a shrewd eye on how Orban’s actions are being mirrored in the United States. The episode also includes discussion of a new leader who observers think has a real chance of upending Orbán’s hold on power in the 2026 election.

LEARN MORE:

Stream Democracy Noir now! 

Watch a trailer for the film, find out where it’s being screened, or request a screening

Download the discussion guide.

Connie Field bio

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Suchitra Vijayan is a journalist and attorney. She is the author of two books: How Long Can the Moon be Caged? Voices of Indian Poltiical Prisoners, co-authored with Francesca Recchia, and Midnight's Borders. Vijayan is also the founder and executive director of the Polis Project, a journalism and research organization focused on authoritarianism and state oppression. She was born and raised in Madras, also known as Chennai, in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu, and lives in New York City. 

Read Vijayan’s reporting in The Nation about the government’s targeting of Kashmir’s free press.

Follow Suchitra Vijayan on Substack.

This episode was originally published in November 2023.  Music in this episode by Siddhartha Corsus and Blue Dot Sessions

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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In the Nørrebro neighborhood of Copenhagen, there's a small building with a garden and wooden seats. At first glance, it looks like some sort of neighborhood cafe, but it's actually the Menneskebiblioteket or Human Library, where the "readers" and "books" are people having deeply personal and intimate conversations about topics that might normally be considered off-limits or taboo in polite society. The library is staffed by volunteers whose life stories and experiences mean they face some sort of stigma, whether it be due to their ethnicity, religion, orientation, occupation, disability, or social status.

Gurian visited the Human Library and produced this episode for his award-winning documentary-style travel and culture podcast Far from Home. 

Since its beginning in Denmark, the Human Library concept has now spread to more than 80 countries on 6 continents. You can visit the library's Facebook page to find out about upcoming library events near you.

Find all four seasons of Far from Home where ever you listen to podcasts. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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But if  we expand the concept of peace to include what peace actually means to people who have lived through conflict, then what peace looks like can be expansive. Like a portrait of a family reunited after a war. Or something unexpected, like a photo of a man walking on stilts through a refugee camp, entertaining a host of children.  

Our guests this episode are Tiffany Fairey, a Senior Research Fellow based at the Department of War Studies at King’s College London, and Ingrid Guyon, a photographer and participatory visual media practitioner. They’ve both spent over 15 years working around the world helping communities affected by conflict to tell their own stories through photography.  

Fairey and Guyon are co-authors of Peace Photography: A Guide, which presents a methodology and approach that celebrates peace efforts and encourages creativity, drawing on projects in 21 countries. Fairey’s upcoming book Imaging Peace: How People Use Photography to Resist Violence, Transform Conflict, and Build Connection will be out this autumn from Edinburgh University Press.  

To view the images discussed in this episode, go to makingpeacevisible.org/podcast.  

LEARN MORE

Download a free copy of the guide in English, Spanish or French; browse peace photography projects, explore Fairey’s research, and more at imagingpeace.org.  

Follow the Imaging Peace project on Instagram @imaging_peace.

Read Tiffany Fairey’s essay on the Everyday Peace Indicators project in Colombia in The Conversation  

Read Ingrid Guyon’s blog post for Beyond Skin on visiting Belfast as a peace photographer

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Our guest this episode, journalism scholar Jennifer  Henrichsen, says local newspapers, news webistes, and TV and radio stations are a necessary part of public infrastructure too.

Local news journalists play crucial roles in times of crises, like wildfires and floods. They also play a less visible watchdog role in keeping local governments accountable. And even less visible -- there's evidence that the erosion and closure of local news outlets is contributing to increasing polarization.

Jennifer Henrichsen is an Assistant Professor at the Edward R. Murrow College of Communication at Washington State University. She's also the research director of the Washington Local News Ecosystem Project -- a publicly-funded initiative to measure the health of local news around the state. Washington State University is using the data collected by Henrichsen's team to help match up young reporters with newsrooms that need them.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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In the month of July, we're working to raise $40,000 to continue and grow this work. With your help, we can fund journalists producing rigorous, underreported stories of conflict transformation through the Making Peace Visible story awards, and convene strategic gatherings of peacebuilders and journalists to shift how stories get told. Your donation also keeps this podcast going and helps us reach more listeners. Make a one-time or recuring gift at makingpeacevisible.org/donate. 

--

When Pope Leo XIV addressed over a thousand journalists at the Vatican just days after his ordination, his message was both striking and urgent: “Let us disarm words, and we will help disarm the world.” In a time of escalating global conflict and diminishing trust in institutions, the new pope placed moral responsibility on the media: to move away from aggression and polarization and toward communication that fosters understanding and peace.

In this episode, we hear from Miguel Díaz, 9th U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See (under President Barack Obama), and Elizabeth Hume, Executive Director of the Alliance for Peacebuilding. Drawing from their respective fields—diplomacy and international peacebuilding—they reflect on the broader implications of Pope Leo’s message, particularly the role that religious institutions like the Vatican can play in addressing global division, violence, and institutional fragility.

Díaz offers context on the Vatican’s long-standing diplomatic role. He describes how Pope Leo’s formation in both the U.S. and Latin America, along with his theological grounding in justice and bridge-building, may inform his priorities as pontiff. Hume brings a sobering view from the peacebuilding field, where violent conflict is on the rise and support for prevention is declining. Together, they examine how the Catholic Church, under Pope Leo, might offer renewed institutional leadership in a world in search of stability.

Further Reading: 

Pope Leo’s address to journalists, May 12, 2025 (English translation):
https://www.vatican.va/content/leo-xiv/en/speeches/2025/may/documents/20250512-media.html

NYT coverage of Pope Leo’s address to the media:
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/05/12/world/europe/pope-leo-vatican-journalists.html

‘The pope is Peruvian!’ How 2 decades in South America shaped the vision of Pope Leo XIV:
https://theconversation.com/the-pope-is-peruvian-how-2-decades-in-south-america-shaped-the-vision-of-pope-leo-xiv-256415

Maria Ressa’s speech at the Vatican on January 25, 2025: 
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t0kHvIeYN5M&t=12s

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

Support our work

Connect on social:

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We want to learn more about our listeners. Take this 3-minute survey to help us improve the show! 

In the month of July, we're working to raise $40,000 to continue and grow this work. With your help, we can fund journalists producing rigorous, underreported stories of conflict transformation through the Making Peace Visible story awards, and convene strategic gatherings of peacebuilders and journalists to shift how stories get told. Your donation also keeps this podcast going and helps us reach more listeners. Make a one-time or recuring gift at makingpeacevisible.org/donate. 

Our guest this episode is Terrell Jermaine Starr, an independent journalist based in Ukraine. His work focuses on interconnection: how Ukrainian politics and society relates to the rest of the world, especially the United States, Europe, and Africa. In the early days of Russia's full-scale invasion, Starr gained international attention for his up-close-and-personal reporting style, and for helping vulnerable Ukrainians flee the country. And, for being a rare Black American reporter on the ground.  

On Starr's podcast, Black Diplomats, and his Substack blog, Terrell provides reporting and analysis on politics in the Ukraine, the United States, and beyond. He pays special attention to equity and discrimination, drawing parallels between Putinism and the MAGA movement in the United States.  Terrel is also a contributor to Foreign Policy magazine, the Washington Post, and MSNBC.

MPV digital media producer Andrea Muraskin sat down with Terrell Jermaine Starr on July 3, 2025, just days after his home city of Kyiv was bombarded by Russian missiles and drones.

Follow him on X @terrelljstarr

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Guest Bette Dam is a Dutch journalist who covered the war in Afghanistan for 15 years. She began her coverage in 2006, embedded with the Dutch military. She’s the author of two books: Looking for the Enemy, Mullah Omar and the Unknown Taliban, and A Man in a Motorcycle, How Hamid Karzai Came to Power. 

In the course of her reporting Dam realized that most Western journalists were providing a distorted view of the war. It left out the perspective of the Afghan people, and made the country appear more dangerous than it really was. And Dam says the press missed opportunities to hold the U.S. and NATO to account for major blunders – including largely overlooking the fact that the Taliban surrendered in December 2001. 

This interview was recorded in October 2023.

In 2024, Dam completed a PhD at the Vrije Universiteit in Brussels on the role of Western media in conflict, where she now serves on the faculty. In February 2025 she launched UNHEARD in partnership with the Tow Center at the Columbia School of Journalism, a project that aims to help news organizations reveal potentially overlooked narratives by using AI to audit who is quoted in their articles. 

**Copy this link to share this episode anywhere**

MORE FROM BETTE DAM

TEDx talk: The shortcomings of war reporting

Follow Bette on X (formerly Twitter)

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions, Zero V, and Doyeq. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Our guest helping tackle these questions is anthropologist Stephanie Savell. Savell is the Co-Director of Costs of War at Brown University, an interdisciplinary research project focused on the impact of the post 9/11 wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and beyond; the U.S. global military footprint; and the domestic effects of US military spending. Savell's own research highlights US military involvement around the world, most notably in Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia. In many of these places, American assistance has served to fuel existing conflicts, and provided governments with tools and justification to target Muslim populations. But, Savell says, it doesn’t have to be this way. 

This episide was originally published in December 2023.

MORE FROM COSTS OF WAR

Stephanie Savell’s map of US counterterrorism operations 2021-2023

The Costs of United States’ Post-9/11 “Security Assistance”: How Counterterrorism Intensified Conflict in Burkina Faso and Around the World by Stephanie Savell 

Why Media Conflation of Activism with Terrorism Has Dire Consequences: The Case of Cop City by Deepa Kumar

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Those words from neuroscientist Bob Deutch triggered a lightbulb moment in the mind of Tim Phillips, a veteran peacebuilder and educator.  Over the past twelve years, Phillips has worked with neuroscientists and psychologists to integrate brain science into research and practice at Beyond Conflict, the peacebuilding organization that he founded in 1991 and where he serves as CEO. 

In this conversation, we focus on Beyond Conflict’s research on dehumanization. If you perceive another person or group as less than human, it’s much easier to justify violence against that group or person. Dehumanizing rhetoric – like describing people as animals or vermin – is often a precursor to violence.  

But Phillips says if we can identify signs of dehumanization early on, we can make changes to decrease the likelihood of violent conflict. Phillips and host Jamil Simon also discuss the difference between fear and disgust – both motivators of conflict that are each processed differently in the brain and require different interventions. Plus, how Beyond Conflict has applied this research to create media interventions in Nigeria and the United States. And, how journalists can utilize knowledge of how the brain works to reach more people and avoid incitement. 

This episode was originally published in April 2024.

LEARN MORE

Watch the video “America’s Divided Mind” by Beyond Conflict

Read key takeaways from Beyond Conflict’s research on dehumanization

Read Beyond Conflict’s Decoding Dehumanization policy brief 

Listen to our episode with psychologist Donna Hicks: “Dignity: A new way to look at conflict”

Watch “How to Grow Peace Journalism” webinars from the George Washington University Media and Peacebuilding Project. Presentations from Making Peace Visible host Jamil Simon, education director Steven Youngblood, and  producer Andrea Muraskin in this video.

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ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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This episode we’re joined by Suzette Brooks Masters, a thought leader, political strategist and Senior Fellow at the Democracy Funders Network. She says that for American democracy to thrive, it's not enough to defend the existing system against attack, because the system doesn’t work well for most people. 

She’s been researching ways to invigorate democratic practice, including citizen’s assemblies and participatory budgeting – frameworks that give ordinary people a bigger say in government. And she advocates for storytelling that envisions positive, possible futures. 

00:00 Introduction and Current Political Climate

00:40 First 100 Days of the New Administration

01:35 Guest Introduction: Suzette Brooks Masters

02:08 Imagining Better Futures for American Democracy

03:36 Challenges and Opportunities in Democracy

05:57 Why the Right Sees Democracy as Under Attack 

11:31 Bridge Building and Civic Engagement

16:44 Innovations in Democratic Processes

22:59 Telling a Different Story About the Future

30:57 Conclusion and Final Thoughts

LEARN MORE

Suzette Brooks Masters’ articles for The Fulcrum

Imagining Better Futures for American Democracy report

Becoming Futures Ready: How Philanthropy Can Leverage Strategic Foresight For Democracy report

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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In a five-year investigative series for the environmental news outlet Mongabay, reporter Karla Mendes exposed environmental crimes in Arariboia and other protected areas of the Amazon, including palm oil production, logging, and cattle ranching. She also investigated the murder of Paulo Paulino Guajajara, an indigenous Forest Guardian who was ambushed by loggers. He was one of more than 50 indigenous Guajajara individuals killed in the last 20 years. Mendes’ reporting is helping to bring justice to these remote areas where impunity has been the norm.

Her investigation was part of a Pulitzer Center Rainforest Investigations fellowship. She says as the climate changes, Brazilians are showing increased interest in journalism like hers that highlights the importance of protecting the rainforest. 

LEARN MORE

Read Karla Mendes’ report: Revealed: Illegal cattle ranching booms in Arariboia territory during deadly year for Indigenous Guajajara.

Learn more about the impact of the investigation.

Watch a short documentary film about the Guardians of the Forest and the search for justice for Paulo Paulino Guajajara.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Carlos Alvarado Quesada served as President of Costa Rica from 2018 to 2022. While president, he focused on combating climate change, defending human rights, democracy, and multilateralism, which is when countries cooperate to solve problems. Carlos currently teaches graduate courses on leadership at the Fletcher School at Tufts University, where the World Peace Foundation is based. Follow Carlos on Instagram @carlosalvq.

Jorge Vargas is Director of the State of the Nation Program in Costa Rica. As an academic researcher, he focuses on state reform and democracy in Central America. Find out more about Jorge’s work at estadonacion.or.cr.

Disrupting Peace is a podcast about why peace hasn't worked, and how it still could, from the World Peace Foundation. It's hosted by Bridget Conley, and produced by Bridget Conley and Emily Shaw. Engineering by Jacob Winik and Aja Simpson.

Additional music in this episode by Kevin MacLeod and Xylo-Ziko. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Frangie Mawad is an independent journalist and political analyst, based in Caracas, Venezuela.  He writes the Substack Venezuela Weekly, where he keeps a close eye on developments both at home, and in the Venezuelan diaspora.  He’s written for international news outlets including Bloomberg, The Economist, and Americas Quarterly, and was an editor for the Caracas Chronicles.

Making Peace Visible producer Andrea Muraskin spoke with Tony about what it’s like to work in an authoritarian context, where journalists are often censored and threatened, and sometimes arrested. As you’ll hear, it helps to have a sense of humor, and a long view of history.  

This interview was recorded on March 24. Things may have shifted in Venezuela by the time you hear it.  

LEARN MORE

tonyfrangie.com

Venezuela Weekly (English edition)

El Chiguire Bipolar - "The Bipolar Capybara" Venezuelan satire website

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Our guest this episode, Bridget Conley, started her career in peacebuilding in the 1990s. At that time, Western academics and politicians spelled out a formula for creating peaceful nations. You would hold elections, convert the economy to a free market, pursue human rights, and prosecute bad actors. But the post 9/11 years showed that the militarized world order was not going away.

There’s been a push in recent years to localize peace efforts – meaning fund them and run them based on direction from people in the effected countries. But to a considerable extent, peacebuilding still revolves around that formula from the 1990s. 

That’s why Conley launched Disrupting Peace, a podcast that explores why peace hasn’t worked, and how it could.  

Bridget is the research director at the World Peace Foundation, a research organization affiliated with Tufts University. Her research is currently focused on mass incarceration in the United States, and she teaches college classes inside the prison system in Massachusetts as part of the Tufts University Prison Initiative. For Conley, prison abolition and international peacebuilding are all about creating societies that solve problems through debate and discussion, not through coercion.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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The reality, of course, is much more complicated. It’s heartbreaking to hear stories of children suddenly unable to attend school and receive essential vaccinations. But beyond the shockwaves of a sudden halt in the flow of assistance, there's a lot about US foreign aid that's up for debate. Questions like what does it accomplish? Does it really help? How does it help? Should it continue? Or, should foreign aid be scaled down over time? 

Our host, Jamil Simon, has seen USAID projects succeed, and fall short – having worked for more than three decades as a USAID contractor, developing communication strategies to promote reform in more than 20 countries.

Our guest, Gregory Warner is a Peabody Award - winning journalist who has reported on USAID on the ground in places including Sub-Saharan Africa, Ukraine and Afghanistan. He was the creator and host of NPR's international podcast Rough Translation. Before that, he was an international correspondent for NPR, based in East Africa. Warner has reported on USAID on the ground in Africa, as well as in Ukraine and Afghanistan. He writes the Substack blog Rough Transition.

MORE FROM GREGORY WARNER

Subscribe to get Rough Transition in your inbox. 

Read Warner’s recent reporting about the gutting of USAID and what it says about the perception of America in the world. 

Listen to the Rough Translation episode about a woman who lied so she could receive aid designated for sexual violence survivors in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. 

Explore the Rough Translation podcast archive. 

CONNECT WITH US

Do you have a story of your own about USAID? Keep the conversation going on LinkedIn, or drop us a line at info@makingpeacevisible.org.

Music in this episode is by Xylo-Ziko, Blue Dot Sessions, Gavin Luke, Feras Charestan, and Caro Luna. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Our guest this episode, journalist and documentary filmmaker Etant Dupain, gives us a behind-the-headlines look at events in Haiti, his home country. Dupain says that the gangs who control much of the country now are supported by powerful elites. Their aim, his says, is to suppress a grassroots protest movement that is calling for accountability for the embezzlement of billions of dollars in development funds. 

Dupain's new documentary film, The Fight for Haiti, tells the story of the Haitian movement against corruption and impunity, which started with a tweet and at its height had hundreds of thousands in the street. 

In this episode, you’ll learn about

• The problematic history of foreign aid in Haiti including the aftermath of the the 2010 earthquake
• The Petrocaribe agreement with Venezuela that was supposed to fund crucial infrastructure projects in Haiti
• Creative tactics activists used to demand accountability
• Who profits when gangs overtake a country

Watch a trailer and learn more about the film and the movement at thefightforhaiti.com.

Protest audio used in the episode is from the film The Fight for Haiti, used with permission. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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This is a paradoxical moment to talk about long term peace. The horrific October 7th attacks and the near - destruction of Gaza that followed, served to amplify already high levels of distrust, hate, and trauma. At the same time, the war has demonstrated to Gazans that their government placed conflict with Israel above their own survival. And it has shown Israelis that an indefinite blockade of Gaza doesn’t ensure their security. 

So while the ceasefire doesn’t mean the end of the conflict by any means, it does offer an opportunity to envision a way out. 

Our guest for this episode is Ksenia Svetlova, an expert observer of politics and media in the Middle East and the executive director of the Regional Organization for Peace, Economics, and Security, or ROPES. 

Svetlova is an immigrant to Israel from the Soviet Union, an Arabic speaker and a Middle East specialist. For fifteen years. Svetlova reported from Israel, Gaza, the West Bank, and different countries in the region. She served four years in Israel’s parliament representing the center-left Zionist Union Coalition. 

MORE FROM KSENIA SVETLOVA

Read: Netanyahu’s phase two dilemma: Political survival vs defying President Trump, for Chatham House

Listen: ROPESCAST, the podcast from ROPES

Watch: Webinars and more on 

ROPES’ YouTube channel 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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What if, just by sending a text message, you could reach a trusted source for an instant fact check?  

Our guest today, Ed Bice, heads an organization called Meedan, that provides a consumer-facing fact checking service in countries around the world. Meedan’s software integrates with messaging apps, to connect people quickly with trusted news organizations. Instead of asking Chat GPT or Google, you can ask a customized chatbot, and get an answer based on reporting from your local TV station or newspaper.  

Meedan’s work has been especially impactful during contentious elections in countries like Mexico, India, and Brazil.  

Unfortunately, Meta’s announcement that it will stop fact checking on its platforms this year – including WhatsApp, Instagram and Facebook – threatens the funding and support essential for tools like Meedan to combat misinformation.

Ed Bice has been working for two decades to make the Internet a more collaborative and democratic space. And he’s still optimistic.  

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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In this episode, we welcome back Zaina Erhaim to share her perspective on the sudden fall of the Assad regime, and what's ahead for Syria. Zaina is an award winning Syrian journalist, who is widely recognized for her commitment to ethical reporting and amplifying marginalized voices. She began her career reporting on the civil war in Syria, but fled to the UK after both the Assad regime, and opposition forces threatened her life. 

Zaina Erhaim is the managing editor of Jeem, and a communications consultant. 

Note: This interview was recorded on December 22, 2024. On December 30, Syria’s transitional government appointed Maysaa Sabrine as head of the Syrian central bank, the first woman to hold the role. 

Listen to our 2022 episode with Zaina Erhaim, Decolonizing international journalism

More from Zaina Erhaim on Syria after Assad:

New York Times Opinion | Al-Assad Is Gone, and One Idea Fills My Brain

New Internationalist: Where to now for Syria’s women? 

Al Jazeera’s The Listening Post: Images and narratives of Syria’s historic moment

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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When you look at the online reactions to major events, or watch news footage of political rallies, you might conclude that people on the political Left have a completely different moral compass, – or sense of right and wrong–, from people on the political Right. But Kurt Gray, a social psychologist who studies morality and politics, says that’s not true. 

The main thesis behind Gray’s work at the Deepest Beliefs Lab at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and his new book Outraged: Why We Fight About Morality and Politics, and How to Find Common Ground – is that humans share a sense of morality based on fear of harm, the product of our evolutionary heritage.  However perceptions of who is vulnerable to harm and how those vulnerable should be defended differs widely across the divide. 

In this episode, Kurt Gray draws on research to shed light on issues including

• Why so many people reacted positively to the assassination of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson
• Why we often think our communities and our children are less safe than they actually are
• How the decline of local news may contribute to polarization 
• Why facts rarely change minds in a political argument
• How to approach politics with a sense of “moral humility” 

Learn more about Kurt Gray and the book at kurtjgray.com. Follow his newsletter, Moral Understanding: The Science of What Divides Us, at moralunderstandingnewsletter.com.  

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Photographer Anastasia Taylor-Lind and writer Alisa Sopova create intimate, accessible portraits of Ukrainian civilians living close to the frontlines of the Russian invasion. Sometimes their subjects are picnicking in a park or tending a garden. Other times, they’re repairing a ceiling damaged by shelling or waiting for departure on an evacuation train. Anastasia and Alisa have been working together in Ukraine since the Maidan Revolution, also known as the “Revolution of Dignity” in 2014. And over the years, they’ve returned to visit the same families, witnessing how the war touches men, women, and children over time. 

Independent Projects

5K From the Frontline 

Welcome to Donetsk

International media work:

NPR: The Ukraine war isn't new. These intimate photos show 3 families enduring it for years

The New Humanitarian: How seven years of war and COVID-19 split Ukraine in two

The New York Times: Opinion: Where There Are Fish in the Tap Water and Women’s Uteruses Fall Out

Time Magazine: The Strange Unreality of Life During Eastern Ukraine's Forgotten War

Music in this episode by Doyeq, One Man Book, and Bill Vortex

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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As a podcaster, journalist, and Senior Fellow for Public Practice at Braver Angels, a nonprofit working to depolarize America, guest Mónica Guzmán is an ideal voice to help us make sense of what happened, and provide some helpful perspective. On her podcast A Braver Way, Guzmán is  joined by guests from across the political spectrum to unearth tools, insights, and messy real life stories that can guide listeners over the divide in their everyday lives. She says that Americans are being hurt by misinformation not only about facts, but also “misinformation about what’s in the hearts of other people.” 

On this episode you’ll hear a few clips from A Braver Way – including from a conversation Guzmán, a political "blue"  recorded with her parents – who voted for Donald Trump. 

If your family is politically divided, you’ll definitely want to listen to this in time for Thanksgiving! 

Learn more about our guest at moniguzman.com

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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We can point fingers at social media, the news media, political parties, fear mongering leaders, poor education, broken political systems… the list is long. The divides can seem so vast, the problems so huge. It’s easy to retreat into a huddle with people who see the world the same way you do. 

But our guest for this episode, Columbia University psychology and education professor and author Peter T. Coleman, says there are things each of us can do to help heal these societal wounds. And he says the press and media can play an important role in decreasing polarization. 

That's the subject of his latest book, The Way Out: How to Overcome Toxic Polarization. Coleman outlines evidence-based practices that you can do on your own- or with a group- to help recalibrate assumptions, and re-create bonds with people you disagree with. 

Coleman also partnered with the organization Starts With Us to turn the lessons from the book into an online program, called The Polarization Detox Challenge. It's like an exercise routine, for strengthening your compassion muscles. The book is focused on the United States, but the exercises can be done anywhere. 

This episode originally published in January 2023. 

Follow Peter T. Coleman on X: @PeterTColeman1

Making Peace Visible is  hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. We had help on this episode from Faith McClure. 

Support our work with a tax-deductible donation. 

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions and Bill Vortex

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Qamar-ul Huda is the author of Reenvisioning Peacebuilding and Conflict Resolution in Islam, published in April 2024. He’s worked for major players like the US Institute of Peace and the UN Development Program. He served in the Obama Administration as Senior Policy Advisor to Secretary of State John Kerry, and is now a professor of International Affairs at the US Naval Academy.

In this conversation, Huda shares a refreshingly positive perspective on the possibility of peace in Islamic countries, rooted in his deep understanding of Islamic religion and cultures. In his book, he reflects on some of the mistakes made in the early years of the War on Terror, by the US government, and other international actors.  He says many of these mistakes were rooted in seeing peacebuilding as a secular project, which failed to acknowledge the conflict resolution tools and ethics that exist in Islamic tradition. And he says this thinking continues to influence foreign policy to this day. He also highlights more constructive examples of conflict resolution in the Muslim world.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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On a small desert campus, students from Israel, Palestine, and other parts of the Middle East take classes in ecology, earth sciences and renewable energy. They also debate the hot button issues: history, politics, religion, war, occupation, terrorism, while learning to listen actively, and living together amidst contradicting narratives. 

Our guest David Lehrer is Director of International Development at the Arava Institute, based at Kibbutz Keturah in Israel. He teaches there, and also heads up Arava's action arm, working with Palestinian partners to bring clean water, sanitation, and eco-friendly temporary housing to displaced people in Gaza -- among other projects. 

Learning to care for a shared environment in the region, providing essential infrastructure in wartime, and working together across divides are usually treated as a footnote in the media, David says. But he hopes that as Arava continues to work with Palestinian partners in the face of a war with no end in sight,  peacebuilding becomes news. 

LEARN MORE:

The Arava Institute

Arava Institute on Instagram

David Lehrer's bio

Times of Israel: Palestinians, Israelis partner to bring off-grid solutions to Gaza camps

Special thanks to Tamar Miller and Rachel Kalikow. Music in this episode by One Man Book, Blue Dot Sessions, Doyeq, and Joel Cummins. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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 Awwad has been working as a peacebuilder since 2002, and has given talks around Israel, Palestine, and the world. His current work is leading Taghyeer, a Palestinian movement —"to take nonviolent responsibility for self-development and forging a path to end occupation." Awwad says he founded Taghyeer, a "DNA Palestinian movement" to focus on the "homework" needed to lay the foundation for true Palestinian self-governance and an end to Israeli military occupation. In this conversation, Awwad gives us an intimate view of his own inner transformation, and an inside look at Palestinian identity and self-determination. 

LEARN MORE

Watch: An Israeli and a Palestinian talk peace, dignity and safety a conversation with Ali Abu Awwad and Ami Dar, Israeli peace activist and founder of Idealist.org, from TED.

Read: “I Don’t Want to Resist the Occupation—I Want to End the Occupation” an interview with Ali Abu Awwad in the Nation Magazine

Read: Nonviolence Is the Missing Path to Israeli-Palestinian Peace editorial by Ali Abu Awwad in "The Daily Beast"

Listen: Ali Abu Awwad and Robi Damelin on Nonviolence as The Path to Freedom for Palestinians and Israelis  on "Unlocking Us" with Brené Brown

Music in this episode by Xylo-Ziko and Blue Dot Sessions. 

Special thanks to Cloe Shasha Brooks.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Today’s guest, veteran mediator and peacebuilder Mark Gerzon, says to strengthen peace and reconciliation efforts, we need to make peacebuilding mainstream. And to do that, the reasons behind the practice need to be practical and more accessible to both the public and to donors. He says the messaging we've been using for years, grounded in a moral imperative for peace, isn't working. And today, he’s working in the United States to train leaders to work across the partisan divide. 

Gerzon has served as advisor to the UN Development Program and multinational corporations.  He is president of the Mediators Foundation, an incubator for social action projects that bridge divides around the world, and has authored several books on the topic of polarization and reconciliation. 

LEARN MORE

Leading Through Conflict and other books by Mark Gerzon 

Harvard Business Review: To Resolve a Conflict, First Decide: Is It Hot or Cold?

Documentary by Mark Gerzon: The Reunited States

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions and SFmusic.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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His new book, From Vision to Action: Remaking the World Through Social Entrepreneurship, explains how he built Search for Common Ground, and what made it so successful. His new book delivers practical guidance on building bridges and creating meaningful change. Of particular interest to us at MPV, John is a remarkable innovator, not only in the production of effective media to promote peaceful solutions to conflicts, but also in the breakthrough ways he found to disseminate the media, and ideas and approaches they celebrated. 

RESOURCES:

Virtual book talk with John Marks with Harvard Law School's Program on Negotiation, September 23, 2024

Clips from Common Ground Productions:

·       Radio in Burundi: 1:42 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qghsd3-Wpv8

·       Children’s TV in Macedonia with Sesame Workshop: 2:04 - https://youtu.be/ifyCYSbHp2A

·       Reality Series:  CNN piece on “The President: 2:45 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQFlmUzi6ys

·       Adult Drama:  Team trailer:  2:14 - http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NqYVapttDEQ&feature=youtu.be

·       PSA:  Ziggy Marley: 0:23 - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llinHdw_gdU

·       Music Video:  Ring the Bells: 3:38 - https://youtu.be/5Rs94ztNROI

Music in this episode by Joel Cummins, Podington Bear, Xylo-Ziko, and Faszo.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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While working with a program that facilitates ritual reconciliation processes in Sierra Leone, a process known as fambul tok (or “family talk”), peacebuilder and philanthropist Libby Hoffman learned that justice for Sierra Leonians isn't about punishing or ousting a perpetrator. Rather, justice comes through making the community whole again. “When you hurt somebody, you don't just hurt them; you hurt the community as well,” says Hoffman. 

In this episode, host Jamil Simon speaks with Libby Hoffman about fambul tok, a process she calls “building peace from the inside out.” Fambul tok is an ancient tradition where disputes are solved through community-wide conversation around a bonfire. In this post-war context, Hoffman and her team facilitated the revival of the practice for Sierra Leonians. 

Hoffman also documented this remarkable peacebuilding process in her award-winning documentary film Fambul Tok, which has itself catalyzed further reconciliation within Sierra Leone’s war-torn communities. Hoffman's book about her experiences in Sierre Leone is called The Answers Are There: Building Peace from the Inside Out.

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. A former Political Science professor, Hoffman has a Master of Arts in Law and Diplomacy from Tufts’ Fletcher School of Law and a BA in Political Science from Williams College.

The film Fambul Tok is available for private viewing through MPV's  Peace Docs initiative. Watch the film here: vimeo.com/26644766. 

This episode was produced by Andrea Muraskin, with help from Faith McClure. It was originally published in October 2022.

 Music by Xylo-Ziko via freemusicarchive.org. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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A user on X posted that the suspect was a Muslim asylum seeker named Ali Al-Shakati. A prominent YouTuber claimed the attacker was an "illegal migrant." As rumors quickly spread on social media, attracting tens of millions of views, Brits on the far right used platforms like X and TikTok to organize violent protests around the country. In one town, a mob started a fire outside a hotel housing asylum seekers and and smashed a glass door, chanting "get them out." In another, demonstrators attacked a mosque. By the end of the next weekend, violent protests had taken place in at least 18 towns and cities, and 147 people had been arrested, as Tortoise reported. 

When a judge eventually released the attacker's name, Axel Rudakubana, it turned out he neither Muslim not a migrant, but a Christian and the British-born son of Rwandan parents. 

This is just one of many stories of online misinformation leading to real world harm. Our guest this episode, Lena Slachmuijlder, is working to stop the flow of misinformation in a world where so many get their news from social media. She heads Search for Common Ground's Digital Peacebuilding initiative, which identifies and trains "digital stewards" around the world, people who are trusted by their communities and help stop the spread of fake news online. Also, in her work as co-chair of the Council on Tech and Social Cohesion, Lena is envisioning ways to design new tech that fosters real conversations online, including the use of AI. 

Learn more:

Digital Community Stewards free online course

Digital Peacebuilders' Guide

Searching for Safer, Healthier digital spaces - review of digital peacebuilding initiatives

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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As a young displaced person, Aciro became a journalist so the world would know about the suffering in Northern Uganda: The abductions, killings, the ambushes, the destruction. But after a few years, she wondered if focusing on bloodshed was the right approach. What if journalists like her could help bring peace to the country? 

Today, Aciro is director of the Peace Journalism Foundation of East Africa. Peace Journalism -- as you might remember from one of our previous episodes -- is when editors and reporters make choices that improve the prospects for peace. She covers peace and conflict, refugee issues, and the environment, and trains journalists around East Africa in peace journalism. 

Aciro was a finalist for the 2022 Women Building Peace Award given by the United States Institute of Peace. And in 2019, she received a Golden Jubilee Medal awarded by Ugandan President Yoweri, for her coverage of the LRA conflict and her contributions to current peace efforts in Northern Uganda. 

Aciro sat down with Making Peace Visible Education Director Steven Youngblood to reflect on her decades in the field in Uganda, and the real impact of peace journalism in the face of war and gang violence. 

Music in this episode by Xylo-Ziko and Joel Cummins.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Scripted storytelling, with its ability to get up close and personal with human emotions and struggles, also has a powerful influence on our perceptions of the world. And with news outlets increasingly politically siloed, perhaps Hollywood has a better chance of shifting perspectives than journalists do.  

Our guest Kate Folb  is director of the Center for Hollywood Health and Society,  a project of the Lear Center at USC Annenberg. Hollywood Health and Society (HHS) provides expert guidance for screenwriters, producers and actors about issues from HIV, to immigration, to gun violence. They have projects on the threat of nuclear war and the impact of military expenditures on our lives and wellbeing. In this interview Jamil and Kate discuss how HHS gets Hollywood writers to think differently, as well as shows and movies featuring compelling heroes without guns that you should be watching.  

Series and films mentioned in this episode, in order of appearance:

How to Get Away with Murder (ABC)

The Cleaning Lady (Fox)

Mayor of Kingstown (Paramount Plus)

Arrival (Paramount Pictures)

The Diplomat (Netflix)

Oppenheimer (Universal Pictures)

Madame Secretary (CBS, available in the US on Netflix)

Getting Bombed (YouTube)

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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“To Save Us From Hell” is a new weekly news and analysis podcast about the UN. Mark Leon Goldberg, a veteran global affairs journalist and editor of the news outlets UN Dispatch and Global Dispatches, and Anjali Dayal, a political science professor and author at Fordham University, co-host the show. They join us on Making Peace Visible to explain the significance of the UN today, especially when it comes to deescalating conflicts and laying the groundwork for peace. 

Goldberg and Dayal’s intense focus on the UN and its work comes at a time when the world’s focus on the institution seems to be diminishing, while violent conflicts are increasing. We also have global crises like climate change, infectious disease, and refugees. The one global institution designated to deal with problems at that scale is the UN. So what’s missing from mainstream news coverage of the UN, and can it save us from hell?!

Subscribe to “To Save Us from Hell” at globaldispatches.org. 

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions, Siddhartha Corsus, and SFmusic.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Hiding in a janitor’s closet, David Hogg recorded his classmates on his phone. 

"I interviewed my classmates so that if we didn't make it out of there, hopefully our voices would carry on,” Hogg told NPR.” And it wouldn't be possible for the NRA and gun lobby to say, 'Oh, you can't talk about this. You're politicizing this.’”

Seventeen students and staff died that day. Later that year, David Hogg co-founded March for Our Lives, and helped organize hundreds of thousands of young people to rally for an end to gun violence in the United States. In the years since, they’ve had some wins, including the Bipartisan Safer Communities Act of 2022, which enhanced background checks for 18 to 21 year-olds, and provided funding for community violence intervention and mental health services. 

Hogg’s new project, Leaders We Deserve, helps young progressives run for office. 

This week, we’re bringing you a recent interview with David Hogg from Democracy Works, a podcast about what it means to live in a democracy, from the McCourtney Institute for Democracy at Penn State University. 

Something that stands out about Hogg, from our perspective as a podcast about peace, is how he works across the aisle to get laws passed. Like many in the peacebuilding field, Hogg recognizes that change is often incremental, and a compromise that will save lives is more useful than political gridlock.

Democracy Works co-host Jenna Spinelle spoke with David Hogg on his trip to Penn State’s campus this spring.

You can find the original Democracy Works episode and a transcript here.

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Today's guest, Steve Killelea, is the founder and Executive Chairman of the Institute for Economics and Peace, an internationally renowned think tank. Each year, IEP publishes the Global Peace Index and the Positive Peace Index.  

IEP researchers draw on reems of data to determine how the world is doing when it comes to peace. They also study the elements that make for peaceful societies: things like strong social cohesion, satisfaction with living standards, and resilience to crisis.  

IEPs work promotes peace as a positive, and achievable state of well being. It also serves as a kind of warning system in times like the one we're living in, where violent conflict is on the rise in many parts of the globe. 

Visit visionofhumanity.org/peace-academy to take IEP's free short course on positive peace. 

Music in this episode by Joel Cummins, Jesse Gallagher and SFmusic.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Peace Journalism, the guiding practice behind Media Association for Peace, (MAP) is when editors and reporters make choices—of what to report, and how to report it—that create opportunities for society at large to consider and value non-violent responses to conflict. 

Growing up in an insulated Christian community in the wake of the Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990), Vanessa never had the opportunity to meet a Lebanese Muslim. As a rookie journalist, instead of working inside of one of her country’s ethnic media silos, she chose independence. She was drawn towards peacebuilding, and would report on camps that brought together groups of Sunni and Shia Muslims and Christians in the mountains. With the founding of MAP in 2013, Vanessa created a space where journalists learn to report on Lebanon’s divisive issues – including an economic crisis, the difficulties of hosting Syrian refugees, and LGBTQ rights – in ways that are nuanced and depolarizing. 

Watch videos produced by MAP to break stereotypes about Syrian refugees (Arabic with English subtitles)

The Genius Syrian Refugee

Myassar, the Woman Who Never Gives Up

The Robot Team

Watch Vanessa Bassil’s webinar presentation to learn more about MAP (about 15 minutes)

To learn more about Peace Journalism, listen to our episode with Steven Youngblood, founding director of the Center for Global Peace Journalism at Park University, and now Making Peace Visible’s Director of Education. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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His new book is called Possible: How we Survive - and Thrive - in an Age of Conflict. It’s filled with incredible stories from Bill’s career. In this episode, Bill talks about how lessons from the failures and success of the past – in places like Northern Ireland, Colombia, and the Middle East – can be instructive when dealing with the conflicts of today.  He shares exciting ideas about how journalists can tell stories about peace. What’s more, his insights on managing conflict can be applied anywhere from the UN to the boardroom to your own family. 

William Ury’s ideas aren’t easy to implement –  in fact they’re incredibly challenging. Ury says conflicts don’t end, but they can be transformed, from fighting with weapons to hashing differences out in a democratic process. And if Northern Ireland, South Africa, and Colombia – places where people said violent conflict would go on forever – could transform their conflicts, then there’s hope for the seemingly “impossible” conflicts of today. 

Music in this episode by Joel Cummins, Podington Bear, Kevin MacLeod, Meavy Boy, and Faszo.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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On that first visit to Dharamsala, Yee was struck by the throngs of Tibetans protesting peacefully in the streets. She was also surprised when the Dalai Lama approached her after the press conference, asked if she was Chinese, and embraced her in a warm hug.  

A few months later, Yee quit her job at the Financial Times and moved to this small city in the foothills of the Himalayas as a freelance reporter. She writes that “Dharamsala is more than an ethnic enclave; it’s a unique microcosm of a culture fighting for survival.” Her new book, Far from the Rooftop of the World: Travels among Tibetan Refugees on Four Continents follows the stories of ordinary Tibetans who have lived extraordinary lives. It also documents this community in exile: its education system, self-expression, and non-violent resistance.  

In this second episode in our series on refugees and immigration, we take a look at what it means to build a new life, when you may never be able to go home; and how Tibetans have forged their own path in India and elsewhere.  

Music in this episode by Joel Cummins, One Man Book, and Podington Bear

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Those words from neuroscientist Bob Deutch triggered a lightbulb moment in the mind of Tim Phillips, a veteran peacebuilder and educator. This is what the field of conflict resolution had been missing: a science-based understanding of how the human brain works in conflict situations.  Over the past twelve years, Phillips has worked with neuroscientists and psychologists to integrate brain science into research and practice at Beyond Conflict, the peacebuilding organization that he founded in 1991 and where he serves as CEO. 

In this conversation, we focus on Beyond Conflict’s research on dehumanization. If you perceive another person or group as less than human, it’s much easier to justify violence against that group or person. Dehumanizing rhetoric – like describing people as animals or vermin – is often a precursor to violence.  

But Phillips says if we can identify signs of dehumanization early on, we can make changes to decrease the likelihood of violent conflict. Phillips and host Jamil Simon also discuss the difference between fear and disgust – both motivators of conflict that are each processed differently in the brain and require different interventions. Plus, how Beyond Conflict has applied this research to create media interventions in Nigeria and the United States. And, how journalists can utilize knowledge of how the brain works to reach more people and avoid incitement. 

LEARN MORE

Watch the video “America’s Divided Mind” by Beyond Conflict

Read key takeaways from Beyond Conflict’s research on dehumanization

Read Beyond Conflict’s Decoding Dehumanization policy brief 

Listen to our episode with psychologist Donna Hicks: “Dignity: A new way to look at conflict”

Watch “How to Grow Peace Journalism” webinars from the George Washington University Media and Peacebuilding Project. Presentations from Making Peace Visible host Jamil Simon, education director Steven Youngblood, and  producer Andrea Muraskin in this video.

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ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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The brutal October 7th attacks by Hamas inside of Israel, and the IDF’s seemingly relentless assault on Gaza have captured the world’s attention for the past six months. In this episode, we attempt to understand the psychological state that’s developed over generations on both sides, which enables people to commit such violent acts. 

Our guest is Lydia Wilson, a research fellow at Oxford’s Centre for the Resolution of Intractable Conflict, a visiting fellow at the University of Cambridge’s Department of Middle Eastern Studies, and the Culture Editor at New Lines Magazine. Lydia has spent a good part of her career studying radicalization and the long-term psychological impact of violence on a population level.  

LEARN MORE

Articles by Lydia Wilson

The Psychology of the Intractable Israel-Palestine Conflict, New Lines Magazine, October 2023

Jordan’s Fragile Balancing Act, New Lines Magazine, December 2023

What I Discovered From Interviewing Imprisoned ISIS Fighters, The Nation, October 2015

Follow Lydia Wilson on X: @lsmwilson

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories (www.warstoriespeacestories.org), and hosted by Boston-based documentary filmmaker Jamil Simon.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Order Amanda Ripley’s book, High Conflict: Why We Get Stuck and How We Get Out. Watch Amanada’s talk on High Conflict for The Alliance for Peacebuilding. Follow her column in the Washington Post. 

Find our episode on the Colombian peace process here. You can watch the documentary “A Call for Peace” for free here: vimeo.com/305983614. Enter password peace2019. Learn more at acallforpeace.org.

Music in this episode from Blue Dot Sessions and Pianobook. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Reza Sayah is an Iranian-American journalist, currently based in Tehran. He’s reported on major events around the world including the Ukrainian Revolution of 2004, the Second Iraq War, and the Egyptian Revolution. 

Reza has spent much of his career working for major broadcast news networks including ABC, CNN, and Al Jazeera. In those roles, he’s had to explain complicated conflicts - in the form of very brief segments. And he says the corporate news model often works to perpetuate conflicts. But, another way is possible. 

This episode was originally published in June 2022. 

Watch:

Top Hamas official discusses Israel attack, Iran relations for PBS Newshour

Reza Sayah reports on Iran’s Jewish community for PBS Newshour

Reza Sayah: How This Iran-Backed Militia Helped Save Iraq from ISIS for PBS Newshour

Reza Sayah’s Tedx talk: How to Spot News that is NOT News

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Many are escaping wars, gang violence or repressive regimes, others are fleeing climate change impacts. Some are leaving collapsed economies where they can’t feed their families. How journalists cover refugees and immigration has a major impact on public perceptions. 

This is the first in a series of episodes looking at the intersection of journalism, refugees and immigration because it’s such an important issue, and because how journalists report on it has such a strong impact on public attitudes.

Guest Dina Francesca Haynes is an immigration and human rights attorney with decades of experience around the world. She worked for the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Bosnia and Afghanistan, and with the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights in Rwanda, among other international organizations. She’s personally represented hundreds of asylum seekers and victims of human trafficking. 

Haynes also writes for publications like The Jurist and The Hill, and has served as an expert source for journalists at CNN, Vice News, NPR, and other news outlets. She is the founder and president of the legal aid organization Refugee Projects, and directs the Immigration Law Certificate Program at New England Law. In this interview, she shares moving stories about clients trying to escape war and human trafficking; as well as advice for both journalists and activists on how to communicate fairly and accurately about immigration in a highly politicized atmosphere. 

LEARN MORE

Visit refugeeprojects.org, and follow on Instagram @refugeeprojects.

Read Dina Haynes’ article in Jurist: Rule of Law Chronicles: Migration, Xenophobia and the Immigrant Other (May 2023)

Read the Vice News article on human trafficking in Afghanistan quoting Dina Haynes: The Anti-Trafficking Movement Is Pivoting to Afghanistan (October 2021)

Music in this episode by Poddington Bear, Bill Vortex, Meavy Boy and Doyeq. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Charles Stuart was a father-to-be from the suburbs of Boston. Shortly after attending a birthing class in the city with his wife, Carol, Charles Stuart placed a 911 call. The couple had both been shot in their car. Stuart said a Black man pulled the trigger. 

Carol died from her injuries the next day. She and Charles were white, and the reaction from authorities was worlds away from what usually happened when a Black person was shot in Boston. Mayor Ray Flynn asked the police commissioner to assign every available detective to the case. Police immediately began raiding the homes of Black residents and conducting strip searches of young Black men in the Mission Hill area. With TV news playing and replaying the 911 call and a photo of the Stewarts bleeding on the front page of the Boston Herald the next day, a media circus ensued. 

But two months later - when Charles Stuart died by jumping off a bridge – it quickly became clear he was in fact the killer. 

This episode, we’re joined by Adrian Walker, an associate editor and columnist at the Boston Globe who was a rookie reporter there at the time of the Stuart case. Walker headed up a team of investigative reporters who recently revisited this story in a new and fascinating way. 

In the podcast Murder in Boston, and web series Nightmare in Mission Hill, investigative reporters at the Globe brought new evidence to light – like law enforcement officials who knew about Stuart’s guilt, but kept quiet. The podcast and the report also give voice to the family of Willie Bennett, the Black man who was the Boston police’s prime suspect. 

In this retelling, Walker – who hosts the podcast, – and other journalists discuss the media’s shortcomings in covering the Charles Stuart story, and how the news reports often fanned the flames of racial tension around it. The project also offers a blueprint for how journalists can help bring about healing following community trauma. 

Listen to the podcast, Murder in Boston

Read the web series, Nightmare in Mission Hill

This episode was edited by Faith McClure, and we had production help from Kristin Nelson. Special thanks to Lazzaro. Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Jamil has certainly had plenty of those. In 1990 he took a job in Tunisia designing communication strategies to promote water conservation and family planning. He would go on to promote social and environmental reform in 25 developing countries. Through these experiences, Jamil became convinced that peace efforts must become more visible and that journalism is the most powerful way to advance positive change globally. 

In 2018, he organized a symposium in New York City titled War Stories, Peace Stories: Peace, Conflict, and the Media, which brought together peace builders and journalists for a dialogue on covering war and violence more thoughtfully. It was this symposium that inspired Jamil to launch his podcast, in order to continue these important conversations. Jamil was awarded the 2019 Luxembourg Peace Prize for his work building global awareness of peaceful solutions to conflict. 

Jamil has also protested the Vietnam War, hitchhiked from Mexico City to de Janeiro, and driven a taxi cab, and that’s just scratching the surface. 

Find This is My Silver Lining wherever you get your podcasts and at thisismysilverlining.com.

Listen to previous Making Peace Episodes referenced in this interview:

Building peace on a walk through the Middle East with Anisa Mehdi and Joshua Weiss from the Abraham Path Initiative 

Un-embedding Western narratives about Afghanistan with Dutch journalist Bette Dam

This episode was edited and produced by John Keur at Wayfare Recordings, with additional production by Andrea Muraskin. Special thanks to Lauren Passel. Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions and Xylo-Ziko. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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But that handshake moment is just a fragment in a peace process. It often takes years of building trust and openness between warring parties to get to an agreement. And then more years after, to transition from violent conflict towards a political process; and see if peace can stick, and whether the grievances that led to war in the first place are being addressed.  

The slow speed and complexity of these processes may not lend themselves to mainstream news formats. But they are happening, and we're missing out on valuable lessons in reconciliation that can be adapted to other conflicts around the world.  

That’s why we invited Jonathan Cohen, executive director of the peacebuilding organization Conciliation Resources, or CR. In this episode, he shares stories from two ongoing peace processes: In Ethiopia, an ethnic Somali state called Ogaden. And on the island of Mindanao in the Philippines, a new autonomous region called Bangsamoro.  

You’ll also hear about CR’s work in Nagorno-Karabakh, where journalists from both sides – Armenian and Azeri – collaborated to make documentaries about that conflict. And we’ll discuss why this kind of storytelling still matters, even after most of the region’s Armenians were displaced during an Azerbaijani offensive in September 2023.

LEARN MORE

Parts of a Circle: Nagorny Karabakh conflict documentary series (Scroll to bottom to watch 2019 Summary Film)

Ethiopia: persisting with peace – short film about Ogaden peace process

Southern Philippines: Making Peace Stick in the Bangsamoro – May 2023 Crisis Group report

Music in this episode by Bill Vortex

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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This week we're featuring an interview from our friends at Democracy Works, a podcast about what it means to live in a democracy  from the McCourtney Institute for Democracy at Penn State University. Host Jenna Spinelle speaks with  Barbara F. Walter, political scientist and author of the book How Civil Wars Start: And How to Stop Them. Walter has spent decades studying civil wars around the world and working with other political scientists to quantify how strong democracy is in a given country. The interview covers those findings, how the democratic health of the United States has shifted over the past decade, and more.

Barbara F. Walter is the Rohr Professor of International Affairs at the School of Global Policy & Strategy at the University of California, San Diego. She received her Ph.D. from the University of Chicago and completed post docs at the Olin Institute for Strategic Studies at Harvard University and the War and Peace Institute at Columbia University.

LEARN MORE:

How Civil Wars Start: And How to Stop Them

Barbara F. Walter on Twitter

We need your help to continue producing Making Peace Visible. Make a one-time or recurring tax-deductible donation here. 

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Our guest to help tackle these questions is anthropologist Stephanie Savell. Savell is the Co-Director of Costs of War at Brown University, an interdisciplinary research project focused on the impact of the post 9/11 wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and beyond; the U.S. global military footprint; and the domestic effects of US military spending. Savell's own research highlights US military involvement around the world, most notably in Africa, the Middle East and Central Asia. In many of these places, American assistance has served to fuel existing conflicts, and provided governments with tools and justification to target Muslim populations. But, Savell says, it doesn’t have to be this way. 

We need your help to continue making this podcast. Make a one-time or recurring tax-deductible donation here. 

Read the first issue of our new journal NUANCE.

MORE FROM COSTS OF WAR

Stephanie Savell’s map of US counterterrorism operations 2021-2023

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ABOUT THE SHOW

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin, with help from Faith McClure. Learn more at warstoriespeacestories.org. Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions and Xylo-Ziko

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

Support our work

Connect on social:

Instagram @makingpeacevisible

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We want to learn more about our listeners. Take this 3-minute survey to help us improve the show! 

These days, Trey splits his time between New York and West Virginia to make Us & Them, an award-winning  narrative podcast about America’s culture wars, in partnership with West Virginia Public Broadcasting. 

On Us & Them, Trey treats people with respect, he listens carefully to their point of view whether he agrees or not, and he facilitates conversations that might not otherwise happen. A guiding value is empathy – no matter who the interviewee happens to be.  This episode was originally published in May 2023. 

EPISODES OF US AND THEM EXCERPTED IN THIS EPISODE, with photos and additional context

The Gun Divide

Critical Race Theory

Please Pass the Politics

Subscribe to Us & Them on your podcast player

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ABOUT THE SHOW

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace. Write to us at jsimon@warstoriespeacestories.org. 

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin, with help from Faith McClure.

Music in this episode by Doctor Turtle

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his government have been especially harsh towards critics of the regime, including journalists. Journalists who have criticized the government have been harassed, detained, imprisoned, and even murdered. Meanwhile, 75% or more of news organizations are now owned by 4 or 5 large corporations, all led by allies of Modi. As you’ll hear in this episode, today’s Indian government uses complicit media outlets as a weapon against non-violent descent. 

Suchitra Vijayan is a journalist and attorney based in New York City. Her new book, How Long Can the Moon be Caged? co-authored with Francesca Recchia, tells the stories of political prisoners in India today, including artists, activists, academics, and journalists. Vijayan is also the founder and executive director of the Polis Project, a journalism and research organization focused on authoritarianism and state oppression. She was born and raised in Madras, also known as Chennai, in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu. 

Read Vijayan’s reporting in The Nation about the government’s targeting of Kashmir’s free press.

Something we didn’t have time to include in this episode is the legacy of journalism and activism in Suchitra Vijayan’s family. That includes her grandfather, who took part in India’s freedom struggle – and became one of the new country’s first political prisoners. You can find that story and more in our newsletter, which publishes on Thursday, November 9th. To sign up, go to warstoriespeacestories.org/contact. If you’re reading this after that day, email us at info@warstoriespeacestories.org, and we’ll be happy to forward it to you. 

Making Peace Visible is produced by Andrea Muraskin. We had editing help on this episode from Faith McClure. Peter Agoos is the creative director of the War Stories Peace Stories Project. Our host is Jamil Simon.

Listen to a recent interview with Jamil on the podcast This is My Silver Lining: Learning to Walk in the Shoes of Another:  a Prayer for Peace with Documentary Filmmaker and Podcaster Jamil Simon.. The New York-born son of Iraqi Jewish immigrants, Jamil’s curiosity about the world had him traveling independently from the age of 15. In this interview, Jamil talks about discovering his love for film and photography, working on communications projects in Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East, and developing the War Stories Peace Stories project – including this podcast – to illuminate peace efforts. Plus, twists and turns along the way, including a stint as a taxi driver in Boston. Find This is My Silver Lining wherever you listen to podcasts. 

If you find this show valuable, please consider supporting our work. Visit warstoriespeacestories.org/take-action. You can choose a one-time or a recurring tax-deductible donation.  Thank you. 

Music in this episode by Siddhartha Corsus and Blue Dot Sessions

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Our guest Cynthia Smith is the Curator for Socially Responsible Design at the Smithsonian Cooper Hewitt Museum in New York City. She spent five years creating the remarkable exhibition Designing Peace, which includes 40 design proposals, initiatives and interventions from 25 countries, including maps, images, textiles, video games and film.

From a teeter-totter installed on the US-Mexico border fence to a crowd-sourced reimagining of war-damaged Damascus, the works in Designing Peace coupled with Smith’s vision present a world of possibility. 

Designing Peace is on view at the Museum of Craft and Design in San Francisco through February 4, 2024. Explore the virtual exhibit here. Purchase the beautiful companion book here. 

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ABOUT THE SHOW

Making Peace Visible is produced by Andrea Muraskin and hosted by Jamil Simon. Faith McClure writes our newsletter and designs our website. Creative direction by Peter Agoos. Music in this episode by Xylo-Ziko, Doyeq, and Blanket Music. 

Sign up for our newsletter to be notified when episodes come out and learn more about our guests: warstoriespeacestories.org/contact. You can get in touch with us at jsimon@warstoriespeacestories.org, or on X @warstoriespeace. We’re also on LinkedIn. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Guest Bette Dam is a Dutch journalist who covered the war in Afghanistan for 15 years. She began her coverage in 2006, embedded with the Dutch troops fighting there. She’s the author of two books: Looking for the Enemy, Mullah Omar and the Unknown Taliban, and A Man in a Motorcycle, How Hamid Karzai Came to Power. Dam also teaches a class called "Unlearning Afghanistan" at Sciences Po in Paris, and is working on a PhD at the Vrije Universiteit in Brussels on the role of media in conflict. 

In the course of her reporting Dam realized that most Western journalists were providing a distorted view of the war. It left out the perspective of the Afghan people, and made the country appear more dangerous than it really was. And Dam says the press missed opportunities to hold the U.S. and NATO to account for major blunders – including overlooking the fact that the Taliban surrendered in December 2001. 

More than 2,000 have died and over 9,000 have been injured in an earthquake that hit western Afghanistan on Saturday, October 7. Dam is partnering with Sense of Humanity and Learn Afghanistan to raise funds for medical aid, food and shelter. Help provide medical aid, food and shelter by donating here. 

**Copy this link to share this episode anywhere**

MORE FROM BETTE DAM

TEDx talk: The shortcomings of war reporting

Bette’s Substack

Follow Bette on X (formerly Twitter)

ABOUT THE SHOW

Making Peace Visible is produced by Andrea Muraskin and hosted by Jamil Simon. Faith McClure writes our newsletter and designs our website. Creative direction by Peter Agoos. Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions, Zero V, and Doyeq. 

Sign up for our newsletter to be notified when episodes come out and learn more about our guests: warstoriespeacestories.org/contact. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

Support our work

Connect on social:

Instagram @makingpeacevisible

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We want to learn more about our listeners. Take this 3-minute survey to help us improve the show! 

Our past guests have presented a variety of explanations: TV news segments are too short to talk about much beyond dramatic events, like battles and coups. For-profit media doesn't cover peace efforts because there's not enough interest in peace to attract advertisers. Conflict and divisiveness drive revenue on social media platforms. Professionals in the peacebuilding field speak in jargon that's not easily accessible to the average person. Or maybe, seeing so much violence in the news, has audiences thinking that peace isn't even possible, and therefore not worth working for.

 Given all these challenges, we thought it was time to speak with someone whose job it is to make peace more visible.

Jack Farrell is Director of Communications for Search for Common Ground,  the world's largest peacebuilding organization, with offices in 40 countries. Part of working in communications at an organization like Search is putting human lives before stories – Jack says many of the best stories about peacebuilding never reach the public to protect the safety of the people involved. Nevertheless, peacebuilding NGOs can and do play an important role in the media. 

With over a decade of experience in nonprofit communications and politics and an eye towards the future, Jack has valuable advice for anyone looking to amplify their message, while exercising sensitivity and humility. 

To get to know Jack a little better, sign up for our email newsletter, where we've got a more personal Q & A that you won't find on the podcast. Subscribe at warstoriespeacestories.org/contact. 

Email Jack Farrell at jfarrell@sfcg.org and find him on X (formerly Twitter) @JackWFarrell. 

You can get in touch with us at jsimon@warstoriespeacestories.org, or on X @warstoriespeace. We’re also on LinkedIn. 

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Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace. 

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin with help from Faith McClure.  Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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In this episode Dickinson paints a picture of a country in the midst of slow and difficult reforms. In the years since the FARC and the government signed a peace accord in 2016, putting an end to 50 years of violent conflict, breakthroughs in peace continue to happen. At the same time, armed groups who have taken the place of the FARC extort communities and fight each other. Violence between the military and guerrillas has decreased in the past year, but clashes between armed groups have increased since Gustavo Petro took the presidency in August 2022. According to one analysis, violence between these groups has risen 85% since Petro was inaugurated. However in August 2023, Petro’s government began a six-month ceasefire with the National Liberation Army, or ELN, an important armed group. Dickinson says the most important peacebuilding work is taking place at the community level, and she’s seen it with her own eyes. 

For more on the evolution of peace in Colombia, check out our previous episodes: 

Spotlight Colombia: After demilitarization, a new narrative with journalist Daniel Salgar

Spotlight Colombia: Behind the scenes of making peace with documentary filmmaker Juan Carlos Borrero

Learn more about Elizabeth Dickinson:

Twitter: @dickinsonbeth

Profile from Crisis Group: "I love understanding people. And I love listening to toads sing at night in the countryside"

Recent news and analysis on peace and conflict in Colombia:

Colombia's 'Total Peace' 1 Year On: Less State Violence, Stronger Criminal Groups from Insight Crime

Colombian gang leaders announce talks to address urban violence from Al Jazeera

The secret to Colombia’s drop in deforestation? Armed groups from Al Jazeera

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About us

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace. 

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin with help from Faith McClure. Special thanks to Samantha Schmidt. 

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions, Doyeq, Poddington Bear, One Man Book, and Kevin MacLeod.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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But many Colombians saw the FARC as enemies, and were not ready to integrate them into society so quickly. Just over half of voters rejected the agreement in a referendum. Some ex-combatants were killed.  And in 2018, the country elected Iván Duque, a vocal opponent of the peace accord. 

But peace takes time. And our guest Daniel Salgar says that over time, more Colombians, including many journalists, have begun to accept former guerillas as members of society, rather than enemies. The election of President Gustavo Petro in 2022, who ran on the peace agreement, reflects that mindset shift.

Salgar counts himself among a generation of journalists who spent most of their careers covering peace efforts. When we spoke with him last year, he was wrapping up a job as an editor for the Colombia Truth Commission Report, which shed light on decades of atrocities and human rights violations that were committed during the civil war. Before working for the Truth Commission, he was a reporter and editor at the newspaper El Espectador, where he oversaw a project on peacebuilding called Colombia 2020. Salgar also served as editor and director of the Spanish news service for Anadalou, a Turkish international news agency. 

Now working in communications for ACNUR Colombia/ UNHCR, Salgar says he continues to be optimistic about the implementation of the 2016 agreement and the possibility of peace with other guerilla groups in his country. 

The original version of this episode was published in September 2022. 

Follow Daniel Salgar on Twitter: @DanielSalgar1

View the Colombia Truth Commission Report (in Spanish) 

Read Daniel Salgar’s interview with former FARC leader Timochenco (in English)

Read Daniel’s analysis piece on drug policy in Colombia (in Spanish) 

Explore the peacebuilding journalism project Colombia 2020 (Now Colombia +20) (in Spanish)

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace. Visit our website: warstoriespeacestories.org

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin.

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions, Phil Larson, Meavy Boy, Podington Bear, Pianobook, and Kevin Mac Leod

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

Support our work

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Our guest, filmmaker and Bogotá native Juan Carlos Borrero, used to run from the guerillas when filming in the Colombian countryside. Everyone he knew had a family member who had been kidnapped or killed. He never thought he’d see peace between the government and the FARC.  Borrero’s documentary film “A Call for Peace” tells the story of the peace process in Colombia, through interviews with peace builders who played key roles behind the scenes. Skilled negotiators from places like Northern Ireland, Israel, and El Salvador shared their experience and counsel with then-President Juan Manuel Santos.  

The implementation of the agreement has been rocky, with continuing violence surrounding the drug trade, and victims still waiting for reparations. In August 2022, newly elected President Gustavo Petro announced a campaign called “Total Peace.” He said he would work to follow through on the promises of the 2016 agreement, and to forge peace agreements with other militant groups. Just last week, leaders of the guerilla group ELN arrived in Bogotá, amidst negotiations – a historic show of cooperation with the government. But on the same day, President Petro’s son Nicolás  confessed to receiving illicit donations to his fathers’ campaign.  

Despite setbacks, there’s no doubt that the 2016 peace agreement was a significant achievement that offers hope and a new way forward for Colombians. This is the first episode in our Spotlight Colombia series, where we look at Colombia as a laboratory of peace, from the 2016 agreement to Petro's election, to today. We first recorded this interview with Juan Carlos Borrero in May 2022. 

Watch "A Call for Peace."

Follow Juan Carlos Borrero on X (formerly Twitter) @juancborrero1

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ABOUT THE SHOW

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace. Write to us at jsimon@warstoriespeacestories.org. 

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin, with help from Faith McClure.

Music in this episode by MARiAN.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Some of the most polarized debates in the United States today stem from issues of race, from policing to how history should be taught in schools. Our guest this episode, award-winning American journalist Deborah Douglas, believes the answer to polarization isn’t to cloister ourselves in so-called “safe spaces.” Rather, she sees journalism as a “brave space” to excavate the impact of America’s racial history on the current moment. Like previous guests Amanda Ripley and David Bornstein, Douglas practices Solutions Journalism – which looks at how systems work to solve social problems – and how they could work better for more people. 

Deborah Douglas is the Director of the Midell Midwest Solutions Journalism Hub at Northwestern University in Chicago. She’s also the author of US Civil Rights Trail: A Traveler’s Guide to the People, Places and Events that Made the Movement. In the past, she’s been co-editor In chief of The Emancipator, founding managing editor of MLK50: Justice Through Journalism, and much more. 

Find Deborah Douglas on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram @debofficialy. Learn more at debofficially.com. 

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ABOUT THE SHOW

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace. Write to us at jsimon@warstoriespeacestories.org. 

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin, with help from Faith McClure.

Music in this episode by Xylo-Ziko, Doyeq, and Blue Dot Sessions

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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WORK FEATURED IN THIS EPISODE

A 70-year-old man in Gaza needed open heart surgery. It was a race against time July 2022

While Israel is in turmoil, tonight it marks its 75th Independence Day April 2023

Hotel Corona May 2020

Rooting for a Eurovision singer of the same name May 2023

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ABOUT THE SHOW

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace. Write to us at jsimon@warstoriespeacestories.org. 

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Interview in this episode by Andrea Muraskin.

Music in this episode by Doyeq and Eddy. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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The situation frustrates both activists and journalists. Activists complain that their actions don’t get enough coverage, or more important, that the coverage tells an incomplete or skewed story. Journalists counter that activists need to get better at communicating with the media. 

Our guest Hardy Merriman watches political movements and the media that covers them closely, and he has advice for how both sides can tell better stories. Merriman is Director of the International Center for Nonviolent Conflict (ICNC), an organization that supports civil resistance movements globally through research and education. He’s deeply worried about the rise and strengthening of autocracy around the world. Authoritarians are cracking down on activists in ways that are hard to see – making the jobs of journalists more difficult, and even more crucial. 

LEARN MORE

Chronicling Civil Resistance: The Journalists’ Guide to Unraveling and Reporting Nonviolent Struggles for Rights, Freedom and Justice

By Deborah Mathis and Hailey Grace Allen, edited by Hardy Merriman

ICNC, April 2021

Fostering a Fourth Democratic Wave: A Playbook for Countering the Authoritarian Threat

By Hardy Merriman, Patrick Quirk, and Ash Jain

ICNC and The Atlantic Council, March 2023

Read more from Hardy Merriman at hardymerriman.com

Please leave us a rating or review and let us know what you think of the episode.

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ABOUT THE SHOW

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace. Write to us at jsimon@warstoriespeacestories.org. More at warstoriespeacestories.org.  

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Additional sound engineering by Faith McClure.

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions, Podington Bear and Bill Vortex.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

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Americans were asked if they agree or disagree with the above statement in a 2022 poll conducted by the American Friends Service Committee, an advocacy organization that promotes peace and social justice around the world. AFSC conducted the study for two reasons: to gauge US public opinion on cutting military spending, and to test how people would respond to different messages about why cutting the military budget is important. They found that when Americans across different groups were asked if they would support shifting Pentagon spending to domestic issues like healthcare and education, 60% said yes. 

Guest Beth Hallowell, Director of Research and Analytics at the American Friends Service Committee, (AFSC) helped design the Pentagon spending study, along with a 2023 study on US attitudes towards peacebuilding. In this episode, Beth shares helpful insights about how peacebuilders can be more effective when communicating to the public and the media. 

Follow AFSC on Twitter @afsc_org.

Leave us a review and let us know how you talk to the people in your life, or to the public, about peace.

HOW TO RATE AND REVIEW MAKING PEACE VISIBLE

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ABOUT THE SHOW

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace. Write to us at jsimon@warstoriespeacestories.org. 

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin, with help from Faith McClure.

Music in this episode by Blue Dot Sessions, Podington Bear, Doyeq, and Bill Vortex

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

Support our work

Connect on social:

Instagram @makingpeacevisible

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We want to learn more about our listeners. Take this 3-minute survey to help us improve the show! 

These days, Trey splits his time between New York and West Virginia to make Us & Them, an award-winning  narrative podcast about America’s culture wars, in partnership with West Virginia Public Broadcasting. 

On Us & Them, Trey treats people with respect, he listens carefully to their point of view whether he agrees or not, and he facilitates conversations that might not otherwise happen. A guiding value is empathy – no matter who the interviewee happens to be. 

EPISODES OF US AND THEM EXCERPTED IN THIS EPISODE, with photos and additional context

The Gun Divide

Critical Race Theory

Please Pass the Politics

Subscribe to Us & Them on your podcast player

HOW TO RATE AND REVIEW MAKING PEACE VISIBLE

In Apple Podcasts on iPhone 

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ABOUT THE SHOW

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace. Write to us at jsimon@warstoriespeacestories.org. 

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin, with help from Faith McClure.

Music in this episode by Doctor Turtle

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

Support our work

Connect on social:

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We want to learn more about our listeners. Take this 3-minute survey to help us improve the show! 

Guest Maria Stephan is a political scientist who studies nonviolent protest movements.

Stephan has worked as a Foreign Affairs Officer for the State Department under President Barack Obama, and directed the Program on Nonviolent Action at the U.S. Institute of Peace. With Julia Roig, she co-founded the Horizons Project, which is focused on community organizing as a means of combating polarization and oppression in the United States. Stephan is the co-author with Erica Chenoweth of the book Why Civil Resistance Works, along with other books on the topic.

In this interview, Maria widens the lens on nonviolent resistance, and offers tips for how journalists could apply that lens to tell more complete and captivating stories. 

Follow Maria Stephan on Twitter @MariaJStephan.

HOW TO RATE AND REVIEW MAKING PEACE VISIBLE

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ABOUT THE SHOW

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace. Write to us at jsimon@warstoriespeacestories.org. 

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin, with help from Faith McClure. Music in this episode is by Blue Dot Sessions, Podington Bear, and Xylo-Ziko. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

Support our work

Connect on social:

Instagram @makingpeacevisible

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We want to learn more about our listeners. Take this 3-minute survey to help us improve the show! 

In In this episode, we’ll explore the dangers of social media, but we’ll also talk about ways technology can be used to build bridges and promote social cohesion., we’ll explore the In this episode, we’ll explore the dangers of social media, but we’ll also talk about ways technology can be used to build bridges and promote social cohesion. 

Guest Shamil Idriss, is the CEO of Search for Common Ground. SFCG is the largest peacebuilding organization in the world, and has a long history of using media in reconciliation efforts. Almost fifteen years ago, Shamil established a virtual exchange program connecting young adults in Europe and North America to their peers in the Middle East, and he’s been working at the intersection of peacebuilding and tech ever since. In February, Shamil helped launch the Council on Technology and Social Cohesion to foster collaboration between peacebuilders and tech workers.  Shamil says it’s crucial for the peacebuilding field to understand technology’s dangers AND to harness its potential for good.

Follow Shamil Idriss on Twitter @ShamilIdriss.

HOW TO RATE AND REVIEW MAKING PEACE VISIBLE

In Apple Podcasts on iPhone 

Tap on the show name (Making Peace Visible) to navigate to the main podcast page.

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ABOUT THE SHOW

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace. Write to us at jsimon@warstoriespeacestories.org. 

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin, with help from Faith McClure. Music in this episode is by Blue Dot Sessions, Meavy Boy, and Bill Vortex. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

Support our work

Connect on social:

Instagram @makingpeacevisible

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We want to learn more about our listeners. Take this 3-minute survey to help us improve the show! 

Guest Babak Bahador is a scholar who studies the relationship between peace, conflict, and the media – kind of like the academic version of this podcast. He teaches at George Washington University, where he directs the Media and Peacebuilding Project, and he founded the Peace News Network in 2015. 

Babak has analyzed American news coverage of armed conflicts from World War II through the 2003 Iraq War, and he’s noticed a pattern in the way politics, public opinion, and the media inform each other over the course of each war. 

In this wide-ranging conversation, Babak and host Jamil Simon begin by discussing coverage of the Vietnam War and the 2003 Iraq War. They also highlight the positive role of the media in Northern Ireland’s Good Friday peace agreement; touch on Ukraine, and reflect on how journalists can attract more attention to reconciliation and rebuilding efforts. 

LEARN MORE

Read Babak Bahador’s research and analysis

Mapping the Enemy Image through Different Conflict Stages, University of Canterbury, 2011

Did pictures in the news media just change U.S. policy in Syria? Washington Post, 2017

Peacenews.com

Listen

Peace Journalism: at least don't make matters worse, our 2022 episode on Peace Journalism and the importance of language with Steve Youngblood

Slow Burn: The Road to the Iraq War, a podcast from Slate that explores the people and ideas that propelled the country into the Iraq war, and the institutions that failed to stop it

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin, with hello from Faith McClure. Music in this episode is by Blue Dot Sessions, Xylo-Ziko, and SF Music. 

HOW TO RATE AND/OR REVIEW MAKING PEACE VISIBLE

In Apple Podcasts on iPhone 

1. Tap on the show name (Making Peace Visible) to navigate to the main podcast page
2. Scroll down to the "Ratings and Reviews" section
3. To leave a rating only, tap on the stars
4. To leave a review, tap "Write a Review"

In Spotify

(Note: Spotify ratings are currently only available on mobile.)

1. Tap on the show name (Making Peace Visible) to navigate to the main podcast page
2. Tap on the star icon under the podcast description to rate the show

In Podcast Addict

(Note: you may need to sign in before leaving a review.)

From the episode page: On the top left above the show description, click "Post review."

From the main podcast page

1. Tap "Reviews" on the top left.
2. On the Reviews page,  tap the icon of a pen and paper in the top right corner of the screen.

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace.

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin, with help from Faith McClure. Music in this episode is by Blue Dot Sessions, Xylo-Ziko, and SF Music. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

Support our work

Connect on social:

Instagram @makingpeacevisible

LinkedIn @makingpeacevisible

Bluesky @makingpeacevisible.bsky.social

We want to learn more about our listeners. Take this 3-minute survey to help us improve the show! 

Our guests for this episode are Joshua Weiss, a peacebuilder and co-founder of The Abraham Path Initiative, and Anisa Mehdi, the Executive Director of the project and a veteran broadcast journalist. 

This episode originally published in June 2022. 

Donate to help Abraham Path homestay hosts and guides rebuild in Southeast Turkey and Syria.

HOW TO RATE AND/OR REVIEW MAKING PEACE VISIBLE

In Apple Podcasts on iPhone 

1. Tap on the show name (Making Peace Visible) to navigate to the main podcast page
2. Scroll down to the "Ratings and Reviews" section
3. To leave a rating only, tap on the stars
4. To leave a review, tap "Write a Review"

In Spotify

(Note: Spotify ratings are currently only available on mobile.)

1. Tap on the show name (Making Peace Visible) to navigate to the main podcast page
2. Tap on the star icon under the podcast description to rate the show

In Podcast Addict

(Note: you may need to sign in before leaving a review.)

From the episode page: On the top left above the show description, click "Post review."

From the main podcast page

1. Tap "Reviews" on the top left.
2. On the Reviews page,  tap the icon of a pen and paper in the top right corner of the screen.

Making Peace Visible is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Our mission is to bring journalists and peacebuilders together to re-imagine the way the news media covers peace and conflict, and to facilitate expanded coverage of global peace and reconciliation efforts. Join the conversation on Twitter: @warstoriespeace

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon, and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Music in this episode is by One Man Book, Doyeq, and Les Portes Du Futur. 

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

Support our work

Connect on social:

Instagram @makingpeacevisible

LinkedIn @makingpeacevisible

Bluesky @makingpeacevisible.bsky.social

We want to learn more about our listeners. Take this 3-minute survey to help us improve the show! 

Our guest Elizabeth Hume is Executive Director of the Alliance for Peacebuilding, the umbrella organization for NGOs working on conflict resolution, bridge-building, and reconciliation in the US and around the world. And she says, peacebuilders have been doing a poor job of communicating with the public—too academic, and not connecting with issues that concern everyday Americans. 

A few years ago, Liz called on our other guest, Andrew Volmert, for help with this messaging problem. Drew is Senior Vice President of Research for the FrameWorks Institute, a think tank that helps non-profit organizations reframe social issues to gain broader public understanding and acceptance.

Drew and his team surveyed thousands of Americans to find out how they think about peace and peacebuilding, and how they’d respond to new ways of framing the issue. They came back with insights that peacebuilders, as well as journalists covering peace and conflict, can learn from.

Download the FrameWorks Institute’s reports on reframing peacebuilding:

Building the Bridge to Peace: A Messaging Guide for Peacebuilders

Communicating about Peace and Peacebuilding: Challenges, Opportunities, and Emerging Recommendations

Follow Liz Hume on Twitter: @Lizhume4peace

Follow the FrameWorks Institute on Twitter: @FrameWorksInst

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. The associate producer is Faith McClure. The podcast is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Follow us on Twitter @warstoriespeace.

Support our work with a tax-deductible donation.

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

Support our work

Connect on social:

Instagram @makingpeacevisible

LinkedIn @makingpeacevisible

Bluesky @makingpeacevisible.bsky.social

We want to learn more about our listeners. Take this 3-minute survey to help us improve the show! 

These are the kind of big-picture questions journalists Anastasiia Lapatina and Jakub Parusinksi tackle on their podcast, Power Lines: From Ukraine to the World. Jakub and Anastasiia (aka Nastya) founded the Kyiv Independent in 2021 as part of a group of journalists who had been fired from the Kyiv Post by an owner who threatened that paper’s editorial independence. On Power Lines, they interview academics, policy experts, aid workers and others with deep insight into the Ukraine-Russia war and regional history, providing vital context to an English-speaking audience.  

In this episode of Making Peace Visible, Nastya and Jakub speak with host Jamil Simon about topics including Ukrainian identity and values, the politics of language, and the possibility of peace. Also, what podcasting offers that other media do not. 

Power Lines: From Ukraine to the World is a project of the Kyiv Independent and Message Heard. Listen and subscribe here, or wherever you listen to podcasts. Learn more about the Kyiv Independent at kyivindependent.com

Follow Jakub Parusinksi on Twitter @j_parus.

Follow Anastasiia Lapatina on Twitter @lapatina_.

Making Peace Visible is a production of War Stories Peace Stories. It’s hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin and Faith McClure. 

Support our work: warstoriespeacestories.org/take-action

ABOUT THE SHOW

 The Making Peace Visible podcast is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. Our associate producer is Faith McClure. Learn more at makingpeacevisible.org

Support our work

Connect on social:

Instagram @makingpeacevisible

LinkedIn @makingpeacevisible

Bluesky @makingpeacevisible.bsky.social

We want to learn more about our listeners. Take this 3-minute survey to help us improve the show! 

An exhibition of their work in Ukraine is showing at the Imperial War Museum in London from February 3 through May 8, 2023. 

Independent Projects

5K From the Frontline (ongoing)

Welcome to Donetsk

International media work:

NPR: The Ukraine war isn't new. These intimate photos show 3 families enduring it for years

The New Humanitarian: How seven years of war and COVID-19 split Ukraine in two

The New York Times: Opinion: Where There Are Fish in the Tap Water and Women’s Uteruses Fall Out

Time Magazine: The Strange Unreality of Life During Eastern Ukraine's Forgotten War

Making Peace Visible is hosted by Jamil Simon and produced by Andrea Muraskin. The associate producer is Faith McClure. The podcast is a project of War Stories Peace Stories. Follow us on Twitter @warstoriespeace.

Support our work with a tax-deductible donation.