Franco Vaccari is the founder and president of Rondine, Cittadella Della Pace, and is a practicing psychotherapist. Miguel H. Díaz is the John Courtney Murray University Chair of Public Service at Loyola University Chicago and former U.S. Ambassador to the Holy See. Charles Hauss is veteran activist, author of eighteen books in comparative politics and peacebuilding, and is Senior Fellow for Innovation at the Alliance for Peacebuilding.
Rondine Cittadelle della Pace brings students from around the world to its campus to participate in the Rondine 3D creative peacebuilding method empowering them to be active global citizens. The youth's lived experience of relationship deconstructs the enemy in intergroup and intragroup conflicts as the Rondine creative conflict transformation practice builds trust. Participants heal from trauma through the sharing of their pain and develop compassion for their new friends. This unique book must be read by peace educators, students, and policymakers interested in creative peacebuilding and healing strategies adapted to local milieus through creative superordinate projects. The Rondine experience--described beautifully in this book--gives hope to those who feel overwhelmed by a global environment marked by polarization, political discord, and intractable conflicts. Based on the belief that relationships are the cornerstone of peace, The Rondine Method welcomes us into a world where young people on opposite sides of a divide build relationships of respect, community, and trust. This is a must-read book for all students and practitioners seeking to learn how enemy images are transformed and reconciliation emerges from the seemingly infertile ground of conflict. The Rondine Method: A Relational Approach to Conflict brings to the world a practical relational based approach to transforming conflict. The model shared through this text provides inspiration and a viable path to those that struggle to overcome the conflicts that tear apart our communities. This path is solidified by the authors' ability to connect the experiences and learnings gained through the two decades of the program with theory and practical advice for applying this model elsewhere. This timely book is a must read for practitioners of peacebuilding who wish to understand how sustained intercommunal living, dialogue, and deep reflection can be creatively organized and successfully sustained. Contributors offer moving and theoretically grounded insights about the way that fear, mistrust, and trauma are implicated in conflict and how carefully facilitated encounters with 'the other' can serve as a foundation for conflict transformation.