Leadership for Reconciliation

To conclude the deliberations of the conference Marcia Langton and Cheryl de la Rey will draw together the conference themes and highlight the implications for leadership. What sort of political leaders manipulate enemy images for their own ends? Why do populations vote for war mongers? What are the qualities of leadership that enhance the capacity of organisations and states to embrace the values of peace?

Speakers:

• Marcia Langton - Keynote Leadership for reconciliation
• Cheryl de la Rey - Keynote Leadership for reconciliation
• Joy Murphy - Traditional closing ceremony

Dinner Keynote
Arnold Zable - The Power of Storytelling

Marcia Langton - Closing Keynote

Leadership for Reconciliation

One of Australia's leading authorities on contemporary social issues in Aboriginal affairs, Marcia Langton was appointed Professor of Australian Indigenous Studies at the University of Melbourne in 2000. An Arts graduate of the ANU with first-class honours in anthropology, Marcia is completing a doctoral thesis in the Department of Geography at Macquarie University. On her appointment to the University, Marcia chose to be located in SAGES, and her current teaching commitment includes three undergraduate Geography subjects - Place and Possession, Native Title and the Garma Fieldtrip.

Marcia has many years experience working as an anthropologist in Indigenous affairs with land councils, the Queensland government, commissions and universities. Marcia has been a member of the Centre for Aboriginal Reconciliation, serving on the Legal and Cultural Issues Sub-Committee, Director of the Centre for Indigenous Natural and Cultural Resource Management and has acted as a consultant to the Northern Land Council and the Australian Film Commission. Marcia's work in anthropology and the advocacy of Aboriginal rights was recognised in 1993 when she was made a member of the Order of Australia.

Marcia has published extensively on Aboriginal affairs issues including land, resource, and social impact issues, indigenous dispute processing, policing and substance abuse, gender, identity processing, art, film, and cultural studies.
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Cheryl de la Rey - Closing Keynote

Leadership for Reconciliation

Reconciliation and leadership constitute the central concepts in this paper, which attempts to respond to the question: What are the qualities of leadership that enhance the capacity of organisations and governments to embrace reconciliation?

Reconciliation is a complex concept that cannot be easily defined. One of the reasons that it is so difficult to arrive at a single definition of reconciliation is that its interpretation seems to vary depending upon the specific dynamics within a social context. For example, people in South Africa have interpreted reconciliation primarily in terms of an ideology of non-racialism that will produce a decrease in the salience of racial identities that formed the basis of the old apartheid system. This may be appropriate in a context like South Africa where race discrimination between black and white people has been the primary source of conflict, but it may not be applicable in other contexts where the divisions may have difference sources. Therefore, the paper offers as a starting point an analysis based on identifying commonalities that supersede differences of context.

The analysis shows that the concept of relationship building is at the core of reconciliation and on this aspect there is consensus across contexts. Overall, reconciliation is widely seen as a process undertaken to restore relationships. Furthermore, there is consensus on the idea of reconciliation as a process rather than an event or a series of events.

What kind of leadership is required to promote the process of relationship building in post-conflict societies? In the literature on leadership there is a prevalent view that leadership can be taught and therefore learned. These assumptions have lead to a proliferation of leadership training programmes. This paper reviews this literature to indicate the qualities and styles that are likely to facilitate the process of building transformative relationships between previously divided groups. Some of the qualities identified include the capacity for identifying with the other, sharing power and information and fostering mutual trust and respect.

The paper concludes by noting that even though effective leadership is necessary for reconciliation, without a number of other societal conditions being present within a particular context, it is insufficient. The importance of structural mechanisms in addition to effective leadership is signalled as necessary for peaceful societies.

Cheryl De la Rey is currently serving as the Deputy Vice Chancellor at the University of Cape Town, where her responsibilities include research and innovation, postgraduate studies, Government and community relations and institutional transformation. She first joined the UCT Department of Psychology in 1995, following an eight-year scholarly stint at the University of Durban-Westville. She is currently seconded to the National Research Foundation (NRF) as Executive Director: Research Promotion. In addition to her teaching commitments, De la Rey has penned numerous articles for journals and books, as well as reports and papers. She sits on the editorial boards of Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, Agenda: a Journal about Women and Gender, and Feminism and Psychology. She is also the editor of the South African Journal of Psychology.
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Zable, Arnold - Dinner Keynote

The Power of Storytelling

Award winning author and story teller, Arnold Zable, weaves tales of love, migration, Greek madness, Yiddish curses, wanderers and dreamers, displaced peoples, and epic voyages to the Great Southern Land. To be a story teller requires first, an act of listening, and an entering into relationships over time. Zable has listened to countless tales told by refugees, asylum seekers, holocaust survivors, travellers, street people, family and friends. He has listened in living rooms, cafes, kitchens, pubs, detention centres, on the road, on boats and trains, in hospital corridors, and the various places where people meet. Stories identify moments that are both terrifying and wondrous, and the shades of light and shadow that make up all our lives. We are, as a nation, the sum total of all our stories.

Arnold Zable is a writer, storyteller and educator. Formerly a lecturer at Melbourne University, he is the author of numerous essays, columns, novels, works for theatre, and short stories. He is the author of six books. They include the award winning 'Jewels and Ashes', which depicts Zable's journey to Poland to trace his Jewish ancestry; 'Wanderers and Dreamers', tales of Yiddish theatre in Australia; and 'Cafe Scheherazade', a novel that tells the story of a group of refugees who meet in a St Kilda cafe where they weave their tales of displacement and flight. His most recent book, 'The Fig Tree', is a book of true stories set in the Greek island of Ithaca, Eastern Europe, Melbourne and Outback Australia. It too depicts tales of journeys from the old world to the new. Zable has written extensively on the migrant experience and the plight of refugees. His books have won numerous awards, and he is one of the co-writers of a play 'Kan Yama Kan' in which Middle Eastern and Afghani asylum seekers tell their stories. Directed by Robin Laurie, the play was staged in 2002. In recent years he has appeared as a story teller in a range of venues including the Melbourne Concert Hall,Melbourne Town Hall, and writers' festivals throughout Australia. He is currently completing a novel depicting the lives of an immigrant community in the inner Melbourne suburb of Carlton.
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Joy Murphy - Closing Ceremony

Joy Murphy Wandin is an Aboriginal Elder of the Wurundjeri people. Joy has been involved with Aboriginal issues for 30 years and is Chairperson of the Australian Indigenous Consultative Assembly. She has held executive positions across the sectors of Government. Joy is an honorary Professor of Swinburne University, a Trustee of the National Gallery of Victoria, a member of the Victoria Police Ethical Standards Consultative Committee and the Equal Opportunity Commission, she also operates her own business Jarlo Visions.
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