Messages of Peace, Advocacy, and Mobilization from Syria

February 24, 2022 - Without the capacity to create voluntary associations, effective large-scale advocacy is more difficult. Organizations such as Baytna encourage people to be willing to take some action that transcends the self to further a common cause or goal, to collaborate for the common good, and to fill social spaces not already covered at the macro-level or family level.

The Women for Peace organization understood the importance of advocacy from inside Syria and made it their main job to deliver to people in their community. They now conduct periodical workshops with the young men and women of their city to convey powerful advocacy messages to their participants, spreading the culture of mobilization advocacy and empowering a group of women and youth to be community capital.

After the end of the project, the team felt the experience had a good impact and helped change the trainees' lives. The activities introduced them to civil work while developing their skills, deepening their understanding of the foundations and values ​​of work and civic engagement and transforming them into activists and influencers in the community, equipped with knowledge of various societal areas such as data collection and analysis, communication skills, coalition building, team building, management, and more. They continued to develop their new skills through campaigns and activities they carried out later. .

The knowledge and experiences received qualified many of the trainees to participate and work with civil institutions in the region. Warda, for example, one of the girls who participated in the project, has a disability in her limbs, which affects her life in general. Yet, she is an ambitious girl who believes in her abilities and seeks to have a positive role in society.

She benefited from the trainings in developing her capabilities in more than one field, especially in communications, data collection and analysis, and management and facilitation of sessions. She continued to grow and participated in many volunteer activities and initiatives implemented by the Women for Peace organization or other teams. As a result of her active participation in so many activities, Warda found permanent work with one of the civil institutions in the region.

At a group level, the trainers divided the participants into three groups, with one group consisting of 15 women from all components and segments of society. Responsible for working on issues of concern to women, they formed dialogue sessions that included several female activists and representatives of parties interested in women. One main focus of their work was child marriage, about which they launched an awareness campaign to tackle the phenomenon that is widely spread in society and has adverse effects on children forced to marry at an early age.

The campaign continued for two months and included distributing surveys on child marriage among the citizens. The team then analyzed and discussed the results of these questionnaires, and held various discussion sessions and interviews with girls affected by this phenomenon.

The work included:

-   Launching a media campaign on social media platforms.

-   Distributing road signs in the streets and public places.

-   Giving brochures to the citizens.

At the end of the campaign, the girls and women of the team conducted evaluation sessions on the activities of the entire campaign and its impact on society. They produced a research paper on this problem, its causes, implications for society, and the solutions proposed to address this problem.

Among the trainees was also a group of 8 young men, who developed their abilities through participation and implementation of mobilization and advocacy campaigns. Through teamwork, the group decided to form their own volunteer team, launching a group called the Youth Peace Volunteer Team. Now they have their organization, internal system, goals to work on, and work areas as the starting point for all their activities. The organization planned, organized, and launched many initiatives, including The Volunteer Month, Warm Winter Initiative, We Grow Up Together Initiative, and the Hygiene Engineers Initiative.

These, and other projects supported by Baytna throughout Syria, demonstrate time and time again how civil society and advocacy ideas are crucial to any group or organization working socially, aiming at achieving results through influence rather than pressure.