John STEWART

Southern African living in Zimbabwe, but a world citizen. I grew up in Lesotho, Kenya, Malawi, and England; and worked in Congo ( a job for the Central Africa region) before coming to Zimbabwe. I live here with my wife, who is a writer and development worker, and my complex household which has processed six teenagers, only two of whom are biologically mine (though another is the son of my sister assassinated ten years ago in South Africa).

I work on issues of social change, justice and peace, both in Zimbabwe and more widely. I am the director of a small service organization called NOVASC (Nonviolent Action and Strategies for Social Change), which trains individuals and collective organizations in skills of negotiation, mediation and leadership and which participates in peace-building and human rights organizations in Zimbabwe. With the Zimbabwe Social Forum group I am organizing a workshop on Zimbabwe’s crisis at the WSF.

Globally, I am on the international Governing Council of the Nonviolent Peaceforce, which is working to create a global ’shanti sena’ of trained and organized unarmed civilian peacekeepers to intervene in situations of violence and conflict. I am helping organize a workshop on this at WSF.

In the Alliance for a Responsible, Plural and United World, I participated in the difficult, hopeful but uneven process of the African Caravan for Peace and Solidarity; I was at Lille as a participant-facilitator, as inspired and confused as anyone; am involved in trying to enliven the Alliance in Southern Africa; my organization is working to publish in English some of the Proposal Papers; and now am part of the steering committee of the Charter of human responsibilities, and will be involved in the workshop on the Charter with Edith, Makarand and Pinky (and hopefully many others....)

You can reach me at: afsc 68p ecoweb.co.zw, novasc 68p ecoweb.co.zw