The Centre for Nonviolence

Hello everyone, we're here.  The Centre for Nonviolence, Commonground, is now
set up and the Network Facilitation Collective(NFC)  that is running the
Centre is ready to respond to your ideas and requests.  The Centre is like a
big white board or some butchers' paper where we capture your ideas/needs and
the Facilitation Collective is available to facilitate responses.  If you
want information or contacts referring to nonviolent communities and
lifestyles or action groups and campaigns we will try to help.  The six of us
are putting one day each month into meetings and we look forward to continued
support from the rest of the network as we work together to weave the
Australian Nonviolence Network (ANN) tighter and more intricately.

This is the regular report of what we have covered in the meetings and how we
are putting the aims and objectives as they currently stand into practice.

We have been staying in touch with our contacts in different regions through
the national Phone Link Up (PLU) that happens every six weeks or so and
through personal phone calls and letters.  Margaret travelled to Brisbane and
Lismore to exchange news with contacts there.  And we have linked to Pegasus,
the Australian node of a vast global computer communications network.  One of
the benefits of this is being in touch with the "nonviolent.action"
conference.  We can also send and receive mail.  Our email address is
nonviolence@peg.apc.org.

The NFC realised that gathering nonviolence magazines and journals was
relevant to the Centre's work.  There are a number that we think are
important but at present we will subscribe to only the War Resisters 
International's Peace News and Dawn Train which is an 'occasional
publication' of the Irish Network for Nonviolent Action, Training and
Education (INNATE).  Dawn Train is not received widely in the Australian
network but is a valuable activist/theoretical magazine.  Peace News is a
monthly news paper that covers comprehensively alternative views and
analysis, including the peace/nonviolence movement's role, on many major and
minor military conflicts.  As the financial base of the Centre expands we
hope to gather more global perspectives in the form of journals but in the
meantime we have some access through people's personal subscriptions and/or
Pegasus.  Journals in this category include Nonviolence International's
Frontline and the WRI Women's Newsletter and the International Fellowship for
Reconciliation's Reconciliation. For a completish list, contact us - there's
lots of enjoyable reading.

The NFC has also been working on a pamphlet outlining simply the services we
offer.  At the last two Australian gatherings, we talked about the ANN having
an 'outreach' component.  In the same way that we resource, support and learn
from each other, we can offer support, resources and empowering education to
other groups and individuals in the wider social change movement.  The
pamphlet will be one way to 'advertise' these services.

Skill Sharing
A discussion on skill-sharing within the Network was held at the October
meeting.  Neither workshops requested by participants at the Australian
Gathering were run due to lack of numbers.  Those who put time and energy
into organising these events felt frustrated and disappointed about this.  We
felt this needs wider discussion in the network.  What form (length, subject
etc.) of skill sharing would be appropriate?  What do you want?  What would
you come to?  Perhaps there just aren't the numbers in the network at present
to make a two day workshop go.  Perhaps we need to look at smaller numbers of
deeply interested participants. Or look again at the much longer, intensive
workshop model.

Agenda Exchange
We've had several requests for agenda exchange for nonviolence (and other)
workshops.  Agenda exchange will enable people to use other's agendas for
ideas and as a basis for their own agenda formation.

Please send photocopies of your (favourite) agendas or agenda bits to the
Centre for Nonviolence and we'll keep them and distribute them to those who
want them.  It will help if you keep this in mind when you are scrawling your
agenda the day before a workshop! - Try and write it out so that it can be
understood by somebody else.

One of the main roles that the Gathering hoped the Centre would fill was as a
connector of people, and groups.  To facilitate this we are hoping to
pinpoint regional key contact people who keep a directory of interested folk
in their region.  The Centre would have copies of all the lists.  Kay is
facilitating this at present with David Alderson organising a computer
database system for housing the information.  There will be a sample
information gathering questionnaire available for Key Contact People that
will cover skills, interests, areas of activity, availability for activist
exchange and shareable resources.  Your area might not have enough
participants yet to need such records but keep it in mind for the near future
as your region begins to flourish with nonviolence activity!

Many thanks to those of you who have contributed to these early stages of
setting up the Centre.  We are building steadily a resource of books, old
magazines, articles, videos and files.  We need your continued support and
interaction so we will be ready for the increasing needs of the network as it
grows and diversifies.
The Australian Nonviolence Network Facilitation Collective