In 1994, ethnic Hutu extremists in Rwanda initiated a genocidal attempt against Tutsis, slaughtering over 800,000 people in just 100 days. The captured and imprisoned perpetrators were later released back to their own home communities; they returned to live in the same Rwandan villages among the surviving family members of the murdered victims. This living condition has caused enormous interethnic, social, and personal challenges, high levels of resentment and hostility toward the offenders among the surviving victims, and anguish, remorse, and guilt among the ex-prisoners. Reconciliation and healing from the scars and traumas of the genocide continue to be the central theme for bringing peace to people’s minds and society in Rwanda today.

In the peace-building and ethnic conflict-preventing framework, Masahiro Minami at the University of British Columbia (UBC) developed an innovative reconciliation program called the Action-Based Psychosocial Reconciliation Approach (ABPRA) incorporating therapeutic principles of Japanese Morita therapy and contact theory (Minami, 2014). The Program is designed to foster interpersonal and interethnic reconciliation between offenders and surviving victims of the 1994 Rwandan genocide, and to help both groups move beyond unforgiveness, guilt, hatred, and anguish toward psychosocial healing and peaceful coexistence. The purpose of the Globe in Peace Project is to extend the delivery of the original ABPRA Program to involve over 1,000 participants in 500 working pairs in multiple villages in Rwanda. The efficacy and impact of the Project will also be investigated scientifically.

Morita therapy is a Japanese psychotherapy practised by psychiatrists and other health professionals and para-professionals since the 1920s. It emphasizes: (a) having an accepting stance toward affective conditions as they are without negation, preoccupation, or manipulative attempts to control, (b) redirecting self-focussed attention toward concrete activities and immersing self in practical tasks in the present, (c) revitalizing and mobilizing constructive desires for a productive and meaningful life and an improved lifestyle, (d) encouraging choice over action (vs. emotion) and appreciating the consequences of positive action, and (e) fostering a natural and spontaneous process of emotional healing (Ishiyama, 2003; Ishiyama & Minami, 2009).

This Moritian approach is applied to facilitate reconciliation between members of the two ethnic groups previously in deep conflict which escalated to the 1994 Rwandan genocide. A feeling of forgiveness is neither required nor requested of the genocide survivors in the ABPRA Program. Compared to emotion-controlling psychological approaches, the Moritian approach does not attempt to control or change the participants’ genuine feelings and attitudes toward each other (e.g., anger, guilt, hatred, ambivalence). Neither are such unreasonable demands placed upon them throughout their program engagement. Instead, honest feelings and attitudes toward each other are honoured as they are and left to a natural and spontaneous flow of change, while participants engage in practical shared activities (e.g., clearing the land, farming, roasting coffee beans, preparing and laying bricks for a building project) for the service of survivors. They direct their attention and energy to concrete and pragmatic activities and come to appreciate the productive outcomes of their shared labour. Purposeful social contact will be thus sustained between survivors and perpetrators of the 1994 genocide over time through shared work activities in the ABPRA program. The effectiveness and positive outcomes of the above approach in fostering interpersonal reconciliation has been demonstrated by Minami’s (2014) recent research. Minami’s recent study (2014) showed promising results of facilitating reconciliation through shared work activities.

This approach stands in contrast to commonly and traditionally used psychological approaches focussed on affect regulation (e.g., forgiveness-based interventions), that are designed to help surviving victims learn to control their anger and hostility and forgive the offenders. Such approaches to changing victims' affect and attitudes and appeasing their strong, genuine and natural emotions (e.g., anger, hostility, and resentment) seem to have limitations which can impede a natural healing process. 

Your donation will be used to fund various activities such as (a) hiring and training psychosocial reconciliators, and their living expenses to deliver the program, (b) purchasing equipment and material necessary for the shared work activities, and (c) program evaluation. Your donation will help make this happen. We will update you on the reconciliation work and share the stories of the participants' experiences at the following website: www.globeinpeace.org.

Project Co-Director. Masahiro Minami, Ph.D. holds the Morita Post-doctoral Fellowship for Peace Action Research at UBC. He is the originator of the ABPRA Program and the current director of the Prison Fellowship Rwanda-Morita Centre for Peace and Reconciliation Research in Kigali, Rwanda. He is also the Assistant Secretary General for the International Committee for Morita Therapy. He travels worldwide to give lectures on the Morita-based reconciliation approach and its application in Rwanda.

Project Co-Director. Ishu Ishiyama, Ph.D. is an international authority on Morita therapy and its applications. He is the Secretary General for the International Committee for Morita Therapy and an executive board member of the Japanese Society for Morita Therapy. He is an associate professor of counselling psychology and the Director of Clinics and Practica in the Dept. of Educational and Counselling Psychology, Faculty of Education at UBC and an associate member of the Dept. of Psychiatry at UBC.

• Hinson, L. W. (Director). (2009). As we forgive. [Documentary]. Los Angeles, CA: Mpower Pictures.
• Ishiyama, F. I. (2003). A bending willow tree: A Japanese (Morita therapy) model of human nature and client change. Canadian Journal of Counselling, 37, 216-231.
• Ishiyama, F. I., & Minami, M. (2009). Application and features of a Morita therapy approach in clinical counselling: Deepening of authenticity and therapeutic turning points in a Canadian case. Japanese Journal of Morita Therapy, 20(2), 1-9.
• Minami, M. (2014). Development and field testing of action-based psychosocial reconciliation approach in post-genocide Rwanda (Doctoral dissertation). Retrieved from http://circle.ubc.ca/handle/2429/46864
• Minami, M. (2014). Nurturing reconciliation. Therapy Today, 25(7), 10-13. http://www.therapytoday.net/article/show/4453/nurturing-reconciliation/