What does it actually take to prevent mass violence and cultivate lasting peace in a divided world?

In this episode of Becoming Bridge Builders, we sit down with Jai Ayla Sutherland, a brilliant program officer at the Stanley Center for Peace and Security, to unpack how we can tackle structural violence right from the ground up. Jai brings an incredibly refreshing perspective on how local communities can move away from division and shift toward genuine connection.

Together, we dive into the blueprint for a safer, more connected world. From the powerful impact of restorative justice circles to why addressing historical harms is non-negotiable for healing, this conversation is packed with real talk, wit, and transformative wisdom.

Whether you’re wondering how city-wide collaborations can drastically lower violence rates or how a simple mindset shift can start building bridges instead of walls, this episode is your guide. Grab your favorite beverage, kick back, and let’s explore how we can all play a part in creating lasting change!

Key Takeaways from the Episode:

• The Core of Peacebuilding: Shifting community focus from systemic division to real, grassroots connection.
• Restorative Justice: How circles of accountability can heal deep-seated wounds and reduce violence.
• Healing Historical Harms: Why looking at past traumas is a non-negotiable step toward modern-day community reconciliation.
• Your Blueprint: Practical mindset shifts you can use right now to start building bridges instead of walls in your own backyard.

If this conversation inspired you, make sure to hit subscribe, leave us a review, and share this episode with someone who is ready to build bridges in their own community!

Links referenced in this episode:

• ibmv.org
• peaceinourcities.org
• stanleycenter.org

Mentioned in this episode:

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Hello.

Welcome back to Becoming Bridge Builders, the podcast where we explore ideas, stories and strategies shaping peace, justice and connection in our communities and around the world. I'm your host, Reverend Dr. Keith Haney.

On this show, we talk with leaders, practitioners, bridge builders who are doing, more often than not, unseen work, or building or bringing people together across different denominations, different ethnic groups to solve our most pressing challenges. Today I'm excited to welcome Jai Allah Sutherland.

She is a program officer for mass violence and atrocities at the Stanley center for Peace and Security where she supports efforts to prevent both structural and acute violence by working with representatives from government and civil society. Her work focuses on heavily on the role cities play localities locally and globally in implementing evidence based violent prevention strategies.

She's also part of the Secretariat for Peace of Our Cities network, a global network of cities and organizations collaborating to reduce violence at the municipal level.

She holds an MA International Security from the Yosef Korbel School of International Studies and the University of Denver and a BA in International Relations from the University of Southern California. Welcome to the podcast. How are you doing today?

Hi. I'm doing so well. Thank you so much and happy to be here.

So glad to have you on. So I'm going to ask you my favorite question to get us all warmed up here. What's the best piece of advice you've ever received?

Oh, I'm so glad that you started with this one. I thought about this a lot and I have two answers.

So I think most recently the advice that I didn't receive directly, but a lot of us received this through reading her book is the emphasis on that Bernie Brown put places on clear is kind.

I think for me it's been a really important lesson that there's a difference between being nice and being kind and, and when you're clear with someone that's actually respecting them.

And so I, I try to take that to heart and I, I feel like I have lots of opportunities every, every day and every new year to, to implement that kind of advice.

But I have to also say I was listening to your interview with Christy Pretzinger a few episodes back to familiarize myself with your podcast and there was something that she quoted her son saying that has really stuck with me, which was he told her to stop asking for permission.

And I think, you know, as peacebuilders, as people who look at systems and try to change them, I feel, I mean, in so many ways as a, as a female professional, but that's some pretty sound advice. She, she must have done a great job raising him and to receive that advice from her son. So been trying to keep hold of that one too.

Stop asking for permission.

Yeah, two of my favorite people. I actually have Brene's new book on my audio of it, Vic, and I've been listening to it as I drive on my journey. So it's been kind of fun.

I haven't gotten there yet, but I will. There's always. I mean, yeah, some people just are here for a reason.

So unfortunately, she tells truth in a very kind way, but also very strong.

Yeah, well, clear is kind.

That's right. Clear is kind. So let's start with your journey because I'm curious. What drew you into the work of preventing mass violence and atrocities?

And how did that path lead you to where you are today in Stanley Peace and Security Center?

Oh, man.

Um.

Well, you know, my, my journey is. Well, I don't know. I. I'm always jealous of people who know exactly where they're going and seem to just articulate the path and follow it.

Um, that is certainly not the case for me. But I, I'm from Wyoming. I'm actually calling in from Wyoming right now. And I work for full time remotely from here.

And I never thought that I would be back in Wyoming because my journey was, I'm getting out and I'm gonna go see the world and I wanna learn and experience and, you know, starting through college, just got really interested in peace and security kind of generally. And so there's so many different angles and approaches that you can take when you say you're curious about peace.

And ultimately I studied international relations, but then went back to school to study international security where I really started to look at the kind of holistic approach of human security.

And, and what does security mean to individuals and to communities beyond just the notion of, you know, military or the sense that you're, you know, sovereignty is secure or, you know, there, there are different interpretations of what security means.

So I, I ended up moving to Iowa for, for personal reasons and, and because I was studying international security, I, I had to be pretty precise about the type of organizations that I could find that are based in Iowa, that focus on that and, and happened across the Stanley center for Peace and Security, which at that time was actually called the Stanley foundation, and began an internship. And I've been there ever since.

And I think I'm going into 11 years now where I've been able to work through different angles again around what peace and security mean.

But what is really cool and rewarding about the work is that we really Focus on what, what it looks like to bring about peace and to prevent violence in a, in the really early stages.

So basically what are the structural components of, you know, one's life that makes them less prone to experience violence, to be involved in violence, to be pushed into using violence. And so we focus a lot on those kind of upstream qualities of prevention.

And, and through navigating what that means at the global level, all the way down to the community level, is really how we have come to this piece of work that brought us together today, which is this book on identity based mass violence. So that's a little bit, I guess, of my journey.

No, that's good. But you know, I live in Iowa and I've imagined what Wyoming's like. I've never been to Wyoming.

Those are not two states that you think of when it comes to violence or insecurity. So I'm curious, when you're in Iowa, you're not necessarily thinking about global issues like that or of security.

Define for me a little bit more clearly because when I think of insecurity, I lived, my first real job was in Detroit. So there was a lot of sense of lack of security there, lack of peace.

How do you define the areas that you work a little bit more clearly for the audience that's trying to wrap their mind around exactly what you do?

Well, so specifically at the Stanley center, it is, I would say, an anomaly in terms of its area of focus and where it's geographically located.

So the Stanley center focuses on actually global challenges and it was started by a family that's from Muscatine who maintains a strong commitment to the community. And that's why it's, it's still located there, but it actually does engage at the international level.

And its history is really rooted in global governance and collective action around major challenges that are shared across borders. So we focus on mass violence and atrocities, nuclear security and climate change. Those are the three global challenges that we focus on.

And historically my team did, did really emphasize the role of, you know, of building global norms, reinforcing global norms and strengthening collective action around ideas such as the responsibility to protect, which is an agreement that that nation states made to both prevent mass atrocities and genocide inside of their own borders, but to also work collectively to prevent them in other states when, when the call comes and, and there's a place for that and it's an important one. And also when you think about preventing large scale violence, there's a lot of chronic violence that happens all over the world, all the time.

That's not necessarily related to conflict.

And so that's what, where our work has started to go a little bit more local, a lot more local, and to really consider what the foundation of peace looks like. And cities are naturally a place to focus that work.

And it's because, you know, in Detroit or wherever people are living, people naturally are, will have conflict with one another. But there are ways to manage that conflict responsibly.

And there are also ways that the governments and the organizations that operate in that environment can make those conflicts more or less likely.

And so our theory and why we're working on this in this area is that if we want to prevent the worst forms of violence, we have to be working with communities who are working to prevent violence around and among them. Because it's all interconnected.

I love that. Let's dig into this mass atrocity prevention concept.

I'm curious because it seems to me just from watching when this happens on the outside, usually before anyone knows that it's going on, it's already gotten to the point where it's almost out of control. How do you, on the front end of that, get people to agree that we're not going to cross this line, this red line of going too far?

Because usually it's, it's always, you can, you can easily look at your opponent that you want to do mass violence to as less than human. So how do you begin to shape and change the mindset and have a love for human life, value human life so that you don't cross that line?

Yeah, well, I guess there are different ways that you could answer that question. So there, you know, internationally, there are diplomatic ways that you could answer that question.

We, and through this book really make the case that in order to prevent these forms of large scale violence, in order to prevent the conditions that too easily allow neighbors to other one another or to see each other dehumanize one another? You need leadership from local governments, you need leadership from local community organizations and community organizers.

And you need narratives and power structures that, that reinforce equal opportunity, that reinforce access to justice, that reinforce access to economic opportunity. Basically the social structures and conditions that allow people to prosper in a way that doesn't put them against one another.

And too often there are people with authority and power who may not be interested in reinforcing, you know, the social fabric, the peaceful mechanisms of coexistence, but often there are, often there are leaders.

And even when a national government may be moving in one direction, that doesn't mean that at the city level there aren't leaders that are actually very interested in reinforcing and consolidating peace and trying to make improvements in systems and the justice system and the economic systems that allow that equal access to opportunity. And so it's. So there are a lot of levels to the question that you asked.

But what we would say is that first we need to see people need to be able to see one another in their differences and accept and honor those differences and those with the power to support structures that recognize and, you know, see everyone in their full humanity and then create a society that, that reinforces belonging rather than othering, that those are preconditions to peace. And really starting there is the core to what happens at higher levels of government as well.

I love that at your website. I love how you have this goal in cities and communities around the globe. We nurture policy progress and system change from the ground up.

Tell us a little bit about the policies that you are trying to implement and systems that really kind of create the peace and security you're trying to develop.

Yeah, well, I mean, maybe I could tell you a little bit about this book project because really it's a strong partnership and I want to honor our partners who were part of developing this book too.

Oh, please do tell us the name again, just so we know where it is.

Yeah, so the name of the book is Identity Based Mass Violence in Urban Contexts Uncovered. And it was a partnership between the Stanley center for Peace and Security as well as the Violence and Inequality Lab at.

Sorry, it's the Kroc Institute for Peace and justice at the University of San Diego. And it was the Violence, Inequality and Power Lab at the institute there.

And Rachel Locke, who was the executive director, she is our core partner along with Andre Servenpont, who were co editors on this volume with us.

But what we really wanted to do was bring different fields of practice together who were operating with similar goals, but who were operating very siloed from one another.

So there's the peace building field, there's urban violence prevention, there's the mass atrocities prevention field, and everybody has their little piece of the peace pie, I guess.

But there, there hasn't historically been a lot of integration among those, you know, experts and practitioners in those fields, those policymakers, to really understand where there's room for alignment and shared learning as well as, as collaboration. And so this was kind of becoming a theme as, as we worked, you know, with each other in, in other areas.

And we wanted to try to bring it all together and to try to bring these different fields of practice together to explore what could we be doing better by.

Actually, you know, I think the terminology you, you would use would be, you know, building bridges, you know, among these different communities of practice.

And for us it was breaking down these silos and you know, among these practitioners who, who really have shared goals, but who often use different language, who maybe use different frameworks, who maybe talk to different portions of, of government or organizations, but who, who are again, you know, acting their activities are, are, are quite reinforcing of one another. And, and so we really, we brought in so many people to this project, I think over 30 different contributors to all said and done.

And, and we started to look not only at, you know, what are the core problems that are, that are leading to, you know, mass identity based or identity based, mass violence, but also what are the solutions that are making communities safer, people feel more safe. And it turns out it's, it's actually quite a hopeful conversation. There are a lot of cities in particular that are leading change.

There are a lot of policies that are evidence based and practices that are evidence based.

And so to your question, the volume explores anything from restorative justice circles to focus deterrence policing, to using public health approaches to actually build frameworks for violence prevention based on epidemiology and the studies of transmitted diseases and, and looking at violence as actually a disease that, that can be understood and therefore predicted and prevented. And so that gets a little bit to your question about, you know, what are, what are the specific policies that, that you're looking at?

And the reality is it touches so many different components of governance, but it's really about looking at the community level, seeing where there are people who are being marginalized or who are being excluded from systems that are there to protect them or support them and identifying opportunities to bring them in more intentionally. And, and those are the foundations for building safe communities.

I want to dig into something you brought up, since you brought it up, restorative justice, because when I was working on my doctorate, I was going to do my dissertation on that topic because I was really fascinated about that when it came to a way to kind of deal with some of the. I think our justice system to me just seems sometimes so unfair and I thought this would be a great way.

So I wanted to dig in a little bit and see who's been doing restorative justice.

Well, and my initial research was there was a group in New Zealand that had tried it in the court system and they kind of abandoned it as my, if my remember, if I remember this Correctly, because the judges just thought it took too much time and didn't have the patience for it.

Um, and then just recently, my wife and I were watching one of our favorite guilty pleasures we watched at Chicago pd and it was a restorative justice episode where they convinced these two young people to go and do restorative justice. So they had the young kid go to the house where he had wronged one of the family and the sister and to, you know, fix the fence.

And you could see a little bit of hope as he was getting into fixing the fence. He'd done what he was required to do, but he's like, you know, let's finish this.

Cause it doesn't look good to have this new part of the fence, but not the other part done. So let's go the extra mile. As he's working at night, he gets gunned down and shot and killed.

And now all of a sudden, the circle of violence starts all over again. I'm like, we got so close to seeing restorative justice possibly work.

So tell me a little bit about your experience with that idea, because I know the concept somewhat seems idealized, but never to my knowledge realized in a way that's actually productive. And maybe it's just. I've been tried long enough. I'm just curious what your thoughts are on it.

Yeah, well, and I would say we have an entire chapter in the book that actually goes into a case where restorative justice circles were used. And it's a case that is discussed. The author for that chapter, her name is Bobby Sherrod and she's wonderful.

So I invite you to read that specific story because one of the. Sorry, I'm gonna like backtrack for a second and then I'll come back to your question. One of the approaches of this.

Yeah, one of the approaches of the book was to both do peer reviewed, you know, academic research. But it can be challenging, as I'm sure you. I maybe would guess that you might feel that way hearing that you've gone through your PhD process.

Sometimes it's hard to connect as a human to very cerebral information. While it's true. And it's important we connect more to stories as human beings and to others experiences.

And we see, see and understand things differently when it's presented through someone else's story. And so this book is basically half and half.

There's evidence, peer reviewed research, and then there are complimentary first person narrative or second person, you know, documentation of stories. There's art, there's poetry, and it's to get to that full human experience.

So I say that because the story that is shared by Barbie, by Bobby Sherrod is one about a young black girl in a predominantly white school in Baltimore who she worked with.

Because the young girl was being seen as the problem child or the one that was, you know, causing disruption, but it was actually an effect of her peers who were bullying her. And the entire system was not set up to see this student's experience through that lens.

And Bobbi herself happened to be there as an instructor and was able to implement a restorative justice justice circle not only with the children who were involved, but also with the teachers and to help those who were involved in the situation understand the dynamics that were occurring with this young girl in her school. And this is one case.

So I can't necessarily, because I'm not a restorative justice practitioner myself, I can't say what the evidence will tell you writ large.

But in this circumstance, they were able to actually arrive to a conclusion where the, the kids were able to speak with one another and understand, you know, that of course, there's one kiddo that's leading the charge the others are following for whatever purpose. It actually turns out that, you know, these young boys actually really like her. It's just that they're trying to belong in their own way. And, and so.

But it was all informed by somebody who could speak truth to what was happening, who could identify truth, who could hold people accountable, but who also created space for learning and for a different way for these kids in this incident, incident to, to come to a different way of, of being with each other in the school. And, and it did lead to a better environment for, for all of them.

And so it's an example where I think the first answer is there's no one size fits all approach. I think most of what we'll find when it comes to solutions and what the evidence shows is that you need multiple solutions.

You need multiple approaches that are going to complement each other. You need some that are focused on prevention. You need some that are focused on justice and accountability.

And they can either reinforce one another or if done improperly, they can make the problem worse.

Either, you know, people aren't held accountable or people are put in positions where they're being blamed or scapegoated for problems that they're not responsible for. So, so that's the story of restorative justice that's presented here. There's.

It's also, you know, justice circles more broadly are presented through some of the work that focuses on peace building in communities in Nigeria or even in Kenya in like trauma healing circles.

And, and I think it's just another method of helping people manage conflict in a productive and constructive way that allows them to be with each other in, in, in a peaceful manner. And it's hard for me to see how that that isn't an important tool.

So it might not be the tool, but I do think it's really important when we, when we think about helping each other manage. I mean, humans will conflict with each other, but we have to be able to manage it in a way that is respectful but also clear and kind.

I like that. So we're going to pivot just a bit because I want to ask you a little bit about the violence prevention piece.

How do issues like equity, historical harm, social inclusion show up in violent prevention work in the city? On city level?

They are core to the violence prevention work at the city level, I think. So this, the framework, part of the framework that we use in this book is, is looking at both structural and acute violence.

And so those historical conditions of exclusion of violence, all the dynamics that you mentioned, we would, we would mostly look at those through the structural lens.

So how are these inequalities and these harms actually experienced, institutionalized and essentially continue to be carried forward through institutional processes? And those have to be mindfully reviewed and understood in order to correct how they're impacting communities.

And so there's, I mean, we know that the best predictor of future violence is past violence.

And so in order to get out of what are cycles of violence, there has to be community healing, there has to be truth and reconciliation, there has to be accountability for those who have perpetrated violence in the past.

And there have to be opportunities then to meaningfully include the full community in developing policies and pathways moving forward out of those historical harms of injustice and inequality.

So that theme of moving along that process of moving out, healing, you know, telling the truth, holding people accountable, doing, you know, restorative justice circles or healing trauma healing exercises among communities who have, have been in conflict with one another, those, those are actually critically essential to sustainable peace in the long term and to the prevention of future acute physical forms of violence that happen, you know, at a large scale.

So your prevention work can be hard to measure because success often means something that didn't happen. So how do you and your partners think about impact and accountability in this space?

Well, so there are. So I see that in kind of two parts. So you can tell me if I'M answering this incorrectly. But when it comes to prevention, it's. There are.

You will hear that a lot. It's hard to, to say, you know, what hasn't happened.

Right.

I think, I think we're in a place and I'm actually going to pull up some stats here for you.

I think we're in a place where we can pretty confidently say that certain approaches to violence prevention are very much backed by evidence and they are very much having a meaningful impact and influence on rates of violence in communities in the United States over the past couple of years.

There is really compelling evidence of reduced violence from historically very high rates of violence that occurred coming out of like throughout and coming out of the COVID pandemic and then moving up to now. So let me just see here. So one incident is in Boston.

So I think we're at a stage and it's really important and, and that gets to the point about there, there being space for hope here where these not holistic, but these, you know, inclusive approaches and these comprehensive approaches to violence prevention that both hold perpetrators accountable but also see opportunities for rehabilitation, for strengthening of communities, for restoring peace and security, that together these approaches are meaningfully reducing and preventing further violence.

And I think it's important that we just keep saying that really confidently because I personally think it can be a little bit of, can be a little too easy to be like, oh, well, we don't know what we're preventing, so we shouldn't invest in that. But we also know that prevention is far more cost effective than reacting to violence.

Going through the justice system, putting our resources on the after violence stage of conflict is much more expensive than working to consolidate peace, to strengthen safety and security ahead of time. So there's a good reason to work on prevention.

I would agree. So this podcast is all about becoming bridge builders in your work.

What does effective bridge building look like, especially in across political, cultural and institutional divides?

I mean, I have to tell you that this book, the process that we got to use, you know, with our partners at the Kroc Institute, with Andre and his organization at Kris the I've never had the opportunity to be part of Something that I feel like represents that kind of bridge building in, in the ways that you describe. We brought people from all over the world, from different areas of expertise, different ages, different genders, different fields of practice.

Some people were journalists, some people were artists, some people were, you know, heavy academics. Some people were from multilateral institutions, others were from hyper local, you know, service oriented community organizations.

And being a part of a space where people got.

Not only got to be, but were willing to be curious about what each other could bring and who were willing to pose hard questions and to disagree, but to disagree respectfully, and who were willing to sit with one another as they shared really difficult stories of personal experience or trauma, and who wrestled with, you know, their theories or their approaches to looking at violence, you know, through this. This different lens. It.

It was such an amazing and hopeful exercise of humanity that gives me hope about our ability to build bridges, about our ability to work with others who are coming from different perspectives of our own. It's really.

I mean, we wanted to do more than just write a book, but I don't think we could have ever imagined that these people would foster community and friendship and in some cases, you know, family support.

I mean, we've seen little kids become big kids and, you know, through all of this process and, and so something that felt both really meaningful when it comes to making a difference in the world and presenting something that can help us understand how to make people's lives safer and, you know, how to help people feel more well in their experience. This experience was, was intellectually and from a personal, heartfelt, you know, perspective, it was. It was so rewarding.

And I think that therein for me lies the answer to how we build bridges, which is you just show up as yourself and you're willing to allow others to show up as who they are. And when curiosity has space to grow and to be present, it's pretty incredible what people can achieve together.

I love it. Is there a book that influenced how you think about peace and security?

There is a book. Book, yes. There's a book that I think about a lot in terms of how policy influences the way people experience their life.

This book is called the Nordic Theory of Love. I don't know if you've heard of it. I think the author is. Okay, I wrote it down. Katie Marquette, I believe is her name. Yep, Katie Marquette.

And it's basically how the policy approach among Nordic nations. She says that it's rooted in love.

And it's a similar perspective as one that we include in the book, which is designing cities around an ethics of care.

And that when you design policy that is actually rooted and grounded in the care of the people who live, you know, among you and under your authority, if you're a policymaker, those policies begin to look different and they begin to, you know, support young people in the workplace.

They begin to offer parental leave, they begin to make sure people have equitable access to health care, that, you know, kids can go home safely from school. And. And all of that matters when you're thinking about whether or not you feel safe at home and safe in your community.

And so, yeah, that book I would recommend to anyone because I think it's. It's really enlightening from a kind of a nerdy policy person like me.

But in terms of the way that people experience what policy actually means as a human being, that's good.

Is there a city you believe is doing inspiring work in violence prevention?

Yes. So many. Well, I mentioned several who have done really remarkable. Have made really remarkable improvements in their experience of violence.

So Baltimore, also Boston. I was thinking of Oakland, which we didn't talk a lot about the Peace in our Cities network, but Oakland is part of the.

Is a member of the Peace in Our Cities network. And as I mentioned, they've, you know, in the past five years or so brought down their homicide levels by about half, which is really incredible.

Huge, huge improvements. And they also have a really strong emphasis on how they incorporate gender into their violence prevention approaches.

And so I'm really, I really admire their process. Another member of the Peace in Our Cities network is Rosario, Argentina. They have also, they had a spike in violence a few years ago and have.

Have really committed themselves to bringing down those levels of violence and are, you know, engaging in. They're running surveys to understand how their people living in Rosario are experiencing safety and their perceptions of safety.

And I really admire, again, the city's commitment there to understand first what's going on and then design solutions with support of expertise to bring those numbers down. So, I mean, two examples of really a lot of amazing places that are willing to learn more and do more to make their cities safer.

So let's get back to that. Tell us about the Peace in Cities network. Since we didn't cover that, I'm just curious for those who would want more about it.

Yeah. So the Peace in our Cities network is.

It's a network that is actually organized and run by a couple of institutions and then a couple of individuals who are experts in. In violence reduction and particularly in violence reduction at the city level.

So it's the, the center for International Cooperation at New York University, it's a Stanley center for Peace and Security. And then it's our colleagues Rachel Locke and Flavia Carbonari who are also, we all kind of co convene and form the secretariat of the network.

But peace in our cities is actually focused on, it's we, we call it the three A's. So we amplify, we accompany and we advance the, the mission of reducing violence, reducing all forms of significant violence.

And our membership is formed of cities and local civil society organizations.

So in most cases we actually have members from both, from every city that is part of the network, which is again an evidence based approach to ensure continuity and longevity to policies that are implemented to reduce violence. Because as we know on the political side, it's always changing.

And so having, you know, city government represented members and organizational members helps offer that continued support to the community. But so I said the, amplify a company in advance.

When we amplify, that's really working with our city members to be present at a, at a, at a larger or at a higher level.

So you know, in global conversations around violence prevention, there hasn't historically been much of a space for city leaders to be present in the same way that there have been historically city leaders present in global climate negotiations or global conversations around migration. For different reasons, cities just haven't been organized necessarily to be present in those spaces.

So we do our best to support that really important voice because cities are on the front lines of violence and of the international conditions that also impact the violence they experience to a certain degree. So we work with them to amplify their message. We also work with cities to do peer exchanges.

So cities who are members of the network who have similar violence prevention priorities or challenges, they're able to, you know, work with one another.

You know, one city can travel to another's to learn to see what they're doing, to, you know, implement new technologies to understand violence or to do some more, you know, community engagement, things like that. So we offer them opportunities for that.

And then the network also does research and not only compiles research from others, but, but does new research that perhaps doesn't exist yet to help cities better understand how they can address the violence that they're working on reducing in their own communities.

So it's been a really rewarding and I think constructive network in terms of trying to really get practical with each other and to understand and then implement as quickly as possible the different solutions that actually make peace and safety more, you know, experienced and real good.

Glad we didn't leave that one off. Yeah. So I'm going to ask you my favorite question as we kind of wrap this up. This has been a phenomenal conversation.

What do you want your legacy to be?

Oh, I want my kids to live in a peaceful place, wherever they choose to be.

And I. I think that in terms of, you know, the work that we do, I. I hope that the legacy here is that that people believe they can work with each other, that people understand that.

That there's always someone else who can offer insight, but who can also offer community in thinking outside the box and in pursuing new approaches and in maintaining hope that we can still do things that seem hard, especially as the world is the way that it is, that remind each other that we should be hopeful and that we can be hopeful about making things better.

Awesome. So, as you probably know, there's a surprise question on the episode. Now pick a number between one and 10 for your surprise question.

Oh, goodness. All right. Three.

Three. No one picks three. Which band or artist, dead or alive, would you want to play at your funeral?

Oh, my goodness. Of course. This will be the hall of fame.

Not that you'll be enjoying it.

Yeah. Playing at my funeral. Wow. That's a really good question. I genuinely don't know the answer.

I mean, it's got to be just like something people can dance to. So, I mean, like, it has to be, right. Yeah, it has to be a party. Otherwise. No, I. I don't know. I. I mean, so I have this weird, um.

Well, maybe it's not. Maybe there's more connection. I mean, the first person that came to mind was Michael Jackson.

It's going to be somebody who can dance and carry a tune.

So.

Yeah, somebody like that.

There you go. So where can people find you, connect with you on social media and learn more about you?

Okay. So for the book for. I'll say it again, Identity Based Mass Violence in Urban Contexts.

Uncovered, we have a standalone website for that, so it's ibmv.org the book is available for purchase, but it's actually available online entirely free.

It was really important to us as partners to make sure that not only those you know who are part of the project could share it with everybody that they knew but that there were no barriers to access.

And so anybody can, can go to the publisher's website, it's linked on ibmv.org and can, can download the book, download chapters, individual chapters. It's super accessible. So please find that work there. Also.

The Peace in our Cities Network is PeaceInRCities.org so all of the work that we do there, including our co editor Rachel Locke, she, you know, all of all of that work and she can be found there. And then the Stanley center is the StanleyCenter.org I think or you can Google us Stanley center for Peace and Security.

So yeah, that's, that's, those are the best places to find us. And all of our contact information is all over the place on each website.

And when you do Google it, it will come up in Iowa. So just so you know.

Yes, it will, it will come up in Iowa.

If you think it's the wrong place. No, you're in the right location.

Yep, absolutely. Muscatine on the banks of the Mississippi.

Well, thank you so much for, for sharing your content with us today and your, your goal for peace for our listeners. Thank you for doing the work that you're doing. Jaya working that you're doing is important.

And thank you for joining us today on Becoming Bridge Builders. Your insights into cities, collaboration, prevention are incredibly valuable. And to our listeners, thank you for tuning in.

If this conversation resonates with you, please share it, subscribe and leave us a review. Building Bridge Builder starts by listening and listening starts with conversations like this one.

Until next time, I AM your host, Dr. Keith Haney and this is Becoming Bridge Builders. Thank you so much.