• Rotary Alumni Global Service Award winner Pushpi Weerakoon on working towards building lasting peace

From the war zones of Iraq to the climate-threatened shores of the Pacific, Rotary Alumni Global Service Award winner Pushpi Weerakoon has been at the heart of some of the world’s most urgent crises. A force in peacebuilding, migration, and gender justice, her work spans continents, conflicts, and cultures. 

In this compelling question and answer session with ‘Kaleidoscope’, she opened up about navigating fragile futures, building lasting peace, and what it truly means to serve humanity at the frontlines of global transformation. 

Following are excerpts from the interview:

You’ve worked on some of the world’s most complex crises, from post-conflict Iraq to the Iranian crisis in Bangladesh. How do you navigate all these fragile and often politically charged environments?

When I’m informed that I will be posted for a mission, the next step is that we get a briefing. Sometimes, that briefing can be very brief too. It is important that we do our own research and educate ourselves. It could be even from a report that has been written. However, one thing I make sure that I do is to read up about the history, the norms, and the rituals of that country, because it helps greatly when I go to that country to understand the context. 

Once in situ, we conduct a needs assessment and stakeholder mapping to understand the conflict at the ground level, which almost always becomes a totally different story from what we hear when we are outside and on the fringes. This part is really important because it is not like we just parachute in and provide solutions. We first assess the situation and speak to the local constituents which involves the local leadership, the international leadership, and the other international agencies like international non-governmental organisations (INGOs), NGOs, and the other United Nations (UN) agencies. Then, we figure out the most conclusive way of going about helping the people.

You were instrumental in developing Sri Lanka’s first Office for Reparations and also led key efforts in drafting legislation. What makes these efforts more meaningful when you have to work especially with survivors of conflict-related sexual abuse, for instance?

Reparation is provided in different ways. It’s compensation plus services offered to the survivors. The most important thing in reparation is that we listen to the survivors and give them what they need. 

In terms of the Sri Lankan Office for Reparations Bill and the Office for Reparations Act, to get that information, I travelled across Sri Lanka for almost one-and-a-half years, to all the districts and little pockets of provinces, to speak to survivors – many of whom had, at that time, migrated deeper into the Southern areas.

This travel was to understand their current needs, because needs change. Even if you were given a certain amount maybe in the ’1980s and ’1990s, given the current situation, that’s not enough. So, they will tell you that. You need to listen to them. Listening to communities and figuring out what they need is the most important fundamental in providing reparation.

You were leading some projects in the Pacific, at the forefront of climate-induced migration. How do you navigate the tension between the humanitarian response and the long-term policy?

Our immediate action is lifesaving. We go in and do whatever is needed to make sure that people have security. And then, within conflicts, there are always other little conflicts that arise, so we go in and start the mitigation activities. At the same time, we look at how to do it in a long-term, more sustainable way. That’s where early warning systems come in. 

We collect data – that helps us a lot to know what’s going to happen in the future. We put early warning systems in place. Then, we move on to long-term policies, like sea level rise adaptation plans. We also build international cooperation, which is very important. In small islands, sometimes you have to evacuate, and you need another space to take the evacuees to, so we build that relationship.

You lead a fair number of gender-focused projects across diverse cultural contexts. How do you ensure that these strategies don’t just become tokenistic?

Gender mainstreaming is not only done in gender-specific projects. It's done in all projects across the spectrum. We have what is called the Gender Marker Index, which gives a percentage for the population and the issue at hand. It tells you whether you are giving resources in an equitable way. 

When you say gender, many think it’s about sexual orientation, which is not the case. It’s also linked to age, youth, and disabilities. So, every project – say, for instance, we’re building a housing scheme or working in a camp context – asks: Are there separate toilets for everybody? Is it safe? Is the road workable? Can children play? All this and more is taken into account. So, it’s not just gender-focused projects.

You’ve contributed to transitional justice in Sri Lanka, Iraq, and other places. How can countries reconcile their demand for justice with the political will for peace?

That’s a very complex process. It takes a lot of time. One thing is to keep in mind that transitional justice and reconciliation should be done together. It’s not like reconciliation first and transitional justice after that. They should be done at the same time so that everyone understands the issues that pop up based on the survivors’ needs. 

But of course, it takes time. It also takes political will and the locals’ will. It’s really important that locals speak up, voice their opinions, and let leaders know what they want so that the nation will not be silent.

You’ve worked with displaced persons, refugees, and survivors. How do you keep human dignity at the centre of a humanitarian landscape?

The focus, again, is on the beneficiaries, what they need. When we go into a situation, the focus is to figure out the root causes of the problem. How can we deal with the immediate issue at hand? Once you speak to the locals, you understand what’s needed. And that’s what should be provided.

What we do is provide the technical knowledge to make things better. It’s not about bringing unknown solutions to a locality and trying to change it. That should never be done. In scenarios like that, I think that the most successful way is for us to be locally global.

Your work spans from the UN to the Rotary and everything in between. How do you balance international diplomacy with the urgency of community voices?

The thing is, when you read the news, you feel like diplomacy is separate and the community is separate. But, in reality, for me, it has never been like that. We are all human. So, even if I speak to a regional leader or a world leader, they understand the problem at hand. You just have to be very human. And that’s my way; I’m very honest. 

I would go into the discussion saying: “This is the issue at hand. These are the solutions that we think should be applied.” And if you take the time to explain, if the person is of the same mindset, they understand the urgency. So, miniscule diplomacy doesn’t come into it. We do understand that there are issues in politically sensitive scenarios. We need to navigate those in a very sensitive manner. It takes time. But, you get there.

You’ve been trained in peacebuilding in many places, from Harvard, United States, to Chulalongkorn, Thailand. How do you define peace personally?

I’ve stopped defining peace. I would say it’s a process. Whatever big words you might use, it’s definitely a process. It’s not a one-off event. It’s something you should work for. What exactly is peace of mind? Is it the absence of conflict or the absence of the fear of conflict? In life, we are never going to be rid of conflict. We will always have it.

For me, peace is the ability to have a conversation or hold a space for somebody who wants to have a conversation with a different perspective. It’s the ability for a person to say: “I am safe here, I can speak to you, and I can resolve my conflict.”

With all these decades of impactful work, what’s the one change that you still hope to see in the world within your lifetime?

Societies that have inculcated empathy – from their traditional ways, rituals, beliefs, or norms, or even in a modern sense – have a better way of dealing with conflict. We will always have conflict for the rest of our lives, but, it is about how you deal with it. So, I hope that all these artificial intelligence tools, the social media, and everything that we’re coming up with these days will be geared towards that: helping build cultures and nations with empathetic people.

(The writer is the host, director, and co-producer of the weekly digital programme ‘Kaleidoscope with Savithri Rodrigo’ which can be viewed on YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn. She has over three decades of experience in print, electronic, and social media)