Women's Peace-Building Activities: The Case of Cyprus

Tuesday, October 1, 2002
Author: 
Katie Economidou
Europe
Western Europe
Cyprus

Civil society in Cyprus is still shaping itself in the newly formed political sphere where citizens need to have a voice in tackling issues such as: citizens' actions, feminism and gender, environmental concern, and issues that have always been either neglected or taboo. The efforts ofthe women of Cyprus at all levels, such as businesswomen, educators, youth, political women, and others oriented toward peace-building have been targeted to develop a civil society, where institutional and discursive transformations would enable the creation of new or additional space a for public debate aimed at cultivating attitudes of tolerance and understanding and, most importantly, the de-construction of the image of the "other" as the "enemy" which nationalism and extremism has managed to construct throughout the long history of the island of Cyprus.

Document PDF: 

peaceproc_womenpeacecyprus_economidou_2002.pdf