Earlier this month, PeaceMover Amanda Munroe attended the 3rd International Forum on Sport for Peace and Development at the UN headquarters in New York. “Creating a Common Vision” was the theme of the forum, and it was co-organized by the United Nations Office on Sport for Development and Peace (UNOSDP) and the International Olympic Committee (IOC). This week’s Mover Monday features Amanda’s great experiences while in attendance at this forum! Enjoy!
I jumped at the opportunity to attend the conference, what with the prospect of rubbing shoulders with former Olympic athletes, royalty, politicians, and other celebrity figures in attendance (UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon shared opening remarks), but if you’ll believe me, I was even more interested in learning from other practitioners and academics in the field of sport for peace and development (or SDP). I’ve grown deeply interested in the field since becoming a PeaceMover with Move This World over three years ago, and through my graduate research on sport and peace education in 2011 and 2012.
Panel presentations over the course of the two day forum covered themes such as “creating a culture of peace through sport,” “sport and social inclusion,” and “sport and social development legacies,” woven together by persistent inquiry and speculation about how to integrate physical activity into sustainable development initiatives as they relate to health, education, and post-conflict reconstruction.
By this point, some of you may be wondering what this blog post really has to do with Mover Monday, and I can imagine others of you protesting, “But I thought MTW was a creative arts endeavor…what’s all this talk about sport?!”
Bear with me. MTW has been present in the SDP community for a few years now – MTW was shortlisted in 2011 at the Beyond Sport Awards for Best New Project and again in 2012 for Best Project for Conflict Resolution. Not to mention the fact that the program satisfies physical education requirements in its U.S. locations. (If you’re a PeaceMover like me, you understand there is good reason to wear the black stretchy pants that have become our standard uniform – some of the moves our participants develop bring out more of the athlete in me than the dancer).
MTW sits at a unique intersection between the world of sport and the world of art. Think of a Venn diagram. MTW would be right at the sweet spot where the two circles intersect, to put it simply, or to complicate things, not only at the intersection of those two spheres but blending also with education, social inclusion, creative and critical thinking, peacebuilding, sustainable economic development, leadership development, and…you get the point.
It was clear from conference attendees and presenters at the forum that sport and physical activity initiatives are being increasingly valued throughout the world for their contributions to social welfare. Formal and informal discussions revolved around how sport can be integrated more deeply into or better complement other fields of practice. This particular audience was especially interested in sport’s potential to further achievement of the 2015 Millennium Development Goals.
Leaving the conference, I felt proud to contribute to Move This World for a number of reasons. Among them: Forum attendees and presenters voiced a deep respect for organizations like MTW working “in the trenches” of sport for social change. Those who have committed themselves to the practice (rather than just the promotion) of SPD are viewed as pioneers exploring a frontier fraught with conceptual and very practical challenges.
Also, my experience is that MTW is highly conversant, if not in fact taking the lead, on many of the lessons learned and new ideas and discussed at the conference, including social inclusion (at this forum, the term referred to cultural diversity, gender, and inclusion of persons with disabilities); a culture of peace as the outcome of playing together; the creation of sustainable funding structures for social profit organizations; and the primacy of effective program design, measurement, and evaluation.
One particular example of how MTW is blazing the trail in this field is the recent name change from Dance 4 Peace to Move This World. In her letter introducing the organization’s rebranding, MTW Founder and CEO Sara Potler LaHayne made clear that the change did not signify a shift in identity, but rather a widening of the family: “We feel as though we have grown beyond the Dance 4 Peace name to an organization that truly has a global impact,” said Sara. Moving away from preconceptions associated with “dance” and “peace” feels consistent with the organization’s mission to increase inclusion, diversity, and international connections. Practically, it avoids causing misconceptions before a PeaceMover or MTW supporter has a chance to explain what we do.
Consistency – across hubs and in MTW’s identity – feels reinforced by the name change, which communicates an honest and reflective awareness of MTW’s mission, vision, and real impact. To me the name change represents MTW’s leadership in the emerging field of sport for development and peace, demonstrating the organization’s consistent use of monitoring and evaluation structures in every aspect of program planning and implementation. It represents an awareness of purpose, a clearly articulated theory of change and follow-up on that theory.
Coming back round to our starting point, I was pleased to represent MTW at the 3rd International Forum on Sport for Peace and Development despite needing to introduce the organization as “the artist formerly known as Dance 4 Peace.” I have come to the conclusion that the transformation reflects those hallmarks in program design and growth that set MTW apart, and my hunches were confirmed by practitioners and academics alike. MTW possesses organizational awareness and flexibility, a considered theory of change, strong and consistent structures for monitoring and evaluation that effectively impact organizational growth, and finally, a mission-consistent value for inclusion echoed in the vision to move not just one corner of, but this whole world.