Completed Projects

The Team: A Dramatic Television Series

As a way to promote constructive dialogue and a culture of mediation and conflict resolution amongst Moroccan youth, SFCG-M has created a dramatic new TV series entitled The Team.. The series elaborates on subjects of moderation, mutual understanding, non-violent communication, tolerance, and citizenry through the depiction of a fictionalized football team and the conflicts they face in their day-to-day lives. Outreach debates and discussions in schools, community centers, and prisons across Morocco followed the airing of the 26-episode series in 2010.

In addition, production of The Team produced the following results:

• 50 youth mediators were trained as facilitators and worked with SFCG-M to carry out the wide-reaching community debates;

• 103 public debates around themes in the series have been conducted in 20 cities around Morocco, facilitated by trained youth mediator/facilitators; and

• Over 4000 youth participated in debates that were held in schools, associations, and youth centers in the aforementioned 20 cities.

Link to the Theme Song from The Team: Morocco

Promoting Civic Engagement: Media in Morocco

Due to a dearth of genuine channels of dialogue between elected officials and their constituents in Morocco, citizens tend to have little access to their elected officials, or governmental processes in general. Forming 57% of the population, Moroccan youth suffer from feelings of political apathy more than any other group. In response, SFCG-M is conducting a project that aims to increase constructive youth participation in political and democratic debates through media tools (internet and radio) and to contribute to greater accountability of government officials (both elected and not) vis-à-vis the Moroccan public. Through the media and internet, the project will reach an estimated 10,000 people in 2010 and 2011.

Cross Fertilization Project: Morocco and Sierra Leone

In dozens of countries throughout the world, youth can play a major role in the transformation of conflicts. SFCG-M recognizes the huge potential of youth to transform conflict and is currently implementing cross-fertilization between two successful projects – SFCG Morocco and SFCG Sierra Leone – to bring youth radio programming to Morocco and to bring youth mediation to Sierra Leone and other countries in West Africa through the end of 2010. SFCG-M’s work focuses on enabling youth to find their voice and move beyond dialogue to action, addressing root causes of the conflict with concrete actions.

National competition for young mediators

In order to encourage young mediators to continue their work and to introduce the alternative of a culture of conflict resolution in the Moroccan society, SFCG-M organized a national contest to reward the best written, visual, and audio creations that demonstrated tangible results in social mediation for the benefit of the Moroccan youth. The winner, a young mediator from Meknes, made a film documenting a successful mediation she had conducted between a landlady and her tenant.

MediAction

From January 2008 to April 2010, SFCG-M trained and coached 132 new youth mediators in five cities around Morocco to promote a culture of mediation and dialogue, and reinforce social cohesion. SFCG-M aimed to promote youth empowerment through capacity building of NGOs and by introducing a culture of mediation and peace in slums and other excluded areas in different regions of Morocco. Through field assessments, baselines, consensus-building seminars, training, workshops, guides, retreats, coaching, and the creation of youth mediation centers, SFCG-M was able to achieve:

• 132 youth leaders (70 women; 62 men) were trained in social mediation, including conflict transformation, non-violent communication, negotiation, facilitation, and leadership;

• 9,224 cases were mediated with a 81% success rate; and

• 64 youth leaders took a train-the-trainers course enabling them to conduct mediation trainings.

“The vast majority of young mediators feel that the programme has positively changed their life and that their self-esteem has grown remarkably as a result.”
-Final external evaluation, March 2010, Lama DCA consultants

Click here to read more about MediAction...

Contributing to the Reduction of Violence against Women

In 2010, SFCG-M conducted an exchange visit that aimed to create a valuable exchange of expertise between Americans and Moroccans working to reduce violence against women. The program sought to exchange information between both countries, with government officials, professionals, NGOs, and general audiences focusing on the growth of offender-focused programs, including: preventive youth education against domestic violence; creation of centers for male domestic violence offenders, and the role of the judiciary and police force in addressing offenders in their efforts to curb violence against women.

“I was impressed with the work being done in the United States regarding offender-focused reform. The members of the US delegation had so much expertise to offer. I was very satisfied with this exchange, and it was a total success as an initial step in reducing violence against women in Morocco.”
-Government Official from Morocco

Countering Radicalism Project

The reality of prisons worldwide is that inmates often lack constructive-change programming because the prison staff lacks conflict management training to transform conflict and stem radical behavior. With this project, SFCG-M piloted a program to introduce conflict management into prison and post-prison centers in Morocco. A training retreat was held in Marrakesh in April 2010 to raise prison directors’ awareness and understanding of the benefits of conflict transformation. The retreat was a success, enabling a cross-fertilisation among Moroccan Prison Directors and national and international experts in this field of conflict transformation, as well as establishing a buy-in of stakeholders through continued participation in and contribution to conflict management training for both detainees and prison staff.

Alternative Dispute Resolution Program

Carried out in three strategic phases from 2004 to 2008, SFCG-M and the Moroccan Ministry of Justice worked to increase alternative dispute resolution (ADR) methods in Morocco. The ADR program sought to alleviate the court system of cases, prevent long court delays, reduce the cost of legal cases, and promote alternative dispute resolution through mediation. The project focused on introducing new and creative mechanisms to judges and legal experts to expedite legal cases and reduce Morocco’s institutional bottlenecks. The project included an effective and far-reaching public awareness and education campaign on the use of mediation. The project resulted in a first-ever Conventional Mediation Law in Morocco, number 08.05, created in 2007 with the Moroccan Ministry of Justice.

Click here to read more about the Alternative Dispute Resolution Program...

Mitigating Communal Conflict by Engaging Youth Constructively in Local Democratic and Economic Development (YCMC) Project

From January 2008 to September 2009, SFCG-M sought to mitigate communal conflict by engaging youth constructively in Morocco’s democratic and economic development, through training and coaching youth mediators and the establishment of three youth community mediation centers in Casablanca in addition to one in Tetouan. The project was widely successful in fostering stability and cooperation in the targeted communities as well as teaching youth better methods for resolving day-to-day conflicts, as shown in these results:

• 105 youth leaders trained in social mediation, including conflict transformation, non-violent communication, negotiation, facilitation, and leadership, as well as entrepreneurial skills, including project management, strategic planning, commercial communication, revenue generating activities and fundraising techniques;

• 43 youth trained as trainers in mediation and conflict transformation;

• Over 10,000 community members became aware of community mediation; and

• 5 mediation centers created in different schools across Casablanca.

“There are very few jobs in Morocco. Now, after the training, if we wanted to start our own project, we can do that. … Before, we were afraid to confront someone who has power in the framework of searching for work, and now we can confidently work with them.”
-Female participant, Sidi Moumen

Other important results and findings from the project included:

• 70% of those surveyed during the final evaluation directly link a reduction of social tensions to the work of mediation centers, an increase of 44% from the baseline evaluation;

• 65% directly link an increase in economic opportunities for youth to the work of mediation centers, up from an average of 37% at baseline for both cities;

• 59% of community members report increased cooperation and partnership between associations and local municipalities, up from an average of 38.5% at baseline, and

• On average, those who participated in the survey rated the project’s impact on their lives at 7.45 out of 10.

“On the personal level I have learned many skills that have changed my way of thinking, communicating and behaving. Roughly SFCG-M has taught us what I call "the art of behaving. Before this project training I used to deal with problems and conflicts in a blind way. Without knowing the true causes of the problem or the consequences of my actions.”
- Assad Tawfik: A male youth leader who participated in the YCMC project, 24 years old

Family Mediation

In September 2007, SFCG-M launched an 8-month project geared towards strengthening the capacity of the Moroccan women listening centers in mediation and conflict resolution techniques. In a country where awareness of family mediation is relatively low, the project has been very successful in informing women listening centers in Morocco about the culture of mediation as an alternative way to solve family disputes. Two cycles of comprehensive training were offered, which covered both basic mediation and advanced mediation. A methodological guide was prepared and a family mediation final conference was held on May 2, 2008 in Casablanca.

Bachkou Project

By bringing together various government authorities at the local and national level with the inhabitants of the Bachkou neighborhood in Casablanca, SFCG-M enabled the improvement of local participatory government, as well as the establishment of consultative decision making. This decision-making led in turn to the effective application of a project facilitating the transfer of the inhabitants from precarious housing conditions to better and durable housing. The residents were successfully aided in their move, thus increasing the confidence of the residents in the local political system.

Building a Collaborative Community in Douar Chanti Shantytown

In partnership with national and local government partners, SFCG-M implemented a project which introduced and institutionalized participatory and collaborative approaches to development in one impoverished urban community in Northeast Morocco, the Douar Chanti Shantytown, and aimed to create a model of collaboration between national and local development institutions.

Read more on Building a Collaborative Community in Douar Chanti Shantytown...

Engaging with women in Douar Chanti shantytown

This project sought to reinforce a culture of confidence and responsible citizenship within the Douar Chanti of Sidi Yahia Al-Gharb. The four-month long project helped Douar Chanti community residents design and implement a sustainable development project focused on women, by using the skills that SFCG-M previously promoted. The project results included:

• 60 people trained in computer skills, of which 39% were women;

• 24 youth activists trained in communication, leadership and conflict resolution;

• 35 women recipients of micro-credits and trained micro-project management;

• Built and launched a Community Resource Center in Doaur Chanti; and

• 40 women beneficiaries of literacy courses

Labor Unions

In the labor sector, conflicts and drawn-out strikes resulting in "lose-lose" outcomes are the dominant confrontation norms. This protracted situation is costing Moroccans billions of dirham in opportunity costs, lost investments, and jobs. SFCG-M brought together the government, private sector, and main labor unions around a joint project to institutionalize a culture of collaborative problem solving. The project was focused on creating a group of Moroccan mediators and trainers in dispute resolution and included capacity-building events, exchange visits abroad, and other activities.

Read more on our work with Labor Unions...