The Contribution of Women to Peace and Reconciliation

surroundings, against marriage partners and workmates. There were divorces
and firings after quarrels or brawls in workplaces. The results
were long-term unemployment and unhappy children, who lost a parent
or a whole side of their families.
German friends could hardly understand all this, they saw these nation -
alistic overtones as threatening, and wanted nothing to do with them.
They thought they had overcome nationalism for all time. The press, the
politicians, the peace movement, too, did not understood the development;
and the opinion predominated that this was something incomprehensible
to them, something Balkan-like, primitive, that Tito had been
able to suppress with his dictatorship, and that was inevitably breaking
out again after his death, since it had always been there.
Founding of Political Organization
I too felt the deep helplessness and despair. To escape from the paral y -
sis, I founded the organization “Southeast-Europe Culture” (Südost) with
friends. Philosophy seemed senseless to me, if even people who spoke
the same language couldn’t reach agreement, if all confidence was
gone. It was my desire to create a place in which every person would
be welcome, regardless of his or her national or religious affiliation, a
place at which words give expression to the mind, and support understanding,
a place where confidence exists. Culture, the expression of
both understanding and mind, had been turned upside down and mis -
used to stir up hatred against others. In Südost, we wanted to turn culture
back the right way up again. The Berlin Senate (the state govern ment)
understood and welcomed our request, and granted us money, so that
we could move into our rooms in January 1992.
My work has become my university. I learned that the refugees who
came to Berlin starting in 1991, fleeing the war that had now broken
out, mainly needed practical assistance. To meet their needs, we devel -
oped humanitarian aid, counselling advice and educational opportunities,
therapy for the traumatized, later support for those who were returning,
and then integration assistance.
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