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Programmes of the SRA are addressed to the basic sectors: farmers and landless rural workers, fisherfolk, the urban poor, indigenous peoples, workers, especially in the informal sector, and other disadvantaged groups, including women, youth and children, the disabled and the elderly. The agenda includes:
• agrarian reform and agricultural development;
• natural resource management and conservation;
• protection of ancestral domains of indigenous peoples;
• socialized housing for the urban poor;
• protection for workers in the informal sector;
• social services for disadvantaged groups;
• expansion of credit, including for the poor;
• employment and livelihood programmes;
• strengthening of participation in local governance.
The Social Reform Agenda is administered by the Office of the Presidential Advisor on the Peace Process. This illustrates how the culture of peace must be closely tied to equitable, sustainable and endogenous human development in order to produce a durable peace. One may note that in proposing programmes for expansion of credit, the Programme cites the example of the Grameen Bank in Bangladesh, which is described below in the chapter on non governmental organizations.
A dialogue between UNESCO's Culture of Peace Programme and the Philippine Office of the Presidential Advisor on the Peace Process contributes to the enrichment of each. During 1994, the Executive Director of the Philippine Office contributed to the First International Forum on the Culture of Peace in San Salvador and to the First Consultative Meeting of the Culture of Peace Programme in Paris, while the Director of the UNESCO Programme visited the Philippines and toured the country to observe the peace process.
The Philippines is hosting the Second International Forum on the Culture of Peace in November 1995.
South Africa
After struggling for many years against white minority rule imposed by the Apartheid system, the Black and Indian populations of South Africa, led by the African National Congress (ANC) and with the support of the international community, succeeded by the end of the 1980s in obtaining an agreement for free elections to determine the future of the country. At that point the critical question arose as to whether the process would be characterized by war or peace.
The South African people chose peace, engaging in an unprecedented process, which began with the signing of the National Peace Accord in September 1991 and extended through elections in April 1994 and the establishment of a government of national unity. One man, Nelson Mandela, the leader of the ANC, exemplified this process. In his words, 'I saw my mission as one of preaching reconciliation, of binding the wounds of the country, of engendering trust and confidence... I reminded people again and again that the liberation struggle was not a battle against any one group or colour, but a fight against a system of repression. At every opportunity, I said all South Africans must now unite and join hands and say we are one country, one nation, one people, marching together into the future.'
The mission of Nelson Mandela exemplifies the culture of peace: preaching reconciliation, binding the wounds of the country, engendering trust and confidence. 'The liberation struggle was not a battle against any one group or colour, but a fight against a system of repression.'