Catherine Walsh, S-CAR Masters Student
Catherine Walsh is part of the exciting class of MS students that enrolled at the School for Conflict Analysis and Resolution in Fall 2012. As she noted, “I was drawn to the program because of the prospects of learning about intervention techniques to use in times of conflict.”
Catherine became interested in the field of conflict analysis and resolution when she spent a year traveling around Western Europe and was given a crash course on the devastating effects of the World Wars. More importantly, she realized that it was exactly because of these devastating effects that, henceforth, European conflicts ought to be resolved peacefully. “For me, this realization of a nonviolent approach to resolving conflict is what other nations should try to emulate,” Catherine says. “Currently we can see that the EU states are the most accomplished evolving modern republics of all time with their emphasis on promoting good governance and development over war making.”
Catherine is currently working with the Gender Center at S-CAR, where she ultimately hopes to be able to develop a comprehensive peacebuilding framework that would include many more sections of a society that may sustain such processes in the long term.
Catherine also hosts “S-CAR Speaks,” a video podcast program that highlights projects, publications, and research areas that students are currently exploring. “I find this task very rewarding as I learn so much from my colleagues and this knowledge is oftentimes priceless,” she said. After she graduates from S-CAR, she plans to take this knowledge to an organization that is fully committed to promoting peace “everywhere and anywhere” and also to seeing the whole process through to the end.