Tenth International Conference on Sport & Society

Abstract

Sport for peace initiatives are particularly effective in helping to build confidence and trust between opposing parties and advancing the healing process. Healing comprises strategies, processes, and activities aimed at improving the psychological health of individuals or rehabilitating and reconstructing local and national communities. Building trust requires that each party — victim, and offender — gains renewed confidence in himself or herself and in each other. Building trust also entails seeing the humanity in every individual. This acknowledgment is the basis for the mutual trust required to build a lasting culture of peace. Sport can help advance this process by virtue of its far-reaching appeal and its ability to create new, shared identities that transcend the lines that divide societies. This dimension of sport has long been appreciated by nations and used to foster positive feelings of national identity, pride, initiatives at making use of sport’s power to create and strengthen group identities. In the context of peace-building, sport offers a means to create positive new shared identities among formerly opposing groups in order to build a solid foundation for a peaceful future. The successful use of sport as a ritual for this shared identity-building relies on cultural sensitivity and the use of symbols that are meaningful to those involved in the reconciliation process. In some circumstances,