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David Becker is a trained psychologist and PhD. After having worked for many years with victims of political persecution in Chile he is now based at the International Academy for Innovative Education, Psychology and Economy (INA) at the Free University of Berlin, of which he is vice president. In 2002 he was a co-founder of the Office for Psychosocial Issues (OPSI) at the International Academy (INA), through which he works as a consultant for international organizations in reference to psychosocial projects in regions of conflict and war. He has published extensively on the issues of trauma, human rights, and dealing with the past. His most recent book was published in Germany in 2006 and is titled "Die Erfindung des Traumas – Verflochtene Geschichten" (The invention of Trauma- Entangled Histories"). Together with Barbara Weyermann he has authored the toolkit "Gender, Conflict Transformation and the Psychosocial Approach" and is currently working for SDC on the introduction and implementation of the psychosocial approach into Conflict Sensitive Programme Management (focus: Tajikistan, Grands Lacs, Nepal, Colombia). He is furthermore engaged in institutional coaching and training in Bosnia and Herzegovina (Vive Zene/IAMANEH) and Palestine (WEP-GCMHP/CFD). Since 2008 he is directing the OPSI-teams dedicated to three-year evaluation and scientific coaching of two groups of model projects operating within a program of the German Government, the first deals with Germany as an immigration country (34 projects) and the second deals with youth at risk of engaging with right wing parties (18 projects). Since 2008 he is "Privatdozent" (German academic degree of professor) at the University of Hannover, Germany, where he teaches Social/Political Psychology.
Contact : david.becker@fu-berlin.de
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Kathrin Groninger is a psychologist and is presently training as a psychotherapist at the Institute for Psychological Psychotherapy and Counseling in Berlin. From 2000-2004, Kathrin Groninger was associated with the service center for refugees and immigrants of the German Red Cross in Berlin. From 2004 – 2008 she worked for the Civil Peace Service of the German Development Service in Rwanda. There she was associated with the Rwandan NGO Ibuka and developed psychosocial projects to address post-conflict related trauma and to support traumatized witnesses of the Gacaca Courts. With the Rwandan human rights organization Kanyarwanda she provided psychosocial support for women and girls who had become victims of rape during the genocide. At OPSI, she currently develops materials and tools and works in project evaluation and research.
Contact : kathrin.groninger@web.de
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Brandon Hamber is Director of INCORE, a United Nations Research Centre for the Study of Conflict at the University of Ulster. He was trained in South Africa as a clinical psychologist and and holds a Ph.D. from the University of Ulster. He was also co-founder of the Office of Psychosocial Issues. He was a Research Associate of the Belfast-based think-tank, Democratic Dialogue (2001-2006) and an Honorary Fellow at the School of Psychology at the Queen's University in Belfast (2001/2002). Prior to moving to Northern Ireland, he coordinated the Transition and Reconciliation Unit at the Centre for the Study of Violence and Reconciliation in Johannesburg. He is is a Board member of the South African-based Khulumani Victim Support Group and coordinated the Centre's project focusing on the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission. He has consulted to a range of community groups, policy initiatives and government bodies in Northern Ireland and South Africa. He has undertaken consulting work and participated in various peace and reconciliation initiatives in Liberia, Mozambique, the Basque Country and Sierra Leone, among others. He has lectured and taught widely, including, on the International Trauma Studies Programme at Colombia University, New York; the Post-War and Reconstruction Unit, University of York; the Psychosocial Training Programme with the Group for Community Action, University of Madrid, and at the University of Ulster.
Contact : mail@brandonhamber.com
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Gráinne Kelly is an independent researcher, specializing in various aspects of peacebuilding theory and practice in post-conflict societies. She holds an MA in Peace and Conflict Studies. She has worked for INCORE (International Conflict Research), The Cost of the Troubles Study (Belfast) and Democratic Dialogue. Her specific expertise is in local and culturally-appropriate dispute resolution, cross-community engagement, social exclusion and reconciliation. She co-developed (with Brandon Hamber) a two-year research project exploring the theories and practices of reconciliation in Northern Ireland and recently returned from a four-month study visit to Cambodia to explore cross-cultural applicability of this research and the experience of reconciliation in a post-genocidal society. Since 2004, she has worked as an independent research consultant for a variety of organisations including Mediation Northern Ireland (good relations and diversity), Save the Children UK, Healing through Remembering (on storytelling and testimony work) and Belfast City Council (on cross-community engagement).
Contact : grainnekelly@gmail.com
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Claudia Luzar studied Political and Social Sciences at the Free University Berlin with a specialization in the research on political violence and migration. She has worked for different national and international human rights organizations mainly in Europe and Latin America. In 1998, she co-founded the organization Opferperspektive that assists victims of racist violence in Germany. She also analyzed right wing extremist structures and designed project activities for the promotion of democracy in the area of community coaching. She focuses on a combination of research, evaluation and consulting. Her main interests are psychosocial aspects of migration and integration of psychosocial concerns and conflict research in NGO work. She is a Research Associate for the Office of Psychosocial Issues (OPSI) at the the Free University of Berlin, where she works on the nationwide evaluation ”Präventions- und Bildungsangebote für die Einwanderungsgesellschaft“ (Prevention and educational programs for a society of immigration) for Germany. Together with David Becker, she designs the concept for trainings on the psychosocial and do no harm approaches in Kenya.
Contact : luzar@ina-fu.org
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Josephine Reuss is research fellow at the Office of Psychosocial Issues (OPSI) at the Free University of Berlin. Since January 2009 she is working in a three-year evaluation and scientific coaching of model projects dealing with Germany as an immigration country. Josephine Reuß studied educational science, journalism and Latin American studies at the University of Hamburg and the Free University of Berlin and holds a diploma in educational science. She worked in several social projects in South America and with victims of political persecution in Germany. Her main research interests are trauma, empowerment of refugees and migration politics.
Contact : reuss@ina-fu.org
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Sibylle Rothkegel is a psychologist and psychotherapist. She has worked as trainer and evaluator for different projects in the area of trauma and recovery (Services in Overseas, Caritas International, Christlicher Friedensdienst Bern/CH, IRCT, UNHCR) in Algeria, Egypt, Lebanon, Marocco, Bosnia and Herzegowina, Kosovo, Palestine, Russia and Sierra Leone. From 1994 to 2002, Sibylle Rothkegel was deputy director of the Treatment Center for Torture Victims in Berlin. For the next five years she led the psychological counseling service for victims of right winged, racist and antisemit violence. In 2003, she co-founded OPSI and in 2005 she co-founded the institute ‘Justice would help’ in Berlin. Since 2008, Sibylle Rothkegel has been the leader of OPSI’s project for the scientific accompaniment of model projects dealing with Germany as an immigration country, connected to the German federal state program "VIELFALT TUT GUT. Jugend für Vielfalt, Toleranz und Demokratie" (2008-2011). For the German Institute for Human Rights she regularly trains police and legal staff in dealing with traumatized persons and in intercultural communication.
Her main interests are human rights, gender issues, intercultural communication, trafficking, support of traumatised witnesses at the International Court, migration, forced displacement, vicarious traumatisation and burnout, crisis interventions.
Contact : sibrot@yahoo.de
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Claudia Skoda studied social pedagogy and social work. She has worked in various fields of social work, i.e. she worked with people with disabilities, she was social worker in a shelter for battered women in San Francisco; and she worked with children and youth for the prevention of sexual abuse. Since 2004 Claudia Skoda has been working in an anti-psychiatric crisis shelter for homeless people. Currently, she works in the scientific accompaniment of projects that are engaged in the prevention of right-wing extremism and connected to the German federal state program "VIELFALT TUT GUT. Jugend für Vielfalt, Toleranz und Demokratie". Next to this research work she is studying psychology with main focus on qualitative research, critical psychology, queer studies and psychotherapy.
Contact : claudiaskoda@freenet.de
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Barbara Weyermann is an economist and social anthropologist. She has worked for different aid organisations (Terre des hommes Lausanne/CH, Christlicher Friedensdienst Bern/CH, UNICEF South Asia) mainly in Nepal, in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, the Great Lakes region and Palestine. In 2003, she co-founded OPSI and has since been working as an independent consultant. She is designing, coaching and/or evaluating psychosocial projects and training psychosocial (para-)professionals. Her main interests are gender aspects of the psychosocial approach and the integration of psychosocial concerns in development and humanitarian programs. She has gathered experience in this field while developing a psychosocial approach to nutrition programs for the Swiss NGO Terre des hommes. Presently she is working on the integration of psychosocial activities in income generation, health and natural resource management programs for the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) in Nepal and in community based programs in the Democratic Republic of Congo. Together with David Becker, she wrote the Toolkit Gender, Conflict Transformation and the Psychosocial Approach for SDC.
Contact : bweyermann@opsiconsult.com
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