The journey towards reconciliation is a long process that needs to weather many seasons of transitions and therefore demands the utmost will and courage to keep the process going. To sustain the continued process of understanding and reconciliation it is essential that pragmatic steps are taken at regular intervals. Such pragmatic steps must hold clarity in intention and concreteness in implementation with a visionary approach.
Due to severe nature of distrust and pain that have been caused, especially in situations of protracted armed conflict, it would be erroneous to assume that understanding and reconciliation would be bridged within a short span of time. It must be understood that the pathway to reconciliation cannot jump stages. The process demands that it goes through every stage, no matter how painful or difficult it may be.
Practical steps are what sustain the process. Often one will find that a process gets lost in slogans and rhetoric. Of course any process needs to define its values, which act as a guidepost in directing the path, but this does not mean getting stuck in sloganeering. The key is to ensure that practical and concrete steps which affirm the values of the process are made deliberately, to strengthen the process. A process without consistent concrete steps is bound to be weak.
One serious obstacle is that, because of the violence of the past, relations are based on antagonism, distrust, disrespect and possibly, hurt and hatred. It is hardly a step for optimism, no matter how effective or perfect the process in itself may be. There is therefore a pressing need to evolve practical steps that address negative relationships and assumed perceptions that feed on dehumanization. Hence a nation seeking reconciliation needs to develop effective working structures in its pursuit to build bridges of understanding; understanding which is the understanding of differences.
Since democratic values demand a working structure in which differences are addressed constructively, these structures require a minimum level of fairness, cooperation and interrelationship and they serve the purpose for building constructive communication, empowering confidence and developing trust. These structures need to be independent and must be dynamic in its origin so that it will be in a position to adopt and adapt to the fast changing nature of the process.
Reconciliation applies not simply to political leaders, governments and armed factions; it applies to the whole nation. The relationship at question must be addressed between whole communities and societies. It is the entire nation that has to begin to reorient themselves from the adversarial relation of conflict to a more respect centered relation of cooperation.
Reconciliation is urged for pragmatic reasons and it is through practical and concrete steps that it can be realized. History reveals that reconciliation is not a luxury, it is a necessity. While democratic frameworks result in resolving differences, reconciliation addresses the relationships between those who will have to implement just solutions.
