Spaces free of violence: the key role of Moroccan women in conflict prevention in schools. A case study

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis article analyses the involvement of Moroccan women in the process of implementing the dialogic model of conflict prevention and resolution. It explains the process of transformation of a school in an underserved area in Catalonia seriously affected by the economic crisis and with a foreign population totalling 85%, of mostly Moroccan origin. Through a case study, elaborated following the precepts of the communicative methodology, (1) we identify some of the elements that promote the effective participation in school by Moroccan women, and (2) we explain the impact that the participation of these women has in the prevention and resolution of conflicts inside and outside the school’s walls. The research with these women allowed us to delve into the process of transformation that these women have promoted and how the egalitarian dialogue that they have initiated has enabled this transformation. Moroccan women have found in the school and its dialogic organization a driver of the transformation of interactions. This study shows how, from the school, new dialogic spaces are open to the participation of all neighbours and how these women are involved in contributing to the improvement of coexistence both inside and outside the school.