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Barrio De Paz
Youth worker Nelsa Libertad Curbelo Cora describes the inspiration behind Barrio de Paz (Peace Town), a non-violent youth movement in Guayaquil, Ecuador. It brings together street gangs to provide services to the struggling community. Gang members band together out of a need for unity, structure, and love when their social fabric has been torn apart. Mirroring the society that marginalizes them, gangs use this unity for domination and aggression. Nelsa shows how this instinct toward oneness can be transformed into a power of service, life, and love.
Nelsa Libertad Curbelo Cora is a proponent of
non-violence who has fought for indigenous people's rights and worked
as a mediator in armed conflicts throughout South America. In 1999, she
founded the organization Ser Paz (Being Peace) specifically to work
with youth gangs in Ecuador's southern city of Guayaquil. Through her
work, many of Guayaquil's most dangerous gangs have disarmed, agreed to
abandon violence and are now working together to rebuild the community.
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