“We do the incredibly radical thing of getting people to talk to each other,” says Lauren Abramson, Ph.D., founder and executive director of the Community Conferencing Center in Baltimore, Maryland. The people she and her staff of five bring into discussion are criminal offenders, their victims and the supporters of each. The forum is face-to-face and everyone has an equal voice. The purpose is to introduce dialogue, gain understanding, create win-win resolution and, ultimately, transform attitudes.

Lauren, who is also an assistant professor at John Hopkins Division of Child Psychiatry, describes the Community Conferencing Center as a justice and conflict management facility that provides Baltimore residents with a process that helps neighbors, schools, students, government agencies, faith communities, organizations and families uncover their natural wisdom for responding to destructive behavior in constructive ways and to build connections that serve the well-being of all.

The community conferencing program draws upon a social technology of interaction, common among tribal cultures, in which all persons involved with an offense sit in a circle to discuss the cause and effect of their actions. “We include everyone,” Lauren says, “usually from ten to 40 people, and, through trained neutral facilitators, we provide the structure for people to have a conversation that will transform how they look upon that crime. Everybody gets to tell how they were affected by what happened.”

Lauren illustrates with an example of four teenagers who stole a car; they told what it was like to be arrested. The 81-year-old woman who owned the car explained how the theft impacted her. Her family spoke of the expense she incurred due to damage that was done to the vehicle. The arresting police officer described the situation from his perspective. The youths’ parents stated their feelings and the punishment they had already applied within their families. Then all parties discussed what needed to be done to repair this situation and to prevent it from happening again. “The victim’s family saw that the young people were not bad but they had done a stupid thing,” Lauren stated. Apologies were exchanged, and a contract was signed in which each teen agreed to pay $375 for car repair. Comparing this discussion to legal courtroom proceedings, a son of the elderly woman said, “This was heart to heart.”

Since its inception in 1995, the Community Conferencing Center has trained over 600 Baltimore residents to be conflict conferencing facilitators. An intensive three-day instruction session is followed by eight months of experiential apprenticeship in which trainees learn to withhold their feelings about a case in order to retain maximum neutrality.

Lauren says that, while similar neighborhood conflict resolution programs exist in other communities, the program in Baltimore is unique in that the Community Conferencing Center applies its practices in multiple venues: the juvenile justice system, the criminal justice system, schools, neighborhoods, organizations in conflict, and among persons re-entering society after imprisonment.

Lauren is quick to point out that her organization works in association with Baltimore courts and school district, which has its own police force. “In schools, our program is an alternative to suspension and arrest,” she states.

In Baltimore, which experiences 300 homicides a year, the Community Conferencing Center provides an opportunity for murderers and families of their victims to have a conversation that often leads to some level of emotional release, understanding and forgiveness. “Time does not heal all wounds,” Lauren emphasizes. “The number of serious crimes in this country and the number of people affected by it impacts the emotional tenor of our neighborhoods. We need emotional healing so as to not magnify and increase pain and aggression.”

Complimenting the Amish community of Nickel Mines, Penn., who forgave the man who killed five girls in West Nickel Mines School in October 2006, Lauren says, “Their immediate forgiveness came, in part, from their deep connection to spirituality and the fact that they practice prayer and mindfulness in every aspect of their community.  This makes forgiveness much more possible. But, for most of us, our daily lives are not as steeped in spiritual practice, so we typically do not have the capacity to immediately and genuinely forgive. We must learn and practice that. At the Community Conferencing Center, we try to create opportunities for forgiveness. We don’t tell people that they must forgive. Rather, we invite people to have a conversation. What comes out of that conversation is up to them.”

As the practice of non-violent conflict resolution spreads, Lauren sees evidence that people are using the principles proactively in family meetings and within schools. “A safer school is one in which students feel connected with adults. We encourage teachers to circle up with students for a ‘daily rap’ and, in a nonjudgmental and nondirective way, encourage students to talk about what’s concerning them,” she says.

Overall, Lauren and her staff are trying to change culture within Baltimore’s inner-city neighborhoods from reprisal to understanding, from revenge to compassion and forgiveness. “Our punitive system is costly and it doesn’t work,” she says. “At Community Conferencing Center, we are trying to show that we have a social technology for conflict resolution that is less expensive and more effective.”

Within Baltimore, the Community Conferencing Center promotes its efforts through radio talk shows, poster campaigns and video presentations. Beyond Baltimore, Lauren speaks at conferences for organizations such as the International Institute for Restorative Practices, the Victim Offender Mediation Association, and the campaign to establish a Cabinet-level Department of Peace and Nonviolence within the U.S. federal government. “The Department of Peace and Nonviolence would support conferencing programs that help people understand the cause-and-effect consequences of their actions,” she states.

Repeating a point made by Marianne Williamson, founder of The Peace Alliance, a grassroots support organization for the Department of Peace and Nonviolence legislation, Lauren says, “For our society to try to fund this type of a program through short-term grants from private foundations is ridiculous. We must fund this kind of culture through long-standing support – like that which would come from a Department of Peace and Nonviolence.”

The Community Conferencing Center is located at 2300 N. Charles Street, Second Floor, Baltimore, MD, 21218. Phone: 410.889.7400 (voice), 410.889.0944 (fax). E-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it