CMU Faculty

Wendy Kroeker she/her

Associate Professor and Chair of Peace and Conflict Transformation Studies

Wendy specializes in community conflict transformation processes as Associate Professor in CMU's peace and conflict transformation studies department and in locations around the globe. She has over 25 years of experience as a community mediator, conflict transformation trainer, peace program consultant, program manager for international development projects and university instructor. The Philippines, Indonesia, Myanmar, India, Bangladesh, and Palestine are some of the locations in which she has worked over the past two decades with Indigenous groups, NGO staff, community and religious leaders, and various educators.

In addition to teaching the Introduction to Peace and Conflict Transformation Studes, the focus for Wendy's teaching is upper level Peace and Conflict Transformation Studies (PACTS) courses such as: Models for Peace and Conflict Transformation, History and Strategies of Nonviolence, Doing Peace and Cultures of Violence/Cultures of Peace. Wendy is also contributing to CMU's MA in Peacebuilding and Collaborative Development program. 

Wendy completed her MA Theology at the Mennonite Brethren Seminary in California. After significant years of practice within the conflict transformation field, she entered the Peace  and Conflict Studies PhD program at the Arthur Mauro Centre in the University of Manitoba and graduated in January 2018.

Wendy's contributions to the conflict transformation and peacebuilding field include years of teaching and course development at the Mindanao Peacebuilding Institute (the Philippines), the Resolution Skills Centre/Mediation Services (Winnipeg), the Achieve Centre for Leadership, the Ukranian Evangelical Theological Seminary (Kyiv) and at the Northeast Asia Regional Peacebuilding Institute in Korea, Taiwan, Mongolia, China and Japan. Her work with the Mennonite Central Committee (MCC) has seen her and her family spend 5 years working in the Philippines, assisting in strategic planning and training for the peace programs in India and Bangladesh and most recently resourcing the program in Palestine and Laos. She continues to spend considerable work time in SE Asia.

In addition to her other research projects, Wendy's significant research into the role of local and everyday peacebuilding has been published by Lexington Press (2020). It is entitled: Multidimensional Peacebuilding: Local Actors in the Philippines.

Wendy, her partner Gordon Zerbe, and two children are all active in the CMU community.

Areas of Teaching

Conflict Transformation, peacebuilding, workplace conflict systems, nonviolence and creative action, the art of Peacebuilding, creating collaborative partnerships, peace processes and local initiatives

Education

PhD, University of Manitoba, 2018; MA, Mennonite Brethren Biblical Seminary, 1986; BA (Hon), University of Waterloo, 1982

Work in Detail

Teaching

Models of Peace and Conflict Transformation

Doing Peace

History and Strategies of Nonviolence

Cultures of Violence, Cultures of Peace

Peace Processes and Local Initiatives

Research

Kroeker, Wendy and Dennis Solon. Forthcoming 2024. "Peacemaking as Diaconia in the Philippine Context." In Research in Diaconia in International Perspective, edited by Beate Hofmann, Thorsten Moos and Johannes Eurich.

Kroeker, Wendy. (2023). Review of Disarmed: The Radical Life and Legacy of Michael "MJ" Sharp. Journal of Mennonite Studies, vol. 41. No. 2: 177-179.

Kroeker, Wendy. 2023. "'Justpeace-Diaconia' and the Challenges of Reconciliation in the Canadian Context." Religions 14, no. 5: 651ff; https://www.mdpi.com/2077-1444/14/5/651

Kroeker, Wendy. 2023. Review of High-Risk Feminism in Colombia: Women's Mobilization in Violent Contexts, Julia Margaret Zulver. Peace Research: The Canadian Journal of Peace and Conflict Studies 55, no. 1: 118-120.

Kroeker, Wendy and Myla Leguro. 2022. "Constant Motion: Multi-Dimensional Peacebuilding for Peace Processes." In Confronting Peace: Local Peacebuilding in the Wake of a National Peace Agreement, edited by Chris Mitchell, Landon Hancock, Susan Allen and Cecile Mouly: 279-308. Cham, Switzerland: Palgrave Springer Nature.

Kroeker, Wendy. 2021. "Local Peacebuilding in Response to Violent Extremism: Empowering Local Communities." In Teaching in a World of Violent Extremism, edited by Eleazar Fernandez. Wipf and Stock Publishers.

Kroeker, Wendy. 2021. "Diaconia as Peacebuilding and Reconciliation." In Contextual Theologies of Diaconia Handbook, edited by Dietrich Werner. Geneva: World Council of Churches.

Kroeker, Wendy. 2020. Multi-Dimensional Peacebuilding: Local actors in the Philippines. Lexington Press.

Kroeker, Wendy. 2020. "The peacebuilding spaces of local actors." In Routledge companion to peace and conflict studies.  Edited by Sean Byrne, Tom Matyok, Imani Michelle Scott, and Jessica Senehi. Routledge Press.

Kroeker, Wendy. 2019. "Peace Education in Post-Conflict Zones." In Oxford Bibliographies in International Relations. Ed. Patrick James. New York: Oxford University Press.

Kroeker, Wendy. 2020. "Emancipatory peace building and conflict transformation: Mindanao as a case study." In The Routledge Handbook of Peacebuilding and Ethnic Conflict, edited by Jessica Senehi, Imani Michelle Scott, Sean Byrne, and Thomas Matyók. New York: Routledge.

Kroeker, Wendy. 2015. "Shaping Peacebuilding Partnerships between International and Palestinian NGOs: Implications for Peace Studies" In Peace Studies between Tradition and Innovation, edited by Randall Amster, Laura Finley, Edmund Pries and Richard McCutcheon. Newcastle upon Tyne, UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Wendy Kroeker, Jarem Sawatsky, and Valerie Smith, eds. 2015. Toolbox: 52 Online Resources for Peace Work. Winnipeg: Canadian School of Peacebuilding.

Kroeker, Wendy. 2104. "Trauma Healing: Possibilities and Practices." Proceedings from the 2014 "Peace Studies in the XXI Century and Mongolia" conference. Ulaan Baatar, Mongolia: Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Kroeker, Wendy. 2013; published 2015. "Interventions in Secessionist Intrastate War: Understanding the Conflict between the Moro Islamic Liberation Front and the Government of the Philippines." Peace Research: The Canadian journal of Peace and Conflict Studies 45, no. 2: 5–33.

"Strengthening Peace Education Skills for the Creation of Social Change" intensive course, Mindanao Peacebuilding Institute, Philippines May 2013

"Collaborative and Culturally Responsive Partnerships" intensive course, Canadian School of Peacebuilding, June 2013

"Restorative Justice and Community Mediation" intensive course, Northeast Asia Peacebuilding Institute, August 2013

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