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Terry Savage

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Terry Savage

Associate Professor

 https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0010-5147
20012024

Research activity per year

Personal profile

About

Growing up amid war in Zimbabwe and then transition from apartheid to democracy in South Africa, Terry Savage was confronted early with the brutal impacts of structural violence and of war. He took a stand as a conscientious objector against the apartheid military, before studying social sciences at the University of Cape Town; conflict mediation at the Maxwell School, Syracuse University, thanks to a Fulbright Fellowship; and his PhD in political sociology at the KU Leuven.
 
Dr Savage worked in South Africa’s vibrant non-profit sector for the Institute for Justice and Reconciliation, setting up projects in the Congo, Burundi, Sierra Leone, Liberia and Zimbabwe, running a fellowship for the International Center for Transitional Justice (92 fellows, 24 societies in transition, 4 years), and publishing avidly on reconciliation and transition in Africa. He has served with the United Nations as Chief of Human Rights Reporting in Burundi and as Reparations Policy Adviser in Nepal, where he used elicitive methods to produce a national reparations policy that incorporated victims’ needs and priorities in their own words.
 
He has taught extensively at Stellenbosch University since 2003 and consulted widely. Recent clients have been the Berghof Foundation, working with the challenges posed to mediation efforts by conflicting versions of history; Avocats Sans Frontières in Mali, brokering channels between victims' groups and Mali’s Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission; and the German civil peace service in the Kurdistan region of Iraq, building dignifying interviewing methods for consulting women & girls returning from abduction and sexualized enslavement under Da’esh / Islamic State.
 
Complementing his work with Nova Southeastern University, Dr Savage enjoys a continuing research affiliation with the University of Leuven. He has published numerous articles and op-eds, as well as three books on the challenges of reconciliation after violent conflict on a large scale in African settings. He is working on a fourth book, developing a victimological approach to transitional justice. He is on two United Nations experts' rosters - the Governance and Peacebuilding Roster for Africa and the UNDP-DPA Peace and Development Roster - the board of the Swiss Restorative Justice Forum, and the editorial team for the Africa volume of a project to establish an international encyclopedia on Restorative Justice.

Related documents

Education/Academic qualification

Faculty of Social Sciences, PhD, University of Leuven

… → 2020

Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Master of Public Administration (MPA), Syracuse University

… → 2005

Maxwell School of Citizenship and Public Affairs, Master of Arts-International Relations (MA-IR), Syracuse University

… → 2002

Departments of International Relations and Public Administration, Maxwell School, William Flaherty Scholarship, Syracuse University

1998 → 1999

Graduate Studies in Conflict Mediation, Fellowship, Fulbright U.S. Student Program

1997 → 1998

Master of Social Sciences (MSocSci), University of Cape Town, South Africa

… → 1997

Bursary, Centre for Science Development

… → 1995

Bachelor of Social Sciences [Honours], University of Cape Town, South Africa

… → 1995

Research Fellowship, Institut français d'Afrique du Sud

2006 → …

External positions

Research Consultant, Berghof Foundation

Jan 1 2020

Senior Adviser, Danish Institute for Human Rights

Jan 1 2015 → Dec 31 2016

Chief of Reporting Unit, Human Rights and Justice Division: United Nations Integrated Office in Burundi (BINUB)

Feb 1 2009 → Jan 31 2011

Research Associate, French Institute of South Africa / Universite de Paris Nanterre

Jan 1 2006 → Dec 31 2007

Head of Research and Analysis, Africa Programme, Institute for Justice and Reconciliation (IJR)

Jan 1 2004 → Dec 31 2005

Programme Coordinator, Institute for Justice and Reconciliation (IJR)

Jan 1 2003 → Dec 31 2003

Projects Coordinator, Institute for Justice and Reconciliation (IJR)

Jan 1 2002 → Dec 31 2002

Special Assistant to the Executive Director, Institute for Justice and Reconciliation (IJR)

Jan 1 2001 → Dec 31 2001

Research Intern, Arms Trade Resources Centre, World Policy Institute

Jan 1 2000 → Dec 31 2000

Disarmament Intern, War Resisters League

Jan 1 2000 → Dec 31 2000

Tutor, Syracuse University

Jan 1 1999 → Dec 31 2000

Tutor, University of Cape Town, South Africa

Jan 1 1995 → Dec 31 1996

Lecturer, Université de la Réunion, France

Jan 1 1993 → Dec 31 1995

Disciplines

  • Arts and Humanities

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