" We need a new system of values, a system which recognizes the organic unity between humankind and nature and promotes the ethic of global responsibility.”

--Mikhail S. Gorbachev, President of Green Cross International

UC Irvine is very honored to host former President Mikhail Gorbachev to be the inaugural recipient of UCI�s Citizen Peacebuilding Award. This award, named in Mr. Gorbachev�s honor in perpetuity, recognizes the tremendous impact he has had on world peace. Mikhail Gorbachev served as leader of the Soviet Union from 1985-1991. He is world-renowned and admired for streamlining and decentralizing the oppressive system he inherited. In an effort to secure relations with the West, Gorbachev signed two broad disarmament pacts, and ended Communist rule in Eastern Europe. He taught the world two new words: perestroika (governmental restructuring) and glasnost (political openness). As a result of his extraordinary achievements, Gorbachev was the recipient of the 1990 Nobel Peace Prize.

Mr. Gorbachev is a guest of the Citizen Peacebuilding Program in the Center for Global Peace and Conflict Studies at UC Irvine, in partnership with Global Green USA, (the U.S. Affiliate of Green Cross International.) Since 1997, it has been the mission of the Citizen Peacebuilding Program (CPBP) to help citizens seek realistic ways to improve human conditions locally and globally. CPBP activities aim to prevent violent conflict and, if violence occurs, to promote reconciliation and sustainable peace. The CPBP engages in research, education, and action supporting citizen participation in public peace processes. The integration of all three is especially important to the Citizen Peacebuilding Program in promoting knowledge about positive models for change and fostering constructive public debate.

The Citizen Peacebuilding Program is one example of UCI�s response to the growing problems of conflict and violence. Turning research into action, the UCI program takes an integrated approach to studying the best grassroots peacebuilding methods in both domestic and international conflicts, and utilizes those findings in direct engagement in peacebuilding projects in selected communities in Northern Ireland and the former Soviet Union, as well as in neighborhoods in southern California.

For further information please call
(949) 824-8687