Tensta is the base for world peace

The World Presidents’ Organisation under the guidance of Tord Magnuson arranged a meeting at Ross Tensta Gymnasium this week,

They pulled out all the stops to present a program that covered issues from fledgling solutions to the Middle East peace process and discussion of the coming elections in Burundi to the architectural short-sightedness of local architecture and the progressive global pedagogy of the Ross Institute.

It was an intense presentation with many highlights. One was an extraordinary and heartwarming story of a young Swedish man Ahmed Abdirahman who moved to Tensta from Somalia when he was a child. Abdirahman attended Ross Tensta Gymnasium and won a prize for a school project about desalination. The background to why he chose this topic was also revealing. When he first came to Sweden and saw a world map for the first time he asked what all the blue was, and when he was told water, he couldn’t understand why anybody went thirsty. The prize consisted of a trip to New York to present his project at The Ross School. Courtney Ross widow of Time Warner boss Steve Ross and founder of the school saw his presentation and immediately offered him the chance to work for her, a move that changed his life - he now lives with the Ross family and is attending university in the US.

Ahmed Abdirahman was also the catalyst for the evening after a chance encounter with Magnusson in New York. Impressed by his story Magnusson has engaged himself in looking at how the WPO can also become more involved in Tensta. Subsequently Guleed Mohammed, Faid Issa and Suleiman Ali all of whom work at Tensta Konsthall became involved in setting up the evening. All ex-students from Ross Tensta Gymnasium they also made sure that evening became meeting of alumni as well as an opportunity for the Ross schools including Tensta Gymnasium to show their very particular way of working, an holistic and global approach that seems more pertinent today than ever.

The main speaker for the evening was Scott M. Weber, Director-General of the international peace building organization Interpeace. It was a truly fascinating lecture from an important figure in world affairs. The insights he offered on the problem regions of the world were as clear as they were terrifying. He discussed issues ranging from peacekeeping in Somalia and Burundi to building the infrastructure for self governed democracy in Afghanistan. One arena that Interpeace work with is the growing transnational gang networks of groups such as La Mara Salvatrucha or MS-13 and their rivals the 18th Street gang or M 18. As Weber explained, these gangs originally made up by immigrants from Mexico, El Salvador and Guatemala in Los Angeles have developed into an international network stretching over thousands of miles. Following mass deportations of gang members in the US they have now established themselves as a major power broker and crime syndicate in Central and South America and are now spreading rapidly into West Arica, Europe and North America. The total number of gang members in these two groups rivals a small country, with over 40,000 members of M-13 in the Honduras and 70,000 in the US alone. Weber’s presentation was a wake up call but equally as he repeatedly pointed out, these issues are not about some distant culture thousands of miles away, but questions that we all need to address. The global issues of peace are something we all need to be concerned with and seeing his remarks in the light of Tensta reveals just how critical a role the institutions that are based in the area have to play. Ross Tensta Gymnasium, and all the other local schools along with Livstycket and Tensta Konsthall and others are part of a community that in its diversity can play a significant role. In some respects Tensta is a model of the future of much of Europe and as we struggle to define the roles we play and to develop ways that education and culture help form attitudes and behaviors that will determine our future it is perhaps not so strange to see this in the light of global peace. It is also remarkable to see the engagement of people such as Mohammed, Issa and Ali in their own neighborhoods and it really feels that evenings such as this one coupled to the generosity of the WPO and the support of the Tensta community can produce remarkable things.