CBS

CBS Rwanda

The Center for Community-Based Sociotherapy Rwanda(CBS Rwanda) is a Rwandan non-governmental organization established in 2017, with the aim of promoting healing, resilience, unity and reconciliation for sustainable peace and development.

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Sociotherapy groups help restore trust, rebuild relationships, and promote reconciliation in post-conflict communities.

Our

Vision, Mission and Values

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Mission

CBS Rwanda is an organization whose mission is to contribute to the improvement of psychosocial wellbeing of people affected by the Genocide against Tutsi, a painful past and/or on-going daily stressors, restoring the social fabric, and promoting sustainable peace

Vision

The vision of CBS Rwanda is to promote psychosocial wellbeing in Rwanda through interventions focusing on healing, reconciliation, social cohesion and economic empowerment.

Values

Integrity

Teamwork

Dignity

Excellence

Inclusion

CBS methodology

Sociotherapy is conducted in groups of ten to fifteen people.
CBS group serves as a therapeutic medium and groups are facilitated by skilled facilitators who are members of the community.
These groups meet weekly for about three hours over fifteen weeks in a safe and familiar environment, which can range from schools and churches to private homes or outdoor spaces. Two trained sociotherapy facilitators guide the groups through the phases of “safety, trust, care, respect, new life orientations, and memories of emotions.”
The process is governed by seven principles: “interest, equality, democracy, participation, responsibility, learning-by-doing, and here-and-now.”

Safety

Due to the feelings of unsafety that many war-afflicted sociotherapy participants report, sociotherapy facilitators must first of all create safety. This is done by providing structure, using social activities in the group, but also discussing the meaning of safety to the participants and their social environment.

Trust

The second phase, “trust,” presents itself when safety is increased in the sociotherapy group. The aim of the second phase is for participants to regain their ability to trust, which is especially important for those who have experienced trauma. A vital precondition for creating a supportive and healing group environment.

Care

The focus in this phase is on helping those who have had difficult experiences and struggle to take care of themselves or others. The hardship people have gone through are expressed in various ways. Distinctive expressions of care involve reflection and increased caring behaviour in the sense of looking after each other and forms of self-care.

Respect

Increasingly felt certainty to safety, trust and care, allows the expression of tensions that have arisen over cultural differences regarding respect. While maintaining the support structure and trust in the group, the facilitators bring the subject respect to the group, allowing people to express their desire specific forms of respect, related to present-day reality.

New life orientation

During the fifth phase, there is room for future-oriented discussions. Often this includes the wish of participants to have a say in the rules of the institutions that govern the basic structure of the participants communal life. By emphasizing the variation of rules (for instance in games), the sociotherapy facilitators enable participants to reflect on effective ways of exercising control.

Memories

In the last phase participants are clear about the reliability of the sociotherapy group and therefore favourable conditions arise for deciding whether or not to proceed to a more in-depth manner of processing traumatic emotions. By discussing both good and bad memories, participants find new ways to understand their past experiences. From here, one can be decide whether help from a specialist is desired.

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