Paula Green

1937 - 2022

Paula Green

Leverett, MA — Acclaimed peacebuilder, educator, and trainer, Dr. Paula Green of Leverett, who crisscrossed the globe to foster conflict transformation across cultures, died February 21, surrounded by family and friends. She was 84. A cancer survivor for 17 years, she experienced a recurrence last week.

In recognition of her decades of international work for peace, the Dalai Lama bestowed upon her his "Unsung Hero of Compassion" award in 2009.

Born in Newark, New Jersey, on December 16, 1937, Paula Green raised her two sons in Englewood N.J., before embarking on graduate studies in intergroup relations and humanistic psychology, as well as the emerging field of international peacebuilding, and receiving her doctorate.

In the 1980s, she worked as a psychologist in private practice, but her heart was drawn to peacebuilding. Paula was among a group that organized the building in Leverett of the New England Peace Pagoda, affiliated with a Japanese Nichiren Buddhist group, the first such shrine to peace in the US. In her decades as a peace educator and mentor, she served on the national council of Fellowship of Reconciliation, and the steering committee of the International Network of Engaged Buddhists.

After living in Southeast Asia for a year, in 1994 she founded and directed the Karuna Center for Peacebuilding in Amherst, Massachusetts, an organization with international outreach dedicated to bridging deep divides, transforming violent conflict, and fostering reconciliation.

One of Karuna Center's early projects was a convocation Paula organized and directed on the site of the Auschwitz concentration camp in Poland, marking the 50th anniversary of the 1945 liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau.

Through the Karuna Center, Paula led multi-year interventions in dozens of the world's most intractable post-conflict areas, including Bosnia, Rwanda, Israel/Palestine, and Myanmar/Burma. Karuna Center dedicated itself to being a long-term presence in order to promote trust, help develop nonviolent responses to communal conflict, and shift attitudes. In many countries, Karuna Center engaged in this way over a 25-year span.

In 1995, Paula began teaching graduate students at the School for International Training (SIT) in Brattleboro, Vermont, co-founding its Master of Arts degree in peacebuilding and conflict transformation. In 1997, at SIT she launched CONTACT, Conflict Transformation Across Cultures to train future peacebuilders. Each year 60 participants from across the globe learn from professionals in the field, as well as from each other, in an intensive, multi-week residential learning community.

Paula and her colleagues successfully replicated this program in other parts of the world, including: CONTACT Africa in Ghana, South Africa, and East Africa; and CONTACT South Asia in Nepal for aspiring peacebuilders from India, Pakistan, Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka and Nepal. CONTACT's students have gone on to become leaders in their own right in the ongoing quest for peace and justice.

Although she stepped down from her roles directing Karuna Center and CONTACT, Paula Green never stepped away from peacebuilding. Deeply concerned about the growing polarization in the US, following the 2016 presidential election she and other residents of Leverett birthed Hands Across the Hills (HATH), a dialogue-across-divides group which partnered with residents of Letcher County in eastern Kentucky coal country. Despite significant political, social, and class differences, HATH sought to deepen the connection of common humanity between the groups. For HATH Paula developed a three- day-weekend immersive experience that involved dialogue circles, homestays, art and music. This ongoing endeavor has received national media attention, including The New York Times, NPR and CBS.

In 2018, Hands Across the Hills received the first domestic peacebuilding award from the Alliance for Peacebuilding. The group continues to share its work in bridging divides through speaking engagements, opinion pieces, public events and training future dialogue facilitators.

Another recent project in which Paula played a central role is Bridge4Unity, a 2018 initiative that features interracial dialogue and cultural exchange. Inspired by Hands Across the Hills, it includes participants from South Carolina, Massachusetts and Kentucky, all working toward racial reconciliation and healing, and dismantling racism and white supremacy.

In 2012, Psychologists for Social Responsibility awarded Paula Green the Psychology of Peace and Justice Prize, and in 2015, she received the Outstanding Human Rights Activist Award from Kean University. Paula described her work this way: "It has been my mission to encourage those separated by war, enmity, prejudices, or perceived differences, to seek understanding, discover common ground, learn new skills, and increase their capacity to promote peaceful societies for the benefit of all."

Paula Green's activism and organizing, her powerful public speaking, and her unquenchable thirst for learning were all rooted in healing divides in scores of countries. For this reason Paula could accurately be described as a citizen of the world. She was also known as a gracious host whose home in Leverett was regularly the scene of social justice gatherings as well as artistic events.

Paula Green leaves behind her loving husband and partner, Jim Perkins. She also leaves her son Daniel Bacher, his wife Claire and daughters Emily and Rachel of Monroe, New York, and son David Bacher, his wife Kirsten and daughter Sophie of San Ramon, California, as well as her brother, Rabbi Arthur Green of Newton, Massachusetts. In addition she leaves her husband Jim's daughters Jennifer, Laura, Alysa, and Cindy, and his son Daniel as well as a granddaughter and a great granddaughter.

Donations in memory of Paula Green may be made to Hands Across the Hills, P.O. Box 33, Leverett MA 01054.

A celebration of Paula Green's life will be held in the Spring.