An active bystander training teaches effective skills for assessing, de-escalating, and diffusing a problematic situation, such as intimidation, harassment, abuse, physical violence, etc. Active bystander training focuses on a bystander observing a problematic situation and determining if and how to intervene. This is distinct from self-assertion training that teaches how to de-escalate and diffuse unwanted attention when you are being harassed or attacked. An active bystander is someone who not only witnesses a situation, but takes steps to speak up or step in to keep a situation from escalating or to disrupt a problematic situation.

This is an interactive, participatory, beginner’s workshop designed for those that may have none to little prior studies of bystander intervention.

Eli S. McCarthy, Ph.D. (he/his) is a co-founder of the DC Peace Team and has led numerous trainings. He also teaches at Georgetown University in Justice and Peace Studies. Eli has published a book called “A Just Peace Ethic Primer: Building Sustainable Peace and Breaking Cycles of Violence" (2020) along with numerous journal articles such as "Truth and Reconciliation Commissions: Toward a More Just U.S. Society," and "Will You Really Protect Us Without a Gun?: Unarmed Civilian Peacekeeping in the U.S." He has been formed by multiple trips to Haiti working with the poor, working with the homeless in Boston and DC, and monitoring the Palestinian Elections in 2006 with the Nonviolent Peaceforce. He has also led strategic nonviolent resistance campaigns, such as on issues of immigration.

This training is brought to Indian audience by Arts4Change International in collaboration with Wild Strawberry, India and DC Peace Team, USA as a pre-cursor to the upcoming Festival for Change.

Arts4Change International believes in Arts serving as a force for social change in individuals, organisations, and communities. Its vision is to leverage the power of creativity and storytelling to address the world's greatest problems.

DC Peace Team empowers ordinary civilians to increasingly serve their communities particularly as nonviolent peacekeepers, and by extension as peacemakers and peacebuilders. The DC Peace Team lives this mission by: deploying unarmed civilian protection and accompaniment units, providing training in various nonviolent skills, and facilitating dialogues and restorative justice approaches.