Empowerment and Protection - Stories of Human Security Oct. 2014 | Page 100

de Colaboración Cívica (CCC), which is part of
several international peacebuilding networks. The
interviews/conversations were conducted between
December 2013 and February 2014 by the authors.
All interviews were conducted in Spanish and
translated by the authors. When explicitly permitted
by the interviewees, we have used their real names
and personal information.
MEND focus group in Ramallah, OPT

The data collection
methods used, were mainly
face-to-face interviews and
focus groups, supported by
survey-style questions in
writing or by phone.

The purpose of the interviews was to give people
a chance to talk about what is most important to
them, to share their perspectives or stories, and to
allow them to freely state how they define human
security. They were asked a series of questions
which tried to identify the issues they saw as main
contributors to their insecurity, where they felt
these issues originated, which issues are the most
important in driving their insecurity and how that
played out in their daily lives. In contrast, they were
also asked to identify local issues that contributed
to their sense of security and to highlight which
ones they considered most important and why.
Additionally, interviewees were also asked if they
felt that one group of people or ethnicity was
affected by them more than others, and why.

Mexico

This chapter was based on in-depth interviews
and/or conversations with stakeholders from
different sectors, and an analysis of stakeholder
and conflict assessments carried out by Centro
100 stories of Human Security | A Methodology for Human Security

Gaza. The Palestinian people are so fragmented that
many are not even aware that they share the same
concerns.
While we filmed the groups in the West Bank and
Jerusalem and received detailed quotes from them,
we only obtained summaries of the work of the
three focus groups in Gaza. There were very high
levels of fear connected with any kind of discussion
on security among the people from Gaza. People
were afraid they might lose their income or their
slight chance of obtaining a permit to leave the
strip, due to the occupation. They need to have
permits from the Israeli side to travel between Gaza
and West Bank. For example, a facilitator told us:
“Sorry for my late answer, it was really very hard to
find people from Gaza to participate in the focus
group for many reasons. They were afraid to talk
about any case [because they think speaking about
it could cause problems due to Hamas and because]
they are afraid of the [Israeli] occupation. Also,
some of them are working with the Palestinian
Authority [so they do not want to participa WK