A/HRC/37/55 Palestinian children and young adults, regardless of social or economic background. 22 Barenboim and Said likewise established the West-Eastern Divan Orchestra to bring together Israeli, Palestinian and other Arab musicians to “meet, talk and play alongside each other”.23 36. Governments have the responsibility to preserve existing spaces and institutions for the exercise of cultural rights as well as create new ones, and to support voices of tolerance, equality and diversity so as to promote universal human rights and peace. 24 C. Strengthening resilience 37. When faced with violence, oppression and hardship in various forms, every society searches for ways to make sense of the experience, to cultivate resilience, mourn losses and move forward. This is particularly true in the immediate aftermath of conflict. Artistic and cultural initiatives provide tools to understand suffering and means of expression for individuals, groups and entire societies, and hence can help to increase capacity to recover from human rights violations. 1. Mourning losses 38. As Joseph Montville points out, “the psychological work of grieving is often required before victims can look to the future rather than try to recoup past losses”.25 If groups or individuals fail to mourn, their self-esteem is bound up with images of what has been lost. If the circumstances of the losses generate intensive anger, rage can interfere with the ability to complete the cycle of mourning, in turn leading to more violence and human rights abuses. In addition, losses that have not been mourned may also be passed on to future generations, leading to the intergenerational transmission of trauma. 26 39. Resistance to remembering and to mourning is understandable, as memories of trauma can be shattering in different ways, both for those who are victims/survivors and for those who committed violations themselves. The challenge consists in finding ways for memories to serve to heal rather than exacerbate trauma, and for acts of mourning to go beyond victim/victimizer dichotomies. Understanding the suffering of one’s own group — and mourning its losses — is also a critical step towards reconciliation. 40. Processes of memorialization encompass a variety of engagements, which do not necessarily become concretized through the erection of physical monuments, but can also take the form of numerous activities and cultural expressions. Artists can shed new light on the past, enhance the ability of people to imagine the other and widen debate regarding the meaning of memorials. Artists have contributed to negotiating the meanings attributed to events being memorialized, in some cases by challenging State authorities or calling into question the parameters of “calls” for memorials. These actions have opened spaces for important conversations that in themselves have been construed as acts of memorialization.27 2. Resisting oppression and terrorism 41. Individual artists, groups and cultural institutions have in many places been on the front line of resisting oppression and upholding the values of diversity, human rights and inclusion in difficult contexts. 22 23 24 25 26 27 See www.barenboim-said.ps. G. Bedell, “Daniel’s codes of conduct”, Guardian, 17 August 2003. Rabat Plan of Action, paras. 23 and 25. J. Montville, “Psychoanalytic enlightenment and the greening of diplomacy”, Journal of the American Psychoanalytic Association, vol. 37, No. 2 (1989), p. 305. D. Bar-On, “Attempting to overcome the intergenerational transmission of trauma: dialogue between descendants of victims and of perpetrators”, in R.J. Apfel and B. Simon, eds., Minefields in their Hearts: The Mental Health of Children in War and Communal Violence (New Haven, Yale University Press, 1996). See A/HRC/25/49, paras. 66–69. 9