About Wairimū Nderitū

Wairimu Nderitu is a mediator of armed conflict, ethnic relations educator and author of the following books:

1. The Companion for Women Mediating Armed Conflict in Communities: Peace through Pluralism
2. Kenya: Bridging Ethnic Divides, A Commissioners Experience on Cohesion and Integration.
3. Beyond Ethnicism: Exploring Ethnic and Racial Diversity for Educators, approved by Kenya Institute for Curriculum Development for use in Teacher Training Colleges.
4. Mũkami Kĩmathi, Mau Mau Freedom Fighter, the authorized biography.
5. Catherine Ndereba, the authorized biography. (Catherine Ndereba broke the world marathon record in 2001. She is also the only four-time women’s winner of the Boston marathon in the world)

She also authored the Case Study: From the Nakuru County Peace Accord (2010-2012) to Lasting Peace and Book Chapters in:

1. Human Rights in the Middle East & North Africa, A guide for NGOs, 2011, (which has been translated into Arabic)
2. Minding the Gap, African Conflict Management in a Time of Change, edited by Pamela Aall and Chester A. Crocker, 2015.
3. Support for Penal Reform-Kenya, EAJHRD, Vol.2, NO.2, 2004 and WPS as a political movement, co-written with Swanee Hunt in S.E.Davies and J. True (Eds). Oxford Handbook of Women, Peace and Security.

She has authored articles and policy briefs that include;

1. Bringing up the Child: Local Conflict Prevention Mechanisms in Kenya in Building Peace: http://buildingpeaceforum.com/2013/09/bringing-up-the-child-local-conflict-prevention-mechanisms-in-kenya/
2. Conflict Transformation and Human rights, a Mutual Stalemate? "Berghof Conflict Research, www. Berghof- handbook.net. No 9 (2010). http://www.berghof-foundation.org/publications/handbook/handbook-dialogues/9-human-rights-and-conflict-transformation/
3. Taming the Demon of Kenya’s Election Violence", Institute for Justice and Reconciliation Policy Brief No.4.
4. And with Jacqueline O’Neill, the seminal paper, Getting to the Point of Inclusion: Seven Myths Standing in the Way of Women Waging Peace. https://www.inclusivesecurity.org/publication/getting-to-the-point-of-inclusion-seven-myths-standing-in-the-way-of-women-waging-peace/

Wairimū has been an experiential lecturer at the University of Pretoria, South Africa and Summer Course faculty SIT Graduate School in Vermont. She was the 2018 keynote speaker at the Oxford University Symposium in Comparative and International Education. She is also an online instructor for the Auschwitz Institute for the Prevention of Genocide and Mass Atrocities course on Early Warning and Mass Atrocity

Wairimū has mediated processes that resulted in peace agreements signed by 10 ethnic communities in Nakuru, Kenya (in which she was the only woman among 100 male elders). She was the lead mediator in a process involving 29 ethnic communities in Kaduna State, Nigeria and a second process involving 56 ethnic communities in Southern Plateau, Nigeria.

In 2019, she received the Diversity and Inclusion and Inclusion Peace and Cohesion Award from the Kenya Nationa Diversity Inclusion Award Recognition (DIAR Awards). In 2018 the Simon Fraser University named Alice the Jack P. Blaney Award for Dialogue winner for using dialogue to support conflict resolution including but not limited to roles in Kenya and Nigeria. In November 2017, His Highness The Aga Khan and the Government of Canada named Alice the 2017 Global Pluralism Awardee for commitment to conflict prevention throughout Africa and an innovative approach to mediation. In 2015, she was an Aspen Leadership scholarship recipient. In 2014, she was a Raphael Lemkin participant of the Auschwitz Institute on the Prevention of Genocide. (http://www.auschwitzinstitute.org/profiles-in-prevention/alice-nderitu/). In 2012 the Joan B. Kroc Institute for Peace and Justice named Alice Woman Peace Maker of the Year. In 2011, she was a Transitional Justice Fellow, Institute for Justice and Reconciliation, Cape Town South Africa. In 2005, Wairimu was a Commonwealth Exchange Fellow to the South African Human Rights Commission.