In Uganda, the rates of mental illness are high due to poverty, high prevalence of HIV/AIDS and longterm exposure to civil wars and armed rebellion. The cost of mental health services in urban hospitals remains prohibitive for the rural poor who resort to traditional healers, and many mental health workers prefer working in urban areas. In response, a community outreach program has been developed in rural, southwestern Uganda to deliver effective mental health care.

A community based sociotherapy programme was implemented in the North of Rwanda in 200.5. This article describes the background of sociotherapy, explains its principles and application in the rapy for refugees in the Netherlands, and gives a justification for the introduction of the approach in a particular setting in post war and post genocide Rwanda. It then focuses on the development of the programme in this setting and addresses recruitment criteria for facilitators.

Evaluations of psychosocial projects are meant to contribute to better projects. However, in practice, the evaluation process, in particular when done by external evaluators, can pose its own difficulties. Based on a wide field experience, the author presents arguments about how evaluations can cause problems, and even produce negative effects in project staff and recipients of assistance. Psychological processes triggered by external evaluators, or appearing in the process of evaluation, can create uneasiness in field workers.

This paper reviews what is currently known from research about the effectiveness of interventions to address mental health problems in children and adolescents affected by armed conflict. The focus will be on interventions delivered in conflict affected countries either during active humanitarian emergencies or during the post conflict period. The paper will discuss two main paradigms of intervention dominating the field: psychosocial approaches and clinical/psychiatric approaches.

Evaluation of psychosocial and community oriented projects includes a series of procedures to determine if project outcomes are achieved by an activity planned to help reach an individual or socially relevant goal. Typically, various stakeholders have an interest in evaluation of psychosocial projects. These may include project staff and manager, donors,    authorities, beneficiaries and the

Evaluation of psychosocial programmes can be carried out for a variety reasons. It is the nature of these reasons that determines what is exactly is evaluated, what criteria and which methods are used. In this article, the focus is on evaluation as a pathway to learn from experience and develop expertise. Some evaluation criteria are discussed, and a step-by-step plan is described.

Keywords: effectiveness, evaluation criteria, impact, indicators

This article reports the 25 recommendations made by a NATO Advanced Research Workshop on Evaluation of Community based Psychosocial Programmes in Areas Affected by War and Terrorism that took place in April 2007. It summarises the workshop’s agreements on how evaluators should combine values, evidence and their experience, and that of programme providers, when they design and conduct their work.

Introduction

This paper describes the development of a guide on evaluation, commissioned by UNICEF for their field officers in 2006. The consultation process in developing the content of the guide is discussed, revealing varying perceptions of what is known and practiced in the field in relation to evaluation. Broader findings about evaluation design and methods are also discussed, based on a review by the Mailman School of Public Health. The paper then focuses on specific aspects of evaluation of psychosocial programmes that seem to generate particular difficulties in practice.

The internet is an enormously rich source of information, but its richness can also be its weakness. How do you find what you need? How do you know that what you find can be trusted? In this contribution we will present a selection of some internet resources on psychosocial and mental health aspects for children and adolescents that we have found to be useful for work in post-conflict settings in low and middle-income countries.

IFRC Reference Centre for Psychosocial Support http://psp.drk.dk/sw30190.asp

Asylum requests by victims of torture who have fled to the Netherlands are often rejected. In these cases, the torture stories of the asylum seekers have failed to convince officials judging their asylum request. The author studied the cases of asylum seekers whose claims were first rejected, but then supported by Amnesty International, and eventually, after a court appeal, received residency. The author, therefore, concludes that the initial rejections are the result of the manner in which these asylum seekers were interrogated by civil servants of the immigration authority.