ABSTRACT
In Africa, too, forms of mediation are a part of tribal traditions and the “palaver” in its original sense is a “social institution of negotiation”. In the psychoanalytic supervision the discrepancy was striking between the softness and understandable sadness of the husband and his alleged violence. Alerted by this discrepancy the view taken by the police and prosecution, namely “violent husband threatens wife and children”, was challenged by the staff of Tater-Opfer-Ausgleich. The civilising of children’s drive-driven needs and the surrender of their narcissistic orientation in order to turn instead to objects in their environment is forced on children in the course of their development in constant battles with the people in their childhood environment. Community mediation is concerned with conflicts between residents and administration, questions concerning the environment, intercultural conflicts, conflicts at work, use and design of public space, but also of conflicts between neighbours.
