Virginia has published many articles on global leadership, peacebuilding, and development, as well as a new book, entitled A Mantle of Roses: A Woman’s Journey Home to Peace. In an excerpt from the Introduction, she writes: “I am an ordinary woman with extraordinary experiences. My story begins in 1979 when I felt a leading I couldn’t ignore… Because I have a certainty of what I am being led to do with my life, I understand now how I can make a difference in the world.” Read Strategies Review of the book in the February 2008 Strategies Newsletter, published in Sweden by Jonas Himmelstand.

Virginia Swain was awarded The Third Goal Service Award from the Boston area Returned Peace Corps Volunteers. This award is given to those individuals who, through continued service to their communities, have exemplified the Third Goal of the Peace Corps, to promote a better understanding of other people on the part of the American people by promoting intercultural awareness and understanding. The nominee must have served in the Peace Corps and live in New England.The award reads: “Virginia Swain, who served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Liberia from 1964 to 1966, is Founder and Director of The Institute for Global Leadership. A consultant, mediator and trainer, Virginia has made it her lifelong commitment to support a just, sustainable, intercultural and multiethnic global peace.”

As an adjunct faculty member at Lesley University, Salve Regina University, and Clark University, Virginia has taught courses in global management, negotiation, mediation, and leadership. She co-founded the Center for Global Community and World Law, which supports the goals of the UN Charter through research, education and publications. And she served on the executive committee of the Coalition for a Strong United Nations, which offers public education in partnership with the John F. Kennedy Library.

Virginia has also extended her reach beyond the United States. For example, she co-facilitated workshops at the Global Forum conference at the 1992 UN Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, and at the 1995 UN Social Development Summit in Copenhagen. She was also involved in preparations for the 1996 Beijing Women’s Conference.

Current multiethnic peace training programs she is involved with include:

  • From 2000-2005, teaching peer mediation and conflict skills to emerging leaders from 30 cultures, including immigrants from war zones and child soldiers, in Worcester, with funding from the Massachusetts Attorney General’s Office.
  • Training seasoned leaders at the United Nations in a Reconciliation Leadership Certificate Program. She partners with the Under Secretary-general for Least Developed Countries, former Ambassador from Bangladesh, Anwarul K. Chowdhury, to co-sponsor a five-module Reconciliation Leadership Certificate Program. The pilot for this five-course program at the United Nations, “Designing and Implementing Interventions for Global Change,” brought seventy-five participants from fifteen countries in the first year.

Virginia Swain is also affiliated with Community Resource and Renewal Center: A Center for Personal, Professional and Organizational Renewal in Tiverton, Rl.

History of Virginia Swain’s presentations

News Coverage

Presentations of Joseph Preston Baratta, PhD and Virginia Swain

Publications by Virginia Swain

Virginia Swain’s Presentations and Practice