Women from around the world light a candle to launch a peace initiative with a difference. Mary Lean joined them in the mountain village of Caux, Switzerland.

Louise Diamond, Director of Peace Works, Washington DC, gives her impressions of the conference:

On 1st August 1291, a handful of farmers from the mountain cantons of Uri, Schwyz and Unterwald met in the meadow of Rutli and swore to stand by each other. 700 years on, Switzerland's 26 cantons and half-cantons and four national languages represent a unique experiment in democracy. Andrew Stallybrass - English- born, married to a Swiss and living in Geneva - takes an affectionate look at his adopted country.

New Zealand balances on the edge of old-fashioned maps. But its Maori people can teach the world a thing or two about rediscovering cultural pride and identity. Edward and Elisabeth Peters investigate a renaissance nurtured in 600 pre-schools.

Troubled by the Irish question, English doctor John Lester feels the need for a clinical examination of his own attitudes:

In the 1960s and 70s Bill Taylor, otherwise known as 'Burglar Bill', was one of the principal trade union convenors of the huge Austin car plant in Birmingham, where 28,000 people worked. In 1974 the IRA bombed two pubs in the city centre.

Decisions - love them or hate them, you often have to make them. And usually others feel the effects for good or ill. Warren Buckley, who graduated in political science in 1989, looks for pointers on how to face that

It is the behaviour of some of his white compatriots that from time to time causes him to question whether he really belongs in Britain.

Now she is in her final year of training, working on a cardiology ward with 30 beds. The patients are critically ill and deaths are frequent.

'After praying to know what was right, I felt I should accept,' he said. And so his diplomatic career began - unsolicited.