MIJARC Europe

Study session – “I, YOUTH ADVOCATE”

A study session organised by MIJARC EUROPE and DON BOSCO YOUTH NETWORK in cooperation with the Youth Department of the Council of Europe – European Youth Centre Budapest.

Dates: 7-10 October 2019

This study session has been a common idea of MIJARC Europe and Don Bosco Youth Network, two international organisations that work on very similar topics and who decided to do a joint study session on advocacy for their members.

Aim and objectives

The “I, Youth Advocate” study session aims to prepare young people from MIJARC Europe and DBYN Networks to be active advocates at European level, on diverse topics of interest for youth.

The main aim is built on the following objectives:

Assist young people to reflect on their local realities and link them to the policy changes they want at European level,
Explore advocacy tools and policy instruments of the Council of Europe, DBYN, MIJARC Europe and other European stakeholders in order to use them in their advocacy work,
Develop advocacy competences such as communication with relevant stakeholders, strategic planning and other skills to implement successful advocacy plans,
Empower young people to design concrete actions plans on advocacy to be implemented within the two organizations.

Hosting organizations

MIJARC Europe is a European coordination network for rural and Christian youth organizations all over the continent. MIJARC Europe represents over 130. 000 young people from rural areas in 14 European countries. It promotes sustainable agricultural, rural and international development, European citizenship, youth policies, gender equality, environmental protection, interculturality and human rights.

Don Bosco Youth-Net is an international network of Salesian youth work offices and youth organisations which work in the style of Don Bosco. The network assemblies 18 organisations, who cater for over 125.000 children and young people in 16 European countries. The task of the network is to create and promote international activities for and by young and to create possibilities for member organisations to share their good practices and start-up new projects together.

Study session design

The study session is based on non-formal education methods and will present a mixture of the methodologies used by the two host organizations. The “See-Judge-Act” methodology of MIJARC Europe and the Don Bosco method promoted by DBYN. You should expect a lot of experiential learning activities, reflection moments, practical examples and space for sharing and exchanging facts and opinions. As MIJARC Europe and DBYN are both faith-based organizations, we will also take time to reflect on our own values, beliefs and spirituality.

Phases

Thee will be two main phases of this study session:

E-learning phase (20th September – 2nd October) which will require 1-2 hours of involvement in total and will focus mostly on getting to know each other and setting a common ground to what we all understand by advocacy.
Study session (7-10 October) a four-day residential phase taking place in Budapest, at the European Youth Center. This is the main phase of the activity and participants will learn about advocacy practices and tools and will create action plans that the two host organizations will implement in their work.

Participants will also be invited to continue their involvement within the representation structures of the two host organizations and to further contribute to the implementation of the action plans.

Call for participants: study session “I , Youth advocate”

”Let our voice be heard” – an annual work plan co-funded by the European Youth Foundation of the Council of Europe and the Erasmus+ Programme of the European Union.

Between 2018 and 2021 MIJARC Europe is leading its work around three thematic focus points described in the Specific Objectives adopted by the General Assembly back in 2017. The work plan we run in 2019 addressed MIJARC Europe’s commitment to support citizenship and youth participation in rural development.

Through the work plan we run in 2019 we aimed to help rural young people in MIJARC Europe network and beyond feel that they have the right, the means and the skills to drive change at local level and to motive other stakeholders to support their ideas and create opportunities for youth participation together.

We wanted young people to feel that they know, they can, and they want to be involved, to be able to imagine the concrete, sequential steps towards achieving real impact and to identify how to determine local authorities to join their initiatives in order to see those changes they envision, happen in reality.

This aim was pursued through the following specific objectives:

O1: enable young people from rural areas to discriminate between self-imposed barriers to participation (their own perceptions, stereotypes and attitudes) and real barriers and find inspiration to identify solutions to both types of barriers;

O2: teach young people how to communicate with, involve and ask for support from local authorities and perceive them as partners rather than opponents;

O3: empower young people from rural areas to become competent and effective digital citizens;

O4: contribute to the implementation of the principles of the Revised Charter on participation of young people in local and regional life and to the dissemination of the “Have your say manual” to local public authorities and youth NGOs in at least 10 rural areas in Europe.

PHASES

The work plan included one local activity and two international activities, reinforced by follow- up activities at local level.

From February to April 2019, MIJARC Europe organized focus groups, called “local visits” in 9 different countries in Europe. Small groups of 10 to 20 people aged from 12 to 22 years old came together, sometimes also with representatives of local authorities, to discuss the topic of youth participation.

Questions like “what does youth participation mean?”, “what kind of youth participation does take place?”, “does real participation take place?”, “how young people are involved, do they have a real chance to participate and co-decide?” have been deeply discussed with the help of the manual “Have your Say”. The manual Have your Say is a tool of the Council of Europe for young people and local authorities to implement and use the Charter on youth participation in the local and regional life. The findings of the local visits were included in a report and illustrated in country fact sheets. The results of this small scale research were at the basis of the next two phases.

Report on the state of youth participation – local visits

Info graphics – country fact sheets

The second activity was an international seminar, which gathered 40 young people, for four full working days. It had the role to bridge the results of the fieldwork done by MIJARC Europe during the local visits with the theoretical and practical aspects of the participation at local, national, regional and European lever by involving active members in a proactive learning process.

The seminar was designed and led based on the methods of non-formal education and relevant approaches using the Revised European Charter on the Participation of Young People in local and regional life and the “Have your say” Manual. The successful implementation of the seminar resulted in a magazine of personal stories of participation written and drawn by the participants, the creation of vlogs and of three infographics. The final evaluation results show that the seminar scored high in the hearts and minds of the participants. The percentage of those who believe that they got the basic theory, practical approaches and tools, to help them to build a culture of participation after the seminar is about 92%.

Digital magazine “My story of participation”

Vlogs – https://www.youtube.com/user/MIJARCEurope/videos

Info-graphics

Congress of Local and Regional Authorities of the Council of Europe

The seminar was complemented by the third phase, an international training course on e- citizenship that offered additional tools and ideas to tackle the problems identified in the first phase. The training course aimed to bring the participants closer to e-participation. The participants were encouraged to build their own positions for different topics related to participation and e-participation and they had a possibility to present and discuss in a safe learning environment.

They had a possibility to address their comments and questions to Dirk Van Eeckhout, the Thematic Coordinator on Information Policy in the Council of Europe and Rita Jonusaite, part of the secretariat of the YFJ. That was a highly valuable experience that helped the participants to meet stakeholders, gain self-confidence and resilience breaking the present barriers. The participants worked together in intercultural subgroups in order to solve practical case studies through the e-participation tools they have discovered.

The most impressive result of the training course was the set up of an online campaign “Every Breath we take” the participants used to raise awareness on the fires in the Amazon and climate injustice. The campaign worked as a Facebook challenge in which young people were challenged to take a photo of themselves with their eyes closed, taking a deep breath along with the written message: “Our common home is on fire. The Amazon is burning. We cannot hold our breath until you finally take action. We need to act NOW!”. It also included four calls to action and messages inspired by the position papers of MIJARC Europe such as: “We demand national governments to take concrete actions to meet their commitments to the Paris agreement”. The campaign gathered more than 100 people who took a photo of themselves, posted the photo along with the message on their Facebook profile and challenged their friends

Every breath we take campaign

Training booklet on e-participation

Finally, each organization involved did a follow-up activity of their choice, involving a minimum number of 10 participants. The full list of follow-up activities can be seen here.

Follow-up activity in Bulgaria

Follow-up activity in Germany

Follow-up activity in Romania

The results of the work plan were also presented and promoted in our biannual magazine: MIJARC Explore.

Between 4th – 8th September 2018, our member movement APSD-Agenda 21 is hosting a youth exchange on peace and conflict. The project is called “Messages from the future” and it is part of our annual work plan on 2018 “We are the others”. The youth exchange is co-financed by the ERASMUS+ Programme of the European Union. It is organized as an international simulation on four different topics which affect peace and conflict at global level: climate change, migration, gender inequality and extremism.

The final day of our youth exchange brought to our attention the topic of extremism with the help of a very interesting game and many balloons. The team of facilitators adapted ”The Island” simulation from the All Different, All Equal Education Pack in order to show that differences should be first acknowledged and then accepted, that tolerance and adaptability are key skills and that diversity should be celebrated.

Split into two different tribes, both worshiping balloons the participants took their roles seriously and started looking for a very rare type of balloon which could only be found with a special map. Of course each tribe possessed only half of the map and only by coming together and mending the two halves could the tribes find the balloons. The negotiations were tough and the members of the tribes had to learn the other’s culture in order to be able to communicate with them.

In the debriefing part they talked about how important it had been to stay open and to adapt to the situation by learning the language of the other tribe, sharing their habits and not using violent methods. They discussed about culture, what makes it important and about what brings the cultures into conflict. They reflected on who gains and who loses from a conflict and about the negative and positive consequences of opening up towards other cultures.

Next, the tribes prepared the photo-messages with their most important conclusion.

The day ended with a long evaluation and follow-up session, in which the participants reflected on their learning, filled-in their youth passes and discovered what competences they had developed throughout the week. They also made plans for hosting the travelling exhibition and found out who their secret friend had been.

Gender inequalities were at the core of the fourth day which brought participants face to face with some of the realities of the labour market and of domestic violence. After an energetic start of the morning, the participants watched a short movie about gender and split in four groups deciding on weather some adjectives described male or female features or positive and negative features. The activity was adapted from the “Gender Matters” manual and it introduced the participants into gender stereotyping.

Next, it was time for them to work and get paid. They were assigned a role with information about their sex, age and experience and they had to go through five work stations where they performed different tasks (arranging small balls on piles of the same colour, preparing bread dough or scoring with a basket ball). At the end of the game they made a long row and received their payment which, of course, took into account their performance but also their sex and their age. In the debriefing part, they discussed about the inequalities on the labour market between genders and how unjust the system is with huge pay gaps in some countries.

The next game brought them face to face with real cases of domestic violence of all types which they discussed in national groups and then presented their conclusion to the rest of the participants. The fact that they were split on national groups really helped with showing the different approaches the countries represented have towards gender violence, the laws that apply and the feeling of the community towards the victims and the perpetrators.

The day ended with the creation of the photo-messages which were very creative and provoking.

The third day was full of strong feelings, tears and tense moments as the participants experienced an impactful simulation on the topic of migration. The facilitators adapted the United Nations simulation game ”Passages” and tried to make it as vivid as possibe in order to make the participants experience a tiny bit of what it would be like to be forced to flee your home and head into the unknown.

It all started out very enthusiastically, with everybody smiling and fooling around. Split on families, the participants had to assign names and roles to each member of the family and create their family story. Next they were blinfolded and following a bomb attack on their home town they had to find their family members through the smoke that did not allow them to see anything. The simulation took them through different experiences such as deciding which objects to take in their suitcases, spending the night (around 8 minutes) in a shelter, filling in forms in a language they were not familiar with, being rejected at the border without any explanation, crossing the border illegally, facing the harsh conditions of a refugee camp and finally pleading their case with the authorities to get asylum.

The debriefing phase revealed how powerful the exercise was and many participants spoke about the intensity of the feelings they had, the impact it made on them and the amazement of how little they knew about the experiences some of the refugees go through.

The photos they created stand proof for the powerful messages they felt inside, as they are deep, thought-provoking and trully inspiring.

The rain tried to be the star of the second day but we managed to keep the focus on climate change, the topic of our simulation. The secret location was revealed first thing in the morning when the participants gathered next to the bus that was going to take us to the Mud Volcanoes.

Unfortunately, we were able to visit the site for only 5 minutes until the rain started. It was a real thunder storm, but we continued to work divided on teams taking shelter and focusing on our learning objectives. The simulation on climate change was inspired by the game “Pacha Mama” and adapted to the context of climate change. The participants were divided in five teams, each representing a certain imaginary country, each of which had some advantages and some disadvantages. The citizens of Vital, Rassas, Activ, Cocoon and Scrib prepared their country’s identity (flag, map, how their life is) on a flip chart and introduced themselves to each other.

Then it was time for the Climate Change Olympic Games when they had to go through five games, in which they could use their advantages or see what it feels like to have less chances than the others. It was a very funny activity which challenged everybody to do their part and help their country become the victor of the games.

The next phase was very important, as it invited the participants to debrief the experience they had. This session revealed the injustice of climate change as the countries which contribute the less to the carbon dioxide emissions will be the ones most affected. It also helped the participants reflect on the different scenarios of climate change and the probabilities of each of those happening. They then connected these potential consequences to the state of global peace, realizing the strain the changes in climate would impose on countries which were already overburdened by issues such as poverty, political instability or lack of access to resources.

Finally, the participants gave a visual form to their reflections as they created photo-messages to send to young people living in the present in order to motivate them to take action so that the worst scenarios would never become reality.

This article is part of a series of stories written by the young people who took part at our seminar “A call for peace for all”. They include real life stories of people who left their countries and/or information about migration in one of the European countries where MIJARC Europe has members. All those whose names or any other identification data appear in the articles have given their written consent for making this information public.

In the context of the topic chosen for this year by our member movements – peace – we have launched an online campaign of peace messages and quotes under the #nevertakepeaceforgranted slogan. This campaign is part of our work plan which also includes two international activities and a travelling exhibition on the topic of peace. The first international activity of our work plan was preceeded by a preparatory phase during which our members had to interview/discuss with at least two people who had left their countries and are now know as “migrants”, “refugees” or “asylum seekers”. To our members they are just people, as are those living next to us. They have emotional and unusual stories, they live in different conditions but as our participants discovered they have not forgoten to be kind, tolerant, open and to forgive.

Here we bring you the article written by the participants from Armenia.

Article written by:

Armine Movsesyan
Seda Mkrtchyan
Yeghiazaryan Diana

Being considered as the worst humanitarian crisis of nowadays, the Syrian refugee crisis is one of the major and complex issues in the world. According to Armenian officials, more than 22,000 Syrians have been forced to leave their homes and come to their ancestral homeland since the start of the conflict in 2011. By 2015, the United Nations refugee agency said Syrian refugees accounted for six of every 1,000 people in Armenia.
Currently, Syrian Armenians have various legal statuses in Armenia, including Armenian citizens (dual citizens), refugees, asylum seekers, and persons with temporary or permanent residence (one/five/ten years). According to the Armenian Ministry of Diaspora a total of 10,707 people received citizenship in the period of 2012-2014. Refugee and asylum seekers comprise a smaller number, around 700-800 Syrian-Armenians, for the period of 2012-2013.

According to the Migration Service of Armenia: 236 people were granted asylum, of which 136 provided with shelter. Considering the regional developments and multiple challenges Armenia faces today, the need for a relevant infrastructure to address the social and economic issues of Syrian-Armenians becomes extremely urgent.

The arrivals are still ongoing (86 persons in 2017). It should be noted that Armenia also hosts refugees and asylum-seekers from Iraq, Ukraine and Iran and smaller numbers of refugees from some African countries. Moreover, about 600 of the persons displaced in consequence of the escalation of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict in April 2016 remain in Armenia and have been now integrated into the general assistance and integration activities.
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We were pleased to have a talk with Ramella Khanoyan, who left her home in Aleppo, Syria and came back to Armenia during the war.

FYCA-Ramella Khanoyan.jpg — Ramella Khanoyan

“I arrived in Armenia with my family several years ago. I was 11 years old, when the war began. At first, I couldn’t believe that it was a reality. The first shock happened in March 2011, when I was going to take part in a dancing concert in Aleppo. I had waited for that concert so much. It was one of my biggest dreams to participate in it. We were practicing at the hall with my friends and tutors, when suddenly the first bomb exploded. At first we couldn’t imagine that a war started. We felt like unconscious people, but in a few minutes realized that it is not a dream. We escaped from there, and everything got cancelled. Afterwards, similar attacks occurred and I started getting used to it. I have lost a lot of acquaintances, friends and neighbors day by day. The situation gradually became worse and worse, and my parents made a decision to abandon. I remember how frightening it was our way to the airport. We took a taxi, can’t remember how luckily passed the border and immediately went to Damaskos. It is a pity, that we left our childhood, friends, memories there in Aleppo. But anyway, I would never leave my homeland and go back. Armenia is the only place, that I should live in. There is no place like HOME”.

Here we bring you the article written by the participants from Italy. The Italian version of the article can be found below.

Article written by Steven Gheno

Immigration in Italy

From 2014 to 2017 every year more than one hundred thousand migrants have landed in Italy; in the first five months of 2018 only 13 thousand have arrived. Analysts attribute the drastic decline to agreements signed by the outgoing Minister of Interior Marco Minniti with armed militias in Libya, which in recent months have pledged to block the departures of the boats, and to the strengthening of the Libyan Coast Guard, ie substantially other armed groups, brought forward by the Italian and European authorities.

Between 2014 and 2017, ie in the four years in which the flow from North Africa was more active, about 623 thousand people arrived by sea in Italy. These numbers have never been supported recently by any European country, excluding Greece

Between 2014 and 2015, however, few of the migrants arriving in Italy by sea stopped here: often they had relatives elsewhere in Europe or they felt more comfortable in a country where they were able to speak at least one language, like France or United Kingdom. Theoretically, the Dublin regulation, the European Treaty that regulates asylum procedures, requires that each request for international protection be managed by the European country where the newcomer first set foot. Since 2016 almost all European countries have increased controls at their borders and downloaded the burden of reception on Italy and Greece; and given that every migrant who arrives makes a request for international protection – otherwise he would be sent back, due to national laws – the two countries have dealt with tens of thousands of people.

The program studied in 2015 by the European Commission to transfer certain categories of asylum seekers from Italy and Greece to other EU countries did not work. It should have involved 160,000 asylum seekers who are almost sure of obtaining protection – and therefore Syrians, Eritreans and Iraqis – but since the Union has no legislative instruments to make a temporary instrument of this kind binding, most of the countries have cheated: three years Hungary, Slovakia, Denmark, the Czech Republic and Poland did not accept any asylum seeker from Italy. Estonia has welcomed 6, Bulgaria 10, Austria 43

According to UNHCR, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, most of the migrants who land on the Italian coast come from Sub-Saharan African countries.

Immigrazione in Italia

Dal 2014 al 2017 ogni anno sono sbarcati in Italia più di centomila migranti; nei primi cinque mesi del 2018 ne sono arrivati solamente 13mila. Gli analisti attribuiscono il drastico calo agli accordi stretti dal ministro dell’Interno uscente Marco Minniti con le milizie armate in Libia, che nei mesi scorsi si sono impegnate a bloccare le partenze dei barconi, e al rafforzamento della Guardia Costiera libica, cioè sostanzialmente di altri gruppi armati,portato avanti dalle autorità italiane ed europee.

Fra il 2014 e il 2017, cioè nei quattro anni in cui è stato più attivo il flusso dal Nord Africa, sono arrivate via mare in Italia circa 623mila persone. Sono numeri mai sostenuti di recente da nessun paese europeo, esclusa la Grecia

Fra il 2014 e il 2015, comunque, pochi dei migranti che arrivavano in Italia via mare si fermavano qui: spesso avevano parenti altrove in Europa oppure si sentivano più a loro agio in un paese dove erano in grado di parlare almeno una lingua, come Francia o Regno Unito. Teoricamente il regolamento di Dublino, il trattato europeo che regola le procedure d’asilo, impone che ciascuna richiesta di protezione internazionale sia gestita dal paese europeo dove ha messo piede per primo il nuovo arrivato. Dal 2016 quasi tutti i paesi europei hanno aumentato i controlli alle proprie frontiere e scaricato l’onere dell’accoglienza su Italia e Grecia; e dato che ogni migrante che arriva fa richiesta di protezione internazionale – altrimenti sarebbe rispedito indietro, per le leggi nazionali – i due paesi si sono trovati a occuparsi di decine di migliaia di persone.

Il programma studiato nel 2015 dalla Commissione Europea per trasferire alcune categorie di richiedenti asilo da Italia e Grecia verso altri paesi dell’Unione non ha funzionato. Avrebbe dovuto riguardare 160mila richiedenti asilo quasi sicuri di ottenere protezione – e quindi siriani, eritrei e iracheni – ma poiché l’Unione non ha strumenti legislativi per rendere vincolante uno strumento temporaneo di questo tipo, gran parte dei paesi se n’è fregata: in tre anni Ungheria, Slovacchia, Danimarca, Repubblica Ceca e Polonia non hanno accolto nessun richiedente asilo dall’Italia. L’Estonia ne ha accolti 6, la Bulgaria 10, l’Austria 43.

Secondo l’Unhcr, l’Alto commissariato delle Nazioni Unite per i rifugiati, la maggior parte dei migranti che sbarcano sulle coste italiane proviene da paesi dell’Africa subsahariana

Here we bring you the article written by the participants from Romania. The Romanian version of the article can be found below.

An article written by:

Ivan Emilia Iuliana

Neagu Sara Georgiana

Vlădulescu Cristian Giovani

We are Emilia, Sara and Cristian. In the year 2018 we undertook the mission to overcome the barriers of indifference developed by the collective spirit of the last decades and to penetrate, inspired by the moral and social values of MIJARC Europe, in the world of the least listened.

We put our microphones, cameras, mind and soul beside them, and listened to their stories, I stared at them. Among the key tools that facilitated this road were patience, understanding, solidarity, empathy, and an unwavering psychological force. Although we have prepared to equip them from the start, we recognize that we have had some surprises. At both the beginning and the end, I realized that I needed courage. The courage to accept that we, in front of them, are strangers. Aliens are not so much the country and their language, as foreigners of life experience, strangers of a tortured livelihood, strangers of sacrifice, strangers of suffering. However, the people we discussed with were very open, warm and sincere. They talked to us kindly, they smiled parents and treated us in the purest form, just as they treated their family members. The joy we received with these emotions was unbounded for us, and the feeling itself was overwhelming.

Finally, we can add that we have not only developed a sense of great empathy, but we have understood and how blessed we are that we have been born ordinary citizens, in common, citizens of a country exempt from sacrifice and pain.

Un articol scris de:

Ivan Emilia Iuliana

Neagu Sara Georgiana

Vlădulescu Cristian Giovani

Noi suntem sunt Emilia, Sara și Cristian. În anul lui 2018 ne-am asumat misiunea de a depăși barierele nepăsării dezvoltate de spiritul colectiv al ultimelor decenii și de a pătrunde, impulsionați de valorile morale și sociale ale MIJARC Europe, în lumea celor mai puțin ascultați.

Ne-am pus microfoanele, camerele de filmat, mintea și sufletul lângă ei și le-am ascultat poveștile, i-am privit în suflet. Printre instrumentele-cheie care au facilitat acest drum s-au numărat răbdarea, înțelegerea, solidaritatea, empatia și o forță psihologică de neclintit. Deși ne-am pregătit pentru echiparea cu acestea încă de la început, recunoaştem am avut parte de câteva surprize. Atât la început, cît și la sfârșit, am realizat că aveam nevoie și de curaj. Curajul de a accepta că noi, în fața lor, suntem niște străini. Străini nu atât de țara și de limba lor, cît străini de experiență de viață, străini de un trai chinuitor, străini de sacrificu, străini de suferință. Cu toate acestea, persoanele cu care am discutat au fost foarte deschise, calde și sincere. Ne-au vorbit cu bunătate, ne-au zâmbit părintește și ne-au tratat în cea mai pură formă, la fel cum îi tratează pe membrii familiei lor. Bucuria cu care am primit aceste emoții din partea lor a fost, pentru noi, nemărginită, iar sentimentul în sine a fost copleșitor.

În final, putem adăuga că am reușit nu doar să dezvoltăm un simț al empatiei foarte puternic, dar am înțeles și cât de binecuvântați suntem că ne-am născut cetățeni obișnuiți, de rând, cetățeni ai unei țări scutite de sacrificiu și durere.

Between the 2nd and 5th July 2017, MIJARC Europe ran the international youth peace camp “We are the others”, part of the annual work plan on the topic of peace. The peace camp took place in Portugal and it was co-financed by Renovabis.

Even though Europe is still one of the most peaceful and prosperous parts of the world, there are some regions on the continent that have become unstable and more insecure and where acts of extremism and an increased fear towards the so-perceived “others” – migrants, refugees or asylum seekers and any minority group – have resulted in lower levels of tolerance, respect of human rights and freedom. In rural areas, conflict often appears because of competition for land and natural resources. In addition to this, poverty, lack of employment and opportunities of a better future can nurture resentment and cause fertile social contexts for intolerance and extremism. Also, for young people living in rural areas conflicts often have devastating consequences making them even more vulnerable.

“We are the others” is a youth project that aims to prove everybody exactly what it says: that we all are responsible ourselves for all the situations we are part of. It sends the message that it is always in our power to generate change and play our positive role in our community, country, in Europe and around the world. The project aims to make the young people involved and those it reaches aware of the important and positive role they play in the maintenance and promotion of peace and security at all levels. Its objectives are to encourage tolerance, solidarity and intercultural dialogue exerted by young people as means of moving beyond the mistakes of the past and building the future, to help the rural young people participating in the project acquire intercultural competences in order to become more aware and active citizens for peace, countering radicalization and extremism, to promote a different narrative on the role of young people in conflict contexts depicting them as assets in peace building and peace maintaining and to create a tool for young people to spread their message of peace and social inclusion in their rural communities. It will do this by involving 30 young people from rural areas across Europe: Armenia, Belgium, Bulgaria, France, Germany, Italy, Malta, Portugal and Romania and migrants, refugees or asylum seekers located in Portugal. They all decided to join forces and invest in the development of their intercultural competences in order to be more prepared to work and live with vulnerable groups, to promote social inclusion in their communities and diffuse tensions that appear whenever we see those different from us as “the others”. Through the project, the young participants will create together a Position Paper and a travelling photo exhibition that will include portraits and stories of conflict and peace and photos that will suggest solutions for what young people can do today in order to build a safer and peaceful future.

The exhibition will be accompanied by an educational booklet, containing activities designed by the participants that can be done with the exhibition. This exhibition will travel to eleven different countries, to meet with 500 young people and it will also be displayed at a peace festival where it will be seen by more than 5,000 young people from all over Europe.