Divided Past – Joint Future

Currently the number of conflicts inside and between the countries of the Western Balkans and Turkey is increasing. These conflicts are often based on ethnics and religions. In the last 2 years Youth Communication Center, together with multiple other partner organisations have faced the fact that peace and reconciliation as a topic has become “unpopular”. Through this Civil Society has become fragmented and contested. However, Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) should be ready and resourceful and the main actor in peace and reconciliation policy. The overall objective of this project is to have Civil Society Organisations (CSO’s) recognized by governments as an important societal factor with strong capacity to implement peace-building and reconciliation.

This project brings together 18 partner organisations (Educational Center – Krusevac (ECK), Forum MNE, Interkulturelles Zentrum (IZ), Youth Cultural Center – Bitola (YCC- Bitola), Youth Resource Center (ORC),Toplum Gönüllüleri Vakfı (TOG), The Zamah Foundation, EUROCLIO, Institute for Social Research Zagreb (IDIZ),LENS, MOVIT, The Progress Institute, Beyond Barriers Association (BBA), Youth Peace Group Danube, Vojvodina Environmental Movement (VEM), War Trauma Center and SEEYN ) who all have different skills and areas of expertise. By combining these specific abilities the project has a good starting-point and can rely on a huge network. In the first phase of this project, will focus on the desk research. In this research different types of effective reconciliation models in Europe and beyond are mapped and analysed.

PROJECT AIMS

  • To help CSO’s be recognized by governments as important societal factors
  • To strengthen regional cooperation
  • To increase credibility, political participation and effectiveness of CSO’s
  • To advocate prevention of radicalization
  • To facilitate inter-ethnic dialogue in the region of the Western Balkans and Turkey
  • To implement cross-stakeholder’s approach which will foster societal reconstruction
  • To find out challenges and opportunities in implementing DSCB classes in middle schools in Turkey

EXPECTED OUTCOMES

  • CSO platform established to develop an effective cross-stakeholder approach for advocating societal reconstruction in the region of the Western Balkans and Turkey
  • Improved and strengthened internal capacities from the regional CSOs in order to effectively advocate for reconciliation action in the Western Balkans and Turkey
  • Fostered stakeholder dialogue in/across the region of the Western Balkans and Turkey through CSOs

EXPECTED RESULTS

  • Base line study on the perception of public, civic and private sector
  • Desk research on different sustainable reconciliation models and independent financial support mechanisms
  • National Social Innovation Labs (NSIL)
  • Regional Social Innovation Labs (RSIL)
  • Manual on cross-stakeholder approaches
  • Thematic Job-shadowing activities
  • Creation and promotion of an online resource platform
  • Final Conference