CONFERENCE REPORT MERGING PARALLEL SOCIETIES: TOOLKIT TO UNITE UNITED Conference • 15-20 October 2011 in Struga (MK) MERGING PARALLEL SOCIETIES TOOLKIT TO UNITE Merging Parallel Societies: Toolkit to Unite • 15-20 October 2011 in Struga, Macedonia - 3 - 1 A Platform for Action 3 1.1 Our Hosts 2 Macedonia: A Land in Transition 3 2.1 The Ohrid Framework Agreement 2.2 Perpetuating Parallels 2.3 Opening Up the Debate: Minority Voices 2.4 Working with Words 2.5 Census-consensus 2.6 Elections and the Long Road to Democracy 3 Roll Up Your Sleeves: Merging Parallel Societies 5 3.1 Making Our Mark at Every Level 3.2 Field Work In Struga 3.3 Concrete Steps for Peace 3.4 Breaking Down Walls In Schools 4 Our Freedoms Under Attack: Responses in a Time of Crisis 6 4.1 Nationalism and Populism: Playing the Blame Game 4.2 Homophobia: Seeking Solidarity 4.3 Russia: When Online Meets Offline 4.4 Greece: Times of Crisis 5 Media Literacy: Navigating a Sea of Messages 7 5.1 Identifying the Bias 5.2 Perfecting Your Press Release 5.3 Images in Focus 6 Pulling Together for Minority Rights 8 6.1 Minority Rights Network 6.2 A Decade Against Discrimination? 7 On The Run – Where to Turn? 9 7.1 Internally Displaced Persons: Learning From the Local 7.2 Shapeshifting at EU Borders 8 The Logistics Of Activism: Getting Things to Run Smoothly 10 8.1 Toolkit to Connect 8.2 UNITED Against Racism 8.3 Youth Inter-Action 8.4 Broadening Our Horizons 8.5 Fund-raising: a Denar for Your Thoughts 9 Closing the Conference 12 9.1 Facing the Future 9.2 Last but not least, thank you! 10 Conference Program 13 11 List of Participating Organisations 14 Merging Parallel Societies: Toolkit to Unite • 15-20 October 2011 in Struga, Macedonia - 3 - 1 A PLATFORM FOR ACTION On 15 – 20 October 2011, antiracist activists from across Europe gathered together in Struga, Macedonia for 5 days of networking, learning, brainstorming and strategising, with the common goal of creating a stronger presence for the international movement. The topic of the conference – “Merging Parallel Societies: Toolkit to Unite” - was chosen with Macedonia’s particular situation in mind, because it is a country where different minority communities live without coming in contact with each other. Macedonia suffers from interethnic tensions and smaller communities, such as the Roma, are often neglected in the face of tensions between the larger groups. This is a worrying situation and it is not helping the move from a multicultural society (where communities live side by side) to an intercultural one (where communities live with each other). An international conference that brings 83 organisations from 30 countries was therefore especially important. It brought together Macedonian activists and those from all over Europe to be an example of intercultural collaboration and inspire, and hopefully help, the Macedonian activists and those within the antidiscrimination movement to continue their important work as they try to bridge the gap and reconnect their societies. 1.1 OUR HOSTS This conference was organised with the help of many of these Macedonian activists and three partner organisations: the Centre for Intercultural Dialogue and the Multi-Kulti Youth Centre in Kumanovo, and the Initiative for Social Change in Skopje. UNITED conferences have been held in many different countries, and this would not be possible without its local partners. The Centre for Intercultural Dialogue (CID) was formed in 2006 by young people for young people and actively works on the issue of interethnic dialogue. Its mission is to promote and support intercultural understanding and cooperation as well as active youth participation through educational activities and events.CID provides non-formal education activities for different community groups in order to support them to become active citizens especially in creating intercultural sensitive policies. The organisation also supports the development of volunteering and it is part of bigger national and international youthwork networks. Multikulti Youth Centre is the only youth centre in Kumanovo. Through youth programmes and extracurricular activities, it offers young people from different ethnic backgrounds opportunities to socialise with peers from outside their own ethnic groups. Multikulti offers many activities that promote tolerance and improve youth relations in Kumanovo, open to everyone from 6-18 years old. The main aim of all Multikulti activities is to facilitate intercultural dialogue and promote active youth participation for an inclusive democratic society. Initiative for Social Change is an association of citizens and is human rights oriented, seeking to empower disadvantaged communities to work for their own interests. It has three main programmes: Roma rights advocacy, empowerment, and networking. The initiative has monitored the activities of the Roma decade in Macedonia, helped the government implement its suggestions, informed the Roma about this year’s census, pushed for the implementation of anti-discrimination legislation and is active in anti-poverty networks. 2 MACEDONIA: A LAND IN TRANSITION 2.1 THE OHRID FRAMEWORK AGREEMENT A State Adviser from the Secretariat for Implementation of Ohrid Framework Agreement gave a presentation of the complicated political past of Macedonia and its current situation under the Agreement. Macedonia’s split from Yugoslavia happened without bloodshed, but ten years later a conflict erupted between different communities. The majority of the population are Macedonians (64.2%), but there is a large Albanian minority (25.2%). There are also many other minorities, including Turks, Serbs, Roma and others. The Albanian minority had for years tried to get full rights on equal terms with the other nations in Yugoslavia - and later Macedonia - which culminated in a conflict in Tetovo in 2001. The conflict was ended with the Ohrid Framework Agreement, signed at Lake Ohrid - where our UNITED conference also took place. The agreement promotes the concept of equal citizenship over the preferential status formerly given to ethnic Macedonians. Among other things, this has meant that minorities now have the right to education in their own language, and official communication from authorities now needs to be in minority languages as well as Macedonian, provided that at least 20% of a community speak that language. However, the implementation of the Ohrid Framework Agreement is going slowly, and the language requirement has actually turned out to divide citizens, as we shall see later. - 4 - Merging Parallel Societies: Toolkit to Unite • 15-20 October 2011 in Struga, Macedonia Merging Parallel Societies: Toolkit to Unite • 15-20 October 2011 in Struga, Macedonia - 5 - 2.2 PERPETUATING PARALLELS A delegate from Centre for Human Rights and Conflict Resolution explained the lived realities of parallel societies, where there is a tendency to view people as members of their ethnic group rather than simply individuals, creating barriers. It also fortifies collective identity as opposed to personal identity, which in turn increases the risk that people will be more prone to degrade other groups in order to build self-esteem. There are political parties in the country who play on this and deepen divisions for their own political benefit. Unfortunately, a study conducted this year by the Municipal Commission On Inter-Ethnic Relations showed that half of the population is concerned or very much concerned that there will be an ethnic conflict. On the other hand, almost 73% of respondents realised that leaders of political parties were not good role models for multiculturalism, so people do actually see through their games. 2.3 OPENING UP THE DEBATE: MINORITY VOICES Another provision in the Ohrid Framework Agreement is the creation of minority committees, discussed in the workshop “Political Participation of Diverse Groups”. The committees’ aim is to ensure that the minorities’ voices are heard. They do not have power as such, but they can give recommendations, and should be consulted on potentially sensitive issues to avoid tensions. However, there are several problems: without real power, the authorities do not always consult them or follow their recommendations. There is a democratic issue as well; committee members are not elected, but usually appointed by the municipality. For the moment, they represent the first stages of awareness-raising among minorities in Macedonia. 2.4 WORKING WITH WORDS Geopolitical context and personal background influences our every experience and our interpretations of all we see around us. “Multiculturalism”, according to some participants, is a buzzword in Macedonia, however the country’s different communities are often deeply divided. “Tolerance” similarly can be seen to have negative and positive aspects. In Macedonia, it mostly means being aware of other groups, but interaction and acceptance are still some way away. “The Danger Of Words”, a session early on in the programme, aimed to make participants aware of the fact that not everybody uses the same words in the same way. It served as an introduction to the topics and terms of the conference, as well as the participants’ work. They were very eager to share interesting cases - so much so that some of them continued the session into their free time. 2.5 CENSUS-CONSENSUS Because the Ohrid Framework Agreement carries certain rights for minorities that make up at least 20% of a community, counting citizens is directly connected to achieving rights and benefits. As much of the rest the world, Macedonia had a census earlier this year, and this was the focus of a workshop facilitated by a delegate from the Macedonian NGO HCRA. The census was only partially carried out before being cancelled because of disagreement on the surveying methodology. As the census was registering ethnicity, there were political interests to increase/downplay the numbers of certain groups. In other words the lack of political consensus played a part in stopping the census.