Work starts in the Paris Region

Work starts in the Paris Region

4 April 2013

IMPLEMENT: A diverse volunteer team from Initiative Dialogue in Paris organised a workshop with their members and colleagues from its partner organisations on 23-24 March. Fifteen of them came, who currently conduct “dialogue spaces” addressing diversity issues in four areas of the greater Paris region. Their leader had requested that the INGO Dialogue Toolkit content be added to their existing capacities. Accordingly, the workshop materials got prepared in French. The President of the Council of Europe INGO Conference came to speak to them; setting the scene institutionally and outlining what INGOs can do in Europe.
All together fifteen topics figured in the programme, often being worked on in groups of five. It seemed the participants were keen to improve on their act. It was an energizing environment, so much so that on the second day a very lively process had to be stopped half way through because of time running out. It was a great group to be with. One participant wrote afterwards: “It was a pleasure for us all.”  Another message read: “…it was really precious.” Yet another thanked for the workshop: “This week-end has stimulated me to get back into the vortex.”

SUBMIT: End of March was the deadline for submitting the INGO Dialogue Toolkit initiative for the next World Forum for Democracy (WFD) on 27-29 November 2013 in Strasbourg, France. The WFD literature describes this event as follows: “The core content of the Forum will consist of discussions about experimental initiatives and innovative ideas that have the ambition to amplify citizen voices, increase institutions’ transparency, responsiveness, re-focus on common interest and enable more deliberation and citizen influence on decision-making.”

REPORT 2012: The Dialogue Toolkit got published and printed in English and French, and the Russian translation and initial layout tests are made. The dialoguetoolkit.net website was built. With this the visibility of the INGO Dialogue concept is sustainably achieved. To illustrate this a few Internet search words are placed in the table below, with the figures of search results at the time of the website launch and the time of writing this report.

The Project Aims have been reached and have partly exceeded the initial targets. This was possible because some budget items turned out to be cheaper, hence making other items possible that were only “wait-listed” at the time of the project submission a year ago. The 2012 project segment worth just under CHF 28’000.00 closed at CHF 49.04 below the budget.

NEXT: The Dialogue Hub will take opportunities to keep up the visibility of the INGO Dialogue approach as a way to promote a culture of participation in societies. It is grateful for the support received last year and expects further implementing activities to be self-sustainable, as was the case with the activity in Paris. It welcomes ideas / invitations to conduct dialogues in situations where they are needed.