Main Partners:
Sakharov Center, Russia
Participant: Polina Filippova
In the first years after its creation the Sakharov Center, founded in the 1990s, focused primarily on the creation of permanent museum exhibitions, library collections, temporary exhibits, and historical research. In 2009, the main priority of the Center shifted towards a robust discussion programme. Since then, leading specialists and opinion makers have been invited to participate in debates, seminars, public lectures, panel discussions, and gatherings in the Sakharov Center’s cinema club. These activities have attracted numerous young, educated, and socially conscious people.
Institute of Social Science “Ivo Pilar”
Znanje na djelu, Croatia
Participant: Caroline Hornstein-Tomit (PhD), Rafaela Tripalo
The Institute of Social Sciences “Ivo Pilar” is the largest multidisciplinary national research institute in Croatia in the fields of social science and the humanities with more than 50 PhD researchers and 20 research novices. The main activities of the institute include basic scientific research, professional and consultancy services, strategic analyses, market and public opinion research. The institute has participated in more than 50 research projects.
Congress of Culture Activists, Ukraine
Participant: Olena Pravylo
The Congress of Culture Activists aims at stimulating effective public cultural activities and at organizing free space for cooperation of cultural activists. The main objectives of the Congress are to create space for the free ideas and experience exchange between cultural leaders and activists; to determine the current state of the country’s culture and underline the necessity for reforms and positive transformations in the Ukrainian culture; to identify ways of forming the cultural environment; to initiate the establishment of non-governmental coordination system between cultural activists; to establish a mechanism for expert support of various cultural projects and to assist in the establishment of an open dialogue between cultural activists and the public.
Perspektive3, Germany
Participants: Mandy Schulze, Dörte Grimm, Judith C. Enders (PhD)
Perspective3 gathers activists of the so called 3rd Generation – those born between 1975 and 1985 – not only from East Germany. Starting from the experience and perspective of this Generation they aim to contribute to a public discourse on question of common social-political relevance. Perspective3 does projects in the sphere of science, culture and education.
Mandy is working in a Czech-Polish-German network in Lausitz region on transformation and participation in boarder region. The activities focus is on preserving public spaces – as community halls were people can come together, unfold various activities and develop a sense of active community living and civil society. She is also working and doing research on the role of women in transitions process.
Dörte is a filmmaker and author from Berlin. She’s just finished the post production of her first long documentary about „children of the change”, born in East Germany between the years 1975 and 1985. Dörte supports the project by following the meetings across Europe with a camera. In each country she would have the possibility to speak to local initiatives and collect ideas. She could collaborate with film makers of the belonging countries or could work on her own. The different short videos could be uploaded to a project homepage or a similar online appearance.
Judith C. Enders (PhD) is a political scientist and founder of „Perspektive Hoch 3“. She works at the University of Applied Sciences „Alice Salomon“ in Berlin. Her main research interests are, Environmental Studies and Ecological Economy, Feminist Theory and Trans- and Interdisciplinarity in Sustainability Sciences.
perspektivehochdrei.wordpress.com
DRA e.V. German-Russian Exchange, Germany
Participant: Johanna Sievers; Christine Wetzel
The German-Russian Exchange in Berlin works with its partner organisation, the German-Russian Exchange in St. Petersburg, and numerous partners in Germany, Russia, Belarus and Ukraine to establish a strong civil society in the East and the West. The German-Russian Exchange works with NGOs, citizens’ groups and individual projects in Moscow, Perm, Ischevsk and Vladikavkaz, Kiev, Donetsk, Minsk, Gomel and Western Europe. The Exchange facilitates network with other sections of society, such as businesses and parliaments, government agencies, educational establishments, scientific and religious groups. Along with its partners, the German-Russian Exchange organises advanced training and other educational projects relating to a range of areas, such as press freedom and the promotion of small businesses, memory politics, organisational development and the environment.
Johanna is working on a Polish-German-Russian project on the transition processes currently in Russia. The participants – seven from each country – will gather information by talking to locals whose lives changed due to the proceedings of the 80s and 90s. The 21 participants will be working in small tri-national groups, producing texts, videos and / or audios (and maybe other things as well) which will be published in a special blog. The one-week-workshop is taking place in April in Moscow.
Sofia Platform, Bulgaria
Participants: Louisa Slavkova, Iva Kopraleva and Nickoleta Gabrovska
Sofia Platform is a venue for dialogue and exchange between the societies in transformation. Launched in 2011, its main objective is to promote the smoother transition to rule of law and democracy by reflecting the need of knowledge transfer between the countries in transition. The concept, successfully established by Sofia Platform, is based on comparison of transitional experiences, obtained through research and dialogue between civil society and the political leaders of four transitional blocks: Central Eastern Europe (former Communist states), the MENA countries, the Western Balkans and the Eastern Partnership countries.
The community of Sofia Platform believes that societies in transition have gathered unique knowledge and experience, while at the same time share many traits in common which are worth considering for the benefit of all. Thus, countries with more experience in transition can reasses their past from the distance of time and those, currently under transition, can benefit from the lessons learned and the mistakes made by others. While any comparison should be taken with a grain of salt, we believe that the need of reforming the entire political system and readjusting the notion of civility, imposes similar challenges to all countries in transition. Establishing democratic institutions, empowering the youth, working with political actors, promoting civic education and human rights are only few of them.
Further Partners: Antikomplex, Czech Republic antikomplex.cz/de / Populari, Bosnia and Herzegovina, populari.org
The project Mapping a Generation in transition is funded by the Federal Agency of Civic Education, Germany. We like to thank for the kind support!
