This year, with the support of 6 NGOs and nearly 500 people, Civitas Georgica launched a CPW campaign across 21 Georgian communities. Here are some of their activities: 1. Public debates concerning infrastructure rehabilitation projects, social initiatives, and education issues were organized in 12 communities. Three community initiatives were supported by local government, while another two were addressed to service provider companies. Around 280 people participated in debates. 2. Eight community preschool centers were opened across 4 municipalities of Racha-Lechkhumi. In remote villages, alternative kindergartens were established as part of a community initiative. These are all owned and operated by local communities and gave the opportunity to 76 children to go to kindergarten. 3. A workshop concerning issues of public participation was organized for 10 regional NGOs. In particular, the workshop focused on discussing the Code of Good Practice of civil participation issued by the CoE. The Georgian translation of … Continue reading →
Foundation PACT, Partnership for Community Action and Transformation, Romania, carried out two activities within Citizen Participation Week 2011. Volunteering – an active citizenship experience! (Kick off meeting of the European project “Future active citizens: volunteering as an exercise of democracy”) Within the European project “Future active citizens: volunteering as an exercise of democracy”, PACT organized a meeting on September 20th, 2011 at the premises of the National College “Mihai Viteazul” in Bucharest, with approximately 100 young people from six high-schools in the city. This meeting marked the start of the “Future active citizens: volunteering as an exercise of democracy” project which was implemented during September 2011 through to December 2012 by 8 partner organizations from 7 European countries. The event brought together representatives from three Romanian organizations experienced in working with volunteers, and partners in this project: Save the Children Romania, New Horizons Foundation, and PROVOBIS – National Resource Center … Continue reading →
During this years Citizen Participation Week, CREST Resource Center, Romania, carried out activities aiming to raise people’s eco-consciousness and promote sustainable development. The two main activities were: A public debate on the theme of sustainable development and NATURA 2000. The aim of this debate was to make people aware of the advantages of NATURA 2000; A drawing contest on the theme of biodiversity was organized for primary school children.
Campaign for Citizenship and Democracy Citizen Participation Week 2011 – Hungary – a report by Máté Varga, Hungarian Association for Community Development Between 19th and 25th September 2011 hundreds of civil organizations ran a campaign for raising awareness on citizen participation and local action at 146 local, small regional and regional events across Hungary. Similarly to previous years, the programme followed two main threads: a national random sample survey, and local and national events. Survey: The survey was designed to highlight the level of citizen’s participation in Hungary. HACD collected more than 4200 questioners from across the country and the results are soon to be published on their CPW site! “Central” events: 1) Press-public roundtable with party politicians about the new Civil Law. Budapest, Parliament Café 22nd September Participants: Ertsey Katalin (LMP), Lendvai Ildikó (MSZP) és Gulyás Gergely (FIDESZ). Civil experts, press representatives. The event had been live broadcasted, all recordings … Continue reading →
During Citizen Participation Week 2011, the Centres for Civic Initiatives, Bosnia & Herzegovina, organized their first CPW street stand in Bijeljina, in the Republika Srpska region. An article about their activity appeared in EUROBLIC, a widely read regional newspaper. Please check it out below, followed by the English translation. Tuesday, September 20, 2011 www.euroblic.ba The campaign of the Centres for Civic Initiatives in Bijeljina on animation of citizens INFORMING ABOUT THE FUNCTIONING OF GOVERNMENTS: The goal is greater participation of citizens in the supervision of their local government. The adage that people have the government they deserve proves to be correct in practice every day, and it shows that it is crucial that citizens change their attitude towards the community in order for a fundamental change in society to be made, said the activists of the Centres for Civic Initiatives yesterday in Bijeljina. As part of the “Week of Civic … Continue reading →
Our friends from the Resources Centre for Non-profit Organisations from Oltenia (CRONO), Romania, were certainly ones to keep busy during Citizen Participation Week 2011 and totally blew us away with their CPW report. Without further ado, check it out here (pdf)!
A message from Prof. Elena Shomina, Vice President of the Russian Tenants Association: Dear friends and colleagues! Congratulations with CPW! We were very happy to get such big and beautiful banners, and they did a very good job during our events. I delivered a lecture to a group of 20 students from our new masters programme at the Higher School of Urbanizm and we had a very fruitful discussion on public participation in the improvement of our urban environment. We dicussed, among others, the following case study: In Petrozavodsk (city in Carelia, not far from Finland) the union of car-owners protested against the bad conditions of the city roads, yet local authoritis did not pay attention. At last they arranged volunteer works and converted the largest holes (which were very dangerous for cars, particularly because there were no warning signs) to beds for flowers (KLUMBA in Russian) where they planted large … Continue reading →
This year, Agora Central Europe promoted Citizen Participation Week through three different events in order to motivate different social groups, including local government politicians, NGOs and students, to get involved in the project. RNDr. Ivana Bursikova, the director of Agora CE, has been involved in a nationwide program called “The Educated Local Politician” which is organised by the Union of Municipalities (supported by ESF – OPLZ) in the Czech Republic following a Norwegian model. The program involves a series of events encouraging local politicians to seek mutual understanding and strengthen their competence to better serve their community. The program is also designed to help local governments share their know-how and experiences using interactive methods. As a certified lecturer, RNDr. Bursikova had the responsibility of leading a training seminar for nine mayors from various Czech cities. The aim of the seminar was to increase their knowledge and skills in participation methods … Continue reading →
This year, “Millennium” Association for Education and Research has been working on a project for the promotion and development of argotourism in the rural regions of Gegharkuniq and Vayots Dzor, Armenia. The main objectives of the project are: cross-regional cooperation and participatory planning of tourism development strategies; supporting the development of SME and establishing new SME in the argotourist sphere; and involving the local community in the strategy implementation processes. As part of this last objective, Millennium has been working towards raising awareness about the role of the community in the maintenance of tourist resources in the region with an emphasis on the role of community mobilization which would create a better environment for agrotourist households development. Some of Mullennium’s activities included promoting volunteering in schools and organizing garbage disposal events with school pupils of the Eghegnadzor region communities (Arpi, Areni, Shatin, Artabuynk, Sali, Vernashen) and were conducted throughout Citizen Participation … Continue reading →
