„New Wave in Roma Public Life” was a 20 months long youth democracy project supported by the Youth in Action Program, coordinated by Digonál Hungary and Phiren Amenca. Our goal was to overcome geographical distances and get information about the Roma integration system both in Hungary and in the European Union, learn more about the way in which the Roma self-governments are elected and to gain the required competencies. Based on this knowledge, we as young people wanted to be an important factor in the eyes of policy makers and join to the decision making. Beside that we wanted to multiply the result in our own regions, establish Roma youth roundtables, in order to express the opinions and results that come from the grassroots level of communities.
Documentary video about the project (in Hungarian): 12 minutes
The project consisted of the following activities:
• Trainings and seminars
Introductory training (Seregélyes, 3-5 April 2014) Second training and international seminar (Nagyvázsony, 20-23 May, 2014) Closing seminar and conference (Demecser, 22-23 September 2014)
• Realization of small-scale local projects with mentor support
In between the three trainings we realized local projects related to local social life and participation. The outcomes were analyzed together at the closing Conference.
• Visibility of the project and online activities / Website
We created a website that gives space for interactive communication among young Roma people. We came up with actual youth related topics with solution-focused approach, we vote and commented in connection with the actual issues. We presented these results on decision-making forums.
• Study tour
The project included a short study visit to Gudevica, to a Bulgarian organization. Five of our youngsters visited the organization to discover their good practices, methods and system regarding work with Roma communities and immigrants in Southern Bulgaria.
• Closing conference
We invited decision-makers, young people and our partners to this event, where we have formed sections in connection with our project’s topics and discussed them in an interactive way. Before the conference, we were shooting short movies about our project which was also shown to the audience.