Atrás New generations on the wave

Purpose:

This project aimed at giving the opportunity to local administrations and local communities to work together to develop strategies for the promotion of civic and intercultural active participation that benefit the whole community.

Focusing on new generations (understood as young people belonging to families with migrant background but grown or born in Italy) the project created public spaces for debate to attract and involve a part of population that usually has no voice. Being young and embodying multiple identities, new generations can be perfect cultural and social innovators and, as they are naturally in between different groups, they can contribute to increased social cohesion and positive political discourse, to contrast racism and segregation.

Stimulus/Rationale:

16% of Pontedera’s 29,270 inhabitants are residents of foreign origin, while 10 % of Olbia’s 60,365 inhabitants are of foreign origin. These residents are sometimes – but not systematically - participating in migrant-associations and communities. Through the local authorities aimed at involving migrant associations. For local authorities, the possibility to develop a civic and intercultural active participation strategy that empowers migrant youth by including recommendations coming from the ground, represented an added value to increase social cohesion and direct exchange among people.

Process:

In order to build spaces where new generations’ opinions on local intercultural policies were taken into account, external experts with expertise in designing successful participation processes were contracted.  This process empowered new generations groups/associations, giving them the possibility to raise their voices through the organisation of events, cultural initiatives or the design of materials.

The two municipalities of Pontedera and Olbia have coordinated the activities and contacted local associations to translate into actions the ideas included in the project, giving them the means to exchange and to organise the final events of the project.

Several thematic round tables have also been organised gathering the representatives of the associations or communities of migrants present in the two municipalities. Participants included: new generations’ associations and informal groups, other associations or bodies that deal with interculturality, the local authorities.

A training module on how to put in place a youth association targeting new generations was also organised. The module, divided in 3 meetings of 4 hours each, has been conducted by civil society experts.

The two municipal administrations made a small fund available so that the associations and migrant communities present in the area, with the direct participation of new generations, organised public, cultural events, while also designing materials that can be used for raising awareness (videos, brochures, social campaigns)

Impact:

The City Councils’ members took the project’s conclusions into consideration in political discussions and decided to devote some of the cities’ funds to events dedicated to the second generations of migrants’ residents. The project further contributed to create new generations’ ownership for intercultural change in their own community.

Furthermore, in Olbia, a new youth organisation was created to promote young people participation in the local community.

Key reference documents:

April - November 2022
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