Where the magic happens – Joint Session Warsaw

by Marta Gawinek - Dagargulia

On May 18-19 we met in Warsaw for last meeting in the group of country representatives, It was an occasion to sum up our efforts and prepare a message we want to share with all other participants at the Final Conference in Brussels.

We have reached two main objectives: we have finalized our working group process and defined some challenges for participation in Europe and we have been learnt how to communicate about them effectively to the community and to the policy makers.

The variety of the themes working groups have discussed proves the diversity of issues challenging Europe currently. The EU functioning awareness team was discussing how to make information about Europe more accessible and fun? How to create a platform for real dialogue between people  insted of a leaflet exchange? How to make citizens feel more encouraged to participate and act?

The basis for their work was the  belief that the EU is not the union of the states but of citizens and that empowering Europe should first happen by empowerment of citizens. The group claims Internet not to be a sufficient tool for communication about Europe and for more informing and involvement of seniors.

The group with social inclusion in working focus will use mapping tools to create a social change platform. Showing civic engagement initatives from all over Europe will be a bottom up approach to involve those who have so far been marginalised.

The youth issues groups sees two layers of the challenge – youth unemployment and low quality of youth employment in Europe. With its symbol of empty hands they wish young people good luck in the European Union where 23,4% of citizens are unemployed, 30% of the budget allocated in agriculture and only 0,8% in education and youth issues. They want the EU to allocate the remaining budget to the projects combating youth unemployment.

Public spaces shall be made for people and by people – this is the belief of the working group, which wants to use the spaces people are at in their everyday lives to inspire them for social engagement. They see a problem of hardly involving local communities in the planning processes related to public spaces. Their proposal is to make it other way round than it has been so far and involve citizens in the planning process. EU should oblige code of conduct to the local authorities and impose on them to ensure the participation process.

The trainers from the British organisation The People Speak offered several workshops: Anna Mouser was talking about visuals, how to do mapping with open source tools, use different other instruments for presenting information and gave some specific tips how to communicate. Raji Hunjan showed different perspectives of talking about power and identifying who really has power in the issues and tools. Mikey Weinkovey showed specific tips of how to be effective, confident and convincing in public speaking, as well as how to create space making people feel invited.

It was the third and last meeting in this team. For me personally it was a proof of how wonderful things can happen if we create a space for such a diversity of people to get to know each other really well and exchange on issues that do matter. In such a dynamic group of very inspiring active people from all over Europe magic happens. This makes me feel where the heart of Europe beats. The Joint Session meeting consolidated the I AM EUROPE network and this is probably the most powerful outcome of the project so far.