At the last meeting of partners of the “NEAR” project that took place at the Multiburo Bruxelles Parlement – Square de Meeûs, on February 8, the Workshop “Building inclusive cities - How to allow diaspora stakeholders to develop and provide local integration services”, which brought together 22 international organizations, including AIDGLOBAL.
Meeting in Brussels, Diaspora Organisations and European platforms of Diaspora Organisations, representatives of diversified AMIF projects focusing on multi-stakeholderpartnerships and the participation of migrants in local integration policies and services made known the results achieved on the ground, in the course of actions in their countries and, together, reflected on how Diaspora stakeholders can be involved, at local level, in the development, implementation and evaluation of integration services for newly arrived migrants.
In addition, the results of the project implemented in the four cities of the consortium — Nicosia, Milan, Perugia and Lisbon - were presented from a round table with examples of innovative practices and working sessions on sub-themes with solutions to consolidate the policy brief of “NEAR”.
Topics discussed were how to strategically identify diaspora stakeholders, how to develop their capacity to act as intermediaries between migrants and local services, promote networking, institutionalise their contribution to inclusion services, centralise existing services for further integration and what tools to use to provide more effective services to newly arrived migrants.
The opening of the session was carried out by the promoter of the “NEAR” project, Fondazione ISMU, in the person of Francesa Locatelli, who welcomed all participants and gave a brief contextualization of the project.
Next, the Researcher and Project Manager of Fondazione ISMU, Luca Merotta, advanced with the presentation making some observations, focusing on WP3, which is intended for the training carried out for Community Agents throughout the duration of the project. He referred to six 6 strategies that underline the potential of diaspora stakeholders in the integration and/or inclusion of migrant people in the host country community. The strategies support the work of policy makers and civil society actors.
Led by the Coordinator of the Eurocities Migration and Integration Team, Katharina Bamberg, the second presentation, under the theme “Integration of migrants' opinions in local integration policies and services – the perspective of the city”, focused on three different themes, namely mutual learning – generated through the workshops and study visits carried out –, advocacy and grant – through the maximisation of EU funding, partnerships and training. The integration processes in cities were also addressed, relating to the rights and duties of European cities in the integration process and co-development strategies for integration: strategy codesign.
The next speaker, the architect and urban planner Nausicaa Pezzoni invited all participants in the event to look at today's Europe from the perspective of newly arrived migrants, asking each one to draw a map that would lead them to give a new meaning to the territorial spaces around the city of Milan, where the experience took place and which resulted in a recent interpretation of the context of the city.
The architect photographed the different dynamics around the city to register the new territories, even if temporary. Although they are not yet mapped, the importance of migrants' vision of geographical areas has been underlined so that, in the near future, the new perspectives of the city and Europe itself will be included in an inclusive plan that will result, in turn, in an updated map.
Thinking about the relationships with the territories and the emotions that each individual brings with them reveals the identity and reason for the existence of the maps that become a tool for citizenship. It is through geographical interpretation, seen as a positive challenge and social reflection, that the recognition of the most significant areas for the development of activities that can expand and enrich themselves prevails. Maps prove to be of singular importance, an interface that consolidates them with cities and a way for people to express and share information.
After a coffee break, the meeting continued with a group action that addressed six sub-themes that gave rise to a debate and reflections on the inclusion of migrant people in the host country, namely how to identify diaspora stakeholders strategically, build their capacity to act as intermediaries between migrants and local services, promote networking between diasporaand local stakeholders, institutionalize the contribution of diaspora actors to integration services, centralize these services and/or mainstream integration and, finally, what tools to use to effectively provide services to newly arrived migrant people, via diaspora stakeholders. Fondazione ISMU closed the Workshop with general observations of the “NEAR” project.
The networking and peer-to-peer exchange initiatives sought to promote links between different actors working in different areas and services for the integration of newly arrived migrants, also supporting transnational learning and the transfer of practices. In addition, a new generation of refugee and migrant leaders working within and outside their community have become an added value in ensuring the effective deployment of integration services in host cities.
“NEAR – NEwly ARrived in a common home” is a European project funded by the European Commission, under the Asylum, Migration and Integration Fund (AMIF), with the ISMU Foundation as the promoter and Tamat, CARDET, AIDGLOBAL and Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuoreas partner entities. In Portugal, this project is being developed in the Lisbon Zone.
