Overview

Connective Cities organized in cooperation with the Qudra-Programme and UCLG-MEWA a dialogue-workshop with the topic “Refugee Friendly Municipalities’ Options towards Integration and Social Cohesion”. This workshop addressed refugee-hosting municipalities from Turkey and Germany. Through an interactive methodology, participating experts had the chance to discuss peer-to-peer challenges and opportunities for strengthening integration and social cohesion as well as improving municipal public service provision in the context of flight.

The dialogue-event took place from 08 – 10 November 2018 in Istanbul, Turkey. 9 German and 38 Turkish experts exchanged their experiences on integration of refugees and strengthening social cohesion. Thereby, German and Turkish representatives of urban municipalities, NGOs, science, governmental institutions, the private sector and organizations of intermunicipal cooperation participated. During the workshop, project ideas were elaborated in peer-to-peer consultations. Also new project ideas were identified with the aim to implement them in potential partnerships between German and Turkish municipalities.

Connective Cities organized this event in the framework of the <link www.initiative-nahost.de/en/home.html - external-link-new-window "Öffnet internen Link im aktuellen Fenster">“Municipal Know-how for Host Communities in the Middle-East”-Program.

Keynotes

Ingrid Roesner, Connective Cities/GIZ, Germany and Benjamin Jeromin, Connective Cities/Engagement Global/ Service Agency Communities in the One World, Germany
Introduction of Connective Cities and the “Municipal Know-how for Host Communities in the Middle-East”-Program (EN)

Suemeyye Gedikoğlu and Nebahat Başibüyük Tekin, Union of Municipalities of Turkey
Municipal Context and Services for Refugees in Turkey (TR)

Ingrid Roesner, Connective Cities/GIZ, Germany
Municipal Context and Services for Refugees in Germany (EN)

Benjamin Jeromin, Connective Cities/Engagement Global/ Service Agency Communities in the One World, Germany
Prospects for Further Engagement with Connective Cities and the Municipal Know how Initiative (EN)

Results

The three-day event facilitated the participants to intensively exchange on challenges and potential solutions for the integration of refugees and strengthening social cohesion in refugee hosting municipalities. This was enhanced through an interactive methodology that was applied during the workshop. This included poster-presentations, rounds of discussions, peer-to-peer consultation as well as an excursion to Bağcılar Municipality. Here, the participants visited a Women and Family Arts and Culture Center, a Center for Disabled People and WALD, an NGO supporting refugees in registration, access to services, psychosocial needs, etc. Through this methodology, the participants could exchange their individual experiences and expertise intensively within the four main topics of the workshop.

In the opening ceremony of the event, selected Turkish mayors presented the current state as well as challenges and potential solutions of refugee management in Turkey during a panel discussion. Through this, the participants got an overview on the topic as well as the local context of the event. The discussion with Turkish mayors also highlighted the need for implementation of innovative ideas. This served as a constructive starting point for further input from the participants. 

Subsequently, German and Turkish experts presented Good Practices of the integration of refugees and strengthened social cohesion. These allowed the reflection of challenges and potential solutions the individual municipal experts are experiencing in their every-day work. Questions and suggestions were thereby elaborated in peer-to-peer consultations.  

Based on the results of the poster-presentations, rounds of discussions, as well as peer-to-peer consultations, 6 concrete project ideas were developed during the event and were presented and discussed in the plenary at the end of the workshop. The development of these project ideas benefited greatly of the expertise of the present municipal experts, which enhanced the critical reflection and therefore enhanced the conceptualization of project ideas.  

The presented project ideas were measures aiming to enhance the integration of refugees and social cohesion in refugee hosting municipalities. The projects included: Enhancing the provision of language courses, developing integration centers, enhancing municipal public service provision for refugees and other local communities, strengthening vocational trainings of refugees as well as strengthening the integration of women and other vulnerable social groups.  

The participating municipal experts of the dialogue-workshop implemented by Connective Cities, Qudra-Programme and UCLG-MEWA in Istanbul, Turkey, continue to work on these 6 project ideas. For this, Connective Cities facilitates a follow-up workshop in February 2019 with the aim to make existing project ideas more concrete and/or develop new project ideas, which can be implemented by potential partnerships of German and Turkish municipalities.