الشهر: السنة المالية

The initiative “Looking for European Innovators” promoted by the Italian Alliance for the European Year of Citizens 2013 saw representatives by Italian political forces take part to the meeting in order to actively engage and support by their respective elective assemblies the actions and the goals contained in the Declaration of the Italian Alliance.

The event “Looking for European Innovators” was the second part of the involvement process, launched through the questionnaire, which had been sent to the political forces, focusing on specific issues, such as citizenship, integration, European Policies, and immigration.

The Deputy Paola Binetti (UDC), Monica Frassoni (SEL), Flavio Lotti (Rivoluzione Civile), the Deputy Sandro Gozi (PD), Luca Cefisi (PSI), Chiara Colosimo (Fratelli d’Italia – Centrodestra Nazionale), the former president of the Constitutional Court Giovanni Maria Flick (Centro Democratico), Piero Soldini (SEL), the Senator Vincenzo Vita (PD), and Imma Battaglia (Lista Civica Nicola Zingaretti Presidente attended the event.

The main objective was to introduce in the political debate and campaigning the European Union and raise awareness among the Italians about European matters since it seems that these issues are completely excluded from the political campaign. Indeed actually all political parties do not open the debate about European Union, and the Italian Alliance wanted to stress the importance of mobilising political parties on it with this initiative.

The adhesion to the contents of the Declaration “2013 We, Citizens of Europe…” was broad, although there were some differences. All attendees arranged on the necessity to focus more on European issues and, especially, they agreed with the aims of the Italian Alliance, ensuring their commitment to promote and to support the action of the Alliance. Due to the different political memberships and traditions, the different candidates did not hide their different opinions in several points, such as citizenship and naturalisation, environment, justice and detention, European integration, European policy towards the Mediterranean countries, European social policy, European monetary policy, Youth policies, and Labour policies. All these themes will be the main matters, on which the action of the future Italian government will focus its efforts.

That is why, the event represented an important opportunity to exchange, to debate and to confront between the political forces and the most important associations and organisations of Italian civil society.

The meeting “Looking for European Innovators” occurred after the Steering Committee of the Italian Alliance for the European Year of Citizens 2013 , which took held on January 2013, 29 at 11:30 a.m., in the “Sala Natali” in the Permanent Representation of the European commission in Italy (Via IV Novembre – Rome).

ALDA Director, Antonella Valmorbida, updated the coordinators of the seven working groups of the Italian Alliance, about the progress and the decisions, which were taken by the working groups of the European Alliance.

The meeting served the purpose to enhance the synergies between members of the steering committee, and it contributed to organise the activity of the Alliance in view of the next national and European commitments, to give new issues of cooperation, and to exchange proposals among the delegates.

Finally, the Italian Alliance decided to arrange and to organise, in view of the next European commitments. Finally, thanks to ALDA proposal and request, and thanks to CIME (Italian Council of the European Movement) cooperation, the steering committee decided to submit to local authorities a document, which will have to concretise in a order of business to present to city and local councils and assemblies, on the Declaration “2013 We, Citizens of Europe…

On the 29th of January 2013 the Italian Alliance for the European Year of Citizens 2013 meets Italian political forces in Rome, in order to launch a dialogue about the future of Europe and of European citizens, in view of the forthcoming national elections. The Italian Alliance aims that the European dimension of the policies promoted by the next government will be one of the priorities of the electoral campaign.

Besides, a prompt and detailed reply is expected concerning the constant erosion of the public opinion’s consensus, towards national and European institutions. 
In this occasion, the dialogue, which the Alliance guess to launch and to establish with the candidates to the premiership, with leaders of the parties and of coalitions, the nominators of Latium Region, will focus on the priorities and on the goals, which the Alliance pursues on the issue of the future development of the European citizenship.
The Italian Alliance has been created in the framework of the European Year of Citizens 2013, in order to exchange best-practices, coordinate the implemented activities during the year, ease the dialogue between citizens and institutions, launch supporting actions for the initiatives, which will be realised through the instruments, foreseen by art. 11 of the Treaty of Lisbon, and, finally, prearrange some proposals, to submit to the European Commission, the European Parliament and the Italian Government, in view of the six-month rotating EU Presidency in 2014 (1st July – 31st December 2014).

The 22nd and 23rd of January 2013 is taking place in Brussels the first thematic Conference on the Europea Year of Citizens. ALDA is an active partner of the European Alliance since it is co-chairing the Working Group 1 on Civic Dialogue and How to increase citizens participation in time of crisis.

The Conference set the scene for the future activities of the EYAC 2013 (http://europa.eu/citizens-2013/) and launched the first activities of the activities of the Working Groups.
The participants, among 150 NGOs and civil society networks coming from all over Europe, takes part in a mapping exercise of difficulties and opportunities for European Citizens to be more aware of their rights and how to implement them fully. It was also given the chance to identify failures and solution to be presented at the end of the Year and to be delivered to the European Decision makers.
The national alliances of the Europea Year of Citizens (http://ey2013-alliance.eu/) also took part in the event, in particular the italian and the croatian ones, which received a substantial support from ALDA (http://www.ey2013-italia.eu/)
“We need to consider civil society as a political actor of the participatory democracy. The good results can also be reached with the support of the local authorities”, confirmed in her contribution Mrs. Antonella Valmorbida, Director of ALDA.
The two days event are followed by an Open Space methodology event promoted by the European and Economic Social Committee on the 23rd and 24th (vedi e trovi il sito)

The next meeting of the working groups will take place in Brussels on the 5th of March.

The local event VIT in Vicenza took place on the 18th and 19th of January 2013. It was, for the whole community, full and intense days on the topics of twinning and cooperation between communities and cities.
“The twinnings between cities in Europe were an essential part of the Development of Europe, based on the commitment of local authorities and citizens.

Today, this instrument is a strong element to build the European citizenship and city to city cooperation”, said the Director of ALDA, Mrs Antonella Valmorbida.  The participants to the international conference that took place in the Council Room of Vicenza on the 19th of January, brought the best practices and difficulties. In particular, were introduced the experiences of the city of Vicenza (Councellor Mr Federico Formisano), hosting the event, and the twinned cities, like Pforzheim – with the Mayor Gert Hager – and Annecy – with the Deputy Mayor, Mr Jean Claude Fabbian. Vicenza has also a friendship with Osijek (Croatia) but they could not participate.

Mr Roger Lawrence, Leader of Wolverhampton City Council and member of ALDA Bureau, represented ALDA.

The recommendations issued by the conference were very concrete. In particular, it was agreed to write a common letter to the Italian authorities to make sure that the costs for twinning are not considered as public relations costs but cultural investments (and therefore not easily cut). A committee for the support of twinning will be soon set up soon, within the umbrella of ALDA and its office in Vicenza.

For the general recommendations that will be presented in the final international event of VIT (on the 18th and 19th of April in Pula), will also include the need a) to support the twinning committees b) to create a link between twinning and communities of foreigners in our own countries c) to identify the possibility to support twinnings with oversees municipalities.

The work started on the 18th on very practical basis with the training for local authorities and Association at the Association of Craftmen, where the Development officer of ALDA, Mr Boaria presented all the opportunities offered by the programme Europe for Citizens. The training gathered more than 30 participants and many from the area.

The Governing Board that took place in Vicenza (Italy) on the 17th and 18th of January 2013 was of particular importance for ALDA since it adopted the Strategic Paper 2013/2016. In particular, the strategy is confirming the role of ALDA as a membership based organisation, focusing on local governance and citizens participation in Europe and in the Neighbourhood.

It addresses the role of the Local Democracy Agencies in South Eastern Europe and in the Eastern Partnership. Following the Statute, the LDAs could be opened also in other areas, in particular in the Mediterranean area, when useful and when the conditions are met.
As for the LDAs are concerned, the future step will be towards East with activities in Azerbaijan and in Ukraine.

The programme of 2013 was also adopted with an ambitious list of activities. “In the present times, it is difficult for all the local authorities and associations to find the necessary resources to be engaged, but we confirm that ALDA and the Local Democracy Agencies represent a resources for the communities that needs support rather than a cost”, states the President of ALDA, Oriano Otočan. “We could secure our members a list of services that will help them to be better informed on all the policies and opportunities. We are also  a very big source of networking and contacts”.

On January 15, During a meeting which occurred in Belgrade at the Palace of  the Government Mr Alessandro Perelli, representing ALDA Governing Board, introduced to the Serbian Prime Minister, Mr Ivica Dadic, the activities of the association in the European project planning for the promotion of democratic rights and, in this framework, the important role of the two Serbian LDAs of Subotica and Niš.

Mr Perelli also urged that also the other Serbian local authorities join ALDA and its network.

The Prime Minister Dadic underlined his approval for ALDA’s action, in order to ensure more effective local governance and the support to decentralisation processes and local development.

EU TUNE (www.eutune.eu), coordinated by Università degli Studi “Guglielmo Marconi” (Italy), is a one-year project financed by European Commission under the PRINCE 2010 – EU 27 programme. Regione Molise (Italy) and Associação de Professores de Sintra (Portugal) in cooperation with Istrian Region (Croatia), Herzegovina-Neretva Canton (Bosnia-Herzegovina), Youth Office of Ministry of Education and Sport (Montenegro) and the Education Directorate in Shkoder (Albania) are project partners.

Project’s objectives were showing the contemporary reality of candidate and potential candidates countries and discussing their role as possible future EU members, promoting tolerance and understanding – through intercultural dialogue – between EU citizens, candidate countries and potential candidates, fostering inter-institutional dialogue between academics and representatives of regional institutions, national and European standards related to the enlargement process.

Besides, EU TUNE aimed at creating a community of secondary schools students from EU Member States, candidate and potential candidate partner countries (Italy, Portugal, Greece, Romania, Austria, Croatia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Montenegro, Albania). The goal was to make young people “talk” through the digital storytelling language, in order to prevent the growing up of preconceptions and stereotypes or to delete the existing ones.

The final conference in Rome, on December the 14th, reached its topical moment during the award ceremony during which best digital stories produced by students for the EU TUNE contest moved the audiences between laughters and tears. Final workshop organized by Marconi University, approached the topic “A larger Europe for next generations. Hopes and expectations of young people towards European enlargement”.
The award ceremony testified the surprising involvement of young people, their ability to tell stories, addressing a European perspective and exchanging emotions with their peers across Europe.

Young students from European Union and in the Balkan countries approached three different themes: “Yes, that’s me!” they told themselves and the cultural or natural heritage of their country, explaining why it might be an enrichment for the European Union. In “European High Hopes” they were asked to talk about their expectations for the entry of their country into the EU. Finally, thanks to the theme “Stereotypes”, students had the opportunity to talk about the stereotypes associated to their country.

All stories are uploaded on the project website.
Besides that, Europe and its forthcoming enlargement was the topic of a very interesting debate among experts, journalists, university professors and institution representatives: Ms. Ilaria Mascitti and Mr Marco Ciarrocchi from Marconi University, Ms. Alexandra Pana (European Commission – DG Enlargement), Mr. Matteo Luigi Napolitano (professor in International Relation at Marconi University) and Mr. Marco Boaria (ALDA Europe). Finally, Mr Joe Lambert (Center for digital storytelling – USA) showed the audience the importance of digital storytelling in communicating and building bridges among different cultures; Ms. Monica Fasciani (Marconi University) presented RIGHTS project about global citizenship. The awards ceremony was chaired by Mr. Joao Sousa, president of the Association of Professors of Sintra.