THIENE – IJEVAN TWINNING

AT A GLANCE

The municipalities of Thiene in Italy and Ijevan in Armenia will together with ALDA implement the project “Citizen Participation and town development: the role of local authorities”. The project is focused on developing the cooperation between Thiene and Ijevan and includes study visits and trainings in both Municipalities.

The project is funded by the Veneto Region under the programme “Iniziativa Diretta 2011- Cooperazione decentrata allo sviluppo” for regional interventions for the promotion of human rights, the culture of peace, development cooperation and solidarity.

OBJECTIVES

The project aims to build inter-municipality relations between the Municipality of Thiene in the Veneto region in Italy and the Municipality of Ijevan in the Tavush region in Armenia.
Furthermore it aims to develop decentralized cooperation between the two towns as a first step and then to increase and strengthen the role of local authorities in the politics and practise of participation in Armenia. A final objective is to support participative urban development.
Although local self-government and citizen participation in Armenia is guaranteed by law there is a lack of mechanisms to implement these provisions and use the principles for citizen participation in practice. This project seeks to provide exchange of good practice to develop these issues in the future.

ACTIVITIES

The three activities that compose the core of the project aim to increase citizens’ participation in Ijevan and give possibilities to study the dialog between local authorities and civil society and the instruments used to facilitate citizen participation.

• The first activity will be a training session in Ijevan in October or November 2011 by two representatives of Thiene with the local staff in Ijevan for information about participation and the developing methods used by Thiene and to identify topics for the later study visit to Thiene.
• The second action is a workshop with an expert from ALDA for 30 persons of local authorities and civil society organisations about topics of Active Citizenship, participation and cooperation between local authorities and civil society for urban development.
• The last action is a study trip to Thiene in Italy in March 2012 where representatives from Ijevan will see concrete examples of the trained methods such as the Urban Centre of Thiene. This study visit will thus help create contacts and a network for the sustainability of the whole project.

The project is funded by the Veneto Region under the programme “Iniziativa Diretta 2011- Cooperazione decentrata allo sviluppo” for regional interventions for the promotion of human rights, the culture of peace, development cooperation and solidarity

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