Workshop C - Session 2

Title: Promoting Social Inclusion and Active Citizenship - Work with Under Represented Groups Chair: Fiona Blacke, Scottish Community Education Council, UK Albino Lopes, Portuguese Association for European Citizenship Development, Portugal

I come from Lisbon in Portugal, representing an association which works in a European training network This network has a CD Rom called 'Learning Europe to Make History', which follows a method of implanting things among citizens. This is a method that we HAve developed, particularly in Portugal, to try and reach the people who really have the lowest level of education.

My starting point is training, training method on building Europe, on discussions, on European policies or on the Euro for example. After all, we frequently get called upon to head groups of unionists or workers, who are trying to understand what is going on with regard to the construction of Europe, and this could be seen as an exercise in citizenship.

Usually we start with the things that people do not understand, and with the objections that they raise. The concepts behind this idea are that we are talking about active citizenship and we are trying to get an acceptance of difference of opinion, bearing in mind that we have workers who come from the old Portuguese colonies to work in the building industry or other industries, and who also want to know what is going on with regard to the building of Europe, because that is of importance to them as well.

Identity

Behind this concept of citizenship there is identity, the individual person with his opinions and his choices, with regard to the other people with their own way of thinking and acting so that they are a whole group really with a common identity. The European identity is very complex and it is rather difficult for all Europeans to grasp. It is an emotional thing, apart from anything else, and European unity means a high level of political commitment and also learning about European construction.

Now, the training method, where do we start? Working on identity pre-supposes that the person providing the training has to be able to help to show the cognitive map, the mind map of an individual or a group. This map is an ensemble of concepts and there is a problem behind this. The stability of this cognitive map is constant; even if there is information which contradicts the map, individuals choose and pay attention to information which confirms their own mind map.

Changing Mind Maps

Now we all want the world to be as constant as possible; we do not want change; we want to be able to see what is happening. How can we help people to transform their mind maps? An individual does not know what he is going to do before he starts talking about it to other people. When an individual is defending his point of view on the building of Europe, for example, when he states a problem, when he raises a question, agriculture in Portugal for example, then he is making himself known to us and he is telling us what he cares about.

Social and political reality is very complex obviously. This process of revealing oneself to others, is never ever totally simple and clear, and this means you have to have a procedure for giving a meaning to this. The social and political reality of Europe has to be broken down into smaller parts and you have to have cause and effect relations relating to people. Going from concepts of end value and instrumental value, you can try to make sure that you get a picture across and you therefore give something that an individual will be able to understand and transform into his own reality. The reality will then be remembered in the form of a transformed mind map. This process is carried out by the individual becoming aware and it enables individuals to make sense of the specific situation in other contexts.

I will just perhaps give a little example of how you can carry out an exercise on the mind map. For a group of 40 teachers, we asked everybody to point out one thing that they had difficulty with in building Europe. We then built an overall plan, values, final values - pros and cons basically; then we talked about identity, personal identity, compared to national identity, compared to community identity, for example.

Plurality

The European Union is a plurality. There are some things where you lose; there are some things where you gain; you may lose your identity for example but you gain something else - equality for example.

This sort of approach can be analysed in a way which breaks down the building of Europe. This enables everybody to see that European integration is an open process which requires everybody to take a position, to make a commitment, and to make an individual interpretation. Basing yourself on personal experience or global experience, you could have more for Europe, you could go towards more Europe, more collaboration between the States, or you can have questions like education or agriculture where you could see them as being an opportunity for a more federal approach and bringing in a more federal idea, a sort of constant compromise solution, a sort of common economic area. Or you could even have people who were in favour of keeping the nation state, so you can go all the way round the compass of opinion really. By having an open discussion, everyone can see how they relate the different ideas of the European Union.

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