21 November 2017
Brussels Erasmus+ Week
Young Friends of the Earth International
A week of informative workshops, important concepts, interesting people and extremely inspiring conversations.
This was the second part of a three part project organised by YFoEI known as the Erasmus+ project which is aimed at strengthening the north-south divide, specifically between member countries from Europe and Africa. This was done through exchanges; representatives from European member groups visited their African partner countries last year at various times while the representatives from Africa all came to Brussels for a week in July this Summer. Solidarity, communication and knowledge-sharing were key themes. The location of this part was quite specifically chosen; Brussels is the centre of EU policy-making and legislative decisions and the agenda for the week included a lobby tour of Brussels European quarter!
One thing I really appreciated was that the group contained diversity in every sense of the word but the approach was overwhelmingly equitable. Now this might seem obvious; people can’t be treated differently based on age, gender, race, creed, colour, level of English or anything like that but I got a real sense that such differences did not even occur to anyone in this meeting. For instance, I had been involved in YFoEIreland for just over 2 months at my time of participation (and so my lack of experience might have been a factor). Now, I was working with people who had already been involved in activism for many years. However, all of my contributions during group discussions were taken as seriously and given the same level of attention as the input of seasoned professionals, in spite of how ill-informed or wrong they might have been (some definitely were, but it’s all a learning curve, right?). The diversity within the group was beneficial for other reasons; the greater the difference between the social identities of you and another person you interact with, the greater the potential for learning. These were my first ever friends from Africa and certain parts of Europe so it was hugely culturally enriching. To quote Andrew Solomon – 'It is almost impossible to hate someone whose story you know.'
Incidentally, I came away with a much deeper understanding of the type of organisation which YFoEI aspires to be. The horizontal structure is valued over the hierarchical structure and before having a discussion there must be a discussion about the fairest way to have that discussion. Even the food was a reflection of the values of YFoEI; whenever we ate in the office, it was always rescued food from a food sovereignty group and was always vegetarian. And it was delicious! (although an omnivore might have needed two servings to feel full). All of these measures naturally inform a consistent, committed and intelligent approach to activism. There is great power in recognising just how many different factors are at play and considering them all simultaneously.
We worked pretty damn hard, it must be said. Some of the ideas and suggestions being thrown around were big and abstract and at times I felt out of my depth. However, I spent most of my time pushing the outer limits of my learning zone rather than suffering in the pain zone. I was very, very interested rather than being left in the dust. Workshops on solidarity, youth mobilisation and best practice for communication were all inspirational but where I took the most inspiration from was the more personal conversations. For the workshops, we would generally split into small groups of two to four people and discuss the questions we had set for ourselves. This was when you could get to know people but would still be productively working on a specific problem. One of the more exhilarating ideas which came to the fore during these parts was when Kate from YFoE Scotland pointed out that the most powerful campaign message comes directly from those effected by the issue i.e. it is far better to have someone from a marginalised indigenous community delivering a talk than to be a YFoE member delivering the talk on their behalf. Another pearl of wisdom came from Zivile from YFoE Europe who said that you should always consider what type of activism is the most useful to your cause e.g. is it more effective to focus on saving a specific species or on saving the entire habitat?
Through such discussions and the general thrust of the week's work, the focus became clear to me. It was not just on training smart, effective activists or just on being decent human beings who engage in activism but on the potent combination of justice and intelligence at every step of the process to become the best, most complete and most effective representatives of the cause we are championing. The focus was on being the sort of person who those we are fighting on behalf of, whether that be humanity or non-human nature, would be proud to call their advocate.
It really does give a man a lot of hope to know that there are, in fact, many very intelligent, capable, passionate people out there working away on this problem. It validates your own concerns and means you don’t have to feel quite as unfortunate about giving a shit.
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