[Possible]

Living together: Possible together

As YADA Foundation, we are working to increase the dialogue between different actors of civil society and thus to make civil society more effective. In all these events, we bring together many different institutions, both in terms of their fields of work, backgrounds and motivations, and we pursue negotiations and even cooperations together.

We start our work with the project, “Living together: Possible together” which we are conducting within the scope of “Strengthening the Multicultural Approach of Non-Governmental Organizations in Turkey and the EU” within the scope of the Civil Society Dialogue V Program implemented by the EU Presidency and will focus on the coexistence of different identities and cultural groups.

Because we know that if we struggle together, living together is possible, together.

When we look at the thematic and methodological diversity of non-governmental organizations in Turkey, it is possible to see everything that can be found in advanced democracies. Civil society is a reflection of Turkey's multicultural, multi-ethnic, multilingual, multi-religious and multi-denominational reality. However, when we look at the relations of CSOs among themselves and with decision centers such as the public administration and the private sector, this pluralistic structure leaves its place to a multi-part picture consisting of introverted clusters. Introversion manifests itself in both workspaces and focused themes, as well as identities. On the one hand, NGOs draw the boundaries of their own subjects too thickly and they differ with other subjects, are affected by the political and identity-oriented polarization and take care not to come into contact with those who are outside the group they think they belong to.

For this reason, as YADA, we implement projects with the vision of supporting the formation of a civil society that can express itself better, has a negotiating style instead of a language of conflict, and has the power and influence to form public opinion. Dialogue is possible if we overcome our prejudices. And overcoming these prejudices is the first step of the dialogue. Dialogue can "work" for solving problems, and it is also a very important tool for identifying differences, problems together and discovering areas of struggle. We think that if very different institutions and individuals with different worldviews, representatives of different identities and cultures tell each other their stories, they will create an important basis for the discovery of new areas of struggle.

If we listen to our stories, it is possible to understand. We set out by saying “it is possible” and we invite non-governmental organizations and actors who work and think about culture, dialogue, identity and coexistence to our events. We want to increase and support the influence of NGOs that dream of a social transformation in this field, take more concrete steps and want to deepen their work. We believe we will be stronger through each other's stories and experiences.

We are waiting for you to listen to each other's stories, to explore the obstacles in front of living together, to reason about the areas of struggle and therefore to strive together.