Georgeta Mureanu (Forumul Cetatenesc pentru Actiune Sociala si Educatie Civica) and Li Fangfang (Evergreen Center for Sustainable Development)
A tiptap e.V. (Berlin) & FCASEC (Romania) & Evergreen Centre (Beijing)
This year, we witnesses a remarkable outcome of the networking after our capacity building seminars where they all met for the first time: a cooperation between three 2015 twinners on the use of forum theater as a method for environmental education.During the Twinning exchange 2015 they have encountered a vivid and active community of NGOs using non-formal education tools to work on a broad range of environmental and social issues. They work with communities to conserve cultural and agricultural practices in mountain villages in Yunnan, on the improvement of living conditions of working migrants in the cities or on women suffering from domestic violence in Kunming and Beijing, just to provide a few examples.
Throughout the discussions, the three NGOs became curious about the diversity of groups and their approaches. They have made promising contacts to theatre groups, researchers of various disciplines, anthropologists, and student union leaders. The the idea of a Chinese Festival on non-formal education and arts-based research methods came up.
The three NGOs started to plan a three day festival in Beijing. During the planning, a fourth research institution joined, the University of Sheffield. They work on a cross-national research project about intergenerational justice, specifically looking at the issues of climate change, consumption and sustainability, in the UK, China and Uganda (www.sheffield.ac.uk/intersection). The researchers are now informally linked to the twinners group and their activities.
The festival aims at contributing to the coproduction of knowledge and mutual learning. It hopes to foster new coalitions between NGOs, researchers, students, artists and practitioners. The festival will take place from 20. to 22. of October 2016 in Beijing. The festival will also include a photo voice exhibition which was prepared during the twinning exchange 2015 by Evergreen and FCASEC. Key decision makers are invited to participate at the exhibition.
